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University Daily Kansan SPORTS
Big Eight Preview
Woods Leads Quarter Field
Last year's Big Eight 440 race at Boulder was the greatest in history. This year's quarter here the afternoon of May 19 should be even better.
Consider last year's two-turn battle in the lee of the Colorado Flatirons, Buffalo sophomore Jim Heath edged Missouri veteran Jim Baker by a stride, tying the conference record of .46.5. Oklahoma State's Charles Strong was third in .47.1; Oklahoma's Bob Wilcox fourth in .47.2, and KU's Gordon Davis fifth in .47.4.
HOW CAN A FIELD run tighter or faster than that? One way is to inject Teddy Woods, Colorado's 1960 NCAA champion, who sat out last year because of scholastic griefs. Add the top three returnees from last year and the meet record could take its third battering in the last four years.
Woods must be the most fantastic quartermiler in conference annals. Thick-thighed and barrelchested, this 190-pound halfback is constructed as sturdily as the emblematic bison of his school. He runs with the same bouncing power too. He owns the swiftest quarter in league history, the .45.7 he used to win the Intercollegiate over the 400-meter (eight feet short of 440 yards) route. He ran .46.0 in the Final Olympic trials that year to pick off the fourth place on the U.S. 1600-meter relay team. But he was not used at Rome.
He won a conference double in '60, bagging the Indoor championship in 49.8 and the Outdoor in 47.7. He lost the former crown last winter when he chased Strong to a record-tying .48.6 in Kansas City. This is his last chance to recapture the outdoor title and he likely will be pressed to record time to do so.
TOO, HE MUST accomplish it in the midst of a gruelling test which has him scheduled to anchor the 440 and Mile relay teams
and fire the 220 in addition to running his specialty. Preliminaries in the 34th annual show are scheduled May 18, which means Woods will have run qualifying stints in the 220 and 440, plus the 440 relay before he reaches the quarter final on Saturday.
Since most Big Eight athletes have been busy on the relay circuit through the early season, there have been few good open quarters to date. Heath owns the best at this writing on :46.9 for second behind Wisconsin's Elzie Higgenbottom in the Buffalo-Badger dual. Woods has clocked two :47.0's; Baker :47.5; Strong :48.0.
Under the pressure of trying to close gaps or hold leads in terrific Mile relay flights on the Grand Circuit, respective clockings have been considerably faster, although unofficial. Woods was caught in at 45.7 in anchoring the Buffers to a 3:10.0 victory at Kansas. Strong hit 45.8; Baker at 46.2 in wheeling their teams home behind Abilene Christian at Texas.
IF THAT THREESOME touches off under a blanket in the same race here, comparable times can be expected, and with them, likely a new conference record. Oklahoma State has held the current 3:10.5 mark since 1959.
Wilcox, and Missouri's Greg Pelster, who finished sixth last year, are not expected in the field here, moving up to the 880 instead. This would leave two scoring sports open behind the "Big Four." Fighting for them will be Dale Alexander, Kansas State; Bob Covey, and Bill Stoddart, Kansas; Jack Miller, Oklahoma State; Gil Gebo and Tom Saunders, Nebraska, and Standish Barnes, Iowa State.
Oddly, the three top contenders for the team title, Oklahoma, the defending champion, Nebraska and Kansas, all could come out of this race without a single point.
Records May Fall at Kansas Oklahoma Dual
Every meet record could fall in the seventh annual Kansas-Oklahoma dual outdoor track and field meet here at 3 p.m. Saturday.
Coach Bill Carroll's Oklahoma Sooners, Big Eight conference outdoor champions, will fight hard to fracture Kansas' 12-year-old record of never having lost a dual meet to a Big Eight school. The Crimson and蓝 has won 21 straight conference duals. Their last defeat was to Missouri $77 \frac{1}{2}$ to $53 \frac{1}{2}$ in 1950.
"EVERY BOY ON our squad will have to perform at top ability to stay within reach of them," says Carroll. "Basically, they are a stronger team. But we have the potential to make it close."
Largest crowd of the season is expected. Oklahoma's 86-50 trimming of Oklahoma State last week at Stillwater indicates the Sooners are nearing peak form. Kansas licked Southern Illinois 73-57 at Carbondale Saturday.
Kansas has two regulars listed as doubtful, spinner Larry McCue (hamstring) and two-miler Charles Hayward (mononucleosis symptoms). Ralph Youngworth (hamstring), Sooner spinner, is doubtful. Oklahoma has lost broad-jumper Steve Swafford (heart condition). Big Eight outdoor runner-up last year.
THE MEET SHOULD abound in thrilling duels between individual aces of the two squads. Bill Dotson, Kansas miler, has been clocked in 4:03.7 and Ted Riesinger, Kansas junior from Tulsa, has done 4:07.7. Their race with Paul Ebert, Sooner senior who ran 4:09.2 over a muddy course while winning the open mile recently at the Drake Relays should be close.
Other dues should be just as good. Anthony Watson, Oklahoma's tall Negro dash phenom from Oklahoma City Douglass who ran the 100 in 9.4 and the 220 in 21 flat at Oklahoma State last week, will meet Larry McCue, Kansas senior, if McCue's pulled muscle is ready to go. McCue whizzed through 220 yards with the wind in 20.3 seconds this spring and sped a 46.7 anchoring the Jayhawkers' mile relay home in 3:11.7.
The half mile will bring together four men who have run around 1.50. Kirk Hagan and Tonie Coane of Kansas and Bob Wilcox of Oklahoma if Carroll doesn't first use Wilcox in the 440. Tim Leonard, Dick Neff, Buddy Stewart and Walt Mizell of the Sooners have traveled below 1.54.
University Daily Kansan
714 Vermont UNIVERSITY FORD VI 3-3500
Friday, May 11, 1962
Old Grads Battle Varsity Tomorrow
Kansas's football Alumni, best Old Grad squad since 1954. will test the rebuilt Jayhawker varsity sorely in what are believed to be its two weakest areas, pass offense and pass defense, tomorrow in the 11th post-war climax of spring practice. Kickoff time is 7:30 p.m. at Haskell Stadium.
Wally Strauch, who has accounted for most of the 717 passing yards with which the old timers have bombed the Varsity over the past four years, is not returning. But in his man-under spot will be John Hadl, first two-time football All America in Kansas history. He poses an even more complex defensive problem than did Strauch since he can penetrate the opposition's defense with runs as well as threading the air needle.
ly active professionals (Washington Redskins), but eight men have been signed off last year's Bluebonnet Bowl club for 1962.
With him in the Alumni secondary will be such past aces as Curtis McClinton, Doyle Schick, and Homer Floyd. Schick and Center Fred Hageman will be the Old Grads' on-
Among Haddl's targets will be Charlie Tidwell, five-time national sprint-hurdles champion on KU's two NCAA track and field title squads, who will be playing his first football game since graduating from Independence high school. Tidwell never played college football, but has been signed for a trial by the Minnesota Vikings. Alum Coach Don Fambrough will use him as a split end.
With Hageman and Schick backing a line which contains such mauraids as Stan Kirshman, Elvin Basham, and Jim Mills, the Varsity likely will be forced to throw if it is to move the ball enough to win. Spring camp turned up no passer who can approach matching Hadl's flinging of the past three seasons.
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