Back again

It is truly egregious that I haven't posted in nearly a month. Here's some recent work, some cool stuff. Oh and the Blazers are still terrible, they lost Monday night to the Wizards. Come on guys, you know you're bad if you lose to the Wiz. The Wiz! It's strange, but in the time since I last posted Mo Cheeks has been fired and the Blazers are 2-12. What a month.

Will Funn's cerebral play has helped him become the nation's second most prolific assist-man with 8.0 assits per game. Last year he struggled to run the offense, this year he has become the key to the Vikings' success.

Having Funn the key to winning

Viking point guard's resurgence has guided team to the top of the Big Sky

Owen Smith

March 08, 2005

Seamus Boxley may be the face of the Vikings and the Big Sky MVP, but Will Funn is the Vikings' motor. Or as third-year head coach Heath Schroyer puts it, Funn is the straw that stirs the Vikings' drink.

Literary allusions and quirky metaphors aside, Will Funn is quite simply the difference maker and the key ingredient for a Vikings team that has gone from the bottom of the pack to Big Sky regular season champions in just one year.

Last year Funn was solid but hardly outstanding, averaging 7.7 points and four assists a game while shooting 40 percent from the floor. He had 104 assists on the year, but committed 101 turnovers along the way. Schroyer was concerned enough to bring in transfer Josh Neeley from Salt Lake CC in the off-season to push Funn and compete for the starting job.

What a difference a year makes. Funn fought for his starting job and has upped his assists to eight a game, second most in the nation. During conference play, Funn absolutely locked in and dished 9.8 assists per game in 14 regular season conference games.

His scoring is down slightly from last year to 7.4 points a contest, but he is hitting at a 46 percent clip and has learned to score more opportunistically instead of forcing up bad shots. "I'm just the guy that's able to get the ball to my teammates," Funn said of his big numbers.

The change from middle-of-the-pack point guard to national assist stud didn't happen overnight. Funn, a Rialto, Calif. native, spent two years at San Bernardino Valley JC before garnering attention from Portland State. "I signed early to PSU," Funn said. "They just gave me a chance and I'm blessed with the opportunity."

Determined to put his chance at PSU to good use and build off of a promising first year, Funn put in some serious hours last summer, honing his game and working to prove he could compete at the highest level. "I had to adapt to Division 1 competition and learn to bring it every night," Funn said. "I needed to make better decisions in the open court."

To do this, he played in the LA Pro Am league last summer. "It was a real college atmosphere," Funn said of his experience there. Funn played with Pac-10 players such as Jordan Farmer of UCLA and a bevy of other top talent from around the nation during his stint in Los Angeles.

Besides playing on the Pro City league, Funn also worked heavily with Vikings assistant coach Senque Carey, a former D-1 point guard at Washington and New Mexico. "What I tried to help Will with was his mental approach," Carey said. "He was trying to make the spectacular play last year. We want him just to make the good play, the right play."

Carey describes Funn as somewhat of a throwback point guard, perhaps one of the few guards left who thrives off of his passing game. "Will gains confidence from his passing," Carey said. "His offense rests on his ability to pass the ball."

As important as Funn's ability to pass the ball are the teammates he is passing to. "We only got to have one year last year but over the spring and the summer we were able to really come together," Funn said of his senior cohorts, the core of the potent Vikings offense. "I just try and feed them, get them going."

Funn noted that newcomers like Jake Schroeder have made life easier for him and have made the team deeper. However for a familiar face and a comfort zone on the court, Funn has to look no further than to Blake Walker. He has been playing with Walker since the ninth grade. "Every year it gets easier and easier to play with him," Funn said.

Walker isn't fazed by Funn's transformation into the upper echelon of point guards. "I've always seen this part of him," Walker said. "He just brings everything: energy, focus, leadership. He gets us in scoring position by being so unselfish."

"I'm his biggest fan," Walker said with a sly smile.

Coach Schroyer has become a Will Funn fan and has backed off and let the senior laden team find its own way on the court this year. "He understands we're serious," Funn said. "He's given us more freedom, and its paying off for the team."

Schroyer should have no worries letting Funn and the Vikings find their own way. "I'm feeling in the best shape I've ever been in," Funn said. "I'm ready to do something this school has never done."

OIS Tournament

Coordinators of the OIS tournament: Raji Mathews, Kirko Hashikaws and Young Soo Yi.

OIS soccer tourney

Over 100 players participate

Owen Smith

March 04, 2005

Over the weekend over 200 students flooded the community rec field to take part in the first annual Organization of International Students (OIS) Soccer tournament, which was held all day Saturday.
The tournament, backed by PSU Intramurals, was organized with the hopes of creating an event that would cater to the interests of Portland State's international student community. OIS representative and tourney organizer Young Soo Yi said, "We know that people outside the U.S. love soccer, so we thought it would be a good idea."
"We started planning this a month ago," he added. "We are hoping to have a tournament every term." The turnout was strong, especially considering the limited time the OIS had to plan and advertise the event. Among the first to join up was the PSU Soccer Club team.
"The OIS came to us and invited the team to play," said PSU Club team member Carlos Cardenas between matches. "We have a lot of good competition here."
Cardenas plays club soccer year round, and is a new addition this season to a PSU club team that was league champion last year. "It's been beautiful so far," Cardenas said.
Eight teams, representing Iran, Korea, Japan, Mexico, Persia, Turkey and the Middle East, competed for the first place trophy and a $200 gift certificate to Far Post, a soccer supply company.
Cardenas was one of many players to point out that different nationalities had unique styles of play. "The Japanese teams are usually really good," Cardenas said. "They are quick and fast."
Of the eight teams that competed, the strongest teams were Intramural regulars the Persian Mafia and the PSU club team, which faced each other in the championship match.
"The Persian team passes the ball well," Cardenas said. "They're really skilled."
The Persians used their precision passing and shot out to a 3-0 lead in the first half, but the experience of the PSU club team proved invaluable. The soccer club rattled off six straight second-half goals to win by a final score of 6-3.
"It was a good game," PSU club player Brian Ryberg said. "The Persian team brought some ringers with them, and they probably expected to win."
Now Ryberg and the rest of the club team prepare for the March 4 start of their league season. Thanks to an outstanding 2004 campaign, the club team earned the right to compete in the Premier League of Portland, which is the highest-rated league in the area.
"It's going to be tough this year and getting into the top three will be hard," Ryberg said. "But this tournament win was a satisfying way to start our season."

Clyde Drexler Isn't Walking Through That Door

Blazer Analysis
Owen Smith

The firing of Maurice Cheeks was inevitable, and really the only question for Blazer management was when to do it. John Nash decided that sooner was better than later and now Mo is looking for another job and the Blazers are looking for someone (other than interim coach Kevin Pritchard) to replace him.

In a way, it makes a lot of sense for Cheeks to go now and not at the end of the season. For all intents and purposes Mo was going to be a lame duck coach for the rest of the year, though it’s very arguable he already was—especially after the Darius Miles debacle.

It didn’t make any sense to make the team and Cheeks suffer through what is most likely going to be a miserable end to the season and another trip to the draft lottery. As John Nash put it at the Blazers’ Wednesday press conference, “We made the internal decision that we were not going to exercise the option to extend Maurice's contract beyond this year… [and] did not want to make Maurice a 'lame duck coach' and remain for the balance of the season.”

Now Cheeks has more time to find a new job, if that’s what he wants to do. He expressed several times Wednesday that he was to close to the game of basketball to give it up, so expect him on the bench of an NBA team very soon. It is clear that almost any franchise he walks into will be a more hospitable situation than the one he faced in Portland for three-and-a-half years.

As for the Blazers, don’t expect either Phil Jackson or Flip Saunders to come to Portland next season. Though they are both big names and Paul Allen has the money to pay them, the personnel situation is not ideal. This is especially true for Jackson, who is getting older and probably doesn’t have the energy or patience to deal with a rebuilding situation.

A rebuilding situation is on hand no matter who takes over coaching duties next year. To paraphrase the famous Rick Pitino quote, Clyde Drexler is not walking through that door, meaning that now GM John Nash has made his move and has to pick up the pieces from here.

The pieces are somewhat troublesome. The Blazers have an overpaid ($86 million contract), kind of wacky power forward in Zach Randolph and an overpaid ($36 million), verbally abusive and definitely wacky small forward in Darius Miles. They also have three veterans who are all overpaid now and who will be free agents at the end of the year in Damon Stoudamire, Nick Van Exel and Shareef Abdur-Rahim.

Nash has a lot of decisions to make in the coming months, and given the success of the team in recent years Nash could find himself in trouble soon if things don’t turn around. Paul Allen has already fired his longtime associate Bob Whitsitt, better known as Trader Bob to Portlanders, from the general manager position of the Seattle Seahawks, the other franchise Allen owns.

There doesn’t seem to be an end all be all solution on the horizon for this franchise. However, indicators seem to point to a youth movement, at least if Nash is still around to make it happen.

“Moving forward we need to really evaluate what we have, and what better way to do that than for the Player Personnel Director to get under the hood and take a look,” Nash said Wednesday. “We have some exciting pieces, especially when you talk about adding Monia next year, Sebastian [Telfair], [Viktor] Khryapa, Ha, Joel [Przybilla]; we've got some pieces, we really need to find out how good those pieces are.”

And this summer, Portland fans will get to find out how good of a GM John Nash is as well.

Blazers Fire Cheeks

No more Mo
Blazers fire coach
Owen Smith

The Maurice Cheeks era of the Portland Trail Blazers is over. The team fired its head coach Wednesday morning, ending the relationship after just less than four seasons. The Blazers are in the middle of their worst season in 23 years and are riding a current three game skid.

Cheeks leaves the Blazers with a 162-139 record, fourth best for Blazer head coaches. He guided the team to the playoffs twice, but failed to win a series during his tenure in Portland.

The team came close two years ago, as they took the Dallas Mavericks to a game seven showdown in the 2003 playoffs, only to come up short in the final minutes. However it was during that series that the highlight of Cheeks’ time in Portland occurred, when he helped local girl Natalie Gilbert, then 13-years-old, through the national anthem when she forgot the words.

The Blazers’ and Cheeks’ plight started last year, when the team went 41-41 and missed the playoffs for the first time in over 20 years. The team fell to the draft lottery for the first time in franchise history, drafting Sebastian Telfair with the 13^th overall pick. Cheeks started the 2004-05 season on the hot seat and had to get the team to compete for a playoff spot. After wallowing at .500 for 30 games Shareef Abdur-Rahim was lost for over a month and the Blazers’ record plunged. They are currently 22-33 and are 11 games under .500 on the year.

Recently Cheeks has dealt with controversy stemming from his conflict with Blazer forward Darius Miles, whom he had a verbal altercation with last month that led to a two game suspension of Miles. Other low-lights during Cheeks’ years in Portland include Qyntel Woods’ animal abuse allegations, numerous marijuana infractions by multiple players and the trading of Bonzi Wells and Rasheed Wallace.

Though obviously upset, Cheeks was reflective about his time in the River City. “In this business I think we all understand what we are here for, we are here to win basketball games,” Cheeks said at his press conference. “If you don't win basketball games, something's gonna happen.”

Cheeks’ firing should come as little surprise to anyone who follows the Blazers, but the timing is somewhat suspect. Players, fans and the media had all predicted the firing to occur after the season was finished, but Blazer GM John Nash thought otherwise.

“It's a wins and losses driven business,” Nash said. “In recent weeks and months our team has not made progress, so we felt it was time for someone else to take over.”

That someone is 37-year-old Trail Blazer Director of Player Personnel Kevin Pritchard, who was hired last August. Pritchard, a University of Kansas alumnus, was a second round draft pick in 1990 by Golden State and spent his years as an NBA journeyman. Pritchard also played internationally and was a head coach at the ABA level and now takes over the Blazers on an interim basis.

"This is not the role and not the career path I want to take," Pritchard said. "That said, I would do anything to help this organization."

The Blazers now start the search for a new permanent head coach, and the names Phil Jackson and Flip Saunders will most likely be tossed around all summer. The likelihood of hiring either man is questionable, however they are the two marquee names on the market at this point and Blazer owner Paul Allen is a reported Jackson fan.

Cheeks, always an example of class, was sure to thank Portland fans. “You know that’s really one of the things I am going to miss is the fans, the fans have been great to me,” he said. “I've had a beautiful experience here.”

Viks Almost Done

After a dismal season the women call it quits.

Bittersweet home finish

Women's basketball team loses two more

Owen Smith

March 01, 2005

Vanguard Sports Section

The women's basketball team dropped another pair of games over the weekend at the Stott Center, losing 58-68 to Montana State and then dropping a close 54-59 decision to Montana. The games brought PSU's consecutive losses to 15, tying the dubious school record of 15 straight failures and dropping its record to 2-22 (0-12 Big Sky).

The small crowd in attendance Thursday was treated to a vintage performance by senior guard Heidi Stuart, but unfortunately for the Vikings the game was vintage Portland State, circa 2004. After leading 27-22 at the half, PSU surrendered 46 second-half points and countless threes to the feisty Montana State team.

Stuart poured on 18 points, including many clutch shots down the stretch to keep the Vikings close as MSU made its run. Using a combination of jumpers and crafty post up moves, the senior team captain did her best, but an off night from sophomore Heather Arns and too many turnovers hindered the Viking attack.

On defense, the Viks were overwhelmed by the Bobcats' crafty screens, which allowed MSU to shoot 52 percent in the second half. Forward Kati Burrows controlled the paint, hustling her way to 22 points while dominating the glass. Burrows grabbed 13 boards, five of them offensive rebounds.

The weekend brought redemption, of a sort. After seniors Heidi Stuart, JJ Magee and Lisa Thompson were honored in a pre-game ceremony, the Vikings steeled themselves for a game against the league-leading Montana Grizzlies.

Portland State jumped on the Grizzlies from the get-go, and led 5-0 after 2 minutes. A Heather Arns jumper with 9:50 left to play in the first half gave the Vikings their last lead at 13-12. Montana went on a 17-8 run to close the half to lead 29-21 at the break.

Things got worse for PSU before they got any better. Montana built on its halftime lead and led 26-46 with 11:43 left to play. That's when the Vikings made their move.

Heidi Stuart started the run by scoring six straight Viking points and after two Marci Garski free throws added another bucket to make the score 36-50 in favor of Montana.

With the clock winding down and the game still 13 points in favor of the Grizzlies, Heather Arns went off. In a span of two minutes, Arns scored nine points in a row for PSU to bring the Vikings within 49-53. Arns forced four straight Montana turnovers (three of them steals by Arns) and hit three driving lay-ups and a long three pointer during her run.

A Garski free throw made the game 50-53 but the Vikings were unable to get the stops and scores they needed down the stretch, eventually succumbing 54-59. Montana forced some bad decisions with its defense and held on by making six of nine free throws to close the game.

Stuart finished the game with 14 points and eight boards and rebounded after shooting 0-7 in the first half. Stuart was 5-7 from the floor in the second stanza and 4-4 from the foul line in a valiant effort.

Heather Arns had a Heather Arns-like game, as she shot 6-10 from the field on route to 13 points, three assists and a game- and career-high eight steals. She added six rebounds. Freshman center Marci Garski had the best overall performance of her young career, playing stellar defense on Montana's 6-4 center Hollie Tyler while managing to score seven points and grab four rebounds of her own.

The Vikings are not done yet. They play two away games next week, visiting Sacramento State on Thursday and closing the season out at Northern Arizona Saturday night in Flagstaff.

OIS Soccer Tourney champs for this term: PSU Soccer Club team
courtesy of orginal source

Preview for Tomorrow's Game

Women's Basketball Preview
Portland State: 2-20 (0-10 Big Sky)
Montana: 16-7 (9-1 Big Sky)
By Owen Smith (Vanguard 2.25.05)

The women's basketball team plays its final home game Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m. at the Stott Center against Montana. It has been a tough season for first year head coach Charity Elliott and her young charges, but they remain optimistic.

The good practices are encouraging, but so far they haven't led to any wins. The Vikings are currently suffering through a disheartening stretch that has seen them drop 13 games in a row, including 10 straight in Big Sky play.

"We're not looking at the wins and losses right now," senior guard JJ Magee said. "We're just playing hard no matter what."

The game will feature a short ceremony prior to tip-off honoring outgoing seniors Heidi Stuart and JJ Magee. Then the Vikings must contend with the best team in the Big Sky.

Montana comes to the South Park Blocks with a 9-1 Big Sky record and is led by its own senior, center Hollie Tyler. Tyler is fifth in the conference in scoring at 13.8 points a game and also adds 7.6 boards. She leads a stifling defense with a league leading 3.13 blocks per contest.

The Grizzlies suffered a home loss to Northern Arizona last week and should be plenty angry and focused when they take the Vikings on. To counter the Grizzly attack PSU will rely on the usual suspects.

Heather Arns is averaging 15.4 points a game in Big Sky competition and is looking to become the first Viking to lead her team in points, rebounds, steals and assists for a season. Frosh forward Delaney Conway has rebounded from a slow start and is the Viks' second leading scorer at 9.7 points a game.

With a win, the Vikings can avoid tying the school record for consecutive losses. However, records negative or positive have little meaning at this point in the season. Heidi Stuart summed it up. "We're not looking at records right now, but it would be great to give the fans an upset.""We're still continuing to fight," Elliott said. "I've been impressed with how we still show up to practice hard."

Manny in Game Four of the World Series

New Name?

What should I call my blog? It should be something related to sports. It was originally the Sports Depot, now it is The Viking Report. Any suggestions?

Viks Drop Another

Recap
Owen Smith
Portland State-58
Montana State-68

The Lady Vikings dropped another game Thursday night at the Stott Center, losing 58-68 to Montana State. The loss brings their consecutive losses streak to 14, within one of the dubious school record of 15 straight failures and drops their record to 2-21 (0-11 Big Sky).

The piddling crowd in attendance Thursday was treated to a vintage performance by senior guard Heidi Stuart, but unfortunately the game was vintage Portland State, circa 2004. After leading 27-22 at the half, PSU surrendered 46 second half points and countless threes to the feisty Montana State team.

Stuart poured on 18 points, including many clutch shots down the stretch to keep the Vikings close as MSU made its run. Using a combination of jumpers and crafty post up moves, the senior team captain did her best, but an off night from sophomore Heather Arns and too many turnovers hindered the Viking attack.

On defense, the Viks were overwhelmed by the Bobcats' screens, which freed them up for their outside looks. Kati Burrows controlled the paint, hustling her way to 22 points while cleaning the glass effectively. The Vikings get one more shot to win on their home floor when the return to the Stott Center Saturday afternoon for Senior Day. Tip-off is scheduled for 2:00 pm.