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Lifting up the legends who raced in Roanoke

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Megan LombardCharleston Southern shortstop winds up her career

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Vol. 8, No. 7, April 9, 2012Vol. 8, No. 7, April 9, 2012

Brookside Golf CourseCelebrates 50 years of memories

3Starkey’s NASCAR Track

2 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

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aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 3

Andrew Rowsey, a junior from Rockbridge County,

also earned first-team all-state honors at the Group AA level and was named Timesland Player of the Year. Rowsey scored 802 points this season, averaging 28.6 ppg a game for the Wildcats, and scoring 34 in the state semifinals against Brunswick. When Brunswick defeated Rockbridge County and Cave Spring in back-to-back games for the state championship, Brunswick coach Bryant Stith jokingly said that two people he didn’t want to see anymore were Hicks in a state champion-ship battle and Rowsey.

Articles Carter Williamson Catches on at North Carolina Central ...........10

Megan Lombard Sets Records for Charleston Southern ..............12

Red Sox Brass Readies the Staff for Opening Night ......................14

Roanoke City Hires Outdoor Event Specialist ................................15

Hollins Lacrosse Program Overcomes Growing Pains ..................18

Extras Playmaker Spotlight ......................3

Ask A Ref ..........................................6

Snapshots of the Season ..............9

Local Basketball Talent ............. 18

ing nearly 80 percent from the free throw line and 47.3 percent from the field. In a victory over archrival Hidden Valley in February, Abuhawwas scored 27 points, grabbed 15 rebounds and converted all 14 of his free throws. Cave Spring coach Billy Hicks remembers when Abuhawwas was cut from the JV. “We see a lot of potential in you,” Hicks said to Abuhawwas on that fateful day, according to a recent Robert Anderson article in The Roanoke Times. “But we’ve got to see a little more commitment.” Few players who are cut from the JV end up making first-team all-state before they graduate. But Abuhawwas got his act together, sav-ing his best for the end, scoring 29 points (20 in the first half) in Cave Spring’s 76-59 state semifinal victory over Fluvanna County March 6 that gave the Knights a berth in the state championship game.

The Cave Spring senior capped off a brilliant

basketball season by earning Group AA first-team all-state honors in late March. Abuhaw-was, who was cut from the Knights junior varsity team three years ago, averaged 19 ppg this past year. He helped Cave Spring advance to the Group AA Division 3 state championship game before falling to defending state champion Brunswick. A 6-foot-3 swing man, Abu-hawwas averaged more than 7 rebounds and 2 steals per game for the Knights, while making better than one-third of his 3-point attempts and shoot-

Other area basketball

PLAYMAKERSpotlightBi

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Amin Abuhawwas

Sponsored by:

Playbook

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Opinions Todd Marcum ........................................... 4

Mike Stevens ........................................... 5

Christian Moody ..................................... 6

John A. Montgomery ............................. 7

Walker Nelms .......................................... 8

Mike Ashley ............................................19

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The only area school to win a state basketball championship this winter was Christiansburg, coached by Shawn Good. The Demons were

led by Zach Davis, who earned sec-ond-team all-state Group AA honors. Chris-tiansburg had a re-cord of 55-4 over the past two years, los-ing just one regular sea-son game.

Andrew RowseyAndrew Rowsey

Christiansburg coach Shawn Good (above) and star Zach Davis (shooting, right) won a Group AA state title

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4 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Former NFL star weighs in on ‘Bountygate’TODDS AND ENDSby ToddMarcum

Players in this Issue

P.O. Box 3285, Roanoke, Va 24015 (540) 761-6751 • E-mail: jmonty@cox.netOn the Web: www.playbyplayonline.net

and at www.facebook.com/playbyplaysports©Copyright 2012. All rights reserved. No part of Play by Play may be reproduced by any means or in any form without written permission from the publisher. Play by Play is published every

fourth Monday. Deadline for submissions for the May 7 issue is April 23.

Publisher/Editor John A. Montgomery

Graphic Designer Donna Earwood

Contributors Mike Ashley Rod Carter Leslie Coty Donald Earwood Brian Hoffman Sam Lazzaro Bo Lucas

Todd Marcum Gene Marrano Joyce Montgomery Christian Moody Walker Nelms Mike Stevens Bill Turner

Cover photograph courtesy of North Carolina Central University

In THe WAKe oF “BounTY-gate,” the national Football League recently handed down

some of the stiffest penalties in history to the new orleans Saints for paying for an assortment of dirty deeds, including knocking out opposing players and gener-ally bringing even more mayhem than usual to the nFL football field. Saints head coach Sean Pay-ton? Suspended for the year. Defensive coordinator Gregg Williams? out indefinitely. Several other team officials and coaches are suspended for parts of the season. The team also lost its second-round picks for the next two drafts and got hit with a half-million dol-lar fine, according to nfl.com. Was the Saints’ pay-for-pain scheme wrong? Yes. But was it the first time it ever happened in the nFL? Hardly. Just ask Ferrum as-sistant football coach and former Pro Bowl run-ning back Chris Warren. In fact, somebody did at the recent Pat-

rick Henry High School Boosters dinner held at the Roanoke City Market Building. “I don’t know if there was a for-mal bounty on me,” said Warren, “but I am sure there were discus-sions about knocking me out of the game. That’s part of football. I worked to be the kind of player the other team worries about and wants to put on the sideline.” It’s good to have the former Fer-rum star back in Southwest Vir-ginia. Warren’s not only a volun-teer coach with the Panthers, but he has also been active in reach-ing out to young athletes. Drafted by Seattle in the 1990 nFL Draft, Warren played eight seasons for the Seahawks, rushing for more than 1,000 yards four straight years (1992-95). Warren was a three-time selection to the Pro-Bowl (1993-95). He also played for the Dallas Cowboys and the Phila-delphia eagles during his career. I hope to have an in-depth inter-view with Warren when football

season rolls around.* * *

Also at that dinner, I caught up with Patriots bulldozer Ryan Revia, a 6-6, 280-lb. offensive

tackle who finished up his last year of eligibility at PH last fall. While at one time Revia received seri-ous looks by larger schools,

he told me he was excited to sign with east Carolina of Conference uSA. It could be a great fit for him. The school is rebuilding to a de-gree, coming off a 5-7 season, so Revia could play very soon. He has an uncommon frame and consid-erable agility for a big man and could become a star in a league with schools that have produced next-level luminaries such as Ah-mad Bradshaw, Chris Johnson, Don Maynard and Brett Favre. I coached Ryan in youth basket-ball a few years back and I think eCu got a steal. He was a nice kid, coachable, and could take control of a game. I think he believes that he has something to prove and I both look forward to and dread watching him play against my be-loved Marshall university Thun-dering Herd for the next few years.

* * * Former VMI basketball star Ra-mon Williams played a role in the Cinderella story of the ohio uni-versity Bobcats’ run to the Sweet 16 in March. A Roanoke native, Williams is in his third season in Athens. He is rapidly gaining a reputation as being one of the stars in devel-oping top-shelf guard talent for successful pro-grams. He has also coached at Big east power DePaul. A few of the guards he has mentored include professional players Dar Tucker, Wilson Chandler, Cliff Clinkscales and Sammy Mejia. Current Bobcat guard D. J. Cooper may be the best of the lot. As a VMI Keydet, Williams teamed with brother Damon to form one of the most productive scoring twin-tandems in college basketball history. He is doing a great job of building a very im-pressive coaching résumé.

* * * Former PH catcher Will Kaufman, son of one of the great sports guys in Roanoke, Jon Kaufman, is doing a nice job in his first year as catcher. He’s playing at California university of Penn-sylvania. He’s backing up a senior catcher but the redshirt fresh-man is getting a fair amount of playing time, usually catch-ing the second game of dou-bleheaders and hitting in the .270s. He’s expected to move into the starter’s role next year.

* * * It’s not sports, but it is a compe-tition and Play by Play wants to be the first to connect the dots back to the Blue Ridge. American Idol top-10 contestant Elise Testone plays in a band with Roanoke na-tive Gerald Gregory in Charles-ton, S.C. Gerald’s mom, Martha, is my next-door neighbor and one of our best friends. The connection has made it a lot of fun for us to fol-low the show this year.

* * * Finally, it happened right on deadline, which limited the op-portunity for coverage, but “Seven Days in utopia” author Dr. David Cook made a local appearance on March 28 on behalf of the Fel-lowship of Christian Athletes. The book was made into a major mo-tion picture starring Robert Du-vall that is now available through netflix streaming video. While it is often described as a religious movie, it didn’t come across as overly preachy; it’s a good story that’s well worth a look.

Chris Warren

Ramon Williams

Will Kaufman

Ryan Revia

Do you have any special memories of Brookside Par 3? (See story on page 6.) Play By Play would love to know. Tell us about them and they could be included in a future issue. E-mail “Brookside Memories” to John Montgomery at jmonty@cox.net or Christian Moody at moodyreferee@gmail.com. Or post your memories on our Facebook page (www.- facebook.com/playbyplay-sports).

Brooksidememories?

aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 5

Roanoke College sports show gains footingOPEN MIKEby MikeStevens

IT’S Been neARLY 30 YeARS since I graduated from college and I recently discovered that

cell phones and computers aren’t the only things students have at their disposal these days to give them a leg up when it comes to en-tering the workforce. As a communications major concentrating in broadcasting back in the early 1980s, I found there weren’t a lot of opportunities to practice your craft on campus at Virginia Tech. They had a nice studio where Bill Dool-ey taped his football coach’s show, but there was no way they were letting a bunch of college students touch that equipment. In fact, the best on-the-job training experience I can remember was the day professor Ed Ewing sent a group of us out of the classroom and onto campus with the instructions to do some random interviews. Most of my group had no idea where to go, so I immediately led them to the Hillcrest dorm that at the time was occupied by all of the athletes. Luckily for me, four football players were standing outside and willing to let me do an impromptu taping with them. Looking back, Bruce Smith, Cyrus Lawrence, Padro Phillips and Mike Johnson — all nFL draft picks —formed a pretty stout quartet for my first on-campus sports interview. If I had only thought to get a copy of that tape, I might not have received 75 employment rejection letters after graduation. Thankfully, today’s col-lege students who aspire to be broadcasters have it much better. Recently I was invited to be a guest on the Roanoke College sports pro-gram “Maroons Tuesday night Live,” which was first introduced to Play by Play readers 15 months ago. I wasn’t expecting a great deal from the program — largely because my 20-plus years in the TV business taught me that in order to produce a quality product you need a lot of bodies and even more money. You also need a lot of time, a huge amount of passion, an old-school work ethic — and a few other things.

“You have to be a little crazy, I guess,” says Roanoke College’s Director of Athletic Communications, Brad Moore. “I was really worried about being able to keep something this big going and honestly, I was most concerned about my student helpers and their stress levels.” The “Maroon Five,” who make up the core of the production each week, is comprised of Moore, students Nick DeSanctis, Reed Hall, T.J. Kemper, and a transplanted college graduate from Kentucky in Richmond Bram-blet. These individuals, along with a handful of other dedicated students, do everything from designing graphics in Photoshop, to operating studio cameras, to making the show a reality each Tuesday night. The program debuted in August of 2010 and has now been on the air for nearly 40 hour-long episodes. The fast-paced interview-style sports magazine program features as many as eight guests an hour and is streamed live on the Internet and

shown in a tape-delayed format on the Comcast cable system in Salem. “I had absolutely no TV experience when we began this process and I quickly discovered that it is very time-consuming, tedious work,” says Moore. “But I know it is giving these students the best experience possible when it comes to hands-on learning. They are going to be in the driver’s seat when it comes to getting that first job out of college.” Roanoke is the only school in the old Dominion Athletic Conference to put on such a production. Moore and company were fortunate that former Maroons’ All-Amer-ican lacrosse goalie Steve Mason (once a close co-worker of mine) do-nated the lights to help get the ball rolling and Alan Johnston, the father of a former Maroons’ soccer player, generously paid for a couple of pricey TriCasters. These are portable, yet powerful, production studios that are no bigger than a small suitcase. They allow the students to set up quickly and work in a confined space. David Mulford, the director of Roanoke College’s Instructional Tech-nology Resource Center, also does his part to ensure that the staff has the proper cords and connections to keep it on the air. Roanoke College alumnus Bob Rotanz, the 1978 national Lacrosse Player of the Year, took care of getting a professional-looking set built for the students. In addi-tion, each week he blocks off a portion of his Mac and Bob’s restaurant on Main Street and hosts the production. “The student-athletes have a chance to get some exposure and be seen by their parents back home,” says Rotanz. “Plus, when I see kids who have this kind of passion, who are pursuing what they want to do, it really gives you hope that they will be successful.” Rotanz and Moore take pride in knowing that in some small way they are helping prepare these aspiring broadcasters for the workplace. one Moore disciple now works for nASCAR, two have landed jobs in the colle-giate ranks at West Virginia university and Randolph-Macon and another recently interned with a minor league baseball team in north Carolina.

now it’s Moore’s turn to get his own bump up the college corporate ladder. The 2008-09 oDAC sports information direc-tor of the year was recently named the Assistant Athletic Direc-tor for external Relations at the college. The former basketball player at Thomas More College, who got his master’s degree at Xavier, will now oversee the sports information department at the college while also working to raise money for Roanoke’s 19 intercollegiate teams through the Maroon Club. “This is a great opportunity for me to advance my career and I’m very excited that I will be able to oversee the things I’ve

built since I got here in 2007,” he says. “I’m very grateful and indebted to the college for taking a chance on me and showing confidence in my abilities.” In effect, Moore was rewarded for doing far more than his previous job description required, and somehow, it only seems appropriate that the same things he’s worked to instill in his student workers ended up en-hancing his professional life as well. “I’m a go-getter and I believe I have the drive to make this a success,” he says. “It feels good to know that the work I did was appreciated and now I just want to make sure that I don’t disappoint.” That won’t be an issue, because in his case, Moore never means less.

Roanoke College Director of Athletic Communications Brad Moore (above center, and far right) talks with Jeff Kisiel (left) and Nick DeSanctis on the set at Mac and Bob’s

Nick DeSanctis (right) interviews Roanoke men's lacrosse coach Bill Pilat

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6 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Brookside celebrates 50 years of golf

Ask A Ref

Q. A team has a shooter on the free throw line for a two-shot foul. All four of the shooter’s teammates go to the opposite end of the court for defensive reasons. The non-shooting team has its players positioned along both sides of the lane. As the shooter is preparing to shoot the first of two shots, one of the players along the lane, since no potential rebound is involved, turns around to discuss strategy with his coach on the sideline. Is this a violation? Also, in this situation, since the shooting team has no players on either side of the lane, can the opposing team claim any of the va-cated spots now available along the lane?

— Bill T., Roanoke County

A.

To inform fans of the games’ finer points, Play by Play publishes “Ask A Ref,” a chance for fans to ask a question about specific sports rules, preferably those related to high school or the nCAA. Questions can be sent to moodyreferee@gmail.com. Basketball season may be over, but a good question still deserves an answer. This issue we ask a question to Reggie Poff, a high school basketball official since the Nixon administration.

If the referee determines the conversation is disconcerting to the shooter, he will signal a delayed violation by extend- ing either arm with a clinched fist parallel to the floor. The arm extended should be the one closest to the bench, so it can be easily observed. If the first shot is missed, then the referee will blow the whistle, state loudly, “Disconcerting to the shooter,” and the shooter will shoot again. The volume of the conversation may be a key as to whether an infraction is called. As far as the vacated spac-es go, yes, the defensive players may take those spaces as long as it is before the shooter receives the ball.

F IFTY YeARS AGo, GoLF changed in the Roanoke Val-ley.

The new look of April 1962 is still there, mostly unchanged, next to Williamson Road. It’s a golf expe-rience unlike any other in the val-ley. Brookside Par 3 is fifty. For those who might not carry enough years to re-call, April 1962 saw America go mad for golf. The na-tion watched on television as Arnold Palmer won the Masters in a three-man playoff over Gary Player and the immortal Dow Finsterwald. I doubt much of the tournament was actually broadcast (compared to today’s extensive coverage, anyway), but enough made it to the airwaves to enthuse thousands to make golf a new and viable pastime. Arnie’s raging popularity was a major factor as well. eleven days after Arnie captured the green jacket, on April 20, 1962, Brookside opened. What is notable now is that it survives. ever hear of Lakeview Golf Course? It was about a half-mile north of Brookside on Williamson Road. It’s long gone. Jefferson Hills? That bordered Colonial Avenue and ogden Road, I believe, and it’s gone. I’ve even been told about one course that was on Brambleton Avenue called Devil’s elbow — what a great name — that succumbed to the power of the increasing value of land in a commercial zone; when that closed, I have no idea. even Hollyfields, a great little track on Bent Mountain, came and went in re-cent years.

Brookside is still there. It’s still a par 3, and it is still the only place to play golf at night in this part of Virginia. no one ever tried to make this little course into something it wasn’t. extra holes were never proposed. Adding length has not been discussed — the layout is almost exactly what it was when it was designed and built by Jack Hall on the family farm of his brother, Bill Hall. Brookside is now surrounded by the bustle of commerce and develop-ment. Its driving range was turned into a shopping center years ago. A

field next to it is now a neighborhood. Williamson Road is one of the main traffic arteries in the valley. Although it definitely was a major

route even then, this portion of Williamson Road was out in the country back in 1962. There are five courses in the valley older than Brookside — Ro-anoke Country Club (1899), Salem Municipal (1919), ole Mon-terey (1925), Blue Hills (first opened in 1927) and Hidden Val-ley Country Club (1949). Botetourt Country Club also opened in 1962. Brookside is the only one of that group that’s a par-3. Its pur-

pose is different from the others. Short, easy — a relative term in golf, I admit — scenic and unique. Brookside has probably been

the setting of more dates than all the others combined. not calendar dates, romantic dates.

How many couples play at Brookside in later years? It’s an easy walk, great exercise, inexpensive and it doesn’t take five hours to play. It’s a great place for couples of all ages. How many kids have played their first rounds there? no telling. It’s a perfect place for youngsters to take to the course. The First Tee recogniz-es this; there are events at Brookside as a step between the instructional

course and a regulation course. And seriously, where else can you play after dark? The lights show the course pretty well, but there are now glow-in-the-dark balls available, just in case a wayward chip lands in a dark spot. Course operator Milton Crandall believes the lights are part

of the original course. He says most of the bulbs have been replaced in the last 15 years, but the poles were put in the same time as the greens and tees, he believes. Crandall marked his own milestone on April 1. He and his wife, Diana, have been leasing and managing the course for 14 years, taking over on April 1, 1998. Diana’s brother, Ken Mooty, bought the course from Pete Dodd in 2007. Crandall, a native of the Wash-ington, D.C. area, lived in Silver Spring, Md., and had made a living for 20-plus years in real estate when he moved here in 1995 to work in Mooty’s family business. Buying a house from his in-laws just a block from the golf course, Crandall says Brookside was part of the reason he moved here — not to run it, to play it. With sons Joe and Scott loving golf, the family had enjoyed playing the little course on visits for years. When Mooty sold the family business, Crandall was at a crossroads. “I just didn’t know what I wanted to do but I said Brookside, gosh, I love golf and love being outdoors and it’s a block from the house,” Crandall says. “When we came on I thought I was the luckiest guy in the world. At the time, I was.” Crandall says from 1998-2001 the golf industry was booming. The economy was strong and the cash register stayed busy. “Then the whole country started to dip and all golf just fell off. But I’m still here,” he says. The boys went on to play on the northside golf team. For that reason members of the Vikings’ team can play the course for free at any time. “northside will always play free here, as long as I’m here,” Crandall says. “We have discounts for other teams, but northside is our team.” It is and always has been a small operation. Ronnie Sachs, a jack-of-all-trades who also dabbles in set and prop work for the film industry,

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Brookside is an easy walk, great exercise, inexpensive and fast

aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 7

Ayers follows the Road to the Final Four I Don’T KnoW RoAnoKeR

Roger Ayers especially well — and yet sometimes I feel like I

do. That’s because whenever we have spoken, he has routinely gone out of his way to make me feel important. Moments before the tipoff of an oDAC basketball tournament game in February, which Roger was officiating, he came over to the press table and briefly talked with Mike Ashley and me about the most recent issue of Play by Play. oK, so that’s not an unheard-of experience; Mike has a lot of fans — but for someone to do it when they are about to perform on a public stage in front of a large audience? I was im-pressed. Roger’s engaging style seems to have that effect on other people, too. It’s a trait that has served him swimmingly. Roger, 46, has been a college basketball official since 1999. He worked about 100 games this past season, mostly major conferenc-es. If you’re a hoops fan, you’ve no doubt seen him on TV — whether the game’s origin was in Blacksburg, Charlottesville, Chapel Hill or far beyond. Maybe you saw his picture in Sports Illustrated when he was working a Duke-Wake Forest game. Just in the past few weeks I heard highly regarded broadcaster Mike Patrick introduce a particular game’s officials, including Rog-er. “You can’t do much better than that,” Patrick said. (Did I tell you Roger reads Play by Play?) As I write this, the morning of the 2012 nCAA Division I basketball championship, Roger is in new orleans. I am quite sure he is not stag-gering along Bourbon Street. Roger may very well work tonight’s game, although the officials who will call the Kansas-Kentucky contest have not yet been publicly revealed. Roger spoke to the Roanoke Valley Sports Club March 19, regaling us with his tales of the trade. He had just returned from Albuquerque after calling two games in the nCAA tournament’s opening rounds. He was justifiably proud to be selected, among the elite 5 percent of 2,000 Divi-sion I officials. Like the teams, officials advance based upon their game performance. Following his RVSC speech, Roger was one of the 36 refs selected to work the nCAA regionals — and then one of just 10 tapped for the Final Four. As he was not one of the three officials who worked either the Kentucky-Louisville or the Kansas-ohio State semifinal games March 31, he’s among the four remaining referees available to work tonight. Three will call the Kentucky-Kansas title tilt; the fourth will serve as an alternate. Whether he calls the championship game or not, Roger’s story is worth telling. During his March talk, Roger recounted the highlights of his career —dating to when he was cut from the Patrick Henry High School varsity basketball team. With a large dose of self-effacing humor, Roger shared his dislike of work, in general. He said he knew early on he needed to find an occupation that required about two hours a day, five days a week, five months a year. “Fortunately, I’ve been able to find that,” he said, minimizing the re-quirements. Division I basketball officials are well-paid; Roger’s able to take the rest of the year off. Roger’s known for applying gel to his hair. When WDBJ sports director Travis Wells reported at the end of March that Roger was going to the Final Four, Roger told him that the two hours’ worth of gel he was apply-ing needed to be increased because of the additional media timeouts and an extended halftime. The current gel application is designed to last 2 ½ hours. From 2004-11 Roger also served as Commissioner of the Western Vir-ginia Basketball officials Association, overseeing the assignments of of-ficials who call high school basketball. I have been privileged to share the dais with him several times — at the annual Kiwanis unsung Heroes Banquet and a couple of other sportsmanship presentations. Roger can tell a story — whether it be the details of hitting Coach K

with a technical, explaining an obscure rule to Virginia’s Tony Bennett, or calming down Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg. But Roger’s most touching stories involve people that he’s encountered during everyday life — be it a hotel clerk, a restaurant waitress, a disabled child. “I grew up in Southeast (Roanoke) on Sixth Street,” Roger says, strip-ping away any hint of false sophistication. not every situation Roger has encountered as an official has a story-book ending. But even missteps become teachable moments for him. In early January, Roger was part of a crew working a Western Kentucky-Louisiana/Lafayette game that was decided in the game’s final seconds.

The winning team had six players on the court, an error that could plague an official for a lifetime. Instead, Roger owns up to his gaffe. He made a mistake, served his suspension and is back on the court — continuing to earn the respect of players, coaches and fans. In the past few days I have talked to several other Roanoke-based officials that know Roger — including Owen Grogan, Jerry Spangler and Pete Lampman, a trio with more than 100 years of combined officiating experience. While the con-sensus is that Roger’s officiating mechanics are beyond reproach, it’s his personal touch that sets him apart. Roger communicates openly and honestly, and displays sincere respect for other people — even when no one is watching. “Roger treats every

game and its players like it’s their championship,” Lampman says. There’s a lesson here. Treating people well is not only the right thing to do; it often pays off. next time you run into Roger at el Rodeo, stop at his booth and say hello. I’m betting he talks back — in a good way.

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8 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Remembering Starkey’s NASCAR trackIN THEREARVIEWMIRRORWalker Nelms

I T’S SunDAY MoRnInG, about 9 a.m. I’m standing in the parking lot of the Starkey Park

Ballfields 5, 6, 7, just off Merriman Road in Roanoke County. As light rain falls, I am struck by the quiet and solitude of where I am stand-ing. It wasn’t always that way. From the early 1950s until about 1978, this was the site of the Starkey Speedway, a paved quarter-mile oval with a dirt half-mile flat track sur-rounding it. The paved oval was slightly banked and had an asphalt “X” in the middle. There were no guard rails, so when a driver went off the track, he simply gassed it up again, came over the edge of the track and re-entered the race. (So much for “safer barriers”!) Beginning in 1956, nAS-CAR held five races at Star-key Speedway. In 1956, the first nASCAR-sanctioned race that was held there was in the “Convertible Se-ries.” The race featured 18 entries and was won by the Roanoke Valley’s own Cur-tis Turner in a ’56 Ford. The next four races at Star-key were “Grand national” races. What was called the “Grand national Series” at that time is now known as the “Sprint Cup Series.” The first Grand national race at Starkey was in 1958 and was won by a little-known driver named Jim Reed in a ’57 Ford. nAS-CAR returned to the track in 1961 for a race won by future nASCAR Hall-of-Famer Junior Johnson in a ’60 Pontiac. That race featured 20 entries and a first place purse of $900. The year 1962 saw the start of the 50-mile, 200-lap races at Starkey. Pre-vious races were limited to 38 miles. The 1962 race had 18 entries and was won by another future Hall-of-Famer, Richard Petty, in a ’62 Plymouth. Petty received the least amount of money he would ever get for winning a race, $550. Starkey’s nASCAR history came to an end in 1964 with a race that was sponsored by yet another Hall-of-Famer, Glen Wood of Wood Brothers Racing. The race featured a 22-car lineup, most of which came to race because of Wood’s involvement. Wood sat on the pole with an average speed of 55.97 mph. unfortunately, he only led five laps in a race that was ultimately won by Johnson driving Banjo Matthews’ ’64 Ford. It would be Wood’s last race as a driver. The drivers who competed at Starkey read like a who’s who of the pi-oneers of nASCAR. In addition to the aforementioned legends Turner,

Johnson, Petty and Wood, other greats such as Rex White, Lee Petty, Buck Baker, Joe Weatherly, Wendell Scott, Ned Jarrett, Jim Paschal, G. C. Spencer and David Pearson all raced at Starkey. I, too, have a bit of history with the track. on a Sunday in about 1977, I showed up at Starkey Speedway with my highly modified twin-engine sprint go-kart. There was an autocross being held at the track by the local sports car club. I asked if I could do an exhibition run with the kart and was told no. not to be denied, I unloaded the kart in the pit area and fired it up. I created enough noise and mayhem to be asked by the sports car club to leave. But then a funny thing happened. Several of the club members went to the race organizers and asked them to let me run. After some discussion, I was allowed to run the course. The first run I attempted ended when I went off course, but they graciously lined me up again and allowed me

to go. The second run went off without a hitch. I beat the best time of the day by about two or three seconds and was greeted at the end by an ovation from the crowd. In a twin engine go-kart, it wasn’t too hard. I’m no Richard Petty! Looking back on that day, I had no idea that I would be one of the last racers to turn laps at speed on Star-key Speedway. What an honor — and a wonderful memory. So now it’s gone, returning only as a memory to a few old fans. The track was removed to the point that there is no evidence that it was ever there — no marker, no plaque. But on a Sunday morning, in a light drizzle of rain, when I stand where it once was, if I’m really quiet, I think I just may hear the sound of engines and the roar of the crowd still echoing in the valley. How wonderful is that? (Walker Nelms has always been avid about motor-

sports. In the mid-1970s he competed as a go-kart racer on Lowe’s Motor Speedway, Summit Point Raceway and South Boston Speedway. His home track was a go-kart road course in Monroe, Va., Mountain View Speedway, a track where Ward and Jeff Burton also began their careers. Later, Nelms attended SCCA driver’s school at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in a rear engine Elva. He also competed in a stock car at Franklin County Speedway. From 2008 until 2010 he worked SCCA flagging and communications at Virginia International Raceway and also at the Rolex 24-hour race in Daytona in 2009, 2010 and 2011).

On a Sunday in the late 1970s, Walker Nelms ran the Starkey Speedway in a go-kart, posting the best time of the day

MoodyFrom Page 6

helps out, as do other members of the Crandall family. Scott lived on the property, but he recently fin-ished his degree and is looking to move. Diana is a fixture in the pro shop, as is Milt, when he’s not on a mower somewhere. The same was true for previous operators. For half the time Brook-side has been in operation the operators were Archie and Elsie Goode. Crandall says the Goodes were well-known and “beloved by all who walked through the doors. To those of us lucky enough to have known [Archie], he was and always will be the heart and soul of Brookside.” The nine holes cover just 12.66 acres. Most people carry only a putter and a couple short irons or wedges when playing, but the number of memories made in that

little tract probably rivals any oth-er special area in the valley. For those who pay attention to the fine print of the daily sports section, it’s common to see holes-in-one recorded at Brookside. Most of the holes are less than 100 yards so a shot on the small greens has a chance. For the record, Tye Hartman recorded the first one. He was in the third group off the day the course opened and only needed to wait until the second hole to knock in the ace. George Mercer and Jerry Saun-ders are co-holders of the course-record low round of 20. TWENTY! That’s a stout round. Maybe there’s a 19 out there wait-ing to be shot. Crandall would love to see it. He intends to be around for a while longer. “Taking care of Brookside is the most fun I’ve ever had,” he says.

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NCAA Division III National ChampionshipWisconsin-Whitewater (yes, the foot-ball power) edged Cabrini 63-60 to win the basketball title game played at the Salem Civic Center March 17. Whitewater’s Chris Davis (below), the tournament’s most outstanding player, hoists the championship tro-phy. Cabrini’s John Boyd (left, shoot-ing) put on a show in spite of coming up a whisker short. Boyd scored 34 points in his team’s semifinal victory.

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North Cross Wins VIC Championship The Raiders defeated Hargrave 75-70 in the VIC championship game played Feb. 25 at VES in Lynchburg. Pictured left to right: Asst. Coach Oren Prunty, Coach Bill Hodges, Tay Calloway, Zach Lawson, Paul Ross, Max Revercomb, Keith Oddo, Matt Doughty, Bryce Woodliff, Bennett Holley, Harrison Call, Sam Lawrence, Eddie Smith, Asst. Coach Chris Richards and Asst. Coach. Chris Bielizna. Lawrence was named first-team all-conference (VIC Division 2) and first-team all-state (VIS Division 3). Holley was named first-team all-conference, Woodliff second-team all-conference and second-team all-state and Doughty second-team all-state.

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Snapshots of the season

New PH Baseball FieldWhen Patrick Henry High School dedicated its new baseball field (below) in late March, the powers that be called on one of their own to throw out the first pitch. State Sen. John Edwards (above), a 1962 PH graduate, did the honors. A former state champion pole-vaulter, Edwards is a member of the school’s athletic hall of fame.

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Not QuiteCave Spring High School’s basketball team (below) came up a few points shy of Brunswick in the Group AA Division 3 state championship game played in Richmond March 10. Thanks to the leadership of Amin Abuhawwas (see page 3) and Connor Baker (left, dribbling), the Knights made it inter-esting. Trailing 15-4 a few minutes into the title game, the Knights closed to within six points in the game’s waning minutes.

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10 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Catching on...Salem backstop is a building block in new D-I programby Mike

Ashley

A SK CARTER WiLLiAMSON about his highlights so far as a sophomore catcher at north

Carolina Central, and he starts running down how well the pitch-ing staff for the eagles is doing. You would think catchers should know that it’s better to receive than give. But Salem High School graduate Williamson is giving his all for the fledgling nCAA Division I nCC program, new to the Mid-eastern Athletic Conference this season. The results aren’t always what the eagles want to feather their nest, but first-year coach Jim Koerner sees progress, particu-larly when he looks homeward. “It’s challenging but if you’ve got a group that works like these guys, it makes it a lot more fun,” says Koerner. “Carter has started every game and he’s a real workhorse, a guy that we really depend on.”

Williamson is your classic, tough-er-than-nails catcher who has caught on quickly. He had to. Last

year as a freshman he played in 43 of the eagles’ 46 games, starting all but two. But in the unforgiving world of Division I independent schools, nCC took its lumps last year in a 7-39 campaign. The pro-gram only resumed again in 2007, after being dormant since 1975. “Coming down here last year I didn’t really know what to expect,” says William-son, a 2010 Spar-tans product. “I didn’t think it was going to be as tough as it was, playing (46) games, the c o m p e t i t i o n was definitely an eye-opener. I was basically catching ev-ery game, and it took a toll on me.” W i l l ia m son made an imme-diate impact, p a r t i c u l a r l y on the base-balls thrown his way. He had at least one hit in 14 of his first 16 games, and his aver-age was hover-ing around .360 until midsea-

son. Then, being the only reliable backstop on the team, Williamson slowed his bat as he wore down, finishing the year with a .298 aver-age and 22 RBI. Those numbers made him a leading returnee this year. A new coaching staff has been just as reli-ant on him; Williamson had start-ed every game through the first month of the season. And while he has been off to a slow start at the plate (.268 batting average at press time), his hits have been timely. He knocked in two runs in nCC’s first D-I conference win ever, a 5-4 victory over north Carolina A&T. The next day, he went 3-for-5 with two more RBI in a 12-9 win over the Aggies. At press time, he was leading the team with 21 RBI. “He puts together great at-bats,” says Koerner. “His average might be a little down now but his on-base percentage is very good. He has had some big hits for us, deliv-ering when the game is on the line. When there are runners on base and we need to get something go-ing, he’s a guy we like to have up

Going up the foul line to take an errant throw, former Salem High School catcher Carter Williamson tags out a Glenvar runner trying to score

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In his two seasons in Durham Williamson has been a top RBI man for Division I North Carolina Central

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Pay cash for gas and save 6 cents

per gallonE verypenny counts !

aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 11

Catching on...

there.” Williamson, too, has found a home behind home plate in Dur-ham, n.C., where the eagles play in the historic Durham Athletic Park, the former home of the Dur-ham Bulls and the 1988 movie “Bull Durham.” Williamson loves the place, particularly the 16-foot-fence down the 290-foot right field line, though few opposing pitchers give in to giving him a pitch he can pull. Williamson liked the pitch he got from the previous coach, Dr. Henry White, and his staff in the recruiting process. They gave him a scholarship that swayed him from a host of walk-on and Divi-sion III offers he was considering. “That definitely helped out finan-cially with my family, and coming down to north Carolina was not too far but just far enough to get away from home,” he says. “The weather’s nice down here all the time, too.” Williamson’s outlook is sunny

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and he’s a son that says he owes a lot to his father, Doug, a captain on some pretty good northside High School football and baseball teams in the late 1970s. “He was a role model and taught me every-thing I know,” says Williamson. “He was always there to support me and was always the coach on my (Little League) teams.” Williamson has fond memories of going to Waldron Park near his home, to throw and hit with his dad, his father teaching him to be a lefty hitter just like him. When it came time to settle on a position on the diamond, Doug pushed him toward catching but Carter was already sold before he really got started. “When I was younger I would get bored out in the field,” he says with a laugh. “Catching was the place I could be most involved, so I loved it.” Williamson would go on to star at Salem High School in baseball, football and wrestling. He was all-district and all-region his junior and senior seasons as a catcher, batted over .400 during his career and played for a district champion his final spring in 2010. In long-stranding tradition, the catcher’s equipment is known ironically as the “tools of igno-rance,” and that’s certainly a mis-nomer in Williamson’s circum-stance. Koerner lists his catcher’s top strength as intelligence. “He does a good job of manag-ing the pitching staff, and keeping them where they need to be,” says Koerner. A business management major with a concentration in market-ing, Williamson has always been a good student and chose nCC in part because the campus boasts a burgeoning law school he some-day hopes to attend. He’d like to get into business law someday af-ter he’s done giving baserunners the business. “Defensively, I’m a pretty good blocker (at the plate) and I can keep runners honest over at first,” says Williamson, who was a mid-dle linebacker/fullback in foot-ball. “I’m working on my footwork and my arm strength. I think I can be quicker, too.” Koerner has been working with him to go the opposite way at the plate as a hitter, since teams avoid pitching to him where he can pull the ball over the short porch in right. The adjustments have con-tributed to a slow offensive start,

but Williamson still has that sun-ny outlook going for him. “I just stay positive and I’m sure good things will happen,” he says. At press time, the team record stood at 8-22, but the eagles had

won their last four games in a row, including a first-ever victory over Longwood. That’s just the kind of player that helps build new Division I pro-grams.

Williamson has established himself as a calm and steadying influence for the Eagles’ pitching staff, largely an inexperienced group

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For more information please call 540-231-6725or register online at www.hokiesports.com/ camps click on Men’s Basketball to register

2012

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June 18-20: Offensive Skills Camp*• Rising 3rd-8th graders • Develop position specific fundamental and advanced concepts • Experience the same drills and concepts VT players receive • Intensive sessions conducted by Virginia Tech coaching staffJuly 9-12: Individual Overnight Camp*• Boys ages 7-rising 12th graders • Improve individual basketball skills • Opportunity to develop both basic and advanced skills

July 9-13: Individual Day Camp*• Boys and girls grades 1st-8th • Improve individual basketball skills • Learn in hard working yet fun environment

July 30-Aug. 3: Individual Day Camp*• Boys and girls grades 1st-8th • Improve individual basketball skills • Learn in hard working yet fun environment

Seth GreenbergSummer Basketball Campsat Virginia Tech

This sports camp is owned, controlled and operated by Seth Greenberg the head men's basketball coach at Virginia Tech. The word "Hokie(s)", or any other reference to Virginia Tech are by permission of the University, and do not indicate, express or imply in any fashion involvement of the Univer-sity in the operation or control of the camp, whose sole operator is Seth Greenberg. All Seth Greenberg Camps are open to any and all participants.

*All camps will be held in Hahn-Hurst Basketball Practice Center & Cassell Coliseum, home of the Hokies; Skills taught through individual and group instruction

12 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

by Mike Ashley

Leaving her printsI T MAKeS PeRFeCT SenSe

to go to CSu to someday be-come a CSI, and for Megan

Lombard, it’s working out just fine. Chances are that long after Lombard is gone — graduated, not departed, mind you — they’ll still be poring over the evidence of what a great softball player the Roanoke County native has been at Charleston Southern university. “She has been the best offensive player that this program has ever seen,” says coach Shane Win-kler. “She has natural ability off the charts and she’s going to own most of the offensive records in the books. She has been a player we can build our offense around, sitting in the leadoff spot for four years now.” Lombard will graduate in the fall with her degree in crimi-

Megan Lombard uncovers a record careernal justice, and she wants to be a crime scene investigator or a fo-rensic scientist. no one has to be a CSI or scientist to see just how the Hidden Valley High product has been so successful.

Some of the evidence points to both her parents being highly suc-cessful college athletes, as well. Father Kelly Lombard is still re-membered in these parts as the point guard on VMI’s 1976 and ’77

Southern Conference champion, Sweet Sixteen (elite eight in ’77) basketball teams. He was also an All-Southern Conference catcher in baseball in 1977. Mother Lorie

Megan Lombard is considered to be Charleston Southern’s best of-fensive player in school history

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Date: Saturday, May 5, 2012Location: Smith Mountain Lake State Park – Huddleston, VirginiaTime: 9:00am

To register or volunteer visit:

www.CommonwealthGames.org

aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 13

McCollum played field hockey at the university of Connecticut, earning All-American honors and playing for the 1981 Huskies’ na-tional championship squad. “You know how some parents are,” says Lombard. “But mine never pressured me (about play-ing sports). I always wanted to be out there.”

She remembers her father teaching her to hit and throw and catch in the backyard, and she also remembers always having a strong desire to keep improving, even when Mom and Dad weren’t there. “My sister is six years younger than me so she wasn’t old enough to play with me back then,” she says. “I would play by myself, imagining I was hitting the game-winning home run, hitting a ten-nis ball over the house.” There was catch against the wall, too, but Mom usually had to come out and yell at her to stop that. Lombard obviously got in enough work to improve her soft-ball skills. She was Charleston Southern’s Most Valuable Player and a Big South all-conference first -team selection last year when

she hit .330, with 12 doubles, eight home runs, 30 runs scored, 33 RBI, 102 total bases, a .410 on-base per-centage and a .534 slugging per-centage, all team-leading figures. All those numbers are precursor to what Lombard is doing to the Buccaneers’ career records. Before she’s done, the hard-hitting short-stop could be the school’s all-time

leader in home runs (21, currently tied for first with left fielder Jana Matthews), RBI (97, third, the re-cord is 109), slug-ging percentage (.520, first), hits (200, third, record is 207), total bases (321, first), on-base percentage (.392, third, record is .413), and doubles (40, second, record is 47). More signifi-cantly, the Bucs weren’t stopping

here like last season. They were 20-16, and improving, bouncing back from a 25-33 mark in 2011. Lom-bard is a pivotal part of the foun-dation Winkler hopes to lay down in the Low Country. “I think we’re a whole lot bet-ter this year,” Lombard says. “We have more pitching and what we brought in with our freshmen this year has greatly improved our hit-ting and defense. We’re a more complete team.” Ironically, Lombard was off to an uncharacteristically slow start this season; she didn’t have a home run in her first 74 at-bats but has since clouted two to tie junior Matthews for the school ca-reer record in what is shaping up as a Roger Maris-Mickey Mantle situation coming down the stretch this season.

Last year Lombard led the Buccaneers in average (.330), doubles (12), home runs (eight), runs scored (30), runs batted in (33), total bases (102), on-base percentage (.410) and slugging percentage (.534) — while playing the demanding position of shortstop

“Yeah, we joke about it all the time,” says Lombard. “Who’s go-ing to break the record today?” Lombard already knows a little something about historic home runs. She hit the first home run in Hidden Valley High School histo-ry, clouting a round-tripper for the junior varsity team when she was but an eighth-grader. When she was a freshman, she hit the first homer for the varsity team at the Titans’ home field. She left the Titans something to remember, earning All-District honors four years, all-state and all-region honors twice and holding career records for home runs, bat-ting average, doubles, triples and defensive putouts, including 11 in one game. Her defense has long been a source of pride, and something she leans on as a player. “Sometimes if my hitting is not going well, I rely on my defense and just try to be consistent and lead the team in a positive way with my attitude on the field,” she says. Lombard isn’t a vocal leader for

the team but Winkler likes the way she leads by example, likening it the way many top players in the Big Leagues provide leadership. “She’s one that everyone’s going to

follow because she’s such a good player,” he says. Lombard honed in on softball in high school, leaving the volley-ball team after one season and the basketball team after two seasons. “It was very time-consuming and there were conflicts with softball,” she says. “I just love softball, the competition and the fun you get out of it. There’s a feeling you get standing on the field. It never gets boring.” Lombard, who played for her father on travel teams, had offers from George Mason and Hofs-tra coming out of Hidden Valley but she fell in love with the city of Charleston on her visit. “I played travel ball and we would go all over the country, places like Col-orado and California,” she says. “I just really wanted to go some-where out of state and try some-thing different. I wouldn’t change a single thing that has happened in my career.” Lombard is wistful as the sched-ule winds down on her senior season. She is literally counting

the days but she’s excited about a future career in forensic crime i n v e s t i g a t i o n , though she says she doesn’t watch the CBS show “CSI.” “I like the real crime shows more,” she says. “I learned about (crime scene in-vestigation) while I was in high school, reading about it. I really like science and the whole idea of

CSI really intrigues me.” And again, you don’t have to be a great investigator to figure out that Lombard is likely to hit a home run in her future career.

KiwanisPancake Day

— 11th Annual —

Sat. Apr.8 • 7am-2pmRoanoke Civic Center

Fun for the whole family!

Tickets: $5.00 in advance; $6.00 at the door

Children under 5 FREECall 761-6751 to order tickets

Silent Auction begins at 8amLive Auction begins at 10am

Supports local non-profit organizations

— 17th Annual —

Sat., April 217am-1pm

Roanoke Civic CenterFun for the whole family!

Silent Auction begins at 8am

Tickets: $5.00 in advance; $6.00 at the door

Children under 5 FREECall 761-6751 to order ticketsSupports local non-profit organizations

Kiwanis Pancake Day

14 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Sox return with new antics, new manager

by Gene Marrano

WHAT CHAnGeS ARe In store for the Salem Red Sox in 2012? There’s a perma-

nent roof for the picnic pavilion in left field and a snazzy new cover for the Ted Williams grill behind the stands…. oh yes, the Salem Red Sox will also welcome plenty of new faces on the field and in the dugout as the 2012 Carolina League season gets underway. opening home weekend is April 13-15 against Myrtle Beach at LewisGale Field, a venue almost 17 years old that still looks close to new. The popu-lar Tuxedo night T-shirt giveaway on Saturday is a highlight that weekend. The new manager is Billy Mc-Millon, expected to bring some of his Greenville Drive players from low-A ball up to Salem when the roster is set in early April. The former major league outfielder (Marlins, Phillies, A’s and Tigers) led Greenville to the South Atlan-tic League cham-pionship series in his 2010 debut as a manager. Last year’s Salem hitting coach Alex Ochoa — now up with the big club in Boston as the first-base coach — has been replaced with a true Red Sox hero of yesterday, Rich Gedman. The for-mer catcher played for Boston from 1980-1990 and was twice selected as an All-Star. Kev-in Walker returns to Salem as the pitching coach. The Salem Sox did not reach the postseason last year, posting an overall record of 64-75 and a second half mark of 33-37. ex-pect some of the 2011 players to return, while others have moved on. one that started the season in advanced-A Salem last year — catcher Ryan Lavarnway — hit two home runs for Boston in a late season game as the BoSox tried to stay in the playoff hunt — but ulti-mately were unsuccessful.

Then there are promotions — the lifeblood of minor league baseball clubs. Salem general manager Todd Stephenson, now in his third year with the team, has assembled another ambitious calendar full of giveaways, special appearances and themed nights.

This season, as in the past, Stephen-son and his staff want to “engage the fan [and] make it fun” at the ballpark, even for the very casual attendees who come mainly for the cheap beer on Thursdays or just because their son plays Little League ball. Stephenson says changes at the top of the Red Sox food

chain, where new general manag-er Ben Cherington replaced Theo Epstein, haven’t created much of a ripple effect yet because Chering-ton was already working for the club. “If we brought in a GM that hadn’t been with us there would have been more change. He’s been with us since 1998 as a scout [and elsewhere].” Cherington had been vice presi-dent of player personnel until ep-stein was lured away to the Cubs. “I don’t see a big philosophical change,” adds Stephenson, “other than after last year [the historic

late-season Boston collapse] com-ing out aggressive and hustling —to prove a point.” As for McMillon, “he’s very ex-cited to come here,” says Stephen-son, who also spent time with the big club at spring training this year. Salem hasn’t won the Caro-lina League championship since 2001. In an eight-team league where four teams make the play-offs, “the numbers have to line up for us sooner or later.” The big attraction of minor league baseball for some, besides watching future major leaguers learn their craft, is the family-friendly atmosphere and afford-able ticket prices. Anyone who has sat in stratospheric upper-deck seats at a big league park and paid $30 or so for the privilege of doing so can relate to the attraction of Sa-lem Red Sox games, where single-game tickets can still be had for as little as $8 each — less with pack-age deals, Kids Club membership, etc. even the best box seats are just $11 this season. Get your Snookie on at Jersey Shore night, or come out for the elvis, ’80s-’90s and Military Ap-preciation nights — or Hee Haw night, when Stephenson and Star Country DJ Brett Sharp will dress up as characters from the old va-riety show and gamely sing corn-pone songs. There are beach music and wrestling nights as well. A “Hippie night” in August co-incides with the anniversary of

the death of the Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia. There’s even a nod to some of the clientele who nor-mally attend the Salem Fair — a game during the fair’s run where folks can get a dollar off for every body piercing or tattoo they have — up to six. “Do things that are quirky and engage in it ourselves,” says Ste-phenson, noting that the entire staff will dress up for events like Hee Haw night or the Mayberry Look-alike contest. As they did for the pocket calendar, look for lots of tank-tops, spray-on tans and spiked hair on Jersey Shore night. The Red Sox staff is also going viral this year, filming commercials for YouTube and Facebook to promote their product. There’s a Pink in the Park Weekend (May 18-20), a fundrais-ing weekend for breast cancer awareness. on a much lighter note, try Team Ghost Riders, where monkeys ride on the backs of dogs and herd goats on the field. Believe or not, “it’s some-thing that’s really big right now in minor league baseball,” says Ste-phenson. or occu “pie” Ballstreet (June 14-16), a takeoff on the “occupy Wall Street” movement that ends with an invitation to camp out at the ballpark. on June 15, 1 percent of all fans in attendance will get in free — as in the “one percent-ers” the occupy movement was protesting against. Also look for a staffer dressed as Gordon Gecko (“greed is good”). Camping on the field June 15 leads right into Father’s Day on June 16. “A good father-son activ-ity,” notes Stephenson, a proud north Carolina State graduate. Look for poster giveaways every weekend, dollar-ticket Mondays, Baseball Bingo, “Big Bang” Thurs-days ($1 beverages) and five post-game fireworks nights during the season. “You try to top it every year but you also do things that become traditional and work,” says Ste-phenson about the art of drawing fans to minor league baseball. See salemsox.com for more details on the upcoming season. oh yeah, Play Ball!

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aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 15

I T WAS CARVInS CoVe THAT did it for Joe Hanning: the mountain-biker and trail-run-

ner was looking for a new place that he and his wife, Jayenna, could call home, when they came across Roanoke and the Cove. “We like our mountains,” says Hanning, who relocated most re-cently from south-ern ohio. Within a few months, he landed a job with Roanoke City Parks and Recreation in the newly created po-sition of outdoor event Specialist. now you can just call him “Active Andy,” as in the mascot he created for the Roanoke 100 Miler challenge that wraps up in mid-April with an event for partici-pants (see roanoke100miler.com for details). Launched in January, the challenge was billed as a new Year’s revolution, not a “resolu-tion,” since people seem to break those. “Literally we opened a map and picked several cities to research. Believe it or not, Roanoke was no. 1,” says Hanning, who was the marketing director for a footwear company in ohio. The Star City beat out Asheville (n.C.) and sev-eral other larger eastern cities for the couple, who have two young children. (Jayenna is an eye doc-tor.) It was the layout and trail sys-tem at Carvins Cove that enabled Roanoke to sway the Hannings in the end. Since coming aboard last sum-mer Hanning has been involved with several major outdoor-relat-ed projects, including the outdoor Circus last fall. Then he picked up the ball and ran with an idea first suggested by Paul Chapman, the outdoor education coordinator for Roanoke City — how to get people off their backsides during the win-ter, and get them outside.

Thus was born the Roanoke 100 Miler challenge — walking, run-ning, biking, paddling — 100 miles in 100 days, between Jan. 7 and April 15. The idea, says Hanning, was to get people outside dur-ing the (normally) long and cold winters — although mileage on a treadmill or stationary bike was allowable. Participants, who paid an entry fee and a received

a T-shirt, could log their mileage online and were eligible for weekly giveaways. For those peo-ple who don’t reach the 100-mile goal but do more miles than they nor-mally would have, “I’ll throw them a high-five,” prom-ises Hanning. next year’s chal-lenge will include options for higher mileage, for the more hardcore

outdoor athletes already running, biking, hiking, etc. The 100 Miler’s mascot, Active Andy, also sent weekly updates via e-mail with health tips and details about places where people could rack up some of the miles needed to reach the 100-mile goal. That task falls to Hanning, 37, and he tackles it with pleasure, since he’s a huge outdoors buff himself. “Joe’s been knock-ing it out of the park,” says Chapman, Hanning’s supervi-sor. They didn’t know what to expect in terms of numbers for the first 100 Miler challenge — but more than 850 signed on. Hanning thought a few dozen people might turn out for a kickoff one-mile walk from Smith Park to Vic Thomas Park and back along the Roanoke River Greenway in early January — but around 150, including Roanoke Mayor David Bowers, showed up.

Hanning was hoping to attract people who are less apt to enjoy the outdoors and need to get in shape, along with the more ac-tive types. “Very surprised,” says Hanning of the final numbers. “People seem very happy to be in-volved with this.” He sees a lot of untapped potential here: “I think Roanoke has the potential to be the next Boulder of the east,” says Hanning, referring to Colorado’s outdoor-loving Mecca. Hanning was hired by Parks & Rec to oversee larger outdoor events for the City, which wants to play off the region’s amenities and quality of life, in part as an eco-nomic development engine. now he oversees the Wednesday night Disco series of mountain bike rac-es on Mill Mountain, which take place in April and May (kitschy ’70s era disco garb is optional). A 3.5-mile loop starting and end-ing at the Discovery Center (hence the name Disco) is designed for bikers at all skill levels. He’s also involved with the outdoor Circus, which is being renamed the “Go outside Festival,” or GoFest, for its second run in october The first outdoor Circus, held on the old Victory Sta-dium site, featured athletic gear vendors and demonstrations. “It’s going to be bigger and better this year,” promises Hanning. The outdoor Circus was created

in conjunction with Pete Eshel-man, the first director of outdoor branding for the Roanoke Region-al Partnership. Hanning commu-nicates with eshelman on a regu-lar basis; both are in newly created positions designed to help capital-ize on the valley’s outdoor assets.

“We’re like brothers, we work very closely [together],” says Hanning, who keeps a bike in his downtown office and often uses it for short jaunts. He also marvels at the number of people that use the Roanoke River Greenway, even during the week. now he’s involved as well in overseeing the Gallop 4 the Greenways 5K run (coming May 12), which the City assumed con-trol of last year after it was created and developed a few years back by a group of young professionals. “Gallop” is a fundraiser for the greenway system. entry fees guar-antee a T-shirt and an after party; corporate race sponsorships cre-ate the funds that are plowed back

into development of the green-way system.

With a “Bridge the Gap” campaign underway to fund

the last four-mile stretch of the Roanoke River Greenway — it

will complete an 18-mile section — Gal-lop 4 the Greenways may be more impor-tant than ever. “This

year we’re hoping for 500 people,” says Hanning. (See gallop4the-greenways.com for registration de-tails.) He looks forward to the immi-nent opening of a link from the 13th Street terminus for the green-way via an L-shaped bridge to the Tinker Creek Greenway, believing that will take some pressure off the Roanoke River Greenway, which is “probably overused,” at times. When he lived in ohio, Hanning saw what happens when a green-way system was completed — peo-ple pedaling bikes “that haven’t been out of their garages for 10 years, probably.” Shops sprang up to repair and sell bicycles, some-thing that is happening in Roa-noke as well. other major outdoor events are in the planning stages. “We’re learning as we go along,” says Active Andy — make that Joe Hanning — about his role as Roa-noke City’s outdoor events Spe-cialist.

‘Active Andy’ makes his presence feltby Gene Marrano

Joe Hanning

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150 citizens kicked off the Roanoke 100 Miler

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16 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Local men playing basketball in collegeHere is a summary of 2011-2012 college basketball statistics for those

players we were able to trace to area high schools.

Bluefield

Catawba

Emory & Henry

Guilford

Radford

Roanoke

Local women playing basketball in college

Ferrum

Concord

Richmond

Bridgewater

Charts by Donna Earwood Research by Christian Moody

notice anyone missing? With a list of this magnitude, we’re bound to have overlooked a college basketball player or two who hails from the Roanoke Valley. Please e-mail any additions to us at jmonty@cox.net and we will gladly publish them in an upcoming issue.

Roanoke

GP-GS FGM-FGA-Pct. 3FG-3FGA-Pct. FT-FTA-Pct. Reb-Avg. A TO Blk Stl Pts-Avg.

Ti’Asia McGeorge, Soph. G from William Fleming 30-3 35-115-.304 33-111-.297 6-6-1.000 33-1.1 11 20 2 13 109-3.6

Sarah Boeren, Sr. G from Lord Botetourt 20-4 15-50-.300 1-10-.100 10-19-.526 26-1.3 20 38 0 23 41-2.1

Sammi Webster, Soph. C from William Byrd 27-0 5-22-.227 0-0-.000 6-14-.429 21-1.2 3 3 0 2 16-0.9

Abby Redick, Jr. F from Hidden Valley 3-0 0-1-.000 0-0-.000 2-2-1.000 2-0.7 1 1 0 0 2-0.7

Amanda Farmer, Soph. G from Lord Botetourt 14-0 4-17-.235 4-14-.286 8-12-.667 256-0.4 14 15 0 5 20-1.4 Shea Smith, Soph. G from Franklin County 28-17 91-220-.414 9-35-.257 60-92-.652 98-3.5 115 101 5 54 251-9.0

Jessica Rhodes, Fr. C from William Byrd 15-0 17-29-.586 0-0-.000 9-14-.643 17-1.1 3 11 3 1 43-2.9

Caitlin Falls, Sr. F from Staunton River 26-6 49-111-.491 0-1-.000 51-84-.607 137-5.3 30 52 10 22 149-5.7

Sam Sublett, Jr. F from Staunton River 12-1 11-33-.333 0-2-.000 6-8-.750 25-2.1 0 5 5 4 28-2.3

Abby Oliver, Sr. G from Hidden Valley 32-32 183-405-.452 54-125-.432 106-113-.938 106-3.3 81 94 10 49 526-16.4

Nicci Moats, Sr. C from Lord Botetourt 11-9 52-122-.426 0-0-.000 35-56140-.625 129-11.7 14 41 19 13 139-12.6 Hannah Ward, Fr. G from Lord Botetourt 25-0 22-66-.333 0-10-.000 18-37-.486 56-2.2 20 39 0 15 63-2.5

Kenzie Poindexter, Fr. G from Patrick Henry 20-0 5-24-.208 1-8-.125 0-5-.000 13-0.7 4 16 0 6 11-0.6

Grace Blaylock, Jr. G from Lord Botetourt 30-16 49-178-.275 46-156-.295 8-13-.615 99-3.3 50 39 2 31 152-5.1

Delaware

Eastern Mennonite

VCU

Lynchburg

UVa-Wise

Drexel

USC-Aiken

Averett

Bridgewater

American Univ.

Randolph

Valparaiso

UNC-Asheville

GP-GS FGM-FGA-Pct. 3FG-3FGA-Pct. FT-FTA-Pct. Reb-Avg. A TO Blk Stl Pts-Avg.

Paul Porter, Soph. C from Patrick Henry 26-26 91-182-.500 0-0-.000 64-108-.593 217-8.3 15 33 10 17 246-9.5

Alvin Board, Jr. G from William Fleming 33-1 39-88-.443 30-67-.448 12-21-.571 20-0.6 14 13 1 13 120-3.6 George Brooks, Soph. G from Roanoke Catholic 34-7 20-60-.333 1-10-.100 16-25-.640 98-2.9 49 24 9 30 57-1.7

Ronnie Thomas, Soph. G from Patrick Henry 26-26 94-248-.379 27-81-.333 67-86-.709 135-5.2 105 92 50 5 125-4.8

Chris Tyree, Soph. G from Franklin County 20-0 5-20-.250 1-8-.125 10-10-1.000 7-0.4 1 2 0 4 21-1.1

Jamelle Hagins, Jr. F from William Fleming 32-32 155-283-.548 0-0-.000 86-129-.667 354-11.1 28 73 95 21 396-12.4

Adam Burroughs, Soph. G from Northside 27-27 81-252-.321 43-157-.274 19-31-.613 76-2.8 60 49 1 35 224-8.3

Chris Ware, Fr. F from James River 2-0 0-2-.000 0-0-.000 1-2-.500 3-1.5 0 2 0 0 1-0.5

Clarence Turpin II, Soph. G from Roanoke Catholic 13-0 5-14-.357 0-1-.000 1-5-.200 8-0.6 8 3 0 4 11- 0.9

Chance Smith, Sr. G from Northside 32-12 5-22-.227 0-0-.000 6-14-.429 21-1.2 3 3 0 2 16-0.9

Stefan Vulevic, Soph. G from Roanoke Catholic 21-0 28-56-.500 6-20-.300 17-28-.607 28-1.3 16 25 0 11 79-3.8 Logan Singleton, Sr. C from Hidden Valley 26-26 147-321-.458 34-94-.362 64-79-.810 187-7.2 12 45 31 20 392-15.1

Zach Barrett, Jr. F from Hidden Valley 23-0 33-83-.398 7-27-.259 10-16-.625 32-1.4 10 19 1 7 83-3-6

Ethan Humphries, Soph. G from James River 26-26 28-52-.538 1-3-.333 5-32-.156 55-2.1 65 70 1 19 62-2.4

Clay Lacy, Soph. G from Cave Spring 26-13 51-118-.432 14-39-.359 33-45-.733 113-4.3 14 40 1 8 149-5.7

Rick Alderman, Jr. F from Lord Botetourt 29-6 62-111-.559 0-0-.000 50-83-.602 83-2.9 29 42 0 10 174-6.0

Ben Boggs, Jr. G from Hidden Valley 24-20 30-102-.294 16-54-.296 33-41-.805 76-3.2 22 36 2 7 109-4.5

Troy Daniels, Jr. G from William Fleming 35-20 111-294-.378 93-243-.383 43-51-.843 117-3.3 18 33 2 42 358-10.3

aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 17

C h a n c i Wright is a sophomore who plays defense. She is another two-sport ath-lete who also plays basketball. Wright majors in mathematics and chose Hol-lins for its highly regarded aca-demics. Polito says Wright is an excellent de-fender with ex-ceptional speed who leads the team in forced

turnovers. Californian Christine Somersett is an attack spe-cialist. She is a sophomore whom Polito reports is “ex-tremely involved in the cam-pus community.” Biology/pre-vet major Amanda Duffie-Fritz is a freshman who plays defense. She is also a member of the Hollins soccer team. Duffie-Fritz is “a great athlete from a lacrosse hotbed outside Philly [with] a great attitude and work ethic, lots of poten-tial,” says Polito. Meg O’Brien is another of Polito’s multi-sport athletes. This freshman international business major is an attack specialist. o’Brien says. “I chose Hollins for the broad academ-ics and the study abroad program. I love the size of the school and the feeling of being close to so many peo-ple.” “[o’Brien] played at a top high

HollinsFrom Page 18

of fans.” The 2012 Hollins lacrosse play-ers are serious about their com-mitment to the sport, they are realistic about their expectations and they are willing to make the sacrifices necessary to improve. It’s an eclectic group of multi-tal-ented athletes that have come to-gether in this common pursuit of quality. Jacqui Sommerman, also a captain, is one of two seniors on the team. She is willing to fill whatever position is needed for the success of the team, and currently plays attack. “This senior played goalie last year,” Polito says, “and transitioned to attack.  She brings energy to the team.” LaWall, who plays midfield, is the other senior team member. She is a business and economics major. Polito describes LaWall as a “great veteran leader, [who] leads the team in points.” Although La-Wall was initially lured to Hollins by its nationally prominent rid-ing program, she calls Hollins la-crosse her favorite sports team. Jessie McAfoos is a junior mid-fielder. Her major is biology and her minor is math. McAfoos is im-pressed by the faculty and also by the traditions at Hollins. McAfoos displays “great wisdom in the hud-dle,” according to Polito. She is “an experienced athlete, taking the draw for us this year.” (The draw in lacrosse is the midfield faceoff at the beginning of each period and after each score. It’s an intense, crucial battle for possession of the ball.) McAfoos is a “quick study on the sport,” Polito says. Sage Otto is a junior midfielder. Her major is environmental stud-ies and her minor is communica-tions. otto is described by Polito as “a second-year player, a workhorse [who] will run through a wall for you [and] can be an aggressive defender.” otto is impressed with the “opportunities for discovery” at Hollins. Melissa Hubbard is a junior psychology and education major. She came to Hollins to play soc-cer, but was eager to add lacrosse to her repertoire. She plays de-fense. Hubbard is the “fastest shot on the team, a two-sport athlete at Hollins [who] has great speed and work ethic,” according to Polito. Lindley Taylor majors in math-ematics and film. She is a junior and plays defense. Polito calls

Taylor the “emotional leader of the program. She is a three-year player, a junior captain. everyone looks up to her and [she is a] great leader in the defense.” Communications major Corinne Nicholson, a transfer from Juniata College, anchors one of the most critical positions on the field. She plays in the goal. This position requires physical and mental toughness, quick reaction time and great hand-eye coordi-nation. only fearless, indefatiga-ble athletes need apply. nicholson won the job over both of last year’s goalies and she recorded an eye-popping 24 saves against West Virginia Wesleyan. Sophomore Brandi Chesne is a political science major who plays attack. She is also a key member of the Hollins basketball team. Chesne’s athleticism is a great as-set, Polito notes. Chesne says that one of the advantages of going to Hollins is “knowing someone. no matter where I am on campus.”

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school program in Tennessee, swims at Hollins too, [and is] a great energy on the team,” Polito says. Schuyler Hughes is a freshman biology major who is an attack specialist. Hughes is currently in-jured, hasn’t had a lot of time to build experience, but “could be-come a major offensive contribu-tor,” Polito says. In a recent game versus the 14th-ranked Washington & Lee power-house, Hollins was forced to play at less than full strength. Circum-stance and injury had reduced their roster to 12 players, the mini-mum number required to field a

team. There were no substitutes available. each player was re-quired to go the entire 60 minutes of the game with no relief. This is essentially another affirmation of their mantra “no Prey, no Pay,” a team slogan borrowed from 18th-century Caribbean pirates. The end result of the W&L game was a lopsided Generals victory, but Hollins did not quit. Like those infamous pirates of old, the Hollins teammates put it all on the line in a one-for-all, all-for-one effort. either prevail as a team and share the rewards, or come up short and face their des-tiny together. So how is the Hollins team do-ing so far this season? Let’s say they are doing better. What is their record? That’s not relevant to these determined pirates. They will do better tomorrow and the day af-ter, and when the season is done everyone will know that they did their best.

Hollins defender Chanci Wright (right) drives W&L midfielder Kirby Taylor away from the goal

A skull and crossbones flag reminds Hollins of its ‘No Prey, No Pay’ slogan

Hollins players are committed to giving their best effort, win or lose

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18 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

See HOLLINS, Page 17

by Bo Lucas

‘No prey, no pay’

RANDy POLiTO IS In THe midst of his second season coaching the Hollins lacrosse

team. Polito was recruited from Rollins College in Winter Park, Fla., where he was assistant coach for the Tars’ women’s lacrosse team. Rollins’ athletic teams are members of the nCAA Division II, where their women’s lacrosse team is currently ranked among the top 10. Polito’s tenure at Hollins has been a challenging venture. He was brought into the lacrosse pro-gram to facilitate a major change in focus on athletics. This is a team in transition. Polito and his team are in the process of rebuilding a program capable of competing with the best in their classifica-tion. Hollins has been at the top be-fore. Those associated with the program are willing to put in the effort required to return to that plateau. It is an exigent and itera-tive process that can be accom-plished even within the challeng-ing academic environment of this university. Athletic Director David Zinn is vested in this approach and he’s pleased with Polito’s methods. “Coach Polito does an outstanding job of teaching lacrosse to our ath-letes and I am excited about the development of the program. our

young ladies are working hard and showing rapid improvement. I be-lieve with continued leadership and effort, this team will continue to progress,” Zinn says.

Hollins lacrosse team continues to battle

The synergy within the athletic department should help to culti-vate this ambitious challenge. Hollins has an outstanding his-tory in collegiate lacrosse. In the early years of the sport, Hollins was one of the premier programs. At the height of this era, Lanet-ta Ware coached those lacrosse teams from 1962-1984. In 1979, Ware and her Hollins team were runners-up in the uSWLA nation-al championship. Her teams were

also Vir-ginia State Division 2 Champions in 1979 and ’80. Several of Ware’s teams went u ndefeated during their regular sea-sons. In 2001, Ware was in-ducted into the uS La-crosse Hall of Fame for her perfor-

mance as a player while at the university of Richmond. Ware’s achievements as a player, coach, administrator, official and sup-porter were discussed in a Play

by Play story in 2011. Ware’s legacy continues to be an inspi-ration to those who follow in her footsteps — and the former coach can still be found cheer-ing from the sidelines. As Polito di-rects his squad

through Act 2 of the re-

construction, he has a better understand-ing of the plot than he did last year during Act 1. Polito was caught a little off guard when he took over at Hollins. “even though we were varsity com-petition (prior to his arrival) and we played an oDAC confer-ence schedule, there was never a real e m p h a s i s on recruiting student-athletes,” Polito says. Polito has quickly come up to speed. “In the last decade or so the mentality of athletics (at Hollins) has changed,” Polito explains. “one by one they started bringing in new coaches with the mentality of competitive nCAA athletics. We were kind of the last sport to take on the shift, take on that turn. And I didn’t (fully) realize that big pic-ture of where the program was.” Last season was a learning ex-perience for everyone involved. now in 2012, all connected with the Hollins lacrosse program are of the same mind. This year be-gan with a series of preseason

meetings where everyone shared their goals and what they wanted from their experience. A common premise was a positive self-image and optimistic — yet realistic —expectations. “There should be no reason why good student-athletes that would want to go to Sweet Briar shouldn’t want to come to Hollins and play for us,” Polito says. “When we talked about this in the preseason meetings, the common theme shared by all the ladies on the team was that they want to know that when they are older that this program is still around, that it’s strong and that it’s thriving.”

The Hollins lacrosse team wanted to accomplish something of which all its

members could be proud, and that future generations could embrace.

These teammates docu-mented their goals for the year. They identified and agreed on daily, short-term and long-term goals.

Then they created an appro-priate poster of these goals and posted it in their locker room. one of these goals is to “earn a team GPA of 3.2 or higher” — an indication

of the importance that academic pursuits are given.

of course they also have goals about number of wins and victories over certain op-ponents. There are

goals of individual performance, communication and building a strong and positive culture. But for the long term, they want the program to be the best again. They know that it involves doing bet-ter each day than they did the day before, and helping each other to maximize their efforts. Team co-captain Erika LaWall puts it this way: “We are  redefin-ing the sport of lacrosse at Hol-lins.  The team is creative in how we motivate each other, and the campus sees how much fun and determination we have.  It is a great feeling to glance over at the sidelines and see a bleacher full

Hollins University’s Jessie McAfoos (above, left) battles W&L’s Meade Brewster for the airborne ball during a faceoff. Midfielder Erika LaWall (right) says, ‘We are redefining the sport of lacrosse at Hollins’

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The Hollins lacrosse team is in transition, rebuilding a program capable of competing with their best opponents

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aPRIl 9, 2012 Play By Play 19

Global warming made my March madnessI MuST SAY THIS GLoBAL

warming thing is working for me so far.

Thanks, Al Gore. I know he in-vented it, or the Internet, or some-thing. See why I stick to sports? All I know is that I was walking my dog in shorts all of March. (I was in the shorts, not my dog.) This is a far cry from the March I used to know. We got over a foot of snow the second week of that month back in 1993. I know because it col-lapsed the roof of the Dedmon Center at Radford university where I used to work. It was the day before we hosted the Big South Conference wom-en’s basketball tournament final, with an nCAA berth on the line. The snow came down so hard and fast it fooled the sensors in the Ded-mon Center’s once-state-of-the-art air-supported roof, and the roof didn’t heat to melt the snow. Instead, the snow piled up and the roof came down. And the cool thing was it was designed to do that. It collapsed perfectly and there would have been no damage at all to the facility — other than pumping the roof back up — had college basketball not added shot clocks to the game in 1984, three years after the facility opened. The shot clocks atop the basketball backboards were just enough of an addition in height to puncture small holes at each end of the collapsing roof, above the backboards. A little water seeped in but it was nothing like the 2010 Metrodome collapse in Minneapolis when snow came gushing in. (Has snow ever “gushed” before?) oh, and the other cool thing at Ru was that the next day, instead of hosting the championship, I was on the roof shoveling snow. Always wanted an excuse to get on top of the Dedmon Center, which I thought looked like the Michelin Man lying on his back. of course, not much was made of Radford’s dome dilemma in the lo-cal media because that same night, the LancerLot in Vinton completely caved in. Soon pro hockey gushed right out of town. of course my point is…where’d the snow go this March? not that I’m complaining. I’ve shoveled enough snow. I haven’t worn shorts in March enough. neither has my dog. It all makes me think there’s something to this end of the world thing. The Mayans, who seemed like a pretty sharp lot, had their calendar run-ning out on Dec. 21, 2012, and that’s got folks pretty uptight. A lot of them are the same dingbats that didn’t think we’d survive new Year’s 2000. I’m not taking sides but I have told family and friends, just to be sure, I’m not doing any Christmas shopping until Dec. 22. I visited some Mayan ruins several years ago in Chicken Pizza in Mexi-co. (Wait, that’s just how I remember the name. It’s actually Chichen Itza.) The Mayans built some pretty cool stuff way back when. Must have had federal subsidies or sold personal seat licenses or something. Some folks think aliens came down and helped them build all that stuff but you have to wonder if Mexico was interested in letting aliens into their country back when they were civilization top dogs. Anyway, I, of course, only cared about seeing the stadium there among all the temples and towers — luxury boxes, I assume. They had a huge

field and stands way up high. It was so old it reminded me of Victory Sta-dium. Well, that and my back patio where grass and weeds grow through the bricks. They had these iron-like goals on the walls and our guide was explain-ing that they played some sort of soccer-like game where the aim was to get the ball-like thing through the goals maybe 12-14 feet off the ground. The ball, he said, was most likely someone’s head. (Probably Sean Pay-ton’s. By the way, Roger Goodell just called and I’ve been suspended for three games for using Bounty paper towels. And he said if I switched to Brawny, I’d have to undergo drug testing.) That’s not the worst of it. Apparently whichever team lost got sacrificed after the Mayan game. Talk about do-or-die. All the players had bounties on them. There was this big quarry-like place where they say many Ma-yans jumped to their death. I prefer the Lambeau Leap. And come to think of it, I could use a little frozen tundra next year. By the way, Radford won that 1993 Big South title and an nCAA berth a week later, putting the ball through the hoop more to stay ahead of unC Greensboro. As I remember, none of the Greensboro players lost their heads — although it was a big upset. Anyway, I love in the fall when the weather starts turning crisp, the trees change to Virginia Tech colors and you can smell the football in the air. Also, you get a whiff of the tailgating. I don’t want it too warm then, at least not until the geniuses at eSPn make us sit in Lane Stadium on a november Thursday night. I jest. There are no geniuses at eSPn. If eSPn had covered the Mayan games, they’d have had a talking head interview the head-ball at halftime. I wonder what’s on eSPn Dec. 22? I think it’s part of Armageddon Week brought to you by The Home Depot. I’m just cranky that we haven’t paid our winter dues and that means spring and summer will be crappy and I won’t get my carcass out to the beach as much as I want. oh, and I do wish those jerks from Greenpeace would stop rolling me into the water every time I’m lying out there.

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SIDELINESby Mike Ashley

20 Play By Play aPRIl 9, 2012

Pitching in at Home.