SPORTS
FOCUSING ON PRACTICE TIME
Jayhawks benefit from long stretch with just one game. MEN'S BASKETBALL | 3B
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
MEN'S BASKETBALL PICKUP ENDS TODAY
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10.2008
WWW.KANSAN.COM
Visit www.kuathletics.com or the Allen Fieldhouse ticket window by 5 p.m. today to get your winter break tickets.
PAGE 1B
Keith Loneker, left, plays the role of Clarence Darlington in the movie, "Lakeview Terrace," as Samuel L. Jackson, the movie's star, looks on. Loneker, a former Kansas football player, has been in six movies including "Superbad" and "Leatherheads" and has worked with stars such as Jackson and George Clooney.
FORMER LINEMAN HITS HOLLYWOOD
BY B.J. RAINS
rains@kansan.com
PHOTO COURTESY OF KANSAS ATHLETICS
PHOTO COURTESY OF KANSA ATLHETRIC Keith Loneker was an All-Big Eight offensive tackle at Kansas and appeared set for a lucrative career in the NFL. But his pro career ended after just three seasons and he turned attention toward a career in Hollywood.
Keith Loneker was riding high.
The former Kansas offensive tackle was having the best training camp of his three-year NFL career. He was outplaying veterans and looked set to win a starting spot on the offensive line with the Atlanta Falcons.
"I felt like it was the best football I had played," Loneker said. "The other linemen thought I was going to get the starting spot. They felt like I was going to be the guy"
But as final cuts approached in August, Loneker was stopped during a workout and told that assistant coach Rich Brooks needed to see him.
Brooks, the team's defensive coordinator, called Loneker into his office on that day in 1997 to inform the former All-Big Eight tackle that it was over. He had been cut.
The 6-foot-3, 330-pound Loneker saw Brooks' lips moving, but he didn't hear a word he said.
"I wasn't trying to hear any of it," Loneker said.
Loneker, the guy with the outgoing personality that everyone loved, had been released for the second time in as many training camps. He was without a job and a way to support his wife, Kelly, and their two young children.
He headed back to his hotel and packed his bags to return home to Lawrence. His NFL career appeared over, and he hadn't graduated from Kansas and didn't have a second job to fall back on. Loneker was in trouble.
A ringing telephone interrupted his worried thoughts.
Loneker crouched down into his right
tackle position, threw a solid block on a Missouri defensive end, and watched as Tony Sands ran by for a 15-yard gain.
The next play was called — another run. Loneker and right guard John Jones approached the line.
"Lonny, where do you think the ball is coming this time?" Jones said.
"I think it's coming here," Loneker answered, an air of cockiness in his voice.
Sands rushed for a then-NCAA record 396 yards on 58 carries against the Tigers that day in 1991. The record remains a KU mark that probably won't be touched for some time. As Loneker reflects on his four years at Kansas, nothing stands out more than the dominating performance by both Sands and the offensive line.
"It was Tony's senior year, it was Mizzou, it was his last game — he was real emotional," Loneker said. "He was just ready to play that day. He turned a lot of two-yard
runs into 10- and 15-yard runs."
By his senior year in 1992, Loneker was named first team All-Big Eight and was ranked in Mel Kiper Jr's top 100 players entering the 1993 NFL Draft. It looked as though Loneker was a can't-miss prospect with a big and lucrative future ahead of him in the game he loved.
But then things changed. At the scouting combine, teams found out about a hip surgery Loneker had when he was in eighth grade. Scouts were afraid he would sign and say he was too injured to play and just collect the signing bonus.
He had shown no signs of lingering problems and was one of the top linemen in the country, but that didn't matter. He went undrafted.
"We kept telling them and telling them that I was fine," Loneker said. "But it is what it is."
SEE LONEKER ON PAGE 4B
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
Consistency is key for junior point guard Jacobs
Jacobs adjusts to responsibility as team leader early in season
BY JAYSON JENKS
jjenks@kansan.com
Immediately after Kansas' convincing 76-55 victory against Iowa on Nov. 18, a text awaited junior guard LaChelda lacobs.
I'm so proud of you because I know that's how you can play every day.
It was a simple message, one that Jacobs likely could have received from any friend or family member. That it came from assistant coach Karen Lange, though, gave the words extra meaning.
jacobs and Lange share one of the most interesting and important player-coach relationships in college basketball — the raw
season stats
point guard and the mentor in charge of sharpening those skills.
"I told her I think you can average 10 points, five or six assists, two turnovers, four defensive rebounds and two steals," Lange said. "I think that's achievable for her every game."
Early on, Karen Lange made her statistical expectations clear to junior guard LaChelda Jacobs.
"She demands a lot from me" Jacobs said,
"because she knows I have it in me."
So far, Jacobs has been close to matching those numbers through six games.
Team Points Rebounds Assists Turnovers Steals
Sacred Heart 10 4 5 5 4
Iowa 18 3 6 1 3
St. Louis 10 5 5 4 1
New Orleans 9 8 7 8 1
San Jose State 6 5 5 2 0
Marquette 5 3 7 5 0
Season 9.7 4.7 5.8 4.2 1.5
Never was that more apparent than winn Jacobs' performance against Iowa. Facing a team that tied for first place in the Big Ten last season, Jacobs turned in her most complete game of the young season. She scored a team-high 18 points, distributed six assists and, most importantly, committed just one turnover.
Two games later, though, Jacobs committed a season-high eight turnovers against a New Orleans team that lost by 30 to Oklahoma State earlier in the season.
More than anything, those two games reveal the areas in which Jacobs still needs the most improvement: turnovers and consistency. The Iowa game, Lange said, should be the starting point, not a peak.
"When LaChelda's on and when she's having that energy, she passes it on to everyone else," Lange said. "We talk to her all the time about it. You can really dictate our defensive intensity by what you bring and how you
SEE JACOBS ON PAGE 3B
KANSAN FILE PHOTO
LaChelda Jacobs drives to the basket against a defender in Kansas' Nov. 14 game against Sacred Heart. The Jawhayks won 106-64 and Jacobs scored 10 points on the night, adding five assists and four rebounds. Jacob's best game of the season came against Iowa, when she scored 18 points and added six assists as the Jawhawks beat the Hawkeyes 76-55. Kansas faces Western Illinois at 7 p.m. tonight at Allen Fieldhouse.
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