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GAME SCHEDULE POMTAPT TN BASEBALL vs. Duquesne, 3 p.m. Friday LCW i 1 U O MEN’S AND WOMEN’S TRACK at USC Invitational, Saturday Story ideas? Questions? Comments? MEN’S BASKETBALL at Georgia, 2 p.m. Saturday E-mail us at gamecocksports@hotmail.com WOMEN’S BASKETBALL vs. Auburn, 3 p.m. Sunday «< Gamecocks extend streak PHOTO BY MARK BISSET/THE GAMECOCK Tony Kltchings takes a free throw during the Gamecocks’ win over Tennessee. Kltchings led USC with 21 points and eight rebounds. I I Tennessee co } BY NICK YOUNG THE GAMECOCK Coming into a rematch with red-hot Tennessee, the USC men’s basketball team had one goal in mind: contain UT su perstar Ron Slay. And at the game’s most im portant stage, they achieved that goal and won the game 77 63. Tennessee was coming in on a seven-game winning streak, its longest in two years. Carolina came in on a streak of its own, winning three in a row, two of which were SEC match-ups. Carolina (11-11, 4-7 SEC) started the game off with a 9-0 run opened by a Kerbrell Brown 3-pointer and capped by Rolando Howell’s dunk. Tennessee (15-7,7-4) then an swered with a run of its own as it went on a 12-3 streak, with four of the Volunteers’ points scored by C. J. Watson. “I think our early start was a key,” Carolina coach Dave Odom said. “You teach your team that you get off on a lead like that, and though you want to try and keep the lead, reali ty tells you that they’re going to come back and the water’s going to level out. “You have to guard against deflation when that happens, and I felt that we did a really good job of that.” After nine minutes of play, Slay finally scored his first bas □ ket of the night on an easy layup. Near the end of the half, when Tennessee was leading 27-26, _ „ Carlos Powell Powell , and Tony Kitchings de cided to take matters into their own hands. Powell hit two 3 pointers and Kitchings added four points to end the half with a 10-1 run and gave USC the lead at 36-28. “It was a hard-fought first half,” Odom said. “I thought a key was at the end of the half, when we were up 31-27, and then we took it up to eight points at the half.” Things continued the Gamecocks’ way in the second half, as they opened with a 16 3 surge. Kitchings, who also had eight rebounds, led the run with seven points. Kitchings, an Aiken native, played a big role in putting the game away; he scored 21 points for the Gamecocks. A little more than four minutes into the second half, he blocked an attempted Slay layup. Five seconds later, he did it again as Slay tried to dunk the ball. Moments later, a frustrated Slay received a technical foul after arguing a call with the referee. Many factors played a large role in the containment of Slay, but the main factor was Howell. “Rolando Howell drew the majority of the charges on try ing to contain him. I don’t think anyone ever stops him,” Odom said. “I think Ro would be the first to tell you that he had a lot of help from his friends tonight,°but Ro did the bulk of the work.” One of those friends was Kitchings, who played weak side defense and often would rotate to help whoever was guarding Slay. Slay finished the game 10 for-24 from the floor and scored 23 points. Sixteen of them came after South Carolina went ahead 52-31 with 14:35 remain ing in the game. Carlos Powell and Chris Warren scored 17 and 14 points, respectively, for the Gamecocks. Carolina’s next game is on the road against Georgia in Athens on Saturday. Tip-off is at 2 p.m. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail. com Baseball needs to regulate drug use SHAWN ROURK GAMECOCKSPORTS@HOTMAIL.COM League should get a clue after pitcher’s death. It is apparent that the days of athletes eating raw eggs and malt ed milkshakes to beef up or eating salads and fruit to lose weight are over. Monday morning, Baltimore Orioles pitcher Steve Bechler died of complications because of a heat stroke he suffered during spring training in Florida. His death, al though tragic, should bring about many changes in Major League Baseball’s drug policy. It seems that intervention in this case, like many other cases in this country, will have to come after someone loses his life. Although toxicology reports won’t officially be released for a few wee'ks, medical examiners said they think Bechler was tak ing the drug Xenadrine, an over the-counter weight-loss supple ment that contains ephedrine. Ephedrine speeds of the heart rate and makes the body unable to cool itself. It has been banned by several organizations such as the NFL, NCAA and the International Olympic Committee. So the ques tion is, why isn’t It banned in MLB? Don’t you think the MLB would have gotten a clue from the other leagues? After the NFL and the NCAA lost players because of ephedrine use, one would think that someone in baseball would go: “Hmmm, maybe we should ban this substance.” The Major League Baseball Players Association, however, has . been steadfast against any drug testing for such drugs as ephedrine. In an interview with Baseball America magazine about drug use in the league, union head Donald Fehr said the players association needs to see what it needs to do concerning random testing of players and whether or not it is needed. Not needed? It’s obvious that it is needed. How many more people have to drop dead before they’ll get the point that random drug test ing is needed? The average salary for a baseball player is close to $1 million. I think that for that much money, many people would be happy to urinate in a cup. It doesn’t seem like that big of a deal, really, when the kid down the street has to do the same thing and he works at McDonald’s. The point is, players are grown men and should be able to make these decisions for themselves. But because they cannot, the league should put programs in place that would clean up the game and protect its players from themselves. Frankly, I think the league should hit the players over the head with a rolled up newspaper and say, “No.” Then, they should rub the players’ noses in the drugs like they are training a dog. Maybe then they would get the point. Rourk is a first-year print journalism student. * Odom pleased with USC’s success, but not satisfied BY BRAD SENKIW THE GAMECOCK A week and a half ago, the USC men’s basketball team seemed to be at its lowest point in years. The team had lost seven straight games going into the Vanderbilt game, and a 14-point thrashing of a streaking Tennessee team was not on their minds. Fortunately for the m, Gamecocks, they got just that on Wednesday night. Carolina has won its last four games by an average of 12.5 points per game over Vanderbilt, Clemson, Arkansas and the Vols. USC head coach Dave Odom was happy with the team’s per formance, but thinks improve ment is still needed to keep the winning streak going. “I’m very, very pleased we beat a good team tonight,” Odom said. “I thought we did it with style and class. Three wins is not something ‘SportsCenter’ is go ing to focus on. But our team is playing better. I’ll be the first to tell you that. I don’t think it’s anything to be amazed at.” Odom expects the Gamecocks |rto play even better against • Georgia on Saturday and says practice and time have gotten the team together. “I think it was in us all along. It was just a matter of getting everybody together. We’re doing what we are supposed to be doing right now. We are not doing any thing exceptional,” Odom said. The goal now for Odom is to show his players what they did right and what they need to work on. - “You want to keep them moti vated,” he said. “You want them to know that you’re pleased, but there is a huge difference be tween being pleased and satis fied. I certainly am not satisfied. We didn’t finish the game like we really wanted to.” Much of Carolina’s improve ment over the last few games can be credited to Chris Warren’s performances coming off of an in jury. After returning with a slow start against Kentucky and LSU, Warren has scored in double fig ures during the four-game win ning streak, averaging 16.3 points per game during that span. “I’m just playing every game like it’s my last,” Warren said. “It’s my last year, and I’ve got nothing to hold back. It’s been working out for me.” Warren also thinks winning has become easier because of team play. “We are just moving the ball better, sharing the ball. We don’t care who scores or how many points guys are scoring. We just care that the Gamecocks are win ning at the end of the 40 min utes,” Warren said. Tony Kitchings is another se nior that has picked up his play as well. In the last three home games, Kitchings has scored 48 points, including 21 points against Tennessee. Carlos Powell broke out of a mid-season shooting slump against the Vols, going 7-for-15 and scoring 17 points, including two big 3-pointers. Carolina has had four players scoring in double figures in three out of the last four contests. USC has done this by focusing less on the 3-pointer and putting the ball in the hands of their post players. After what looked to be a ter rible season, the Gamecocks are slowly turning it around. With two tough games coming up against Georgia and one each against Florida and Vanderbilt, USC knows what it needs to do to keep the winning going. “We take them one game at a time,” senior guard Chuck Eidson said. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail.com SPORTS CHALLENGE THE CHALLENGE: Matt Brad Jill Johnny Shawn David The Gamecock’s readers and Rothenberg Senkiw Martin Haynes Rourk Anderson staff test their sports knowledge Sports Asst. Sports Editor in Photo Page Reader of with predictions of the Editor Editor Chief Editor Designer the Week weekend’s games. (Rankings (33-17) (34-16) (33-17) (33-17) (31-19) (35-15) are from the Associated Press.) 3 Texas at 16 Oklahoma State Texas Texas Texas Okla. St. Texas Okla. St 6 Kansas at 5 Oklahoma Kansas Kansas Kansas Kansas Kansas Kansas 14 Xavier at 25 Dayton Xavier Xavier Xavier Xavier_Xavier Xavier Fresno State at 17 Creighton Creighton Creighton Creighton Creighton Creighton Creighton Mo.-K.C. at Oral Roberts_ORU ORU UMKC ORU UMKC ORU_ 19 Miss. St. at 2 Kentucky Kentucky_Kentucky Kentucky Kentucky Kentucky Kentucky •Alabama at TennesseeTennessee ^Tennessee_Alabama Tennessee Alabama Tennessee Auburn at Ole Miss_ Ole Miss Auburn _Auburn Auburn Auburn Auburn Florida State at Clemson Clemson Clemson FSU FSU FSU_Clemson USC at 22Georgia Georgia Georgia use USC USC Georgia 73-64 69-63 68-65 76-75 72-64 75-67 lam WEEK’S WINNER: Corey Garriott (6-4) - Garriott, editor of The Mix, barely escaped with the win this week, pulling the tiebreaker over Reader of the Week Heather Simmons, who also finished 6-4. Simmons lost because she predicted USC to win by three points, while Garriott said the Gamecocks would win by five points. Matt Rothenberg was denied victory, after all, and he finished in a four-way tie for third place with Brad Senkiw, Jill Martin and Page Designer Staci Jordan. The Reader of the Week has now pushed ahead for the overall lead. WANT TO BE READER OF THE WEEK? E-mail your selections next week to gamecocksports@hotmail.com. If you'te picked and have the best record, you’ll win a’free Gamecock T-shirt and be able to talk all the trash you want. Harris lifts Carolina over the Bulldogs BY SHAWN ROURK THE UAMECOCK Justin Harris’ 4-for-5 perfor mance lifted 12th-ranked South Carolina over the struggling Citadel Bulldogs on Wednesday at Joe Riley Park in Charleston. Harris hit a two-run homer that started a four-run third in ning, after Kevin Melillo drew his only walk of the game to lead off the inning. Two RBI doubles by Nick Gardiner and Bryan Triplett gave the Gamecocks a comfortable lead for the re mainder of the game. USC (5-1) added two more rims in the top of the fifth inning when Hank Parks hit a single to center field and batted in Landon Powell and Trey McDaniel to put USC up 6-3. The Gamecocks added one more in the sixth to give them a 7-3 lead. The Citadel (0-3) added two more runs in the seventh and eighth innings off reliever Steven Bondurant, but it was not enough to overtake USC. Aaron Rawl pitched six strong innings to hold off the Bulldogs and gain his second win of the season. He had a sea son-high 10 strikeouts and only one of the two walks allowed by USC. Sophomore Matt Campbell recorded five strikeouts and got his first save of the season. All three Carolina pitchers com bined for 18 strikeouts in the game, which ties the school record. The Gamecock’s hitting has been warm in the past few games. They had 30 hits in the two games of the Berkeley Co-op Shootout this past weekend and racked up 14 in their win against The Citadel. Powell went 3-for-4 with a walk, while Gardiner went 2-for-4 and picked up his fifth RBI of the season. Harris also'upped his season total for RBIs to seven. Going into the game, Melillo was riding a .500 batting aver age in the past two games. However, he went Q-4 against the Bulldogs and dropped his season average to .471. Next, the Gamecocks will play host to Duquesne in a three game home stand that starts Friday. This will be the season opener for the Dukes, who went 26-23 last year including a 10-10 per formance in the Atlantic 10 Conference. Duquesne will look to ride the back of Pete Maropis, who was recently named by Baseball America Magazine to the All-Atlantic 10 team. The 6 foot-l-inch junior led the team in almost every offensive cate gory last season. Maropis fin ished last season with a .361 bat ting average, 11 home runs and 46 RBIs. USC will start Friday with left-handed pitcher David Marchbanks on the mound. In his last outing against Old Dominion, he went seven in nings to record his second win of the season and lowered his ERA to 1.88. The Gamecocks will start freshman Conor Lalor for the first time this season on Saturday, and Campbell, who has a 5.79 ERA, will get his sec ond start on Sunday. First pitch on Friday is sched uled for 3p.m. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail.com Gamecocks to take on Auburn BY TRAVIS BOLAND THE GAMECOCK The USC women’s basketball team will continue its quest for a first-round bye in the SEC tourna ment when it takes on the Auburn Tigers Sunday at the Carolina Center. Carolina (18-6,6-5 SEC) enters the game coming off a big win over the Arkansas Razorbacks. But right behind the Gamecocks in the standings, the Tigers (17-7,5-6) en ter the game coming off a near-up set of third-ranked Tennessee, los ing 59-56 to the Lady Volunteers. Leading the way for the Tigers this season is sophomore guard Natasha Brackett, who leads the team with 16 points per game. Junior forward LeCoe Willingham leads the team in rebounds with 6.5 per game. Carolina comes into the game fighting for one of the top four spots in the SEC. The Gamecocks are led by Jocelyn Penn, who is tops on the team in points per game. Penn was announced to be one of 20 finalists for the Naismith College Player of the Year Award. The Gamecocks will also rely on Cristina Ciocan, who is second on the team in points and leads the team in assists with 193. Petra Ujhelyi, who will go for another double-double to add to her SEC leading 10 so far this season. Tip-off is set for-3 p.m., a change from the original sched ule to accommodate the IFMA Freestyle Motocross event at the Carolina Center earlier in the weekend. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecocksports@hotmail.com