Men's Tennis vs. Toledo Today, 11:30 a.m. Track & Tennis Building SPORTS Women's Basketball vs. Wisconsin Friday, 7:30 p.m. Crisler Arena The Michigan Daily Thursday, February 16, 1989 Page 9 Ailing cagers prepare for Boilermakers BY JULIE HOLLMAN It's a good thing the eligibility of the Michigan basketball team doesn't depend on a February physical. If it did, the Wolverines would flunk out of the Big Ten race. Michigan's overall team health is the worst coach Bill Frieder has seen in six years. And Frieder will be forced to find a cure before 8:00 tonight when he leads his group of battered basketball players intoCrisler Arena for a must- win game against Purdue. Michigan's Glen Rice, the Big Ten's leading scorer, and Rob Pelinka both missed Monday's practice because of bronchitis and Sean Higgins missed Tuesday's practice with a pulled hamstring. Meanwhile, starting guard Rumeal Robinson has been hampered by a torn ligament in the thumb of his shooting hand, and guard Kirk Taylor underwent arthroscopic surgery, yesterday, for torn ligaments in his knee. Taylor will require extensive rehabilitation and will miss the rest of the season. The loss of Taylor forces Frieder to utilize sophomore guard Demetrius Calip in a major role, now that the Michigan coaching staff has made the decision not to play forwards Mike Griffin and Higgins in the backcourt. Frieder realized after the Wisconsin and Indiana games that this combination was not effective enough for Big Ten competition. Calip performed well against Iowa last Thursday when he went in for Taylor, who fouled out. But Calip has not seen much playing time and is still very inexperienced. "Calip is at a size disadvantage and has a lot to learn," Frieder said. "He has a lot of work to do."' Besides hurting physically, the Wolverines (18-5 overall, 6-4 Big Ten) are faced with repairing their damaged psyche after last weekend's loss to Minnesota. On the other hand, the Boilermakers' marked improvement has Frieder weary despite Purdue's losing record. "I have great respect for Purdue," Frieder said. "They've been on the verge of beating people." The Boilermakers stunned America by beating Illinois 76-72, Febuary 2. Purdue (10-13 overall, 3-7 and tied for ninth in the conference) again demonstrated upset potential last Sunday against league-leading Indiana. Purdue was ahead of the Hoosiers by eight points with less than five minutes to play, before loosing at the buzzer on a Jay Edwards jump shot. "Believe it or not, we're getting better," Purdue coach Gene Keady said. "But because the league is so tough, you can't tell. And Monday we had our best practice of the year." Leading the Boilermakers is pre-season first team All-Big Ten selection Melvin McCants. Michigan held McCants to only eight points and four rebounds in their January 29 matchup in West Lafayette, but Keady expects more from his starting power forward. Center Steve Scheffler picked up the slack for McCants and scored 19 points against the Wolverines while ending the afternoon as the game's second highest scorer behind Rice's 34. Purdue's leadership in the backcourt will come from Tony Jones, who added 17 points against Michigan in the last meeting. Keady feels his team must prevent Michigan from getting open outside and taking quick jump shots. "If you let them pop out and shoot wide open, they'll kill you," he said. "And we did that last time. I watched the video for the 15th time and we played bad against Michigan. Hopefully, defensively we can be better." The Wolverines, now third in the conference behind the Hoosiers and Illinois, know they must win tonight and pin a loss on Indiana Sunday to have an outside shot at the Big Ten title. DAVID LUBLINER/Daily, Michigan's Terry Mills drives to the basket against Purdue center Steve Scheifler during this season's 99-88 Wolverine victory in West Lafayette. W omen swimmers, N'western battle for league title BY JAY MOSES The party is at our house this year, and the weekend has finally arrived. The Michigan women's swimming team tries for its third consecutive Big Ten Championship today, tomorrow, and Saturday at the Donald B. Canham Natatorium. And according to two of the favorites' coaches, it promises to be a battle. "This shapes up to be the fastest meet ever for our conference," Michigan head coach Jim Richardson said. Richardson's first indicator that this week- end was not going to be a cakewalk was the psych sheet designed to evaluate the teams in preparation for the meet. "Northwestern had 714 points, and we only had 680," Richardson said. What would it take to beat the Wildcats? "715." Northwestern coach Kathy Wickstrand- Macintosh was not about to let some stat sheet put the pressure on her team to finish ahead of Michigan, especially since the Wolverines beat the Wildcats 77-60 when the two met in Evanston January 7. "They're awesome," Wickstrand-Macintosh said of the Wolverines. "They've got a lot of talented girls." Richardson and junior Gwen DeMaat also pointed to Minnesota as a source of formidable competition for the meet. "Minnesota scares me," DeMaat said. "This is the first time we've seen them because we don't get to swim them in a dual (meet)." Richardson said the Wolverines are hoping that they have solved the fatigue problems which plagued them near the end of their regular dual-meet season. "We were very successful last year with respect to gauging our level of fatigue," Richardson said. "We've tried to do some of the same things this year." Despite the tough Big Ten foes Michigan will face this weekend, Richardson did retain a note of optimism. "We've been getting a little better every day," Richardson said, although he said that practices lately have been "reserved." "We've got kind of a quiet team this year," Richardson added, "I'm hoping they're storing up some of this energy and they're going to cut loose at the meet." Don't count on it, coach. "It's tough getting into the excitement of' the meet, because we train here every day," DeMaat said. "But we should come around-as soon as we start seeing other teams." Regardless of the spirit of the swimmers, it does promise to be an exciting weekend. Any ten-team meet, especially one with a conference championship is on the line, tends to generate a special buzz. Richardson was philosophical about what it would take to nab a third straight Big Ten title. "We're just finding out now that it's a lot harder to stay at the top of the mountain than it is to get there," Richardson said. "It is a real test of a team's will to win." Pist for DALL small-for delighted Dallas M Pistons .teammate In retL small forw #'Pistons' 1 Ime Isiah (Th "Mavs' al "We've dr :team since ,;Finally, it ons get Mark Aguirre Dantley, first-round pick AS (AP) - Often moody Aguirre, who scored 13,390 ward Mark Aguirre was points in his eight NBA seasons, that he was traded by the wore out his welcome with a series {avericks to the Detroit of incidents which included refusal to yesteray. So were the play in one game, loafing in several s he left behind. others, and an "obscene" gesture to irn, the Mavericks received the press table when he was pulled in ward Adrian Dantley and the one game. 991 first-round draft choice. He said he wasn't going to excited. I'm going to join -Detroit to become a scoring star, just omas)," said Aguirre, the to help Thomas, an all-star guard, ill-time leading scorer. win games. --&A ===== PUT YOUR COLLEGE DEGREE TO WORK. 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Call 764-0557 [ EURIPIDES' TE I 'TROJAN WOMEN Translated by Moses Hadas The University Players, Department of Theatre and Drama Directed by Andre De Shields (Emmy Award-winning star of Broadway'sThe Wiz and Ain't Misbehavin) Mr. De Shields, recent winner of the 1988 Joseph Jefferson Award in Direct- ing and visiting Martin Luther King, Jr./Cesar Chavez/Rosa Parks Professor, works his creative magic on a pan-historical production of this ancient classic. February 16 -18 at 8 PM February 19 at 2 PM -- - -- - - _.I1--- - -- AIt-%IAI