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Home - Sports
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Bye Bye Blatt - |
Royals play last games at Rosenblatt Stadium
By Brandon Vogel
As far as late summer nights at the ballpark go, this one was almost perfect. It was warm at Rosenblatt Stadium, but as the sunset got trapped in the triangles of the Desert Dome behind right field there was just enough chill to remind you that you’ll soon need a sweater. |
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The Jump - |
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How’s this for a first week of the fall sports season? We’ve got the return of Husker football, home openers for UNO football (against in-state rival UNK no less) and Creighton men’s soccer on Saturday night, and the Royals farewell to Rosenblatt. |
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Have A Ball - |
NU Volleyball kicks off ambitious final season in Big 12
By Brandon Vogel
Faced with the move to the Big 10 next season, a potential new home in the Devaney Center and a bold new formation on the court, Nebraska head volleyball coach John Cook said things are definitely changing in Lincoln. |
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The Jump - |
Behold the power of the pen.
About a month ago in this very space, spurred by a fun international friendly featuring the U.S. Women’s National Team, I asked if the time had come for this city to give professional soccer another try.
Last week, news came that the beautiful game was returning to Omaha. This time indoors.
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Enjoy The Greens - |
Cox Classic celebrates 15 years in Omaha
by Brian S. Allen
Dabbling in golf has always been a part of my life. As long as it is cheap and accessible, I’m in. As a kid it started with hand-me-down clubs and par three courses, and during the holidays I was fortunate to hit the greens with my grandfather at private country clubs in Iowa and Florida. In my late teens I inherited another set of hand-me-downs when technology forced the dedicated players (including my grandfather) to upgrade to the next big thing. Think Calloway’s Big Bertha.
Last week, I was able to take my trusty wood drivers with an old, semi-rusty Gary Player signature on them to Champions Run for a golf scramble with the other media types. Thanks to The Reader and Cox Classic it was on the cheap with some delicious Bloody Marys to boot.
This year marks the 15th Annual Cox Classic presented by Lexus of Omaha at Champions Run. If you’re familiar with the tournament you know that it’s not only the premier event on the Nationwide Tour, but also the first big tournament Omaha hosts after the College World Series. |
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The Jump - |
You’d that Anthony Dorsett, Jr. has seen just about everything when it comes to football.
By age 3 his father, Tony, was hoisting the Heisman Trophy. At 5 he saw his dad become a Super Bowl champion. Over the course of his own seven-year NFL career, Anthony played in two Super Bowls. But even that football-heavy pedigree wasn’t enough to prepare him for the 2000 some fans that turned out at Papillion-La Vista High School for the Omaha Nighthawks mini-camp/fan fest last Saturday.
“You don’t usually see this many people come out to watch practice,” Dorsett said.
Welcome to Nebraska. See Ahman Green if you need help navigating this football-mad state.
“Being a native, it doesn’t surprise me,” the former Omaha Central and Nebraska star said of the turnout. This place where 70,000 will show up for the Huskers annual spring game is, after all, home for Green. |
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What a Hoot - |
Inaugural ‘OwL Ride’ to swoop through Omaha
by Ben Coffman
Although pedaling your bike around Omaha at night may sound like a good way to become a hood ornament, Joel VanderVeen, a board member for the Meyer Foundation for Disabilities (MDF), thought it sounded like a pretty good time.
He and fellow board members were looking for ideas for a summer fundraising event. “I traveled to Denver last year for the specific purpose of observing their ride (the Moonlight Classic),” said VanderVeen, an attorney and one of several avid cyclists on the board of directors for MFD, a charity that provides programs for adults with developmental disabilities. “I spent a lot of time with the organizer of the Chicago ride. What we did was look at what was successful in those cities and do what makes sense for Omaha.”
What made sense for the city and its bike community was the Omaha with Lights (OwL) Ride, an event destined to become the largest nighttime group ride between Denver and Chicago. But after having hatched the idea, VanderVeen and his fellow board members needed some assistance for it to take flight. |
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The Jump - |
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As the College World Series rolls on despite the rain, here’s hoping that an enterprising concessionaire will brand some ‘Final Year at Rosenblatt’ ponchos and galoshes, and pay for their kid’s college with the profits … |
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Hard to Say Goodbye - |
A preview of teams at Rosenblatt’s final College World Series
by Adam Froemming
They’ll come this summer from Anchorage and Miami and everywhere in between, all to get a glimpse of a relic. An ancient, slightly rusted but still charming and endearing, relic. They’ll come because it means crossing a life-long goal off their bucket lists. They’ll come because they’ve always watched the games from afar and felt the need to venture to a mid-sized, steak-and-potatoes city on the banks of the muddy Missouri River to see it in person. They’ll come to enjoy a slice of Americana that’s bound to change by June 2011.
They’ll come to watch baseball and witness each of these eight teams battle and claw for a national championship. |
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The Jump - |
No Longhorns, no Tigers, no Tar Heels … Oh, my! What a College World Series it’ll be this year without those long-time participants. Nothing like the DJ changing the songs at the last dance to make it interesting …
Speaking of the College World Series, fans who were among the crowd in June 2005, when Joba Chamberlain, Alex Gordon and the rest of the Husker nine made their last appearance in Omaha, might want to hang onto those memories for a while. It’ll likely be a very long time, if ever, until the boys from Lincoln make it back to the CWS.
With Nebraska’s move to the Big 10 (something I advocate and support 100 percent as both an alumni and sports writer) it means that Mike Anderson doesn’t have to coach in the pressure-cooker that the Big XII is/was, but it also means fans will have to get used to the Huskers being left out of the NCAA Tournament. |
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The Jump - |
That’s a collective sigh that you just heard coming from local college baseball fans. The spring of 2010 has been one to forget if you’re a fan of Creighton, Nebraska, Bellevue or UNO.
Bellevue was forced to forfeit 40 games due to an ineligible player and finished the year with a 2-40 record. The Bruins had charged out to a 35-7 mark and were ranked seventh in the NAIA prior to receiving the news.
On the Hilltop, 24-21 Creighton lost the first game of a three-game set last weekend to Seattle University, a school that is in its inaugural Division I season that left Omaha with a 9-36 record. The Jays hosted Nebraska at Rosenblatt on Wednesday, once the can’t-miss sporting event of the spring that drew crowds in excess of 20,000, now relegated to the back of fans’ minds. |
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The Jump - |
Is Nebraska going to make a move to the Big 10? Taking a look at the big five sports individually (baseball, men’s and women’s basketball, football and volleyball) tells different tales for each sport.
When it comes to baseball, there’s no question the Big XII is superior across the board. With the Husker nine struggling, however, they’d likely immediately challenge for a conference title in the Big 10, as it stands today. The hang-up, however, would be recruiting. In baseball, much like football, you’re recruiting kids from the south. Are those kids going to want to play an early-season series in Ann Arbor or Columbus in March when it’s 40 degrees? More importantly, can playing in the Big 10 help you get back to the College World Series and compete for a national championship? |
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Slam Dunk - |
Hoops legend Abdul-
Jabbar to talk history
by Leo Adam Biga
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the man who made the sky hook and goggles signature parts of hoops iconography, will headline the May 12 B’nai B’rith Charity Sports Banquet at the Qwest Center. Now an author, he is the rare ex-sports superstar who’s applied a social conscience to life after the spotlight.
The Naismith and NBA Hall of Famer was a legend before playing his first collegiate basketball game in 1967. His schoolboy dominance at Powers Memorial in New York City made him the most prized recruit since Wilt Chamberlain. He was so unstoppable at UCLA, when still known as Lew Alcindor, that dunking was outlawed after his sophomore season. He led the Bruins to three national championships. |
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The Jump - |
Down here at the sports office, we’ve already beaten the Alex Gordon horse to death. The once-promising (and lately, oft-injured) third baseman hasn’t quite lived up to the hype that crowned him the ‘next George Brett’ when he was drafted in June 2005. Gordon hasn’t even been the second coming of Joe Randa.
While his stick hasn’t been hopping the last few years, Gordon certainly has taken the ride with his chin up. The former Husker and Lincoln Southeast bopper hasn’t lashed out at the media. He hasn’t gotten into it with fans. He’s taken the past two years in stride. He’s been a pro.
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The Jump - |
And so, very suddenly and unexpectedly, the Dana Altman era has ended at Creighton. Unlike in 2007 when he called the Hogs in Arkansas, Altman isn’t coming back from Eugene, Ore., and his time on the Hilltop speaks for itself.
His arrival in 1994 turned the program around, and breathed life into an alumni base and city that had left the Bluejay program in the dust, jumping on the Nee-basketball bandwagon in Lincoln.
Who can forget the excitement of a packed Qwest Center Omaha cheering the Jays onto one of their many Missouri Valley Titles and numerous NCAA Tournament berths? The program truly reached amazing heights under Altman’s leadership, but he was never able to take the team over the ultimate hump and advance deep into the Dance. |
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The Jump - |
I wasn’t among the 2,111 last Saturday night at the Omaha Civic Auditorium who saw Fargo down Omaha 4-2 and tie up the Clark Cup West Division Finals at one game apiece. I didn’t see Lancer captain C.J. Ludwig’s crushing open-ice check to Fargo’s Corey Leivermann in person, but I watched a video replay of it several times.
Ludwig’s hit, despite earning him a three-game suspension, isn’t anything that fans of the National Hockey League haven’t seen 25 times this year. It wasn’t a vicious, terrible blow. What was unacceptable and inappropriate were Ludwig’s actions following the hit. Taunting the Fargo bench, waving the one-fingered salute and general half-assery is an embarrassment to the team and most importantly, an embarrassment to himself. |
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The Jump - |
Would you have ever guessed that the largest fundraiser for women’s athletics in the country is right in your backyard? If you said ‘yes,’ I need to see if your fingers are crossed behind your back, because for 25 years, the UNO Women’s Walk presented by Pepsi has flown under the radar in Omaha.
The fundraiser drew more than 1,000 participants last year and raised over $300,000 for the Maverick athletic department. Since the first walk was held in 1986 (with 86 participants and $12,000 raised), over $3.75 million has been collected for women’s athletic scholarships at UNO. |
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Royal Expectations - |
KC looks to
feed the pipeline
by Adam Froemming
Throughout much of the 1980s and early 1990s, the Kansas City Royals were a model Major League Baseball franchise. Winning the 1980 American League Championship and the ’85 World Series to go along with a handful of divisional titles, it seemed the club would for years be among the elite in the league. Their roster was dotted with stars including George Brett, Bo Jackson and Bret Saberhagen.
Unfortunately, consistent winning wasn’t in the cards. The departure of General Manager John Schuerholz in 1990 to the Atlanta Braves and the death of owner Ewing Kaufman in 1993 splintered the franchise, and it’s still recovering, with just one winning season since finishing 84-78 in ’93. |
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The Jump - |
And so this week begins the slow (and likely painful) goodbye to Rosenblatt Stadium. We’ll most certainly have more on Omaha’s beloved park later in the season, but saying goodbye is never easy. Despite our emotions, Rosenblatt has outlived its useful life. Sure, it’s a quaint little park that’s nestled into a quiet neighborhood, but it’s also a stadium that was erected in 1947 and is in dire need of being replaced if Omaha wants to hang onto the College World Series and be considered a growing, cosmopolitan metropolis.
This writer will be among the crowd at the ’Blatt Thursday night, saying my farewell to a rusty, hulking shell that holds oodles of my memories, and looking forward to making more in 2011 downtown at TD Ameritrade Park and in Sarpy County at the Royals new home. |
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The Jump - |
First of all, a major pet peeve of mine. With the spotlight suddenly on the Nebraska women’s basketball team, numerous members of the local media have been referring to the squad as the Lady Huskers … it’s Husker women. You wouldn’t call Doc Sadler’s team the ‘Gentlemen Huskers’ would you? That being said …
It would be easy to get caught up in the hyperbole that was the Husker women’s 2009-10 season. Using three-dollar words and piling on the praise is easy to do, and in a lot of respects, very warranted.
After all, this team battled, and won the conference title in arguably the toughest league in the land. They earned the top seed in their region and played a gritty, hard-fought style of basketball that likely left bruises and skinned knees on anyone wearing a scarlet and cream jersey.
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