Guard makes successful switch to Husker basketball
Success in transition
to Comhusker court
doesn’t surprise Wald
By Todd Walk»nhor»t
Staff Reporter
Nebraska junior guard Tom Wald has
made a quick and easy transition onto the
Comhusker basketball team, but his success
has not been a surprise.
“It’s been a year and a few months since
I have been here,” Wald said. “If I had
started playing like this right away without
redshirting, I would have been surprised.”
Wald transferred to Nebraska before last
season from Mankato State, where he was a
first-team All-North Central Conference se
lection as a sophomore. Wald redshirted last
year since he was ineligible to play as a
transfer.
Wald scored 29 points in two games in the
Ameritas Classic last weekend, where the
Huskers won their seventh consecutive
Ameritas Classic. Wald shot 70.5 percent
from the floor and earned all-tournament
honors.
Despite winning individual honors, Wald
said that the Huskers’ wins were a full team
effort.
Wald
not in the game.
“Team unity is ten times
better this year, but not
perfect,” Wald said. “It’s
hard when you come in
with 15 high school play
ers that were all stars.”
Nebraska started to lose
momentum early in the
second half against Idaho
State. Wald said that it
was difficult for him at
that point since he was
“It affected me because I had to sit on the
bench for the first five minutes of the half,”
he said, “and I can see what’s going on, and
it seemed like we lost intensity.”
Wald said that even though many fouls
were being called on the Huskers, the Husk
ers could not let that affect them.
“Referees are human, and they’ll call
fouls on you if you’re showing them up,”
Wald said, “and once we stopped doing that,
we started playing ball. I think that’s what
turned it around.”
Nebraska raised its record to 4-1 against
what some may call weak teams, but Wald
said that those teams deserved more credit
than they’ve received.
“I believe that both of those teams we
beat this weekend,” Wald said, “are going to
beat a lot of teams this year. Idaho State will
probably win the Big Sky and go to the
NCAA tournament again.
“The only way I’d say they were easy is
because we came out and played well,” he
said. “We very well could have come out and
played lackadaisical and had a tough game
“Team unity is ten times better
this year, but not perfect. It's
hard when you come in with
' 15 high school players that
were all stars. ”
m
TOM WALD
Nebraska guard
against both of them, but we came out and
took care of business right away.”
Nebraska’s lone loss came to Virginia
Tech in the San Juan shootout. Wald said
that the Huskers would continue to use that
loss as a learning experience.
“It’s kind of like Appalachian State last
year,” he said. “It would have been kind of
nice to have it.”
KU coach tests his team early
By Todd Waltonhoret
Staff Reporter
Kansas basketball coach Roy
Williams has a plan for getting
his squad ready for the NCAA
tournament. That plan is to play
the best you can. And this year is
no different for the Jayhawks,
who may play one of the toughest
schedules in the country.
Kansas,-currently ranked No.
4 in the Associated Press poll,
defeated top-ranked Massachu
setts 81-75 last Saturday.
In the next 12 days, the
Jayhawks will play four games,
including Florida and North Caro
lina State at home and at Indiana.
Also in the middle of the Big
Eight conference schedule, Kan
sas will play Connecticut at
Kemper Arena in Kansas City.
But Williams looks at his
team’s tough schedule as a tool
to make his team ready to com
pete in the NCAA tournament.
“We try to get them ready for
conference play,” Williams said
in Monday’s Big Eight coaches’
teleconference, “and hopefully
we’re ready for the NCAAs if
we’re good enough.”
Kansas was very fortunate to
come up with a victory over a
talented Massachusetts team this
early in the season, Williams said.
“It was very early in the year
to come up with a victory like
this,” Williams said. “I’m very
pleased.”
Kansas sophomore guard
Jacque Vaughn was suffering
from a stomach injury, but he
and the rest of the team may have
benefited from the game being
on television.
“I think that the long timeouts
helped out,” Williams said. “The
2 1/2-minute timeouts helped. I
don’t think any of our players got
tired.”
Williams said that he was not
concerned with the statistics of
his team through the early part of
the season.
“My two best free-throw
shooting teams had losing
records,” Williams said. “1 don’t
give a flip about statistics, just
the bottom line, and the bottom
line is that we have to win our
games.”
Along with this year’s
Jayhawk team, Williams is ex
cited about future Kansas squads.
Williams said that he was
happy with the quality of the
high school recruits, including
T.J. Pugh from Creighton Prep in
Omaha, that Kansas has signed.
“They’re all good students,”
he said, “as well as doggone good
basketball players. They give us
players that can step on the court
and do the things we want to do
to win.”
But Williams realizes that they
do not have the corner on great
players and that trend has led to
parity in the Big Eight, as well as
in the entire country.
“There’s a lot of parity be
cause there are a lot of good
players in the country,” Will
iams said.
Women’s basketball team
to face a grueling week
By PwkSawon
Senior Reporter
Only six games into the season
and Nebraska women’s basketball
coach Angela Beck is already hop
ing to see a different Comhusker
team when Nebraska plays the Uni
versity of Buffalo at 7:00 tonight.
After losing to Indiana State in
the opening round of the Duke Invi
tational, Beck and her 4-2 Husker
team are glad to be back in the Bob
Devaney Sports Center tonight.
“The first half of our season is
grueling,” Beck said. “I didn’t know
really what to expect from this team.
I thought we’d probably be 5-1.
The Duke Invitational didn’t ex
actly end up like I thought it would,
for a couple of reasons.
“We didn’t play well on that
trip, and I think I realize that we’re
lacking a little bit on the inside.
The trip just didn’t turn out like I
thought it should.”
Even though Buffalo is in the
Mid-Continent Conference, Beck
said beating the 3-0 Bulls wouldn’t
be a simple task.
Another detriment for the Husk
ers could be the forced day off on
Monday, she said.
“They have a pretty good player
(5-foot-8 guard Brenna Doty) that
just scored 3 6 points the other night,
and she’s pretty tough,” Beck said.
“I think they’ll challenge us. We’re
taking a day off prior to playing a
pretty tough team. So that should
be an interesting deal.”
Buffalo has three returning start
ers off its 20-9 squad from a year
ago, including Doty — who leads
the team in scoring as only a sopho
more.
The Bulls are just the beginning
of a busy week for the Huskers.
Nebraska has three games in five
have so many games, but to get 27
games in your schedule and then to
take finals week off, this is how you
have to do it. If we get past this
week, we should have a pretty easy
schedule until after Christmas.”
days, including a road trip to Micni
gan Thursday.
“This is a critical week for us,
Beck said. “People wonder why w
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Dance Contest
Every Itiesday
9 pm
1823 0 St.
NO COVER
Phi Beta Delta
The Internetiotud
Hotter Society
is sponsoring a panel discussion:
How International Activities
Can Influence Your Career
Wednesday, December 7th
4 pan.
Nebraska Union
Public is Welcome
Refreshments will be served
