Volleyball at Iowa Tomorrow, 8:30 p.m. Carver-Hawkeye Arena SPORTS Thursday, September 26, 1991 Football vs. Florida St. Saturday, 12 noon Michigan Stadium The Michigan Daily Page 9 Sikkila carries 'M' golf to fourth place by Jim Foss Daily Sports Writer The opening tournament of a sea- son can tell a team exactly what it needs to do in order to improve. The Michigan men's golf team now knows that it has to have consis- tency from all of its players in or- der to win tournaments. Riding the strong performance of Denny Sikkila, the Wolverines finished fourth in the Northern In- tercollegiate Golf Tournament Tuesday. Sikkila shot a three-round total of 214 (74-70-70) for the second- best individual performance on the Finkbine Golf Course in Iowa City. Curt Sanders of Ohio State edged out Sikkila for individual medalist honors, finishing at 213. Michigan coach Jim Carras felt that the tournament provided a mixed review for the Wolverines. "I am happy in the sense that we finished fourth and still didn't play particularly well," Carras said. "Our players realize that if they had played well we could have won the tournament." The tournament was dominated by the Big Ten conference, with the top five places in the 17 team field going to Big Ten schools. Ohio State, which put together a strong final-day performance, won the tournament with a score of 878. Wisconsin finished in second place and Minnesota took third. The Bad- gers and the Golden Gophers shot 880 and 881, respectively. Michigan finished fourth at 894, and host team Iowa rounded out the top five with 898. Last year's Big Ten champion, Indiana, did not fin- ish in the top five. This may have been due to their coach's decision to let several new golfers gain experi- ence in this early season tournament. Individually for Michigan, An- thony Dietz also had a good tour- nament. Dietz finished fifth overall with 217 (73/74/70). Senior Dean Kobane, who had the third-best stroke average in- the Big Ten last year (73.5), carded a 228 (75/80/73). Carras saw promise in the per- formances of several of his players throughout the tournament. "Our top two players (Sikkila and Dietz) played very well, and Dean Kobane had one bad hole the last day that kept him from placing higher," Carras said. "We can use this as a stepping stone." Rounding out the scoring for the Wolverines were James Carson and Bob Henighan. Carson shot 236. (80/77/79), while Henighan finished the tournament at 238 (80/80/78). Carras felt that the team's per- formance at the Northern Intercol- legiates showed that it is capable of playing well in the future. "We are going to have a very strong squad, and a very competitive squad," Carras added. "What hurt us here was that we had to count an 80, 80, and a 78. We had to count those (scores), when we should be throwing out 75's and 76's. Those 80's should be throwaways." Next on the Wolverines' fall, schedule is the Fall Buckeye Classic at Ohio State, Oct. 5-6. The teank will hold a qualifier a few days be- fore the tournament in order to de- termine which players will make the trip. Michigan wide receiver Desmond Howard makes a catch against Maryland last season. This Saturday, Howard will face his toughest test of the season by working against Florida State defensive back Terrell Buckley. Out of the shadow Florida State's Buckley looks. to steal Howa by Theodore Cox Daily Football Writer Now that the media has put Michigan wide receiver Desmond Howard into the Heisman derby, there is no question opposing play- ers will be gunning for him. "Just as he made his name off other defensive backs, they'll want to make their names off him," for- mer Wolverine defensive back Tripp Welborne said.. Enter Florida State's cornerback *Terrell Buckley: "I welcome the opportunity to go one-on-one with Desmond Howard. I'm not worried - the cornerback is going to be the best athlete on the field," the junior second-team all-American said. .The Mississippi native has al- ready made a name for himself in the South. In his first two years he has nine career interceptions; two of which he ran back for touchdowns. *Street and Smith lists him as the second-best collegiate defensive back in the country. Like his predecessor Deion San- ders, Buckley is not only one of the top defensive backs in the country, he also returns punts with similar explosiveness. On his first ever punt return at Florida State, he faked a fair catch *by standing still for a full second after catching the ball. He then pro- ceeded to take a few steps as if to walk off the field before turning on his 4.35 speed to score a 69-yard touchdown. It was a move that he planned, without telling a single coach. Buckley is the typical Florida State football player - 5-foot-10, 175 pounds, fast, and extremely ag- gressive. In the Blockbuster Bowl against Penn State last winter, Buckley made another spectacular punt return, running as much back- wards and sideways as down the field, covering over 100 yards to gain 39. Buckley is just as aggressive on the defensive end. He often con- fronts the receiver at the line of scrimmage, bumping him before he can start his pattern. He prides him- self on hard hits, and he doesn't mind going one-on-one with any player. "I don't know if they'll match him up completely, but I think they'll find ways of getting Buck- ley on Howard," Michigan coach Gary Moeller said. "Buckley is a fine all-American candidate that will be a good matchup. He presents bigger problems because he is a bet- ter cover guy." Buckley is certainly not intimi- dated by the prospect of playing Howard. "I play against two receivers (Seminole wide receivers Eric Tur- ral and Shannon Baker) as good as him everyday in practice," Buckley said. "I'm just gonna go and play ball." "That doesn't surprise me," Baker said in response. "That sounds like something he'd say.". Which brings up the other simi- larity Buckley has with Sanders - his mouth. "He talks more on the line of scrimmage than the opposing quar- terback," Florida State wide re- ceiver Mike Spencer said. But during spring practice, Buckley's antics got him in trouble with Florida State coach Bobby Bowden. According to the Seminole coaching staff, Buckley developed an attitude that he was above his teammates. Bowden feared a return to the problems Sanders' cockiness brought to the team his senior season. Bowden's solution was to bench Buckley this summer in favor of a redshirt frosh Corey Sawyer. "I was in total shock," Buckley said. "I had a great spring. It was a messed up situation where people got me mixed up with Prime Time (Sanders)." The coaches explanation to Buck- ley was that he didn't make a proper rrd's spotlight tackle on one play. Something he didn't buy: "How can you be the best tackler on the team and on one play become a poor tackler?" Buckley felt the decision was based on the politics of football. His reasoning was the alumni and media made the negative comparison of himself and Sanders. They then pressured Bowden to do something, Buckley says. "College football is a business. You can't get personal with the coaches. They are your bosses in a sense. You just go about your busi- ness," Buckley explained. But Sawyer proved to be a legit- imate threat to take Buckley's job. Sawyer has similar speed, and proved two weeks ago that he can also return punts, running one back for 39 yards against Western Michigan. Depth is a problem the Wolver- ines will have to contend with Saturday. The schedule has been kind to the Seminoles, allowing younger players to see plenty of action. "It's hard to experiment when you're playing Notre Dame," Moeller said. "And our young kids have not played enough. That's the advantage Florida State has over us. They've had a lot of kids play in a game situation and that means a great deu'.!" Buckley won back his starting position before the season began. His play has already produced one interception this fall, a diving catch against Heisman Trophy winner Ty Detmer of Brigham Young. And while his other statistics have been average thus far, his concern for what Florida State does as a team has improved. "I feel like it is a need for us to win it (the national championship) this year," Buckley said. "Other- wise, the program will be kind of stuck. We're tired of coming in second." - Shane Green contributed to this story. Women's golf looking to regroup at Illinois by Dan Linna The Michigan women's golf team is looking to rebound from a disappointing finish at the MSU Spartan Invitational. The team will get its chance this weekend at the Lady Northern Intercollegiate Tournament. In the Spartan Invitational, Michigan charged out to the lead with a team record 304 in the first round. The Wolverines dropped to fourth in the second round with a 316 and plummeted to a ninth-place overall finish Sunday. Michigan coach Sue LeClair wants to avoid a similar collapse this weekend. "I expect us to be in maybe the upper six of the field," Coach Sue LeClair said. "There was no reason we shouldn't have stayed in at least fourth last weekend, but we just got too tense. The Lady Northern Intercolle- giate Tournament is being held at the University of Illinois' Orange Course in Savoy, Ill. The 19-team field will tackle the 5,891-yard course, playing 18 holes each of the three days. Among those participating in the annual tournament are the defending champs, Minnesota, as well as the rest of the Big Ten squads. Also competing this weekend are Butler, Bowling Green, DePauw, Ferris State, Illinois State, Iowa State, Notre Dame, Wisconsin-Whitewa- ter and Northern Illinois. "We have some excellent teams coming this weekend," Illinois coach Paula Smith said. "Indiana has a strong team and Minnesota has been playing particularly well." In a preseason poll, Golfweek magazine rated Iowa No. 15 in the nation and Illinois No. 20. Renee Heiken of the Illini was named a pre-season all-American and was ranked as the ninth best individual in the country. For the Wolverines, junior Wen- dy Bigler leads the way with a 79.7 stroke average. She was the only Michigan team member to shoot under 80 in the team's final round at MSU. "We should do well this week- end," Bigler said. "We would like to finish in the top three. I think we learned from last weekend what it means to finish up well and have; three good rounds together instead- of just one or two. "We need to realize that you can't count strokes. You just can't play golf and be counting strokes. We have to just play the best we can and be confident in ourselves that we have played well. We shot thatn 304, and we can do it again. We have to be confident that we can play with any school out there." The upcoming invitational tour- nament is required for all Big Ten teams. Each team's finish will de termine the seeding for the Big Ten tournament in the spring, which will be held on the same course. "It is important for us to come in at least the top six so we don'( have to tee off from the back-nine in. the spring," LeClair said. "We don't want to say that this is 'the' tournament of the fall," Bigler added, "because that just adds pressure that we don't need. Sure it's important, but it's just another tournament, and we just want tc improve our game as a whole and keep scoring better as a team." Florida State's Terrell Buckley can be just as dangerous a return man as Michigan's Desmond Howard. Here he returns a punt 63 yards for a touchdown against East Carolina. Women 's soccer mov by Tim Rardin The Michigan women's soccer team headed into Livonia to play its fifth varsity opponent in School- craft yesterday. They left with a 7-0 win and a perfect 10-0 record on the season. The Wolverines, who lost to and tied Schoolcraft in two games last year, recorded their first victory against the squad. goal. Two scores from senior for- ward Heather Marshall off assists from Karen Jones and Steinhebel made the score 3-0 at the intermis- sion. The offense continued where it left off in the second half, dominat- ing play on both ends. Sophomore Lisa Ashton scored on an assist from Lyrna Siklossy. Fellow sophomore Alicia Stewart was as- es to -0 tional tournament qualifier. The team takes on Marquette and Illi- nois Saturday. Sunday will match the Wolverines against the defend- ing national club champions, Min- nesota. Marshall said that the squad will take each game as it comes, but admitted, "We're really looking forward to playing Minnesota. If we win this weekend, we pretty GRIDDES You'll have to get more than five, Norman, if you want to win Griddes this week. Bring picks to the Daily at 420 Maynard Street by 5 p.m. Friday for your chance to win a $10 gift certifi cate to O'Sullivan's Eatery & Pub. 1. Florida St. at Michigan 2. Rutgers at Michigan St 3. Notre Dame at Purdue 4. Indiana at Missouri 5. E. Michigan at Wisconsin 6. N. Ilinois at Iowa 7. Wake Forest at Northwestern 8. Pittsburgh at Minnesota 0. KansasSt. at Washingon I **' U s