FASHION AND FOOD AND FAMILY IN THE FORTY-NINER NATION
Conventional wisdom says that the sporting appetite of the home-based 49er fandom should be a measured sampling of the basic athletic groups, you know, games of basketball, tennis, volleyball, softball, baseball, etc. Last week the Niners offered extra portions of all of that stuff and wouldn’t you know this weekend the faithful will starve for local action.
Baseball is feeling a bit chipper after winning a series over Wichita State but travels to the land of chips, Las Vegas, for a three game set with the UNLV Rebels. Softball, successful hosts for their own tourney, visits San Diego again. Men’s volleyball struggles with paradise on a trip to Hawaii and women’s’ water polo goes out to non-paradise, also known as Riverside. The lone local contest is Friday’s 2 p.m. tennis match between the red hot Niners and Nebraska.
By now the basketballs have been returned to the cages and coaches Monson and Wynn have to recruit without their teams bracketed in any of those office pools. Such is life in the Big West. Both sides made serious improvement over the past year. The men have young guns Casper Ware, TJ Robinson and Larry Anderson and the women have, well … 6, 7 or 8 scholarships to lure tall people.
The coming of age for baseball has been the re-discovery of the pitching game; all three starters had bright moments beating the Shockers twice, and the slugging of Joey Terdoslavich who raised his batting average from last on the team at .140 to fifth at .275. The Dirtbags reappear briefly on Wednesday for a non-conference visit with Hawaii at Blair then off to Oregon State for a series the following weekend.
DUST ON MY PARKING PASS- The Big West brass has a new place and a new plan for their post season hoop tourney next year. It will be the Honda Center, lots of parking and no trade show competition. The format will also change, no longer will a team get a two game bye as UCSB did, each of the eight entrants will have to play three times in three days. That might have made a difference in the final results after the Niner men had inspired wins over Cal Poly and Pacific then wobbled at the end of the Gaucho game.
All the TV faces of the 49ers looked good and the fans and band, including cow bells, were perfect. On the court Coach Monson had the Smith Brothers—bearded boys Andrew Fleming and Arturas Lazdauskas and in time outs two his four kids, son McGuire (9) in a snappy suit and, daughter, Mollie (7), with a bright gold whirly skirt. Everybody had some tears when it was over but what a great moment for all concerned.
Wrapping up that NCAA stuff, the tournament selection chair is UCLA AD Dan Guerrero who cut his teeth in athletic admin at UC Irvine. However Dan G couldn’t play any favors for his old Anteaters who released Coach Pat Douglass. Ironically Pat was the man who would be king of the Beach before being passed over in favor of Wayne Morgan. Not a great recruiting class, both are now out of work and ready to share the porch swing at the old coaches home.
And what about the much discussed former 49er coach Seth Greenberg? Now of Va Tech, Seth missed yet another NCAA invite over the weekend and has one eye on his NIT bid and the other on a job opening at St. Johns. St. John's is prepared to give its next coach $1.5 million a year while the Hokies paid a mere $850,000 this season.—DR. DAN
Baseball is feeling a bit chipper after winning a series over Wichita State but travels to the land of chips, Las Vegas, for a three game set with the UNLV Rebels. Softball, successful hosts for their own tourney, visits San Diego again. Men’s volleyball struggles with paradise on a trip to Hawaii and women’s’ water polo goes out to non-paradise, also known as Riverside. The lone local contest is Friday’s 2 p.m. tennis match between the red hot Niners and Nebraska.
By now the basketballs have been returned to the cages and coaches Monson and Wynn have to recruit without their teams bracketed in any of those office pools. Such is life in the Big West. Both sides made serious improvement over the past year. The men have young guns Casper Ware, TJ Robinson and Larry Anderson and the women have, well … 6, 7 or 8 scholarships to lure tall people.
The coming of age for baseball has been the re-discovery of the pitching game; all three starters had bright moments beating the Shockers twice, and the slugging of Joey Terdoslavich who raised his batting average from last on the team at .140 to fifth at .275. The Dirtbags reappear briefly on Wednesday for a non-conference visit with Hawaii at Blair then off to Oregon State for a series the following weekend.
DUST ON MY PARKING PASS- The Big West brass has a new place and a new plan for their post season hoop tourney next year. It will be the Honda Center, lots of parking and no trade show competition. The format will also change, no longer will a team get a two game bye as UCSB did, each of the eight entrants will have to play three times in three days. That might have made a difference in the final results after the Niner men had inspired wins over Cal Poly and Pacific then wobbled at the end of the Gaucho game.
All the TV faces of the 49ers looked good and the fans and band, including cow bells, were perfect. On the court Coach Monson had the Smith Brothers—bearded boys Andrew Fleming and Arturas Lazdauskas and in time outs two his four kids, son McGuire (9) in a snappy suit and, daughter, Mollie (7), with a bright gold whirly skirt. Everybody had some tears when it was over but what a great moment for all concerned.
Wrapping up that NCAA stuff, the tournament selection chair is UCLA AD Dan Guerrero who cut his teeth in athletic admin at UC Irvine. However Dan G couldn’t play any favors for his old Anteaters who released Coach Pat Douglass. Ironically Pat was the man who would be king of the Beach before being passed over in favor of Wayne Morgan. Not a great recruiting class, both are now out of work and ready to share the porch swing at the old coaches home.
And what about the much discussed former 49er coach Seth Greenberg? Now of Va Tech, Seth missed yet another NCAA invite over the weekend and has one eye on his NIT bid and the other on a job opening at St. Johns. St. John's is prepared to give its next coach $1.5 million a year while the Hokies paid a mere $850,000 this season.—DR. DAN
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