Sports
Husker women shoot for second place
By Chris Hopfensperger
Senior Editor
Tonight, the Nebraska women’s
basketball team plays the sixth-place
team in the Big Eight — a team that
has won only two of its past nine
games.
On Saturday, the Comhuskcns travel
to Colorado for a game that could
decide second place in the confer
ence, facing a team that has won its
past nine games.
But Coach Angela Beck said her
team isn’t concerned with anything
other than the game at hand.
“The only mention of Colorado is
what time we’re leaving,” Beck said.
Before they leave, the Huskers will
meet Oklahoma State tonight at 7
p.m. in the Bob Devaney Sports Center.
Nebraska is 18-7 overall and third in
the Big Eight race at 8-4.
Oklahoma State is 5-7 and 10-15
overall.
One of the Cowgirls’ wins came
against Nebraska. The Huskcrs’ 12
point loss in Stillwater, Okla., was
their worst setback of the season, Beck
said.
The memories could help moti
vate Nebraska tonight, she said.
“We didn’t play very well,” she
said. “We’redisappointed in that. But
we know they’re going to be ready.
They know what they’re capable of
against us.”
The Huskcrs have been working
on their gameplan to attack Okla
homa Slate’s sagging-man defense,
Beck said. Nebraska’s offense played
into the the Cowgirls’ hands in the
first game, she said.
Senior Sue Hesch, who sal out
Nebraska’s game at Iowa State Sun
day with a bruised bone in her leg,
will return to the starling lineup against
the Cowgirls.
Nebraska beat Iowa State 80-61
Sunday.
“We’ve played pretty good bas
ketball here of late,” Beck said. “A
19-point win on the road is obscene.”
This year’s team is only the sec
ond of Beck’s teams at Nebraska to
win more than 17 games. The first, in
1987-88, finished 22-7, won the Big
Eight crown and advanced to the
NCAA tournament.
This year’s team has the same
potential, Beck said.
The Huskers, who have two games
remaining before the Big Eight tour
nament, have a legitimate shot at an
NCAA tournament appearance, Beck
said.
“Last year we were considered with
17 wins,” she said. “We already have
18 wins this season.
“The sky’s the limit at this point.”
NU women's
basketball
probable
starters
Nebraska 18-7 (8-4) ppgrpg
G 24 Meggan Yedsena 5-8 So. 11.1 3.4 \ \ \ \
F 41 Caret Russell 5-10 Sr. 5.3 3.0 \ \ \ \
F 51 Karen Jennings 6-2 Jr. 25.5 9.8 \ \
G 20 Kim Yancey 5-6 Sr. 5.1 1.7 \ \
F 42 SueHesch 6-1 Sr. 7.1 4.3 \ \ \
Oklahoma State 10-15 (5-7)ppg rpg
F 33 Shea Jackson 6-1 Jr. 7.4 4.3 \ \
C 54 Sfeawnette Brock 6-0 Jr. 6.4 4.9
G 20 Leslie Day 5-4 Fr. 6.8 3.7
G 21 Regi Briley 5-9 Fr. 2.0 4.3
G 34 Paula Breeden 5-6 Sr. 11.0 3.0
-■ 1 - ' Scott Maurer/lJrs
NU makes AP poll again
Huskers, Cowboys vie
for Big Eight eminence
By Jeff Singer
Staff Reporter
For the first time this season, the Nebraska
men’s basketball team will compete in some
thing it hasn’t for a year—a game between two
Top 25 teams.
The Comhuskcrs, who
debuted this week at No. 25
in The Associated Press poll,
will battle No. 14 Oklahoma
State lonightat 7:08 p.m. in
Stillwater, Okla. The con
test will be televised live
by Prime Sports.
The two teams arc tied
for third in the Big Eight
Nee standings with 5-5 records.
For the season, Nebraska is 17-6 and the Cowboys
are 21-5.
This is the first lime in school history the
Huskers have been ranked in consecutive years.
Last season Nebraska was ranked 11th in the
final AP poll.
The Huskers’ appearance in the polls at this
point in the season is beneficial in many ways,
Nebraska coach Danny Nee said.
“I think it’$ great,” Nee said. “The reason I
think it’s important is that when the (NCAA
Tournament) Selection Committee is looking
at teams, if you’re in that select group, it means
you’ve earned your way in and it gives you the
credibility that you need to get a good seed.”
Nebraska earned its way into the rankings
with consecutive wins over Top 25 opponents
Kansas and Iowa State, after beginning the
week with a 26-point loss at Missouri.
The Huskers’ 85-69 win over the formerly
No. 2 Cowboys three weeks ago in Lincoln also
had a little to do with Nebraska’s ranking, but
that win won’t be a factor tonight at Gallaghcr
Iba Arena, Nee said.
“The game here has absolutely no relevance
of what’s going to happen in Stillwater,” Nee
said. “We’ve got to play 40 minutes against the
best pressure in the country, and if we play like
we did against Missouri we don’t have a chance.
“But if we play like we did against Iowa
State, we do have a chance.”
After starting the season 20-0, Oklahoma
State has lost five of its last six games and is on
a four-game losing streak, capped by Sunday’s
66-52 loss to Missouri.
-44
We ’ve played for 98 years and
are now on the verge of making
history of two straight NCAAs.
We lost four or five players off
of last year’s program —jnow
we’re right back at the same
level we were at.
Nee
Nil men's basketball coach
-ft -
Nee said many factors explained the Cow
boys recent problems, but the most important
could be Oklahoma State’s loss of All-Ameri
can candidate Byron Houston.
“I think they’re the same team that’s won 20
games, but you have an injury to your star
player and you hit the rough part of your
schedule, you’re not going to have the ball
bounce your way every time,” Nee said.
Houston, who averages 20.3 points and nine
rebounds per game for the Cowboys, is ques
tionable for tonight’s game because of a sprained
ankle that prevented him from playing in the
loss to Missouri.
Nee said much of Nebraska’s success of late
must be credited to senior guard Chris Cresswcll,
who leads the Huskers in three-point baskets
See COWBOYS on 8
Jeff Haller/ON
Nebraska’s Eric Piatkowski puts up a shot as Rex Walters of Kansas defends
in last week’s 81-79 Cornhusker win. The No. 25 Huskers will try to make it
three straight wins over ranked teams tonight when they face No. 14 Okla
homa State in Stillwater, Okla.
Coach says final foe a mystery
By Chuck Green
Senior Reporter
The 10th-ranked Comhusker
wrestling team’s dual season will
end the way it began: shrouded in
mystery.
With one dual left on Nebraska’s
schedule, tonight against Wyoming
in Laramie, Wyo., the Huskcrs don’t
know what to expect from the 2-6
Cowboys, Coach Tim Neumann
said.
“They’re geographically set
where there aren’t many teams for
them to wrestle,’’ he said. “Be
cause they haven’t wrestled much '
this season, and we haven’t seen
them wrestle all year, I don’t really
know what they have.”
Mystery is nothing new to Neu
mann. At the start of the season, he
was unsure how successful his team
would be, because more than half
of his 10-man prcscason starting
roster was made up of freshmen
and junior college transfers.
The Huskcrs have compiled a
124 dual record this season and
have answered a lot of Neumann’s
questions.
But questions about Wyoming
remain.
I Neumann said the only Cowboy
wrestlers he knew about were Mike
Donovan and Greg Johnson, Wyo
ming’s starters at the 126- and 142
pound weight classes, respectively.
Donovan, Neumann said, has
beaten Nebraska wrestlers in the
past, “and he wrestled (former
Huskcr All-American Jason) Kclbcr
pretty close last year at 134.”
Johnson beat Nebraska wres
tlers in his weight class the past
two seasons.
See WRESTING on 8
NU won’t take Lopers
for granted, coach says
By Peter Theoharis
Staff Reporter
When the Nebraska baseball team
faces the University of Nebraska
Kcamey today, the Comhuskcrs will
not take the Lopers lightly, Coach
John Sanders said.
Nebraska will take a 2-0 record
into the nine-inning contest, sched
uled for 2 p.m. at Buck Bcllzer Field.
Facing an NCAA Division II team
this early in the season may make
Nebraska more susceptible to an upset
Just ask nationally ranked Creighton,
which split a doublchcadcr with Divi
sion II Wayne State last Saturday.
“It certainly is nothing to be taken
for granted,” Sanders said. “We need
to go at these guys like it’s the finals
of the Big Eight tournament.”
UNK traveled to Norman, Okla.,
last week for a three-game set against
Oklahoma. The Lopers were swept
by the Sooners, but Sanders said UNK
showed improvement throughout the
contests. The Lopers lost the first
game 7-0, then lost 11-3 and 8-7.
See BASEBALL on 8
