Page 3B The Behrend Beacon This week ’s senior athletic profile | Brent Carlson: If it's singles or I doubles , you can count on MIS major \ by Kate Levdansky Petrikis J assistant sports editor I Brent Carlson started playing ten- I nis his freshman year at Warren Area | High School. During his four years | playing for the Warren Dragons, his | team was undefeated. | “We learned to play tennis to have ■ fun, and not for competition, and the . result was that we were unbeatable,” said Carlson. [ The team took trips to Hilton I Head, S.C. to polish its skills, and I played USTA tournaments in sev- I eral Pennsylvania-bordering states. | Carlson and his doubles partner, | Eric Morrison, received a No. 1 1 USTA ranking fbr the Allegheny | Mountain District. ■ At Behrend, Carlson holds the co captain position along with Dave Cooper. Carlson plays the No. 3 J singles position. ' “Each position on the team is of I equal importance,” said Carlson. I “However, the No. 3 spot requires | shot consistency and good ball con | trol. You need to not make unforced | errors and intimidate your opponent | into making errors. Tennis at this | level requires a good mental game. I Good footwork and playing smart , are the most important aspects when it comes to tennis. Good footwork ' allows you to be in the right place • on the court.” I He also plays the No. 1 doubles I position with his partner Cooper. | Carlson said doubles is extremely | different from singles because you I need to have good communication skills to talk to your partner and I position yourself on the court in re lation to them. “Usually the first team to the net j controls the point,” said Carlson. If ' given the choice, though, Carlson I would rather play doubles than I singles. | “It is tough to say whether I like | singles or doubles better because I they both have their pros and cons,” | said Carlson. “I would probably I choose doubles over singles. Doubles allows you to play fast ! pace points and involves a lot of vol leying. Volleying is one of my fa • vorite ways to win a point. You and • your partner can take over the net I and play better angles.” I Carlson does not think he plays | doubles any more competitively | than he does singles, however. | “You do not want to let down | your partner, so it is important to ■ stay focused on each individual . point,” said Carlson. Carlson said he likes to listen to ’ loud music on the way to the courts I before a match. When he arrives, he I likes to stretch for about five min- I utes before warming up several dif- I —an Men’s tennis gets taste of outdoor play Steve Broussard returns serve against Edinboro on Wednesc The Lions host the Behrend Invitational on Saturday at 1 p.m Brent Carlson mountain bikes, rollerblades, and plays basketball, among other activities, but for the team’s co-captain, tennis is a great way to relax from classes. ferent shots such as the forehand, backhand, mid-court volleys, volleys, and overheads. He also tries to bounce around a lot to keep on his toes, be cause, for him, footing and quickness play a crucial part in the match. Carlson’s highlight at Behrend was a singles match he played at Altoona in his junior year. He was playing the No. 2 singles, and his opponent had beaten him when they previously played. “At the time, my opponent thought that the match would be just as easy," said Carlson. “1 won the first set by a score of 7-5. Then, we went to 6-6 in the second. During the tiebreaker, my opponent was winning 6-3. I fought back to win the tiebreaker 13-11, and closed out the second set. Close matches and come-from-behind wins are always enjoyable.” Carlson said managing time be tween class, tennis, and personal is sues takes a great deal of organiza tion. He uses an organizer to plan duties and activities for the week. Carlson said his two strongest char acteristics are that he is organized and intelligent. Practice times for tennis vary throughout the season. Everyone on the team has classes at different times, so it is hard to schedule con sistent practices, when everyone can attend. But most of the time, the team practices in the evenings from 8-10 p.m. Carlson also belongs to the MIS Club, Communication Club, Sigma Beta Delta, an international honor SPORTS PHOTO BY MIKE BELLO / society for business, management, and administration. In his spare time, when he is not on the courts or in school, Carlson likes to stay in shape by rollerblading, mountain biking, or playing basketball. During the sum mers he enjoys camping, listening to music, and hanging out with friends. Carlson is majoring in Manage ment Information Systems, because he believes the market is shifting in favor of those with technology de grees. “I feel that a knowledge of com puters, business, and management will prove valuable in the increas ingly competitive and technology driven job market,” said Carlson. After graduation, he hopes to secure a full-time job in his field of study. The team’s record so far is 1-1 in the conference with two important conference games coming up on Sunday, against Lake Erie and Frostburg. “I think the team will finish with a winning record,” said Carlson. “We have a good chance of domi nating our conference if we prac tice hard and take the matches one at a time.” Carlson thinks the most important thing about tennis is having fun. “Although with our busy school schedules, it is an excellent way to get exercise and relieve some stress,” said Carlson. by Mike Bello sports edtitor The men’s tennis team has faced some tough competition throughout the season. On Wednesday, it didn’t get any easier. The Lions lost every individual match to Division II Edinboro in a 9-0 loss. The loss dropped the team’s record to 2-7. Edinboro (8-2) certainly was a team Behrend had little chance of beating. But playing against this difficult opponent, something the Lions have become accustomed to this season, gave the Lions a chance to improve their game for the upcoming Behrend Invitational on Saturday. Before the Invite, which includes Alfred, Frostburg, and Thiel, the Lions will play Alfred today at 3:30 p.m. That game, along with the Edinboro match - the first one the Lions have played outside this season up north - gave the Lions some much-needed outdoor experience. Behrend’s two other post break games were played at the Pennbriar. Friday, April 5, 2002 IREND BEACON You win some, you lose some, you riot either way. Such has been the trend in recent years on college campuses after big-time athletic events like the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament. And no one has demon strated it better than fans at the University of Maryland, College Park, where thousands faced off With hundreds of police Monday after the Ten'apins'Wdn the national championship. Post-game bedlam like that has been erupting on cam puses around the country, leaving police and college officials scrambling to implement new security mea sures to break the cycle, which they say has been grow ing more violent, and more commonplace. “This is a trend, but not just at College Park. It’s a national phenomenon,” said Maj. Cathy Atwell, of the College Park campus police. The raucous scenes Monday in College Park - bon fires, looting, drunken brawls, flying beer bottles and walls of troopers in riot gear - were Still milder than damage Terp fans caused last year after losing to Duke in the NCAA Final Four. In Arizona, Tucson Police Sgt. Marco Borboa said he had flashbacks when he saw pictures of the College Park mob scene in Tuesday's newspapers. The chaos Borboa remembers followed the Univer sity of Arizona’s NCAA championship loss to Duke last spring. That night, rowdy Wildcats fans smashed out storefronts, attacked police, set fire to trash cans and even burned a mobile home. The episode, which resulted in at least 17 arrests, re played many of the same problems the city suffered when Arizona beat Kentucky to win the championship in 1997. “They (Edinboro and Alfred) give the team a chance to fine-tune any skills that are out of place at the moment,” said junior Doug Smith. “The games against Alfred and Edinboro should be used to improve consistent serving and lessen the number of unforced errors.” The Lions will count on their top singles players against the three Invite teams, as well as Lake Erie, an AMCC team the Lions play against, along with Frostburg, on Sunday. Saturday and Sunday’s matches begin at 9 a.m. Mike Oey and Brent Carlson lead the way for Behrend, as both players have three match wins under their belt. David Cooper and Oey both have two wins as doubles partners, and will prove valuable if the Lions are to overcome their opponents this weekend. Should the weather hold, the six matches this weekend - Alfred today, Frostburg, Thiel, and Alfred on Saturday in the round robin tournament, as well as the matches against both Frostburg and Lake Erie - will take place at the Behrend Tennis Campus officials see more student rioting after big athletic events by Catherine Dolinski Capital News Service “It’s been increasing over the last two years or so.” “Those photos could've been taken here,” he said. n preparing for “This year we had no incidents, but it looks like other campuses are being faced with it now,” Borboa said. “The problem is that it becomes a tradition. Once you have one or two incidents, it becomes the tradition that this is the place to gather, and that becomes well-known. It’s tough to break the cycle.” Atwell pointed to similar problems in recent years at universities like Michigan State and Ohio State. “Even Indiana had some unrest last night,” she said Tuesday. ' Bloomington, Ind., police reported that after the Hoo siers lost to the Terps Monday, a crowd of thousands of Indiana fans grew unruly, throwing bottles, ripping ply wood off buildings and lighting fires. About 1:30 a.m., the roughly 130 riot gear-clad city and state troopers in downtown Bloomington resorted to using tear gas and pepper spray to disperse the mob. U. Jerry'Minger, of the Indiana University campus po lice, said most of the rabble-rousing occurred downtown, and that things had stayed comparatively peaceful on cam pus. Yet even campus cops wound up making about 20 arrests that night, adding to the 10 or 15 reported by city police. “Part of this is a copycat phenomenon,” said Sheldon Steinbach, general counsel for the American Council on Education. Steinbach, who has observed student riot behavior for several decades, said campus sports rioting traces back to high-profile episodes of violence following professional sports games like the World Series, Stanley Cup and the Super Bowl, “It sets up a pattern for other revelers to mimic,” he said. “Reactions in various towns for professional sports events have set the pattern... It’s behavior fueled by ex cessive alcohol consumption, and with that comes some what of a herd mentality.” Courts. If not, the matches will move to the Pennbriar in the evening. For now, though, the Lions are content to play at home, since their last five matches this season, as well as the AMCC tournament, are on the road. Behrend’s last home game is Wednesday against Fredonia. “I think all the games at home [are] a win-lose situation,” said Smith. “You cannot get comfortable at home since the games after that are all on the road. Yet it gives the team a chance to [achieve] a comfort level.” The Lions are just counting on developing some consistent play to overcome the time off after spring break. “We just want to find a consistent playing level,” said Smith. “We need to have the doubles teams mesh more so that we have the advantage coming out of doubles and into the singles matches. “The tournament begins the home stretch of the season that will tell us where we rank among other teams in the AMCC.” behrcolls @ aol.com nvitati PHOTO BY HEATHER MYERS / BEHREND BEACON Jacob Hillmann awaits the serve from his Edinboro opponent Wednesday at the Behrend Tennis Courts. onal
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