Weekend Observations

Some notes from the first weekend of Pacific action...

• Don't take the women's soccer team's 0-2-0 record as a sign of another dismal season. This team appears to be much improved over the squads of the recent past. Against Cal State East Bay, the Boxers showed some great job passing the ball through the midfield and made some strong defensive stops. Their pace, in particular, was noticably faster, and they were markedly more aggressively.

Joy Boswell's squad didn't exactly get an easy start. UC Santa Cruz opened the season ranked No. 25 in the National Soccer Coaches Association of America poll. Cal State East Bay, meanwhile, is no pushover. they finished 11-7-1 in 2007 and returned eight starters from last season. Very experienced.

• The Pacific volleyball team still has some kinks to work out. They got a good first win in the Boxer Kickoff Invitational against Neumann (Pa.), who competed in the 2007 NCAA Division III playoffs, but struggled in their final three matches, falling to Cal State East Bay, UC Santa Cruz and Christopher Newport. It is obvious that the Boxers are still adjusting to head coach Lena Chan's new system...and an adjustment to a new coach and a new style of play always takes time.

In the meantime, the Boxers have to concentrate of tighter passing and keeping down the unforced errors. In four matches, Pacific committed 95 attack errors and 11 ball-handling errors.

• A common opponent for the Boxers over the last few years, this may be some of the last times we see Cal State East Bay in competition for a while. A long-time dual affiliate between NCAA Division III and the NAIA, the Pioneers are in the first year of a three-year transition period to NCAA Division II. They are slated to become full members and join the California Collegiate Athletic Association in 2011. Their teams will transition to playing primarily a Division II schedule beginning in 2009.

• Prayers and thoughts for those in Louisiana as Hurricane Gustav bears down. The storm, currently at a Category 3, is expected to make landfall Monday morning.

I wrote some stories on some sports information directors who survived Katrina back three years ago and their strggles with moving along with their athletic programs across the south, seeing jobs eliminated, seasons cancelled and homes destroyed. One SID, Jack Duggan at New Orleans, had to ride out the storm as his wife gave birth to twins as the storm ripped through the Bayou.

Hearing those kind of stories makes me very thankful and blessed to live here in the Northwest. I can handle the winter rain and snow just fine.

Meta: Live Stats Difficulties

We are having difficulties with syncing up our statistics computer and the computer that links the live stats to the Web. We apologize for the inconvenience...such is the lot with dealing with new computers and being a Mac guy trying to figure out PC networking.

We hope to have the Live Stats up and running for the 8 p.m. Pacific volleyball match.

UPDATE (7:00 p.m.): Duties with administrating the tournament has not allowed me to look completely into the problem, but I think it lies within our primary stats. We will likely not have the 8 p.m. match on Live Stats tonight. Again, my apologies and we will work further on the problem tonight following the tournament. - Blake Timm, Pacific Sports Information Director

UPDATE (11:23 p.m.): The networking problem has been fixed. It related to a configuration of the computer that dated back to track season. The Live Stats should be live for Sunday's 1:00 p.m. match against UC Santa Cruz. We tested the connection with the file from tonight's Pacific/Cal State East Bay match. It can be viewed here. - Blake Timm, Pacific Sports Information Director

Signed Up For E-Scores Yet?

You can become the first person on your block, or even town, to have scores of all of our Pacific Athletic events. Our e-scores service sends scores of Pacific athletic events to your cell phone or e-mail immediately following the conclusion of most events. You have the scores before they are posted to our Web site.

You can sign-up for e-scores by Clicking Here. The service is provided free of charge thanks to our friends at RocketPromo, but standard text message rates do apply.

Let The Games Begin!

There won't be any parade of nations, torch relay or lighting of the cauldron, but it is time to declare the Games of the 2008-09 Pacific Athletic Season open.

And if you are a fan of women's soccer or volleyball, this is your weekend to be in Forest Grove.

The women's soccer season begins today with not one, but two matches. Pacific Lutheran and Cal State East Bay open things in a neutral site match that begins at 4 p.m. The Lutes are looking to move up in the Northwest Conference standings after finishing with just five wins in 2007. They have been picked to finish in a tie for sixth with Pacific in the conference in the preseason coaches poll. Cal State East Bay, meanwhile, recently announced that they have applied for member in NCAA Division II after years as a dual member of NCAA Division III and the NAIA.

The hometown Boxers, meanwhile, open their season against Division III independent UC Santa Cruz under the lights at 7 p.m. Head Coach Joy Boswell hopes to open the season by building on the momentum that they built in their 2007 season-ending double-overtime victory over Puget Sound, the first in the program's history.

The four teams flip-flop opponents on Sunday, with the Lutes taking on the Banana Slugs at noon, followed by the Boxers and Pioneers at 2:30.

If you can't make it to Lincoln Park Stadium, we are able to offer Live Stats for the first time for both men's & women's soccer. This allows you to follow the stats of the game real time. Log in at goboxers.com/live.

The Pacific volleyball team, meanwhile, begins the Lena Chan era by hosting the fourth annual Boxer Kickoff Volleyball Invitational, Saturday and Sunday at the Pacific Athletic Center. Seven teams and 14 matches in two days will make for a lot of volleyball, but it will be some fast-paced action with four participating teams ranked in the preseason Division III national poll.

Pacific opens the tournament against Neumann (Pa.) Saturday morning at 10 a.m., and close action at 8 p.m. against Cal State East Bay, who is 1-2 all-time against the Boxers in the Kickoff Tournament. On Sunday, the Boxers face UC Santa Cruz at 1 p.m. and Christopher Newport at 8 p.m.

Rounding out the tournament field is defending NWC champion Pacific Lutheran, who went a perfect 16-0 in conference play in 2007, and Puget Sound, who finished second in the NWC and then beat the Lutes in the NCAA west semifinals before advancing to the national quarterfinals.

Log on to the Boxer Kickoff Web page for a complete schedule of events. Live Stats will be available for all Pacific matches, with box scores of all matches posted on the Boxer Kickoff page throughout the day.

Here's to a great weekend of Boxers' action and another relatively sleepless weekend for your local neighborhood SID. But before we go, an enduring question for the audience...how tough can a slug really be? And if you go after one with a can of Morton's, is that "a-salt and battery?"

Hope to see you in Forest Grove this weekend!

Men's Soccer: PGE Park Game Is A No Go

After looking forward to playing their first match ever in Portland's premiere soccer venue, the Pacific men's soccer team will have to wait for another opportunity.

Pacific's scheduled Sept. 4 match at PGE Park against Warner Pacific has been moved back to Forest Grove's Lincoln Park Stadium. Start time has also been moved back one hour to 4:00 p.m.

The match was going to be Pacific's first ever on the same pitch that the Portland Timbers call home. Pacific's head men's soccer coach, Jim Brazeau, is also the Timbers' goalkeepers coach and assistant coach Jim Rilatt is also on the staff.

The bad news is that the match will make for some last-minute drives down the Sunset Highway for Brazeau and Rilatt and for your local neighborhood SID, who is the official scorer for the Timbers. The Timbers have a 7 p.m. match at PGE Park against the Charleston Battery.

Men's Basketball: Raiford To Portland State

After three seasons as the top assistant for the Pacific men's basketball program, Wendell Raiford is moving back to the Division I ranks.

Raiford has accepted a position as an assistant coach at Portland State, where he work under third year head coach Ken Bone. Before coming to Pacific when Lowery became head coach in 2005, Raiford had spent three seasons as a graduate assistant at Oregon State.

Wendell has always wanted to get back into the Division I ranks, and I am happy to see that he got his opportunity to get back there. He joins Portland State at the right time. The Vikings went 23-10, won the Big Sky Conference tournament and advanced to their first NCAA Division I Tournament where they lost in the first round to eventual national champion Kansas.

In his place, Lowery is bringing back a couple of former players who have remained connected to the program since turning in their uniforms. Branden Kawazoe was a four-year player for the Boxers, earning Honorable Mention All-NWC honors at guard in 2005 and 2006. Jason Townsend played for Lowery in 2004-05 and 2005-06, but saw his effectiveness limited by injuries.

Kawazoe and Townsend will join current assistant coach (and Pacific golf coach) Richard Warren.

Men's Basketball: Boxers To Open At Boise State

No better test to start the season than to schedule a WAC opponent, right?

Head Coach Jason Lowery has scheduled a season-opening exhibition game against Boise State. The game takes place on Fri., Nov. 14, 8:15 p.m., at BSU's Taco Bell Arena. It will be one last warm up for the Broncos before they open the regular season on Mon., Nov. 17, at Siena.

Boise State advanced to the 2008 NCAA Division I Tournament after beating New Mexico State, 107-102 in triple overtime, in the WAC Tournament. The Broncos went on to lose to Louisville in the first round by a score of 79-61.

This is the second straight season that Pacific has opened the year with a Division I exhibition game. The Boxers opened at Eastern Washington last season, falling by a final of 91-49.

Ticket and broadcast information will be available soon.

Cross Country: No Place For Home

For the second consecutive year, the Pacific cross country team will not have a meet to call their own. The Pacific University Invitational, scheduled for Sept. 13, was cancelled because Head Cross Country Coach Tim Boyce could not secure a location for the meet.

Boyce hoped to hold the event at Fernhill Wetlands, a natural area about a mile southeast of the Pacific campus, but could not come to a use agreement with the organization that manages the site.

Pacific has not had a home meet since 2006, when the team hosted the Boxer Rebellion as a season-opening event in Lincoln Park. That event was discontinued with the construction of the new Lincoln Park Athletic Complex. Boyce hopes to locate a suitable site for a home meet in 2009.

In it's place, the Boxers will compete in the Warner Pacific-Cascade Invitational, which will be held on Oct. 11 at Portland's Westmoreland Park.

Click Here To View The Full 2008 Cross Country Schedule.

Updates From The Five-Ring Circus

By BLAKE TIMM, Pacific University Sports Information Director
If you are like me, you have been staying up way too late checking out the action from the Games of the XXIX Olympiad. Thankfully, my wife and I do not have cable at home, so I am limited to the horribly tape-delayed coverage provided by NBC. Never mind that I can find out most of the results well in advance of air time, but, especially when it comes to track and field, I still enjoy watching.

Pacific has a number of connections to this year's Olympic Games...
IAN DOBSON: A former runner at Oregon cross country powerhouse Klamath Union High School, Dobson (far right in the photo) qualified for the U.S. Team at 5,000 meters, finishing third behind Matt Tegenkamp and the amazing Bernard Lagat. Dobson placed ninth in his heat on Aug. 20 (14:05.47), failing to advance to the finals. Lagat was the only American to advance to the final, running eighth fastest time in the prelims to win the third heat in 13:39.70.

Pacific Connection: Dobson is the son of Pacific University Library director Marita Kunkel, who is in Beijing to see her son's once in a lifetime experience (but we hope to see him in London).

CLAY STANLEY: The dominant outside hitter for the U.S. men's volleyball team has led the Americans to the gold medal match. A two-time Olympian, Stanley is the leading scorer in this year's Olympic tournament and has started every match for the United States. After outlasting Russia in the semifinals, Stanley and the U.S. will face Brazil in the gold medal match on Sun., Aug. 24.

Pacific Connection: Stanley is the nephew of former Pacific volleyball coach Chris Stanley, and is from a long line of volleyball players. Chris Stanley, incidentally, remains on the Pacific staff as the director of intramurals and event management. If you see him, ask him about jumping center in junior college basketball against a future dominant UCLA center.

FROM THE STANDS: Prior to the beginning of preseason practices on Monday, new Pacific volleyball coach Lena Chan spent the last week in Beijing taking in as much volleyball action as she could, be it men's, women's or beach. Chan's husband, Alex, has relatives in the Chinese capitol and took advantage of free lodging to watch the Americans dominate one of their own games.

The downside to the new job, however, was having to leave early. Rest assured, however, that Alex and the Chan children have taken advantage of their tickets to the gold medal matches.

AND BEFORE THE GAMES: I had the opportunity to work on the media staff for the 2008 U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials in Eugene, which was truly one of the pinnacle experiences of my professional life. You can read more about my time at Historic Hayward Field on my personal blog, blaketimm.blogspot.com.

Additionally, Pacific University photo professor Jim Flory was at the trials shooting photos. He will display his awesome work in a show that is expected to take place later this fall on the Pacific campus.

Hope you enjoy the rest of the Games. Now to get the office cleaned up so I can stay up late again tonight!

Welcome To The Boxer Blog!

By BLAKE TIMM, Pacific University Sports Information Director
Ladies and gentlemen...Pacific University Athletics is working on moving into the 21st Century!

Welcome to the Boxer Blog, a component of our new multimedia initative that we are developing for the Pacific University Athletics program. We will regularly add here interesting news and notes, as well as fun facts and oddities, from our 20 varsity athletic programs and, sometimes, some timely opinion by your local neighborhood blogger.

In other words, think of this as the site for "The News That Didn't Make The News."

Boxer Blog will be edited and maintained by the Pacific Sports Information Office. This is part of a comprehensive multimedia initative we are putting together for Pacific Athletics. As the season progresses, our multimedia offerings will include online photo galleries and photo store, a weekly online newsletter, a score texting service (to your cell phone), podcasts and live Webcasts of selected Pacific athletics events.

As always, we are open to suggestions you have for our online content. If you have a comment, feel free to drop me an e-mail.