FRIDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2005 COLLEGE BASKETBALL
SPORTS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN 5B
Coaches announce hall-of-fame plans
BY STEVE BRISENDINE THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — With CBS announcer Billy Packer tossing out trivia questions about basketball founder James Naismith, and Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski suggesting wryly that one interactive attraction might be instructive for sportswriters, organizers of the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame unveiled details of the $20 million project on Thursday.
"It is our purpose and hope to immerse every visitor into college basketball," Jim Haney, the executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches, said at a luncheon enclosed by Packer. "The Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame is an element of that...but this is not going to be just some staid, reverent place for remembering the coaches, players, contributors and teams who made college basketball what it is today."
Once College Basketball: the Experience is complete, exhibits honoring college basketball's greats will be on the first floor. On the second floor, visitors will find multimedia exhibits designed to recreate the atmosphere of the college game — by putting them into the action.
The hall itself will take up only about a quarter of the 40,000 square-foot facility, dubbed "College Basketball: the Experience," which is to be incorporated into Kansas City's new downtown arena, the Sprint Center.
The Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame is expected to announce its first inductees at the 2006 Final Four, Haney said, with induction ceremonies next fall.
The NABC has committed to raise $10 million toward College Basketball the Experience. The rest will come from the city, under the bond issue that is financing the $250 million Sprint Center.
Sophomore forward Lisa Balsamla leads her offense with six goals and 14 points on the season.
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St. Louis Cardinals' pitcher Mark Mulder talks with reporters in the team's clubhouse Thursday. Mulder and members of the Cardinals baseball team return to Busch Stadium for the last time to pack their personal items. Busch Stadium will be torn down and a new stadium is under construction.
Freshman goal keeper Geneva Sills will likely start for Colorado College. She has racked up 83 saves this season, keeping her GAA at 82. Colorado College is an independent school and the outcome of today's game will have no effect on the Big 12 conference standings. Francis said the match was still important for momentum.
Two games in the last three years required overtime to decide a victor.
James A. Finley/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
"It's going to be an important game to get us back on track," Francis said.
Kansas' 1-0 loss to Colorado knocked the team slightly off track last Sunday. Texas (8-6-1, 5-3-0 Big 12) comes to Lawrence on Sunday second in the Big 12, behind Colorado.
The Longhorns enter the weekend on a three-match winning streak, most recently shutting out Nebraska in overtime, 1-0, on Sunday. Texas is allowing less than a goal per game, sitting right at .98.
— Edited by Erin Wisdom
"It's always a big rivalry," Francis said. "Our last two or three games have been very close. I don't imagine Sunday will be any different."
Texas standout keeper Dianna Fpenninger picked up her second Big 12 Newcomer of the Week accolade this week. She has 43 saves and a GAA of .89. The televised match against Texas on Sunday is quarter hot dog night at the Jayhawk Soccer Complex.
Cardinals end era in stadium
MLB
BY R.B. FALLSTROM THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
ST. LOUIS — The ticket brochure for the St. Louis Cardinals' final season at Busch Stadium read "Saying goodbye has never been so much fun." It was fun while it lasted, anyway, for a 100-win team that fell two games short of its dream to make it to consecutive World Series.
And in the mostly businesslike moving day at the 40-year-old ballpark where the tearing-down process has already begun, players made the most of a somber situation.
Jim Edmonds livened up the proceedings by performing doughnuts with his truck in center field. his old position.
Game 6 loser Mark Mulder wore a T-shirt with the inscription "Whatever," which describes perfectly his baseball philosophy, as he explained.
"If I have a bad outing or even a good one, it's over with, it's done with good or bad, and move on," Mulder said. "You can't sit here and dwell on it and worry about it and get frustrated about it.
"You move on to next year and get yourself more prepared."
For manager Tony La Russa,
it was a somewhat sour ending
The Cardinals fell in a sixgame NL championship series to a wild-card team that finished 11 games behind them in the Central Division. They suffered an offensive letdown similar to what happened in the World Series last fall when they got swept by the Red Sox. St. Louis batted 209 in the NLCS, totaling six runs in the four losses, and going 6-for-38 with runners in scoring position overall.
Against the Red Sox they batted .190 after entering the postseason with the most fearsome lineup in the majors. That attack was not nearly as imposing entering this postseason without Scott Rolen, and with Larry Walker and Reggie Sanders both battling injuries.
to a great regular season, not unlike last year. Mostly, he said, the team ran into superior pitching.
"I think there's a strong segment of our support that marks your season with not even getting to the World Series but winning it," La Russa said. "So, with that group we failed. We've got to be more realistic as an organization, and coaches and players."
Sanders had 12 RBIs in his first four playoff games, but wasn't himself after taking an awkward spill at the warning track in Game 2 of the NLCS.
He went 1-for-12 in his last three games with seven strikeouts. Walker, 38, who required four cortisone shots for a herniated disc in his neck, was 3-for-28 in the postseason and announced his retirement after the final game.
Rolen was a uniformed spectator after undergoing a second shoulder operation in late August that's expected to get him to spring training ready to go.
"I can't lift my arms, so there's not much I can do about it," Rolen said. "I couldn't control what happened and I'm not
going to kick rocks at my head about it."
Subtracting Walker, a former three-time NL batting champion, isn't the only change the team faces.
The pitching staff could face a makeover or at least some tough financial decisions. Matt Morris is due for free agency; Jason Marquis is arbitration-eligible, and the team holds options on Mulder and 16-game winner Jeff Suppan. Morris is the longest tenured Cardinal, completing his ninth season.
Morris would have opposed Roger Clemens in Game 7.
"Sure, I'd love to come back," Morris said. "It's a business decision so we'll see what happens."
For now, 21-game winner Chris Carpenter is the only lock to return.
“It’s tough to see the guys that aren’t going to be back go,” Carpenter said. “But that’s the business of the game and I’m sure when we get to spring training we'll be ready to go.”
Second baseman Mark Grudzielanek, part of a tandem with shortstop David Eckstein that helped the Cardinals lead the major leagues in double plays, can be a free agent.
Sanders and reliever Julian Tavarez, both of whom found a home in St. Louis after years of a nomadic existence, also are not under contract for next year.
"Of course I would like to stay here," Tavarez said. "It's not fun, I can tell you that, playing one year here and one year there. I just hope they can bring me back, but if they don't I guess I'll have to go someplace else."
Pretty soon, all they'll have from the last season at Busch is memories. Workers began removing seats, press box television sets, and outfield wall padding from the stadium. The wrecking ball is scheduled to start knocking down the cookie-cutter park that opened on May 12, 1966, in about three weeks.