SELINSGROVE, Pa. - This has been an unusual spring sports season at Susquehanna University to say the least, with half of the eight teams being displaced from their campus facilities. That may create some unusual story ideas, along with the more traditional variety on star athletes.
CREATIVE COACHING. It's now common for Susquehanna students to see pole-vaulters running up the middle of campus, or the baseball team shagging fly balls in a nearby field. Men's tennis players make the daily trek to the Selinsgrove Area High School for practice and matches. Such is the price for progress. Susquehanna has begun construction on a $14 million expansion and renovation of its sports and fitness facilities - eventually creating a new football and track stadium, field house, baseball field and tennis courts. But the construction has displaced four of the spring sports teams while their new facilities are being built. The baseball team was supposed to be using the new Harold Bollinger Field this season, but weather and construction delays kept the grass from growing in full enough for play this spring. Without their own field, second-year baseball coach Tim Briggs and his team have been forced to practice wherever and whenever it can, playing its home games at Selinsgrove High. Apparently Briggs and his wandering band of gypsies haven't been too affected - getting off to a 3-1 start to tie for second in the MAC Commonwealth Conference. The track and field teams knew they would be without a campus facility this season, forcing head men's coach Jim Taylor and women's coach Craig Penney to get pretty creative about where and how they practice. With his team spread out both on and off campus depending on their event, Taylor has referred to practice as "a three-ring circus at times." The new Nicholas A Lopardo Stadium/Amos Alonzo Stagg Field and track will be completed by fall 2000. The men's tennis team lost three of its six campus courts to the construction - meaning practices and matches are now split between the campus and Selinsgrove High. Twentieth-year head coach Gary Fincke now builds his lineup based on who plays best at the different venues. The strategy has produced a 1-1 home record thus far. The three new tennis courts will be ready in the fall.
CONTACT: Don Harnum, athletic director, (570) 372-4272 (phone) or harnumd@susqu.edu (e-mail)
THE NATURALS. Nobody will dispute the athletic ability of women's lacrosse senior center and co-captain Janelle Reed (Shamokin/Line Mountain H.S.) or freshman three-sport standout Katie McKeever (Norristown/Methacton H.S.), particularly since both are doing well in sports they didn't play in high school. Reed has been a Middle Atlantic Conference All-Star in her first two seasons of lacrosse, and is a leader on a team which is off to a 3-1 start this season. That's pretty good for an athlete who was a prep standout in field hockey and basketball. She starred in both sports, along with men's lacrosse, while studying in Australia last fall. McKeever was the second-leading scorer on the nationally-ranked Crusader field hockey team last fall, then was second in the conference in two events and fourth in another - setting school records in each - as a swimmer during the winter. Now she's running track for the first time and nearly won her heat of the 800-meter run at her first meet last Saturday - placing third (2:35.07) during the Susquehanna Invitational at Bucknell. Based on her "track record," it won't be long before McKeever is running past the competition in this sport too.
CONTACT: Mike Ferlazzo, SID, (570) 372-4119 or ferlazzo@susqu.edu
(Please contact me and I'll set up interviews with the players and/or coaches.)
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