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Show 18 Vernal Express Wednesday, August 25, 1999 A teirasgairdl IhioirQOiredl as coach off wair When Uintah High School wrestling coach Gregg Stensgard opened the mail last week, he was all alone in the state. Stensgard, who this year begins his sixth year at the helm of the Ute wrestling program, found that he had been selected as Utah's Wrestling Coach Of The Year. The award is given annually to one coach and represents repre-sents all of the 5 high school divisions. divi-sions. -This is a great honor," Coach Stensgard said. "To think that the other coaches in Utah think that our program has achieved this level is really an honor." The award originates origi-nates from the National Wrestling Coaches Association and coaches determine the recipient. Stensgard was selected to lead the Ute wrestling program 5 years ago. "Who would have thought I would have lasted this long," Coach Stensgard said. He explained that when he arrived, the position was intimidating because of the reputation reputa-tion that Uintah wrestling had achieved. He said that wrestling had changed somewhat and he felt some changes were in order. "I made a few changes and some people peo-ple didn't like them," he noted. Claiming that he was also a "new guy" made things feel a little sticky and heated for his first year or two. He now feels that the changes he made are finding acceptance and approval among those who first opposed them. x ----- , ' ... :; , K r ' - ,; Volleyball team practices of serving and returning in preparation for upcoming tournament. Uties prepare Wyoming ttoyiriroey The Lady Ute volleyball cannons are being charged and primed in preparation for a season opening tournament in Afton, Wyoming this weekend. The tournament will feature fea-ture 12 teams including two that are nationally ranked. Coach Gloria Heiner is enthusiastic enthusias-tic about the season prospects this year and is looking forward to the volleyball melee in Star Valley. "We're very optimistic," Heiner said. "I think that if these girls work hard and work together as a team they can accomplish anything. Our goal is a state championship this year," she added. Coach Heiner's optimism partially partial-ly from the successful year that the Lady Utes achieved last year. Her 1998 squad gave Uintah High School their first volleyball entry into state tournament play in 11 years. They played through the consolation con-solation bracket to bring home a fifth place trophy and hopes for a new era in state tournament play. Heiner is also excited about the prospects of having a freshman team this year. She explained that in previous years, the team could harbor 20 total players. This included includ-ed players from varsity, junior varsity var-sity and sophomore teams. Beginning this year, the addition of A . Gregg Stensgard, UHS wrestling coach. Stensgard said that during his first year things did not go too good for the Utes but they have been steadily improving ever since. In his 5-year tenure as head coach, Uintah has earned a third, a second and two championship titles in state competition. compe-tition. They have been ranked in the top 20 teams nationally, 18th in 1997 - 1998 and 16th in 1998 -1999. Stensgard pointed out that a good deal of the credit for this honor goes to the assistant coaching staff. Kevin Dickson, Lyle Gillman, Bevan Wilde, Shane Lance and Keith " Stensgard are the assistant wrestling coaches. a freshman team will allow nine additional players to compete. "We understand up front that the freshman fresh-man team will not have a lot of games to play, but they will get playing time that was not available prior to this year," Heiner said. Tryouts and beginning practices started on August 9. There will be nine returning team members from the 1998 team, which includes four seniors and five juniors. Sarah Squires, Janell Heiner, Brooke Salazar and Amy Berts are the seasoned sea-soned senior players this year. Coach Heiner is also planning to draw on the talent of six freshman to fill out the JV team. Linda Bartell and KarriAnn Raddon, have joined Heiner as assistants on the coaching staff. Raddon hails recently recent-ly from Beaver and Bartell is a long term resident of Vernal. Heiner was analytical in her discussion dis-cussion about the upcoming Star Valley tournament. First, she says the area is her hometown. She hopes to return there with her team and make a good showing. Next, and most important to her, she said that the competition would be intense. She expects the two nationally nation-ally ranked teams to kick the tournament tour-nament up a notch. Cokeville, Wyo. is one of the ranked teams and is See Volleyball on page 19 ft . . - I . J. Taking advantage of the last Huck Finn day before school starts are Josh Hooper and Mike Poison at the kids canal. WOODS WcrD(al Paul Hunting of Naples is one of 36 contestants that represented Utah in the Special Olympics World Games. He competed between June 24 and July 4 and brought home two medals and several sev-eral ribbons. The 23-year old is the son of Steven and Patricia Hunting and has been competing in the Special Olympics for over 10 years. Competing in the 50-meter backstroke, back-stroke, Paul became the first gold medal winner from Utah in this year's games held in Raleigh, NC. Paul finished the event in 51.70 seconds. His silver medal was earned in a 50-meter freestyle relay with 3 other team members from Utah, Nevada and New Mexico. This was the second Special Olympics World Games that Paul has traveled to. Four years ago, he participated in Minnesota. While winning several ribbons in his first games, he fell short of a medal. He made up for it this year with the two medals and ribbons for taking 5th place in both the 50 and 100 r . it- t ' i meter ireesiyie evenis. nis mira ribbon came as a participation ribbon rib-bon in the 4X50 meter medley relay. "I was pretty excited," Paul said regarding his feelings when he Blue Mt. competition continues ' After rough and stormy weather cancelled the first day of flight competition, the Pre Pan Am hang gliding competition at Blue Mountain is slated to continue through Saturday. According to Mike Warden of Dinosaur, weather conditions will still determine daily flights. Warden, who helped organize the competition, said that the public is invited to watch the event. The launch site is located near the Point of the Pines on Blue Mountain and daily flights are scheduled. The road route to the cliffs is well marked with signs and can be accessed through from the main paved road from the National Monument headquarters. He said that flights are slated to begin sometime after 1 p.m. as sufficient thermal winds develop. A determination determi-nation to allow scheduled flights to proceed" will be made daily and will be dependent on safe flight conditions. Hang glider pilots compete for the maximum flight distance and time' to predetermined landing zones. The pilots must follow an established course and pass .specified .speci-fied points located along the flight route. Fight target areas are set daily to take advantage of current T V1 t 1 i I I w i . v ft stepped on the stand to receive his medals. Paul works at Burger King and is also a peer tutor. The Special Olympics is an international inter-national sports festival for the developmentally disabled. Eunice Kennedy Shriver founded the celebration cele-bration in 1963. This year in Raleigh, N,.C, nearly 70,000 people from around the world came together for 9 days. According to Patricia, it took nearly 4 hours to complete the opening ceremony. The event featured about 7,000 competitors from 150 countries, coun-tries, 2,000 coaches and about 15.000 friends and relatives. Approximately 45,000 volunteers helped staff and run the festival. Sarah Young of Vemal was both Paul's coach and the Utah swimming swim-ming team coach. She is a teacher at Uintah High School and is also a principal organizer of the local Special Olympics. Sheriff Rick Hawkins also helped Paul and another participant from the west side of the Uintah Basin compete in North Carolina. "You know, I just can't say enough good about Sarah and Sheriff Hawkins," Paul's mother Patricia said. Sheriff Hawkins guaranteed guar-anteed to financially help any "V' . iy . v V t Hang glider soars above Blue Mountain. wind direction and other factors. Distances of 100 miles have been achieved from the Blue Mountain launch site to the target area. The contest this year is in prcpa- Alex Maclean, John Minakhom, lD(al Sk . a 1 Special Olympians from the Uintah Basin that were selected to compete in the World Games. According to Patricia, Sheriff Hawkins provided the $3,000 needed for both athletes. "Rick and the . Sheriff's Department are so supportive of the Special Olympics," Patricia explained. She said that in addition to the financial donation they made from their fund raising activities such as the annual golf tournament, the Sheriffs office provides volunteer volun-teer manpower to the games held locally every spring. ration for the international event that will be held on Blue Mountain next , year. The wecklong flight activities will culminate in an award program to be held Saturday evening in Dinosaur. Utes open gridiron gates The 1999 Ute football season opens Friday night as the Carbon Dinos come to Vernal hoping to erase a season-long losing streak. Uintah hopes to build on their strong 10-1 season finish in 1998. Carbon had a hapless 0 - 9 season in 1998 and are currently ranked 4th in Region 8. Richfield, who beat the Dinos in 1998 to produce their only win of the season sits in the cellar of Region 8 and is the only team listed below Carbon. The Preseason polls have made Uintah the target team in Region 10. Their preseason number one Region rank coupled with their strong 1998 season sea-son will make .them a coveted team to topple especially in a season opening contest Region 10 schools as well as non-region teams that are scheduled for preseason games would undoubtedly enjoy bragging ' rights that would accompany a victory vic-tory against Uintah. Game time is slated for 7 p.m. on August 27. 3 goose limit set For the first time since 1954, Utah's goose hunters may take up to three Canada geese daily. The Wildlife Board approved the new limit on August 18. Coupled with the new daily bag limit is a 6-bird possession limit Wildlife managers credit the increased Canada goose numbers throughout the Intermountain West as the motivating motivat-ing force behind the new rule. "It's been a very successful 50 years for most populations of Canada geese," said Tom Aldrich. Aldrich is the waterfowl coordinator coordina-tor for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources (DWR). He pointed out that the Rocky Mountain Population of Canada geese counted during mid-winter aerial surveys has increased from about 25,000 birds in 1970 to almost 120.000 in 1999. The Rocky Mountain Population includes wintering Canada geese in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, Arizona and southern California. Aldrich credits increased Canada goose populations to fairly conservative conserv-ative hunting regulations and to an increase in agricultural production. The Wildlife Board also approved the third straight year with a 107-day 107-day duck season. The goose season will run 100 days. One day is set aside as a Youth Hunting Day. The duck limit will also remain at 7 birds daily. The general waterfowl season will open on Oct 2 with the special Youth Hunting Day slated for Saturday, Sept 25. Young people peo-ple between 12 and 15 years of age may participate if they are properly licensed and accompanied by a parent par-ent or adult at least 2 1 years of age. In addition to raising the goose limit the Wildlife Board broke with another tradition and approved a 6:55 a.m. season opening in all of the state except the northern 5 counties coun-ties of Box Elder, Cache, Weber, Davis and Salt Lake. The traditional 8 a.m. opening will continue in these counties. The board cited safety concerns related to poor light conditions coupled with large numbers num-bers of hunters who participate in opening day hunts in these areas as the reason for the traditional opening open-ing hour. While the daily bag limit will remain at 7 ducks, hunters will need to be more attentive to the species they harvest For the first time since 1934, the number of scaup ducks in the bag will be restricted. Other regulations reg-ulations will limit hunters additionally addition-ally to two hen mallards, one pintail, pin-tail, two redheads and one canvas-back. canvas-back. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service surveys of scaup breeding populations popula-tions this past spring found numbers were up 27 percent from last year. However, even with the increase, scaup numbers are still 18 percent below the long term (1955 - 1998) average. In reality, this regulation change will likely have little effect on Utah hunters. Biologists note that scaup are not normally plentiful through most of Utah. A total of 2,750 swan permits will be available for the 1999 hunting season. Permits must be applied for through a drawing. The application period will begin August 30 and end at 5 p.m. on Sept 10. Applications will be available Aug. 30 form DWR offices and license agents. r, |