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Show I WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 1 SPORTS 2, 2002 DIXIE SUN -- 7 Rebels in good to a Bids with Kfiolder The current home winning streak stands at 63 games, longest in the nation. by Ben Walker Dixie Sun The Rebels basketball program is lucky Jeff Kidder is training his team for a conference championship instead of training horses for the Kentucky Derby. Head coach Kidder hails from Kentucky, a state that boasts its fast horses and fast basketball. Thankfully, Kidder chose the latter. Besides, although hes a little shorter than the average basketball coach, hes a little too tall to be a jockey. He immersed himself in bas- ketball at a very young age. He was a point guard at Meade County High School He in Brandenburg, Ky. attended a Converse coaching clinic with instruction from the legendary North Carolina coach Dean Smith. Kidder decided as a junior that he wanted to be a basketball coach. year at Dixie where he has compiled an record in impressive 217-4- 7 which most games lost were This is his sixth away from the Burns Arena. The highlight of his career occurred less than a year ago. Kidder led the Rebels to the national championship. Outside of getting married and having my children, it was the most exciting moment in my life, he said. Kidder maintains that the hardest part about coaching a junior college program in particular is recruiting. Recruiting is the backbone of college basketball, said Kidder. Many new faces show up every year, indicating that coaching is not a seasonal job. OK, thats the hardest part, but whats his favorite part of coaching? Practice. I like practice more than I do games, he said. Assistant coach Ryan Burke has been coaching with Kidder for five years. Hes a great motivator and a great defensive coach. He knows how to get his best players the ball. If you tie all that together, youve got a great coach," said Burke. Burke wasnt the only one We feed off with praise. our coachs energy. He challenges us a lot, said forward Mike Hall. His teammates agree. If we start slacking off, hes on us, Steve center said have We just Castleberry. to work hard. Kidder has no plans to leave the Dixie program, but he does have greater aspiraI want to try to coach tions at the highest collegiate level with Dick Vitale yelling my name on ESPN. If that does- nt happen, it doesnt Lady Rebs win by 50, Traore breaks scoring record Traore breaks all-ti- me scoring record by Christine Lewis Dixie Sun Staff Reporter The womens basketball team cruised to a smooth victory Friday night with a of thumping Colorado Northwestern (CNCC). The Rebels, ranked No. 11 in the nation going into the game, went on to win with a final score of But that was only half of 87-3- the story. Traore Forward Aya chipped in 17 points, four below her season average, but good enough to become the leading scorer in program history. Traore walked off the court Friday night having scored 919 points in her career, surpassing the old record of 911. She nine also added rebounds. all-tim- e Shes obviously a good player, and shes a great scorer, said head coach Dexter Irvin. Im glad that shes playing for our team. The Spartans came into the game at the bottom of the conference, with a record of in conference play. In other words, the writing was on the wall before the game even started. 0 The team we played was not a very challenging team, Irvin said. So, we got to work on some other things that we did not work on in practice. For all intents and purposes, the game was over at half- time. The Rebels went into the locker room with a lead, DSC scoring 49 and CNCC managing only 21. Things didnt get any better for the Spartans in the second half. The Rebels in the outscored them second half. 38-1- 6 I thought we came out ready to play good defense, that was our main concern because we worked on that all week, said point guard Jaimey Tanner. I think were pretty good at keeping the opponent from scoring over 40 points, so we reached our goal. Needless to say, the Rebels did everything they needed to do on the offensive side of the ball as well. Four Rebels scored in double figures, Assi Traore. including Ndoye contributed a doubledouble to DSCs cause. She scored 16 points on 6 of 13 shooting and added 11 Aminata rebounds. Soumare scored 10 points seven collected and rebounds. And Chelsea Brown chipped in 10 points, going 8 of 8 from the free throw line. I feel happy that we won this game, Traore said. I think everything just turned out grea for our team. Hopefully, were ready for the next game. Four games remain on DSCs schedule. The Rebels will now put their conference -- .n m .i FOR OUT-OF-STAT- leading 10-- 2 record (22-- 4 overall) to the test against CEU this Friday at the Burns is at 5.30 p m Arena. Tip-of- f The mens game will follow at 7.30 p m r "t e.ir 1 j STUDENTS E If you started school last fall as a nonresident with the anticipation that you would be a resident by now but are frustrated by the change in residency requirements, the Law Office of Rex H. Huang may be able to help you. am looking to assist a select few students who would be interested in representing fellow nonresident students in a potential class action lawsuit seeking to school year. recover excess tuition for the 2002-200- 3 I Please call to see if you qualify to be represented by an attorney. You will not pay any attorneys fees if you do not receive a recovery. g i |