Sports
Huskers respond to Van Horn’s coaching
By Adam Klinker
Senior staff writer
Looking at Nebraska Baseball Coach Dave
Van Horn creates thoughts of a quiet, reserved man
coaching the laid-back game of baseball.
Think agam.
Since Van Horn took over the Comhusker pro
gram last Jan. 8,425 days ago, his players have said
things are changing for the better on die NU squad,
and Van Horn s arrival was the watershed moment.
He does it, they’ve said, with his intensity, his
willingness to teach and his stress of the mental
game - and of course, with his firebrand diamond
demeanor.
Compared to his predecessor, John Sanders,
Van Horn has brought about something of a revo
lution in thought for Husker baseball.
In short, as most players will agree, things are
better now.
“I don’t want to put Coach Sanders down at all,
but this program has changed
around,” junior first baseman
Ken Harvey said. “It’s made
people recognize that, hey,
there is a baseball team here.”
Following Sanders’ firing
just before the beginning of
the 1998 season, most players
were excited about the
prospect of getting some new
« Ifpn Harupv blood circulating into the
" program. They got a perfect
match with Van Horn.
Coming in from Northwestern (La.) State,
where Van Horn was 106-65 in three seasons as the
Demops’ skipper, the 38-year-old brought with
him a staff of young coaches and a new philosophy.
It meant a new lease on life for Husker base
ball, something NU pitcher Jay Sirianni said
Sanders had stifled in his years as coach.
“The expectations are so much more now,”
Sirianni said. “Back then it was, ‘Hey, let’s just go
compete, see if we can win a few ballgames.’ Now,
we go out everyday to win, no doubt about it.”
From the beginning, Harvey agreed, Van
Horn's attention to detail and most importantly,
winning, has paid huge dividends for the Huskers.
“It was big,” Harvey said. “The first day Coach
Van Horn came in, he was installing in us the
mindset that we can win. Everyday he told us we
were just as good as any other team - maybe better.
Once you start thinking that, hearing that everyday,
it’s going to make you start thinking and applying
it.”
Harvey and Sirianni said that from the first
t
practice, Van Horn stressed defense and pitching to
the offensive game that Sanders preferred. He was
upbeat and on the go and, most of all, he com
manded respect from his squad.
“Coach Sanders was a real offensive-minded
coach,” Sirianni said. “His plan was to beat every
one 19-f8, whereas now, we’re still an offensive
team, we’ll still score a lot of runs, but we probably
concentrate two-thirds of our practice on defense
and pitching.”
And, Sirianni said, Van Horn’s come in and
done it with a flair that has surpassed that of
Sanders - a fiery disposition that has ignited a fire
under his players and served as a beacon for them
to follow.
It’s a throwback to Van Horn’s own playing
days in college at Arkansas.
Please see VAN HORN on 8
Matt Haney/DN
WILLIAM AVERY,
Chris Burgess, Elton
Brand, Trajan
Langdon and Shane
Battier join Coach
Mike Krzyzewski as
part of a powerful
C-/ clX! ^ m i mmmx n ■ v Duke team.
AnybodyB eatDllke?
The mighty Blue Devils play the role of favorite in NCAA Tournament
By Sam McKewon
Senior editor
So Duke hasn't been seriously challenged
since January. So the Blue Devils have beaten then
opponents by an av erage of 25.4 points this season.
The top-ranked and seemingly inv incible boys
clad in royal blue and white could lose in the
NCAA Tournament. They reaLly could.
But how9 And to whom9 Those could be the
questions of the 1999 Tournament, which starts
Thursday around the nation and culminates with
the Final Four at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg
on March 27 and 29. They're questions that haven’t
been answered definitively yet.
Indeed in a year that saw few' superlative teams
and a slight fall from grace for certain basketball
superpowers (see Kansas), the Blue Devils, with
their 32-1 record and their performance of perfec
tion through the Atlantic Coast Conference gives
them the tag of the team to beat in March.
Duke, fresh off its perfect 19-0 ACC season
after a 96-73 thrashing of North Carolina in the
conference tournament, now gets to play out of the
East Region, a relatively innocuous collection of
teams led by No. 2 seed Miami (Fla.), which was
n’t ranked at the beginning of the season.
And even if there were formidable foes, it’s
hard to claim any could stack up with the Dukies,
who boast as impressive a resume as the last “Can
they ever be beaten9” team, the Larry Johnson-led
1991 Nevada-Las Vegas Runmn' Rebels.
The Blue Devils have shooting."They have
size. They have guards and forwards aplenty. And
they have depth, so much so that starting guard
Trajan Langdon could sit out most of the ACC
Tournament and have ffosh Corey Maggette fill in.
But Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski knows
there's vulnerability in every team. He ought to
know. It was his outfit of blue-collar underdogs
that upset UNLV in 1991.
“I think the message would be the same that it s
been all year long, and that's to focus on one
game,” Krzyzewski said Monday at Ins press con
ference. “I know (the media) hates to hear that, but
basically that's what this team has done.”
Ironically, the one team that did beat Duke (and
one of the few to not get completely run out of the
gym) is in the same region. Cincinnati(26-5),
which upset the Blue Devils 77-75 in the Great
Alaska Shootout m November, is the No. 3 seed.
The Bearcats went to the Final Four in 1992
and have flirted with it a couple of times since. UC
features the size and speed to match up with Duke.
“I think it’s a very athletic region,” Krzyzewski
said. “Cincinnati is athletic as you get.”
Bearcats' Coach Bob Huggins wasn’t all that
happy with a No. 3 seed, but he’ll have to take it.
“We hurt ourselves by losing 4 of our last 10
games,” Huggins said. “But you have to beat
everyone anyway if you’re gomg to win the thing.”
Still it'd be fair to say Duke has one of those
teams that is not only athletic, but just plain hard to
I think the message would be the same that its been all
year long and that's to focus on one game. I know
(the media) hates to hear that..."
Mike Krzyzewski
Duke basketball coach
stop. Six players average more than 9 points per
game, four in double figures. The Devils have
made more free throws than the opposition has
attempted.
Elton Brand is a big but acrobatic forward.
Point guard William Avery can create and score.
Langdon's a deadly shooter, and forward Shane
Battier, when given the chance (and he was m the
ACC tourney) can fill a role much like Ron Mercer
did once upon a time for Kentucky m 1996.
And here’s the scary part: Out of the six top
scorers, only one is a senior. It’s scary to oppo
nents. It scares Krzyzewski, too.
“I'm not sure you listened to announcements
when they announced the starting lineups in
Charlotte, but if you did and paid attention to class,
we started a junior, three sophomores and a fresh
man,” Krzyzewski said. “What I'm saying is, they
can improve.”
And improv ing through the tournament would
be good because there is danger out there from
various parts ot the tournament. The least menac
ing region figures to be the South, where Auburn is
the No. 1 seed. The Tigers are 27-3, but haven't
beaten a better team than Tennessee all season.
The more likely candidate to win the South
could be No. 2 seed Maryland (26-5) or No. 3 St.
John's (25-8), which lost 92-88 to Duke in January.
No. 4 Ohio State (23-8) and No. 5-seeded UCLA
(22-8) could all make serious runs.
Terrapins Coach Gary Williams said the region
is wide open and even considered No. 7 seed
Louisville (19-10) a threat.
“Louisville, obviously they hit a real surge
when they found out they were eligible for the
NCAA Tournament,” Williams said. “And
Auburn, being the No. 1, has had a great year. I
think they were the people’s favorite team.”
The Midwest region could be where the battle
tested team comes from. It's a loaded slate, with
Please see DUKE on 8
