Page 20-Saturday, May 10, 1980-The Michigan Daily ... . .m m . .. r. ...... " ,..... ....... ..r.wv: -.:... 4.. }:} :. .... ~n :: ::i:"-f+.: {.:} .}':;a.: S.i. ......; ... . r...... . :".....;::.{::" ... ..~ ':. ..."" 4:" Ei},;: {4:.}.':ev F r st -p la c e B lu e b a tsm en...r.. tt..tke.:.:...............:..........v... o n,}}... .v< O S U , In d ia n a..........x.............v.in.:....:c. ru c.}i a l t..v v :...v };.r:".. .;.'?wi:::"Yn.b ill .. lows 4 By JON WELLS The high-flying Michigan baseball team, currently atop the Big Ten with a 9-1 record, opens its final conference homestand today with a doubleheader against eighth-place Ohio State. Today's games at Fisher Stadium and tomorrow's twinbill against sixth-place Indiana are crucial confrontations for the Wolverine nine as they enter the back stretch of the Big Ten season. With - eight conference games remaining, Michigan holds a narrow percentage-points lead over second-place Minnesota (10-2), and sits just two games ahead of third place Iowa (7-3). The batsmen need a strong showing this weekend at home as they take to the road for their final four games next weekend-two of which are against Iowa. IN ADDITION TO the Big Ten championship, which brings with it an automatic berth in the NCAA Mideast Regionals, Michigan, Minnesota, and Iowa are also competing for a possible. at-large invitation to the national tournament. Although one game off the pace, Minnesota appears to hold the schedule advantage as their three remaining doubleheaders are at home against Northwestern, Iowa and Wisconsin. First-year coach Bud Middaugh has his top four hurlers ready for the weekend twinbills and his lineup is intact. Freshman righthander Scott Dawson (7-1, 2.72) and junior righty Mark Clinton (4-3, 2.79) are probable starters against the Buckeyes, with freshman righthanders Steve Ontiveros (6-5, 3.18) and Scott Elam (4-0, 4.20) likely starters versus the Hoosiers tomorrow. The Wolverines will depend on a big weekend from the offensive trio of shortstop George Foussianes, (.355), rightfielder Jim Paciorek (.336), and catcher Gerry Hool (.292), who have combined for just over 50 percent of the team's run production so far this season. The three lumbermen have 26, 37 and 26 runs-batted-in, respectively. Paciorek's 37 moves him past Rick Leach and into second place on Michigan's all-time list, just seven behind Bill Freehan. Both doubleheaders are scheduled to start at 1p.m. I 4 Faciorek ... eyeing RBI record B Before Northern yesterday, Simon tho main road first place the condi course wo goal. "The co Blue link surprised lower than Morse's Michigan golfers 3rd after 1st da y M.J. SCHNEIDER too. "You just had no chance of holing the opening round of the "The course played tough," said out," agreed Fardig. Intercollegiate Invitational Buckeye Rocky Miller. "The greens Despite the discouraging words of his Michigan golf coach Tom were putting extremely difficult. They team, Simon was pleased with the ught Ohio State would be the are just as hard as rock." overall performance. block in his team's quest for "Some of them didn't play as well as . He hadn't considered that The Michigan golfers, who practice they are capable of play in . But the ition of Michigan's home on the course daily, even hadrest of the team took up the slack," said uld stand in the way of his complaints about the condition of the Simon. "Being eight shots down after layout. the first round isn't bad. With three urse played real tough," said "The greens were very inconsistent," rounds to go, a lot can happen." ster John Morse. "I'd be explained Morse. "It's the direction The second and third rounds will be if there were many scores that the grass grows and the played today starting at 8:30, with the 74 today." undulations of the surface." final 18 tomorrow. assessment was accurate." Ohio State's Stan Cooke and Steve Maddalena, of Michigan. were the only golfers to tally less than 74 over the 18 holes. Each turned in a score of 72 to share the first round lead. Ohio State, last year's Big Ten champions, grabbed the first round lead in the team scoring with a tally of 374. Western Michigan finished eight strokes back to claim second place. Michigan is tied with Toledo for third with 382, Playing in his second tournament of the season, Dave Koch shot a 74 to trail Maddalena in Michigan scoring. Morse tallied 78. DavetFardig and Phil Mokris rounded out the Blue effort with identical scores of 79. The highlight of the first round came when Northwestern freshman Neil Skiver shot a hole-in-one on number 14, a difficult par 3. Despite this feat, it took the Cincinnati native 87 strokes to finish the round. "I was just thrashing out there today," said Skiver. "I broke my driver on the range before I started playing this morning. So I had to hit my 3-wood off the tees, and that didn't help any. The greens are very tough to putt on. I had lots of 3-putts." Skiver's complaints about the greens were common among the otherplayers, $ f 1 f r. Doily Photo by DAVID HARRS OHIO STATE golfer Rocky Miller putts successfully from 15 feet in yester- day's Northern Intercollegiate Invitational. Miller finished the first round tied for second place individually. The Buckeyes lead the team standings, .it Mihignnthird FBlue trackers, face three By JON MORELAND The Michigan men's track team will try to continue its hot performances of the spring this afternoon when they will enter- tain three strong midwestern squads. The meet, which begins at 11:30 at Ferry Field will in- clude competitors from the Chicago Track Club, Illinois State, and the Ohio Track Club. The Wolverine tracksters are coming off of several fine per- formances this spring, but the highlight of the young season was the close defeat to Indiana last weekend. Michigan lost to the de- fending Big Ten champion Hoosiers by a score of 78-67, despite outstanding performan- ces from several team members. THE MILE-RELAY team tur- ned in the second finest conferen- ce time of the year in that meet (3:09.74)-however, Indiana came up with the best time (3:09.13). Shotputter Phil Wells set a per- sonal high with a toss of 55 ft. 9 in. in the meet. Other Wolverine highlights were provided by Mar- shall Parks with a time of 14.23 in the 110-meter dash and Tim Thomas' 1:49.7 half-mile, the Big Ten's best 880 this season. This afternoon's meet will be looked upon as a warmup for the Ann Arbor Relays to be held next weekend, and the Big Ten Cham- pionships May 23-24 in Cham- paign. Until then, however, s Michigan coach Jack Harvey should get .a pretty good in- dication of his team's strength from their performance this af- ternoon.