Inside Sports
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Sports
Monday
October 5, 1998
Section:
B
Page 1
The Kansas volleyball team lost Friday to Nebraska and Saturday to Colorado. Both conference rivals are nationally ranked.
SEE PAGE 3B
Kansas Soccer
The rain washed out a soccer game scheduled for Sunday, but the team did play Friday.
SEE PAGE 3B
Pro Baseball
The San Diego Padres are in, the Houston Astros are out. The second round of the playoffs is now set.
SEE PAGE 5B
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Texas A&M disarms Jayhawks
Kansas' defeat Saturday confirms frustrating season
By Jodi M. Smith
Kansan sportswriter
Texas A&M inside linebacker Dat Nguyen tries to run back an interception past Kansas quarterback Zac Wegner. Nguyen, who is a Butuk and Lombardi award candidate, intercepted the Wegner pass on the Hawks' first play from scrimmage. Photo by Dan Elavsky/KANSAN
It's becoming the season of "almosts" and "should'vebeens" for the Kansas Jayhawks.
When they played Oklahoma State, they should've won. When they traveled to Missouri, they should've won. And Saturday, when the Texas A&M Aggies traveled to Memorial Stadium, Kansas almost won.
In a hard-fought battle, the Aggies finished off the Jayhawks with a late fourth-quarter drive to win the game 24-21.
"We're really disappointed," freshman Harrison Hill said. "We could've beat that team. They're a top-25 team in the nation, and we could've beat them. We were right with them, and we were ahead with a couple of minutes to go in the fourth quarter. We're extremely disappointed knowing we let that one get by us."
Texas A&M finished the job when Kansas couldn't—the story of the Jayhawks' season these days.
This loss makes the Jayhawks 2-3 overall and 0-3 in the conference.
it was an ugly win, but it was a win, and that is the bottom line," A&M strong safety Rich Coady said. "We are fortunate everyone played well at the end."
"We're the only team in the league that's 0-3, but we've been either tied or ahead during the fourth quarter in all three of the Big 12 games," coach Terry Allen said.
The Hawks were never tied with the Aggies, but they did take the lead 21-17 at the 8:54 mark of the fourth quarter, a feat few probably thought possible after watching Kansas struggle through the first half.
On the first play of the game, quarterback Zac Wener's pass was intercepted by A&M Linebacker Dat Nguyen, who returned it 18 yards. Two plays later, the Aggies had their first touchdown of the game, and not even a minute had elapsed.
Their second touchdown came later in the first quarter on a two-yard rush from
running back Dante Hall, but that's when the Kansas defense kicked it in.
Kansas held the Aggies at 14 until the 5:38 mark of the third quarter, meanwhile scoring their first touchdown on a 58-yard pass from Wegner to receiver Termaine Fulton.
"We thought we did a good job defensively in the first half to hold Texas A&M to just a 14-7 lead," Allen said. A defensive stand on the Hawks one-yard line forced the Aggies to kick a 21-yard field goal for a 17-7 lead in the third quarter.
After that, it was all about the Jayhawk offense.
With 25 seconds left in the third quarter, Wegner connected with freshman Byron Gasaway for a nine-yard touchdown after driving 87 yards downfield.
A mere four minutes later, after driving 83 yards, sophomore David Winbush plunged two yards to pick up the Jayhawk third touchdown of the game and put Kansas in the lead, 21-17.
"That was probably our best drive of the year," Hill said. "They have a good defense, and we drove all the way down the field and made plays on them."
The defense folded, though,
as the Aggies rallied, traveled
75 yards, and took the lead
for good, 24-21 with 3:24
remaining in the game.
And, as had become the norm for the Jayhawks, it just wasn't meant to be.
"This was really frustrating," linebacker Pat Brown said. "We did not handle our responsibilities on defense. Everybody played their hearts out, but we did not get it done."
Two crucial mistakes, Wegner's early interception and a punt muffed by freshman Henri Childs after the ball hit his helmet, led to a combined 10 points for the Aggies.
But it's not something the team plans to dwell on going into the heart of the Big 12 race in the next few weeks, starting with Baylor this weekend.
"We've just got to keep our heads up and keep working and get some wins," Hill said.
Aggies slip past 'Hawks
By Brandon Krisztal
Kansan Sportswriter
Close but no cigar.
That rhetoric is becoming all too familiar when discussing the Kansas football team. Saturday's 24-21 loss to Texas A&M was the Jayhawks third conference game in which they had a chance to win, but came up short late in the game. Texas A&M coach R.C. Slocum knows that his team was lucky. It made enough mistakes and gave the Jayhawks plenty of opportunities to hand the Aggies their first loss in more than a month.
"I give a lot of credit to Coach
Allen, I think they've done a great job with their team." Slocum said. "I told him before the game I could see their team improving from week to week. I told him before the game that I thought they could very easily be 4-0. I'd say after playing this game they could very easily be 5-0."
"If you look at the games, they played Oklahoma State very competitive, in the second half they were still in there tight," he said. "They played Missouri the same way, and actually they were ahead
Slocum mentioned the Jayhawks' back-to-back losses to Oklahoma State and Missouri.
of us in the fourth quarter. You could easily say that with just a little bit they could be a 5-0 team."
The Kansas defense kept Aggies' quarterback Randy McCown in check. McCown, who replaced starter Brandon Stewart, completed 8 of 19 passes for just 89 yards. Going into the fourth quarter McCown complete 5-of-13 passes, but on the Aggies' game-winning drive he completed a 17-yard pass and a 9-yard pass for a first down and ran for a pair of first downs.
McCown admitted that he was
See TEXAS A&M on page 3B
Military-style Aggie band scares one Jayhawk
Commentary
Editors note: Gerry Doyle, Kansan managing editor, is a member of the Kansas band. His comments on the Texas A&M band follow.
Take the band, for instance. The KU Marching Jayhawks wear elaborate red-and-blue uniforms, huge hats and ugly, white shoes. We can hum our part to any of the KU fight songs. During football games, we perform cheers that, strangely, no one else in the whole stadium knows.
Sometimes, being in a special group can be seen as some kind of a cult.
But any perception of a Marching Jayhawks-Branch Davidians parallel was stomped out Saturday under the boot-clad heels of 300 or soMarching Aggies.
either. Military marches are a staple of bands everywhere.
The fact that they all wore military uniforms wasn't that big of a deal. After all, Texas A&M was a military academy until 1972. It wasn't the music they played.
of those people kinda scared me.
All the members of the Aggie marching band had military-style buzz cuts. Our band director told us that they all live in special residence balls too.
And judging by their marching performance, they must practice at least 150 hours each week.
What really got my attention, at least at first, were the haircuts.
First, were the ha Yep. haircuts.
Gerry Doyle
everything but form curved lines.
I mean, wow. They marched through one another, around one another, over one another, squatted, ran and generally did
And they did it all without hurting anyone. I'm amazed at this. If you took a random sample of a university's population, gave them hard — and expensive — metal instruments and said, "walk fast directly at one another and then change direction at the last second," there would be massive bloodshed.
"Wow. They really blew you guys away.
Well, sure. Whatever. The show they marched at halftime is the only one they perform.
Some people said to me after the game,
"Wow. They really blew you guys away."
They actually never form any curved lines. Ever.
Their music, being composed entirely of marches, is easy to march to. And if they practice as much as they say they do, they darn well better be precise.
them, thus weeding out the less-fit from the band population.
But to me, it doesn't look fun. Part of doing anything is enjoying yourself, and taking band that seriously doesn't seem like it would lend itself to a carefree college life. Even during the game, they seemed less concerned with enjoying a great football game than with being, well, the band.
Besides, anyone who makes a mistake is run over and killed by the person next to
So Saturday was quite an experience. I got to see our football team let another Big 12 victory slip through its fingers. I got to enjoy some cool game-day weather for a change. I got to see my parents. And I was exposed to the Texas A&M band.
Yeah, they're good.
But my blue-and-red clad cult was having more fun.
Doyle is a Kansas City, Mo. senior in journalism and philosophy.
Near misses inspire faith in KU football among'Hawks
I want to believe.
Saturday the football team was oh-so close again.
The Jayhawks could be 3-0 in the Big 12 Conference,5-0 overall.
But I want to believe that we can be a football school, that the Jayhawks can be as fun to watch and as successful on the football field in Memorial Stadium as they are on James Naismith Court in Allen Field House.
Instead, Texas A&M was just another "could've been."
Three times this season, Kansas has taken the field against conference opponents, and three times the team has lost.
Saturday was another shot at a big win that ended up three tantalizing points out of reach.
The Jayhawks played exciting football against the No. 18 Aggies. They made big plays, had defensive stands and, most importantly, gave themselves a chance to win.
Matt Friedrichs
At the beginning of the season, Terry Allen encouraged fans to have realistic expectations. Look to the future we have with our promising young talent, he said.
Zac Wegner didn't look like a timid quarterback trying to survive. On a surprising third-down run in the fourth quarter, he made a first down and didn't go out of bounds, fighting for more yards.
Time and again. Wegner stepped up in the pocket to avoid the rush, and he even scrambled for vardage more than once.
But Saturday, that talent looked almost veteran against Texas A&M, which has a long-standing football tradition in a state known for its voracious devotion to the sport.
Sure, the team made mistakes. An early Dat Nguyen interception and a misce by the punt-return team gave A&M 10 points.
But as I walked through the parking lot and reflected on the game Saturday afternoon, I thought about the positive aspects of the 2-3 Javahawk season.
People are tailgating in the parking lot with KU flags on poles and grills smoking away.
rents on the Hill are filled with student athletes and alumni before games.
Unfortunately, the team is still a big win away from the excitement and confidence the Kansas football program needs.
The win in Birmingham Sept. 26 snapped a road losing streak, but the Jayhawks now need a breakthrough win against an upper-tier Big 12 opponent.
upper left
Not counting Baylor and Iowa State
(teams needing big wins like us), and Nebraska (they don't lose at home), we have games against Colorado on Oct. 24 and K-State on Oct. 31.
There are even people in the stadium. Only a few years ago, the Athletics Department practically had to beg people to wear red or blue to the games.
Everyone wants to believe in these Jay-hawks.
In spite of a long Aggie drive for the winning touchdown, the crowd thought the Jayhawks could pull out a miracle finish.
I know the game against K-State would be a long shot . . . but what better way to ruin their national title hopes than to beat them in Lawrence.
What the heck. The Kansas team has played scrappy football and stayed in games with teams it wasn't supposed to beat.
This season the Jayhawks will benefit from a punt block, an interception or a fumble.
I believe we will beat the Buffaloes or the Wildcats.
Come to the stadium for those games and show that you believe in the Jayhawks.
Friedrichs is a Bremen graduate student in journalism
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