Nebraskan
Thursday, March 11.1M3
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Kiley Tknperiey/DN
Nebraska’s Derrick Chandler puts up a shot in a game against The
Citadel earlier this year.
NCAA Tourney teams
to be picked by Sunday
By Susie Arth
Senior Reporter
For KU athletic director Bob Frederick,
the long and grueling process is about to
begin.
Frederick, who is a member of the NCAA
Tournament Committee, will go behind
closed doors for three days to pick the 64
teams that will compete in the tournament.
The process begins Thursday evening,
and the teams, players and fans will know
who made it into the tournament by Sunday
evening, he said.
The first part is easy, Frederick said.
“Of the 64 teams, 30 of them are auto
matic conference qualifiers,” he said.
Then there are some obvious choices.
“Thereare 15-20 teams thatanyone in the
country could pick right now," tie said.
But then things start to get sticky.
“We might spend an hour and a half
See NCAA on 14
Piatkowski named
to All-Big Eight
first team by AP
By Jeff Singer
Senior Reporter
A first-team All-Big Eight selection at Ne
braska.
It hasn’t happened for seven years, but
Cornhuskcr guard Eric Piatkowski ended
Nebraska’s drought this week by being named
as one of five players on the Associated Press’
all-conference team.
Piatkowski, a 6-foot-7 junior guard from
Rapid City, S .D., became the Huskers’ first All
Big Eight first team selection since Dave Hoppen
received the honor in 1986.
Nebraska coach Danny Nee said he was
proud of the first player to receive the honor
during his seven-year tenure at Nebraska.
“I think it’s one of the highest awards a
player can attain,” Nee said at his weekly press
conference.
He said it was easy to sec why Piatkowski
was named All-Big Eight.
“Eric Piatkowski is as complete a basketball
player as there is in college basketball today,”
Nee said. “I think next year Piatkowski is going
to be one of the premier players in the Big Eight
and one of the prem ier forwards in the country.”
Piatkowski, who leads the Huskers in scor
ing with an average of 16.6 points per game,
joined Oklahoma Stale center Bryant Reeves,
Iowa Slate guard Justus Thigpen, Kansas guard
Rex Walters and Colorado guard Donnie Boyce
on the first team.
Piatkowski said he was happy to join his Big
Eight counterparts on the team.
“It’s just a great honor,” Piatkowski said.
“When I first found out, I was on cloud nine; it
was kind of a little dream of mine ever since I
first came here, and (the honor) was something
I was striving for.”
Piatkowski, who was honorable mention
All-Big Eight last season, said he credited Nee
for his ability to play consistently all year long.
“One of the most important things he did is
how he kind of saved me throughout the season
and kept me really strong so I could be strong
toward the end of the season,” Piatkowski said.
He said it was beneficial that Nee helped him
not overdo himself against weaker non-confer
encc teams because “when you’re playing some
of the lesser teams — some of the cupcakes at
the beginning of the year— you want to go out
there and score 35 or 40 points night in and night
out.”
Under Piatkowski’s leadership, the Huskers
finished in a tie for second place in Big Eight
play this season and have a 20-9 overall mark
heading into this weekend’s Big Eight tourna
ment.
Piatkowski said good showings in both the
Big Eight tourney and the upcoming NCAA
Tournament were important along with his
individual honors.
“That was great, but right now I’m more
concerned about gelling wins,” he said. “This is
my fourth year, counting the redshirt year, and
we’ve been to the NCAA tournament twice and
we lost both times. I want to stay there longer
than we have in the past — that’s my main
goal.”
Injuries won’t keep sprinter
out of NCAA Championships
Washington says bruises,
wounds won’t hinder him
By Tony West
Staff Reporter
One Nebraska track athlete will be thinking
about more than the competition when he trav
els to Indianapolis for the NCAA Indoor Cham
pionships this weekend.
Riley Washington, a freshman sprinter for
the Huskers, will be recovering from an alter
cation that injured his face and left him covered
with bruises Friday.
“I just happened to be in the wrdng place at
the wrong time,” Washington said.
Washington, a football scholarship player
who qualified for the SS-meter dash, said he
would be able to compete this weekend despite
the injuries.
“I thought it might affect my performance at
first,” Washington said. “But not anymore. I’m
not in bad shape, but not in the best, either.”
Washington gained his berth in the NCAA
Tournament with his time of 6.17 seconds at the
Frank Sevigne Husker Invitational earlier this
season.
He also won the 55-meter dash at three
different meets this season and placed second at
the Big Eight Indoor Championships with a
time of 0:06.25.
Comhusker coach Gary Pepin said he was
pleased with Washington’s chances of doing
well in Indianapolis.
“He is ranked as one of the top sprinters in
the nation,” Pepin said. “I am hoping he goes in
and runs three solid rounds.”
Pepin said Washington’s ability to qualify
for the meet did not surprise him.
“He is a great talent,” Pepin said. “I am
going to say what I said all year long about him:
He is one of the finest junior sprinters in the
nation and the world."
Washington said he would give his best
effort when he stepped on the track in India
napolis.
“I just want to go sec what I can do with the
competition,” he said.
Big Eight basketball teams to face unpredictable battle
Former Marquette basketball coach
A1 McGuire once said, “Winning is
overemphasized—the only time it is
really important is in surgery and
war.”
McGuire could probably add the
1993 Big Eight Tournament to that
selective list.
In what could turn out to be the
most exciting conference tourney
ever, or at least in the last two years,
six teams have a legitimate chance of
winning the tournament in Kansas
City, Mo.
Friday’s four first-round games in
Kemper Arena should be loaded with
fireworks, with the battered survivors
advancing to a blood-bath semifinal
round.
And the two left standing for
Sunday’s final game should resemble
the I inal round of a heavy weight cham
pionship fight.
OK, maybe this is all a bit dra
matic, but in a tourney where NCAA
Tournament bids will be won or lost
for several teams, ami the fact that the
difference in Big Eight records be
tween the second and sixth seeds was
one game, it should be exciting to say
the least.
So let’s look at the odds of a prob
able Jayhawk pecking, a possible
Sooner surprise or an impossible Buf
falo miracle:
Kansas (2-1 odds of winning the
Big Eight tourney): The Jayhawks,
whoconvincingiy won the league title
during the regular season, have my
nod to continue in their winning ways
throughout the tourney.
And I still favor Kansas, even
though in my encounter with Jayhawk
supporters last week, I was shot at
with BB guns by some idiotic Kansas
fans in Lawrence after they noticed I
was from Nebraska. (For a split sec
ond, I thought I was in Colorado cov
ering a football came with the equally
hospitable Buftalo fans.)
Nebraska (5-1): TheComhuskers
are fortunate to have drawn one of the
Jeff
Singer
two for-sure wins by playing Kansas
Slate’s Wildcats in the opening round.
Nebraska could cause some dam
age in the tourney, but having to face
Kansas in the semifinals is a lough
draw.
Oklahoma (8-1): You might be
asking how the tournament’s No. 6
seed has better odds than Oklahoma
State does with the second seed?
Reason is that the Sooners will
destroy No. 3 Iowa Stale in the first
round, and with the bracket they are
in, they should cruise right into the
tourney’s final game to face Kansas.
Missouri (10-1): The first round’s
other upset will come when the sev
enth-seeded Tigers upend Oklahoma
State and make up for a lousy regular
*
season.
Remember a couple of weeks ago
when Cowboy center Bryant Reeves
made a miracle 45-foot basket at the
end of regulation to beat Missouri and
all but end the Tigers’ hopes of going
to the NCAA tourney ? Missouri does.
OklahomaState(12-l): TheCow
boys have gone to the well once too
often during the Big Eight season in
finding good fortune against confer
ence foes, and odds arc, they won’t
need to make hotel reservations in
Kansas City past Friday night.
Iowa State (15*1): The question is
whether the Cyclones can win when
they’re not in Ames. Will playing on
a neutral court in Kemper help break
Iowa State’s woes away from Hilton
Coliseum?
In essence, it really doesn’t matter,
because Oklahoma is a better team
and will hand the Cyclones a first
round loss that will send the Iowa
State circus back to Ames.
Kansas State (100-1): The bad
news for the Wildcats is that they are
going to lose by the largest margin of
any first-round loser, which is ironic
in a 4-5 seed matchup.
The good news is it will give Kan
sas State more lime to practice the
Cat’s Tail in preparation for home
NIT games.
Colorado (infinity-1): Remember
three years ago when the eighth
seeded Buffs went to the tourney’s
championship game before falling to
Oklahoma?
Well, that will be the last good
memory Colorado fans have in Kan
sas City for the next couple of de
cades.
Whoever is fortunate enough to
make it through Sunday's final
unblemished will show they’ve got
what it takes to win not only the Big
Eight tourney, but excel through the
NCAA Tournament war as well.
Singer is a senior news-editorial and political
science major and a Daily Nebraskan sports
senior reporter.