MARCH MADNESS
A SPECIAL EDITION OF THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
MONDAY, MARCH 10, 1997
SECTION B
Points of Attack
Senior point guards Tamecka Dixon and Jacque Vaughn lead their teams into battle in the NCAA tournaments
Tamecka Dixon soars higher than most - female or male
By Jenni Carlson Special to the Kansan
The clock speeds toward halftime
16 seconds, then 15. Now 14.
Tamecka Dixon starts down the floor and slows just before the half-court line. She takes two giant steps like a jointless robot, dribbling the ball under her leg with each step.
She crosses midcourt and a Texas defender advances, her ponytail swinging back and forth, shuffling her feet, trying to anticipate Dixon's next move.
At the top of the three-point line, Dixon moves to her right. The defender goes with her.
Dixon crosses over to her left. The defender goes nowhere. She can't. It's happening too fast.
An open look. Elevate. Swish.
Halftime.
"I know a guy in Chicago who can do that," marvels Nancy Lieberman. Cline, television color analyst.
ening cross-over dribble.
"Yea," she says, chuckling "Michael Jordan."
"Do we know him?" play-by-play man Bill Land asks.
Tamecka Dixon is like few women on the court.
Kansas' senior point guard can drive and score. She can pull up for a three-pointer. She can penetrate and deftly find an open teammate. She can leave defenders' heads spinning and feet akimbo with her light-
"A lot of people say I play like Allen Iverson with my ball-handling skills and the way I attack the basket." Dixon says.
It's not that Dixon has skills that few women possess. It's more than that. She has skills that only a smattering of men possess.
And she might have been an iverson or a Stephon Marbury or a Damon Stoudamire, but for a missing microscopic Y chromosome. Put Dixon's skills in a male body and imagine the possibilities. She would have grown up in New Jersey with realistic dreams of the NBA and the
accompanying fame and million-dollar contracts.
That's changing, though. The American Basketball League and the Women's NBA are beginning to give the world's elite females an American stage where they can showcase their basketball talent.
Instead, Dixon lived with a harser reality — she could turn the women's game upside down and still only have a obscure career somewhere in Europe to look forward to.
And what talent Dixon has to offer. She is scoring 20.8 points a game, which ranks in the top 20 nationally, as well as grabbing almost six rebounds and hitting nearly 50 percent of her shots from the floor.
"I can't lie to you that I haven't thought about it." Bowers says, "I'd think, 'If she's this good as a girl, the NBA would be waiting. She'd be a can't miss.'"
Still, the question lingers — what if?
Russell Bowers wonders every once in awhile what his daughter would be like as his son.
Bowers, Dixon's father, never spoke about those daydreams. It's not exactly a good idea to tell your 8- or 9-year-old daughter, "You're good, but man, if you were a boy..."
See TAMECKA, Page 4B
Here is Jacque Vaughn's story: Final chapter still incomplete
By Bill Petulla
Kansan sportswriter
Here is what it's like being the perfect student, the perfect athlete. And, most importantly, the perfect person.
Here is the poem (origin unknown) that Jacque Vaughn memorized as a youth and used as his motto:
I've seen the daylight breaking
High above the brow.
I've found my destination
And I won't stop now.
So whether you deprive me,
Deplore me,
Beseech me,
Or ignore me,
Mighty mountains loom before me
And I won't stop now.
Here's what Kansas' energetic point guard's mother said about Jacque Vaughn as a youth: "Ever since he was little, you just wound him up, gave him the key and he'd keep going."
Here is what Jacque Vaughn said his parents (Nathaniel, a construction worker, and Linnie, a clerical worker) instilled in him at an early age: "Hard work will pay off. No matter what you do down the line, education has to be a part of it."
Here's what Jacque Vaughn said about his dribbling pace: "I remember when I was young, I used to pretend like I was in gears — 'OK,
throw it in third now' — and shift it on a little hit."
Here is Jacque Vaughn's grade point average in high school: 3.97.
Here's how many B's Jacque Vaughn received at John Muir High School in Pasadena, Calif.: One. (A B+ in English.)
Here's where Jacque Vaughn ranked in his class of 350 at John Muir High School No.2.
Here's how many men's basketball players have been awarded the Dial Award, given annually to the nation's top high school scholar athlete, before Jacque Vaughn won: Zero.
Here are the recently retired jerseys at Pasadena's Muir High School: Stacey Augmont (No. 32), and Jacey Vaughn (No. 11).
Here's what Muir High School coach Rocky Moore called Jacque Vaughn: A dream player. "He enriched my life as a coach and person." Moore said.
Here's what the co-MVP to Jacque Vaughn (Jerry Stackhouse) in the 1993 McDonald's All American game is doing now: averaging more than 37 minutes and 19 points for the Philadelphia 76ers.
Here are some of Jacque Vaughn's numbers in high school;
Junior year: 23 points a game. 8.5 assists a game.
Sophomore year: 21.3 points per game. 9.0 assists a game.
Here is what was predicted of Jacque Vaughn as a college sophomore by the Dallas Morning News: "By the time he leaves Kansas, Vaughn should break every assist record at the school."
Here's what he has done at Kansas: Just that — broken Cedric Hunter's Kansas and Big Eight Conference assist records.
Here is how Jacque Vaughn handled his college selection: A telephone call to Williams and a call to a local reporter, then on to practice to work on his goal of leading Muir High School to the Southern Section
See JACQUE, Page 5B