Best Bet
Tennis: Wimbledon,
Early Rounds
Noon, TNT
Sports
Tuesday
June 27,2000
Volume 102, Issue 3
Emerald
Stars shine at the Prefontaine Classic
Azle Malinao-Alvarez Emerald
It was tough to tell which athlete with the initials MJ. was more impressive on Saturday. Marion Jones pulled off the double in the 100 meters and
long jump, while Michael Johnson set a meet record with his 400 meter time of 43.92.
A taste of track life at the Pre
Hayward Field fans
are not
disappointed with
spectacular marks
and sunny skies at
the 26th
Prefontaine Classic
Grand Prix
By Robbie McCallum
for the Emerald
Future and former Olympians
left their mark on Hayward
Field Saturday at the 26th annu
al Prefontaine Classic Grand
Prix.
Overall, seven meet and field
records fell, with four of those
belonging to women.
Although the meet was just a
stepping stone to the Olympics
for some athletes, their perform
ances were enough to dazzle the
12,508 fans on hand'at the Clas
sic.
Highly touted as one of the
best head-to-head matchups of
the meet, the 1,500 meter run
did not disappoint. Romania’s
Gabriela Szabo edged former
Eugenean Suzy Favor Hamilton
by six-hundredths of a second
to obliterate the previous meet
record by six seconds.
Szabo’s time of 4 minutes,
0.73 seconds is the fastest in the
world this year. Favor Hamilton
led for the entire race until the
last few meters, stumbling at the
finish line. Szabo drafted off of
Favor Hamilton, who cut the
strong breeze on the backstretch
of the track.
“Coming within an inch of
the world best is not too bad,”
Favor Hamilton said. “I’m real
Turn to Classic women, page 6
Olympic hopefuls
flood Hayward Field
in hopes of
establishing
themselves as the
best of the best at
the Prefontaine
Classic
By Jeff Smith
Oregon Daily Emerald
There Michael Johnson sat.
On a bench, beneath a tent
with a herd of media circling
around him in every direction.
It was only moments after
Johnson had captured the men’s
400 meters with a time of 43.92
seconds, but the voice was calm.
The breathing easy. The sweat
barely visible.
His cheeks had hardly moved
during his race as his calm na
ture made it tough to realize
how fast he was actually going.
His time was fast enough to
establish a new Prefontaine
Classic meet record, but Johnson
insisted that meet records don’t
mean much to him.
“I’m not really concerned
about the records,” Johnson
said. “At this point, it’s all about
the Olympics.”
Indeed, that was the theme of
the 26th annual Prefontaine
Classic Grand Prix at Hayward
Field on Saturday.
“The Olympic Trials is some
thing totally different from any
thing you’ll ever experience,”
said Allen Johnson, who won
the 110 meter hurdles with a
wind-aided time of 13.28 sec
onds. “There is so much pres
sure and so many people put so
Turn to Classic men, page 8
Emeralds just
short of a win
against Yakima
■ Despite losing a tough one-run game on
Monday, the Ems look much improved from
a season ago and treated their fans to a
home-opening9-3 win on Sunday
By Jeff Smith
Oregon Daily Emerald
The young Eugene Emeralds
are learning an important les
son one week into the 2000 sea
son.
Baseball is a day-to-day
game.
One day you can totally dom
inate a team — as the Emeralds
(3-4) did to the Yakima Bears on
Sunday evening, winning 9-3
in its home opener.
And then the next, you can
commit six errors and fall to the
same team by a count of 5-4, as
the Ems did on Monday night.
The loss prevented Eugene
from going over the .500 mark
this late in the season for the
first time since 1996, and im
proved Yakima to 4-3.
“The hard part about this is
that these kids think we expect
them to be perfect,” manager
Danny Sheaffer said. “And we
don’t.”
Sheaffer has been around the
game long enough to know that
one loss will not ruin a season,
and said he sees this as an im
portant part of their maturity as
players.
“Hey, guys are going to make
mistakes,” Sheaffer said.
“We’ve got to bounce back from
that. It’s all a part of the learning
and part of the development of
these players.”
But even with having more
errors than runs, the Ems still
gave themselves a chance to
win in the ninth, trailing 5-3.
Ems reliever Scott Tranchina
came on in the ninth and con
tinued his stellar pitching thus
far in the season by shutting
down the Bears one-two-three
—all strikeouts.
Things didn’t start off well in
the bottom of the ninth as Ems
right fielder Nic Jackson went
down on strikes. But catcher
Yoon-Min Kweon woke up the
faithful 2,105 ferns on hand by
fouling off two pitches and then
earning a base on balls. The
speedy Sam Cooper immediate
ly pinch ran for Kweon.
Blair Barbier, who had pinch
hit for Jeff Felker earlier in the
game, proceeded to hit a lazy fly
ball that appeared to be the in
ning’s second out. But Yakima’s
Candido Martinez lost it in the
Civic Stadium lights, putting
Cooper at second and Barbier at
first.
Then the crowd was given
even more hope of a comeback
when Yakima pitcher Gregory
Bauer’s wild pitch put runners
at first and third with only one
out. Brandon Sing lined one tc
center, but this time Martinez
Turn to Emeralds, page 8 saw
Eugene
notables
Centerfiedler
Michael Mallory:
2-for-5 on Sunday
with an RBI and 1
for-4 on Monday
Leftfielder Peter
Graham:
2-for-3 on Monday
Third basemen
Blake Barbier:
a combined 2-for
3 on Sundayand
Monday
Pitcher Wilton
Chavez (2-0):
6 innings pitched
on Sunday, three
hits, one run, one
walk, six strikeouts
Catcher Yoon-M in
Kweon:
2-for-5on Sunday
with an RBI
Third basemen
Brandon Sing:
2-for-2on Sunday
with 2 RBI
First basemen Jeff
Felker:
2-for-5on Sunday
with an RBI