Wednesday, September 1,2004
Page Design: Jordan Meserole
Sports
The Battalion
Page IB
SIDE NOTES
ON 3B
A continuation of quick pre
views of Texas A&M’s football
opponents. Today features
Clemson and Kansas State.
ON 4B
Kyle Davoust opens the Big
12 notebook and takes a look
at the upcoming Colorado, Ne
braska and Texas games.
COMING THURSDAY
A complete preview of
A&M’s first football game
against the University of Utah.
Game time is scheduled for
6:45 p.m. on ESPN.
A in-depth look at the begin
ning of the volleyball team’s
regular season, which starts
Thursday with the McDonald's
Invitational Tournament.
BRIEFLY
A&M senior forward Cris
tina Echavarry was named the
Big 12 Offensive Soccer Player
of the Week after scoring all
three of A&M’s goals in its first
two games.
Texas Tech head basketball
coach Bob Knight could have a
sitcom on CBS soon. Network
executives are in the initial stages
of writing the comedy that would
have a character modeled after
the hot-tempered coach.
The New York Yankees
were shutout by the Cleveland
Indians 22-0 Tuesday night.
The Yankees were behind by as
much as 15-0 by the fifth inning.
After 16 seasons on the
sidelines, Bevo XIII is being put
out to pasture. A new 2-year-old
steer will be introduced at the
Longhorn's first home game on
Sept. 4,
A limited amount of
tickets for the A&M-Texas
football game being held in
Austin are on sale now at
the Zone in Kyle Field.
Houston shuts down Reds in 8-0 win
Tom Uihman • THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Astros’ starting pitcher Brandon Backe delivers a pitch in the first
inning against the Cincinnati Reds. Backe got the shutout win.
CINCINNATI (AP) — One inning, four pitch
es, three home runs, that was more than enough for
the streaking Houston Astros.
Jeff Kent homered twice and Houston hit three
straight shots in the fifth inning Tuesday night to
help the Astros beat the Cincinnati Reds 8-0 for
their fifth straight win and eighth in nine games.
Carlos Beltran, Jeff Bagwell and Lance Berk-
man hit consecutive home runs for the Astros, who
pulled within three games of the NL wild-card lead
after the Chicago Cubs’ 8-0 loss at Montreal.
Brandon Backe (2-2) scattered three hits over
six shutout innings to win for the first time in
three career starts. He threw seven shutout in
nings in a no-decision against Chicago in his first
career start on Aug. 21.
The Reds got just one runner past second base
against Backe. Barry Larkin went to third on Sean
Casey’s two-out double in the sixth, but Backe
struck out Adam Dunn looking to end the threat.
“I had already gotten him out twice,” Backe
said. “On 3-2, I threw him a backdoor slider.
First base was open, so 1 wasn’t going to leave
it in the middle of the plate. He was either going
to take it for a ball, take it for a strike or swing
through it.”
“Backe was in some jams, but he made pitches
when he had to,” manager Phil Gamer said.
Relievers Chad Qualls, Mike Gallo and Dan
Wheeler allowed a combined three hits over the
final three innings for Houston's 11th shutout of
the season.
Kent led off the second with his 18th homer of
the season to give Houston a 1-0 lead, then hit a
two-run shot in the ninth.
Aaron Harang (8-7) allowed four home runs
in five innings and lost for the fourth time in
five starts.
With one out in the fifth, Beltran and Bag-
well each hit their 21st, on consecutive pitches,
and Berkman followed with his 24th, his third
in two nights.
“You can’t be perfect all the time,” said Harang,
who threw a three-hit shutout in his last start, a 1-
0 win against St. Louis last Thursday. “They’re a
good team, and they're hot right now. I didn’t ex
ecute my pitches the way I wanted to, but 1 went
back and looked, and they weren’t that bad. Their
lineup’s tough. Any of them can hurt you.”
“We didn’t muster any offense,” Reds manager
Dave Miley said. “You look at Aaron, he gave up
the home runs, but they were all solo shots. Tech
nically, we’re still in the ballgame, but we couldn’t
get anything going.”
Bagwell added an RBI single in the ninth, and
Berkman had an RBI groundout before Kent’s sec
ond homer, which gave Houston a combined eight
in the first two games of the series.
“Good weather,” Kent said about the power
surge. “It’s better hitting on the road. Our home
park is not a power park. A lot of our hitters like
to drive the ball to left-center and center, and those
just get chased down for outs in our park. This is a
hitter's park. I like this place. It allows you to be a
complete hitter, not just a pull hitter.”
The Reds, who have been shut out eight times,
fell a season-worst seven games under .500 for the
second time this season.
U.S.-Canada fireworks in World Cup opener
MONTREAL (AP) — The hockey ri
valry between the United States and Can
ada is very much alive.
Martin St. Louis had a goal and an assist
to lead Canada to a 2-1 victory Tuesday
night over the United States in the World
Cup of Hockey opener for both teams.
“I think the crowd pumped everybody
up,” said Canada coach Pat Quinn of
the roaring, chanting, capacity crowd of
21,273, which included Canadian Prime
Minister Paul Martin.
The game was so physical and conten
tious that Canada’s 38-year-old captain
Mario Lemicux went after American
Steve Konowalchuk, who took a run at
goaltcnder Martin Brodeur.
American counterpart Robert Esche
held his team in it with stellar saves dur
ing a first period in which the United
States was outshot 19-6.
St. Louis, the NHL scoring champion
and MVP last season, scored the only
goal of the opening period during a power
play and earned an assist on Joe Sakic’s
goal early in the second.
But the momentum turned toward the
Americans when Bill Guerin scored mid
way through that period.
“It was like it was two games — we
controlled the play in the first half and
they took over in the second,” Sakic said.
“When we went up 2-0, we changed our
game a bit. We tried to make too cute
plays. Then they got a goal and got a lot
of life from that. We came back in the
third, but we have to do a better job of
that, to keep pressing when we have the
momentum.”
It took little time for the teams to show
signs of the heated rivalry that has peaked
since Canada beat the United States in the
gold-medal game of the 2002 Salt Lake
City Olympics. The Americans won the
inaugural World Cup by beating Canada
in Montreal.
“It’s an emotional tournament,” Guerin
said. “It's Canada-U.S., it’s for lots of
pride. It always tends to be physical.”
Both teams also lost players to injuries,
as defenseman Ed Jovanovski was knocked
out of Canada’s lineup, and the United
States was without forward Mike Modano
for most of the game. As is typical with
NHL playoff games, neither team would
give specifics about the ailments. Both were
said to have lower body injuries and were to
be re-evaluated on Wednesday.
Canada will play its second game of
the round robin portion of the eight-team
tournament
Wednesday
against Slova
kia in Montre
al. The United
States will
play Russia on
Thursday in
St. Paul.
“You have
to give Canada
credit, they
came out hun
grier than we
were and were
a lot more in
tense,” U.S.
coach Ron
Wilson said.
“They got
physically in
volved. They
pushed us
and we didn’t
push back.
Fortunately, Robert Esche was on top of
things. In the second period, we started to
turn things around.”
Canada was leading 2-1 at 16:03 of the sec
ond period frame when Konowalchuk came
Jacques Boissinot • THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
U.S.A.’s Jeff Halpern, right, and Canada's Scott Niedermayer
square off during second period World Cup of Hockey Tuesday.
in hard and bumped Brodeur in the crease.
“They tried to run Brodeur four or five
times,” Quinn said. “Mario had to try to
do something to restore common sense
out there.”
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