Riding the heels of a three-game winning streak the UNI men’s basketball team takes on Southern Illinois tomorrow night in Missouri Valley Conference play. The Panthers are 19-8 overall after Saturday’s victory at home over Western Michigan.Panther coach Greg McDermott says it’s a tall order to go to Southern Illinois and win, but he says that’s what makes it fun, to go into someone’s building where they don’t lose very often and try and knock them off. The Panthers are still in the Valley title hunt with a 9-6 conference mark. McDermott says he’s been a Cubs fan a long time, so until they’re mathematically eliminated, they’ll keep fighting.Chris Lowery is trying to lead Southern to it’s fourth straight Valley regular season title in his first season as coach. He says the pressure to keep the string going is more than getting it started, as he says when you win there are certain expectations. UNI won the first meeting with the Salukis in Cedar Falls and Lowery says rebounding was the major reason.Southern is 12-3 in the Valley and 22-6 overall.
Thousands prepare to descend on Vets for wrestling tourney
More than 40-thousand fans are expected to crowd into Vets Auditorium in downtown Des Moines for the high-school wrestling tournament that begins tomorrow and runs through Saturday night. Those fans will have to negotiate through the road construction zone along the Des Moines freeway. David Harty with the Iowa High School Athletic Association says the wrestling tournament is even bigger than the boys’ or girls’ state basketball tournaments.
By the time it’s all done, Harty says they’ll have counted between 80 and 85-thousand paid admissions, and “fan-wise, it’ll be the biggest push you have all year,” at least as far as traffic’s concerned. With construction on the new Iowa Events Center surrounding Vets Auditorium, it’s likely to be even more confusing than usual.
Harty says Thursday and Friday events begin at 9 A.M. so fans arriving early along with tournament workers will share the morning commute on the city’s freeway, the planners’ biggest concern along with parking in general. But Harty says they won’t be able to count on all the fans arriving and staying for the whole day’s events. Whereas in a basketball game you have a halftime break, Harty says “In a wrestling tournament it’s always halftime.” He explains people come to see their favorite team or wrestlers and then they go, so people are coming and going all the time. Though the auditorium seats about 12-thousand, he says each day of the wrestling tournament they may have 18-thousand people or more in all go through it. They only come to see a part of it, like the Class 1A, 2A oor 3A, or a kid from their school or a local team –then they leave, so Harty says “That turnstile is goin’ all the time.”
Harty says there are 224 schools in the state tournament that have one or more wrestler in the tournament…and even those with few players bring a great following. Traffic managers in Des Moines hope to spare visitors confusion and cope with all the cars by offering tips and maps for parking and getting around the construction. This is the last year any of the tournaments are held at Vets — in the future they’ll be in the Iowa Events Center, a complex that will include an auditorium, Hall of Fame, and more. Of special concern: the times between sessions.
Expect lots of extra traffic downtown and on the freeway from about 4:30 to 6:30 P.M. Wednesday, 4:15 til 6:30 P.M. Thursday and 3:30 to 6:30 P.M. on Friday as fans travel between Vets’ and other locations. Also, traffic will be heavier than usual from the 8 to 9 o’clock hour both Thursday and Friday morning.
Iowa FFA to build enrichment center in Ankeny
The Iowa F-F-A Foundation announced plans today (Tuesday) for a new headquarters and enrichment center on the campus of the Des Moines Area Community College in Ankeny. Ed Wiederstein is the chairman of the fundraising campaign for the center. He says it’s a center that’s been envisioned for almost 14 years as a leadership and career development center for Iowa F-F-A. Wiederstein says as they moved into fundraising for the project, officials at D-MACC suggested building the center at their campus in Ankeny. He says college officials thought there could be some synergy between what F-F-A wanted as far as classrooms and some of the things the college could offer. He says they decided to partner on the project and the F-F-A thinks it’s a great fit. He says they’ll share the use of the building. Wiederstein says they’re in the middle of the fundraising effort. He says they don’t have an exact number on the cost of the building, but they estimate it’ll be around 13-million dollars for the 75-thousand square foot building. Wiederstein says the center will enrich the information that F-F-A participants get from their local chapters. He says this center will provide opportunity that the students can’t get at the local level. He says they want it to be an opportunity to expose the students to different careers and to use it as a leadership development tool. Wiederstein says they hope to be able to start construction on the new facility in September.
Iowa Donor Network CEO becomes donor
The C-E-O of the Iowa Donor Network on Monday became the first chief of such a group in the U.S. to become a live organ donor. Suzanne Conrad, of Swisher, donated a kidney to Tom Jorgensen, of Ames, a longtime volunteer for the organization. Paul Sodders, spokesman for the Iowa Donor Network, says Mayo Clinic doctors performed the surgery at Methodist Hospital in Rochester, Minnesota. Sodders says everything went well. He talked to Conrad this morning who felt good and had even gotten a congratulatory call from Governor Vilsack. Sodders says Jorgensen’s family says he’s doing well too and the kidney started to work right away after it was transplanted. Sodders says Conrad has been a tireless transplantation advocate. Conrad has worked in the field for 21 years, starting as a floor nurse for transplant patients at a Connecticut hospital. Jorgensen is a long-time volunteer, board member and he also received a liver 15 years ago at the Mayo Clinic. The non-profit Iowa Donor Network is the primary contact for organ, tissue and eye donation services for the state of Iowa. For more information, surf to “www.IowaDonorRegistry.org” or call 800-831-4131.
Former Hawkeye Reggie Roby dead at 43
Former University of Iowa All-American punter Reggie Roby has died. Melissa Roby found her 43-year-old husband unconscious and with no pulse this morning at the couple’s home in Nashville, Tennessee. The family released a statement saying the Waterloo native and former Hawkeye great was pronounced dead in the emergency room. The cause of death isn’t known. Roby was a high school All-American kicker at Waterloo East, and was the first player signed by Hayden Fry after he took over as Iowa’s coach in 1979. With the Hakweyes, Roby was a two-time consenseu All-American. His career average of 45-point-four yards per punt and 49-point-eight season average in 1981 set N-C-A-A records in both categories. Roby twice led the nation in punting at Iowa, and was drafted by Miami in the sixth round of the N-F-L Draft in 1983. He was named to the Pro Bowl three times during his 16-year N-F-L career. Roby is survived by his wife and six children. Funderal arrangements have not been aanounced.
ISU looks for 8th straight at Texas A&M
The Iowa State Cyclones try to make it eight in a row tonight at Texas A&M. The Cyclones improved to 7-5 in the Big-12 after Saturday’s thrilling overtime win at second ranked Kansas and will now play an Aggie team that is 16-7 under first year coach Billy Gillispie. Cyclone coach Wayne Morgan says Gillespi has done a good job and deserves all the accolades he’s been given. The Aggies are 5-7 in the Big-12 after going 0-16 a year ago. At 15-8 overall, the Cyclones are in the NCAA hunt with two weeks remaining in the regular season. Morgan says the focus has to be on this game and when that’s over, win or lose, the focus will move to the next game. He says that’s the way it has to be if they’re going to make it into the tournament.
A key in recent weeks has been the play of guard Curtis Stinson who hit the game winning shot at Kansas and was named the Big-12 player of the week. Morgan says Stinson has shown great leadership by example and says he can also verbally get on other players if they’re not doing the job. He says the others on the team draw confidence and inspiration from Stinson.
Gillispie says the Cyclones’ run has been impressive, and says he doesn’t know of any other team that’s done as much. Gillispie says you have to be strong with the basketball against Iowa State. He says they do a great job with their hands and have the strongest hands in the league and get a lot of loose balls.
A&M is 16-7 overall.
Civility counselor meets with Iowa lawmakers, elected officials
A counselor on civility met with Iowa’s 150 lawmakers as well as other elected officials like the governor this morning. In an unprecedented move, Michael Josephson, founder of his own “Institute of Ethics” stood in the center of the Iowa House of Representatives and gave one of those motivational pep talks to Iowa’s political leaders. He interacted with lawmakers and the governor, talked about what motivates people and then tackled the issue of political bickering. “I think generally speaking as a nation we are concerned that somehow our society is being coarsened,” Josephson says. “It isn’t only by politics. You see the shows: Temptation Island, Survivor, The Apprentice — all kinds of shows which demonstrate incivility as being an advantage.” Josephson told state policymakers there are “meaningful” rules of engagement. “Could you imagine people in a corporate setting conducting competition in the same way that it’s sometimes done in politics?” Josephson asked the group. “People want collaboration because among other things they think it works.” Josephson urged lawmakers to examine their own motives and be a bit more humble and willing to consider other people aren’t “idiots” for having different beliefs. Afterwards, legislative leaders and Governor Tom Vilsack met with reporters to talk about their reactions to Josephson’s advice. “I think the challenge that Michael laid before us is changing the ‘Golden Rule’ in politics,” Vilsack says. “Historically, the ‘Golden Rule’ in politics is he who has the gold rules and I think what he’s suggesting is we get back to the more biblical notion of the ‘Golden Rule’ — you do unto others as you’d wish others to do unto you.” Vilsack says it’s a fairly simple idea, and if Iowa policymakers govern their actions that way, they’ll accomplish many of the goals Josephson outlined for them.House Speaker Christopher Rants, a republican from Sioux City, says the exercise was valuable for a Senate that’s evenly split with 25 republicans and 25 democrats and the House, which has 51 republicans and 49 democrats.”For my part, I thought it was a good experience and hopefully all members, all 150, had their thoughts provoked today about how we handle ourselves going forward,” Rants says. Josephson, a lawyer, founded the national Character Counts coalition which promotes civility and citizenship.
