Ladd lifts cats back over .500

Last week in a match against Oregon, with her volleyball team needing a sweep, sophomore middle blocker Bre Ladd responded with a .606 hitting percentage with 22 kills on 33 attempts and just two errors.

In the tougher match against Oregon State the following night, Ladd, the 2001 Gatorade National High School Volleyball Player of the Year, had 14 kills on a sizzling match-high .650 hitting percentage, with only one error and a match-high seven blocks. [Read article]

Isaiah Fox is ready to put his off-court troubles behind him and start playing basketball.

The 6-foot-9 forward will have to wait one more game, however, as he finishes his 2-game suspension imposed by head coach Lute Olson for shoplifting from a campus convenience store two weeks ago.

Fox missed last week's 109-66 win over Sydney and will sit out the Nike game this week.

"At least it's not a real game," Fox said. "I wish I was playing because (in) the exhibition game you get to work out some of the rustiness." [Read article]

21 years in, Lute keeps on winning

Can you remember what you were doing in 1982?

Prince was 17 years ahead of his time with his mega-hit "1999," and Men at Work were still making albums. Back then, movies such as "E.T." and "Poltergeist" were probably scaring you to death, while the third installments of "Rocky" and "Star Trek" were paving the future of jocks and nerds everywhere.

Just two years into those awesome Î80s, the University of Iowa had just lost its head coach. The man who had taken the Hawkeyes to the NCAA Midwest Regional Final that year had accumulated a 168-90 record in nearly a decade's worth of coaching. In fact, the North Dakota farm-bred coach became the winningest coach in Hawkeye history ÷ he's since been surpassed by Tom Davis with 259 wins. [Read article]

The UA women's basketball program has signed guard Ashley Whisonant to a National Letter-of-Intent, head coach Joan Bonvicini announced yesterday. Whisonant, who will join the Wildcats for the 2004-05 season, completes the list of early signees this fall.

A native of Bowie, Md., Whisonant is a 5-foot-8 swing guard for St. John's College High School in Washington, D.C. A two-time Street & Smith's honorable mention All-American, Whisonant was a first team All-WCAC selection and a fourth team All-Metro DC choice last season. She averaged 12.4 points, 6.5 assists and 4.6 rebounds per game as a junior. [Read article]