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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (March 31, 1997)
Emerald MONDAY March 31,1997 — .~ *.. m«« - mm mm mmm mmmmmmmmm.*.■< < - .. -33CS ' : , - « > UO wrestlers place 14th at NCAA championships ■ CHAMPIONSHIP: Norton ends his ca reer in second place on Oregon’s all time victory list with 111 By Alex Pond Sports Reporter With a pair of fourth-place finishes and all-Amer ican honors, 150-pound Scott Norton and 136 pound Jeremy Ensrud led Oregon to its best finish at the NCAA Wrestling Championships in six years, The Ducks finished in a 14th-place tie with Clari on, their best showing since also coming in 14th in 1991 and just off their best-ever placing of 11th in 1980. “Both [Ensrud] and [Norton] did a terrific job,” head coach Ron Finley said. “This was the best I’ve seen them wrestle all year. I think they represented Oregon and the Northwest very well.” Both Norton and Ensrud suffered tough losses in the third-place match on the final day of the tourna ment, which was held March 20-22 in Cedar Falls, WRESTLING lowa. Norton, who entered the tour nament as a No. 6 seed, secured fourth place with a heartbreaking double-overtime loss to Minneso ta’s Chad Kraft. The first overtime ended in a 1 1 tie, extending the match to a 30 second neDreaK session. Morton won the toss and chose the down position, but Kraft maintained con trol to take the win. Earlier in the day, Norton decisioned Lock Haven’s Mike Rogers 5-0 to earn a spot in the third place match. “I would have liked to come back with a champi onship,” Norton said. “I was right in there and proved I can go with the best of them.” Norton ended his Oregon career with three Pacif ic-10 championships, a personal best 35 wins this season and 111 career victories, putting him second all-time on Oregon’s career list behind Scott Bliss, who had 120. “It was a heartbreaker for [Norton],” Finley said. Turn to CHAMPIONSHIP, Page 14A Arizona looks for first-ever national title ■ NCAA: Tonights championship game will be a battle of quickness pitting Kentucky’s press against Arizona’s guards The Associated Press INDIANAPOLIS — Get the VCRs ready. The pace of the NCAA, title game promises to be so fast you might need to watch it in slow motion to catch it all. Men’s Basketball ■ WHAT: The men's 1997 NCAA championship game ■ WHO: Arizona (24-9) vs. Ken tucky (35-4) ■ WHERE: Indi anapolis, Ind. ■ WHEN: 6 p.m. today ■ WHEN: CBS (KVAL) Channel 8 Kentucky and Arizona are quick. No, they’re quicker than that. The pressure won’t be in trying to repeat as na tional champion, Kentucky’s aim. And it won’t be winning the crown for the first time, Arizona’s goal. It will come Monday night from defenses that live to force turnovers and create easy bas kets. "Our guys like fast-paced games,” Arizona coach Lute Olson said Sunday. “It’s guing tu ue iixu waicmng a tennis maicn, so people better do some neck exercises before they come in tomorrow night." Both teams capitalized on their quick ness to reach the title game. Kentucky is well known for the speed it uses in a va riety of defenses, which forced 26 turnovers in Saturday’s 78-69 victory over Minnesota in the semifinal. Arizona (24-9), the only non-No. 1 seed in the Final Four, made its move in the NCAA tournament with wins over top-ranked Kansas, Providence and Turn to NCAA, Page 20A EMERALD Arizona forward Miles Simon and the rest of the Wildcats will be looking for the their first ever national championship tonight against defending national champion Kentucky. Wildcats prove power of Pac-10 If you would have told someone a month ago that the Arizona Wild cats would be playing for the na tional title, you would have been laughed right out of your friendly tour nament pool. If you would have picked the Wild cats to beat Kansas in the third round of the NCAA Tournament, people would have called you dumber than Dick Vi tale. But you know what? Maybe Dick Vitale isn’t so stupid. And maybe if you picked Arizona to be playing on the first Monday of April, you are now being called a genius. But to supporters of the Pacific-! 0 Confer OPINION i jfltsfc t Ryan Frank ence, Arizona s late-season surge is no surprise. When the NCAA selection committee handed out five invitations to the Pac 10, many experts were calling the com mittee’s decision... well, insane. And those experts’ arguments made sense. The Pac-10 was extremely balanced this year, but not extremely talented. There were some players who donned the national spotlight: Stanford’s Brevin Knight, Arizona’s Miles Simon and UCLA’s starting line-up. But all it took was a quick look at the Big Ten and Atlantic Coast Conference to see where the nation’s powerhouses were. And those conferences did get their representation in the tournament with a combined 10 teams. And both conferences could have got Turn to FRANK, Page 20A Ducks earn 10 NCAA provisional marks at Stanford meet ■ WOMEN: Six Ducks make NCAA provisional qualifying marks in early season loss By Ben Kwasney Sports Reporter It may not have been a win, but in track and field, a win or a loss doesn’t necessari ly tell the whole story. The Oregon women’s track and field team, competing in a triangular meet at Stanford, lost to Stanford in the team com petition, but used the meet to provisionally qualify six athletes for the NCAA meet. UC Irvine also competed. “I think we had several individual ef forts which bode well for the future,” Ore gon head coach Tom Heinonen said. “Sev eral people really stepped up and showed they’re going to be challengers at Pac-10 time, so that’s something to look forward to.” The Oregon distance connection claimed three wins in four races against Stanford’s talented distance corps, which helped the Cardinal win the NCAA team cross country meet last fall. Turn to WOMEN, Page 14A ■ MEN: Four athletes achieve NCAA provisional marks to lead the Ducks to victory in Palo Alto By Alex Pond Sports Reporter The Oregon men’s track and field team wrapped up spring break Saturday with a convincing victory over Stanford and UC Irvine in a triangular meet at Palo Alto, Calif. The Ducks finished with 184 1/2 points, followed by the Cardinal with 148 1/2 and UC Irvine, which managed to tally 51 points. Oregon was led by strong performances in the distance and field events. Leading one of four NCAA provisional men’s efforts, senior Daniel Das Neves cruised to a victory in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in a time of 8-minutes, 54.60 seconds. Oregon’s Rob Aubrey and Micah Davis finished second and third, respec tively. "Today was a good day to run and it could have been an 8:45 type if I would have pushed it.” Das Neves said. “The best Turn to MEN, Page 15A
