Editor in chief: Jack Clifford
Associate Editors: Jonathan Allen, Jeff Smith
Newsroom: (541)346-5511
Room 300, Erb Memorial Union
P.O. Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403
E-mail: ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
Tuesday
July 18,2000
Volume 102, Issue 8
Emerald
KEfTW/in^
Funny how one move begets an
other.
On June 30, University of North
Carolina men’s basketball coach Bill
Guthridge announced he was step
ping down after three years as head
coach and 33 years with the Tar Heel
program.
It is doubtful that the move caused
much stir in Eugene.
Then on July 6, University of
Kansas men’s basketball coach Roy
Williams ended week long specula
tion that he would coach at North
Carolina by announcing that he will
stay at Kansas, where he has led the
Jayhawks to 12 straight winning sea
sons.
Again, the city of Eugene hardly
said a word.
Five days later, however, a final
move would be made that would
eventually get this town talking.
On July 11, North Carolina named
former Tar Heel player Matt Doherty
as its coach.
Doherty left behind a team at the
University of Notre Dame that went
22-15 last year and reached the
championship game of the National
Invitational Tournament.
Notre Dame athletic director Kevin
White wanted to act fast on hiring a
replacement and tried to pursue one
of the best college coaches in the
game today.
So he went after our coach, Oregon
men’s basketball coach Ernie Kent.
This time, when the news about
Kent went public on July 12, Eugene
was abuzzing.
Take, for example, a few select
quotes from Oregon message boards
on the Internet last Wednesday night.
“How could he leave us?”
“That trader! He said this was his
dream job.”
“He’s probably after the fame and
money.”
Well guess what folks? You
thought wrong.
Kent proved his love and loyalty
for his alma mater by turning down
the opportunity of more national ex
posure and a higher salary to stay in
Eugene.
“I look at this as a tremendous hon
or for our program and the University
of Oregon to attract attention from a
school of this magnitude,” Kent said.
Kent made it clear that Notre
Dame contacted him, and said that
when Notre Dame calls you have to
listen.
But when will it be seen as an
“honor” to be attracted by Oregon?
The reason Kent is here in the first
place was the decision by former
Oregon coach Jerry Green to bolt out
of town in 1997 to take over the pro
gram at Tennessee. Green used the
school as a steppingstone to bigger
and better things.
When will Oregon stop being a
steppingstone and finally be a desti
nation?
Perhaps that time is approaching
in the next five to 10 years. If Kent
were to commit to Oregon and con
tinue coaching and recruiting at the
pace that he has, odds are his name
would become synonymous with
Duck hoops a la the way Williams is
to Kansas.
But as he alluded to on Friday,
Kent will continue to listen to other
offers from “big-time” schools when
they come calling.
That’s too bad, because with Kent’s
help the Oregon basketball program
could very well be considered “big
time” in the next few years.
So coach, when that phone rings
and there’s some athletic director
from another school on the other end
wishing to speak to you, do what
your heart tells you to do:
Hang up.
This editorial represents the view of the
Emerald editorial board. Responses may be
sent to ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
She has nothing and everything to do with you
Fifteen-year-old Stacie Lyons
should be enjoying summertime the
way most teenagers usually do:
swimming in cool, clear lakes: enjoy
ing the few months of real sunshine:
sleeping until noon or even later; or
just hanging out and being, well, a
teenager.
Instead, Stacie and her tight-knit
group of about 20 friends spend a lot
of their waking hours putting up yel
low ribbons — signifying a safe re
turn — for one friend who isn’t with
them. Leah Freeman, also 15, has
been missing from her Coquille home
since June 28. Coquille is located in
southwest Oregon, about 15 minutes
from Coos Bay.
Leah disappeared while walking
home from a friend’s house and law
enforcement agencies across the state
have been searching for the high
school sophomore.
A pair of shoes believed to be
Leah’s have been found in two sepa
rate Coos County spots, 13 miles
apart, but positive identification of
who owned the shoes has not been
made.
Before you ask yourself, “What
does a story about Leah Freeman
have to do with me, with Eugene or
the University of Oregon?,” think for
a minute. Maybe you have a sister, a
niece, a daughter or even a friend that
age. When a 15-year-old — or any
person who is loved by many — is
missing, the story affects us all.
Stacie first contacted the Emerald
about two weeks ago with informa
tion about Leah, with calls already
made to The Register-Guard and lo
Commentary
Jack
Clifford
cal TV stations. She didn’t know
where this newspaper is delivered or
how many people might actually
read it. That didn’t matter to her, she
said, because Stacie just wants peo
ple to know who Leah is and that she
could be out there somewhere.
Stacie moved to Junction City al
most four weeks ago, and Leah, her
best friend since grade school, was
the last person Stacie saw in Coquille
before she left town.
“I always encourage everyone to
not give up hope until the very end,”
Stacie said Friday, while sifting
through photos of Leah at a Junction
City restaurant.
While going over traits she wanted
to highlight about Leah, Stacie’s de
meanor didn’t change much. The
gravity of the situation is evident
while she talks, but at the same time,
there are glimmers of optimism be
cause Stacie speaks about Leah in
present tense.
“Daisies are her favorite flower,”
Stacie said at first, then listed about
30 other personal characteristics
about Leah. “She loves kids ... Leah
cries whenever she read my poems
... She hates her toes and whenever
she wears sandals, she curls her toes
... She loves to stuff as much food as
possible into her mouth ... She has a
great sense of humor ... She always
has good comebacks.”
It’s when Stacie is talking about the
possibility of a worst-case scenario
that she strays from the optimistic
outlook.
“I don’t even know how to explain
this, but I always knew that I was go
ing to lose a friend, but I thought it
would be in a car wreck,” Stacie said.
“Ever since she’s been gone, I keep -
thinking of the things that we’ve
done. If I see her again, I’m going to
tell her that I love her.”
Sometimes those of us who made
it through our teens relatively un
scathed when it comes to dealing
with trauma forget exactly how much
perception we were actually capable
of back then.
These days, in regards to teens, it’s
so simple on occasion to dismiss
what they may be experiencing as
passing emotions.
“Older people don’t doubt that
there are deep emotions with teens,
but they doubt that we learn from it,”
Stacie said.
Leah’s mother, Cory, has seen the
outpouring of feelings and emotions
from her daughter’s friends. While
Cory can barely talk about the situa
tion without crying, she senses the
impact that this case has had on not
just the Freeman family, but on Sta
cie and her friends as well.
“Everybody loves Leah; it’s impos
sible not to,” Cory said Monday in a
phone interview from her home in
Coquille. “Everybody misses her.”
Police in Coquille immediately
called this case an abduction, Stacie
said. Leah has never run away from
home before, and she wouldn’t let
Description of
Leah Freeman and
contact information
Leah is 5-foot-2,105 pounds, she has
blonde hair, with green eyes and she
wears braces. She was last seen wearing
a white tank top and blue jeans.
Anybody with information can call the
Coquille Police Department at 541-396
2106or396-2114after4pm.Cory
Freeman can be reached at 541-396
4027.
SOURCE; The Freeman family
people worry like this. Stacie even
speculates that Leah knows her ab
ductors, but then again, in a town the
size of Coquille — approximately
4,200 residents — everyone usually
knows everyone else.
That sense of small towns being
safe slips away each time that a Leah
Freeman turns up missing. And the
reality of what awaits Stacie and her
friends in adulthood is just made all
that much clearer.
“I’ve been a lot more careful about
what I do,” Stacie said. But not all in
nocence is lost in these circum
stances. “I’ve also learned to tell peo
ple how I feel about them because it
is really important.”
The Freeman family is offering a
$10,000 award for information that
leads to Leah’s safe return.
Jack Clifford is the Emerald’s editor in chief.
He can be reached at ode@oregon.uoregon.
edu.
Letters to the editor
Candidates offer little hope
At the risk of sounding sycophan
tic toward Bret Jacobson [ODE, July
11], I agree that Al Gore should not
be president. My policy radar, how
ever, is not tracking Jacobson’s logic
when he claims that Gore advocates
a “socialistic, ecologically-driven
agrarian state.” Perhaps I’m suspi
cious of decoys lately ... straw man
arguments. Both major candidates
are easy targets for criticism; Jacob
son busily salutes the flag of private
enterprise, remaining silent about
our dismal options.
He claims that a socialized health
care system would undermine “the
pioneering spirit” and doom our
“prosperous” nation to the fate of our
“European counterparts.” I can as
sure him that life in rich, western Eu
ropean countries (our “counter
parts”?) is just fine — despite 11
percent unemployment. Citizens
there live longer (78 years to our 76),
and more literate (99 percent to our
97) and work fewer hours than U.S.
citizens. Tuition at most German uni
versities consists of a flat fee per se
mester: 160 DM (about $80).
To quote George W. Bush: “Ameri
ca must close the gap of hope be
tween communities of prosperity and
communities of poverty ... You see,
instead of helping cope with their
need, we wrill help them move be
yond it.”
[Ralph] Nader, anyone?
Todd Blevins
Eugene
Baseball binds generations
i, too, remember playing catch with
my son in the backyard on a Septem
ber day in 1998 [“Memories and base
ball are the fields of dreams,” ODE,
July 13]. But it seemed more like an
hour — as there was a lot of “catching
up” and “letting go” to do for each of
us that day. And like the ball that
passed between us, the past was held
onto and then let go, forever linked to
baseball. I just didn’t know that the
flight of the ball would find home
plate 110 miles down the road.
Thanks for remembering and catch
ing me up again on why I like this
timeless game of baseball.
Kyle Smith
Beaverton
EDITOR’S NOTE: Kyle Smith is the
father of Emerald associate editor Jeff
Smith, who wrote the mentioned
commentary.
Quoted
“This is my dream,
and it’s actually
coming true. ”
—Maria Runyan,
who finished third
in theU.S. Olympic
Field Trials. Rum
yan is the first
legally blind ath
lete to ever make a
U.S. Olympic
Team. The Regis
ter-Guard, July 17.
“Welcome
America,’*
—a front page
headline in the
July 13 Philadel
phia Daily News, in
reaction to the
beating of a
African-American
man by a dozen
Philadelphia po
lice officers after a
car chase and
shoot-out. The in
cident occurred af
ter civic leaders
have spent months
preparing for the
GOP convention
duringjuly 31
Aug. 3, The Ore
.gonianjuly 14.
“I have always
gone and picked
out clothes for him
or dragged him to
the store and tried
to get him to do
(something) a little
different. I person
ally get tired of the
blue pinstriped
suit.”
-Tipper Gore, ex
plaining that she
was the one who
persuaded Al&ore
to wear more
brownsandtans
this year. USA To
day, July 17.
CORRECTION
The front page
story “Taylored for
success" (ODE, July
13) misidentified
City Counci lor Bet
ty Taylor’s ward.
She is the Ward 2
City Councilor.
The story a Iso im
plied that Taylor
was actively in
volved in the
protest on June. 1,
1997. Although
she did call and e
mail people in the
days prior to the
event—-and sev
eral people
thought she was
organizing—she
did nothing but
observe the gath
ering on the actual
day.
The Emerald re
grets the error.