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sports
KANSAN.COM/SPORTS | THURSDAY, DEC. 1, 2016
KU volleyball expectations high as tournament begins
► JORDAN WOLF
@JordanWolfKU
ast season, the Kansas volleyball team ran the postseason tables and competed in the first Final Four in program history. Just under one year later, the team has its eyes set on another deep run, this time with higher expectations.
title. The Bulldogs finished the season with a 21-13 record, winning nine of its final 12 matches.
The Jayhawks enter the tournament this year as the No. 5 overall seed. After a season spent consistently at the top of the national
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The biggest threat for the Jayhawks comes from the Samford attack. Senior outside hitter Erin Bognar finished the season 10th in the nation with 542 total kills, and 17th with 4.48 kills per set. Containing her will be pivotal for Bechard's team, as he acknowledged her prominent presence.
DAY IN THE LIFE
"She's a dynamic kid with a dynamic arm, and
- kansan.com
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DREW FENNELLY Meet the man behind the famous LPD Twitter account
Kaila Trollope/KANSAN
By Lara Korte
@lara_korte
REMINDER- We realize politics can make emotions run high, but being mad at a presidential candidate in a debate is NOT a reason to call 911."
On the evening of March 26, Drew Fennelly, like thousands of others in Lawrence, had his eyes on his phone.
Villanova had just brutally kicked the Jayhawks out of the Elite Eight, and Fennelly wanted to take to social media to say something.
@LawrenceKS_PD
He had a tweet written out, Fennelly said, when he paused.
"I stared at it for a couple minutes before I sent it out, because I was like, 'Am I going to get in trouble for putting this out?'," he said. "Then I thought 'Ah forget it. Send.' And I sent it, and it immediately took off."
Officer Fennelly said the first one to go viral was his tweet about the Elite Eight loss.
Fennelly isn't just your average tweeter. In fact, he's the voice behind @LawrenceKS_PD, the Lawrence Police Department's Twitter account, which has gained huge popularity in the past few months for its witty - sometimes snarky - posts.
"Sorry, we can't investigate Villanova ripping your heart out of your chest," it read. "The crime occurred outside our jurisdiction. #RCJH."
The tweet currently
has over 2,200 retweets.
"It's kind of surreal, because you never know when a tweet is going to go viral," Fennelly said. "So it's happened, gosh, three or four times, and each time it's been one that I didn't really expect to do that."
Fennelly said, at the
It wasn't long before he got the idea to start
The account's most popular tweet, at 30,000 retweets, is from the last presidential debate.
"REMINDER - We realize politics can make emotions run high, but being mad at a presidential candidate in a debate is NOT a reason to call 911," the tweet read.
The tweet was so popular that it was featured on Jimmy Kimmel and BuzzFeed.
"I thought it was a need that the department had. I think, like any police agency, we were kind of looking for ways to reach out and better engage with our community, and I thought that Twitter would be a good way to do that." Fennelly said.
an LPD Ttwitter account, Fennelly said.
time, he didn't think the tweet was that funny.
"I hadn't tweeted anything. I knew the debate was that night, and I was like, 'How can I connect the debate to the police department,' and that's what I came up with," he said.
Fennelly, a native of the southwest suburbs of Chicago, wasn't always the man behind the screen. After attending the University for a few years, he joined the Lawrence Police Department (LPD) in 2009 as a patrol officer. In April 2014, he was assigned to the neighborhood resource office, which is now public affairs.
"He is so good at it, and he has so many ideas," Rhoads said. "And he is a very big reason why our social media — Facebook and Twitter — has done so well."
Sgt. Amy Rhoads, the police department's public information officer, said she attributes the social media success largely to Fennelly.
While a simple tweet might not seem like
much, Rhoads said it's part of a larger effort to improve the relationship between the Lawrence community and law enforcement.
"One of the things that we talked about when we came in with neighborhood resource officers is how can we make a better impact between the department and the community and provide a better insight," Rhoads said. "So we really thought that using our social media accounts would be a really good way of being a part of that conversation in the Lawrence community."
One way the department hopes to do this is through what's been dubbed the #LPDTweetAlong.
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During tweet-alongs, Officer Fennelly spends a weekend evening riding in a patrol car and live-tweeting the events of the night.
Followers get a glimpse inside the police work that officers do every week — the good, the bad and the very strange.
"Two units across town are en route to find out why a man is walking around outside ... naked. That doesn't count as a costume sir," read a tweet from an Oct. 29 tweet-along.
"I have a lot of fun with it," Fennelly said. "And it's a different view that's maybe more similar to what the police officer gets than what the public gets."
from deep last season Vick was off to a cold start. Hitting only 24 percent of his threes coming into the game, the Memphis native quickly returned to last year's form.
In his second consecutive start of the season, Vick followed up his 3-of-4 three point night with an even more impressive 4-of-4 from three and 9-for-9 from the field.
"He's not always going to shoot like that," Self said about Vick.
However, Self did say Vick is "going to end up being our best defender, he's really improved a ton."
Mykhaliuk, another sharpshooter who's turned his season around after start-
top that.
Midway through the second half, Kansas was shooting just over 70 percent until a few missed threes dropped the Jayhawks to their eventual total of 54 percent.
Despite the hot shooting, Self wasn't convinced this was a cure for other issues the Jayhawks had had.
What makes the performance against the 49ers even more impressive is that it was mostly without help from the usual suspects, guards Frank Mason III and Devonte' Graham. The two shot 3-of-7, but were overshadowed by the play of Vick and Mykhailiuk.
"You're not going to win relying on three point shots all the time," Self said.
As for Vick's perfect shooting night, that wasn't something Long Beach State coach Dan Monson necessarily expected.
Monson also mentioned that film on Kansas showed that Vick's aggressiveness on the offensive boards is what they focused on, but his multidimensional skill set was the problem.
DASSET, Graham S.
"He's not one that we were focused on," Monson said about Vick. "He just opened the game up with his shooting."
With all the recognition the duo of Mason and Graham have, Tuesday night was a reminder that Vick and Mykhailiuk are waiting in the wings for their time to shine.
Coach Ray Bechard received the Coach of the Year award after leading the Jayhawks to their first ever Big 12 Championship. This is his second consecutive time winning the award, and the fourth in his career.
Junior outside hitter Kelsie Payne was named Player of the Year. She ranked third in the Big 12 during conference play with 4.07 kills per set, and sixth with a .320 hitting percentage.
ware Monday afternoon, as several Jayhawks found themselves recipients of All-Big 12 honors.
Junior setter Ainise Havili was named the Setter of the Year for the second consecutive season. She is the first player to receive multiple titles since the inception of the honors in 2012. She ranked fifth in the conference with 10.70 assists per set.
this season marks the first time a Jayhawk has ever won either the Player of the Year or the Libero of the Year award in Big 12 history.
Senior libero Cassie Wait is the Libero of the
Kansas will start its postseason play Thursday as it hosts Samford in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. First serve is scheduled for 6:30 p.m.
Payne, Wait and Havili, all unanimous selections, are joined by junior outside hitter Madison Rigdon on the All-Big 12 First Team. Senior middle blocker Tayler Soucie,
hitter Jada Burse was named to the All-Freshman Team. While not ranking in the top 10 of any major statistical category, Burse's role has grown in recent weeks after she began the season as a reserve.
- Edited by Cody Schmitz
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