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8C THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
SPORTS
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2004
One of Yankees' big investments pays off in October
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK - The New York Yankees waited all season for that huge hit from Alex Rodriguez.
Boy, did he deliver just in time.
Rodriguez hit a tying double in the 12th inning, then Derek Jeter dashed home on Hidekid Matsui's sacrifice fly and the Yankees bailed out Mariano Rivera with another improbable postseason comeback, beating Minnesota 7-6 last night to even their series at a game aniece.
The Yankees responded with a championship-caliber rally after falling behind in the 12th on Torii Hunter's home run.
Corey Koskie keyed an eighth-inning rally with a tying double against Rivera, who blew a save in the postseason for only the third time in 33 chances.
Game 3 in the best-of-five AL series will be Friday night at the Metrodome, with Kevin Brown starting for the Yankees against Carlos Silva.
Jeter, Rodriguez and Gary
Sheffield homered earlier in this game, and it went to extra innings tied at 5. It stayed that way until Hunter connected on the 49th pitch from reliever Tanyon Sturtze, who had worked 2 2-3 hitless innings to that point.
But Joe Nathan was running out of gas, too. The Twins closer had made 43 straight appearances without going more than one inning, but manager Ron Gardenhire sent him out for a season-high third inning in hopes of finishing it.
After a strike, Nathan walked Miguel Cairo and Jeter on eight straight pitches with one out in the 12th, bringing up Rodriguez, who struggled in clutch situations for most of his first season with the Yankees.
He's changing all that in October. A-Rod hit a groundrule double to left-center on Nathan's 49th pitch, tying the score at 6 with his fourth hit of the game. It gave him three RBIs in the game, and made him 6-for-10 in the series.
Shefield was intentionally
walked before J.C. Romero replaced Nathan.
With the outfield drawn-in, Matsui hit a liner directly at right fielder Jacque Jones that appeared to be too shallow to score letter from third.
But Jeter took off for the plate, and Jones' throw didn't have much on it. First baseman Matthew LeCroy, who entered as a pinch-hitter in the 10th, relayed the ball to the plate, but Jeter slid in safely.
Paul Quantrill got one out in the 12th for the win, retiring rookie Jason Kubel with two on.
Jeter led off with a long ball, and Sheffield and Rodriguez hit their first postseason homers in pinstripes to help the Yankees build a 5-3 lead after seven innings.
With two All-Stars in Tom Gordon and Rivera at the back of the bullpen, that was supposed to be the Yankees' foolproof formula for playoff success. But they couldn't put this one away.
The Twins tied it at 5 in the eighth, rallying against Gordon
and Rivera. Jones reached on a wild pitch after striking out, and Hunter singled.
That was as long as manager Joe Torre could wait to go to Rivera, who had been 12-for-12 in postseason save chances at Yankee Stadium. But he gave up a bloop RBI single to Justin Morneau, cutting it to 5-4 and leaving runners at the corners.
Koskie then came through with an outstanding at-bat, fighting his way back from an 0-2 count. Choking way up on the handle just like Diamondbacks slugger Luis Gonzalez did against Rivera in Game 7 of the 2001 World Series, Koskie sliced a 3-2 pitch into the left-field corner for a double, tying the score at 5.
Koskie's ball bounced into the stands, perhaps costing the Twins the go-ahead run. Pinchrunner Luis Rivas was running on the pitch.
Rivera recovered to strike out Kubel and retire Cristian Guzman on a comebacker, stranding the potential go-ahead run at third.
One night after getting shut out by Johan Santana and two relievers, the Yankees hit three homers off Brad Radke — one each from the top three batters in the lineup.
Rodriguez added an RBI single in the seventh to make it 5-3, snapping New York's 0-for-19 postseason skid with runners in scoring position since Jeter's seventh-inning RBI single in Game 5 of the 2003 World Series.
Jon Lieber pitched 6 2-3 solid innings in his first career post-season start. He left with a 4-3 lead and jogged off the mound to a standing ovation.
After Morneau's two-out RBI double in the first, Jeter hit Radke's third pitch into the empty black section beyond the center-field fence for his 14th career postseason home run.
That ended another punchless string for the Yankees — they had been shut out in consecutive postseason games for the first time in franchise history, dating to Josh Beckett's gem in Game 6 of the 2003 World Series for Florida.
Jeter popped out of the dugout for a curtain call, but the feisty Twins went right back ahead.
Koski drew a rare walk from Lieber leading off the second and scored on Michael Cuddyer's single. Henry Blanco poked a shallow sacrifice fly down the right-field line, making it 3-1.
Rodriguez singled in the third before Sheffield's fifth career postseason homer, bringing chants of "M-V-PI. M-V-PI!" from the sellout crowd of 56,354.
Rodriguez connected in the fifth, giving the Yankees a 4-3 lead.
Lieber walked only 18 batters in 27 starts this season. He and Radke ranked 1-2 in the AL in walks per nine innings.
The first five innings took only 1 hour. 14 minutes.
Jeter became the third player to homer into the center-field black at Yankee Stadium in the postseason, joining Reggie Jackson in the 1977 World Series and Seattle's Jay Buhner in the 2001 ALCS.
LOSSES: Brother's death, mother's cancer puts life in perspective
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1C
A: I just never started and I figure if I don't start I won't get addicted. You know, I figured I won't miss what I don't know. I've never drank alcohol. I've never drank alcohol.
Q: Would you ever be in the Women of KU Calendar?
A: No. Well, I don't know, it depends. I wouldn't say no. I don't know. Maybe, maybe I would if there were more athletes. If there were other athletes, I'd do it then.
Q: How different is Lawrence from Sacramento?
A: For me it's not much different because I don't really do anything, but it's much smaller. Sometimes it gets a little boring, but not much other than that.
Q: Which place would you rather
live after college?
A: Sacramento, just because it doesn't snow.
Q: Have there been any major obstacles in your life?
A: Yeah, well, my mother had cancer when I was in 10th grade and my brother died when I was in 11th grade — he got shot. Those were probably the toughest things in my life.
Q: Do those events in your life motivate you to do better in track or focus more on school?
A: Before those things happened I was pretty much the same. The only thing different was that it made me think 'wow, you can lose somebody' — stuff like that.
Q: So how important is family to you?
A: It's really important because my family is really
close, and that's basically all you have in the end, you know.
Q: Are you going to vote in the upcoming election?
A: Yea, I registered today. I'm going to vote back home, so I's registered in Sacramento. I'm going to vote for Kerry. I don't know why.
Q: What do you think of Bush?
A. I don't know. I'm kind of scared of him because of all the war stuff, so I figure I'd rather vote for Kerry and hopefully the world will get better.
Q: What do you think about the war in Iraq?
At *Like* I said, it's just kind of scary. I'm not going to say it's useless. I just think it's sad because all those people die and I'm not really for sure why. They say weapons of mass destruction and they don't seem to have
those, and all kind of junk like that.
Q: Besides track, what accomplishment are you most proud of?
A: I guess being almost done with college and actually going to college, which track helped me come here.
Q: Are you superstitious about running?
A: I’m not superstitious, but there are some things you can’t do, or you have to do. Like before I run I have to straighten my hair. I don’t know why.
Q: Do guys ever challenge you to races?
A: Yeah, I race with the guys on the team all the time. They beat me usually, but I win every once in a while.
Kucera is a Omaha, Neb., senior in journalism.
Brooklyn Hann is a senior triple jumper from Sacramento, Calif. After graduation, she hopes to continue her studies in physical therapy.
John Tran/KANSAN
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