©regon^JEmeraU)
TUESDAY
Oct. 13,1998
Best Bet
Major League Baseball
Cleveland at New York
5:08 p.m., NBC
Oregon vs. Portland
wgwjga? T i ^ i. .
Matt Hankins/Emerald
After scoring on Oregon State last Friday, foiward T.J. Johnson will look for another goal against an in-state rival today at Portland.
Ducks challenge unbeaten Pilots
Oregon will try to hand No. 7
Portland its first loss of the season
at3p m. today atMerlo Field in
Portland
By Tim Pyle
Oregon Daily Emerald
With its prolific success, Portland has
placed the Northwest on the collegiate
soccer map.
Meanwhile, Oregon is in just its third
season on the women’s soccer land
scape.
So today’s 3 p.m. nonconference
match against the No. 7 Pilots (9-0-2
overall, 1-0 West Coast Conference) at
Merlo Field in Portland represents a
measuring stick of sorts for the Ducks (4
3-2,1-0 Pacific-10 Conference), who will
be finding out where they stand com
pared to the region’s elite program for
the first time.
“For us it’s great to
go up and experience
playing a team of that
level,” Oregon head
coach Bill Steffen
said. "I think Port
land’s been a great
role model in the sense that they’ve been
very successful.”
Successful may be an understatement.
The Pilots had advanced to three
straight NCAA Tournament Final Fours
until they were upset in the first round
by UCLA, 1-0, last season.
Head coach Clive Charles is third
among active NCAA Division I-A
women’s soccer coaches with a winning
percentage of .806. He also coaches the
Portland men’s team and served as an
assistant coach for the U.S. men’s World
Cup team last summer in France.
This season, the Pilots have outscored
their opponents 31-5 and have only
been denied a perfect record by road ties
at Virginia on Sept. 25 and at Nebraska
on Oct. 9.
“They’re very intelligent players,
and they’re also very good players,”
Steffen said, before noting that Port
land has been reduced to two substi
tutes in recent games because of in
Turn to SOCCER, Page 12
Basketball fan
disappointed by
greedy players
My first glimpse of the NBA came to me
in the fourth grade when I won a pair of
tickets to a Portland Trail Blazers game. I re
member sitting maybe 15 rows behind the
basket, awe-inspired by the seven-foot tow
ers who were battling in the paint.
From that moment on, 1 was hooked on
basketball.
I think I became interested in the sport
just in the nick of time, be
ucium; i gui iu sue many great
athletes whom I will some
day tell my kids about. Who
could ever forget the re
spected rivalry between Lar
ry Bird and Magic Johnson,
or the rough play of Bill
Laimbeer and the Detroit
Pistons?
Michael Jordan graced the
nation with his aerial ma
neuvers, and local heroes
like Clyde Drexler and Terry
Opinion
Scott
Pesznecker
i unci pui rurutuiu un uie map.
Who could forget watching the Dream
Team playing in the Olympics in
Barcelona? Simply watching the medal cer
emony — with the NBA’s greatest basket
ball players standing together atop the
podium of victory — was an experience 1
will never forget.
Yes, a few years ago basketball was head
ing in the right direction, and as I sit and
think about that golden age of basketball
legends and world-class athletes, only one
question comes to mind.
What went wrong?
Typically at this time of the year, 1 am
ready to listen to the Trail Blazer preseason
games on the radio, but not this year. And
that is hard to accept for a person like me.
I love basketball, and ever since 1 attend
ed that game in fourth grade, I have loved
the NBA. But something has happened in
the world’s most exciting game that has
made it more frustrating than fun.
Perhaps the problem can best be exposed
by talking about an experience that my old
er sister had. She was at a party near the
Oregon State campus when she ran into
one of the basketball team’s star players.
Like myself, my sister is an avid basket
Turn to PESZNECKER, Page 12
ESPN’s Gameday will broadcast from Rose Bowl Saturday
The Oregon
UCLA game
will mark
College
Gameday’s
first regular
season
broadcast
from the West
Coast
By Rob Moseley
Oregon Daily Emerald
The No. 11 Oregon football team (5-0
overall, 2-0 Pacific-10 Conference) travels to
Southern California to face No. 2 UCLA this
Saturday for one of the biggest games in the
history of the program.
The game’s importance has apparently not
been missed by the rest of the country. ESPN’s
College Gameday, which since 1993 has trav
eled to the site of the nation’s best game of the
week, will be on hand for its first-ever regular
season broadcast from the West Coast.
“We try to be at the best game every week,
and this is one of them,” ESPN communica
tions coordinator Dean Diltz said. “After
both teams beat up on their opponents this
weekend, it solidified the pick.”
Last weekend, the Ducks downed Wash
ington State, 51-29, in Pullman, while the
then-No. 3 Bruins defeated Arizona, 52-28,
in Tucson.
Diltz said the network’s staff makes lists of
about eight games from each week before the
season begins, then shortens the list as
teams lose and games become less attractive.
“We knew UCLA would be tough, and we
have people who live and breathe the sport who
thought that Oregon could be good,” Diltz said.
Due to various circumstances, the Oregon
UCLA matchup has been the only game con
sidered for this week
end by ESPN for “a
couple of weeks," Diltz
said. Had either team
lost over the past two
weeks, Gameday would
have been broadcast
from its home in Bristol,
Conn., he said.
It will actually be the second trip west for
the crew, as Gameday was based at the Rose
Bowl for the postseason classic in January.
The producers considered traveling to Seat
tle for last season’s Nebraska-Washington
contest, but another game was deemed more
attractive, Diltz said.
This weekend may actually be the start of
a trend, Diltz said, as the Ducks’ Halloween
night matchup with the Wildcats is still un
der consideration as a host site by Gameday.
“It’s a slim possibility [after the Wildats’
loss to the Bruins), but it’s there,” Diltz said.
As for the Washington State game, the win
was filled with many ups and downs for Ore
gon, particularly for defensive end Terry
Miller and wide receiver Damon Griffin.
Miller put on a show in the first half, sack
ing Cougar quarterback Steve Birnbaum
three times, one more than he had recorded
in the rest of his career.
“1 was really fired up for this game, being
from Washington and all,” said Miller, a na
tive of Vancouver. “I had some family here
and was really excited for this game, and
that, combined with being in the right place
at the right time, did it for me. ”
A former walk-on, Miller moved from
fullback to end in the spring of 1997 and
ended up starting the final eight games of
Turn to FOOTBALL, Page 10
(( We try to be
at the best
game every
week, and this
is one of
them D
Dean Diltz
ESPN communications
coordinator