Page Six
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Tuesday,.,' August 27, 1968
Page Six THE MICHIGAN DAILY Tuesday, August 27, 1968
Unbeaten tennis squad boasts returnees
By PHIL BROWN
Nine conference championships
and a national title in a span of
18 years make for a pretty impres-
sive record, but for the Michigan
tennis team it wasn't enough.
The Wolverine netters were ed-
ged for the Big Ten crown by Mi-
chigan State in 1967, and they
took to the courts in '68 to see that
that wrong was righted. It didn't
take long for people to see that
they meant business.
Coach Bill Murphy's charges
swept through five straight dual
meets without losing so much as
a single match, and rolled on to
a spectacular 112-5 match record,
undefeated in dual meets.
Included in the victories were a
convincing 9-0 whitewash of con-
ference runner-up MSU and a 6-3
drubbing of national power Miami.
The Wolverines went into the
season with a young squad, hav-
ing only two seniors in the seven-
man lineup. Murphy held playoffs
at the outset to determine who
would play where, and stuck 'to
the results for the entire schedule.
The playoffs brought some sur-
prises, to be sure. Dick Dell, first
singles last' year, was dropped to
third behind Pete Fishbach and
Brian Marcus.
Marcus returned to the number
two spot he had held the previous
season, while Fishbach made the
Jump from third to first. All three
were Juniors and will be back to
plunder conference opponents
again in '69.
The fourth spot was grabbed
off by sophomore Jon Hainline, a
Detroit product rated among the
best in this area.
Senior Ron Teeguarden, a long-
haired native of Los Angeles, held
forth in the fifth singles posi-
tion, and Bruce DeBoer, another
sophomore, rounded out the line-
up.
The order could not have work-
ed much better foi the Michigan
cause. The Wolverines repeatedly
mowed down teams with far less
depth, dropping only one singles
match in 13 dual meets.
The lone loss was Fishbach's
three-set defeat at the hands of
Miami's Jaime Fillol, ranked third
in the country among collegiate
players.
This left a horrendous four
losses by Michigan doubles teams,
with Miami again the major cul-
prit. The Hurricanes took both
the first and third matches from
the Wolverines, while Wisconsin
and Indiana were responsible for
the others.
Fishbach and Marcus combined
in the first doubles shot, sustain-
ing only the one defeat enroute to
the Big Ten first doubles champ-
ionship.
Wolverine pairs also claimed the
other two conference doubles
crowns-Dell and Hainline, the
number two title and DeBoer and
senior Bob Pritula the third.
In wrapping up the conference
championship meet, Michigan
took three of six singles titles as
well as all three doubles crowns.
Dell, Hainline and DeBoer record-
ed wins in the third, fourth and
sixth slots, respectively.
It was a different story in the
national collegiate meet in San
Antonio, however. Lacking the big
man that makes a good team a
great one, the netters languished
in a tie for 13th place with Cali-
fornia and Mississippi State.
Marcus was the only Wolverine
not getting a bye in the first
round, and he came through by
dumping Glen Grisillo of Missis-
sippi State.
But that was the end of the
line for Marcus. He faced Okla-
homa City's Karl Coombes in the
second round and dropped a leng-
thy 13-11, 6-4 decision.
Teammate Hainline also suc-
cumbed in the second round.
Hampered by a lack of practice
before the meet, Hainline fell 6-1,
6-0 to UCLA's Tom Karp. Karp
was seeded 16th among the col-
legians.
Both Fishbach and Dell sur-
vived the second round, Fishbach
downing Tennessee's Leonhardt
Scheuerman and Dell trouncing
Bobby Heald of South Carolina
with little trouble.
Neither could do any better,
however. Del ran into another
Bruin, Ed Grubb, and was out-
lasted, 11-9, 6-4. Fishbach took
on fourth-seeded Roy Barth of
the same UCLA team and played
poorly in losing 6-0, 6-2.
Moving up to replace the de-
parted Teeguarden and Pritula
will be a trio of hopefuls from last
year's freshman squad.
Detroit's Mark Conti, Ramon
Almonte of San Juan, Puerto Rico,
and George Russell will all be gun-
ning for spots in the varsity line-
up.
BILL MURPHY
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from the seat
Bill Levis
of my pants
Sports' own theatre
of the abs urb
The 1967-68 season will go down in the annals of sports as
the year of the absurd.
Amateur athletics had their share of stupidities. The AAU and
the NCAA continued their obnoxious track feud into the midst of
an Olympic year. The International Olympic Committee, headed
by Avery Brundage, first re-admitted and then again kicked South
Africa out of the summer Olympic Games after many nations, in-
cluding the Soviet Union, threatened to boycott the games if South
Africa were present.
Tennis also had its version of stupidity and hypocrisy. Last
year the British proposed that professionals be allowed to compete
against amateurs in all tournaments. Their logic was this: tennis
was dying as a spectator sport because the best of the amateurs
and the pros were not able to play against each other, so why not
integrate the two.
Acceptance by other nations wasn't that easy to obtain, how-
ever. The Australians, along with, a list of other nations, put up
a big stink when the suggestion was made. The Aussies cried that
it would be against the best interests of the sport to integrate.
Doesn't that sound familiar?
The Aussies this summer reversed their stand.
Very good of them, you say, but you must remember the only
reason they changed their position was because it was to their
advantage to do so. Most of the pros are Australian and with
their pros fighting for the mother country, what nation could ever
beat them in the previously amateur Davis Cup.
What a funny world we're living in. Rational as.......It's
like saying we're against pros playing amateurs in principle but
when we are benefitted, well then, we guess it is okay.
The American League proved rational enough by splitting into
two divisions after properly expanding to Karisas City, which had
lost its franchise to Oakland, and to Seattle, putting a major
league club in the previously teamless northwest.
Wouldn't you know, however, that the owners would blow
it when they decided to split the 12 team league into a Western
and an Eastern division. They just took one look at the national
map and cut the league right down the middle, putting three ex-
pansion teams (Seattle, Kansas City, and California) in one
division along with a perennial weak sister, Oakland, and a team
that has been having its troubles this year, Chicago. That only
leaves one viable contender in this year's 10 team league, Minne-
sota, in the Western Division.
The Eastern Division has all the other contenders and the per-
fect television and radio setup. All its teams are in one time zone,
but look at the poor West. The division is split all over kingdom
come and it covers three time zones.
Why didn't Joe Cronin and his buddies put their heads to-
gether and come up with a realistic league setup?, All they had
to do was make one switch, Kansas City for Detroit.
That would leave three teams on the coast, three natural
rivals, and would permit another rivalry to form. Among Minne-
sota, Chicago, and Detroit, all situated in the Midwest and on
or near a Great Lake. Not only that, but it would put one 1961
anct one 1969 expansion team in each division.
But if you thought the American League setup was crazy, just
take a look at what the National League, 25 years older and sup-
posedly that much wiser, did with its expansion.
They. outdid the junior circuit all right. First they expanded
to San Diego and Montreal.
I don't mind San Diego getting a franchise but not just be-
cause Walter O'Malley says so. Who thinks San Diego is such
a great town for sports? Even with a winning team in the Chargers
and a brand new stadium, those weren't capacity crowds I saw on
NBC last fall.
I have only one comment on the Montreal selection. When was
the last time Montreal even supported a minor league team?
If this is the gratitude a city gets for not supporting a team,
then Ann Arbor certainly deserves an expansion club.
Then there is the Milwaukee case. There is no rational reason
why the National League owners refused to re-admit this city.
Milwaukee suffered enough undue punishment when the carpet-
bagger Braves were shipped south to Atlanta some three years
ago. The fans in Wisconsin had supported the Braves for 11 years
like no other fanstinhistory.
If you don't think Milwaukee can still support a baseball team,
just look at the crowds the White Sox draw when they play there,
and don't say that Milwaukee is too close to Chicago to offer a
rich TV and radio market. How close is San Diego to Los Angeles
and Anaheim? And if you feel the lake is a factor, isn't there
an even bigger body of water to the west of San Diego?
And finally, there was the refusal of the senior circuit to split
up into two divisions. That was really absurd.
Who is going to watch the Houston Astros battle the San Diego
Padres for 10th place next year and how many Montreal fans
are going to pay money to watch their team when the Canadians
are 50 games off the pace?
You think that would be bad? How would the fans in, say,
Pittsburgh feel if they had to sit through a game between the
Pirates and the Padres, battling for 11th place? Boy, would that
be exciting.
Well, that's the sports world for you and it appears to be
getting dumber every day.
I
/ 2..,
The Welcome mat is out
And it's good to meet all the new men on campus as well as see our old
friends again. Because keeping in touch is precisely what keeps us aware
of what's happening in University Men's wardrobes. That's why we're
not only authorities on the classic, natural shoulder model and button-
down shirt, but we sense how to ad apt to new things. Ties come a little
wider. Shirts with more color. Of c ourse, everything remains carefully
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and there's no place quite
like us for finding a reliable 3-button, lack vent suit. And almost any-
thing else University life always has needed. So come in soon. We'd be
glad to open ta charge account for you.
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