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Show ^ ^ ™ DAILY UTAH CHRONICLE SPORTS www.dailyutahchronicle.com Wednesday, March 22, 2006 Beating the weather ritual of putting grass in hisx socks from the back of the end zone, forward UNLV Hoemer's Brett good luck charm is his pink shoelaces, while Bulls guard Chris Duhon sleeps with a basketball on game X / Y / started V V working at The Chronicle last spring, sports editor Joe Beatty asked me to pick out a few fun facts from the Ute basketball media guide for a photo spread Matthew Piper of the team roster. A nice easy task for a rookie re- nights, Ute quarterback Kevin Dunn porter, right? So it seemed. I had settled on listing "Acropo- does everything left-handed—exlis Now" as Andrew Bogut's fa- cept pass. Raptors forward Eric Williams vorite TV show before I read that he had a pet kangaroo and croco- was a top prep baseball player as dile back in his native Australia. I a 6-foot~3 shortstop in his sophomore year of high school, receivwent with it. The next day, Bogut responded ing letters from the San Diego on his Web site by assuring the Padres and Pittsburgh Pirates. national media he didn't actu- He sprouted to 6-foot-8 his junior ally own those ridiculous pets year of high school and started and that he didn't think anybody playing basketball for the first would actually be stupid enough time in his life. to believe his little ruse. ObviousUte volleyball player Amie ly Bogut didn't know me. Tinge/s bio claims that nobody ESPN.com ran a lead story on knows how much she loves Chaptheir home page soon after, which stick. Well, Amie, they do now. TCU tailback Robert Merrill led with an allusion to his joke on me, and the rest is history. Well, enjoys raising turtles and snakes, for Bogut at least. I'm still a goof- while lineman Will Oliver is a big fan of glass collecting. ball college sportswriter. If 6-foot-7,230-pound TCU forNonetheless, I still enjoy browsing through media guides—par- ward Chudi Chinweze could pick ticularly the "personal" sections anybody to play him in a movie, on athletes, where you can always it would be 5-foot~7 Martin Lawbank on finding a few silly tidbits rence, while fellow front-court to make the buffet fly by in the mate Art Pierce would like to have met Ponce de Leon. pressroom. UNLV guard John Sharper's For instance: Charlotte Bobcats guard Brevin favorite quote from coach Steve Knight was named after his moth- Fisher is, "You don't know nother, Brenda, and his father, Mel- ing from apple butter." vin. "Shaquille Rashaun" O'Neal Ron Artest lists Queensbridge means "the little warrior" in Is- legend Mike Chatfield—not Kobe lam. (It seems no prophet was in- Bryant—as the best player he's volved in naming the Diesel.) ever played against. Hornets forBobcat Gerald Wallace has ward J.R. Smith considers Luol not one, but two community Deng his top opponent. parks named after him in native Ute defensive back Brice McChildersburg, Ala. Cain once ran the 100-meter in Tim Duncan wears his practice 10.3 seconds, while receiver Trashorts backward, has a large knife vis LaTendresse won seven Jucollection that includes a 3-foot nior Olympic gold medals in Tae samurai sword and is terrified of Kwon Do. heights and sharks. Many media guides quiz athUte power forward Kim Smith letes on their tastes in entertainshowers before each game— ment, always a favorite section of which is almost as strange as Air Force halfback Justin Handley's See P I P E R Page 10 player Uayne Garrett makes a eaten during a game versus 1 and the Utes knocked off New Mexico State on Tuesday afternoon at SLCC. Pimm leads Utes at Ron Moore Invitational On target Matt Patton Chronicle Writer Shootin' Utes bring home national title . Getting to know athletes a little better "T"T Then I first Baseball victorious against New Mexico State after slow start The Ute baseball team (9-10) made a statement before the weather had a chance to intervene at Cate Field on the campus of Salt Lake Community College on Tuesday afternoon. The U plated five of their first six hitters in the lineup in the first inning to take a 50 lead over New Mexico State that they would never relinquish, holding on to win 6-4. Ryan Khoury sparked the offensive outburst with a leadoff walk, and Bret Baldwin knocked him in with an RBI triple to right field. The Aggies filled the bases with Utes again before pitcher Brian Sizemore walked Jay Brossman and tossed two more wild pitches to make it 4-0. An RBI single from junior Erich Kemp capped off the inning. The Aggies changed pitchers after two-thirds of an inning, and all of the U's early runs were credited to Sizemore. The Utes wouldn't score again until the eighth inning, when Khoury smacked a solo shot to give the U a 6-4 lead. It was his third homer of the season. The senior went 2-3 on the day with two RBIs. Ute junior hurler Lucas Trinnaman allowed just two of NMSU's 11 hits in his four innings of work, striking out two. Freshman Brad DeVore picked up his third save of the year after coining on in relief in the seventh. The second half of the doubleheader that was to make up for Sunday's delayed action was cancelled altogether. Next up for the U is a threegaine road trip against St. Mary's in California. Matthew Piper Media guide madness Joe Beatty Chronicle Sports Editor . After struggling as a team and shooting a miserable 965 (+101) last week in San Diego, the U golf team needed a confidence booster at the Ron Moore Invitational in Goodyear, Ariz., and the Utes got just that. "We were able to knock a little rust off from the last couple tournaments," U head coach Randall McCracken said. Dustin Pimm led all Ute golfers over the two-day tournament, shooting 10-under (206) in three rounds of play at Palm Valley Golf Course. Pimm's strong performance was good enough to tie for a seventh-place overall finish, helping the team to finish with an 8-under (856). The Utes were tied for fourth after ; In an upset over two schools that are accustomed to succeeding in the sport, the Ute pistol team edged out Army and Navy to win the national standard pistol title, one of three events at the 2006 U.S. National Collegiate Pistol Championships in Ft, Benning, Ga., over the weekend. The U team of Ashley Davis, Thomas Fairbanks, Dave Seely and Nicholas Zachman scored 2,103 points out of a possible 2,400 to edge out Navy's 2,100 and Army's 2,096. It was the U's first national pistol championship of any kind. "This has been a long time coming," coach Matt DeLong said. "This is our 12th trip to the national championships and our first team championship." The overall event comprises standard pistol, air pistol and free pistol. While the Utes were victorious in the standard pistol portion, they were edged out in the other two, finishing fifth overall behind Army, Navy, Ohio State and MIT. "It is exciting to compete against the best shooters in the country," Seely said "I am just grateful for the ' chance to be on the team and to shoot with and against the most talented people in the country." Davis posted the best score among the Utes in the standard pistol event The senior music major scored 532 out of 600 en route to earning All-America honors in two events. The only other Ute to earn All-America honors was Zachman, who finished among the top finishers in air pistol. The pistol team, which gets roughly $1,000 from the university per year, is already looking forward to getting back to the national championships next season and putting in another strong showing- Even though they returned on Sunday from Georgia, the Utes were training Monday with an eye toward 2007. "Of course winning a national championship is great," DeLong said. "But we're not resting on our laurels. We're already looking at next year, starting with raising the funding to pay for our trip and making the existence of our program known to U students so we can attract / new talent for next year's team." j.beatty@chronicle.utah.edu TENNIS MONTANA STATE AT UTAH MARCH 23, 2006 5 P.M. @ ECCLES TENNIS CENTER the first day of competition, helped by Pimm's two-round score of 133 (11-under par) and third-place finish. But the team finished with its worst round on Tuesday, which pushed it back four slots to end the tournament. "We had a good first couple rounds but stumbled a little bit today," McCracken said. Sophomore Chris Gresh finished with an even-par (216) performance, as Mike Branca (+2, 218), Chance Cota (+4 220), and Nick Micek (+7,223) rounded out the rest of the Utes in competition. The Utes have been at a disadvantage recently because of the unseasonably cold and snowy beginning to the spring. "When courses are shut down, we're not able to practice the way we need to," McCracken said. "We're able to hit balls at driving ranges, but nothing replaces the ability to go out and play." The University of Louisville went on to win the tournament, finishing 28-under par (836), and the University of Denver's James Love was the top individual competitor with a 17-under (199) finish. The team will get two more tournaments to prepare for the Mountain West Conference Championships at the end of April. "Each individual on the team has things they need to work on," McCracken said. "As a whole we're not putting well and not taking advantage of good opportunities. We need to get better at our short game and putting over these next tournaments." The Utes will be off for two weeks before competing in the Cowboy Classic April IO-II in Scottsdale, Ariz. m.patton@chronicte.utah.edu Boston College upsets No. 1 Ohio St., moves on to play Utes in Sweet-16 WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind.—Boston College made Ohio State the first No. 1 seed to exit the NCAA women's tournament. Kindyll Dorsey set a school record for an NCAA tournament game by hitting six 3-pointers and finished with 24 points, leading eighth-seeded Boston College to a 79-69 second-round upset of top-seeded Ohio State. It was the biggest surprise of the tournament as the Buckeyes (29-3), a much-debated pick for the No. 1 seed, became the first top-seed to lose in the second round since Texas Tech in 1998. Despite getting 21 points and seven rebounds from Big Ten player of the year Jessica Davenport, Ohio State fell one win short of tying the school record for wins in a season. The Big Ten regular-season and tournament champs also saw the nation's longest winning streak end at 20 in the same SWIMMING UTAH AT MEN'S NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS MARCH 23, 2006 ALL DAY @ ATLANTA, GA. venue the Buckeyes have endured much misery over the past 12 years— Mackey Arena. The Eagles (21-11) advanced to the Albuquerque Regional semifinal where they will play Utah. For Boston College, the game had a far different look from its rout of Notre Dame two days earlier. Instead of overpowering the Buckeyes with their strong inside game, Dorsey and Brooke Queenan loosened up Ohio State by hitting from outside and midrange. Queenan finished with 19 points and five rebounds. And the Eagles took control early. They used a 12-2 run to pull away for an early 20-9 lead, and got the Buckeyes offense out of synch. Ohio State rallied with a 13-5 first half run to tie the score at 31, but Boston College finished the half on a 5-0 spurt to take a 38-35 lead. The Associated Press GYMNASTICS TRACK BYUAT UTAH AT UTAH ASU INVITATIONAL MARCH 24, 2006 7 P.M. @ HUNTSMAN CENTER. MARCH 24, 2006 ALL DAY @TEMPE, ARIZ. Boston CoireqeTLTsa watc Debbfe Merrill for a rebound WOMEN'S HOOPS BOSTON COLLEGE VS. UTAH MARCH 25, 2006 9 P.M. & ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. |