Monday. Nov. 25, 1985
Sports
University Daily Kansan
9
Dream season fades with onset of winter
It was the early days of August. Heat and humidity clenched lawrence unmercifully. All activity outside of air conditioning was accompanied by scorching sun and pauring sweat.
These were the conditions that met the Kansas Jayhawks when they reported for pre-season football practice.
But the heat didn't really matter. It was just an obstacle to be overcome. This was a team of destiny. Heat wasn't going to stop them. The Cornhuskers or the Sooners, maybe. But that was it.
Little orange dots were stuck to the crystal of every man's watch. The dots didn't necessarily represent the Orange Bowl — they were meant to constantly remind the wearer of the total dedication needed for the Jayhawks to be invited to a bowl game, any bowl game.
"The oppressive heat was gradually replaced by the gentle, temperate days of fall. The Jayhawks were slaughtering victims every Saturday, even coming close to knocking off nationally ranked Florida State."
The offense, led by seniors Mike Norseth and Richard Estell, could do no wrong. Norseth was even considered a candidate for the Heisman Trophy.
Then came Oct. 12, Kansas was 4-1,
riding higher than ever. The Iowa
State Cyclones were coming off a loss
to lowly Drake. The torrential rains
of the night before lingered into a
gray Saturday in Ames, Iowa.
This was it. The Jayhawks were a team to be reckoned with, and bowl scouts were asking for seats in the press box.
By games' end, the Jayhawks had lost their first Big Eight Conference game. As head coach Mike Gottfried said, it's tough to be 0-1 in the Big Eight without having played Nebraska, Oklahoma or Oklahoma State.
The loss hit Kansas hard.
In the next five games, Kansas played itself right out of the bowl picture with one win against four losses.
(Winter blew into Memorial Stadium Saturday as mercilessly as summer sat on the practice field in August. But again, that wouldn't stop
Chris Lazzarino Sports editor
the Jayhays. Kansas, just like the weather, had come full circle. Early season wins were replaced by midseason losses. It was now time to replace the memories of those losses with a win and a .500 season.
The underclassmen made sure that they wouldn't have to endure winter, spring and summer with a last-game loss hanging over their heads. The seniors made sure their last game in a Kansas uniform would be one to remember fondly.
In years to come, tailback Lynn Williams can tell his son about how he overcame academic ineligibility and a badly injured body to score two touchdowns in his last game in a Kansas uniform.
Linebacker Willie Pless can talk of how he proved the doosers wrong — he wasn't too small to play college football. He is leaving Kansas as the Big Eight's all-time tackle leader with 632. No Cornhusker or Sooner has ever done better.
Estell can talk of a truly magical catch in the third quarter of his last game. After reaching over a defender and bobbling the ball a few times, he gained control and completed a 64-yard touchdown pass from Norseth.
Norseth can talk of passing for 480 yards against Vanderbilt, and being considered, at least for that time, one of the best players in all of college football. He can also talk of how he and the rest of the offense combined to destroy Kansas and Big Eight offensive records.
All of the seniors will have fond memories of glory days in a Kansas uniform, Saturday being one of them.
But the Jayhawks fell short. A season of wonderful highs and tormenting lows ended without an invitation to a bowl game.
Now Memorial Stadium sits empty, shrouded in fog, dizzle and freezing cold — silently awaiting another season.
Team loses in tournev
Kansas ends the season with a record of 17-15.
The Kansas volleyball team's season ended Friday night when the Jayhawks lost to the Missouri Tigers 19-15, 7-15, 14-16 in the Big Eight conference tournament.
"What I kept telling the girls in the huddle was that we were too worried about winning." KU hitter Judy Desch said yesterday. "You have to play every point. It wasn't like they were on a roll. We were just flat."
Kansas head coach Frankie Albizt said Missouri played more steadily than Kansas.
The Jayhawks had split two matches with Missouri during the regular season, but players said they were too nervous to play well Friday.
"They played steady ball, and our players were just a bit off," she said.
Chad DeShazo/KANSAN
Mitt Garner, Kansas cornerback, intercepts a pass from Missouri quarterback to bring him down. Garner had two interceptions in Saturday's game against Marion Adler on the KU 40-yard line as Tim Clark, Missouri wide receiver, tries Missouri, the last game of the season for both teams.
'Hawks finish season on winning note
By Frank Hansel
Of the Kansan sports staff
The Kansas Jayhawks took care of some unfinished business Saturday with a 34-20 win over Missouri in Memorial Stadium.
The Jayhawks broke a four-game losing streak and ended the season with a 6-6 record, the best in head coach Mike Gottfried's three year tenure. Kansas finished sixth in the Big Eight with a 2-5 record. Missouri, 1-10 overall, tied Kansas State for seventh place in the conference with a 1-6 mark.
KU never fell behind, and 14 seniors concluded their careers on a winning note.
But Gottfried and the Kansas staff will not take long to ponder what happened or what might have happened in this season filled with controversy
Quarterback Mike Norseth scored on a one-yard quarterback sneak with 3 minutes, 15 seconds left in the first quarter to end a streak of 15 quarters without a touchdown.
on the field and off.
"It's sad knowing this was the last game for the seniors," Gottfried said after the game. "But we have got to look ahead to next year, and there are a lot of players in that locker room who will be ready to take over."
In addition, Gottfried will continue recruiting efforts for next season. Part of those efforts included courting about 60 recruits over the weekend.
Suddenly the talk of a winning season and a possible bowl bid that had followed the Jayhawks since August was gone, and Kansas needed Saturday's win against Missouri to salvage a 500 season.
The season opened on an optimistic note for the Jayhawks. Kansas won four of its first five games, with the lone loss being a four point setback to highly ranked Florida State in Tallahassee. Fla.
"We go directly into recruiting, and then we'll evaluate the season and the program." Gottfried said.
"It feels really good, and we picked a good time to have a good game," linebacker Willie Pless said about the win. "It should carry over into next season."
In its sixth game, Kansas was upset by Iowa State. The team went on to lose four of its next five games. The lone victory was a 38-7 win Oct. 19 over intrastate rival Kansas State, a team that finished 1-10 this season.
For the first quarter and a half it looked as if the Jayhawks would have an easy time with Missouri. Kansas jumped out to a 14-0 lead on the strength of one-yard touchdown runs by Norseth and tailback Lynn Williams.
Missouri rallied with two second-quarter touchdowns, but place-kicker Jeff Johnson gave Kansas the lead for good with a 22-yard field goal with 03 left in the first half.
After Johnson added a 51-yard field goal, the Jayhawks took control in the third quarter on a 64-yard touchdown pass from Norseth to wide receiver Richard Estell.
Estell and Missouri cornerback Tony Facinelli were running side by side down the left sideline when Norseth's pass bounced off of Facinelli's helmet and shoulder pads into Estell's arms at the 10-yard line. He eluded the Missouri defender with a stiff arm at the five-yard line and gave Kansas a 27-14 lead.
"The Missouri defensive back played great defense, but he overran the ball a little bit," Estell said. "It hit him in back of the head, and then we started juggling the ball around. Luckily, I came away with it for a touchdown."
Facinelli said he had Estell covered well, but the ball bounced in his arms. He added that if they would have run that play 100 times he probably would have made a catch like that only three times.
Both Gottfried and Missouri head coach Woody Widenhofer said the catch was the turning point in the game.
"That was probably the biggest play of the game." Gottfried said.
KU women beat Drake in opener
Bv Heather Fritz
Of the Kansan sports staff
when the KU women's basketball team started conditioning at the beginning of the year, forward Jackie Martin was already thinking about Wanda Ford, who plays center for Drake University.
"When we got up at five in the morning to run, I wondered where she was — was she still in bed?" Martin said Saturday. "Today it looked to me like she was still in bed."
Saturday Kansas shut down Ford and beat Drake 80-64 in the season opener in Allen Field House. The Jayhawks held Ford, Drake's leading scorer and rebounder and a finalist last year for the Wade Trophy, to only six points and nine rebounds. Her average last year was 24 points and 17.7 rebounds.
Drake head coach Carolele Baumgarten said, "If KU can play as aggressively as they did tonight, they will really contend for the Big Eight title."
"When you lose a game like that, it's hard to take," said KU guard Lisa Dougherty, who came off the bench Saturday to score 10 points. "We knew we couldn't let up on them."
The victory was sweet revenge for the Jayhawks. Last year on Drake's court in Des Moines, Iowa, Kansas lost by one point on a basket by Drake with one second left.
Kansas' 6-foot-5 center, Kelly Jennings, was held to only two points in the first half, but in the second she scored 13. Forward Vickie Adams added 15 points in the second half to end the game with 26 points and 15 rebounds.
Drake, 24-6 overall and 16-2 in the Gateway Conference last season, went out to an early lead, but Kansas came back to take a 36-29 halftime lead.
"Vickie was just super," said KU head coach Marian Washington, who called Drake a top 25 team. "She had some awesome shots."
Drakes' Caroline Orr gets the offensive rebound as Jayhawk forward Regan Miller goes after the ball in Saturday's women's basketball game against Drake. The Jayhawks beat Drake 80-64 in their season opener.
Kellogg scores 22 in KU victory
From Kansan wires
DENVER — Forward Ron Kellogg scored 22 points, 14 of them in the second half, as fifth-ranked Kansas rallied to beat Washington 68-64 last night in the Denver regional final of the Big Apple National Invitation Tournament.
Kansas will play Louisville in the semi-finals of the Big
Annie NT at 8 p.m. CST Friday in New York City.
The Jayhawks, trailing by as many as eight points in the first half, tossed in 12 straight points — the last six points of the first half and the first six points of the second half — to move to a 40-35 advantage.
Six straight Washington points gave the lead back to the Huskies, and the lead seesawed for the next seven minutes.
Kellogg sank back-to-back jumpers to put the Jayhawks up 48-47. After a Shag Williams basket for Washington, Chris Piper rebounded in a basket and Kellogg scored on a fast break, giving KU a 52-49 lead with 8:47 left.
The Jayhawks didn't trail again, although Washington cut the lead to one point on two occasions.
Guard Calvin Thompson's three-point play with 4:31 left triggered a 9-2 Kansas flurry that produced a 67-58
Center Greg Dreiling added 14 points and Thompson 13 for the winners.
Washington, shooting 44 percent from the floor compared to Kansas' 38 percent in the first half, led in the early stages.
advantage, and Washington got no closer than three points after that.
The Huskies were paced by center Chris Welp with 21 points and forward Paul Fortier with 16.
Back-to-back baskets by Fortier put the Huskies up 8-4. Midway through the half, point guard Greg Feld fed for a pair of baskets inside, and Hill followed with a 16-foot jumper to give Washington a 23-16 lead.
Pepperdine forward Eric White was good for 13 points, center Levy Middlebrooks chipped in 11 and guard Jon Korfas made 10 points.
Thompson led Kansas with 14 points. He was 6-13 from the field and 2-4 of from the free throw line. Manning and guard Cedric Hunter both had 12 points for the Jayhawks. Dreiling had nine points. Kellogg and forward Archie Marshall both had eight points.
Kansas advanced to yesterday's game by defeating Pepperdine 67-61. Friday night.
Chiefs snap 7-game losing streak
KANSAS CITY. Mo. — Backup Todd Blackledge passed for 246 yards and a touchdown yesterday to help the beleaguered Kansas City Chiefs snap a club-record seven-game losing streak with 20-7 victory over the Indianapolis Colts.
United Press International
NFL scores, standings p. 12.
The Chiefs, battered with injuries, bruised by the drug bust Wednesday of their star defensive end Mike Bell and conceding the season to youth, won for the first time since Sept. 29 to improve to 4-8.
Indianapolis dropped to 3-9 with its sixth loss in the last seven games.
Blackieck, who was given the starting quarterback job for the remainder of the season by Coach John Mackovic to see how he can perform in a pressureless atmosphere, completed 16-of-31 passes with a touchdown strike of 22 yards to Stonehua Paige.
In his last start, Blackledge threw a club-record six interceptions and also fumbled once in a 16-0 loss to the Los Angeles Rams Oct. 20.
Blackledge took the Chiefs 77 yards on their opening possession against the Colts to put Kansas City in front for good with his touchdown pass to Paige, Mike Pruitt chipped in a 2-yard touchdown run and Nick Lowery added field goals of 29 and 42 yards.
Scott Radiche intercepted a pass and Bill Maas, Calvin Daniels and Bobby Hamm all had sacks for the Chiefs, which lost their shutout on a 14-yard run by George Wonsley with 2:22 left in the game.
The Colts also started their backup quarterback, Matt Kofler, but he was 2-of-11 passing for 12 yards and could generate only four first downs before being yanked in favor of Mike Pagel midway through the third quarter.
Kansas City put together another lengthy drive at the close of the half, moving 80 vards in 13 plays for the
Blackiege completed (our third-down passes in the game-opening drive, including a 22-yard to rookie running back Ethan Horton, and had two other passes to Anthony Harcock for 66 yards nullified by penalties before Paige's team-leading fifth TD catch of the season.
2-yard touchdown run by Pruitt and a 14-0 lead with 75 seconds remaining.
Blackledge completed passes of 21 yards to Carlos Carson and 14 to Walt Arnold in the drive and also scrambled out of the pocket for 9 yards to move the ball to the Indianapolis 5.
The Chiefs got the ball back with 35 seconds left in the half at their own 29 and Blackledge promptly moved them to the Indianapolis 4 with two passcs to Hancock. The second covered 48 yards to the 4 and, after a sack, Lowery kicked his 29-yard goal goal to give Kansas City a 17-0 halftime lead.
The Colts were forced to punt on their opening possession of the second half and Garcia Lane returned it 57 yards to the Colt 31. Four plays later, Lowery kicked a 42-yard field goal for a 20-0 Kansas City lead.
The Colts finally snapped the shutout with an 80-yard drive in the game's closing minutes. Pagel hit Pat Beach with a 30-yard pass and Owen Gill with a 20-yard pass in the four-play drive to set up the Wonsley touchdown run.