Volume 124 Issue 143
kansan.com
Thursday, April 26, 2012
COMMENTARY Coaches have a tough job
Nobody said the life of a college football coach was easy, although we're envious of the perks.
Try imagining yourself managing hundreds of 18 to 23-year-old men who are in the growing stages of adulthood, yet prone to making consequential mistakes? Kansas coach, Charlie Wies, knows part its part of the job.
Earlier this week, Weis dismissed sophomore linebacker Collin Garrett and freshman cornerback Chris Robinson from the team for violating team rules. Two weeks ago, junior running back James Sims was suspended for the first three games of the season for operating under the influence.
"I understand that 18 to 20-year-old kids will mess up in life just like we all did when we were 18 to 23-years-old," Weis said. "There are learning experiences that take place when you are in college. The number one thing that happens when you are in college is that you grow up."
College coaches are caught in a juggling act. Winning games is a main reason why coaches coach, but they also mentor players because they need discipline.
College athletes are old enough to make responsible and independent choices, but when they make irresponsible choices, they need someone to tell them that their actions warrant disciplinary action. Because Weis can oversee his players on a limited basis, the team voted on permanent team captains.
"There comes a time in their stay at Kansas where they have to determine when enough is enough and when it's time to turn the corner," Weis said. "I think that you can give players a couple of hiccups along the road, but there comes a point where two issues and mentalities are involved with dismissing a player. Number one is if whatever they did is severe enough to let them go right now, but more importantly is when a player has had multiple things occur in their background that you finally give them an ultimatum and say the next time something happens that is going to be it."
It's not just notorious off-the-field behavior such as bar fights or operating under the influence that's deserving of disciplinary action. Poor academic performance, and missing or being late to class and meetings is unacceptable too.
The football team has embarrassed the program and the University enough in the previous couple seasons with its uninspiring and lousy on-the-field performance, and adding off-the-field embarrassment would set the program further back.
Discipline existed during the Turner Gill era, but it wasn't emphasized like it has been during the current Charlie Weis era. A coach's emphasis on discipline is an effort to maintain order and structure. Without it, progression halts.
"I am not trying to be a drill sergeant here." Weis said. "I am just trying to make practical decisions based off of how people act on and off the field."
Edited by Tanvi Nimkar
KANSAS 8, KANSAS STATE 7
ASHLEIGH LEE/KANSAN
Senior infielder Zac Elgie slides home during the bottom of the fifth to score his first run during Wednesday night's game against Kansas State at Hoglund Ballpark.
WALK-OFF FOR THE WIN
ANDREW JOSEPH
ajoseph@kansan.com
With the disappointment of last year's season-ending sweep against Kansas State still fresh in their mind, the Kansas baseball team (17-25, 4-11 Big 12) sent their in-state rival home in dramatic fashion.
Senior third baseman Zac Elgie launched a walk-off homerun to straightaway center field in the bottom of the 11th inning, earning Kansas an 8-7 victory over the Wildcats. The homer was Elgie's team-leading fifth of the season and the first Jayhawk walk-off homer since March of
2009.
Elgie went two-for-four with two RBIs in the ballgame, and the senior — recovering from a celebratory pie in the face — said that he went up to the plate looking to end the game.
"The funny thing about it is that Kuntz and I were talking at shortstop prior to our coming up. And I was like Kuntz, if they're going to throw a first-pitch fastball, I'm going to take a leg kick and try to end it," Elgie said.
Wednesday's game ended offensively for Kansas the same way it began. Sophomore center fielder Tucker Tharp hit a
leadoff homerun to center field, tying the game in the bottom half of the first. The homer was Tharp's second of the season, and it started the early offensive onslaught for the Jayhawks. Kansas went on to score six runs in the inning on seven hits.
Tharp went four-for-six in the contest with an RBI and run scored. In his last 11 games, Tharp's batting average is a lofty .378, and he attributes much of the offensive improvement to his approach as a leadoff man.
"I like starting the game off whether I can draw a walk or get on base, it just sets the tempo for the game," Tharp said. "I think
the guys feed off that, and I'm excited to be in that role."
Kansas led K-State by as much as five, and with two outs in the ninth inning, the Wildcats' Wade Hinkle ripped a game-tying two-run homer off junior closer Tanner Poppe. Inconsistency has been an issue for the newly appointed closer as Poppe's ERA hovers at 5.70 to go along with a 0-4 record. Despite Poppe's alarming statistics, coach Ritch Price was not as concerned with this ninth-inning letdown.
"I tip my cap to the guy that hit it out of the ballpark," Price said. "That's as hard hit as I've seen a baseball hit all year. He
took 93 miles an hour, and he sent it over the fence at like 120 mph. That ball was crushed."
The game did not count toward Big 12 standings, but the Jayhawks will take an emotional victory over their in-state rival heading into the weekend against Oklahoma.
"Any time you beat another Big 12 or BCS team, it's great," junior first baseman Jake Marasco said. "The fact that it's K-State just makes it better."
Edited by Katie James
ATHLETICS
Conferences realign drastically in 2011
ANDREW JOSEPH
ajoseph@kansan.com
When the Kansas baseball team closes the 2012 regular season on May 19 at Hoglund Ballpark, a rivalry so deeply embedded in the history and culture of the two universities, will end with the final pitch.
The Universities of Kansas and Missouri have met every year since their first football game on Oct. 31, 1891, creating one of the most intense rivalries in all of sports. But the rivalry's days are numbered.
Throughout the past 20 months, the landscape of college sports has changed drastically, but no period was more critical than the fall of 2011. The term "conference realignment" dominated headlines and casted a shadow of uncertainty over athletic departments around the country — including Kansas.
As the conference realignment dust settles, many schools around the country prepare for change, and others are simply thankful for their BCS survival.
Dennis Dodd, a national college sports columnist for CBSsports.com, has covered college athletics for more than 20 years. Dodd said he has never seen anything quite like conference realignment, but he
REALIGNMENT'S ORIGIN
"It's unprecedented," Dodd said. "Conference expansion really originated with Penn State's move to the Big Ten in 1993, and that was a huge deal."
can still pinpoint where it began.
Penn State was a long-time independent, and its decision to join the Big Ten set the stage for further conference expansion 17 years later. When the
University of Nebraska announced on June 11, 2010, that the school was leaving the Big 12 for the Big Ten, the Big 12 became the ground zero of conference realignment.
In 2006, the Big Ten signed a $1 billion deal with ESPN/ABC, and the conference already generated profits from its nationally syndicated Big Ten Network. A 2010 Chicago Tribune report estimated that Big Ten expansion could potentially result in an allocation of $40 million annually to each school. After Nebraska chancellor Harvey Perlman saw those figures,
Football is widely considered the driving force of conference realignment because it's the sport that schools generate most of their athletic financial benefits from. The Big Ten provided Nebraska with stability to a degree that the Big 12 could not match at the time.
Nebraska brought a completely new television market and a national fan base to the Big Ten, and the Pac-10 (now Pac-12) looked to be the next beneficiary of conference expansion.
"It's really a function of market sourcing," Dodd said. "College football, since really the time the BCS started in 1998, has become the runaway second most popular sport in the country as far as viewers go."
On June 7, 2010, it seemed that the Big 12's disbandment was inevitable. Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott offered invitations to Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Colorado. It took three days for Colorado to accept the invitation, but the other five schools remained committed to the Big 12.
the decision to leave the Big 12 was an easy one.
Former Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe's last-ditch effort to save
the conference worked.
He gave Texas, and the other
Big 12 schools, permission to start their own networks. At the time, Beebe was praised for his ingenuity and received a three year contract extension. Two months later,
FALL OF DISCONTENT
With one swipe of a pen, UT president William Powers Jr. made Texas the most powerful university in collegiate athletics.
Fox Sports Media Group and the Big 12 reached an agreement that would pay the conference $90 million annually in addition to the conference's $65 million a year deal with ESPN. It was a huge sigh of relief for the Kansas and the "Forgetten Five," who, less than a year earlier, could have found themselves scrambling for a conference.
ESPN and Texas reached a 20 year,
$300-million agreement to launch
a 24 hour channel dedicated to UT
athletics. The Longhorn Network
In April, 2011, the Big 12's stability appeared ensured, even with just 10 universities entering the following academic year.
"It looked like there was a chance it would not stay together," Kansas associate athletic director Jim Marchiony told the Associate Press after the contract was announced. "But we knew a year ago that Fox was very, very interested in the Big 12 even without Nebraska and Colorado."
Even with all the money going around the conference, the Big 12 was far from stable. When rumors started circulating that the
it would join the SEC, the remaining Big 12 schools, led by Baylor University, tried to stop the Aggies from bolting.
While the Big 12 tried desperately to stay alive, the University of Oklahoma had its sights set westward to the Pac-12. As the Pac-12 reopened itself to the pos
The television contract with Fox required the Big 12 to keep at least 10 members, or the agreement would be null and void. Texas
Southeastern Conference was looking to expand, it became apparent that the Big 12 was in jeopardy once again.
sibility of expansion, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas and Texas Tech were the likely targets. The Big 12 would have been gone for good. But on
Sept. 20, 2011, Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott, along with the presidents and chancellors of the Pac-12, saved the Big 12.
SEE CONFERENCES PAGE GB