16
University Daily Kansan
Sports
Thursday, March 27. 1986
Keep away
Chris Maoerl/KANSAN
Michigan State's Vernon Carr attempted to keep the ball away from Jayhawk forward Archie Marshall and guard Thomas Thompson on Friday in the Midwest regional semifinal in Kemper Arena. The Jayhawks in overtime 96-86.
Longhorns try to stay on top
United Press International
LEXINGTON, Ky. — After three years of falling short, Texas enters the women's NCAA Final Four with a 32-0 mark, the nation's top ranking and a few days of rest and relaxation for the Lady Longhorns before the tournament begins.
"If you feed them, let them sleep late and watch soap operas in the middle of the day, they're happy," said Texas coach Jody Conradt of her plavers.
Conradt and the other three coaches talked with reporters yesterday about the fifth National Collegeiate Athletic Association Women's Final Four, which opens tomorrow in Lexington's Rupp Arena.
Texas plays Western Kentucky, the last team to defeat it, in the first semifinal game, and two-time champion Southern California plays Tennessee in the second game. The winners advance to Sunday's title game.
"You see any monkey?" Conradj joked with reporters. "After three years, it feels good to have the monkey off my back."
she brought her team to Lexington early because Texas is on spring
break this week. she said.
The few days of relaxation were intended to give the Lady Longhorns relief from the pressure of shooting for their first national title after being upset the last three seasons in the regionals.
"It has to be that way, right?" she laughed. "I'm the only rookie here. These other coaches have all been here before."
While its undefeated record and top ranking has earned Texas the undisputed favorite's role, Conradt joked about being the underdog.
So they have, but, like Texas, two of them have fallen short.
Tennessee lost in the semifinals in the inaugural event in 1982 and in the finals in 1984. Last season, Western Kentucky lost its Final Four semifinal game. Only Southern Cal, with titles in 1983 and 1984, has won the title before.
His players succumbed to the pressure of the Final Four last year, Western Kentucky coach Paul Sanderford said. "We didn't handle the media attention and were scared to death."
The experience, he said, will do the team good.
"Last year we were wallflowers," he said. "This year we want to dance."
Tennessee coach Pat Summitt continued with the dance theme in a news conference that bordered on a vaudille routine.
"I've been here seven times and never got to dance, Paul." Summitt laughed. Her numerous trips to the finals in the old AIAW championships ranks Summit as one of the country's ton women's coaches.
She has been to the finals before, but with teams picked to be there. This year her squad is the field's only true surprise. With its cast of underclassmen, the Lady Volunteers upset Georgia and Louisiana State on their way to Lexington.
At 24-9, the Lady Volunteers have lost more games than the other three squads combined. But Summit isn't counting her team out. The squad is physically the best team she has ever had, she said.
Linda Sharp, the ninth-year coach of Southern Cal, emphasized that her team was more than Cheryl Miller, women's basketball's best and most widely known player.
Sports Briefs
'Hawks on SI cover of this week's issue
In addition to the cover, Sports Illustrated writer Curry Kirkpatrick wrote a feature about the Jayhawks.
The Kansas Jayhawks will join the three other Final Four teams on the cover of Sport Illustrated's March 31 issue.
Evans is Pitt coach
PITTSBURGH — Paul Evans, courted by a number of schools while steering Navy to the best season in its history, was named the University of Pittsburgh's basketball coach yesterday.
Bozik announced at a morning news conference that Evans, 41, had agreed to a four-year contract at Pittsburgh. Evans coached Navy to a 30-28 record and the National Colegiate Athletic Association East Regional final.
Pitt Athletic Director Edward
The deal is worth a reported $800,000, about four times what Evans at the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md.
Evans succeeds Roy Chipman, who resigned after failing to transform the Panthers into one of the Big East Conference's powers despite recruiting some of the top talent in the school's history.
Pitt was 15-14 overall and 6-10 in the Big East this season, losing eight of its last 10 games and falling to Georgetown in the conference tournament and to
Southeast Missouri State in a firstround National Invitation Tournament game.
BC names new coach
BOSTON — Jim O'Brien, a 1971 Boston College graduate and head basketball coach at St. Bonaventure, was named head coach at BC yesterday.
bv Athletic Director Bill Flynn welcomed O'Brien to the school at a news conference and said he was the best man for the job at this time.
At St. Bonaventure, O'Brien compiled a 67-51 record in four years. Before that he was assistant coach for five years at the University of Connecticut.
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DALLAS — The Final Four, college basketball's annual extravaganza, will attract an estimated 15,000-20,000 visitors this week, and they are expected to pump more than $7 million into the local economy, officials said.
Final Four a boon for Dallas
All of the big downtown hotels will be involved in housing teams, fans and media. The Hyatt Regency, across a parking lot from Reunion Arena, will be the home for NCAA officials. The Plaza of the Americas, the Fairmont, the Sheraton and the Adolphus will be home bases for the four teams.
presents:
Rick Baker, director of the Dallas Executive Committee, said the Chamber of Commerce expected out-of-towners to dish out $7.7 million.
Bass agreed with Baker that the exposure for Dallas would be a boon.
director of the Convention and Visitors Bureau.
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"That's money spent on everything from hotel rooms, restaurants, souvenirs, entertainment, rental cars, whatever, while they're here," he said.
every evening 7-10 p.m.
Baker is one of five members on the executive committee, which oversees preparations for the tournament in conjunction with the National Collegiate Athletic Association. The committee has a budget of about $700,000 from ticket sales and corporate donations to stage the event.
Other members of the executive committee are John Scovell, general chairman; B BobHitch, athletic director of Southern Methodist; Jack Beckman, manager of Reunion Arena, and Ed Simmons, who represents the Dallas Chamber of Commerce.
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"When we bid on this four years ago, it fit right into the schedule very nicely because it happens during the Easter weekend and business conventions don't schedule during Easter," Bass said. "So there were plenty of hotels available. Restaurants are going to do very well for the same reason."
Reunion Arena, which normally seats 17,007 for a Dallas Mavericks
The Dallas economy could get up to $11 million or $12 million because the exposure may attract future business and conventions. Baker said.
game, will hold only 16,373 Final Four fans Saturday and Monday because of an army of reporters, photographers and television and radio personnel, Baker said.
"It's a great event for the city to showcase itself," he said. "Basically, there's not that much going on during the end of March, other than the baseball exhibition season, and the eyes of the sports world will be on Dallas this week."
The payoff for Lexington, Ky., the site of last year's Final Four, was about $14 million in direct spending, officials said. Jim Smither, director of the Greater Lexington Convention and Visitors Bureau, said the exposure alone was worth millions more.
"At this point, the teams that are in it will be irrelevant on the impact," he said. "It's a lot like the Super Bowl."
Still, the 1986 Final Four, which will bring Kansas, Duke, Louisville and LSU to the showdown at Reunion Arena, will be a bonanza for Dallas hotel industry, said Charles Bass,
But the event pales in comparison to the Super Bowl. The National Football League championship game in the 71,647-seat Superdome in New Orleans on Jan. 26, drew 100,000 visitors to the city and pumped $100 million into its economy, New Orleans tourism officials said.
Baker said no matter how far fans must traveled, no seats would be left empty.
expose for Dallas workers
"We liken it to a great extent to the
Republican National Convention
because it's a media hype," Bass said. The Republicans met in Dallas in 1984.
SMU is the host school for the event. New Orleans will host the 1967 Final Four.
Teams face many distractions
United Press International
DALLAS — In the last 10 years or so the NCAA Final Four has, in many ways, come to resemble the Super Bowl — only with more intensity.
The distractions are overwhelming from the time a team steps off the plane until it finally takes the court at Reunion Arena on Saturday afternoon for the national semifinals.
So the coaches who bring their teams to Dallas this week must face many of the same problems that the Chicago Bears and New England Patriots had to deal with two months ago. And they have less time to deal with them.
The teams will practice at the Final Four site tomorrow afternoon
These problems began for Kansas last night since the Jayhawks were the first team to arrive in town. The teams from Duke, Louisville and LSU were scheduled to arrive today.
and on Saturday they will be thrown into the action — Louisville facing LSU in the first semifinal contest and Duke then taking on Kansas in a meeting of the nation's two top-ranked squads.
"The last time I was at the Final Four, I personally didn't do a very good job," said LSU coach Dale Brown. He was referring to his handling of distractions during LSU's trip in 1981.
"I tried to suppress the team as much as possible," he said. "This time we'll do nothing different than we do when we go on the road. We won't turn it into Stalag 17 or anything. But by the same token, it won't be disco time, either."
"We know about all the distractions. There are agents who run around and a variety of other caretakers, all they are protective without sufficating them."
The only coach among this year's
Final Four not to have been to college basketball's big event is Duke's Mike Krzyzewski.
"I've talked to (Indiana coach) Bobby Knight about this week." Krzewzski said. "But most of all I think we will just try to do what we usually do when we go on the road."
"We want to let them be a part of the Final Four. It is a very special trip for them, but we also want them to prepare for a game. We will try to strike a good balance. That is our goal.
Kansas coach Larry Brown said, "We want the kids to enjoy the fact they are going to the Final Four. We want them to be proud and enjoy it. But we want them to also know they have the responsibility to play basketball. We won't hide out."
Hiding out was the philosophy adopted by Georgetown coach John Thompson in his three recent trips to the Final Four.
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