Shaq Still Outgrowing His Shoes

How closely does your age match your shoe size?

It's very close for 21-year-old Shaquille O'Neal, 7-foot-1, 305-pound center of the Orlando Magic.

"We were surprised," Dan Hanrahan, a vice president at Reebok, told the Dallas Morning news after O'Neal complained in training camp that his shoes were too tight. "We really thought he was done growing."

The size-20 shoe O'Neal wore as a rookie had to be discarded. This season, Hanrahan said, O'Neal wears a size slightly bigger than a 21. He will celebrate his 22nd birthday in two days.

O'Neal will get no college credit for his work in the the movie "Blue Chips," according to an Associated Press report.

O'Neal checked with the school about using the film as an independent study, but he was too busy last summer filming and traveling in Europe to make the arrangements, his academic adviser said.

Tommy Karam, director of LSU's Academic Center for Athletes, said O'Neal, who left college in mid-semester after his junior season, has not given up on obtaining a college degree.

Karam said O'Neal plans to attend summer school this year and is "very eager to complete his degree. I think no matter how much money a person has, you want to feel complete. . . ."

THEY SAID IT

-- Brett Hull, St. Louis Blues: "The only people who can help us now are our GM and our team president. We need to make some trades and get some new players. We don't have the horses."

-- Ilie Nastase, on the current state of tennis: "Everyone today plays the same way - very dull. It is a pity there are no characters like John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors or, maybe, Ilie Nastase today."

Compiled by Chuck Ashmun, Seattle Times