ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

So we’re closing. The Big C. We’re done for. The whistle is blowing. The horn is sounding. We’ve run out of extra time. Just took a called third strike.

I’d like to think you will miss us here in Citizen sports, but I don’t want to be presumptuous.

But even if you think that only once a month we nailed a story, a scoop, a column, a feature – and I think our batting average was much higher – well, that’s one story, scoop, column, feature you won’t be getting any more.

That’s not good for anybody.

I asked Arizona athletic director Jim Livengood in February about the Citizen’s impeding demise and how it might affect his department.

“For a great number of years, we’ve had the ability to have things balanced, and all of a sudden you lose that,” Livengood said of this turning into a one-newspaper town.

“It also has an impact on the outside world, about the perception of Tucson when you lose an institution like this. There is an impression that we’re not going forward; we’re moving backward.”

Certainly, Livengood was telling me what I wanted to hear, but he also lamented a financial aspect to the closing and a potential loss of sponsorship/advertising dollars from a reconfigured Tucson Newspapers.

I guess that’s now a story for our pals at the Arizona Daily Star to track down.

I got my start in this crazy business at the Star, back in the fall of 1986. My first byline was on a high school football game, featuring a flash of a running back from Flowing Wells. His name escapes me now.

There have been a blur of running backs, point guards, pitchers and catchers in the years since then.

It was a pleasure to chronicle the Arizona football team through most of the 1990s – the Fiesta Bowl victory over Miami, the Holiday Bowl victory over Nebraska. Waldrop. Bruschi. Bouie. McAlister. Keith and Ortege, the tag-team quarterbacks.

One of my favorite stories: Back in the early 1990s, UA football coach Dick Tomey, upset over something I had written that day, went ballistic on me after practice as the players were leaving the field.

I have never heard someone so copiously and creatively use another term for horse manure.

We agreed to disagree that day, and I feared that a good working relationship would be damaged. Football coaches have been known to hold a grudge.

But the next time I saw Tomey, it was as if nothing had happened. That was his style. Say what you have to say, and then let it go. It’s a life lesson I have never forgotten.

Elsewhere, I covered seven of Arizona’s eight national championships in softball, and had access to the mind of coach Mike Candrea for two decades. Sometimes, this job is so worth it.

No complaints here.

I had a chance to work with, travel with and learn from the twin towers of local sports columnists – retired Corky Simpson of the Citizen and Greg Hansen of the Star. Tucson was lucky to have two such voices for all those years.

So, yeah, it’s been a good ride.

It hit me a while ago, though, that the best part of this job at the Citizen for the past four and a half years had nothing to do with newspapers or journalism.

Recently, for no other reason than boredom, I reached into the closet and pulled out a box I hadn’t opened in years. It was filled with various items from college days.

Two things caught my eye.

One was a 20-year-old edition of the Tombstone Epitaph. A journalism class at the University of Arizona produced – and still does – the newspaper for the Town Too Tough To Die.

In this particular edition, I shared a few bylines with a guy named John Moredich.

As I dug deeper in the box, I found an old address book – the kind of thing we used before we all had cell phones. Thumbing through, I saw I had the old phone number of a guy named Steve Rivera.

Point is, the two writers I have worked most closely with at the Citizen since the start of 2005 – Moredich covering football, Rivera covering basketball – have been friends for more than two decades.

Working with them has been the rewarding part of the job.

Whatever you do for work, I hope you have been as lucky.

When coach Mike Candrea began taking Arizona to the Women’s College World Series 21 years ago, the event was held in an out-of-the-way place in northern California.

Not San Francisco. Not even San Jose. Nearby Sunnyvale.

The venue for the event? If you’ve ever been to the Sports Park on the Northwest Side, you have the right image in your head.

“A four-field setup. Very basic,” Candrea remembered.

The infields in Sunnyvale had such a crown – designed to promote rain runoff into foul territory – that Candrea, standing in the third-base coaching box, had a hard time seeing plays at first base over the rise of the field.

“You couldn’t see the feet of the first baseman,” he said.

Let’s just say that two decades ago, college softball was just a half step up from the summer youth leagues.

Not exactly first class.

Since then – and Tucson can certainly attest to this – college softball has become one of the most visible women’s sports in the NCAA.

If the Wildcats navigate through the 2009 postseason – which begins at 1 p.m. Tucson time Friday in Louisville – they will end up in a world-class facility in Oklahoma City, in a game on ESPN, probably playing a team from the SEC.

That right there – the venue, the blanket coverage from the worldwide leader in sports and the rise of a powerful conference – are three reasons why softball has gone relatively mainstream in recent years.

Which makes it so frustrating when the NCAA continues to nickel and dime the sport.

“That will always be the case for this sport, no matter what,” Candrea said.

The local sports outrage of the moment is Arizona being sent to Louisville for a four-team regional. Nobody would appreciate having postseason home games more than Arizona fans.

The Wildcats have led the nation in attendance nine of the past 16 seasons. The school averaged a school-record average of 2,458 fans this year.

But the NCAA has 64 spots to fill in the softball postseason, including automatic qualifying spots to smaller Eastern conferences, whose teams have as much shot of winning the World Series as Harvard does the BCS football championship.

The NCAA is a slave to geography in arranging the regional sites, preferring to send one Western team east, rather than send three Eastern teams west. Save a few bucks on air fare.

Softball deserves better.

“From a coaching standpoint . . . I don’t worry about it,” Candrea said. “I just worry about getting the team prepared and going wherever you’re going. Like I tell the kids, at least you’re playing.”

Football and basketball have to pay the freight for everything else, but you would think there would be some loose change in the NCAA’s couch cushions from its TV megadeals.

The NCAA is in the midst of an 11-year, $6 billion deal with CBS to televise the men’s basketball tournament. The NCAA and ESPN reached an agreement in the fall on a four-year, $500 million deal for the rights to televise four of the five BCS bowl games, including the title game.

But, apparently, it is too much to ask for the NCAA to send Cal State Fullerton and San Diego State a little farther to Tucson rather than have them play in a regional at Arizona State.

The Sun Devils are seeded one spot below ninth-seeded Arizona and finished 3 1/2 games behind the Wildcats in the Pac-10 standings.

But ASU, not Arizona, gets the home regional because of geography.

Nickels and dimes.

Candrea shrugs.

“I’m too old to fight the battle anyway,” he said.

Someone asked me the other day about my favorite memories across two decades or so of being a sports reporter/columnist in Tucson. My answer was that there were too many to mention, but that, without question, I would rather cover softball than anything else.

Part of that is because the sport is charmingly small. You rarely find oversize egos. You find athletes appreciative of their opportunities.

There are chances to tell untold stories. But the sport isn’t as small as the NCAA makes it out to be this time of year. It’s a shame there is no softball at Hillenbrand Stadium this weekend.

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail:

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

ANTHONY GIMINO

RADIO, ONLINE COVERAGE

UA’s games in the Louisville Regional won’t be on TV, but will be on 1290 AM. Go to www.tucsoncitizen.com/ua_softball for updates.

Friday – Game 1: ARIZONA (41-14) vs. Tennessee-Martin (38-22), 1 p.m. Game 2: Louisville (47-9) vs. Purdue (29-18), 3 p.m.

Saturday – Game 3: Game 1 winner vs. Game 2 winner, 7 a.m. Game 4: Game 1 loser vs. Game 2 loser, 9 a.m. Game 5: Game 3 loser vs. Game 4 winner, noon

Sunday – Game 6: Game 3 winner vs. Game 5 winner, 11 a.m. Game 7: Repeat, if needed, 1 p.m.

ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

Spring football is all wrapped up, so the next thing in the college football calendar is the preview magazine season.

They’ll be coming soon – in some cases, later this month – to newsstands near you.

I’ve been doing my part, thoroughly immersed with production on Lindy’s six college football editions in the past couple of weeks, which means I know at least one thing: I absolutely can’t wait for the season to begin.

Here are 25 things – local, regional and national – to whet your appetite for the 2009 season . . . or at least until the magazines come out.

1. Arizona offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes took a trip in the offseason to visit with the staff of the Dallas Cowboys. The purpose: To study how it used tight end Jason Witten.

Dykes came back to Tucson with new ideas on how to involve junior tight end Rob Gronkowski.

“We took some of the stuff we saw with the Cowboys,” Dykes said. “We are trying to put it in our packages.”

2. Gronkowski is a Lindy’s second-team preseason All-American behind Oklahoma’s Jermaine Gresham, who surprisingly came back for his senior season.

3. I normally wouldn’t divulge Lindy’s No. 1 team, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out this season. It’s Florida.

Question is, who is No. 2 . . . Texas or Oklahoma? Or should that be Oklahoma or Texas?

4. Lindy’s picks the best of the decade in this year’s editions, and the question about the 2009 Gators is if they can become the team of the decade.

The champ in the clubhouse is 2001 Miami, which went undefeated, outscored opponents 512-117 and produced 15 first-round picks in the next three drafts.

5. I can’t wait to see how Salpointe Catholic graduate and former Arizona assistant Rich Ellerson does at Army. Ellerson made one of the most fascinating moves of the spring, switching starting left tackle Ali Villanueva (6 feet 10 inches, 283 pounds) to wide receiver.

Villanueva is expected to be a red-zone threat and serve as a heck of a blocker on screen passes.

6. Sure looks like a down year for the Pac-10, with eight of the teams having some sort of quarterback battle in the spring.

The only ones that didn’t were Oregon (Jeremiah Masoli) and Washington (Jake Locker, coming back from a thumb injury).

7. It figures: East Carolina junior Dustin Lineback is a . . . linebacker.

8. It doesn’t figure: Defensive back Miami Thomas plays for Illinois, running back Princeton McCarty plays for Idaho, Bob Toledo coaches Tulane, and the University of Washington doesn’t have anyone named Washington, although it does have a player named Houston, which is something Houston doesn’t have.

Running back Darius Marshall got it right. He plays for – you guessed it – Marshall.

9. Looking for a reason why the Big Ten flops in big games? It’s not because of speed at the skill positions; it’s because of speed and athleticism at defensive tackle.

Consider this: NFL teams have drafted 16 defensive tackles in the first round since 2004. None has been from the Big Ten.

10. The SEC, not deep in quarterbacks this season after Florida’s Tim Tebow and Mississippi’s Jevan Snead, is nonetheless the conference of elite quarterbacks. Five of the past 12 No. 1 overall draft picks have been SEC quarterbacks.

11. Salpointe Catholic graduate Kris O’Dowd, a junior at USC, is Lindy’s first-team preseason All-America center.

12. The middle of the Pac-10 is a jumbled mess. The top three are USC, Cal and Oregon. The bottom two are Washington and Washington State. Flip a coin for the teams in between, although Lindy’s picked Arizona fifth.

Lindy’s went with Oregon State at No. 4, because at least the Beavers have two quarterbacks they can win with – rehabbing Lyle Moevao (shoulder) and Sean Canfield. The rest of the Pac-10 middle has big questions at QB.

13. The ACC is 2-9 in BCS bowl games and has barely sniffed the national title since expansion. Blame a lack of skill: Of the past 29 first-round picks from the league, only four have been a quarterback, receiver or running back.

14. This year’s BCS buster: TCU.

15. Then again, if Boise State beats visiting Oregon on Sept. 3, who is going to stop the Broncos?

16. Arizona opens against Central Michigan on Sept. 5. The Chippewas are the pick to win the Mid-American Conference, and good-looking pro prospect Dan LeFevour is rated the eighth-best quarterback in the country, higher than anyone from the Pac-10.

17. Notre Dame isn’t in the preseason Top 25, but the Irish could get there because of an easy schedule and an offense that has a chance to be all grown up. Their receiving corps is a national top 10 group.

18. Florida’s defense is this good: The Gators have the nation’s top-rated defensive line, the second-rated linebackers and the top secondary.

19. And that Tebow guy is Lindy’s favorite to win the Heisman.

20. Alabama launched its 12-0 regular season in 2008 with a season-opening blasting of ACC favorite Clemson in Atlanta.

The Tide’s path is the same, a season opener in Atlanta vs. ACC favorite Virginia Tech.

21. Would it kill the Pac-10 to hold a coaches’ teleconference with the media in the spring like other major conferences?

22. Oklahoma State: Love ‘em or hate ‘em?

The Cowboys have the nation’s best trio of quarterback, receiver and running back. The defense hasn’t finished better than 74th nationally since 2001. Is that the right combination to challenge Oklahoma and Texas?

We might know after opening week. Georgia plays at Oklahoma State.

23. Steve Spurrier is still hoping Stephen Garcia is his long-awaited answer at quarterback for South Carolina.

But an SEC coach, speaking to Lindy’s on condition of anonymity, said this of the Gamecocks: “I don’t see them being a very good football team. And I wouldn’t be surprised if he (Spurrier) called it quits after this season.”

24. The Pac-10 has four players rated the best at their positions: O’Dowd, USC safety Taylor Mays, Cal running back Jahvid Best and UCLA kicker Kai Forbath.

25. A year from now, Tennessee, Miami, Notre Dame and Michigan could be back in the preseason Top 25. But not this summer.

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail:

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

Ricky Hunley has some very fine company. Hunley, the former Arizona All-American linebacker, was, until Thursday morning, the only UA player in the College Football Hall of the Fame.

Then the selection committee called the number of ol’ No. 6, free safety Chuck Cecil, heat-seeking missile, Wildcat legend, honor student and author of the signature play in school history – the 106-yard interception return in an upset of Rose Bowl-bound Arizona State in 1986.

“Oh, man, that feels great,” Hunley said upon learning Thursday afternoon that Cecil is part of an 18-member class to be inducted this year.

“You don’t feel like a lone soldier anymore. When I go to all these events, I see that USC has that many guys, and Ohio State has that many guys . . . but now Arizona is rolling. I’m excited to be in the company of Chuck Cecil.

“And he’s so young . He’ll have a lot of years to enjoy this.”

The rest of us have had more than 20 years to enjoy the memories of Cecil.

From walk-on to college football rock star in Tucson to successful NFL playing career to being the new defensive coordinator of the Tennessee Titans.

“I would say Chuck had the most dynamic personality of anybody I’ve coached,” said Duane Akina, who coached the secondary during Cecil’s senior season.

“He probably affected his teammates more than any player I’ve had. That is true leadership. I have never coached another like him who could carry the classroom to the field and who was so damn tough.

“I haven’t had anything close, and I have coached some good ones over the past 25 years.”

Cecil, from 1984-87, led by being one of the most feared hitters in the Pac-10 . . . ever. He didn’t stop there. Who can forget the Sports Illustrated cover of Cecil from October 1993, with the headline: “Too Vicious for the NFL?”

Out of San Diego’s Helix High School, he tried to get a football scholarship to Stanford, but the coaches there ultimately thought he was too small. By the time Stanford made its decision, Arizona, which had previously offered a scholarship, had run out of free rides.

“Back in the day, I was more of a geeky student kind of guy, I guess,” said Cecil, 44.

“My whole thing was to get an education and play a little football. No thoughts, dreams, aspirations of playing in the NFL. It never really struck me until my senior year when they talked about other guys.

“I was like, ‘I’m better than he is.’ ”

Especially as a senior in 1987, in Dick Tomey’s first season as coach.

The previous season, Akina was working with the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League, and he scouted running back David Adams in Arizona’s Aloha Bowl game against North Carolina.

“Chuck had some great hits. I remember sitting in the stands going, ‘God, I wonder who that kid is?’ ” Akina said.

“When I got to Arizona, everyone was talking him up. And then when I saw him, I was like, ‘That’s him? This scrawny 180-pound kid?’ I thought I was going to see Ronnie Lott.”

Akina ended up seeing something he hasn’t seen since. Akina, an assistant coach at Texas, has coached three winners of the Jim Thorpe Award, given to the nation’s top defensive back, but says he’s never seen a senior season as dominating as Cecil’s.

Cecil made 136 tackles, broke up 12 passes and intercepted nine – part of his UA career record of 21.

He picked off four passes against Stanford that season. Tomey told reporters Thursday that Cecil should have had six. Akina said Cecil should have had seven. Arizona assistant coach Jeff Hammerschmidt, who was on two UA teams with Cecil, said he should have had eight.

“After getting four, it’s hard to feel you really missed out,” Cecil said.

“But after the game, watching film, I was very disappointed because I really, truly should have had no less than six easily. Two were blatant drops. I could have had upwards of eight if I had done what I was supposed to do and made a reasonable play.

“And, possibly, if I had done something special, nine.”

Turns out, he’s friends with one of the Stanford quarterbacks that day – Greg Ennis, who threw the final interception. Ennis called Thursday to congratulate Cecil.

Cecil sent back a text: “Couldn’t have done it without your fourth pick.”

The next week, Washington coach Don James was so afraid of what Cecil might do from his center field spot that the Huskies, according to Akina, never once attempted a pass inside the numbers on the field.

That’s respect.

Hammerschmidt, also from Helix High, remembers Cecil as a great influence – “like family,” he said.

Hammerschmidt recalls his recruiting visit to Tucson. Cecil met him at the airport with a coach and drove him around town.

“We go through the drive-through at McDonalds and the girl at the window saw Chuck and dropped the bag of food and was all excited,” Hammerschmidt said.

“I thought, ‘This is great. This is a college football town.’ ”

Better yet, it’s a college football town whose player representation in the College Football Hall of Fame just doubled.

“It’s not just a huge day for Chuck,” Hunley said. “It’s a huge day for the university.”

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail: agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

Cecil picked for College Football Hall of Fame

ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

Gimino

CECIL BY THE NUMBERS

4

Interceptions at Stanford in1987

21

Career interceptions, best in UA history

106

Yards of interception return for a TD against ASU in 1986

392

Tackles at UA, seventh all-time

Continued from 1C

Hunley

2009 HALL OF FAME CLASS

Player, pos., school Years

Pervis Atkins, HB, N.M. St. 1958-60

Tim Brown, WR, Notre Dame 1984-87

Chuck Cecil, DB, Arizona 1984-87

Ed Dyas, FB, Auburn 1958-60

Major Harris, QB, W. Va. 1987-89

Gordon Hudson, TE, BYU 1980-83

William Lewis, C, Harvard 1892-93

Woodrow Lowe, LB, Alabama 1972-75

Ken Margerum, WR, Stanford 1977-80

Steve McMichael, DT, Texas 1976-79

Chris Spielman, LB, Ohio St 1984-87

Larry Station, LB, Iowa 1982-85

Pat Swiling, DE, Ga. Tech 1982-85

Gino Torretta, QB, Miami 1989-92

Curt Warner, RB, Penn St. 1979-82

Grant Wistrom, DE, Nebraska 1994-97

• Coaches: Dick MacPherson, Syracuse (1981-90); John Robinson, USC (1976-82, 1993-97), UNLV (1999-2004)

ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

There’s nothing left but road games in the regular season for the Arizona softball team, and the Wildcats will have to win their share if they want to get back home.

UA finishes the season with eight consecutive road games, starting with something of a doubleheader at 5 p.m. Wednesday at Arizona State.

The teams will conclude a suspended game from April 11 in Tucson. UA, still the designated home team, will be batting in the bottom of the third with Jenae Leles on first base and no outs. The score is tied at 2.

After that game, the teams will play their regularly scheduled game.

Arizona (37-11 overall, 9-4 Pac-10) is one-half game behind league-leading UCLA (10-4). ASU is 37-11 and 7-6.

How teams finish in the league is one factor in determining which schools get to play host to an NCAA regional, which starts May 15.

Seventh-ranked Arizona can help its cause by finishing ahead of Arizona State. Traditionally, the NCAA does not award home regionals to both schools.

“There is a lot on the line there,” UA coach Mike Candrea said of Wednesday’s games.

UA will bus back to Tucson after the games and leave Thursday afternoon for the Bay Area. The Wildcats play 13th-ranked Cal on Friday and third-ranked Stanford on the weekend.

“The way I look at it is that it’s going to prepare us,” Candrea said of the season-ending stretch. “If you’re going to win this thing you have to win it on the road.”

The Wildcats have hit 111 home runs, the second-best season mark in NCAA history. Arizona’s 2001 team holds the record at 126.

Arizona hit five homers in an 11-0 victory against Washington’s second-string staff on Sunday, but it was shut down by the Huskies’ Danielle Lawrie and UCLA’s Megan Langenfeld in the games before that.

“We have a long ways to go,” Candrea said. “This team has to learn how to compete against the great pitchers.”

UA SOFTBALL

Wednesday: at ASU, 5 p.m. (completion game) and 7 p.m.

Friday: at Cal, 3 p.m.

Saturday: at Stanford, 1 p.m.

Sunday: at Stanford, noon

Laine Roth couldn’t swing a bat. She couldn’t take a throw at first base. She’s not a pitcher.

On Senior Day – for a player who was a third-team All-American last season, for a player who has a torn tendon in her left wrist, for a player who has to come to grips that her college playing days are very possibly over – there really was only one thing she could do.

Pinch run.

Coach Mike Candrea sent in Roth for one of the team’s fleetest players with two outs in the bottom of the fourth and the game out of reach.

The next batter made an out, and then the Wildcats closed out a five-inning 11-0 victory over Washington at Hillenbrand Stadium on Sunday.

Cue the on-field Senior Day festivities. Cue the tears.

For Roth, those started about two hours before the game at the stadium.

She heard UA officials running through the maudlin music they play after the game – such as the main theme to “Forrest Gump” – to accompany the text of each senior’s accomplishments.

“I carry my heart on my sleeve, always have,” she said.

For Roth, the emotions were stronger and more complicated because of that torn tendon.

A cortisone shot a couple of weeks ago didn’t help. She played Friday night against UCLA, but the pain was so great that she lost her grip on the bat in her final plate appearance, nearly clobbering on-deck hitter Lini Koria.

“That was it. That was the moment right there,” she said.

“I had hopes it would be fine. But why swing the bat if you can’t hold on to it and you’re going to kill your on-deck batter?

Her prognosis?

“I’m done,” she said.

Candrea holds out slim hope as the regular season heads into its final two weeks. He said they will try another shot to Roth’s wrist.

“If she has a few pinch-hits left in her, we can definitely use her there,” he said.

That doesn’t seem likely, and Roth hasn’t been able to do much this season, coming off her best year as a Wildcat. She hit .328 with 15 home runs and 42 RBIs last season.

Roth suffered the wrist injury in the second week of the season but tried to carry on without telling the coaches how badly she was hurt. Surgery would have ended her season. She is hitting .206 with four home runs.

“If she was a junior, then probably she would have come to grips with it sooner,” Candrea said.

One of her best friends, fellow senior Sam Banister, wrote Roth’s number – 24 – on her wrist for Sunday’s game. Banister, who has shared first base with Roth for much of the past three seasons, hit two home runs Sunday.

“I told her I claimed one of her homers,” Roth said with a laugh.

The Wildcats slugged five homers against a pair of Washington pitchers not named Danielle Lawrie, a sure-fire All-American who is 2-0 against Arizona this season, including a no-hitter.

Lawrie, the winner in Saturday’s 4-1 victory over UA, got the day off.

“If we are going to win 11-0 against their ‘B’ Team, I would rather do that than anything else,” Banister said.

Arizona improved to 37-11 overall and 9-4 in the Pac-10, a half game behind first-place UCLA.

Roth just wanted to play on Senior Day, even if pinch-running wasn’t the stuff of dreams.

But if that is her final appearance – she doesn’t have the speed to make pinch-running a regular occurrence – she will move on and do whatever she can for the team the rest of the way.

“I’m just pretty much going to be their cheerleader,” Roth said of her teammates.

“I’ll be pumping them up . . . just talking to them if they’re having a bad day. Just let them know they’re the best people. They wouldn’t be here if they’re not the best.

“They’re like my sisters. They’re here for me.”

Roth helped Arizona win national championships in 2006 and 2007. Even as a head cheerleader, she isn’t ready for the ride to end. The finality of it all hits the seniors right about now.

“Four years of hard work,” she said. “I can’t believe it happened so fast.”

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail:

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

ANTHONY GIMINO

UP NEXT: Arizona at Arizona State, doubleheader, 5 p.m. Wednesday

PAC-10 STANDINGS

School Conf. Overall

UCLA 10-4 35-8

Arizona 9-4 37-11

Stanford 10-5 41-6

Washington 8-6 35-9

Arizona State 7-6 37-11

California 8-7 32-15

Oregon State 3-12 24-25

Oregon 2-13 15-29

ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

The only thing missing from Arizona home softball games has been Linda Ronstadt herself.

Does she even know? Quick. Someone call her agent since she’s in town for the Tucson International Mariachi Conference.

From the very first game at the on-campus Hillenbrand Stadium, dating to Feb. 13, 1993, the same Ronstadt song has blared over the loudspeakers every time the Wildcats take the field for the first inning.

“I love it,” said senior Sam Banister. “You feel home. That’s how you feel. It’s like, ‘Here I am, I’m home.’ ”

Home. There has been no place like it for Arizona, which has led the nation in attendance in eight of the past 15 years and is on pace to shatter its season record as it heads into this weekend’s final regular-season homestand.

Winning is Arizona’s biggest tradition – we’ll get into all the numbers in a bit – but another tradition is that catchy Ronstadt song.

It’s not your typical ballpark fare, for sure, but her “Palomita de Ojos Negros” from her 1990 release “Mas Canciones” has become as much Arizona softball as the colors cardinal and navy. Shoot, I’m whistling the darn tune as I write this, and I can’t possibly be alone among the Hillenbrand regulars who will, apropos of nothing, start humming the song six months after the season ends.

“I would feel a little nervous if I didn’t hear it,” said Arizona’s notoriously superstitious coach Mike Candrea. “It has become an element of our tradition.”

Totally by accident, of course.

UA sports information director Tom Duddleston is of a certain age to have heard Ronstadt sing with the Stone Poneys on Tucson’s Sixth Street in the late 1960s. He was a fan. He had a copy of “Mas Canciones.” On cassette. For whatever reason, he played it as Hillenbrand Stadium opened.

“We said, ‘That sounded pretty good. Let’s play it again,’ ” Duddleston said.

And so they did.

Another track from the same album, “La Mariquita,” plays during the middle of the first inning. “You hear the other team saying, ‘Oh, what is this music?’ ” Banister said. “And, we’re like, ‘You know what, you have no idea we’re about to come over here and beat you guys up.’ ”

There has been a lot of that over the past 16 seasons.

Arizona is 491-40 at Hillenbrand, including an NCAA-record 70-game winning streak early this decade.

Arizona is 181-25 in Pac-10 games at Hillenbrand.

Arizona is 51-5 in NCAA tournament games at Hillenbrand.

This season has been more of the same, with a 22-1 record at home.

The strange thing is, this season began with the lowest UA expectations of any season since Hillenbrand opened. Arizona doesn’t have its usual ace pitcher but is countering with the best offense in the country.

The Wildcats have slugged 105 home runs, 21 shy of the NCAA record set by UA’s 2001 team.

Seventh-ranked Arizona is 36-9 overall and leads the Pac-10 with an 8-2 mark.

“I think people just didn’t expect us to be good, and they’re kind of coming out here to watch a miracle, almost,” Banister said. “Not in our eyes, but in their eyes. We expected this.”

Arizona is averaging 2,426 fans per game, significantly better than the school record of 1,877, set last season when the team had popular pitcher Taryne Mowatt.

Capacity is 2,956, and there are no immediate plans for expansion – although Candrea, only half-jokingly, said if he had to do build it all over again, he would have put a bathroom in the dugout.

“I think we have developed a good fan base, and they like the game, they like the kids. And they like winning,” Candrea said, trying to explain the spike in attendance this season.

“I think a lot of it, too, is the growth of softball. We see more and more kids here than we used to. I think the growth of softball in the city of Tucson and all over has definitely helped create more fan base.”

Sunday will bring one more tradition to Hillenbrand. Senior Day festivities will be held after the game, and UA officials tend to make it an emotional, downright sappy, tear-inducing affair. Banister, an infielder/outfielder, is one of six seniors, including third baseman Jenae Leles and first baseman Laine Roth. Walk-ons Jill Malina, Jen Martinez and Mandy Monge also will be honored.

“OK, this is the thing,” said Banister, preparing herself for some Sunday waterworks.

“Normally, I wear, you know, a good amount of makeup because I try to protect my face and I want to look pretty for the games. But I don’t think I will be able to wear that much makeup because if I was a mess the last three years, I don’t even want to know what I’m going to be like that day.”

Banister adds that she doesn’t really expect it to be Arizona’s final home game of the season. A Pac-10 title would nearly assure postseason home games at Hillenbrand.

Which, of course, is another fine tradition.

Can Linda make those?

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail:

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

SENIOR WEEKEND

The UA softball team holds its final regular-season homestand this weekend at Hillenbrand Stadium, where the Wildcats are averaging a school record 2,426 fans this year:

Friday: UCLA at UA, 7 p.m.

Saturday: Washington at UA, 7 p.m.

Sunday: Washington at UA, noon

PAC-10 STANDINGS

Pac-10 Overall

ARIZONA 8-2 36-9

Washington 7-4 34-7

UCLA 7-4 32-8

Arizona State 6-4 36-9

Stanford 7-5 37-6

California 5-7 29-15

Oregon State 3-9 22-22

Oregon 2-10 13-26

Pac-10 basketball has gone from great to good to, possibly, being in the dumps.

Looks like new Arizona coach Sean Miller picked a good time to join the league.

Miller has had a whirlwind first couple of weeks, signing two key players in what was otherwise looking like a lost recruiting class. He added big man Kyryl Natyazhko and wing Solomon Hill, both four-star prospects (out of five) as rated by Rivals.com.

Now, if only point guard Nic Wise comes back for his senior season after testing his NBA draft status.

Arizona, without early-entry draft prospects Jordan Hill and Chase Budinger, can’t be as good as it was last season, when the Wildcats summoned 21 victories and a run to the Sweet 16.

But the rest of the league won’t be as good either. With Wise on board – plus any other recruiting magic Miller can conjure – Arizona doesn’t appear to be worse than a midlevel Pac-10 team in 2009.

Combine that with a couple of key nonconference victories – the basic formula from last season – and there’s hope that the school’s NCAA Tournament streak could reach 26.

Interim coaches have kept that streak going at Arizona in the past two seasons.

Not that anyone is shedding any tears for him, but Kevin O’Neill got the worst of it two seasons ago, taking the Wildcats – amid the uncertainty of Lute Olson’s then-unexplained leave of absence – against arguably the best Pac-10 in history.

A talent drain weakened the conference last season, leaving the league with several good teams with low ceilings. No Pac-10 team really deserved to make the Sweet 16.

No Pac-10 team did, other than Arizona, helped by a favorable tournament path and the nurturing of interim coach Russ Pennell.

Now, the league will be without Arizona State guard James Harden, Hill, Budinger, and USC point guard Daniel Hackett, all of whom are leaving early.

Several key seniors are done – Washington big man Jon Brockman, UCLA point guard Darren Collison, UCLA wing Josh Shipp, ASU forward Jeff Pendergraph, Washington guard Justin Dentmon, Stanford guard Anthony Goods, Stanford forward Lawrence Hill and Washington State guard Taylor Rochestie.

USC freshman DeMar DeRozan put his name into the NBA draft, and is expected to stay there.

USC forward Taj Gibson and UCLA guard Jrue Holiday entered the draft, but they haven’t hired an agent, allowing them to return to school.

Let’s assume the worst and that everyone who is thinking about going pro – including Wise – does. That would leave the Pac-10 with only six of its top 20 scorers and four of its top 14 rebounders from last season.

The leading returning rebounder would be Stanford wing Landry Fields at 6.6 per game.

Your preseason favorite just might be Cal, which could have the two best returning players in the league – point guard Justin Randle and guard Patrick Christopher. The Bears’ top five scorers return, including Theo Robertson.

Defending league champ Washington, with one-time UA recruit Abdul Gaddy joining a backcourt with Isaiah Thomas, will be good. USC, depending on who comes back, could also have Top 25 dreams.

UCLA won’t fall off the map, even without Holiday.

Then . . . Arizona?

Miller, who at 40 years old is the youngest head coach in the league, is still fishing for talent for next season, although junior college center Jarrid Famous picked South Florida over the Wildcats and others Monday.

Still, there is a buzz around Miller and his young coaching staff, filled with top-flight recruiters. All that, coupled with the Arizona brand, gives Miller more recruiting clout than he has ever had.

Arizona still will be picking from the elite of the elite.

As the athletic department’s coaching search meandered after the season, some of the national pundits suggested the Wildcats faced a three-year rebuilding job. Or more.

But with Miller off to a fast start, and the Pac-10 likely fading, that demise was greatly exaggerated.

Next year’s Wildcats could struggle, especially offensively, especially without Wise, but it would be a recession lasting no more than one season.

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail:

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

ANTHONY GIMINO

PAC-10 DEFECTIONS

Pac-10 players who declared early for the NBA draft:

HAVE AGENTS (CAN’T RETURN)

James Harden G ASU

Jordan Hill F-C Arizona

Chase Budinger F Arizona

Daniel Hackett PG USC

NO AGENTS (CAN RETURN)

DeMar DeRozan G USC

Taj Gibson F USC

Jrue Holiday G UCLA

Nic Wise G Arizona

Cats have shot to extend NCAA streak to 26

ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

Hating your rival can be fun. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

It was never that way between Dick Tomey and Bruce Snyder, whose football teams treated this state to nearly a decade of some of the fiercest, most memorable games in the Arizona-Arizona State football series.

And when that rivalry boiled over to cheap shots and fights on the field – and heaven knows what else in the stands – Tomey and Snyder stood side by side and told everyone to cool it.

Tomey, the former Arizona head coach, remembered those circumstances Monday afternoon after hearing the news that Snyder, at 69, had died earlier in the day after a 10-month fight with cancer.

“Bruce was such a great competitor,” Tomey said. “Nothing could speak to that more than the way he competed since he was diagnosed. He was fighting tooth and nail.

“He was just an exceptional coach. When he was at Cal, when he was at Arizona State, he was just very difficult to beat. And, yet, I really won’t remember Bruce as a coach.

“I will remember Bruce as a good man and a good person. He gave a lot in his life. His life was well-lived. That is the way I remember Bruce Snyder. He was just made out of all the right stuff.”

Tomey was 5-4 against Snyder in the UA-ASU rivalry from 1992 to 2000.

The worst of the rivalry came during the 1996 game, a 56-14 rout by the Rose Bowl-bound Sun Devils in Arizona Stadium.

During the Wildcats’ late-game interception return for a touchdown, ASU offensive linemen Glen Gable, far from the play, broke defensive lineman Daniel Greer’s ankle with an illegal blind-sided clip.

That sparked more on-field fireworks, including UA fullback Kelvin Eafon sprinting off the bench to knock down Gable.

About a week after the game, Snyder and Tomey co-wrote a letter to fans.

It read, in part:

“The events in the past two weeks leave us with some grave concerns. We want you to take a moment and reflect upon what occurred in connection with the rivalry game.

“The two of us spoke this week and agreed that all members of our fine communities must place a high priority on sportsmanship and common courtesy as it pertains to one of the greatest rivalries in college football . . .

“As the head coaches of the teams involved, we pledged that we will create and promote a year-round atmosphere of respect, sportsmanship and conduct that the rivalry richly deserves.”

The result: a clean, hard-fought game in 1997.

“We just felt that the rivalry was deteriorating,” Tomey said.

“The feelings were really raw, and they were going to be even more raw. We were just trying to balance what it all meant.”

Tomey and Snyder didn’t have to hate each other. There was respect, and a friendship, that continued after both coaches were let go after the 2000 season.

Funny how both schools are on their second coach since then, each trying to recapture the heights of the 1990s – two national top five finishes for UA, a Rose Bowl and near national championship for ASU.

“The only time you get upset with another coach is because he’s hard to beat – hard to beat in recruiting, hard to be on the field,” Tomey said.

“His teams certainly were.”

Tomey is 71 now, entering his fifth season as the head coach at San Jose State. He said his health is good. He takes his coaching future on a year-to-year basis.

Former Arizona coach Larry Smith, who preceded Tomey, died in January 2008 because of cancer. He was 68.

“We lost Larry Smith and now we lost Bruce Snyder. We lost two of the best coaches in the history of college football, in my opinion,” Tomey said.

“I’ve been very, very blessed with my health. That’s not lost on me.”

While remembering Snyder, it’s not lost on the rest of us that, even in a furious rivalry, civility can rule the day.

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail: agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

SNYDER’S ASU YEARS

Bruce Snyder was 4-5 against Arizona while at ASU but 58-45 overall.

Year vs. UA Overall

1992 W, 7-6 6-5

1993 L, 34-20 6-5

1994 L, 28-27 3-8

1995 L, 31-28 6-5

1996 W, 56-14 11-1

1997 L, 28-16 9-3

1998 L, 50-42 5-6

1999 W, 42-27 6-6

2000 W, 30-17 6-6

• More on Snyder, 2C

SNYDER’S ASU YEARS

• His 58 wins rank second on the school’s all-time list

• He is the second-longest tenured head coach in school history

• Led the Sun Devils to four appearances in bowl games

• More than 40 of Snyder’s players were drafted into the NFL, including seven first-round draft choices (Shante Carver, Craig Newsome, Erik Flowers, Adam Archuleta, Todd Heap, Levi Jones and Terrell Suggs)

• Produced more than 100 All-Pac-10 honorees, including one Offensive Player of the Year (Jake Plummer, 1996), two Defensive Players of the Year (Pat Tillman, 1997, and Adam Archuleta, 2000) and one freshman of the year (Terrell Suggs, 2000).

ANTHONY GIMINO

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com

The Arizona basketball program scheduled only one way under coach Lute Olson – fearlessly – and that’s a lesson not lost on new coach Sean Miller.

Consider that Xavier played last season at LSU, at Cincinnati and against Duke on a neutral court. The Musketeers played against Missouri, Virginia Tech and Memphis in the Puerto Rico Tip-Off.

They played at home against Auburn.

Does this sound like a guy who is afraid of a basketball fight?

The early indication is that he is not, and just add that to the list of positives about Miller’s hiring.

It was suggested in a CBS Sports.com report that Miller’s deal with Arizona had included concessions about “buy” games – we’ll explain in a minute, if that’s an unfamiliar term to you – but he said that’s not true.

“That never came up,” Miller said Tuesday at his introductory press conference.

“You can’t recruit the best recruits in the country and talk about doing great things unless you’re willing to play the best programs in the country. And then once you do that, you have to win some.”

That is what Arizona has done over the years – setting up tough opponents and knocking some of them down. That was the team’s saving grace in each of the past two seasons as the Wildcats squeaked by and extended their NCAA Tournament streak to 25.

UA never would have danced in 2008 or 2009 if it had the easy nonconference schedule of Arizona State.

Of course, the coach has to be smart about what he’s doing, and there’s no need to go scheduling overboard in Miller’s first season. The roster will be thin and won’t include NBA-bound juniors Jordan Hill and Chase Budinger.

You couldn’t blame Miller if he wanted to ease up on the accelerator in his first season, but there’s not a lot he can do about it anyway.

Arizona has a potential of four open dates, although the school has handshake agreements to fill two of those with the beginning of a pair of home-and-home series against unannounced teams.

Athletic department official Ryan Hansen, who helps coordinate the basketball schedule, said those deals likely will stay in place.

UA has two other open dates, both of which will be filled by those “buy” games, otherwise known as “guarantee” games.

That’s when a big school, such as Arizona, will pay a certain amount of money to a smaller school, such as Northern Arizona, to come to Tucson to play one game. NAU likely will fill one of the two open spots next season.

The rest of the nonconference schedule is like this:

• at Maui Invitational (Nov. 23-25) – The early season tournament isn’t quite as loaded as in some years. The other teams in the field are Colorado, Maryland, Cincinnati, Gonzaga, Wisconsin, Vanderbilt and Chaminade. Matchups are not yet determined.

UA will play two home games against unannounced opponents before traveling to Maui.

• vs. UNLV (Dec. 2) – The end of a four-game series. The Rebels have been witness to all of Arizona’s drama, going against UA’s fourth coach in four years.

• at TBA in the Big 12/Pac-10 Hardwood Series (Dec. 6). Hansen knows UA’s opponent, but the conferences haven’t revealed the schedule, so he can’t say who it is.

“It’s a team that played in the NCAA Tournament, though, I’ll tell you that much,” he said.

• vs. Louisiana Tech (Dec. 9) – A “guarantee” game against a decent WAC team. It also will be a homecoming for Bulldogs forward David Jackson, a Rincon High School graduate.

• at San Diego State (Dec. 12) – The end of a two-game set with the Aztecs.

• vs. N.C. State (TBA) – The beginning of a two-game series against the Wolf Pack. Miller used to be an assistant coach at N.C. State under Herb Sendek. Arizona will play in Raleigh in the 2010-11 season.

Arizona fans – especially those who pay big money for the home games – have come to expect good value for their entertainment dollar. They deserve the same under Miller.

“It doesn’t sound too different,” Hansen said of Miller’s philosophy.

“We met and I said what my job duties are, and his first words were, ‘I think we’re going to have a good time talking.’ ”

Further out, Arizona has a contract to play a neutral-court game against Kansas in the 2010-11 season as part of the Las Vegas Invitational.

Miller scheduled aggressively at Xavier in order to help offset a weaker conference. He should do the same at Arizona because it’s simply the right thing to do.

“Balance is the key,” Miller said. “The balance of schedule that Arizona has done in the past will continue.”

Anthony Gimino’s e-mail:

agimino@tucsoncitizen.com