Summer injuries
plague Husker
soccer squad
By Darren Ivy
Co-editor
Nebraska Soccer Coach John Walker was
probably glad Kim Engesser wasn’t playing any
soccer this weekend.
Engesser’s two roommates, Jenny Benson
and Lindsay Eddleman both suffered serious
injuries this past weekend in two separate
Denver Diamonds club soccer games.
Benson, who played with the Under 20
National team this summer and is a two-time
All-Big 12 Conference player, tore the anterior
cruciate ligament in her right leg Sunday in
Chicago.
Eddleman, also a two-time All-Big 12 player
and a second-team All-American last year,
broke the fifth metatarsal bone in her right foot
Friday in Columbus, Ohio.
“It’s not been a good day,” Walker said.
“They’re two of the top players in the confer
ence. Lindsay is an All-American, and Jenny
isn’t far off in that category. It’s bad enough los
ing one, but to lose both is a major blow.”
Eddleman, the Husker’s second all-time
leading scorer, had surgery on her foot Tuesday.
“I’m very disappointed,” Eddleman said.
“But I should be back by the first one or two
games. That’s why I did surgery so soon.”
Benson will undergo surgery today.
Neither Benson nor Eddleman thought their
injuries were as serious as they turned out to be.
Walking into the South Stadium training
room Monday, Eddleman thought she had just
sprained ligaments in her ankle and Benson did
n’t think she had torn her ACL.
But by the afternoon, they had the bad news.
Benson called her parents, Mike and Sharon,
right away. Sharon Benson flew in Wednesday to
be with her daughter for the surgery.
“We were devastated,” said Sharon Benson.
“It was a heartbreaker. She had this happen to
her in her left leg four years ago. But she will
get through it because she’s a tough cookie.”
Eddleman said she was dribbling the ball and
got shoved down from behind. When she fell,
she broke her foot. She said it was painful but
she walked around on it all day Sunday.
And it was from the sidelines that she saw
her roommate go down.
“We’ve been together this whole thing,”
Eddleman said. “It still really hasn’t set in yet.”
The loss has set in with Walker.
“A whole set of ideas have flown through my
head,” Walker said. “I don’t know exactly what
is going to happen and I’m not quite sure who
will play where. Obviously this is a huge loss.”
Eddleman said some of her teammates have
stopped by or called her.
“People just can’tbelieve it,” Eddleman said.
Fellow junior Isabelle Morneau was in
Canada playing with the Canadian National
Team when she heard the news.
“It’s very disappointing,” said Morneau
when told about the injuries Monday. “I was
thinking how bad it’s going to be for them. We
are going to have to deal with it. My goal is to
try to stay healthy the rest of the summer.”
Huskers boost Canadian team
By Darren Ivy
Co-editor
Nebraska junior soccer player Isabelle
Momeau has spent more time traveling and
sleeping in hotel and residence hall rooms
this summer than in her own home.
But it isn’t because she is having a fight
with her parents, Claude Morneau and
Raymonde Desmarais.
It’s because she is dedicating her sum
mer to practicing and playing with the
young, upstart Canadian National Team.
“I haven’t been home too much,”
Morneau said. “I knew this summer and
next year would be busy with World Cup
qualifying. But (my family) understands
and are very supportive.”
Beginning in June, the Canadian
National Team, including NU players
Momeau, Karina LeBlanc and Amy Walsh,
began practicing for the Confederation of
North, Central American and Caribbean
Association Football, tjie World Cup quali
fying tournament that will take place at the
end of August in Canada.
After a 5-4 setback to the Adidas All
Stars and a 1-1 tie with the United States
Under 20 National Team ^n exhibition
games in July, the team opened internation
al play Sunday against China, the silver
medalists at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
Losing just 2-1 Sunday to the Chinese
gave many Canadian soccer fans a bright
«—
If I could, I would play
both. But the national
team is my first goal
overall. It has to come
Isabelle Morneau
NU soccer player
outlook for this year’s team, Morneau said.
“People who watched the game against
China said ‘this could be the best national
team ever,’” said Morneau, who is making
her fourth appearance on the national team.
Morneau said the team is much more
fit, which allows them to spend more time
improving technical skills rather than get
• S
ting in shape. She credits this to a new atti
tude and some “young blood” on the team.
There are six players on the team who are
20 years old or younger, including Walsh
and LeBlanc.
Momeau said the team was taking each
tournament step by step.
“Our first goal is to get ready for CON
CACAF,” Momeau said. “We want to qual
ify for World Cup. Then we can worry
about the Olympics.”
To qualify for the World Cup, Canada
needs to win the nine-team tournament or
finish second and then beat Argentina later
in the year.
One of the downfalls for the
Comhuskers is that in August, Momeau,
Walsh and LeBlanc will miss a Nebraska
game or two to play in CONCACAF.
“If I could, I would play both,” Momeau
said. “But the national team is my first goal
overall. It has to come first.”
But NU Coach John Walker said the
good outweighs the bad.
“They are playing against some of the
best teams in the world,” said Walker, an
assistant coach for the Canadian National
Team. “You couldn’t ask for anything bet
ter.”
Bulls to announce hiring of Floyd today
CHICAGO (AP)—The Chicago Bulls are
calling Michael Jordan’s bluff, hiring the coach
he said he wouldn’t play for Tim Floyd.
The next move is up to Jordan.
Floyd will be introduced as the Bulls’ new
coach Thursday, a source close to the organiza
tion told The Associated Press, speaking on con
dition of anonymity. Floyd arrived in Chicago
on Wednesday morning, a few hours after
resigning at Iowa State.
"I really can’t comment any further right
now,” Floyd said. The Bulls also refused to con
firm Floyd’s hiring.
Iowa State athletic director Gene Smith said
Floyd was leaving "to pursue another opportu
nity with the Chicago Bulls.” Asked if Floyd
would be the coach, Smith said: "You’re going
to have to ask the Chicago Bulls about that”
As the Bulls’ coach-in-waiting the past two
years, Floyd’s hiring hardly comes as a surprise.
But Jordan^ dislike ofFloyd is no secret either, he
said just last week that he wouldn’t play for him.
"I don’t know Tim. I don’t have anything
against Tim Floyd,” Jordan said July 16.
' To(play for him) is like starting all over again,
and that’s what I don’t want to do. He may want
to do that, but I don’t
' 'I don’t condemn him. I don’t condemn
(the Bulls) for hiring him,” Jordan added.' 'But
I just don’t feel that I want to start with someone
who doesn’t realty know me and doesn’t know
die way I play the game of basketball.”
Jordan won’t make an official announce
ment about his future until the NBA lockout
aids, and Floyd’s hiring won’t change that, said
David Falk, Jordan’s agent The NBA lockout
bars die Bulls — and their new coach — from
having any direct contact with Jordan.
I
Jordan was playing golf at a country club in
suburban Chicago on Wednesday and did not
react publicly to news of Floyd’s hiring.
"Michael needs to take his time to see how
all of the pieces M into place,” Falk said
A Fishing buddy of general manager Jerry
Krause, Floyd was the top candidate to replace
Phil Jackson long before Jackson left. That
alone was enough to earn die scorn of Jordan,
who derisively calls him' 'Pink,” as in the rock
group Pink Floyd.
Jordan made it clear he didn’t want to play
for anyone but Jackson. But relations between
Jackson and the Bulls’ management were
strained, at best, and Jackson announced his res
ignation a week after Chicago won its sixth
NBA tide in eight years.
"I think he needs to step back from all die
events of the season and all the political events
surrounding the team and decide what he wants
to do,” Falk said of Jordan. "He’s earned the
right after what he’s brought to the team and the
city and the game of basketball to do whatever
brings him joy and satisfaction.”
The Bulls also interviewed NBA assistants
Scott Skiles, Ron Rothstein, Paul Silas and Rick
Carlisle, but die job was thought to be Flpydh to
turn down. Though he has no NBA coaching
experience, the 44-year-old has a solid track
record on the college level. Iowa State’s 12-18
record last year was his first losing season in 12
years as a head coach.
Floyd is 243-130 overall with five NCAA
tournament appearances. He was 81-47 in his
four years at Iowa State ami was runner-up for
die APIs national coach of the year in 1995-96,
when the Cyclones finished 24-9, despite losing
four starters.
"I think it would be a shock to anyone close
to the scoie had Tim Floyd not been hired,” Falk
said. "This was a decision that was made a year
ago.”
What will happen to the rest of the Bulls’
staff isn’t clear. Krause told Frank Hamblen and
two other assistants that whether they stay on or
not will be up to the new coach.
There were reports Floyd was having cold
feet over accepting the Bulls job, possibly
because of Jordan’s insistence that he’d rather
retire than play for Floyd. If Jordan does retire,
Floyd will have the unenviable position ofbeing
characterized—fairly or unfairly—as the man
who drove perhaps die game’s greatest player
into retirement
Other players also have a decision to make.
Of Chicago’s 12-man playoff roster, nine are
free agents. Scottie Pippen, who’s long felt
undervalued and underappreciated by the Bulls,
said repeatedly during the season that he’d play
somewhere else when he became a free agent
this summer. Dennis Rodman called the possi
bility of hiring Floyd' 'a joke.”
Floyd played three years at Louisiana Tech
and served as a student assistant coach his senior
year.
His first head coaching job was at Idaho,
where he served for two seasons with a 35-25
record. He had a 127-58 mark in six seasons at
the University of New Orleans, where his team
reached the NCAA tournament in 1991 and
1993.
He accepted the Iowa State job in spring
1994, only to call a news conference at New
Orleans to announce he was staying. He later
changed his mind again, taking die job at Iowa
State in May 1994. ..
