by Hunter Patterson | Aug 25, 2011 | News Slider, Sports
Hard nosed, honest, tough and a leader. All the words have been used to describe Coach Pat Summitt for over 30 years. Now, just days after she announced that she had been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, those words have never rang truer. Coach Summitt has been the head coach of the Lady Vols at the University of Tennessee since she was 22. Yes, some of her players were older than her. She drove the van to away games. She and her players slept in locker rooms because money was tight. Some ladies even made the team based on the fact that they owned a vehicle. For Coach Summitt, those were the tough times. Now, Lady Vol fans and admirers of the Basketball Hall of Fame coach are calling this a hard time. Summitt refuses to, though. “There will be no pity party,” Summitt told the Washington Post in an interview on Sunday. “I’ll be sure of that.” Summitt says she had felt that something was off for a while, saying she “just felt something different.” Once her Lady Vols were eliminated from the Regional final of the NCAA tournament she visited the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. seeking any sort of explanation to why she had these lapses of memory. Those lapses were everything from forgetting what time she needed to be at the gym, losing her car keys more than once per day and forgetting what type of scheme or play to run at a certain time during a game. “I think last year there was some adjustment in games,” Lipscomb’s women’s basketball coach Frank Bennett said....
by Hunter Patterson | Aug 5, 2011 | News Slider, Sports
With only four returning scholarship letterwinners on his roster for this season, Coach Scott Sanderson has utilized every opportunity in the 2011-12 men’s basketball schedule to get his young team ready for the postseason. In a normal season, the Bisons would play 29 games plus an exhibition. This season however, Lipscomb uses two separate NCAA exemptions to boost this number to 30 games behind an exhibition and a five-game foreign tour for a total of 36 contests. After opening the season with home games against Fort Valley State University (Nov. 11) and Gardner-Webb (Nov. 13), Lipscomb will participate in the Cancun Shootout, a four-game exempt tournament that only counts as three games towards schedule limits. The Cancun Shootout actually starts in the United States and not Mexico with the Bisons traveling to Illinois (Nov. 17) and Illinois State (Nov. 19). Lipscomb will then fly from Chicago to Cancun to play two games in the “Mayan Division” against SIU Edwardsville (Nov. 22) and either Hampton or Sacred Heart the following day. Lipscomb opens a four-game home stand with Austin Peay on Monday, Nov. 28. Lipscomb defeated Austin Peay twice last season restarting an old rivalry between two teams an hour apart that hadn’t played each other for nearly half a century. The Bisons open conference action against Mercer (Dec. 1) and Kennesaw State (Dec. 3) before hosting UT Martin (Dec. 6) in a final home game before spending the next six weeks on the road. Lipscomb plays their third and fourth Ohio Valley Conference opponent in a three-week period when traveling to Tennessee Tech (Dec. 10) and Murray State (Dec....
by despotmj | Aug 2, 2011 | News Slider, Opinion, Sports
Are you ready for some football? If not, get ready, because the NFL has rocketed back from the lull that was the NFL lockout. Just like the 80s movie, Spinal Tap, the NFL has turned it up to 11 and will not be looking in the rear-view mirror anytime soon. In fact, last week set a record for the most NFL transactions (players cut/signed/traded) ever recorded in one week, and the Tennessee Titans certainly accounted for many, posting 51. For the last several years, the Tennessee Titans’ front office has been beleaguered by claims that they act too slow and are inefficient when it comes to off-season activity. Fortunately, General Manager Mike Reinfeldt and his staff rose to the occasion and brought in several additions to offense and defense, all while doing a little housekeeping in the process. The week began with the Titans signing Quarterback Matt Hasselbeck to a three-year, $21 million offer. This will provide the Titans with a veteran quarterback ready to play immediately, leaving rookie Jake Locker a chance to refine his game for the foreseeable future. Following the signing of Hasselbeck, the Titans cut two players who have been staples of the franchise for the last several years. Vince Young, the troubled but talented third-overall choice from the 2006 NFL Draft, was cut after alienating himself from the team and front office. Defensive Tackle Tony Brown, who signed a three-year contract last offseason, was cut after being placed on injured reserve last season. Following the cuts were a slew of signings that included inking the entire Titans’ draft class to four-year contracts, as well as the...
by despotmj | Jul 25, 2011 | Opinion, Sports
Time to buckle your chinstraps NFL fans, after 132 days the NFL lockout is officially over. The NFL Players Executive Committee voted this morning unanimously to accept the proposal previously voted on last Thursday by NFL owners, beginning what will be the greatest flood of player transactions and club business in sport’s history. Imagine this, it is the night before you have five finals the next morning, and you have not been able to study the entire semester. For NFL teams, it’s cram time. Over the next two weeks, NFL general managers must do five months of NFL business including: signing rookies, signing undrafted free agents, signing restricted free agents, trading players and cutting players. As part of the new 10-year deal, free-agency begins tomorrow (Tuesday), teams will begin reporting to training camp Wednesday, and the regular season will begin as scheduled Aug. 11. For the Tennessee Titans, this means making some very quick decisions, that could easily determine whether this team is playoff bound or on track for another sub .500 season. Over the next several days, the Titans must make some difficult decisions on several key players. Here they are: Vince Young– The Titans have until 4:00 p.m. ET July 29 to decide whether to cut or trade the troubled Titans’ quarterback. If not, the Titans will owe him a $4.5 million bonus they have already said they will not pay. Stephen Tulloch/Jason Babin– Both players are unrestricted free agents, and the Titans will have roughly 24 hours from today to decide whether the Titans should retain these players or allow them to hit the open-market where...
by despotmj | Jul 13, 2011 | Sports
Amid the sweltering summer heat, Lipscomb’s campus is buzzing with freshman in attendance for advance, construction workers renovating Fanning and students trying to squeeze in a few hours towards graduation. With so much happening on campus, one cannot forget that Lipscomb University’s Dugan Field has a new tenant this summer, although they’re not wearing purple and gold. The tenant is the Nashville Outlaws, a baseball team which is playing all of their home games this summer on Lipscomb’s campus. The Outlaws are a member of the western division of the Prospect League, a 14 team, two-division league, which offers college players the opportunity to play summer baseball while transitioning from aluminum to wooden bats. The Outlaws previously played their home games at Vanderbilt, but moved to Lipscomb University this summer. When asked why the team decided to begin playing their three month season at Lipscomb, general manager Luke Collier said Lipscomb offered the team a much better location than what they had at Vanderbilt. “The team likes Lipscomb. People are friendly and help out,” said Collier. “Game turnouts have been around 100 people.” The turnout is much-appreciated by the Outlaws players and front office, as the team plays a rigorous 56-game summer season. The Nashville fans are certainly having an impact on the team, and as of July 11, the Outlaws are in second place in the western division, three and a half games behind the Quincy Gems. Many well-known Major League Baseball players have spent time in the Prospect League including Mike Schmidt, Kirby Puckett, Ryan Howard, Jonathan Papelbon and Joe Girardi. Two familiar faces from Nashville are...
by despotmj | Jun 29, 2011 | News Slider, Sports
As June is coming to a close, many football fans are growing increasingly anxious to know when a new Collective Bargaining Agreement will be agreed on by the NFL Players Association and NFL owners. On March 11, at 11:59 p.m., the previous CBA expired, leaving fans to wonder if a new deal would be agreed on over the summer, or if a lengthy lockout would ensue. With the lockout nearly three months in place, there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel, but one must also ask if that could be an oncoming train. The most pointed issues which must be resolved in order for a new CBA to be reached include how to divide the nearly $10 billion in revenues the NFL generates every year, while determining how to split the revenue in future seasons, as revenue is expected to reach $20 billion per season before 2020. Other issues include putting a rookie wage-scale in place to combat rookie deals which have reached $50 million in guaranteed money, better benefits for retired players and increasing the NFL season from 16 to 18 games. The NFL and NFLPA have met multiple times over the last few months, but have been highly criticized for making little progress. In recent weeks, hope has emerged that progress is being made at more than an anemic pace and many believe a deal could be reached by the end of July. That is a crucial date for NFL teams due to the fact that if a deal is reached by then little or no training camp would be missed, allowing for...
