La Salle fan, 90, has been waiting for this

DAYTON, Ohio - Gus Chialastri, 90, subscribes to the perfect philosophy for a La Salle basketball fan.

"I'm thankful for the good in my life," he says, "and I just accept the bad!"

For the past 2 decades, there has been a lot of acceptance for Chialastri and the other La Salle faithful. For the past 2 decades, there has been a lot of bad La Salle basketball.

Wednesday night, the Explorers will play in their first NCAA Tournament game in 21 years. It is a wonderful gift for Chialastri, who celebrated his birthday Saturday.

A wry wit and a sunny disposition have helped Chialastri, a Central High graduate and La Salle product, live a long and healthy life. He has been married to his wife, Dorothy, for 63 years. She is 86, and she goes to La Salle games, too.

They get to almost all of the games at 20th and Olney and they are courtside fixtures in the Hayman Center, but that's just their recreation.

More incredibly, certainly, Chialastri is a full-time pediatric dentist. In fact, Dr. Gus, as he is known around Tom Gola Arena, spent Monday and Tuesday afternoons in the operating room at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children.

He will spend Wednesday afternoon settling into a Dayton hotel, preparing to watch La Salle face Boise State in a play-in game to secure the No. 13 seed in the West region.

"It's unbelievable, what happened for them this past weekend," Chialastri says. "We're all happy as a bunch of so-and-sos."

Granted, Dr. Gus is invested more than most. He spent 2 years at La Salle preparing for dental school. In his second year, 1944-45, he played on the basketball team. Those Explorers went 11-8, but the roster was easy to make, since most able-bodied players were still stuck in the war. Chialastri, an Air Force man, had spent 3 years fighting.

Still, Dr. Gus typifies the La Salle fan that most deserves this moment.

He endured 16 losing seasons since 1993, and last year swallowed his disappointment when La Salle earned only an NIT bid despite winning 21 games.

He endured the 1969 postseason ineligibility due to NCAA violations, which wasted a 23-1 season.

He endured through the 2004 rape accusations aimed at three players. None was convicted but the scandal shattered the program and sped the hiring of current coach Dr. John Giannini.

Dr. John loves Dr. Gus.

"Gus is one of the most wonderful people you'll ever meet. Cream of the crop," Giannini says. "His perspective is ideal. He loves the school, so he's going to support it. He loves the history of La Salle basketball, and he has a passion for it. But he's going to treat it as entertainment. He's going to see it as people doing their best even when things don't go their way. He's not going to turn into the ugly fan, which we [in sports] see too often."

La Salle has seen plenty of fans abandon the program.

"Honestly, when your team hasn't made it for 21 years, a lot of your more ugly fans will have dropped off," Giannini says. "What you're left with are some people who love the school, who understand when things don't go well, people are still doing their best."

Dr. Gus shares his loyalty with Steve McGonigle, Bill DeMarco, Jim Ahern, Big 5 Hall of Famer Frank Corace. But Dr. Gus and Dorothy are their vanguard.

"We're just big college basketball fans," Chialastri says.

They have missed precious few home games since 1946. In the 1960s, he drove to Madison Square Garden once or twice a week to see Gola, La Salle's finest, play out his career with the Knicks. He was a young man then, only 43. Until 1995, when he was 72, Chialastri attended 22 consecutive Final Fours. La Salle was in none of them.

On Friday night, Chialastri watched La Salle lose in the Atlantic 10 Tournament in Brooklyn.

He still gets around. He just picks his spots more carefully.

In 2008, Dr. Gus traveled to St. Thomas to watch La Salle in the U.S. Virgin Islands Paradise Jam. The crowd was sparse, so he and Dorothy snagged seats behind the Explorers' bench.

At halftime, put off by Giannini's exasperation and by Giannini's colorful expressions of outrage, Dorothy turned to her husband and said, "We have to move."

"Coach Giannini is a hell of a coach, and a fine person," Chialastri says. "Now, if he could control his temper, he'd be great!"

Like Giannini in full froth, Dr. Gus speaks in exclamations. The players who have returned the program to relevance understand what Wednesday night means to people like Dr. Gus.

"I heard he never missed a La Salle home game," says guard Tyrone Garland, who, along with the rest of the team, signed a ball that was presented to Chialastri at his birthday dinner Saturday. "That shows you how strong La Salle pride is. He's been through all the down years. I'm sure he's happy. He hasn't seen it happen for so long.

"All the people who support us - they've all been waiting. Waiting for this moment."