Blythe leaves his prints on a generation of stars

Dozens more glitter Blythe's office, but the works of art aren't the photos themselves - they are the players and the legends in the pictures who owe their careers to this San Mateo resident, who proclaims himself "one of the best basketball minds in the country."

Blythe, a former basketball coach at Emery High School in Emeryville, is a little-known basketball guru who has guided and trained some of the best basketball players in the country. Along with Kidd, Young and Stewart, he's mentored Mark Madsen, the former basketball star at Stanford now with the Los Angeles Lakers; he's worked with Brent Barry of the Seattle Supersonics; and he's solely responsible for getting Cass Bauer's life with the WNBA's Charlotte Sting off the ground.

But the former coach, who led Emery High to the state championships in 1993, is far from done.

For the past 12 years, Blythe, along with his wife, Marguerite, have dedicated their lives to advancing the minds and skills of talented prep basketball players around Northern California. Since 1989, when Blythe first opened up his camp at Capuchino High School in San Bruno, thousands of hopeful prep dreamers have been enriched by their experience with Blythe's basketball camps.

One such dreamer, Darnell Robinson, a former All-American prep star at Emery High who carried the 1993 championship team Blythe coached, remembers Blythe and the camps fondly.

"It was just an experience to see each of the region's best players go at it," said Robinson, currently on the Philadelphia 76ers' injured-reserve list while he nurses his fractured ankle at his home in Oakland. "It really just helped to get your game to the next level. You had guys from Oakland, Oregon, Los Angeles, and from Sacramento all competing against each other. And Donovan brought us all there."

"He's a very unique individual," said Robinson of his former coach and mentor. "He's a very motivational person. When it comes to pushing, Blythe will keep pushing you over the hump."

Robinson recalls the days when Blythe trained the 7-foot center for hours and hours - sometimes for 14 hours a day - preaching the values of a drop-step turnaround jumper or a jump hook.

"Since I'm from Oakland and Donovan's from San Mateo," Robinson recounts, "I didn't want to travel so far and I would try to wake up late thinking Donovan might call and give me the day off.

"When I would finally get there, Donovan just trained me to death, sometimes to the point where I would be cramping up. You need more people like that, to go the extra yard for you - and he was there for me."

Along with working with kids on their jumpers and crossovers, Blythe's camps also prepared them for the rigors of college and the problems of everyday life. Before the players even thought of dribbling a ball on the court, they attended a mandatory SAT preparatory class from 9 to 11 every morning. The players would then train and play games until 11 at night.

But aside from preaching the game's fundamentals, Blythe loved to sit down and talk with each individual to help him grow as a young man.

"Donovan's a big-brother figure to me - we had a close relationship," said Robinson. "He really helped me in my days of hardship in prep sports."

Blythe, 41, now devotes much of his time to his Peninsula Youth Basketball Camp, working with kids of a younger age bracket (ages 6-14), and training his daughter, Britney, whom he claims will be one of the best collegiate women's basketball players in the country.

But occasionally, he looks at his office to reflect on what he's done and the lives he has touched.

"Sometimes I go in my office, close the door, and look on my wall," said Blythe. "I can see who I am and I can see the great things I have done as a human being."