Jeff Faraudo, STAFF WRITER

Wednesday, March 27, 2002 - OAKLAND -- When Richmond native Drew Gooden leads Kansas against Maryland on Saturday, he will add to a 60-year legacy of East Bay plaayers who have participated in the Final Four.

From Oakland's Jim Pollard in 1942 to Danville's Mark Madsen in 1998 -- both stars at Stanford -- the East Bay has sent more than a dozen players to college basketball's biggest stage.

None was greater, of course, than Bill Russell, who went from Oakland's McClymonds High to the University of San Francisco and revolutionized the game.

Russell prompted changes in basketball's rules and strategy while leading the Dons to consecutive NCAA titles in the 1955 and'56 seasons.

He was a one-of-a-kind player ... but he had a brother.

Charlie Russell arrived at USF the year after Bill departed for the NBA, and helped the Dons reach the Final Four again in 1957.

"I was a good player," said Charlie, now 70 and living in Oakland. "I never tripped on the comparisons. Bill was a phenomenon."

Charlie Russell actually is Bill's older brother. He had been an all-city player at Oakland Tech High, then played two seasons at Santa Rosa Junior College before being drafted into the Army.

After two years in Korea, where he served in an engineering battalion, Charlie returned home to complete school. His dream was to become a writer -- not a basketball star -- and his first choice was St. Mary's College.

"Everybody was asking me to go to USF," he said. "I don't regret it. I played for Phil Woolpert, who was a great coach. I had great teammates -- Gene Brown, Mike Farmer."

Charlie Russell was not Bill Russell on the basketball court, and he is the first to acknowledge that.

But he remained Bill's big brother, and that gave him a comfortable perspective. "I was his hero when he was coming up," Charlie said.

The stories of young Bill Russell are legendary. Charlie refers to him as "an ugly duckling," at that stage of his development, a player so deep on the McClymonds bench that he shared the 12th uniform with a teammate.

Bill finally grew, shooting past his 6-foot-4 older brother to nearly 6-9. He was a naturally good athlete, Charlie said, and when he adjusted to his body suddenly, he blossomed.

In his USF varsity debut in 1953-54, Russell helped the Dons rout Cal and star center Bob McKeen 51-33. "That's when we knew," Charlie said. "I had played against McKeen -- I knew he was a great player. Bill cleaned his clock."

By the time Charlie arrived at USF, Bill was beginning his career with the Boston Celtics. Asked if he wore his younger brother's uniform No. 6, Charlie laughed. "I wouldn't be that presumptuous," he said. "I ain't crazy."

Charlie was a forward his two seasons at USF, earning his keep with his defensive play. He averaged 1.6 points and 1.9 rebounds on the 1956-57 club that compiled a 22-7 record and lost to Kansas and Wilt Chamberlain in the Final Four.

"Charlie's a great guy," said Farmer, a junior forward on the'57 team. "To me, it's like Stan Musial's son trying to play baseball. How many Bill Russells are there? Just one. If Charlie hadn't been such a strong personality in his own right, I don't think he could have handled it."

"I had no ambitions to be a great ballplayer," Charlie Russell said.

Bill was destined to become one. "I remember one time hanging out with Bill and K.C. (Jones) after a (USF) game, and they messed with my mind the way they talked about the game," Charlie said. "Bill was really smart. He really understood what he was doing."

While Bill was making his mark in Boston, Charlie spent the turbulent'60s in New York City, where he was member of The Harlem Writers Guild, honing his skills alongside the likes of Maya Angelou and William Howard Armstrong, author of "Sounder."

He returned to the West Coast in 1970 and paid the bills by working for child protective services in San Diego and Alameda County. The rest of the time, he wrote.

His play, "Five On The Black Hand Side," was produced in New York, then released by United Artists as a film that Ebony magazine ranked among the 10 best African-American movies of all-time. Russell's movie script earned him the 1972 NAACP Image Award.

Russell will have his first novel published late this spring with the release of "The Worthy Ones," a fictional account of several generations of two African-American families and why they were among thousands that migrated from the South to California to work in the war industries during World War II.

It's a story Charlie Russell knows well. His father, now nearly 90 and living in an El Cerrito nursing home, left the family in Monroe, La., to come to Oakland in 1942. Charlie, Bill and their mother followed a year later.

Charlie has come full circle, living again in Oakland. Bill now resides in Seattle, and the two see one another periodically. While Charlie is outgoing and accommodating, Bill has worked hard to gain a reputation as being distant and difficult.

"Bill has a tough personality. People who know him will tell you he has a dark side," big brother Charlie said. "But I ain't knockin' him. He's really a great guy.

"He was a genius in a field where there are very few. He's a legend, man."