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SPORTS
BIG 12 TEAMS READY FOR BIG WEEKEND
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Top 5 matchup highlights weekend slate of games. BIG 12 FOOTBALL | 6B
RUNNERS RETURN, HELPMENTOR JAYHAWKS
WWW.KANSAN.COM
Four former athletes attend practices to stay in shape for indoor track season. CROSS COUNTRY | 8B
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2008
COMMENTARY
PAGE1B
Dire straits in the next week of local sports
There is no coincidence that on that highway, amongst those crazies the Kansas Department of Transportation reported 14 fatalities during the stretch from 1998 to 2002. There are few sports events outside the town of Lawrence that would merit risking life and limb to see.
K-10 is a dangerous stretch of road. Inhibitions and rationality perishes in the wind. Cars begin to exceed reasonable speeds while turn signals become nonexistent.
It has been another gloomy week of sports and politics for this great nation. Thankfully the jayhawk football team (4-1, 1-0 Big 12) will return to play host to Colorado on Saturday. Those few hours will likely be the happiest of the week ahead
Edited by Brenna Hawley
— unless we see another pitiful first-half effort from Kansas.
Let us pause and reflect on the seven days since my last offering... you recall that we explored how and to what extent an incredibly sour economy would have on sports.
While disillusioned countrymen talk secession from the Union in the wake of a tumbling economy, Kansas Citians are preparing a good of fashioned witch hunt at 1 Arrowhead Drive. The only red Carl Peterson will be wearing in 2009 may be his own blood.
The Cubs were swept and while it'd be nice to see a Tampa Bay Rays championship, no one really cares. The MLB can no longer stack up against the ratings giant that is the National Football League — but even pro football's stock is drowning.
And I cannot remember such a dreary road to the World Series for Major League Baseball. The MLB playoffs got off to a piss-poor start in the television ratings — dipping 27 percent on TBS for the 15 games of the division series, according to Street and Smith's Sports Business Daily.
Tom Brady, the face of the league, still has a knee that resembles a Twizzlers Pull-N- Peel, Eli Manning is actually better than Peyton and the Chargers' haplessness equals their preseason hype. It is a carousel of instability in the NFL week in and week out, although the league would like to tell you that is called "parity."
Back on the local front; it appears a few dozen people plan to showup for tomorrow night's NBA exhibition game between the Atlanta Hawks and Portland Trailblazers at the Sprint Center. This will likely be a disaster. No one cares about a preseason game between two mediocre squads with no ties to the area. Sure, Kansas City is desperate for a pro team for its new arena, but we want regular season games and unless Kobe or Shaq is on the count, a vested interest in the game is vital. Read: Kansas City's own team.
Money is too tight to pay to watch two teams from cities that couldn't be farther from Kansas City play in a game that won't count.
Finally, what should we make of Tuesday's presidential debate, McCain—Obama II, in what is the most important season of our country's most significant sport?
If you tuned in you were treated to an occasional head-scratcher (McCain referring to Obama as "that one") and several moments when it appeared the senators were ready to come to blows.
Attimes, the cylindrical setting in which the audience surrounded the candidates looked more like a stage for combat — certainly more so than last Saturday's Kimbo Slice debacle.
And while John McCain and Barack Obama's showdown was far more competitive than EliteXC's let-down, it was not free from frustration. Too often we were treated to recycled taking points rather than knockout blows — there is much to be decided in these few remaining weeks.
We don't have to leave Lawrence to take part in this sport. Good thing, because not much outside of layhawk sports merit a trip down that terrible highway. I-70 is no ideal alternative either.
SISTER, SISTER
Twin players join team
BY ANDREW WIEBE
awiebe@kansan.com
Kelsey and Kortney Clifton, Wichita freshmen, are twins and forwards on the University's soccer team. Both played soccer in high school, and Kelsey said the biggest differences in college-level soccer were speed and intensity on the field.
It's taken almost a decade for coach Mark Francis to tell freshman forwards Kortney and Kelsey Clifton apart on the practice field.
Jessica Sain-Baird/KANSAN
From the time the identical twins began attending Francis' KU soccer camps in grade school, it's been nearly impossible for him to distinguish the two without the help of the numbers on the back of their iersees.
After years of confusion, Francis caught a break this week in practice.
"I just noticed today Kortney has black shoes now and Kelsey has white shoes," he said Tuesday. "That's going to make it a lot easier for me."
Up close it's not quite as difficult. The faint scar on Kelsey's forehead and her nose ring are both dead giveaways. The piercing also gives a little insight into the differences in the twins' personalities.
"She is more outgoing than 1 am," Kortney said. "If we are in a group of people we don't know, she will be the one to talk before I do or get more comfortable with people."
But both are at home between the lines, and playing soccer at Kansas has been almost a foregone conclusion since the Clifton first caught Francis' eye at one of his camps.
Their talent set them apart as youngsters, and once high school hit there was no stopping them. The duo's team at Andover High School dominated 4A defenses, and their club team, the River City Lady Tigers, played in the state cup final three consecutive seasons.
in their sophomore season, the Cliftons verbally committed right away.
"It was definitely from the start," Kortney said of their desire to play for Kansas. "A lot of people look a lot of places and check out their options, but Kelsey
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and I really didn't do anything except look here."
Kortney and Kelsey dreamed of being jayhawks so when Kansas offered early
started 11 of 12 games thus far and has four goals and an assist to back up her prolific high school scoring record.
So far life in Lawrence has been everything they expected and more.
Kortney, the state of Kansas' all-time goal leader with 256 goals, has
SEE SOCCER ON PAGE 3B
VOLLEYBALL
Kansas comeback bid falls short in fifth set
BY JOSH BOWE
jbowe@kansan.com
The jayhawks had been in it this situation before. Down two sets to none, Kansas needed to win three sets in a row to complete another miraculous comeback. It accomplished two, but that was as far as it got.
Kansas ended up falling to Texas A&M in five sets last night in the Horesei Family Athletics Center. It was another frustrating start for the Jayhawks, creating another 0-2 hole to dig themselves out of.
"Obviously that's not our plan," coach Ray Bechard said. "We just did not respond like we needed to."
Texas A&M, to its credit, played about as well as any opponent Kansas had seen this year. Texas A&M hit an astonishing 413 after two sets with only five errors combined in the two sets.
Meanwhile, the Jayhawks had six errors apiece in the first two sets, failing to hit .200 in each of the first two sets. The Aggies' balanced offensive attack kept the Jayhawks blockers at bay, as four Aggies had at least 12 kills, with junior outside hitter Sarah Armerman leading the way with 17.
After those first two disappointing sets, Kansas came out for set three and four looking like a completely different team. Behind sophomore outside hitters Jenna Kaiser and Karina Garlington, the layhawks cruised to two set victories in a row. It is what makes that ever more frustrating for Beachard that his team came out so flat for set five.
"You throw out all the stats when you go to a set five." Bechard said of the match in general. "Whoever makes the most plays, and once again we came up short on that deal."
In that set five, it was the six Kansas errors, compared to the one of Texas A&M's, that did Kansas in. Especially when it compares to the four errors seen in set four for Kansas. Bechard knows not too many teams are going to win a 15-point set five with six errors.
"We have six errors in the fifth set," Bechard said. "Granted there were some blocked balls you still got to make better adjustments with our swings."
If there was one bright spot in a match full of darkness, it was Kaiser's performance. She notched a season-high 18 kills playing in her second match without her elbow brace. Kaiser hopes this is a sign for more consistent play on her part.
"I felt like I was missing something," Kaiser said of playing without the brace. "It just took me awhile to get adjusted."
Kaiser, along with Garlington were able to form a nice one-two punch the Jayhawks have lacked all season. At times, it felt Kansas had to rely on Garlington too much. But Garlington just hopes that Kansas' early set struggle will be hammered out.
"We've just been struggling to come out strong," Garlington said. "We're right there, we just have to fix one or two things."
SEE VOLLEYBALL ON PAGE 3B
Weston White/KANSAN
junior middle blocker Paige Mazour blocks an attempted Texas A&M kill shot for a Kansas point Wednesday. Mazour played in two of five sets in Kansas' 3-2 loss at the Horeisi Faculty Athletic Center.
FOOTBALL
Freshman validates KU program's direction
BY B.J. RAINS rains@kansan.com
Anyone needing proof that Kansas football is moving in the right direction can look no further than freshman offensive lineman Ben Lueken.
The St. Louis native choose the Jayhawks over four prominent college football programs - Michigan, Alabama, Missouri and Nebraska.
"I don't know who else he was looking at," coach Mark Mangino said. "But he took a liking to us and we liked him. He came from a smaller Catholic school in the St. Louis area and probably, if he had been at a bigger school, he may have gotten more looks.
We're glad that we have him."
Lueken came to Kansas expecting to be a redshirt this season but impressed Mangino and the coaching staff from the beginning of fall camp. He played a few series in the opening game of the season against Florida International to help sub for the injured Jeremiah Hatch and even saw action in the second half of Saturday's game against Iowa State.
"He really is a tough competitor," Mangino said. "He plays hard every play, even if he makes a mistake, he goes hard, and as coaches, we really like that. Anytime a guy will play with fire every play and go hard every snap, he's going to get better and be a really good player. And he's going to be
really good for us."
"Recruiting is a tough process and unfortunately some things fell through," Lueken said. "Coaching changes, things like that, but Kansas was always in the back of my mind even when I was visiting other places. KU was the first school to contact me and they stayed strong with their pursuit of me."
The 6-6, 300 pound Lueken was named first team All-State as a senior and was an All-Conference selection for three straight years. And as one of the top lineman in the St. Louis area, he had interest from some of the top programs in the nation.
"The program just showed a lot of respect and it's a real blue-collar environment and that's the way I was raised. I wanted to be
Lueken, who is majoring in exercise science, hopes to return to his hometown of St. Louis to open his own personal training facility when his time in Lawrence is done. But for now, he's battling with redshirt freshman Hatch and Jeff Spikes for playing time on the offensive line.
"Every day I just approach it like I am coming to work, and if you work as hard as you can, then good things will happen," Lueken said. "I still have a lot to learn but I am learning every day. The older linemen have really helped me out. We'll see."
coached by a hard working, no fancy business kind of program."
Edited by Arthur Hur
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