By Jeff Lund
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Tuesday January 21, 2003
Last week the Arizona athletics department announced that junior Leneah Manuma would not be playing softball for head coach Mike Candrea's squad this season for academic reasons. This obviously means Arizona softball will be dealt a huge blow. Manuma's experience and skills, along with the departures of Jennie Finch (graduation) and Jenny Gladding (transfer) could leave the Wildcats in a position to lose many more games than their fans are used to.
Manuma batted .310, knocked a team-high 21 home runs, and had just two errors at first base ·
Manuma is not the only athlete who has had to put her sport career on hold temporarily. According to Arizona athletics media relations, women's basketball junior forward Svjetlana Papcevic failed to make the grade during the fall semester and winter session, effectively ending her season.
Ouch.
Papcevic played just seven games this season after transferring from Pratt Community College in Kansas.
Papcevic, a native of Bosnia, was a team favorite because of her ethnic background and catchy accent.
She averaged .9 points in 3.4 minutes in her limited action this season, which will not put a strain on head coach Joan Bonvicini's floor schemes, but it is a distraction and an issue that the coaching staff would likely not wish to deal with.
On the court, the Wildcats continue to roll after an impressive weekend sweep against a pesky USC team and UCLA. Could there potentially be a better inside and outside duo than Shawntinice Polk and Dee-Dee Wheeler?
Between the two underclassmen, they have received three Pac-10 Player of the Week awards this year, averaged 34.8 points per game and put the Wildcats in the thick of the Pac-10 race.
Wouldn't it be interesting if Polk considered jumping to the riches of the WNBA? ·
All Arizona fans should be hoping Steve Lavin keeps his job as head coach of the Bruins. Recruiting kids to go and play in Pauley under all those banners and under the watchful eye of John Wooden is not difficult. Lavin has not been able to get the most out of his players consistently for years. When he does get his players to get their acts together it always seems to be after the Pac-10 season, and last time I checked, that had no bearing on Arizona's season.
Keep Lavin, and Arizona will keep a top spot in the conference standings. If another coach were at UCLA, maybe Jason Kapono, one of the best set-shooters in the country, the team would have actually improved during his career. I heard a good one the other day: Steve Lavin turns McDonald's All-Americans into McDonald's employees. That's fine; keep Lavin employed, and the Bruins out of the conference title race ·
UA seniors Bobby Wade and Lance Briggs finally got the taste of a bowl game. The two were victorious Saturday after their North team defeated the South team 17-0 in the Senior Bowl in Mobile, Ala.
Wade ended the game with two catches for 16 yards, returned a punt for decent yardage, and threw a tremendous block on the corner to free Colorado State's Cecil Sapp for an 8-yard touchdown.
Wade is projected by many to go anywhere from the second to fourth rounds.
Briggs helped his NFL stock with three tackles, a broken-up pass and a recovered fumble.
Briggs is expected to go after Wade sometime during the second day of the NFL draft.
The Senior Bowl was just the first in a long line of evaluations for the two Wildcat standouts. Next month's NFL combine will have a lot to say about where both players are taken in the draft.
Wade's listed 5-foot-11-inch 185 frame might make scouts shy away from drafting him, but another former UA football player, Dennis Northcutt, is coming into his own with the Cleveland Browns.
Northcutt, listed as 5-feet-11-inches also, was drafted as the first pick in the second round by the Browns.
Though Wade might be a little shorter, Northcutt's success can surely be duplicated by the strong and quick-footed Wade ·
Will Arizona National be the training ground for the next Tiger Woods? UA director of golf Rick LaRose announced yesterday that the men's team will be bolstered by three new swift swingers next season, one of whom is regarded as the nation's top junior golfer.
Henry Liaw, Ben Marsh and Josh Esler will all be wearing the Arizona "A" next fall, with Liaw headlining the recruiting class. Liaw is a three-time American Junior Golf Association Polo All-American. A few years back, Liaw won 30 Southern California tournaments, including 18 in a row. One guess as to who is the only other person to accomplish such a feat: Tiger Woods ·
