IU runs amok in spring game
With the arrival of Terry Hoeppner in December as the new football coach, one of the most widely anticipated aspects of his coaching was the spread offense.
With the arrival of Terry Hoeppner in December as the new football coach, one of the most widely anticipated aspects of his coaching was the spread offense.
IU will attempt to turn its 3-9 Big Ten record around in the second half of conference play against Illinois, Ohio State, Michigan State, Michigan and Purdue, but not until playing a non-conference game against Ball State Tuesday in Muncie.
The United States-Mexico soccer rivalry hits Bloomington tonight when the IU men's soccer team plays host to the Mexican Youth National Team in an pre-season game at 7:30 p.m. tonight at Bill Armstrong Stadium.
Although it's meant to be one race between 33 teams, the end of Saturday's 55th running of the Little 500 turned into two separate races -- one for first and second places and another for third and fourth. Dodds House and Phi Gamma Delta sprinted down the stretch for first, while Briscoe and Delta Upsilon battled for third.
After losing by literal inches last year, Teter got a taste of revenge Friday winning the 18th women's Little 500. After two long years of training and one gut-wrenching loss, the euphoria could finally set in. "I can't believe it," said Teter Katie Douglas. "I mean, I did it. Everyone was just like 'Forget about the pace, forget about the pace,' and I did it. I don't know how I did it, I really don't know how."
Third place in Individual Time Trials. Second place in Miss-N-Out. Third place in Team Pursuit. Senior Craig Luekens' 2005 Little 500 Spring Series Events résumé is full of second- and third-place finishes, but when it really counted the senior finished first. After a sprint for the finish against Fiji rider senior Matt Davis, Luekens took this year's Little 500 checkered flag along with his Dodds House teammates, a first for Dodds since 1998.
After a week that challenged the hearts of the Kappa Kappa Gamma squad, race day brought more of the same. Earlier in the week, tragedy struck the sorority with the passing of Kappa junior Ashley Crouse. The event changed the team's entire approach, preventing them from preparing in their typical fashion. The past week left the team with little sleep, hindering their ability to focus on the race until late Thursday. In the end, it would be that lack of sleep and nourishment that would seal the team's fate.
With almost a week off since its last game, the IU softball team played four games this weekend against Northwestern and Michigan, the two top teams in the Big Ten. Playing two top teams like Northwestern and Michigan did not alter IU's game plan.
After 12 practices, two scrimmages and Friday's spring game, the IU quarterback situation is still, as coach Terry Hoeppner says, "in pencil." "We've got a long way to go (with the quarterbacks) yet," Hoeppner said. "At times they've all made plays, but we're not passing the football as well as I would like."
The first Cream and Crimson game under new football coach Terry Hoeppner wasn't supposed to be a close match-up -- but it was. The Crimson, filled with mostly first teamers, struggled to put away the second-string Cream team. After three-quarters of play, the Crimson only led 13-3 in front of more than 6,500 at Memorial Stadium Friday night.
While the Bloomington campus was buzzing for the Little 500, the IU baseball team played a four-game series in Iowa City against the Hawkeyes. After dropping the first three games of the series to Iowa, the Hoosiers rebounded Sunday and picked up a victory. IU coach Bob Morgan said he was pleased to get the win Sunday but is disappointed in his team's overall play.
Women's tennis splits weekend IU's No. 37-ranked women's tennis team split the weekend with Friday's 6-1 win against No. 75 Minnesota and Sunday's 7-0 loss to No. 49 Iowa. The weekend started with IU winning all of the doubles matches against the Golden Gophers, garnering the all-important doubles point.
While most of the campus was joining together for Little 500 revelry, Hoosier rowers entered battle to the slow beat of a Viking march, undaunted and without faltering. IU's second Varsity 8 overpowered No. 19 Minnesota 7:30.5-7:33.9 for the first Big Ten win in their category. The Varsity 8 gave No. 4 Ohio State, the regatta host, a respectable fight. IU assistant coach Carmen Mirochna said the second Varsity 8 crew looked strong the entire course.
It took 78 minutes for the Hoosier offense to get started, but once it did, the offense lead the two-time defending national champions men's soccer team to a 2-1 victory over the University of Dayton. A free kick by the Hoosiers with 12 minutes left in the game found sophomore Brian Plotkin on a breakaway. Plotkin's shot found the top corner of the goal and gave the Hoosiers a 1-0 lead.
So who's excited about IU football? Yeah, I didn't think so. While most of the students on campus were either getting drunk, already drunk or passed out from being drunk, Friday afforded die-hard Hoosier football fans with a glimpse of what the 2005 season and new coach Terry Hoeppner may have in store.
For the first time ever, the men's and women's Little 500 trophies will be in display cases on Tenth Street. Only Campbell Street separates Dodds House, which is in Wright Quad, and Teter. But the two teams, along with many of the other dorms, train together in each team's effort to win the Little 500. That effort between Dodds House and Briscoe was evident as both teams were together on the lead lap at the end of Saturday's race.
There were almost too many stories from Friday's Little 500 about Bella Veloce -- a team that had little money and no coaching. But a good start might actually be at the finish, where only three riders captured fourth place. Junior Nicole Williamson was sidelined with a broken collarbone, leaving three riders to do the work of four. Each individual needed to write her own heroic tale to make the fourth place story possible.
His first memory emerges 10 days after he was involved in the accident.
As students slowed down their schoolwork and began to prepare for the "World's Greatest College Weekend," Little 500 riders began to slow down too. But their adjustment was different, as they prepare for Saturday's 55th running of the men's Little 500 at Bill Armstrong Stadium. The men cut back their training to be at full strength for the race and prepared to get in the mindset to be in front on the 199th lap.
Like a fine wine, the quality of the women's Little 500 race improves each year, and this year, the race's value skyrocketed. Today's Little 500, scheduled to begin at 4 p.m. at Bill Armstrong Stadium, will bring 32 teams together all with the same dream of celebrating after lap 100. But unlike years past, there are more than just a couple of teams threatening to win it all.