The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, October 19, 2005, Page 10, Image 10
TH#S&AMECOCK
“I \ f \ T "V rTl GAME SCHEDULE
W 11 |f 11 V f I 1 i MEN’S TENNIS at ITA Southeast Regional, Thursday
|—* ■ ■ | EQUESTRIAN vs. Georgia, 2 p.m. Saturday
L^| V l|| | l ^ FOOTBALL vs. Vanderbilt, 3:30 p.m. Saturday
Page 10 ' KV '-/ —I— V. —I— fV-' Wednesday, Oct. 19,2005
Experience
encourages
hoops coach
in
Preseason similarities
to Elite Eight team
striking to USCs Walvius
IDiquel Jacobs
STAFF WRITER
When five of your 14 players come
from overseas, any coach would be left
to wonder how the lines of
communication and type of play will be
different for those players, especially for
a team that last season had no seniors,
one junior.and eight sophomores.
However, USC women’s basketball
coach Susan Walvius has spent the
past two seasons rebuilding with her
group of young players, and after
playing a summer tour throughout
Europe, believes she finally has the
talent, chemistry and experience to
compete in the SEC.
“When we had our press
conference last year, I told you at that
time, I didn’t know how we were
going to be,” Walvius said. “We did
not have a group of leaders, and we
did not have a senior or junior class. I
- - - - c>- o
The Gamecocks also weren’t sure of
what it took to play to the level of
Tennessee, Vanderbilt, LSU and the
rest of the SEC elite. The team
struggled to an 8-20 record, but _
improved to a 2-12 mark in the
conference, one game better than a
season before when the team relied on
six freshmen in the nine-player
rotation.- Now those players have two
seasons of experience, and the team is
convinced that those down years
prepared them for what they hope
will be a breakout year.
“This year I feel very different
about our team,” Walvius said. “I
think we have a pretty legitimate
chance. We have a chance because we
had an opportunity to take our team
to Europe. We took our team to
Europe the year before we went to the
Elite Eight, and we were in a similar
situation as we are in now.”
During the 2001-2002 season, the
Gamecocks rode a 25-7 record and
fell within three games of winning the
national championship. With five
__l _ ...I_U~A
played a combined 370 games as
underclassmen, Walvius credited the
teams tremendous success to
experience. The eight juniors alone
on this season’s team have played in
334 games with 163 starts.
“We’ve grown up together,” junior
guard Lauren Simms said. “We’ve
been playing together for the past two
years, and I think our chemistry is
better now than ever. We know each
other’s games and we’re all
comfortable together.
“We have a team with two years of
foundation of teaching and a team
that has been through the experience
of playing in the SEC for two years,”
Walvius said. “It’s nice to have a
junior class that has been on the floor.
There are a lot of juniors in this
conference that now, for the first
time, have the first chance to play.”
The team tested how those years of
experience would work by playing
games in Europe that included teams
from Croatia and the Czech
Republic, countries three Gamecock
players call home. Junior forward
i r l • t I II I I
iVlClalilv JU1U15UI1 G<U1CU L11C LUUI d
“once-in-a-lifetime experience” that
also allowed the team to learn from its
mistakes in past seasons.
“When we ran our plays, we looked
really good,” Johnson said. “Now that
we’re juniors, we know that all the small
things really matter. If we did those
small things when we were freshmen,
we would be outstanding now. “
Simms was the lone Gamecock
player to not participate in the games
overseas, as she is recovering from a
knee injury that sidelined her for the
WRLUIUS • II
*
rm s
Wide receivers soar, 0-line stumbles
as Sports Editor Jonathan Hillyard
delivers Carolina's mid-season report card
OUAf^TBF&A^fsS
B
Sophomore Blake Mitchell
has firmly established
himself as the man to beat at
the position for the
foreseeable future. Mitchell
is completing 65.7 percent
of his passes and is ranked
second in the SEC in pass
efficiency.
FVNNIN& &AC.&
The Gamecock rushing
attack his been Minimal
through six games, ranking
dead last in the.SEC with an
average of 78.5 yards per
contest. Freshmen Mike
Davis and Bobby Wallace
have been disappointments,
but the emergence of senior
Daccus Turman gives the unit
a passing grade — barely.
A
You.can't talk about the
receivers without first
mentioning redshirt freshman
Sidney Rice. He leads the
SEC in receiving yards per
game, but funror Syvelle
Newton is also in the SEC's
top 10. Freshmen Carlos
Thomas and Kenny McKinley
have been pleasant surprises,
while junior Noah Whiteside
is enduring a tough season.
__ r
SAC^S
*** f^ '
Catblina's secondary has been
fairly good at not giving up
the home-run ball and ranks
third in the conference in pass
defense. However, before the
Kentucky gameTtRe unit
could not capitalize on
numerous opportunities to
create turnovers and are still
giving up the third-most
points in the conference.
I ~ 7 #
The performance of these
highly touted players has
simply not been anywhere
near as good as it should be.
USCs defense ranks 10th in
the SEC in rush defease, a star
that can be largely attributed
to the linebacking corps.
Middle linebacker Ricardo
Hurley will be looked to for
elevated intensity in the
season's second half.
OFFENSIVE UNZ
D+
It just wouldn’t be fair to give
this unit a better grade than
USC's running backs because
the backs can't produce
without any holes, The
Gamecock line has allowed the
third-most sacks in the SEC,
allowing opponents to get to
the quarterback 18 times in six
games. To their credit, they
seem to be improving.
<>pECJAL TEAMS t?EFEN<Jy/E LINE
B- C
Other than problems at This unit has two very different
USC kicking One seems to bowled
valuable on kickoffs, and senior opponent might be. The other
Josh Brown is holding his own occasional!)' gets to the
on the field-goal end. In the quarterback and is tied for
return game, freshman Carlos second in the SEC with 19 •' ',-y S kU .
Thomas looks like a playmaker sacks. We ll find out how good -'.j
on kick returns, but Kenny they are when they face the
McKinley is leaving something Tennessees, Floridas and V y;:
to be desired on punt returns. Clemsons later in the season.
Photos by Katie Kirkland, Juan Bias and Nick Esares. Graphic Illustration by Laura-Joyce Gough/'YWYj GAMECOCK
4
Men’s golfer Anderson
looks to repeat success
Baron Salter
FOR THE GAMECOCK
Imagine being a highly regarded
athlete coming out of high school,
dominant in your sport, waiting to
see how you stack up against the
• next level of competition.
Now let’s say you select USC as
your college of choice and you get
to play right away as a freshman. By
year’s end you have been named
SEC Freshman of the Year, All-SEC
first team and third team All
American. Not a bad start, eh?
That scenario is reality for USC
men’s golf sophomore Mark
Anderson. Anderson burst onto the
collegiate golf scene with a
phenomenal freshman year, and he
is looking to improve on that
success with an even better year. He
finished the 2004-2005 season with
one tournament win and four other
top-20 finishes.
That success has created a hunger
in Anderson for more.
“This season I really want to
surpass what I did last season. I’d
really like to be an All-American
again. That’s something I want to
do all four years of college,”
Anderson said. “Last year was a
really important season for me. I
proved to myself I could play well at
this level. Now I need to make sure I
continue to get better and keep
improving.”
While Anderson enjoyed last
year’s success, he said he believes this
season and the seasons ahead of him
will be much more difficult.
“It’s a lot harder to stay playing at
h a high level than it is to get there.
Last year, I played well, but at the
end of the year I think I relaxed a
little bit and people passed by me. I
have more experience this year, and
I’m going to make sure that doesn’t
happen again.”
USC men’s golf coach Puggy
Blackmon said he believes Anderson
could be a very special player for the
Gamecocks.
“I believe Mark has the potential
to be a first team All-American,”
Blackmon said. “He still has to
mature some in areas like course
management, but he has a lot of
Photo special to THE GAMECOCK
Golfer Mark Anderson was named
first-team All-SEC as a freshman.
potential.
As a
sophomore, you
wouldn’t think
Anderson would NAME* Mark Anderson ,
, . . , HOMETOWN: Beaufort, S.C..
be looked upon HEIGHT: 5 feet 11 inches
to provide YEAR: Sophomore
leadership for -SEC Frrshmin of theYeer, Fin* reem AH-SEC and Third
the Gamecocks,
blit Blackmon -Waa named to-thcSouth Carolina jftlt-Swc team all four
years of high school
expects , ' ;
4 # -One day hopes to play on the PGA Tourand win a major
Otherwise. championship
“We Only Laura-Joyce Gough/\'WY. ^AMKCOCK
have two
seniors; otherwise our team is made
up mostly of sophomores and
freshmen,” Blackmon said. “We
certainly are looking to Mark and
our other sophomores for some
leadership.”
Anderson seems fine with the
added responsibility, but he chooses
to lead with his play more than his
mouth.
“I try to be a good example to my
teammates when I’m out on the golf
course,” Anderson said. “I like
leading that way more than being a
vocal kind of leader. We do have
www. dailygamecock. com
some excellent leaders on this team.
Senior Eirik Johansen is an excellent
leader and so is Florian Fritsch as a
freshman already. Both of those
guys are very positive and are really
good leaders.”
Anderson and the Gamecocks
head out on the road for the
Isleworth Collegiate Invitational
tournament in Orlando, Fla.,
starting Sunday and continuing
through Tuesday.
Comments on this story? E-mail
garqecocksports@gwm.sc.edu f
w
In week 6,
pair of backs
rack "’em up
fantasy style
Alexander, Tomlinson give
ample reason to stay atop
everybody’s fantasy wish list
Week 6 was marked by the big two
running backs putting up huge
numbers again, a not so well-known
wide receiver leading receivers in .
points, no big numbers W
from quarterbacks /—
and injuries that will |
affect your fantasy fiM|K
football team.
Shaun Alexander
and Ladainian
Tomlinson get first n ,
mention this week ||eujton
because they led most
leagues in scoring Fourth-year
AGAIN. If you were
behind going into the student
Sunday night game with
only Alexander left, you were probably
happy to see Alexanders numbers; if
you were playing against Alexander, 0
you are probably beating yourself over
the head. Alexander put up four
touchdowns and 141 rushing yards
against the Houston Texans’ porous
defense. Tomlinson had 140 rushing
yards and a touchdown, 39 receiving
yards and a touchdown, and rounded
out his day with a passing touchdown.
This is the second time this year
Tomlinson has had a rushing and
passing touchdown in a game.
Santana Moss led receivers with 173
yards to go with two touchdowns.
Moss is a consistent player when it
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