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BOWL: Kansas, fans support East
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"I know that they feature one of the best quarterbacks in the nation in Phillip Rivers." Mangino said. "We also have a great guy who can wing it around, and it'll be his chance to have the national audience as his stage."
Texas Tech lost to Clemson in last year's Tangerine Bowl and brought about 2,000 fans.
Colorado's failure to achieve bowl eligibility left Kansas as the likely suspect.
Even though the game takes place just days before Christmas and is nearly 1,300 miles from Lawrence, Lew Perkins does not think fan support will be an issue.
"Mark had talked to the kids earlier on before they left for holidays, and we felt very comfortable that the kids wanted
"Mark had talked to the kids earlier on before they left for the holidays,and we felt very comfortable that the kids wanted to go to this bowl
game."
to go to this bowl game," Perkins said, "Surprisingly, we have 8,000 to 10,000 alumni down in that area, and we were excited about that. It was just something the kids and coaches really wanted to do and they had my total support."
Lew Perkins
Kansas athletics director
Coast bowl game
Kansas football notebook
■ Jayhawks Hitting The Books
...Nine members of the Kansas football team were announced to the Big 12 conference's All-Academic teams last Wednesday.
Derick Mills, Johnny Beck,
Jonathan Lamb and Kevin Kane
garnered first team honors.
Bill Whittemore, Charles Gordon, Clark McCracken, Zach Dyer and Darren Rus were all named to the second team.
... And Hopefully The Road As Well—The University of Kansas Athletics Department has organized plenty of travel plans for making the trip to Orlando.
Information for tickets and travel arrangements can be found at kuathletics.com.
Edited by Ashley Marriott
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 12A
As the show started, Kansas's name didn't appear right away.
NCAA BID: Late-season play helps Kansas advance to Malibu
"I wasn't nervous," Lima said. "But five minutes after seven my hands started sweating."
"So many things are running through my head, my head hurts," Lima said. "It was so exciting to see our name there."
After their name appeared on the board, screams from players who had been working for this moment all their lives erupted. Everyone calmed down enough to see the Jayhawks will be heading to Malibu, Calif., on Thursday to play the Long Beach State 49ers at Pepperdine.
The 49ers finished 19-10 on the year, but upset No. 8 Georgia Tech late in the season.
Long Beach State is in the tournament annually, and has won multiple championships.
"There's not a lot of similarities between our teams, but that's OK." Bechard said.
But the team isn't worried about the past, only that the two will meet on Thursday in the first round.
Rome said this team deserved the bid.
After the excitement of making the tournament had died down, it sank in where the team would be in three days. Jacobson echoed what many of the team members had already said.
"I wouldn't want to go with anyone else," she said. "This team is great."
"We're going to Malibu," she said.
—Edited by Neeley Spellmeier
VITALE: 'Dickie V.' prepares more before games than fans may realize
Yet, he doesn't even utter his trademark "baby" until 23 minutes into the book signing and that was only after being prompted by a woman who couldn't leave with out hearing it in person.
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"He's not as loud in daily life," says Andy Katz, one of Vitale's colleagues who covers college basketball for ESPN.com. "But he's certainly as passionate."
While college basketball is his favorite, Vitale is a fan of other sports. He holds season tickets to Tampa Bay Devil Rays' games and loves the atmosphere of college football games. He also coowns a racehorse. It's Awesome Baby, with Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino and others. But, it seems that with Vitale the conversation always turns hoops.
Prime-Time Player
"I can't wait to see David Padgett," he says to one fan. "Simien and Langford could be the best 1-2 combo in America," he tells another.
At about 1:30 p.m. the book
signing is over and Vitale is interviewed by four local television crews before heading back to his hotel to relax, grab a bite to eat, talk with Michigan State coach Tom Izzo and change out of his sweater and khaki's into a suit for the broadcast.
He arrives at Allen Fieldhouse at 4:45 p.m., more than three hours before tip-off. The next hour or so is when Vitale really earns his paycheck.
"People don't realize the preparation before a game," Vitale says, shuffling through about 50 pages of notes on the Jayhawks and Spartans. "Once the game starts, that's the easy part."
Patricia Lowry, ESPN producer, walks up to Vitale and asks him to do a promotional spot for the network's Feast Week, the 21 college games airing during the week of Thanksgiving.
Vitale is busy; he already had to turn down being a guest on ESPN's Pardon the Interruption that afternoon. But this provides him an opportunity to interact with the fans so he obliges.
Lowry leads Vitale outside, where the rowdiest of the rowdy KU fans are waiting to get into the game.
The cameras light up and so does Vitale as he ad libs the spot while scores of people surround him and scream. They scream so loud in fact, the microphones can't pick up Vitale and they are forced to shoot again.
"You are quite the trooper," Lowry says to Vitale as they rush back inside to tape Dick's Stock Report, an analysis that will air during halftime of a preseason NIT game the following night. Vitale again works without a script, and after three takes is satisfied.
"Might have been a little long," he says, thinking it over. "You know what? They can edit it."
Lowry comes back and fills Vitale in on some of the recent controversial changes made in Jayhawk Land, including special red uniforms and the enormous Jayhawk at center court that Vitale is sitting in front of. When she finishes, it's time to go live on ESPNEWS.
"Sometimes it's unbelievable.
You're sitting here like you're naked," Vitale says after finishing the segment despite difficulty hearing the anchors in his earpiece.
He chats with Patrick for a few minutes about coach Bill Self and his Kansas team and mentions the controversially huge Jayhawk behind him. It's about 6:00 p.m. when he finally has time to sit down with Self. They discuss the game for about 10 minutes in Self's office before Vitale heads back to the court area.
He takes a few sips of water to help with a raspy voice before going back on the air live to talk with Dan Patrick on SportsCenter.
By now his broadcast partner Dan Shulman has arrived, and they head to the media room to get some food and discuss the night's game.
The students are now in the building, and as Shulman and Vitale walk in front of them, there is a rousing ovation. It's not as loud as the cheering later for Self, but it's close.
"It's like this everywhere we go," Shulman says in his booming broadcast-baritone voice, a sharp contrast to Vitale's higherpitched, less-polished delivery. "It's like touring America with Elvis."
All-Airport Team
By 8:00 p.m., Vitale and Shulman have begun calling the game. Vitale works more than 30 games a year and this will be the first time in 20 years he will spend Thanksgiving at home, in Sarasota, Fla. He has to wake up early the next morning, though and fly to Springfield, Mass., to call the Arizona-Florida matchup in the Hall of Fame Classic.
By the 14:00 minute mark of the first half, Dickie V. is completely wound up, using just about every superlative in the dictionary and tossing out "babies" left and right. This is Dickie V. in his natural environment, letting loose and enjoying his favorite pastime.
He can enjoy it for the next two hours. After that he's off to the airport. He will arrive at his home about 2:30 a.m. Eastern standard time. Just in time to get some sleep. By 7:30 a.m. he'll be up again, this time on the radio, talking hoops and living his dream.
monday, december 1, 2003
— Edited by Ashley Marriott
TCU: Players step up, help in Lee's absence
Self also mentioned freshman Jeremy Case, Hawkins and Nash in addition to Giddens, as players that need to step up in Lee's absence.
Kansas Basketball Notes
If the initial diagnosis is correct, Lee should be back by the beginning of the Big 12 Conference schedule, which begins Jan. 5 at Colorado.
"If there is a positive in the situation, it is that it happened early enough where he can get back for the Big 12," Self said. "And it will not require surgery."
Tonight the Jayhawks will play against former Jayhawk assistant Neil Dougherty. He coached under Roy Williams from 1996-2002 before becoming the Horned Frogs head coach last year.
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His team went 9-19 last year, and is 1-1 this season. The Horned Frogs are coming off a 76-64 home loss to Tulsa on Nov. 29.
Junior Wayne Simien has been perfect from the free throw line this season, 16-16 in two games this year. That is now 23 in a row dating back to last season. That streak is the longest by a Jayhawk since Ryan Robertson made 23 straight in 1999. Simien is 10 short of tying Calvin Thompson's school record of 33 straight free throws in 1983-1984.
■ Tonight's game is a homecoming for both Langford and Nash. Langford is from Fort Worth and Nash is from nearby Carrollton, Texas.
At halftime of the Michigan State game, former Jayhawk Nick Collision had his No. 4 jersey retired. He said that the honor was something he thought about often as a Jayhawk player.
In his speech at center court he reminisced about different games and said thanks to his family, teammates, coaches and fans. He received the biggest cheer at the end of speech when he said: "I became a Jayhawk Sept. 21, 1999, and I will be until the day I die."
— Edited by Ashley Marriott
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