University Daily Kansan / Thursday, September 11, 1986
Sports
9
KU Javhawks get a passing grade from receiver Smith
Freshman receiver earns starting bid for Saturday's North Carolina game
Chris Feelev/KANSAN
Quintin Smith, freshman wide receiver practices at Memorial Stadium. Smith will start for the Jayhawks in the North Carolina game Saturday in Lawrence
The Jayhawk football passing tradition served as the key to laring top Texas high school prospect Quintin Smith to Kansas.
By ANNE LUSCOMBE
Sports writer
Smith, who is from Houston, was heavily recruited by several small colleges and some larger universities. But not even Texas or Texas A&M interested him.
"The Southwest Conference is a running conference. They don't pass the ball and I didn't like it," he said yesterday. "The Texas schools are all being heavily investigated by the NCAA. I don't want to go to a school that's going to be on probation."
It took him only two days to make up his mind about Kansas. He visited the campus Feb. 9, and signed his letter of inent Feb. 12.
The freshman wide receiver got a surprise from the coaches earlier this week when told he would start in Saturday's game ahead of junior Ronnie Caldwell.
"I had sort of mixed emotions when they told me," Smith said. "I knew I could do the job, but I thought I could mess up, too. I was really surprised because I thought I would play, but I sure didn't think I'd be starting."
Caldwell said the change in the depth chart only made him want to work harder. The consolation for him was knowing he would see playing time in Saturday's game, even though he wouldn't start.
Head coach Bob Valesente said Smith had done a good job and moved himself into a playing position. The freshman receiver showed he could
do well in any situation, the coach said. Caldwell will start whenever four wide receivers are used, which Valesente said would be often.
Robert Ford, wide receiver coach, said both Smith and Caldwell were good players. The coaching staff simply decided to go with Smith because of his recent performances. He also said that because Smith was young and inexperienced, the new receiver would probably make a few mistakes in the game.
"We don't have any seniors as wide receivers. All our players are young." Ford said. "We will experience a few growing pains, but that's what makes it exciting."
Smith, who was one of the top 100 Texas high school prospects, is accustomed to winning. His high school football team won the 5A state championship last year. His school, Yates High School in Houston, was the second ranked high school football team in the nation. East St. Louis (Ill.) High School was number one.
As a senior, Smith caught 59 passes for 988 yards and 12 touchdowns. He played defensive back occasionally and was also the team's kicker, tallying up 72 extra points and 12 field goals.
Kicking was fun in high school, but too much pressure is placed on collegiate kickers, he said. He would rather just stay with receiving.
Even with the impressive statistics he gained in high school and his new starting position, Smith said he still had a few shortcomings.
wanted to be taller," the 5-feet-11,
175-pound player said. "And I need to
gain a little weight. I also need to
become faster — not that I'm slow
(he can run 40 yards in 4.5 seconds)
— but I want to get my 40 time down
to 4.3."
"I'm a little too short. I always
Ford said Smith was a tough competitor and a smooth player. So smooth, in fact, Ford said he wished the wide receiver had some rough spots for him to correct.
Adapting to Kansas' program has not been a problem for him, Smith said. Some of the offensive plays are similar to those he ran in high school. However, he will admit to some confusion in the early days when learning the playbook.
"When I first got here and we went through all those plays I could just look at them," he said grimacing. "But Coach Ford goes over the plays at a pace where we can pick them up and understand them easily."
Playing football runs in the family for Smith, who is the youngest of four children. His two older brothers have played football in college. Blaine, a 1982 graduate, was a free safety for the Southern Methodist and Tern is an outside linebacker for Navarrr Community College in Corsicana, Texas.
His mother, Peggy, and Blaire plan to drive from Houston for the opening game against North Carolina to see the youngest Smith play collegiate football.
SMITH PROFILE
Quintin Smith
Club pushes Kansas tickets
Parents: Peggy and Smithy Smith Class and major: Freshman, undecided
Hometown: Houston
Background: Led team to Texas 5A state championship. His high school was the second-ranked high school football team in the country.
Sports writer
By NICOLE SAUZEK
Their sales were successful enough to make even the local Girl Scout troop a little green with envy.
The telephone lines buzzed. The pavement was pounded. It was peddling at its finest.
The mission - to sell 800 KU season football tickets before August 29th.
Instead, they sold 810.
The members of Lawrence's newly formed Hawks Club, which consists of Lawrence businesses, began their ticket-selling quest in early July to help promote KU's athletic programs, said Dolph Simons Jr., coordinator of the Lawrence Hawks Club.
Simons led a sales effort in the form of team and individual competition between local businesses.
Prizes were also set to build incentive for the club members.
He sent out letters asking interested businesses to join the Hawks Club. Eight teams were then created among the different businesses by vocations, such as media, government, realtors and car dealers. The goal of 800 tickets was set, and businessmen were on their way to the life of a door-to-door salesman.
Individual awards were, for first place, a trip for two to the men's basketball Hawaii Rainbow Classic from December 27-30; for second, two free airline tickets to anywhere in the country; and third place was two season basketball tickets.
The first place prize for team competition, won by the realators with 190 tickets sold, was a VIP trip to a Kansas City Chiefs football game for team members and their spouses. The realaters' team sold an average of 16.4 tickets per person.
"This has been the biggest effort ever by any group in Lawrence to promote football tickets," said Kent Weiser, director of marketing and promotions for the athletic department. "A lot of people have made several attempts at something like this before, but they've never been as successful as this one."
A Kansas City Hawks Club also is selling football tickets. Its drive started last spring and will end tomorrow. So far, 530 season tickets have been sold, along with
$30,000 in Williams Fund donations collected.
"But, something like this gives us a base with which to build up attendance whether we have a good team or not. If people in Lawrence don't attend the games, then how do we expect people from other cities to come and watch the games?"
"It's up to the University to field a winning team," said Simons. "We can't really sustain attendance if we have a bad one.
With Lawrence's turnover rate, Weiser said the group had found many first-time ticket buyers.
"There's only a small percentage of the people who stay in Lawrence for more than five years," he said. "If you don't stay on top of something, like this drive, you end up missing a lot of people."
Simons said he hoped the Hawks Club had opened a few eyes to KU sports.
"We got a lot of people to think about the athletic program during the drive," he said. "It's just like the old saying, 'Who came first?' The chicken or the egg?"
"Who comes first? The fan or a good team? It should be the fan."
Rice. Buckner lead Sox to win
From Kansan wires
BALTIMORE — Jim Rice and Bill Buckner each went 4-for-5, backing Roger Clemens' 22nd victory and helping the Boston Red Sox extend their winning streak to 11 games with a 9-4 decision last night over the Baltimore Orioles.
Rice drove in three runs and Buckner delivered two as the Red Sox matched their longest winning streak since 1977.
Boston raised its advantage over second-place Toronto to 8 $ \frac{1}{2} $ games in the American League East. Any combination of Red Sox victories and Blue Jays losses totalling 16 will eliminate Toronto, last year's division champion.
Clemens survived early control problems and went six innings, improving his record to 22-4. Calvin Schrairl finished for his eight save. Ken Dixon, 10-12, took the loss.
DETROIT — Kirk Gibson and Darnell Coles each hit a pair of two-run homers, helping the Detroit Tigers the two club home run records and whip the Milwaukee Brewers, 11-7.
The Red Sox have now posted 37 comeback victories, nine of their last 10. Baltimore has lost seven of its last eight and 19 of its last 24. Only a loss by last place Milwaukee prevented the Orioles from falling into the cellar. Baltimore has not been in last place after the All-Star break since 1955.
Detroit 11, Milwaukee 7
The Tigers hit a club record-tying six home runs in the game, including a club record-tying four in the fourth inning.
Milwaukee got home runs from
*Rob Deer*, who boosted his American
*League-leading total to 33, and Rick
Cerone, who hit his fifth, making
the total of eight in the game the high
in the American League this season.
Oakland 6, Chicago 2
CHICAGO — Donnie Hill hit a three-run homer, and Jose Rijo struck out 10 and led the Oakland A's to a 6-2 victory over the Chicago White Sox.
Hill's fourth homer, which came in the fourth inning off loser Pete Felson, 0,1, who was making his first start, gave the A a 6-10 lead. a blast that hit the left-field, upper deck facade scored Dave Kingman, who doubled, and Mike Davis, who singled off the third base bag.
Rijo, 7-10, scattered five hits and walked two while pitching his fourth complete game in 23 starts.
TORONTO — The game between the New York Yankees and the Toronto Blue Jays was postponed because of rain.
Doug Drabek, who was slated to start yesterday, and Bob Teewksbury are New York's scheduled pitchers. The Blue Jays listed Jimmy Key and John Cerutti as today's starters. Texas 3. Seattle 2
Toby Harrah led off the 10th with a bloop single off reliever and loser Matt Young, 7-6. Browner came in to run for Harrah and two outs later Sierra lineed a shot down the left field to drive home the winning run
The game will be made up as part of a double header today, which will start at 3:05 p.m.
ARLINGTON, Texas — Ruben Sierra double home pincher Bob Brower from first base with two outfs in the 10th inning to lead the Texas Rangers to a 3-2 victory over the Seattle Mariners.
CLEVELAND — Mark Ryal bounced a two-out single past third baseman Brook Jacoby to score Darrell Miller with the winning run in the 14th inning lifting the California Angels to a 7-6 victory over the
Greg Harris, 9-8, the fourth Texas pitcher, pitched the last 2 2-3 innings for the victory.
California 7.Cleveland 6
Cleveland Indians.
SAN FRANCISCO — Eric Davis hit three home runs, scored five runs and drove in four runs to power the Cincinnati Reds to a 14-2 victory over the San Francisco Giants.
The victory enabled the Angels to maintain their 8 $ _{1/2} $ game lead over Texas in the American League West.
Miller opened the 14th inning with a single under the glove of shortstop Julio Franco and was sacrificed to second by Dick Schiffoel. After Ruppert Jones' fly ball moved Miller to third, loser Rich Yett, 4-3, intentionally walked Dou DeCinces. Ryan then followed with a single between Jacey and the bag to drive home Miller.
Eric Davis, who now has 26 homers for the season, hit a two-run shot off loser Vida Blue, 9-10, in the first innning. He hit a solo shot off Blue in the third innings and added his third with the bases empty in the eighth inning of relief pitcher Mark Davis.
Ted Power, with relief help from Bill Landrum, improved to 7-6. The Reds, who scored in every innning but the sixth, collected 18 hits including four by rookie shortstop Barry Larkin, who drove in three runs. Larkin had an RBI single in the second and an RBI double in the fourth. Chicago 8. Philadelphia 7
Eric Davis singled and scored a run in the fifth inning and was safe on an error and scored another run in the seventh inning.
Cincinnati 14, San Francisco 2
CHICAGO — Gary Matthews belted two solo homers and the Chicago Cubs survived a home run festival at Wrigley Field for an 87 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies.
A 24 mph wind blowing to left field contributed to a total of seven home runs - all solo shots - in the game. It tied a major-league mark for most
See BASEBALL, p. 10, col. 1
Ex-player returns to Kansas to face Pattin and Jayhawks
By BRIAN SNYDER
Sports writer
Kent Shelley is returning to his collegiate baseball roots.
As a KU student, Shelley played under baseball head coach Marty
Baseball
Pattin. As a graduate assistant, he coached the Jayhawks alongside Pattin. As an opposing coach, he will face Pattin and the KU baseball team today in the KU fall season opener
Shelley made the transition from player to manager and is the head
baseball coach at Johnson County Community College. The Kansans, Shelley's new team, are ready for the double-header, he said yesterday.
The first game of today's doubleheader will begin at 1 p.m. The games will be played at Holcom Park, 25th street west of Iowa Street, because of continuing renovation of Quigley Field.
Shelley, a 1983 KU graduate, said his team had good speed and was fairly good defensively. However, it isn't a power-hitting team.
As for Kansas, the Jayhawks also are ready to play. Pattin said many players would get into the game, but individual pitchers won't get too much playing time, Pattin said.
"The games are important, but not as important as the conference opener," Henry said. "The fall season is the time where the coach can take a look at the players and decide who makes the team in the spring."
Paul Henry, junior pitcher, will start the first game for the Jayhawks.
Sports writer
By JANE ZACHMAN
Golf team will face Cyclones
The KU women's golf team will tee off its season today with a tournament at Iowa State in Ames, Iowa.
Kent Weiser, women's golf head coach, said the Jayhawks had the opportunity to do well in the two-day tournament.
"You start out the year and it's hard to predict how you'll do," Weiser said.
"Mechanically we're pretty sound. We've been working on the short game (putting and chipping) 65 to 70 percent of the time. It builds confidence when your short game is good."
The five players selected to represent KU in Iowa share Weiser's confidence going into their first tournament.
"I think we’re going to do well," said Susan Pekar, Wausau, Wisc., junior. "In practice we’ve been playing a lot better."
Michelle Mulvihill, Des Moines sophomore, said the Veekner course in Ames will be a good place for the team to start their season.
"Veekner is a challenging course," she said, "I have played on it before and there's lot's of position play."
Michelle Mulhill, Des Moines sophomore, works on her chip shot during practice. Mulhill and the rest of the women golfers practiced yesterday at Alvamar Country Club. Mulhill is one of five KU women's golf team members who will be competing this weekend in Iowa State.
"If we play up to our full potential, there's no reason that we can't win," said Toni Shockley. Madison, Wis., junior.
"Coach Wieser has been out here helping us everyday." Shockley said. "I'm hoping we'll do really well."
Tina Gewuch, Greenbay, Wis. junior, said extra weekend practices helped to sharpen her game before today's meet.
"Everyone has been working really hard," she said. "Practicing this weekend helped a lot. Veekner is a really tight course and there's not a lot of room for error." Gneuweb said.
The tournament in Iowa will be
the first collegiate meet for freshmen Sherri Atchison, Dun can, Okla.
"I hope I do really well," she said. "I'm really nervous. My swing has gotten a lot better but I have to work on my confidence."
Other teams participating in the tournament include Nebraska, Kansas State, Wisconsin, Northern Iowa and Northern Illinois.
Weiser noted that the strength of the women's team this year would be its depth and competitive spirit.