Work Ethic

A dream had carried the boys so far from home, some 5,000 miles across the ocean to a cramped and dingy apartment in Philadelphia: a hope that ice hockey could change their lives. Ivan Pravilov could fulfill that dream, they were told. He could take them from the daily grind of post-communist Ukraine to the gleaming ice of the NHL. He'd done it before. He'd done if for Andrei Zyuzin, who went on to play for six NHL teams. He'd done it for Konstantin Kalmikov, a third-round draft pick of the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1996.

Friday night's episode of Undercover Boss will have a distinctly local flavor — the salty, loamy taste of soft pretzels. That's because the subject of the show is Bensalem native Dan DiZio, the CEO of the Philly Pretzel Factory. The drama on the CBS reality show promises to play out differently as well. Usually, the corporate chieftains haven't lifted anything heavier than a phone their entire careers. So they tend to experience trouble once they take on disguises to perform their companies' most physically demanding, entry-level jobs.

Just after Northern Burlington coach Joe Janney enjoyed his first winning season as girls' basketball coach, he's back in the rebuilding process. Four starters graduated and the remainder of his bench players are gone. He does have a couple of players back who saw some varsity playing time last year, but hardly enough to gain much experience or a letter. Many of the younger players are getting their first opportunity to play organized basketball because there is no junior high program.

Skepticism trails relentlessly behind 7-6 Shawn Bradley, casting a shadow over whatever he does. It goes where he goes. It colors whatever he does. It will not go away any time soon. Bradley knows the drill. He is just back from nine days in Hollywood, part of the cast of a motion picture titled "Space Jam. " The characters range from Michael Jordan to Charles Barkley to Muggsy Bogues to Bugs Bunny. But all anyone in Philadelphia wanted to know was, why wasn't Bradley in the practice gym with the Sixers, working at his craft?

Patty Brophy, a former all-Catholic and all-Suburban girls' basketball player at Archbishop Carroll, is a key member of the varsity at Scranton University. One of the Lady Royals' top defensive performers, the 5-foot, 7- inch point-guard and team captain is the team's third-best scorer, with an average of nearly 11 points a game as well as being the team leader in assists. As of last Tuesday, Scranton was leading the Middle Atlantic Conference Northern Division with a 4-1 record (12-6 overall)

Early in the fourth quarter, when the Eagles were beginning to run down, when they were holding timidly to a 21-17 lead and John Teltschik punted short from the shadow of his goal posts, it appeared that another football miracle was in the making at Veterans Stadium. The punt fell from the sky and bounced crazily into the back of unsuspecting San Francisco linebacker Bill Romanowski and into the hands of Henry "Gizmo" Williams of the Eagles. From there, the Eagles went on to score and take a 28-17 lead with just 8 minutes, 24 seconds remaining.

From the mid-'70s through the early '80s, the critical word on Mark Harmon - who stars in the new Carl Reiner comedy, "Summer School," opening today at area theaters - was this: An ex-UCLA quarterback with bankable blue eyes, dazzling teeth and the acting talent of an ex-UCLA quarterback. For years, he scraped bottom in assembly-line Jack Webb TV productions and the horrendous nighttime soaper, "Flamingo Road. " Then, without warning, he emerged from Actor's Purgatory to deliver thoroughly believable performances as Dr. Bobby Caldwell, who undergoes a radical personality change, then suffers from AIDS on "St. Elsewhere"; astronaut Sam Crawford, who wins and then loses Maddie Hayes on "Moonlighting," and sex murderer Ted Bundy in the NBC mini-series, "The Deliberate Stranger.

John Chaney likes to say Aaron McKie has teeth in his stomach. "Moxie, toughness, inner strength," said Chaney, the Temple basketball coach who didn't know whether to laugh or cry when McKie completed his career last season, going to Portland as the No. 17 pick in the NBA draft. "I don't think you can say he has super-duper skills, but there's a great player inside him. A winner. " If that's the label attached to McKie, a 6-4 shooting guard, he's grateful. It beats being remembered as a Proposition 48, a kid from Simon Gratz High who couldn't crack 700 in the Scholastic Achievement Test, which cost him a season of eligibility with the Owls.

GRANBURY, Texas - Kevin Kolb is cheap. OK, he's frugal. Or thrifty, yeah, thrifty. How does "economically conservative" sound? Nope, Kolb's friends say, "He's cheap. " The Eagles' new starting quarterback doesn't disagree, although he isn't sure if it's his friends who consider him tightest with a buck. "My wife might," Kolb said. Earlier this summer, not long after the Eagles rewarded him with a $12.26 million contract extension, Kolb and his wife, Whitney, went clothes shopping in this burgeoning Dallas-Fort Worth suburb, where they live in the off-season.

At old Media High School, Penncrest coach Doug Randolph could have been considered a legend. He was a three-sport star there before moving on to Delaware State, where he again lettered in football, basketball and baseball. He was drafted by the Houston Oilers in football and by the Cincinnati Reds in baseball. Randolph even made it to double-A baseball in the Reds' chain as a shortstop. So when it comes to winning, Randolph knows a little something about the subject. As Randolph gets ready to start his second season as the Lions' coach, he hopes some of his work ethic and knowledge will rub off on his players.

Like his father before him, former City Councilman Frank Rizzo Jr. is taking to the airwaves in his political retirement, as a radio talk-show host. Rizzo says he'll be doing occasional gigs on WPHT 1210, and he promises to be "less politically correct" than when he took calls at WWDB in the 1990s, while a councilman. "My slogan will be 'Rizzo Unleashed,' " Rizzo told us last week. "I'll always be polite, but I'll tell it like it is, and I have the ability to do that. I'm going to tell people possibly about some of the work ethic in City Council, in some of the people who represent them in the suburbs, and not in a watered-down way. " Asked about times when he pulled his punches, Rizzo said: "Talking about some of my colleagues, I had to be a little bit sensitive.

Friday night's episode of Undercover Boss will have a distinctly local flavor — the salty, loamy taste of soft pretzels. That's because the subject of the show is Bensalem native Dan DiZio, the CEO of the Philly Pretzel Factory. The drama on the CBS reality show promises to play out differently as well. Usually, the corporate chieftains haven't lifted anything heavier than a phone their entire careers. So they tend to experience trouble once they take on disguises to perform their companies' most physically demanding, entry-level jobs.

The best thing about Butch McLean's last season as basketball coach at Triton wasn't the beginning or the end. It was the middle. It was that stretch in January, when the Mustangs won five Olympic Patriot games in a row - and also knocked off perennial power Camden Catholic in a crossover game - to seize sole possession of first place in the division. I went to a Triton practice one night in late January to talk with McLean about his surprising team, and how much his players were helping him through his battle with cancer.

DE JASON BABIN He insists he's not a one-trick pony, but even those who say he is have to acknowledge that Babin was a difference-maker last season with 18 sacks. DE TRENT COLE The most complete lineman on the team, Cole is a relentless fighter against the pass or run. Adding Babin opposite him helped. DT BRANDON GRAHAM After two seasons, the 13th pick in 2010 remains a mystery. He had three sacks in 13 games as a rookie but hardly played last season after knee surgery.

OVER THE PAST WEEK, as Rick Santorum finally ended his quixotic quest for the GOP nomination, the country officially entered general-election season. Mitt Romney commenced the battle last week by engaging in a disingenuous media war over President Obama's political disposition toward women. The war of words began when Romney sidestepped a question about the plight of women in the current economy, suggesting that his wife, Ann, had more insight on the topic than he did. Of course, this was an awful political move.

James S. Herr, 87, who as a 21-year-old former chicken farmer founded Herr's potato chips and turned them into what is today one of the Mid-Atlantic region's most iconic snack brands, died in the arms of his wife, Miriam, Thursday, the date of their 65th wedding anniversary. Mr. Herr's death at his West Nottingham Township home marked the passing of a man described as hard-working, profoundly spiritual, and determined to run Herr Foods Inc. with the same compassion that characterized his Mennonite faith, even as the company grew into an enterprise with more than $100 million in annual sales and business in nearly a dozen states.

The members of the Penn State offensive line seem to have more bounce to their steps this spring, going through the first practices conducted by new head coach Bill O'Brien and his staff. With only one starter - center Matt Stankiewitch - returning to the front five for the 2012 season, the candidates to start at guard and tackle are working hard to claim the edge in filling those spots with a little more than a week to go before the Blue-White Game on April 21. "I've seen more consistency and guys being more focused every day," senior tackle Mike Farrell said Tuesday.

When Tom Lemming says he's going on the road to visit with the top high school prospects in the country, he really means it. "I'm driving this year between 55,000 and 60,000 miles in just four months," said Lemming, the author of Tom Lemming's Prep Football Report, considered in some circles the bible of college football recruiting. "I'll be in every single state except Alaska, and I'm almost in every single city. "I did some in October, some in November. After Christmas, I went all the way to national signing day. Now I've been on the road the last two months and I have one more month to go. " Lemming, 56, spent time last weekend at Cardinal O'Hara High School meeting with some of the area's top high school prospects, including 6-foot-9, 270-pound Penn Charter defensive tackle Mike McGlinchey and Woodbury quarterback Anthony Averett, as part of a program conducted by the National Collegiate Scouting Association.

WHEN A KNOCK on Jacqueline Carr Coleman's door long before daybreak Sunday woke her and her husband, they realized their daughter Tinesha never made it home from work the night before. "We thought she came home, but she didn't," Coleman said quietly Tuesday as she sat on her couch in their Wynnefield home. She was clutching a portrait of her smiling daughter in cap and gown. "I'm numbed," she murmured. "I want someone to pinch me so I can wake up from this bad dream. " The knock was from the police, who broke the news that Tinesha Carr, 33, a single mother of two young children, had been found dead of several gunshot wounds inside her Chrysler Sebring early that morning on 3rd Street near Annsbury in Feltonville.