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SPORTS IVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 1, 1995
Beware,for memories fill the Phog
SECTION B
Allen Field House is 40 years old today. On this day in 1955, Kansas played Kansas State in front of a capacity crowd for the first-ever game in the arena. For four decades, people have entered that structure strictly to watch sporting events. Students have shown their appreciation for teams and their pride for
tion for teams and their pride for
Kansas University — not just for men's basketball, but for all sports that have at one time or another competed inside Phog Allen's dream.
SPORTS
EDITOR
You name it and that sport has practiced or played in the building, Basketball, track, volleyball and cross country are the
SOFTBALL PROFILES
regulars. Even the softball team got in a practice this season after Anschutz Pavilion lost its power.
Places like these give that feeling of wonder even when the crowd is gone. A haze of eeriness hovers above the court and seats even when it is empty and the lights are off.
The structure is a reminder of all that is right with this campus and college sports in general. The shiver a fan gets walking through the entry for the first time is matched by few facilities around the nation.
Memories bounce off the walls and surround the inside — the new hardwood floor, the old wooden stands and the clouded pane glass windows. The buzzer's horn after Steve Woodberry's game winning shot last season against Oklahoma State and the net's swish after Wilt Chamberlain's career-high 52nd point against Northwestern are sounds that remain long after the game is done.
Even when complete silence exudes the inside, the Rock Chalk Chant is buried somewhere deep in the limestone and is resurrected by every basketball game.
Everyone has field house stories: old and new coaches, players, alumni and current students. When I was a senior in high school, I narrowed my college choices to Nebraska and Kansas. I already knew what a Cornhusker football game was like at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, Neb., and luckily I was able to see a jayhawk basketball game during my trip to Lawrence.
The first thing I noticed stepping onto the field house floor was the throng of fanatics. Allen originally wanted the new basketball arena to house 20,000 fans, making it the largest capacity area in the nation. It now holds a mere 16,300, but the crowd seemed immense before that Iowa State-Kansas men's basketball game four years ago.
History suffocates you almost like a wet blanket when looking at the retired jersey numbers and Final Four and National Championship banners. It's easy to understand the honor athletes have in playing on the court below.
Memorial Stadium in Lincoln and the field house here are by far the best places in the Big Eight Conference to watch a game. In both places, people can remember the first-ever game they saw. Even if you're not a sports fan, the energy created in the facility and intangibles like the smell of popcorn and hot dogs are ingrained in your memory.
Kansas won the first game I saw — not surprising, the Kansas men's basketball team is 429-94 at home since 1955. I still have the program, too. After that game, the college choice was all but made. The game wasn't the only reason I came to Kansas, but it was a big one. Any place that shows that much commitment to tradition and school pride was my kind of University.
Sunday should be another exciting event at the field house. Oklahoma State and Kansas will meet on Senior Night to decide the conference title, and a halftime ceremony is planned for the field house's anniversary.
Try to get a ticket. It's guaranteed to be a memorable experience. Then again, nothing escapes the memory of the field house.
Freshmen a hit with softball coach
Tough attitude and play of class make impact
By Robert Moczydlowsky Kansan sportswriter
Kansas softball coach Kalum Haack wanted a strong recruiting class that could make an immediate impact.
The newest members of the Kansas softball team are from left to right, back to front: Michelle Hubler, Heather Hamer, Kristina Johnson, Rebecca Fitzmorris, Sarah McCann and Sara Holland.
Haack signed two catchers, an infielder, an outfielder, a pitcher, four coofer nicknames and one collective attitude.
Freshmen Kristina Johnson, Sarah McCann, Michelle Hubler, Rebecca Fitzmorris, Heather Hamer and Sara Holland all figure to see extensive playing time for the Jayhawks this spring, and that's just fine with Haack.
"I'm very pleased with their play so far," he said. "By the end of the season they will all be contributing. We got six tough players and we got the players that we wanted — we didn't settle for anybody."
Paul Kotz / KANSAN
Nor will Haack have to settle for the usual adjustment period from his new players. Johnson and Hamer have already started as a battery, and Hubler is currently leading the team in hitting. McCann stands at third when sophomore Tiffany Blood pitches, and Holland's recent hot-hitting has her solidly positioned in the outfield.
"Right now you could see four of the six freshman in our lineup at any time," he said. "These players just add to our depth. We've got a strong base to build around."
Mac and Half-pint
Having two players with the same first name might cause some problems and confusion for some teams.
That won't happen to Sara Holland and Sarah McCann.
"The older girls call me Half-pint because of my size," Holland said. "They either call Sarah 'Mac' or 'Big Sarah'. I'm not sure that's fair. She's not much taller than I am."
While Holland might be the team's smallest player, she is certainly not its smallest hitter.
"Sara is probably our most improved hitter." Haack said. "She's hitting the ball so well that I'm going to have to find a spot for her in our outfield."
Holland, signed as a catcher out of Bixby, Okla., came to Kansas after two years as her high school conference's player of the year.
Off the diamond. Holland is a movie fanatic.
"I can't say what my favorite movie is because the girls on the team will really rag on me," she laughed. "I will say that I really liked 'Legends of the Fall'. And not just because of Brad Pitt."
"I'm pretty much a nun," she joked. "I go home a lot. Probably too much. I'm a mamma's girl. It's really not too exciting."
A quiet evening after practice or a trip home for the weekend is all that McCann wants. The aspiring elementary school teacher said that her life away from softball was very relaxed.
Haack used similar adjectives when describing her play at third base.
"She is a very steady ballplayer," he said. "She's not exciting to watch, not at all flashy, but she is very consistent. When Tiffany pitches she takes over at third, and we don't miss a beat. Both her and Sara have really played well, both offensively and defensively."
Heather and Reb
For Heather Hamer and Rebecca Fitzmooris, the transition into the spring has been painful. Both players are suffering from injuries that have kept them out of practice and recent games. Haack said that their return would boost the Jayhawks in their race for the conference title.
"Right now Rebecca is bothered by a strained stomach muscle, and Heather has torn knee cartilage," he said. "Both are future starters, we just need to get them healthy."
Playing ball seems to be the Fitzmorris family business. Her father, Alan Fitzmorris, pitched for the Kansas City Royals and her brother, Matt, is a pitcher for Northwest Missouri State University.
"I'm very close to my family," she said. "That's why I came to Kansas — I wanted to stay close to home."
Getting away from home is what attracted Hamer, however
Getting away from home is what attracted Hamer, however.
"I wanted to be more independent," said the pitcher from Placentia, Calif. "I also really wanted to play for Coach Haack. I knew that this was a good program and I could tell he would really push me to be the best player I can be."
In her limited spare time, Hamer says she tries to do as little as possible.
"Sometimes I'll play Monopoly with the girl from across the hall, but she always wins," she laughed. "Usually I just sleep."
Currently Hamer's practice routine has been limited by her knee, which Haack says may require surgery.
"We'll have some doctors take a look and see if we need some arthroscopic surgery," he said. "I'd love to have her healthy because we need her on our pitching staff."
Mad Dog and Tonka
One is the back-bone of the Kansas defense, the other
knocks the opposing defense to the ground.
Both hit the ball a ton.
"Michelle's nickname is Tonka because once she ran over a first baseman like a truck," catcher Kristina Johnson said. "The strength coach calls me Mad Dog. I don't know why, but it stuck. I kinda like it."
Johnson seems to like everything about Kansas. After an impressive multi-sport career at Lawrence High School, Johnson immediately committed to Kansas.
For Haack, the process couldn't have been easier.
"I wish they all came that easy," he said. "I also wish they were all this good. She has the potential to be the best catcher I've ever coached."
Haack has similar praise for shortstop Michelle Hubler, who spurned softball powerhouses Michigan and Oklahoma State to play for Kansas.
"She had her heart set on Kansas I guess," he laughed. "She's really something. She could be one of the best players in the conference in two years."
Hubler's torrid hitting at the Texas-Arlington Invite has boosted her high stock to a level freshmen rarely enjoy.
"I hope this isn't a streak," she said. "I want to keep it all together, keep everything going. Our goal is to win the conference and go to the World Series."
That goal appears to be universal.
"We're a team and we're also a family," Johnson concluded. "We all get along very well, and we all want to go to the World Series."
KC minor leaguers asked to play ball
The Associated Press
HAINES CITY, Fla. — The Kansas City Royals have asked some of their minor leaguers to play in spring games and some have agreed, general manager Herk Robinson said yesterday.
Robinson declined to identify the players. The Royals plan to pull out today some of the players they expect to use tomorrow in the spring opener against Stetson University, manager Bob Boone said.
Others declined, but no one has been told to leave camp, Robinson said.
Boone said the group would practice on the major league field after an orientation meeting. Previously minor leaguers and replacement players had been working out together on five minor league fields.
Ad class gets pitch from Royals player
Robinson also said that the Royals have taken steps to cancel two scheduled games with the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles are refusing to play any games against teams that use replacement players.
"The best way for me to put it is that basically there has been an intervention by the league and we're responding," Robinson said. "It appears that games will be canceled because of their desire to use only National Association players and we cannot do that because we have hired replacements expressly for that purpose of playing games."
Robinson said canceled dates with the Orioles would likely not be made up because no other teams are available to play.
By Tom Erickson
Kansan sportswriter
Issues in the Major League Baseball players' strike reached the University of Kansas yesterday in the form of Kansas City
Rovals' pitcher Jeff Montgomery
The relief pitcher spoke to a group of students in John Leifer's advertising and marketing class in the School of Journalism. Montgomery came to assist the class with a project they were working on regarding the marketing of baseball.
"They are completing a wide array of discussion on the labor negotiations," Montgomery said. "I'm here as a representative of the Royals and Major League Baseball."
Montgomery said he told the class about his role in the players' union and the work he does as the Royals 'team representative. He is confident that an agreement between management and the union can be worked out soon.
"There is a meeting in progress in Arizona as we speak now," he said. "The calendar tells us a deadline is fast approaching."
"I would be foolish to say that the players can last longer than the owners," he said. "Something has to be done to save the game."
Because of the commitment the Royals and other teams have made to their replacement players, Montgomery believes he will not be in uniform for opening day on April 5. Financial restraints on striking players has led many to want the strike settled as soon as possible, he said.
'Hawks again road kill victim
Kansan Staff Report
The road continued to be unkind to the Kansas baseball team yesterday as it was defeated 5-0 by Southwest Missouri State at Meadorn Park in Springfield, Mo.
The Jayhawks' record fell to 2-8 on the season.
Southwest Missouri pitchers Joe Blasingim and Brandon Shelby held the Jayhawks to just two hits in the contest.
The Bears improved their record to 2-0 on the season with the victory.
Kansas freshman pitcher Ryan Van Gilder (0-1) gave up three runs on two hits in 52/3 innings in his first start of the year.
The Jayhawks' only hits came from junior centerfielder Brian Turney and freshman first baseman Josh Kliner.
The Jayhawks will open their home schedule in a three-game weekend series with Northwestern at 3 p.m. Friday at Hogland-Maupin Stadium.
The event is free for students with a valid KUID. Kansas will play 11 of its next 12 games at home beginning with Friday's contest.