Surgery a slice of life for basketball player

Peter Rudman faced 10 hours of surgery to remove a canceroustumor from his stomach. And he thought about basketball.

"Basketball always made me feel like I was normal, healthy," hesaid.

"As long as I had basketball, I could never get down."

Rudman, then 20, was diagnosed as having testicular cancer thathad spread to his stomach and parts of his chest.

During a six-month period, he endured numerous operations andchemotherapy.

Less than a year later, Rudman nearly led Lehigh University toan East Coast Athletic Conference championship and an NCAAtournament bid.

These days, the former All-Chicago Area player (1986) fromHighland Park gathers regularly with some of his old teammates toplay pickup games at the Deerfield Multiplex.

He still can drive the baseline with a flair and hang in theair. His jump shot is as accurate as ever. Life and basketball gohand-in-hand and once again Rudman is normal.

"Throughout my illness, I never dwelled on `Why me.' In orderfor me to deal with the physical and mental anguish that I suffered,I had to keep a positive approach to everything I did," he said.

"So I looked at each day as a new challenge and my goal was tofinish the treatment and get on with my life. This is the feeling Iwant to pass on that may help others in my situation. That's what Ican make out of all of this."

Growing up with basketball, Rudman always was too small or tooslow or too injured to be very good. But he made the Highland Parkvarsity team as a freshman.

Perhaps his most remarkable accomplishment was recovering from asevere knee injury and arthroscopic surgery midway through the 1984season to help the Giants reach the sectional final. Of all thegreat players to perform at the Proviso West holiday tournament,Rudman holds the record for most points in a game with 50.

During his senior season, Rudman averaged 24.2 points per game,an effort that put him in the company of future NBA players KendallGill, Nick Anderson and Marcus Liberty on the Sun-Times' All-Areateam.

Rudman was not the object of a major recruiting battle. So heenrolled at Lehigh, an Ivy League-like school in Bethleham, Pa. Hewas touted as a major recruit but, upon arrival, promises wentunfulfilled.

As a freshman, he played 117 minutes in 29 games and averaged1.6 points. As a sophomore, he played 31 minutes and averaged 2.1points.

Before a game at Colgate in December of his junior year, Rudmannoticed extreme swelling and pain in his left testicle.

Three days later, during a trip home for Christmas break, hehad the problem checked. He went back to school the next day.

But the pain never subsided and finally an ultrasound test atthe university medical center revealed a malignant tumor in histesticle. He flew back to Chicago where a urologist at Children'sMemorial Hospital confirmed the initial finding.

Fifteen years earlier, Rudman's mother had died of cancer.

"I remember thinking, `Am I going to die?' Whenever I thoughtof cancer, I immediately thought of death," he said. "My life wasbeing threatened and I wasn't equipped to deal with it. Here I amin the prime of my life. I was supposed to be enjoying life, notbattling for it."

On Dec. 30, 1988, Rudman underwent surgery to remove the tumor.Then came chemotherapy, every third week in the hospital takingradiation treatment. In between, he stayed up with his classworkthrough correspondence courses and stayed up with the game by workingout at Highland Park.

At the end of March, 1989, Rudman thought everything was out ofhis system. But when he went for his regular checkup in April, testsrevealed the cancer had spread to his stomach.

"We made it very clear there would be a small amount of residualtumor," said Dr. James Nachman, a pediatrician at the University ofChicago who treated Rudman. "That wasn't unexpected. Testicularcancer is probably one of the most common in young adults. It's alsoone of the most curable."

Maybe basketball prepared Rudman for the 10-hour surgery toremove the tumor that had spread to his stomach and chest. In allhis years of practice, he had run stadium stairs, boxed out biggerand stronger players and figured out how to break a trapping defensewhen there seemed to be no way out.

"I treated the surgery as just another hurdle in my life," hesaid, "but it turned out to be more physically and emotionallydraining than anything I had known."

Nachman said normal recovery time from such surgery andchemotherapy is two to six months before resuming rigorous activity.Rudman was playing basketball again in two.

Less than a year after the last surgery, Rudman scored 18 pointson seven-of-10 shooting to lead Lehigh to an ECAC Tournamentquarterfinal victory over Drexel. His three-point shot lifted theteam to a semifinal victory over Bucknell.

Life is back to normal now for Rudman, which means playing ballfour or five days a week. The game of basketball has helped himendure the game of life.

"I've learned to look inside myself for inner strength when theoutside forces seemed to pummel my previous confidence," he said.

"All my life, I've kept dodging bullets, always making it backfrom the most extreme injuries. I always thought it would be easy,but it hasn't been."