Photos by James Link
It came down to ‘gmts9
Some called it the greatest race they’d ever seen. Others hinted it was just the beginning of a bitter
rivalry. ’’I wanted it to come down to who had the most guts,” said Steve Prefontaine after his stretch
run with Oregon State's Ifailu in the 1,500 meters Saturday. Pre won in 3:39.8, his best time. Early in
the race < left) he trailed teammate Kick Kitchie. Both runners trotted around track at finish.
Sweep WSU in twin bill
Ducks battle into tie
By STll ART WATSON
Of lht> Fmerald
Washington State’s Cougars came to town Friday
needing two victories to maintain their slim one
game margin over the Ducks in the hotly contested
battle for first place in the Pac-8 Northern Division
At the conclusion of Friday’s encounter, the
Cougars needed one victory
They didn't gf*t it.
The scrappy Ducks, undaunted by the 19-fi
shellacking administered by WSII Friday af
ternoon, fought back with tenacious defense and
outstanding pitching to set the Cougars back on both
ends of Saturday's doubleheader at Howe Field
Behind the three hit pitching of starter Bob
Claydon and reliever Steve Townsend, the Ducks
outlasted WSU to win the marathon first game 3-2
when Greg Brosterhous lined a shot down the third
base line to score Guy Krause from first
Brosterhous’s double came in the 13th inning of a
regularly scheduled seven inning game, three hours
and 43 minutes after the first pitch. Relief came
quicker in the tense second game. Oregon winning
3 1
Ducks jumped to a 2 0 lead in the first game. That
didn't last long Claydon walked Cougar Scott
Woodward and came face to face with hulking first
baseman Frank Jackson Jackson promptly
jumped on a juicy Cluydon serve and sailed the
pitch over the hedges in right field, much to the
dismay of Guy Krause and 2,000 Duck fans who
could only watch
When the next tlatter, Dave Pyles, was awarded a
base on balls by umpire Harry Sehrieber, Duck
coach Mel Krause verbally vented some of his
frustrations and was quickly given the heave-ho by
Sehrieber
Barry Sbragia w ent the entire 13 innings for WSU,
working Ins way out of bases loaded situations in
the ninth, tenth, and 11th innings He gave up 11 hits
and stranded 10 Ducks along the way.
"You have to give him a lot of credit," said Duck
mentor Krause "He did a fine job I'm just glad we
won"
Krause was even happier after the second game.
Fireballing Mike Slump went the full nine innings to
record his fifth victory against no defeats But it
wasn't easy by any means
On four straight Singh's by Neal. Brosterhous.
McNally and Dean Roberts. Oregon tallied two
runs to take the lead in their half of!he seventh Guy
Krause iced the cake with a solo homer to right in
the eighth WSU starter Larry Angell gave up all
three runs
Not a team to give in easily, the Cougars forced
the game down to the final out. With men on first
and second and two outs, Shoup served seven
straight fouls to Steve Merkley before getting him to
line out to Krause in right.
“I’m very pleased It’s a credit to the character of
the ball club to come back after a bad defeat and
win two close ones,” said Krause after his Ducks
had finally caught and tied the Cougars for the
Northern Division lead Both teams have 11-4
records
“Our pitching has been improving lately With
good pitching like we had today, we can compete
with anybody,” Krause said
“It really helps when different guys start picking
up for us. Guy (Krause) had a couple good throws
and Roberts (Dave) made some great plays in spite
of the sore elbow."
Krause was referring to the three runners his son
in right field threw out at the plate. In regard to
Dave Roberts who was hit by a Sbragia pitch in the
first game, bruising his left elbow, Krause said.
"We had to keep him in. The elbow was bruised but
no bones were broken that we could see. He couldn't
sw ing the bat real well, but he's too valuable in the
field to take out”
Duck catcher Artie Salveson was also injured a la
Pete Rose and Ray Fosse. WSU’s Merkley collided
with Salveson in a play at the plate
"Artie took a bad bump He didn’t really know
where he was for awhile," Krause said Neal took
over behind home and was replaced at first by
McNally
What does Krause think of next week's meetings
with DSP” "They’ll be up for the game. We can’t
slough off for them or they’ll beat us. At this stage of
the game, we can’t afford that," he said
The Ducks have three games left with the
Reavers while WSF has three remaining with
Washington. If both Oregon and WSU sweep their
upcoming series, as is expected, what will be dixie
atxiut the tie for first place”
"There's nothing in writing about a playoff." said
Krause, "but we ll probably have one No one really
knows right now "
Is Krause looking tow ard a meeting with Southern
Division Champ CSC” No. he says "We’ve got to
win this one first That's enough to think about for
awhile "
Pre staves
off OsU’s
Hailu
By BOB BAUM
Of the Emerald
Name the biggest sports mismatch in the Pacific-8 Conference
this year.
No, it wasn’t Oregon vs. UCLA in basketball or Steve Prefontaine
against anybody at three miles, but it happened Saturday afternoon
when Oregon’s track team amassed all its forces, aimed them at
Bernie Wagner’s fledging spikers from Oregon State, and trotted
through a 117-37 dual meet win, the most thorough trouncing the Ducks
have ever given the Beavers.
Wagner said the Ducks came to compete, he might have added
that the Beavers didn’t. Oregon won every event but one (5,000
meters) and swept the 100 meters, 200 meters, 440 yards, 800 meters,
and the discus.
Luckily, for the crowd anyway, Wagner decided what the hell and
entered OSU’s middle-distance sensation Hailu Ebba in the 1,500
meters against Prefontaine. The result was one of the best races ever
produced at Hayward Field.
Pre said he had keyed himself on running against Hailu all week,
even though Wagner had insisted the Ethiopian would run the 800
meters.
“I planned on it coming down to who had the most guts, not who
hadthe most speed,” Pre said, “That’s the kind of race I like.”
Pre followed his plan to the letter, setting a fast pace, running the
first half mile in 1:57. Hailu im de his move with about 300 yards left,
pulling outside.
Down the backstretch the two battled shoulder-to-shoulder with
the veteran from Coos Bay keeping Hailu farther outside than the
young Ethiopian wanted to be.
Hailu’s kick wasn’t enough as Pre staggered the last 50 yards to
pick up the victory in 3:39.8, good enough to break Morgan Groth’s
eight-year-old field record.
“When he started sprinting at 300 yards, I knew if he wasn’t going
to go by me there he wasn’t going to go by,” Pre added.
Hailu was upset with Pre’s tactics in the race, and aimed for a
rematch between the two in the Pac-8 meet in Palo Alto in two weeks.
“You are racing, you’re not fighting. That’s just one of the tricks
he (Pre) uses. Down the back stretch I had to run in the third lane
where as I could have ran in the second,” Hailu said.
Next time the two meet, the OSU sophomore said, “I’ll have to use
different strategy.”
After the 1,500 meters, and Ivory Harris’ first win ever over
Lowell Harris in the 110 meter high hurdles, the crowd started to
dwindle, evidently an extra-inning baseball game at Howe Field has
more interest than a slaughter on Urethane.
Shot putter Pete Shmoek, upset about rumors that he had reached
his peak, topped his previous best effort by almost a foot with a heave
of 66-5‘4.
“Rumor had it hat I had peaked, that my last throw was the end of
my capabilities. I knew I hadn’t,” Shmoek said.
Bouncy Moore leaped 26-5a4 with an assist from the wind to lead a
one-two finish for the Ducks in that event Moore had three jumps
better than 26 feet.
Steve Bence, deprived of a showdown with Hailu at 800 meters, led
the complete Duck domination at that distance. Bence toured the
track at 1:49.8 just aheadof Wes Smylie at 1 49.9 and Mike McClendon
at 1:50.5.
Russ Francis has had it with the pressures of big-time college
athletics. “I’m just going out and try to have fun throwing the javelin
again." the big freshman ace said after he threw his season’s best of
241 7 Saturday
Marty Hill ou'duelled OSU’s Tom Woods in the high jump and
Tinker Hatfield set a new Frosh record in the pole vault at 16-1 in
keeping with the total Duck domination that prevailed
Golfers win 2 meets;
netters lose to OSU
While Jack Adler's golf team
was winning two tournaments,
the Oregon tennis team ran into a
brick wall over the weekend.
The golf squad won the Eastern
Washington Invitational tourney
in Spokane on Friday, then took a
two-day meet at Moscow, Ida
which concluded Sunday.
Buzz Summers and the Duck
netters had their troubles Friday
in Corvallis The Beavers, who
had already beaten Oregon tw ice,
romped to an easy 8-1 win
Only Rick Wilson was able to
get a victory that came in his
singles match with OSl"s Roger
McKee Duck ace Mark Weir was
upset by Jim Kuenzili.
Doug Roxburgh and Don Smith
had two day totals of four-over
par 146 to lead the Ducks to the
team crown at Moscow Oregon
had .Jo strokes to 756 for
Washington State. 759 for the host
Vandals, and 777 for Montana
Friday Smith had a closing
round 69 to lead a 17-shot victory
in the Eastern Wash meet. Going
into the last day of play, the
Ducks had trailed Washington by
iwostrokes They ended up with a
two-day 713 stroke total to 730 for
the Huskies