8A the university daily kansan
sports
tuesday,november4.2003
Shoot for the stars
Kansan file photo
Despite a knee injury in the off-season, junior guard Keith Langford will start in tonight's game. Langford was third on the team in scoring last season.
Shoulder tears strike athletes
By Bill Cross
sports@kansan.com
Kansan correspondent
Sean Merrion, Overland Park junior, was in the best shape of his life, but it didn't help him avoid disaster. As a varsity swimmer in his junior year of high school he suffered acute soreness in his left shoulder during a freestyle warmup. He sidestroked his way to the side of the pool and eventually went to the hospital. He would never swim competitively again.
The tendons in Merrion's shoulder had been overworked and stretched out, and they were no longer capable of stabilizing his shoulder joint. This condition, shoulder subluxation, recently claimed the season of NBA rookie and former Kansas All-American Nick Collison and is a danger to all young athletes.
Last season, Kansas basketball forward Wayne Simien fought shoulder separation, which is a more severe injury and equally difficult to repair. Despite the wear and tear caused by overhead motion in sports, most cases of subluxation or separation end with a full recovery after surgery.
Separation occurs when the bones in the joint are not touching, while subluxation is essentially a partial separation that results in instability and popping. The injuries are similar, as each results from loose, over-worked tendons
David Pfeuffer, a certified athletic trainer who worked on the Kansas City Chiefs' training camp staff, said separation generally happens only when repetitive motion is followed by one sudden shock to the shoulder. Pfeuffer, a rehab and massage therapist at Neu Physical Therapy, 150 Wakarusa Drive, said people who appear bulky do not always have the strongest shoulder joints.
Simien fought separation last season after jamming his right arm on the rim while leaping for a rebound under the basket. Simien ultimately had season-ending surgery on the shoulder after briefly trying to come back from the injury.
Missouri junior Amy Blair had a similar surgery on her right shoulder after a swimming-related subluxation. In Blair's
case, as in Simien's, the tendons in the shoulder were shortened to stabilize the joint, and a rehab process lasting three to four months followed. Blair, now fully recovered, said she wished she had done more to strengthen the joint before the injury.
Kansas athletic trainer Mark Cairns said strength exercise, or "prehab," is the best way to prevent any damage to the shoulder. Cairns said Kansas athletes who use sudden, violent overhead motion, such as baseball pitchers, quarterbacks and javelin throwers take part in rigorous joint-training exercises. The purpose of the exercises, Cairns said, is to strengthen the muscles around the scapula, or shoulder blade, and the tendons in the rotator cuff, the group of ligaments that joins the arm to the torso. The most severe shoulder injuries include a tear of the rotator cuff.
Merrion made a full recovery without surgery. He said his shoulder was back to full strength after eight months of rehabilitation, and felt stronger today than it did before the surgery.
"I still do the exercises on both shoulders to make sure it never happens again," Merrion said.
Cairns said effective rehabilitation had to include exercises to strengthen the upper back and the shoulder. Cairns explained that the upper back controlled the arms and shoulders, giving the scapulas their common "shoulder blade" name.
"If your hip is snapping and loose, your knees and ankles and the muscles surrounding those joints have to work harder in order for you to walk or run. The scapula is the equivalent foundation of the upper extremity," he said.
DREAM: Nerves are not a factor
Cairns said young people should be careful not to overwork their shoulders if they are experiencing discomfort.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 12A
"The motion that can be generated from our shoulder allows us to perform tasks that would be almost impossible without the freedom of movement we have with our shoulders. We as humans do not want a shoulder that is less mobile than the one we have," Cairns said.
Kansas, where attendance at the All-Stars game had been great in the past, including last year's sell-out game.
— Edited by Andy Marso
Contest participation had been in the mid-20s for the past two years, and most contestants had prior basketball experience.
"A lot are guys that played high school and club basketball, but a few have tried out for KU in the past," Rohde said.
Despite playing in Allen Fieldhouse, and against his school's team, Bueker said he wasn't feeling nervous about the game. Yet.
"I'm excited, definitely. I don't think it'll hit me until I see the crowd or meet the players," Bueker said.
Bueker said he wasn't aware of the contest until he read about it Friday, then decided to try out.
Bueker played basketball in high school, where he made All-State, but never tried walk-on for the Jayhawks because he joined the Sigma Nu fraternity.
Bueker said he even considered skipping the contest because of the cold weather, but eventually changed his mind.
"I felt pretty confident. There were good players, but I felt that I had a good chance to win the competition." Bueker said.
The game will be at 7 p.m. tonight in Allen Fieldhouse.
—Edited by Abby Sidesinger
EASPORTSROSTER
Mike Brownlee 6-2 G West Virginia
Anthony Evans 6-6 F Georgia
Lucas Johnson 6-8 F Illinois
Cory Largent 6-5 G Western Carolina
Randy Livingston 6-2 G LSU
Alvin Mogley 6-8 F Virginia Commonwealth
Robert O'Kelly 6-3 G Wake Forest
Michael Stewart 6-8 C Bradley
Jose Winston 6-0 G Colorado and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Syracuse freshmen debut tonight; Frosh Four have instant chemistry
By Adam Kilgore
The Daily Orange via U-Wire
The University of Syracuse
SYRACUSE, N.Y. - Standing courtside minutes before an NBA exhibition game, Terrence Roberts soaked in the new epicenter of his basketball universe. He stared at the 20,315 fans packing the Carrier Dome. He watched the Denver Nuggets and Detroit Pistons glide across Jim Boeheim Court.
Then, he gazed up at the Dome's video board and realized something wasn't quite right. Those 20,000 sets of eyes weren't on him.
For Roberts and two other members of the Syracuse basketball team's freshman class, the wait is almost over, Roberts, Demetris Nichols and Darryl Watkins will make their Syracuse debuts in an exhibition against Nike Elite on tonight at 7 p.m.
Louie McCroskey, the fourth member of the Orangemen's recruiting class, hasn't been
"Damn," Roberts said. "I can't wait until all these people are watching my face up there."
"We've been waiting to play in college for so long," Nichols said. "I mean, since we were really little this is what we've been dreaming about. We've just been waiting for the first taste."
Chances are, Nichols never fantasized about facing a roster of college basketball retreads, which is what Nike Elite offers. Still, getting their first action in the Dome in front of thousands is invaluable for SU's close-knit freshmen.
practicing with the team due to an academic issue.
Last year, Carmelo Anthony — then a curiosity rather than a paragon — springboarded his historic season by scoring 37 points against Nike Elite in his first performance in a Syracuse jersey.
"I think that all of us freshmen are game-ready," Roberts said. "We're all ready to play and eager to play. This is a real special group, man."
Roberts, always cocksure, feels this year's group could repeat Anthony's success.
Indeed, all four recruits including McCroskey, are ranked among the nation's top 50 freshmen. Several recruiting
Since arriving on the Hill, Syracuse's Frosh Four have done little to dispel their lofty rating. Watkins, a 6-foot-11 center and deft low-pass passer, has shown a soft touch from 15 feet. Roberts, playing with a bandaged left hand, punctuates dunks off of teammates' misses with a savage scream. Nichols routinely stays after practice with junior Hakim Warrick to shoot hundreds of jumpers.
Better yet for Syracuse, the four became inseparable the minute they met. Early in the school year, the four dominated pick-up courts at Flanagan Gymnasium together.
"We all believe in each other," Roberts said. "We're all there for each other. We're like brothers. We're like family."
While Roberts and company could be as talented as last year's group, there's one major difference. Anthony, along with Gerry McNamara, had been guaranteed spots in the starting five as freshmen by head coach Jim Boeheim. This season's class needs to
Even with the loss of Anthony and the graduated Kueth Duany, Syracuse is still the defending national champion. No matter how talented their freshmen are, the Orangemen's lineup will be tough to crack.
Said Boeheim, "Last year, Carmelo had an open spot. Gerry had an open spot. These guys don't have that. They're going to have to play their way in there. That's one thing that's going to be interesting to watch."
On Syracuse's first day of practice, Boheheim refrained from predicting how his first-year group would blend in to the Orangemen's rotation.
"We have some very good freshmen that we think can contribute," Boeheim said. "I really have no idea right now, because I haven't seen how they practice. In a couple weeks, I'll have a better idea of how they fit in."
After two weeks of practice, Boeheim was asked again how his freshmen were fitting in.
His response: "We'll find you out Tuesday."
kansan.com
gurus ranked SU's recruiting class in the top 10.
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