Sports Editor:
Adam Jude
adamjude@dailyemerald.com
Wednesday, May 29,2002
Plot
O IS wl Owl
NBA playoffs:
Boston at New Jersey
6p.m., NBC
Oregon track teams begin quest for NCAA title
WOMEN: Pole vaulter Becky Holliday
leads a contingent of Ducks to the
NCAA Championships in Louisiana
By Hank Hager
Oregon Daily Emerald
Track and field is an enigma in the col
legiate sporting world.
For one, there are no major polls that
help determine where schools will com
pete. Oregon isn’t No. 1, nor is it No. 25.
Then you have the 500 or so athletes
who will converge on Baton Rouge, La.,
beginning today. They won’t be caught up
in what the computers say. Instead, they
will let their actions speak for themselves.
The Oregon women, sending five ath
letes to the Bayou, are in prime position to
finish in the top 20 at the meet.
“I’m really happy with the five athletes
we’re bringing to nationals, and they’re
all capable of doing well and scoring,”
head coach Tom Heinonen said. “We
have the chance for a great meet, but it’s
going to take three, four or five of them to
put serious points on the board. It’ll be
our best chance in years to finish better
than in the 50s or 60s.”
Becky Holliday will lead off Oregon’s
attempt to finish better than 60th, the
spot the team placed in 2001. The first
year Duck, ranked third in the nation in
the pole vault, will begin her quest for
an NCAA Championship at 4:20 p.m.
PST today.
Javelin throwers Sarah Malone, Elisa
Crumley, and Roslyn Lundeen will further
Turn to Women, page 12
MEN: Seven Oregon athletes will head
to Baton Rouge to try to preserve the
Ducks’ trend of defying the odds
By Peter Hockaday
Oregon Daily Emerald
Predictability is fickle in men’s track
and field.
The Oregon men should have finished
deep in the middle of the Pacific-10 Con
ference pack at the conference champi
onships two weeks ago. The Ducks should
have finished well below ninth at last
year’s NCAA Championships.
But instead, Oregon took second at the
Pac-lOs and broke the top 10 at the national
meet in 2001.
So this year, the Ducks are hoping to defy
predictability once more at the 2002 ver
sion of the NCAA Championships, starting
today in Baton Rouge, La.
“It doesn’t take a lot of points,” Oregon
hurdler Micah Harris said. “Last year we
were ranked ninth in the country? We
could definitely be top five. The opportuni
ty is there. We just need to capitalize.”
Harris is one of seven Ducks who will com
pete in this year’s national meet. He is joined
by runners Simon Kimata and Jason Hart
mann, vaulter Trevor Woods, hammer throw
er Adam Kriz, decathlete Billy Pappas and
javelin thrower Nick Bakke. Of the group,
only Kriz and Kimata are in action today.
Harris’ words about points ring true. The
top eight positions in each event score points
toward the team score, in descending order.
If three or four of the seven Oregon athletes
Turn to Men, page 12
Family Matters
■Oregon athletes Adam and
Rachael Kriz share their sibling
bond on and off the track
By Peter Hockaday
Oregon Daily Emerald
At the Pacific-10 Conference
Championships two weeks ago,
the high jumper and the hammer
thrower exchanged loud cries across the
mostly silent infield of the Mooberry
Track in Pullman, Wash.
“People were like, ‘What are you
yelling at?’” the hammer thrower said.
Then the hammer
thrower finished the
pesky business of
winning his event
and went over to the
high jump bar,
where he watched
his sister notch a
personal best in her
own specialty.
“Then I go over to
cheer for her, and
they’re like, ‘Oh,
they’re family.’”
Family. Adam and Rachael Kriz, the
Oregon junior hammer thrower and the
Oregon sophomore high jumper, respec
tively, though those definitions hardly
begin to label them. Adam throws discus
and shot put, Rachael dabbles in javelin.
Growing up in Toledo, Ore., both were
multi-sport athletes with a multitude of
hopes for college and beyond.
But Adam is a hammer specialist, and
today he will throw at the NCAA Cham
pionships in Baton Rouge, La. The event
caps a remarkable 2002 campaign for
both Adam and Rachael, the first family
—numbers-wise—of Oregon track.
* ★ ★
Adam and Rachael arrived at Oregon
in entirely different ways. Rachael, ad
dicted to track since the seventh grade,
knew early that she was Eugene-bound.
“My coach was always saying, ‘Well,
the Ducks are known for track,’” Rachael
said. “From then on I kind of kept my eye
on U of O. Then when I hit high school I
was like, ‘I need to go to U of O. ’”
Rachael attended Oregon’s track
camp after the first three years of high
school, sessions that only heightened
her love for Hayward Field. When the
recruiting letter finally came, Rachael
didn’t think, she just signed on with
head coach Tom Heinonen.
But Adam’s trip to Hayward was much
rockier than his sister’s. He was presented
with a choice: face possible rejection as a
walk-on at Oregon, or take a near-sure
scholarship at Southern Oregon.
Turn to Kriz, page 12
Courtesy Washington State Media Services
After winning the Pac-10 hammer throw, Adam Kriz will compete today in the NCAA Championships in Baton Rouge, La.
His sister, Rachael, a high jumper for the Ducks, will be rooting for him from home.
OUS audit shows minor problem with Oregon athletic budget
■Coaching staff for Duck wrestling
have volunteered to pay back
$732 in missing travel funds
By Adam Jude
Oregon Daily Emerald
Oregon wrestling coach Chuck Kear
ney and two of his assistants will reim
burse $732 to the Athletic Department
after an Oregon University System au
dit revealed discrepancies in the team’s
2000-01 travel budget.
Overall, however, University offi
cials said they are pleased with the
findings of the report issued by the
OUS Internal Audit Division, which
investigated the travel budgets of Ore
gon’s 17 athletic programs.
' T‘We were delighted to learn there
were no major difficulties,” University
Vice President Dan Williams said.
Oregon Athletic Director Bill Moos
requested the audit on Oct. 10 after dis
covering that former softball coach Rick
Gamez had misused more than $5,700
of the team’s 1999-2000 travel budget.
Gamez resigned Oct. 1.
No discrepancies have been reported
regarding the 2001-02 Athletic Depart
ment travel expenses.
As part of the audit, OUS officials in
terviewed coaches as well as current
and former student athletes. The review
also included teams’ travel vouchers
and expense reimbursements on per
diem meals.
“I am gratified by the results of the re
view because it shows we have been do
ing a really good job of tracking expens
es,” Moos said in a released statement.
“In a very detailed review of thousands
of expense reports for 17 different ath
letic programs, the reviewers found
only minor discrepancies in one pro
gram. ... The coaches stepped forward
and voluntarily paid $732 to balance
the books.”
The audit revealed inaccurate docu
mentation of daily meal money by the
wrestling coaches. Several wrestlers
told auditors that the coaches had
asked them to sign blank per diem
sheets, the same problem found with
the softball program’s travel proce
dures in an audit last year. The
wrestling coaches, including assistants
Richard Stewart and Jeremy Ensrud,
denied they asked the student-athletes
to sign blank per diem sheets..
Even so, the coaches will balance
the budget.
“Our reimbursement is meant to be
taken as a sign of good faith by all
members of our coaching staff,” Kear
ney said in a statement. “We have and
will continue to work on ways that we
can improve and streamline our proce
dures, not only in travel but in all areas
of our program.”
Williams said miscommunication
between the wrestling coaches
and players may have led to the
disputed budget.
“Even with the best of intentions,
there is room for mistakes,” Williams
said. “That’s not saying it’s OK, but it’s
understandable. ”
The OUS report recommended that
the Athletic Department improve docu
mentation of travel expenses.
E-mail sports editor Adam Jude
at adamjude@dailyemerald.com.