Shocker T&F sweeps at home, MVC will be a war and what movies do you own on VHS?

It was a great Valentine’s Day at the Heskett Center as we were able to come away with a sweep of the team titles.  Now the focus shifts towards the MVC Championships in two weeks.

Good final “Team” tune-up

At this time of the year the athletes are really starting to round into form and we thought we would have a pretty good meet this weekend – and we were right!

Here were the team scores:

WOMEN:  Wichita St 195, UT-Arlington 130, Emporia St 87, Oral Roberts 65

MEN:  Wichita St 168, UT-Arlington 133, Emporia St 111, Oral Roberts 61

Before the meet we had it very close for the men and a slight advantage for the women so to extend our point total out to a convincing margin was exactly what we were hoping for.  There was a lot of spirit and a very large crowd at the Heskett Center Saturday – it was a great environment for college track and field!  It was also awesome to see Herm Wilson make an appearance – we were honored by his presence!

As with all track and field meets it wasn’t perfect, but I would say our team should gain some confidence from a great effort as we look ahead to the next goal …..

What’s next?

The Herm Wilson Invitational was our final “team” tune-up for the MVC Championships in two weeks.  We have one more meet on Friday at Kansas State where we will have two things to accomplish:  1) finalize our roster of 32 men and 32 women for the MVC meet and 2) give our top athletes a chance to either rest or have one final competition before the championship.

As a coach I try to treat these last couple weeks on a very individual basis.  Some athletes need to take a weekend off while others like to keep competing to stay sharp.  In fact every athlete’s training for each day is very individualized at this time of the year.  It’s the difference between what people refer to as the “art of coaching” versus the “science of coaching”.

I don’t claim to be an artist of any kind but generally the athletes I’ve coached have run their best in the championship meets.  There’s no secret to having success at this time – it’s mostly trying to get the athletes feeling good and confident.  We have a terrific sports psychologist (Greg Buell) who has helped me in this area as well as watching our other Shocker coaches get their athletes ready.

I have told numerous people that I’ve been very lucky to have been surrounded by great coaches and people my whole life.  Hopefully whatever amount of that I’ve been able to collect has rubbed off on the athletes in my group.  It’s an extremely fun and exciting time of the year! 11 days until we head to Cedar Falls, Iowa, to see how we stack up!

How does the MVC look this week?

Last week I gave a short preview of how the MVC looks and I don’t think much has changed for this week.  On the women’s side it’s gonna be a battle between Wichita St, Indiana St and Southern Illinois with Northern Iowa trying to sneak up in there.  For the men I still think Wichita St and Indiana St hold a slight advantage over Loyola and Southern Illinois with, once again, UNI trying to make it a five-team race.

There are no clear cut favorites this year, we could finish anywhere from first to fourth.  Historically we’ve competed well at the MVC Indoor Championships so we expect to be in the mix.

“VHS” Movies

Last week I concluded my 24 part series of movies I own on DVD by letter.  This will be my final movie post for a few weeks as our indoor season approaches it climax.  I thought it would be fun to shake up the old VHS movie box and see what fell out.

Movie Name (year made, length, MPAA rating, IMDB rating, Worldwide box office)

The Big Lebowski (1998, 117 min, R, 8.2, $17m) – The ultimate cult classic film made by The Coen Brothers and starring Jeff Bridges as “The Dude” who is mistaken for a millionaire and tries to seek restitution for his ruined rug.  The plot doesn’t really matter, it’s all about unique and interesting characters and witty dialogue.  I became a track coach around the time this movie came out and it’s definitely a favorite for my colleagues from that time.  It bombed at the box office because most people probably didn’t “get it” initially, but I’m sure it more than made up for it on VHS and DVD sales over the years.  “The dude abides.”

Caddyshack (1980, 98 min, R, 7.4, $39m) – One of the all-time classic comedies, I also own on DVD and wrote about it previously.  One of the most quoted movies ever!  “Did somebody step on a duck?”

Remember the Titans (2000, 113 min, PG, 7.7, $136m) – One of my favorite sports movies, RTT depicts the true story of a newly appointed African-American football coach and his first year as a racially integrated team in 1971 Virginia.  Denzel Washington knocks it out of the park as Coach Herman Boone who brings together black and white to form a championship team.  It’s a cheesy movie in some parts but others it’s very effective.  My favorite part is when they wake up early and run to the site of the Battle of Gettysburg.  

Major League (1989, 107 min, R, 7.2, $49m) – This is a movie I also own on DVD and wrote about previously.  Great movie, I remember seeing it for the first time in high school and thought it was hilarious.  I obviously like it enough to buy it on two kinds of platforms.

Michael Jordan:  Come Fly With Me (1989, 42 min, n/r, 8.1, $??) – Made before Jordan started winning all of his NBA titles, this was an extremely cool video to promote one of the rising stars of the league.  It’s basically a 42 minute Jordan documentary made by the NBA so it doesn’t have anything negative except for the injury he suffered in his second season.  Lots of “ahead of their time” visuals that most kids my age saw at a friend’s house after basketball practice.

Forrest Gump (1994, 142 min, PG-13, 8.8, $677m) – This was a combination of a movie being original, funny and well-acted.  In turn it became one of our country’s most well-known and popular movies of all-time.  Making $677 million worldwide - it was truly a phenomenon.  Almost everyone I know has seen this movie and liked it.  It won best picture of 1994 as well as a host of other awards.  It’s probably the defining role of Tom Hanks’ career, my favorite part is always when he decides to run and run and run without stopping.

Top Gun (1986, 110 min, PG, 6.8, $356m) – Did anyone who grew up in the 80’s not see this movie?  Tom Cruise plays “Maverick” who is a student in the Navy’s elite flight division where he has to curb his reckless ways in order to become the best pilot he can be.  It’s easy for me to like this movie because of the intense flying scenes and cheesy dialogue.  Who can forget classic characters like Ice Man and Goose!  “I feel the need, the need for speed!”

The Hurricane (1999, 146 min, R, 7.6, $73m) – Starring Denzel Washington as a boxer named Rueben “Hurricane” Carter who was wrongly accused of murder and spent two decades in prison trying to clear his name.  This is a great movie that most have probably forgotten because of how many awesome movies Denzel has made over the years.  If you haven’t seen it I would recommend checking it out.  It doesn’t have a lot of sports action but it’s a terrific drama and inspiring to show how hard Carter fought for so long to seek justice.

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981, 115 min, PG, 8.6, $389m) – The classic action/adventure movie from Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford where Indiana Jones goes in search of the Ark of the Covenant.  I have always liked this series of movies but I was never obsessed like some people.  I like the archaeological aspects of the stories but of course they have to Hollywood it up as much as possible, and in this case they made good choices because of how much money they took in.

American Pie (1999, 95 min, R, 7.0, $235m) – The movie that spawned three sequels and numerous other knock-offs was a big hit in 1999 for its combination of crude humor and likeable characters.  I’ve never been a huge fan of these movies but I will admit if I see it on cable I’ll end up watching for a while.  In 1999 it was a unique movie to the R-rated movie genre and opened the door for movies like The Hangover and Old School to be made and make lots of money.

It’s kind of cool to see these movies from back in the day.  I didn’t have any money back then so I was picky to buy good movies – which all of these are.

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed this movie project for the past 25 weeks!  I’m sure I’ll have some more movie talk in a few weeks!

Next week

Everything will be about the upcoming MVC Championships!

Until then, thanks for reading and Go Shocks!

We lose a heartbreaker in the battle of Kansas, the Power 5 make their first big moves and Chevy's finest movie

It was a big weekend of track and field for Wichita State so let’s get right into it!

First ever WSU-KU-KSU Triangular

It’s been a long time coming but we were finally able to get the three Kansas DI schools together for a scored and meaningful track meet Saturday in Manhattan.  Here were the final scores:

MEN:  Kansas St 117, Wichita St 116, Kansas 105

WOMEN:  Kansas St 144, Wichita St 101, Kansas 97

COMBINED (traveling trophy):  Kansas St 261, Wichita St 217, Kansas 202

                                                                                                      

Ahhhh that one point on the men’s side!  The way it worked out was the triple jump ended up being the last event going so believe it or not it came down to a battle between the fifth and sixth placed guys who were only separate by a few centimeters.  We came up on the short end but it was a great early season test for our crew and hopefully the beginning to a great rivalry on the track between the three schools.

As with most track meets only a few people actually knew how close the meet was.  We really need to work on our presentation because a close meet with a meaningful 4x4 at the end is about as exciting as a sporting event can get!

Next year we’ll be at KU for this meet and we’ll host in 2017.  I’m already thinking of ways to make it a great experience for anyone attending.  It could be a fantastic meet for spectators and possibly television!

How did we do?

Obviously we wanted to win this meet and coming up one point short was tough to take for the guys but the only reason we got that close was because of a couple of KSU DQ’s in the 200m so we probably ended up where we should’ve.  I think our kids competed well for this early of a meet and on a facility they aren’t too familiar with (and with the Big 12 events).  KSU’s indoor track is very tight and our kids did a great job turning in times that were near or better than their indoor personal bests.

From looking at results from around the MVC I would say that it looks like we did well this weekend.  It’s still too early to tell much of anything from that but I think it’s better to have a strong start and maintain a consistent level of performance than relying on a big improvement at championship time.

So far, so good.

Shocker Prelude

We also hosted the Shocker Prelude on Friday night in the Heskett Center for those kids who didn’t make the trip to Manhattan.  It was a great opportunity for some of our younger and developing athletes to win events and compete towards the front when normally they may be in the shadow of our top athletes.  I thought those kids did a great job and we’re looking for several of them to make the team and score points at the MVC Indoor Championships in less than six weeks.

What did I do with my day off Sunday?

I went recruiting.

Upcoming …..

We will be similar to last week with a small college meet on Friday and a triangular on Saturday.  Both of these meets will be in Nebraska’s Devanny Center, home of a 200 meter hydraulically banked track.  This will be the only regular season meet where we’ll run on a banked track.  Since we are not very familiar with that type of track it will be an adjustment for our kids, but once they get the hang of it they usually run pretty well.

Our opponents on Saturday will be the highly ranked Cornhuskers as well as Oral Roberts University.  We should beat ORU pretty easily but defeating Nebraska will require a significant effort.  We’ve never beaten them in a scored meet since 2006 and this year they are very strong again.  Hopefully the Shockers are ready to give them a battle!

The NCAA Power 5 make some new rules

For any of you that are interested in this sort of thing, the NCAA and the Power 5 conferences (SEC, Pac-12, Big 12, ACC and Big 10) had their convention and voted some new rules into effect.  The main one is the “cost of attendance” policy.  Basically now schools cover expenses up to the cost of attendance which is beyond what a normal scholarship allows.  What that means is that full scholarship athletes (mostly football, basketball and volleyball) can receive somewhere between $2000 and $4000 more per year to help cover things like travel and other college kid expenses.  Conferences not part of the “Power 5” can choose to apply this to their schools or not – just depends on how much money you have.

I’m not going to go on a rant here but if you want to know how I really feel about this feel free to meet me at a local establishment and we’ll talk about it over a beverage.

There were some other things established but nothing that is too interesting for here.  I’m sure this is just the beginning of what should probably be referred to quasi-amateur sports (football and basketball college athletics).

 “V” Movies

This is the 21st of a 24 part series (we’re almost done!) where I list movies I own by letter (I don’t have any movies that begin with Q, X or Z but I do have some that start with numbers).  I currently own a small collection of 179 movies (and growing most weeks) on DVD.

Most of the movies I own I had previously seen and enjoyed immensely.  Some are movies that I had not seen but was curious about.  Some were gifts from people with bad tastes in movies.

I only own four “V” movies, here is the list from best to worst …..

Movie Name (year made, length, MPAA rating, IMDB rating, Worldwide box office)

Vacation (1983, 93 min, R, 7.4, $61m) – The original that started it all and spawned at least three sequels starred Chevy Chase and was directed by Harold Ramis.  This is probably Chevy Chase’s most recognizable role as Clark Griswold and has classic scene after classic scene.  The only sequel, in my opinion, that is close to this one is Christmas Vacation, but even it doesn’t come close having the amount of laughs as this one.  Did you know the original ending didn’t involve the theme park and rollercoasters?  Originally Clark goes to Roy Wally’s house with a BB gun and then on the plane ride home (which is the wrong plane) Clark snaps and hijacks the plane.  Apparently the test audiences didn’t like it and the theme parks scenes were hastily shot.  Great movie, lots of laughs and Chevy Chase at his best!

VHS (2012, 116 min, R, 5.8, $100k) – This (and its two sequels) are referred to as found footage “horror anthology” because it’s a collection of short films put together to make a feature length movie.  In VHS there is also a wraparound story that supposedly ties everything together.  The plot is a group of young punks are hired to rob a house and get a rare VHS tape and when they watch the tapes they get more than they bargained for.  I thought it was such a cool idea for a movie that I bought #2 (see below).  If you get tired of one part of the movie, don’t worry it’ll be over soon and another original story is soon to follow.  I don’t know how this movie didn’t get popular enough for a national release but unfortunately it didn’t so not too many people have seen it.

VHS 2 (2013, 96 min, R, 6.1, 21k) – I could easily put this one ahead of the original, and in many ways it’s superior, but it’s basically the same idea.  There are fewer short films in this one (four compared to six in the original) but they are of a little better quality because they probably had a little more money to work with.  The great thing about these movies are the parts are so short it’s easier to be creative because you don’t have to stretch the idea for 90 minutes.  Also each different section of the movie is made by a different film maker so it keep the movies very fresh.  If you like horror movies and haven’t seen any of these make sure to check one out.

Vegas Vacation (1997, 93 min, PG, 5.9, 39m) – This was the final of four “Vacation” movies (although there was also Hotel Hell Vacation in 2010 that was only on video and some sort of new version of the original Vacation being released this October).  This version was decent but by 1997 Chevy Chase’s popularity and comedic skills had deteriorated.  This was basically a family movie as compared to the more adult humor of the original.  It’s not a bad movie, and some of the parts are quite funny (especially gambling at the cheap casinos) but the best parts probably include Randy Quaid as Cousin Eddie.  I acquired this move in the Vacation DVD pack so I’d say it was worth the $5.  For lovers of the series it’s a bit of a letdown but as a cheesy family film it’s not too bad.

Next week

I’ll be back to report on our first overnight trip of the year to Lincoln, Nebraska, as well as talking about six “W” movies that include one of the best track movies of all time, a professional wrestler and a wolf.

Until then, thanks for reading and Go Shocks!