THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
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FRIDAY FEBRUARY 16, 2007
SPORTS
3B
》 BASEBALL
Outfield leads offense
Lefty pitchers keep hits low
KANSAN FILE PHOTO
BY ALISSA BAUER
Kansas will play will play its first home game at 3 p.m. Sunday at Hoglund Ballpark, this season. John Allman, pictured, has batted .375 with five BRI
The snow lining the sidewalks and covering the field at Hoglund Ballpark today will no longer be welcome Sunday. After one cancellation and a pair of postponements, Kansas (7-1) is finally set to open at home.
Although the Jayhawks are playing at Hoglund almost a week and a half later than scheduled, Coach Ritch Price made sure his team didn't miss a beat. Kansas has played all eight games it was scheduled to play despite the awful local weather conditions. With that early game time under their belts, the Jayhawks have an eight-game advantage on their opponent, the Bison of North Dakota State University (0-0), who will kick off their season at Hoglund on Sunday.
"Um, they're from North Dakota," junior outfielder John Allman said. "We're just worrying about ourselves right now."
While Allman worries about his team, it has little cause to worry about him. The outfielder has started all of Kansas' eight games, hitting a strong .375 with five RBI. Allman trails only senior outfielder Kyle Murphy.
Traveling to Lawrence from Fargo will likely prove its worth to the Bison, who are in their final season as a Division-1 independent before accepting the invitation to join the Mid-Continent Conference next season. The Bison finished at just 12-41 last season and went 0-16 against the Big 12 Conference in the last two seasons. But the Jayhawks aren't focusing on statistics.
Named to the College Baseball Foundation National Honor Roll on Wednesday, Murphy has started 2007 on a tear. He leads the jayhawk offense with a .381 batting average and the starters with a .714 slugging percentage.
The junior college transfer had just nine extra base hits in all of last season and has collected four already in 2007, including a pair of doubles and a home run.
"I've done a lot of things with my mental approach to the game of baseball and being able to have the confidence in myself to go out there and play," Murphy said. "I'm not too concerned with bad at bats and outcomes that don't go my way."
Murphy stood out against South Dakota State last weekend. He also may have been a little more prepared than some of his teammates. While in junior college, Murphy played at the Metrodome, only his game then started at 5:30 a.m. as opposed to the 3:30 a.m. start time from last weekend.
Whatever the reason, it worked. Murphy hit 500 in the series and scored four times in the series victory. He did mention it was a little harder to focus and it wasn't quite as comfortable as playing during normal hours, but his team overcame
those feelings for the win.
Though Murphy and Allman had plenty to do with putting runs on the board, they didn't have quite as much to do with keeping runs off of it. After surrendering a 6-5 loss in the first game to South Dakota, the Kansas pitching staff allowed just three runs in the next two games.
In the series finale against South Dakota State, sophomore lefty Andy Marks (2-0, 0.73) kept a shutout into the seventh before a solo home run accounted for the only run of the game. Marks, who will start game three, has walked just two and struck out 14 in 12.1 mmings of work.
Fellow letters Zach Ashwood (1-0,
2.53) and Nick Czzy (1-0, 1.93)
are scheduled to take games one and
two, respectively.
On the other side of the ball, the Bison are returning six of their top eight hitters. Junior shortstop Matt Mossey leads the way, returning to his team with a .320 batting average and 31 runs scored in 2006.
Junior left-hander Jake Labor is
MUSEUM
TOPEKA — The Kansas Sports Hall of Fame has an acute aliment that could be cured with an infusion of Kansas Lottery cash, two of the state's most prominent sports figures told legislators.
Sports Hall suffers from lack of funds
Last month, the hall's board of directors voted to shut down if it didn't receive more money from the state.
"If you don't do something, the Hall of Fame will close its doors, and I don't know if it will ever open again," Max Falkenstien, who retired after 60 years broadcasting University of Kansas games, said Wednesday at a Senate committee hearing.
would designate a Kansas Lottery scratch ticket from which revenues would go to fund the hall.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Falkentien and retired Kansas State football coach Bill Snyder tried to impress on the lawmakers what the hall meant to Kansas.
The hall has felt a financial crunch for years as it moved from Lawrence to Ablene to Wichita.
The hall is in its second year of a two-year deal with the city of Wichita for free rent. Officials of the hall are asking for $500,000 per year.
Kansas's 7-1 start is its best under Price, but the modest Jayhawks would likely look at their recent success much like Murphy has looked at his own.
A bill heard in the committee
Since then, executive director Ted Hayes said, the hall has received less than $400,000 from the state.
It was established by statute in 1969.
"With the extra money we could conduct outreach programs to get
"It is a good teeling." Murphy said,
"But it's a long season. You can't get yourself too hyped up about it. I try to stay away from the peaks and valleys through the season and just try and stay pretty consistent throughout the entire thing."
kids involved," Hayes said.
There is some confusion over how the bill would work.
Kansan sportswriter Alissa Bauer can be contacted at abauer@kansan.com.
Committee members said an existing scratch ticket would be designated, but Ed Van Petten, executive director of the Kansas lottery, said he thought a whole new ticket would be created.
Falkenstien spoke Wednesday about the role Kansas sports heroes played in breaking racial barriers. He told Wilt Chamberlain being the first black person to sit on the floor at a two-tiered theater and how Chamberlain was the first to be served at a certain restaurant.
It would be a shame to lose that history. Falkenstein said.
— Edited by Will McCullough
》 INTRAMURAL SPORTS
Final rankings decide postseason
Basketball wraps up schedule play
BY SCOTT TOLAND
As the final intramural basketball pool-play games wrap up this week at the Student Recreation and Fitness Center, several teams have established themselves as
serious contenders to win their respective tournaments.
Some teams have already finished playing their three pool play games and are now waiting to learn who they will play
"I think were one of the best teams out there and I think we have a chance to do really well." Petersen says. "We move the ball really well and we also shoot really well."
Grahm Petersen. Rose Hill freshman, plays for Not Greek and says he met his teammates through a friend. He thinks that his team's chances look good heading into the postseason tournament.
"I think we're one of the best teams out there. We move the ball really well and we also shoot really well."
ranked first while Hangtime and Chi Omega follow at second and third. Chi Omega has run over the competition, outscoring opposing teams 141-42 on the way to a 3-0 record. The ninth-ranked team, Shenanigan, has relied heav-
in the tournament. The seeding meetings will take place Feb. 23 at Alderson Auditorium in the Kansas Union.
KU Recreation Services ranks the Top 10 teams in the men's, women's and co-recreational division each week on its Web site www.recreation.ku.edu. In the men's division, the Not Greek team currently holds the No.1 ranking, while Law is second and the Saints are third. The Untouchables are ranked fourth and have completed all three of their games in their pool, amassing a total of 200 points, which is the highest of the Top 10 men's teams.
GRAHM PETERSON Freshman
On the women's side, SWK is
The co-recreational division has also produced dominant teams in this
ily on defense throughout its first two games, and is only giving up an average of nine points a game.
year's field. The Blue Barracudas lead the way with a 2-0 record followed by We Ballin and Skeet Skeeters. Big Bucks No Whammits is the only team in the Top 10 that has posted a perfect 3-0 record so far, outsourcing its opponents 192-152.
Two other intramural sports, table tennis doubles and racquetball, have also been in action during the past week. Sixteen doubles teams are registered to play table tennis and 24 teams are entered to play racquetball doubles. The matches for both sports are played with a play-by-date format, in which the two teams are responsible for contacting each other to set up a convenient time for all of the players involved.
Registration for intramural nine-ball singles and bowling doubles begins Monday and can be done at www.recreation.ku.edu.
Kansan sportswriter Scott Toland can be contacted at stoland@kansan.com.
Edited by Kelly Lanigan
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