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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 28, 1976)
“Critical mistakes” lead to Beaver win By GREG STILES Of the Emerald There seems to be a jinx on Oregon’s wrestling team. Not only was Oregon State the opponent Tuesday night at McArthur Court, but the audience came in droves "Everytime we get a big crowd we lose," lamented Fin ley But then he put his finger on the real problem We made some bad mistakes at critical times. OSU dominated the match from the beginning, taking a 6-0 edge after wins by Pat Plourd and Bruce Nishikawa in the 118 and 126 pound matches. Oregon's Shuichi Shoji held off a late charge by Joe Kittel to win the 134-pound bout, 5-3. Oregon State s Dale Thomas was quite pleased about the Beavers' good start They (Oregon) should've won the 118 and 142 matches, said Thomas. The Ducks didn t and their backs were to the wall early Dick Knorr beat ftandy Robin son 6-2 in the 142 match and Doug Ziebart registered a superior decision over Danny Hol lembaek to give OSU a 13-3 lead The Ducks then got something going when Kevin Kramer broke a second round tie enroute to de feating Bob Hess 5-2 in the 158 match. Thomas felt that Oregon’s Randy Besaw was going to win the 167 bout, but he was pleas antly surprised—much to the Ducks' dismay—when Dan Zas toupil escaped in the third round for a 4-4 draw. But Finley felt Besaw blew his chance to win in the second round. “Randy went to sleep for a second and got taken down," explained Finley. Mike Dillenburg locked up the team victory for the Beavers when he topped Tim Strobel, 4-0 in the 177 bracket. I think Strobel s got to be in better shape ..he's still not in top condition," said Finley. Bob Bragg chalked up his 16th win of the season against two set backs in his 6-1 triumph over Lon Haberlach in the 190 clash. Defending NCAA champion Larry Bielenberg then nipped Oregon s Greg Gibson, 2-1, in the heavyweight finale. Bielenberg won the match on riding time. Both of them went a little more to the defensive than they have in the past," said Finley. The Duck coach could only shake his head and count the mis takes. He got his big crowd. Now he wants a win and a crowd in the same night. Photo by Greg Clark Shuichi Shoji decisioned OSU’s Joe Kittel 5-3 at 134 lbs. f 1 Five AD. candidates racing down home stretch Pres. Boyd expects to make his decision by Monday. In the meantime, few are placing bets on who Oregon’s next athletic director will be. V Photo by Greg Clark Will Van Brocklin lead Oregon again? By JOHN HENDERSON Of the Emerald Ever since Norv Ritchey resigned as athletic director last fall, the Feb. 2 goal of naming a replacement was laughed at. How do you find the right person out of 150 candidates in just four months? It appears, however, that the goal will be reached as the last of the six visiting candidates was interviewed by the Search Committee Tues day. When the dust had cleared, five candidates of various backgrounds remained: Norm Van Brock - lin, National Football League Hall of Fame quar terback and Oregon alum; William Cobey, Assis tant Athletic Director at North Carolina; David Hart, athletic director at Louisville; Bob Brodhead, former president and general manager of Port land Thunder and Bob Hicks, assistant athletic director at Indiana. Van Brocklin and Cobey were listed as finalists along with former Iowa A.D. Forest Evashevski by the committee two weeks ago. Evashevski, however, withdrew his name last week. Although Cobey holds the college administration edge over Van Brocklin, many believe The Dutchman” may pack more punch. “The man is nobody's man but his own." said one donor. "He's got a lot of positive things going for him. He's a football man which is what we need. He really knows the pro situation. When a kid is recruited with pro aspirations and meets Van Brocklin. it's bound to help recruiting." A member of the NCAA Hall of Fame and NFL Hall of Fame, Van Brocklin led Oregon to the 1949 Cotton Bowl. In his pro career from 1949-60 he captured league championships with the Los Ang les Rams in 1951 and the Philadelphia Eagles in 1960. He also has abundant coaching and administ ration experience as he coached the expansion Minnesota Vikings from 1961-66 and the Atlanta Falcons from 1968-74. He was general manager of the Falcons from 1969 to 1974. "This job appealed to me for a number of reasons," he said. “One, it's obviously a chal lenge. Two, it's rny school. Three, I think it needs an experienced person who’s been in competitive athletics as much as I have." Despite all the yards Van Brocklin has racked up and all the contracts he's negotiated, he's still a rookie in college administration. He's never held a college position, but feels it shouldn t be a handicap. "The administration of professional athletics is just the opposite of college,” he said. “Money was no issue; I had all the money at my disposal. I had two expansion teams and we had to recruit peo ple. “Money should be no problem here, ‘it's out there, we iust have to qo out and qet it." Although Cobey, 36, doesn’t have Van Brocklin's name, his adminstrative background is impressive. Holding a Masters Degree in Busi ness from Pennsylvania, he joined North Carolina in 1968 and became director of operations in 1971. He spearheaded the largest pre-season football ticket sale in North Carolina history this year. Coming from one of the nation's more success ful athletic programs, Cobey was also impressed with Oregon's success. There's a lot of good things in that athletic department," he said. "They have some good sports programs and good academics. There are a lot of sports going well right now. Football has been down but I hope it can come back." One weak area Cobey may have is his of coach ing experience past high school. But he doesn't forsee any problems. “It's only a hindrance if you want to make it one,” he said. "I was an academic counselor for the football team and I was closer to the athletes than most of the coaches. When we recruited they visited me and we got some pretty good athletes here now." His background is extremely balanced as he coached football at Kentucky, Navy and Pittsburgh. He has a Masters Degree in Educa tion and Administration from Pittsburgh and has been athletic director at Louisville since 1973. Oregon’s strong minor and women sports ap peal to Hart the most; he's labored hard for three years to build Louisville s programs to respectabil ity. “We don't have much emphasis on minor sports but I've raised it to where we give scholar ships," said Hart. "We gave $5,000 worth of women's athletic scholarships last year and we just signed the third best hurdler in the nation to a full ride.” Like Van Brocklin, Brodhead has no experience in college administration but doesn t feel it’s a handicap. "Pro administration is not any different," said the former Cleveland Browns' Vice President. "You still have the responsibility to administer a budget and work with young athletes. Athletes are athletes and I have, a financial background a mile long. I'm an accountant by trade. Hicks has been an assistant his entire career. He was an assistant football coach at Wyoming from 1953-57 and at Indiana from 1957-72. He became assistant athletic director at Indiana in 1973. He said he would prefer to not talk about the situation.
