SPORTS
Thursday, May 23, 1985
Page 8
The Michigan Daily
Georgia nails top-seeded I Philling it Up
Er 1 1 1 tani c "rnA"" By Phil Nussel
"A1 0AnI. LLL3 I.u l IIZLA UK " vv AR I
From staff and wire reports
ATHENS, Ga.-It may have seemed unlikely to Georgia
tennis coach Dan Magill, but his team won the NCAA ten-
nis championships without having to play any doubles
matches.
Magill is the winningest coach in collegiate tennis'
history with 645 victories but never had a national cham-
pionship until Tuesday.
The Bulldogs, seeded sixth, took five singles matches
from the top-seeded Bruins to capture their first NCAA
tennis crown. There was no doubles play.
"IT WAS farfetched to think that we could win the mat-
ch in the singles," said Magill. "Realistically, I was
hoping that we'd be leading 4-2. I believe our singles
lineup is one of the best singles lineups ever in the NCAA
tournament"
Georgia dumped the Southern Methodist Mustangs in
the semifinals Sunday. SMU crushed Michigan, 7-0, in fir-
st-round action.
In no. one singles, Mikael Pernfors of Georgia defeated
Michael Kures, 6-2, 6-3. Georgia's George Bezecny beat
Jeff Klaparda 2-6, 6-4, 6-2 in no. two singles, and Bulldog
Allen Miller won no. three singles 6-4, 6-4, over Brad Pear-
ce.
UCLA's Mark Bashan won the no. four singles, 6-1, 7-5
over Deane Frey. Georgia also took the no. five and no.
six singles with Philip Johnson beating Brett Greenwood,
7-6, 3-6, 7-5, and Trey Carter downing Ken Diller, 7-6, 3-6, 6-
3.
"I've got to give Georgia a lot of credit, said UCLA
coach Glenn Bassett. "They won the close matches. They
won the crucial points, and that's what it takes to be a
champion."
A crowd of 5,277 spectators watched the finale Tuesday,
largest tennis crowd in NCAA history.
NEW YORK (UPI) - National In- tournament expanded to 64 teams and
N vitation Tournament officials yester- cut television revenue for his 32-team
day announced plans for a 16-team post-season event.
pre-season competition they expect "When expansion (of the NCAA
will restore some of the luster and tournament) went to 64 teams our
fl ' -se II O fl profit to the long-running post-season revenue was cut in half," Carlesimo
college basketball tournament. said. "The pre-season tourney will
Peter Carlesimo, executive director help us regain some lost prestige and
of the NIT, claims the new tourney, to fund our post-season tournament."
O ,u rfl be called the Big Apple NIT, will refill The 1985 tournament will run Nov.
coffers left half-filled after the NCAA 21-Dec. 1.
Great Gretzky stynmed by Flyers
PHILADELPHIA (UPI)-On a Gretzky wanted was a blanket thrown games this year, was held without a
humid, muggy night in the southern over him. shot on goal.
part of town, the last thing Wayne Nevertheless, Edmonton's super- No, the Flyers did not hide Gret-
star center found himself smothered zky's stick before the game. They ac-
Tuesday night by an air-tight complished the feat with the same
Philadelphia defense that propelled tireless forechecking that also left
the Flyers to a 4-1 triumph in game Bryan Trottier and Peter Statsny -
one of the NHL Stanley Cup finals. key offensive opponents in the Flyers'
On Tuesday night, Gretzky, who previous playoff series - wondering
collected 73 goals in the regular what went wrong.
season and 10 more in 13 playoff Gretzky's best opportunity came mid-
way through the middle period when he
broke in alone on goalie Pelle Lindbergh.
However, his shot, from an angle,
glanced off the outside of the left post.
"Yup, that was an empty net," he
said. "It kinda went off at the end of
my stick. I had the whole net. If I
m t I d e ltcould have gotten that one, we could
SDISCOUNT MUS have turned the momentum around."
AMERICAN AND FOREIGN CAR SPECIALIST The Edmonton center, who has 36
points in the post-season, also set up
Paul Coffey for a 10-footer 90 seconds
into the second period, but the defen-
FROM AS * FITS MANY seman slid the puck wide left.
The best bunch of Wolverines?
Witho*, netters earn the kudos
With the conclusion of the 1985 tennis season, head coach Brian Eisner
once again reaffirmed that men's tennis is the best athletic program at
Michigan. Yes, the best.
No Michigan team can claim 17 Big Ten titles in 18 years. No Michigan
coach, except Eisner, can claim 15 Big Ten titles in 16 years. One can only
imagine what kind of honors Bill Freider or Bo Schembechler would get if
they recorded these feats. Unfortunately, Eisner coaches a "minor"
sport.
There can be no doubting, at least from an outsider's view, this year's
tennis title was the most unbelievable in recent years. Six of the eight
primary starters never played Big Ten tennis before - five of the six
were freshmen. The Wolverines also had to deal with a knee injury to Jon
Morris, the team's top freshman. Mental problems - slumps and bad at-
titudes- surfaced also.
To top off the season's problems, Eisner's team was criticized by the
university's academicians for missing too many classes. Oddly enough,
these administrators didn't know the Wolverines registered the highest
grade-point average of any athletic squad on campus. Senior Kurt Licht-
man had a mere 3.97to top the list.
Now that I've given the team in general its kudos, here are some individ-
ual awards:
The Best "In Your Face" Match: The Wolverines upset the Big Ten
defending champs, Minnesota, last month without the services of first
singles player Jim Sharton. The Gophers laughed when they learned
Sharton was at his brother's wedding, but weren't laughing much when
they lost, 6-3.
Most Valuable Player: Jim Sharton. The team's only All-Big Ten
selection didn't have the best record (16-15), but the fact that he was so
steady at the first singles spot made him a tremendous asset.
Best Decision: Ed Filer. After a year at South Carolina, Filer decided
to transfer to Michigan. He won several key matches throughout the
season. Filer was 14-13 overall, playing second, third, or fourth singles
depending on the matchups.
Best Doubles Player: John Royer.
Although the sophomore standout had a
mediocre year at singles, he still
teamed with Morris to register a 9-4
overall record (8-3 in the Big Ten). The
pair won two important matches in the
Big Ten tourna ment, defeating Illinois
and Minnesota.
Best Late-season Surge: Brad
Koontz. The freshman was caught up in
the depths of a terrible slump and had
to enter a playoff with two other
Wolverines to keep his fifth singles
spot. He came out on top and then went
into the Big Ten tourney red-hot, giving
up only three games in his last two Sharton
matches. Kontz beat Illinois' Tome
Frei, 6-0, 6-1, and destroyed Min-
nesota's Andy Salentine, 6-1, 6-1.
Best Injury Comeback: Jon Morris. The Ann Arbor native was
stricken with tendonitis in both knees in the early going, but recovered
enough to notch a 15-8 overall record. Morris went undefeated in the Big
Ten tournament.
Most Unrecognized Player: Franz Geiger. The freshman out of
Toledo, Oh. had by far the top overall singles record on the team (12-4),
went undefeated in the Big Ten tourney, and was still technically a senior
in high school (he graduated a year early). Yet his hometown paper, The
Toledo Blade, gave him only an inch of copy last weekend when Michigan
won the title.
Most Improved Player: Tomas Anderson. Eisner was in desperate
need of a good third doubles team, and he got it when he teamed Koontz
with the Malmo, Sweden freshman. The two were 8-1. Last fall, Ander-
sson was struggling just to make the team's top ten lineup.
Easiest Interview: Brian Eisner. He's the only coach I've ever known
who justs starts talking without the reporter needing to ask a question.
And he keeps talking until every aspect of the match has been analyzed.
The Foot-In-Mouth A ward: Yours Truly. Early in the season I said
the youth and inexperience on this year's tennis team would make it
unlikely the Wolverines would win atitle in 1985, but they did. So much for
my predictions.
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