THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN SPORTS
TRACK AND FIELD | 6A
Jayhawks raise the bar at track meets
TUESDAY, MAY 3, 2011
At four different track meets over the weekend, the Kansas track and field team won 11 events. Jayhawks set personal best records, broke school records and even set a state record.
WWW.KANSAN.COM
STANDOUT SENIOR SCHOLARS
Tyrel Reed, left, a member of the men's basketball team, and Karina Garlington, right, a member of the volleyball team, accept their Robert Frederick Senior Scholar Athletes of the Year awards at the 2011 Jayhawk Senior & Scholar Athlete Banquet last night. Families, friends, and athletes gathered in Allen Fieldhouse to celebrate the dedication and commitment that senior student athletes have made during their time at the University.
Howard Ting/KANSAN
Reed and Garlington honored at banquet
The two seniors leave a legacy as "models for excellence"
BY MAX ROTHMAN
mrothman@kansan.com
As seniors, the two were honored as Robert Frederick Senior Scholar Athletes of the Year at Monday night's Jayhawk Senior and Scholar Athlete Banquet at Allen Fieldhouse.
As freshmen, Tyrel Reed and Karina Garlington met during their sociology class in the fall of 2007.
After Dr. Bernie Kish, director of facilities for the School of Education, announced Garlington's name for the award, she opened her eyes widely and covered her mouth with her hand. The bitter with
1,309 career kills — the second most in Kansas volleyball history was completely shocked.
"That's the biggest honor that a student athlete at KU could have received." Garlington said.
Reed, who wore a pinstriped suit that Cole Aldrich picked out, said that the event was a great way to culminate his four years at the University.
"I don't know how deserving I am," he said. "I think I'm just a
normal kid."
He said that receiving the award at the fieldhouse and sharing the stage with Garlington made the
night that much more special.
"It's a really big university, so you don't get to know everybody," Reed said. "But I definitely know it."
successes on the court.
"I don't know how deserving I am. I think I'm just a normal kid."
PAGE 8A
"A lot of people just think of us as KU basketball players," he said. "We have to go to school."
TYREL REED Senior, men's basketball
Karina over the years. Shes a great person and a great athlete."
We have to do the things that every student athlete does. We're just normal people."
Reed also said that he enjoyed recognition for more than his
The field-house's hardwood was layered with blue carpet and 98 tables, as stu
dent athletes, university faculty, family and friends gathered to celebrate the athletic and academic achievements of the seniors.
Speeches were made, scholarships were awarded, tutors were applauded and honor-roll students were acknowledged.
"To have the culminating event of the year on this hallowed ground leaves you without words," Athletics Director Sheahon Zenger said of the fieldhouse.
Zenger said that Reed and Garlington were leaving the University as models for excellence.
"They exemplify what we try to recruit, teach and send out there," he said.
Edited by Sean Tokarz
BASEBALL
Jayhawks look to pitchers to pick up their game
BY MIKE VERNON
mvernon@kansan.com
Sophomore pitcher Thomas Taylor hurls the ball to home in the first innings last Thursday. The Jayhawks hope to improve their pitching in tonight's matchup with Wichita State.
The jayhawks' season tells a different story now from the one it told seven games ago. Kansas was 19-18 overall, 9-8 in conference play, and appeared to be ready for its matchup with the Big 12 leader, Texas.
The layhawks are now 20-24 overall. 9-12 in the Big 12 conference and have lost four games in a row after losing two of three against the Longhorns.
The pitching staff for Kansas must recover today and tomorrow against Wichita State, after being hit hard in the last two series.
In their last seven games, the Jayhawks have given up 45 runs, an average of 6.4 runs per game. In the three games against Texas, the starting pitchers gave up 13 of the Longhorns' 20 runs. Over the next four games though, the starting pitchers recovered and only took a minor hit to their impressive 3.82 ERA.
out of the bullpen earlier this season.
Mike Gunnoe/KANSAN FILE PHOTO
Duncan allowed two runs late in the Jayhawks' 5-3 loss to Creighton last Tuesday. Then on Friday, Duncan gave up a 10th-inning run, allowing Texas Tech to come away with the victory. On Sunday, Duncan gave up two seventh-inning runs in Kansas' 8-7 loss to the Red Raiders.
"I think Frank and I, and a couple of other freshman are just getting worn out," said freshman pitcher Alex Cox, who will start tonight's game."It's just from not being used to playing as many games."
The last four games though, have a different culprit for the pitching woes. The Kansas relievers have given up 14 of 25 total runs. Freshman reliever Frank Duncan has struggled lately, after being one of Kansas' top pitchers
Cox will start for the Jayhawks against the 28-19 Wichita State Shockers tonight at 6 p.m. For the Jayhawks to put a stop to their recent skid, they will have to start with pitching.
Thomas Taylor gets his turn at the mound tomorrow at 6:30 p.m. in Wichita in the second game of the series. Taylor will bring a 4-3 record and an ERA of 3.58 into Wednesday's game.
"We have to attack and throw as many first strike pitches as possible," Cox said. "If we do that, we can be successful no matter who we play."
Wichita State's lineup could cause problems for Taylor and Cox. The Shockers are hitting
.289 as a team coming into this week's action. Junior infielder Chris O'Brien leads the Shockers with a batting average of .404 and seven home runs — Kansas has only one batter hitting above .300.
Senior outfielder Casey Lyle is the lone batter bringing with
an average above .300. Lytle is .26 points above the next highest Kansas batter, junior first baseman Zac Elgite.
With their lineup being inconsistent at the plate all season, the pitching got the Jayhawks through the first half of their season. To get back on track,
the pitchers must return to their early season form.
"You have to walk out the next day and flush what happened the day before," coach Ritch Price said.
Edited by Tali David
4
COMMENTARY
President favors sports and national security
BY TIM DWYER
tdwyer@kansan.com
On March 15, President Barack Obama met in his office — you know, the round one, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington D.C. — with ESPN college basketball analyst Andy Katz. They spent the morning shooting the breeze and filling out a March Madness bracket, a huge poster with the presidential seal certifying that yes, indeed, the man presiding over one of the most tumultuous periods in American history spent some time talking hoops, and that this bracket was the result.
Sort of predictably, and entirely ridiculously, critics of the president jumped on the man for wasting time while the world was in chaos. There is a crippling national deficit, and there are wars in distant lands to tend to. Mr. President. You have no time to talk hoops, according to these people.
Republican National Committee spokeswoman Kristen Kukowski said in a statement that Obama was more concerned with his bracket than "monitoring the crisis in the Middle East," as if he would have been able to end the war by watching Al-Jazeera instead of writing Kansas six times.
On March 14, the day before he sat down with Katz to talk hoops, he sat down with his closest advisers. He was, reportedly, briefed on a potential hiding spot for September 11 mastermind Osama bin Laden. It was the first of the series of discussions that would ultimately lead to bin Laden's death. What was said in that room would be discussed five more times before Sunday, May 1, but always behind closed doors, with the same ears listening.
As it turns out, the president managed to find some time to actually $ y $ be the president that week, funny enough. Somehow, spending 10 minutes filling out a bracket didn't kill his schedule for the entire week.
On Friday, April 29, Obama gave the order.
This Sunday, as a product of those closed-door talks between Obama and his advisers, Navy SEAL Team Six — which one television pundit called "the most dangerous people on the face of the earth" — infiltrated a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, engaged in a firefight, and took down the deadliest terrorist of the 21st century. Because the president and his advisers had so carefully planned the infiltration of bin Laden's compound, and because of the exquisite precision of the SEALs, the entire operation took 40 minutes.
It was the finest moment in American military history since the end of World War II. It may have been better, because it didn't take two atomic bombs. It took a well-placed bullet from the rifle of a Navy SEAL. No Americans were killed.
No Americans were killed, and Osama bin Laden was, and the president managed to fill out a March Madness bracket.
What a wonderful country this is.
Edited by Marla Daniels