Fridoy, October 11, 1968
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
11
Jayhawk Jottings
By BOB KEARNEY Assistant Sports Editor
Athletic competition has a capricious quality that can instantly produce the elation of victory—and the bitterness of defeat.
There's also an intermediate sensation—one that numbs an athlete under pressure. Knees begin to wobble, butterflies float in the stomach, and the mouth turns to cotton.
Bill Bell knows that sensation.
KU's placekicker deluxe flunked his first pressure test as a sophomore. The Jaywahks dropped a 21-20 season opener to Stanford when Bell missed connections on a 32-yard field goal with 2:08 remaining.
Since then, however, Bell has established himself as one of the finest kickers in KU football history.
"The game depended on it," says Bell of the Stanford miss, "and I was really shook."
That hard-luck chapter was followed by a success story in which Bell set two school records: most consecutive extra points (16) and most field goals (6) in a single season. The old mark for most three-pointers had stood for 60 years.
The confidence builder came against Nebraska. Bell's 30-yard field goal with 36 seconds left put the finishing touch on a 10-0 KU upset.
"We were ahead, but I had to redeem myself," says the Falls Church, Va., junior.
Most memorable of his 1967 efforts was another 30-yarder, this one with 6:02 remaining that pulled KU past Kansas State, 17-16.
Among those in the largest crowd (42,435) ever to witness the Sunflower rivalry was his father, Joseph Bell. Dad was checking on his kicking student.
You see, Bell has his own "thing" going. It's called the "tied-up toe" with the sheostring wrapped around the first spike, pulling the toe into an almost vertical position. At his father's suggestion, Bell experimented with the idea in high school.
"Before, I couldn't lift my ankle enough to get elevation on my
Bill Bell's
tied-up toe
kicks," he says. "By kicking this way, I can get quick elevation. And that's important, especially on extra points."
But there's one drawback to the "tied-up toe." Bell estimates that he changes shoes 25 times during a game.
"You know, in three games I haven't seen a big run yet. Everyone else is standing up hollering while I'm on the ground tying my shoes!"
Now and then, however, Bell gets an excellent view of what's happening. Last year's Colorado game afforded such an opportunity.
The Jayhawks were trailing Colorado 12-8 in the final quarter, and it was 4th-and-8 for KU at its 17. On a daring gamble for Coach Pepper Rodgers, Bell was under pressure.
Instead of the obvious punt, Bell fired a 25-yard pass to John Mosier and kept alive the KU march.
"During that week's practice, the coach had told me I might pass from punt formation," recalls Bell. "Only Mosier and I knew it. In the huddle, I just nodded to him. Everyone else carried out their fakes perfectly."
That was Bell's only fling at quarterbacking last year, although he had completed 30 of 74 passes for 373 yards on KU's freshman club in '66.
But Bell was calling plays again last Saturday as KU routed New Mexico, 68-7. Along with 37 yards rushing on six carries, Bell scored his first college touchdown on a 9-yard rollout.
"I had an easy job to do," says Bell, who directed a 65-yard scoring drive. "I don't know a lot of plays—maybe two."
It's very doubtful that the 6-2, 193-pound Bell will do any signal calling at Lincoln tomorrow. However, a kicking duel may develop with Nebraska's Paul Rogers. The 'Husker sophomore booted a 51-yard field goal with 21 seconds left as Nebraska trimmed Wyoming, 13-10. And his 19-yard placement with only 1:32 remaining decked Minnesota, 17-14.
Will the pressure bother the Jayhawk kicker, knowing that a late field goal might settle the Nebraska battle?
He was busy tying his shoes.
Bill Bell never answered
MEXICO CITY (UPI)—Embarrassed Mexican officials ended the two-day Olympic "shoe" controversy yesterday and offered protesting athletes a way of getting the shoes they want for the Games.
A spokesman for the treasury department, which controls the entry of imports into the country, termed the whole thing "a terrible misunderstanding" and said the customs department was "prepared to cooperate in any way with the Olympic athletes."
Jayhawk harriers to SIU
KU's cross country team heads for Carbondale, Ill., today where the 7-man contingent will compete in the Southern Illinois meet tomorrow.
The cross country squad ranked first in last Saturday's Oklahoma State Jamboree—a four-mile race.
Going to Carbondale will be:
Glenn Cunningham, Leon junior;
Rich Elliott, Oak Park, III.
freshman; Doug Smith, Sioux City, Iowa, freshman; Jay Mason, Hobbs, N.M., sophomore; Roger Kathol, Wichita junior; Mike Solomon, Westminster, Calif., sophomore, and Thorn Bigley, San Diego, Calif., sophomore.
The whole controversy centered around a shipment of 2,500 running shoes held in custody since last Thursday. The shoes came to Mexico from a West German manufacturer and were to be given to athletes competing in the Olympic Games.
Elliot and Smith placed second and third, respectively, in last week's Jamboree.
Red-faced Mexican officials end Olympic 'shoe' hassle
The shipment was held up—and still is—because the Mexican government had signed an exclusive contract with another West German manufacturer. The move, in effect, left nearly half of the track and field athletes with shoes they didn't care to use. The shipment in custody contained orders filed months ago.
John Carlos and Lee Evans, American world record holders, blew the lid on the "big shoe" controversy Tuesday and went so far as to say they might not compete if they didn't get the shoes they wanted.
Derek Ibbotson, former British mile world record holder and now an aide with his nation's track and field team, took the issue from there and had some 100 athletes from many nations ready to stage a protest demonstration at the airport yesterday in an effort to obtain a release for the shoes in question.
"We're terribly embarrassed by the whole situation," said the
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treasury department official. "The shoes can be released if the Olympic organizing committee requests it of us. That is how the law is governed."
Raymond Cuervo, general coordinator for the foreign press, took a different tack. He dispatched a courier to the United States to bring back any shoe requested of him.
"The committee considers this problem one of very poor planning on the part of the athletes in question," said Cuervo, "but the committee is sympathetic to the problem. As a result, the committee has dispatched a special courier to the United States to buy and return to Mexico with any and all track shoes requested by the athletes."
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