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SPORTS
JAYHAWKS BOOTED FROM NBA PROGRAM
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Mario Chalmers and Darrell Arthur were kicked out of an NBA program after breaking rules. MEN'S BASKETBALL | 6B
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KICK THE KANSAN Get your picks and picture in the Kansan by guessing who wins upcoming games. FOOTBALL 2B
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2008
COMMENTARY
PAGE 1B
Politics is one tough sport
If the Spangles M&M mudslide commercial is not removed from my television soon, I may do strange and terrible things.
I can't do anything in my house without that stupid jingle playing in the background, and I can't watch anything without seeing that Great American family fake smile their way toward obesity.
A far cry from February's Super Bowl ads, indeed.
Everything else is intact right now, though. Only one sport can make the Olympics an afterthought and challenge college/pro/fantasy football for sporting supremacy in the coming months: We are in the heart of Election Season. Campaign 2008 is as harsh and brutal as sports get.
Gladiators may pound one another's faces into hamburger inside the Octagon every few weeks, but every day as we enter the homestretch of this election, personal attacks and fierce debates will flare up... enough damage for everyone to find themselves all torn up and bloody at the steps of their nearest Capitol building.
The Star Wars-Cirque Du Soleil orgies that were the opening and closing Olympic Ceremonies met their match just weeks later as Barack Obama formally accepted the Democratic nomination for the presidency in front of 85,000 screaming supporters at Invesco Field at Mile High Stadium — home of the Denver Broncos. More Americans watched Obama's address — 38.4 million, according to the Nielsen ratings — than those ceremonies.
"I'M A MAMA'S BOY." — JOE MORTENSEN
Flashbulbs lit up the sky before the fireworks did in a spectacle that put many past Super Bowls to shame. No longer are politics limited to one section of the newspaper only. Hell, this is the world's original game.
I'm actually filling out a fantasy politics sheet right now. For a class, I am to select which states will be won by Obama or presumptive GOP nominee John McCain, and just how many electoral votes each will win.
I am beginning to think I spent too much time this summer studying for fantasy football.
McCain's speech tonight wraps up another week of fierce debate over
Tonight, McCain is expected to speak and accept his party's nomination at the Xcel Energy Center in Minneapolis-St. Paul — the same venue that Brock Lesnar of the Ultimate Fighting Championship nearly eviscerated his opponent on Pay-Per-View.
SEE MONTEMAYOR ON PAGE 4B
Graphic by Drew Berqman
The name is still there, painted on a dusty aluminum sign, resting awkwardly against the brick of the Clayton Valley High School gymnasium.
A teenage boy, carrying a bag crammed with football pads, hurries past the sign without a glance.
If he stopped and looked, he'd see Joe Mortensen's name, secure at the top.
If he looked closer,hed see that Mortensen tackled 171 people in 2003,the most in Clayton Valley history.
But the boy is late to summer football practice, and Herc Pardi is waiting for him around the corner. Pardi, a middle-aged man with a salt-and-pepper beard, stands in the doorway of the Clayton Valley weight room. He takes one step inside and points toward a plaque above a rusted rack of weights.
"His name is up there," says Pardi, who's coached at Clayton Valley since 1978. "His name is on everything in here."
The football players at Clayton Valley know the name, but not the story. They run sprints on an asphalt playground in 90-degree Northern California heat, and they know Morgenstern once played here.
They know he left the Bay Area for Kansas and won the Orange Bowl, and that he'll start for No. 14 Kansas at middle linebacker against Louisiana Tech this weekend, and well, they know the name.
But they don't know the story.
They don't know that Mortensen's father abandoned him when he was an infant, leaving Joe's mother. Tracy, alone with two young kids.
They don't know that Joe found strength in his grandpa, the man who taught him how to cuss and the only father he ever knew.
They don't know that Joe's father played at Clayton Valley too, that Joe saw his father's records on the wall, that Mortensen and his father shared the same name; Joe.
"Mortensen," a Clayton Valley football player says, pedaling on a stationary bike. "The guy that goes to Kansas? No, I never saw him play."
The summer heat swelters as you escape downtown Oakland and journey northeast through Contra Costa County. Miles of highway and suburban sprawl connect a community of suburbs speckled across the East Bay. Here in Pittsburg, Calif., 30 miles from Oakland and 25 minutes from the last
trace of Bay Area fog, Joe Mortensen made his first memories.
Here, in a smallish house in a neighborhood coated with ethnic diversity, Tracy Duncan told her kids not to play outside alone.
It wasn't a bias against the neighborhood, Tracy says, just a rule of motherly instinct that she held onto when her family left Pittsburg.
Still, Duncan was a single mom raising two kids, Melissa and little Joey. She found a neighborhood she could afford. And sometimes people who looked like gang members paced the streets.
"They probably weren't." Tracy says. "But it was a tough neighborhood."
Here, Mortensen first started to hear stories about his father.
Here, Mortensen first started dreaming about football.
Mortensen's father and Tracy divorced soon after Mortensen was born. His father had grown up in the same Contra Costa neighborhoods. And he had starred on the same Clayton Valley football fields. But that was all they shared. Mortensen's father was gone, and he would never be a part of his life. Mortensen would go it alone.
"In some ways, he had to take care of himself," says Terry Bolender, Mortensen
maternal grandmother. "He kind of waited over his mother and his sister."
But Mortensen was always protective. Sometimes he'd defend his smaller friends. Sometimes the fighting got him into trouble.
"Let them fight their own battles" Terry Bolender would say.
He had to go it alone. But he was never alone. He had family. He had his mother.
That's my stronghold, Mortensen says. Tracy, Melissa and Joe. Just the three of them.
Of course, the Bolender house was just a few miles away in Concord. And Grandma Terry and Grandpa Frank's house became afternoon headquarters for Joe and Melissa.
Mortensen discovered a kindred soul in grandpa Frank. He found a pal, a confidant and a father figure to look up to.
Frank Bolender never missed. Not a football game. Not a baseball game. Not a graduation. His grandkids meant too much to him. Joe meant too much to him.
Grade school
Junior high
SEE MORTENSEN ON PAGE 3B
High school
High school
FOOTBALL
Bulldogs aim for second big upset of BCS conference opponent
BY TAYLOR BERN
therm@kansan.com
tbern@kansan.com
"While there was a lot of excitement, I don't think there was overwhelming joy." Dooley said. "Our players had worked hard, they were ready for the game, and they were confident going into the game."
If coach Derek Dooley was surprised by Louisiana Tech's 22-14 victory over Mississippi State last week, he hasn't let anybody know about it.
The Bulldogs upset victory certainly caught the eyes of college football fans across the country.
Last year Mississippi State came out of the Southeastern Conference with seven victories and added an eighth in the Liberty Bowl. Conversely, Louisiana Tech won five games in the Western Athletic Conference and its only claim to fame was taking Hawaii to overtime.
Despite the contrast in success, Dooley said he was trying to keep his team focused
on what's ahead rather than what's behind.
"If you feel too good about last week's win, then you don't prepare to win again the next week," he said. "We're playing a top-five team in scoring offense and scoring defense and if you don't come ready to play they're going to embarrass you. They've done that to a lot of non-conference opponents."
In the win, Bulldog running back Patrick Jackson rushed for 62 yards and a touchdown. He caught another touchdown and kicker Brad Oestriecher scored the rest of the points with an extra point and field goals of 48, 28 and 50 yards. Oestriecher was named WAC special teams player of the week for his effort.
The game was ugly, though, as the teams combined for seven turnovers. Senior quarterback Taylor Bennett — a transfer from Georgia Tech — had a rough outing, completing 14 of 40 passes with an interception.
Dooley said Bennett was a "work in
progress" and admired his whole team for overcoming mistakes and digging out a win.
"We overcame a lot of adversity in the game, there were a lot of opportunities for us to put our head down and fold up but we kept fighting." Dooley said.
The Louisiana Tech defense carried it to the fourth quarter, where Jackson ground out the clock.
Cornerback Steve Howze and safeties Antonio Bryant and Deon Young each made an interception. Young's pick came deep in Louisiana Tech territory and he returned it 42 yards to mid-field. Young also recorded seven tackles and the WAC tabbed him as its defensive player of the week.
Dooley said his defense was impressive, but also tipped his perfectly quaffed hair to the Kansas offense.
"Instead of talking about their strengths,
I think what you notice is there's no weak-
SEE BULLDOGS ON PAGE 4B
Joe Goering/KANSAN
Todd Reeding and the Jayhaws are preparing this week to play Louisiana tech on Saturday. The Bulldogs are fresh off a 2:24 victory over Mississippi State and are attempting to pull off another of a power conference for