Holding Court

Pacific tennis coaches Brian Jackson (top) and Sandy Garry play the unofficial first match on the University's new tennis courts. The final score of the match was not disclosed.

They may not be officially open, but Pacific's tennis coaches (and some players) have had a chance to test drive the courts at Pacific's new tennis facility.

Save for some electrical work and last minute finishing touches, the new courts are ready for play. While the courts are not yet open for the campus community, head men's tennis coach Brian Jackson and head women's coach Sandy Garry got out their racquets and tried out the new courts on May 27. They were soon joined by a pair of Pacific women's tennis players who happen to live right across the street from the new complex.

The courts were met with rave reviews from the coaches and players alike. The teams will be ready to take the courts for real when the teams start fall practices in September.

The new tennis complex features six courts, three of which are covered and will be available for year-round use. A ribbon-cutting and dedication will be held at a later date. The tennis facility was originally scheduled to be completed in April, but the unusually wet weather over the spring pushed the construction timeline back.

Some other shots of the new home for Pacific tennis...

The News On Football Gets Out...

In the hours and days since Pacific announced the addition of football to it's athletics offerings, the Portland area news media have picked up on the story. Here is a list of stories out on the historic announcement (note that this list will be updated as new articles are posted)...

• The Portland Tribune's Jason Vondersmith wrote a lengthy article on Pacific's football return, which also include insights on the conference from Linfield Coach Joe Smith (6/11/09).

• The Forest Grove News-Times and the Portland Tribune both ran announcements (the News-Times also ran the story in its print edition - both stories 5/27/09).

• The Oregonian ran a small mention on its Web site and in its May 27 print edition.

• The Pacific Index, the campus student newspaper, posted a story on its Web site (their publication year has finished), with details on the announcement and a follow-up to some other stories they did on football in their final issue.

• Oregon Public Broadcasting is airing a story on the Pacific football program, touching on potential playing sites and the potential revenue from the arrival of 100 new student-athletes (5/27/09).

• KPAM (860 AM in Portland) will air a full feature interview with Ken Schumann on their Inside Sports show, Saturday at 11 am.

• KGW Newschannel 8 (click link for video) is airing a story on Pacific's football program during their 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. newscasts and on their 10 p.m. news which airs on Portland's CW32. The story will also air on Northwest Cable News, a four-state network affiliated with KGW. Text Story On KGW.com Web Site.

Among the Division III sports community...
• D3Football.com, the top Web site in the country when it comes to discussing the sport at the NCAA Division III level, has featured Pacific as one of its notables (5/27/09). The members who use D3Football's message boards (click on Northwest Conference) have also responded positively to the announcement.

• ADvantage Catdome, a blog dedicated to anything and everything Linfield athletics, posted something on the announcement on its site (5/27/09). Despite the fact that Pacific and Linfield have been hated rivals over the years, especially on the gridiron, the site has always been enthuiastic about its support of football returning to Pacific (see references to past interviews with Ken Schumann and past posts on the lead-up to the announcement).

• The NCAA Web site, through its NCAA News section, has a story on the announcement (5/28/09).

• The National Football Foundation mentioned Pacific's program in its June 1 "Chalk Talk" section, which features news and notes from all around college football (6/1/09).

Boxer Media Bytes

Pacific athletics has had it share of mentions in the media recently. Here are some links to some notable stories...

TRACK & FIELD: The Oregonian's Tuesday print edition ran a piece in its Track & Field Notebook on the entry of athletes from five GNAC schools to Saturday's Pacific Twilight. Their online Track & Field Blog (a well done blog by Ken Goe & Doug Binder) had a number of links the teams appearing at Lincoln Park after the GNAC Championships were canceled by Western Oregon's Swine Flu scare.

Stories on the Twilight were also featured in the Bellingham (Wash.) Herald and the Idaho Statesman (Boise, Idaho).

SOFTBALL: Pacific's student newspaper, the Pacific Index, did a nice feature titled "Out With The Old, In With The New." The feature profiled senior outfielder Kristen Croxford, who has been named to her fourth straight All-Northwest Conference team (third first team pick), and freshman pitcher/first baseman Chelsey Chamberlain, who also earned First Team All-NWC honors.

Johnson Wins Heptathlon

Bridget Johnson had a long day on Saturday. Pacific's associate head coach for track and field spent much of the day and night helping to run a Pacific Twilight meet that featured 23 teams and nearly 600 athletes.

Apparently, the long day didn't take too much out of Johnson. The former Western Oregon standout won the heptathlon at the Willamette Multi-Event on Monday. Her total of 4,870 points well outdistanced Willamette's Brooke Smith at 4,398.

Johnson won three of the four events on Sunday, capturing the 100-meter hurdles (14.70 seconds), the high jump (5-4.25) and the shot put (34-3), and then won the long jump (18-9.25) on Monday. She was also second in the 200 meters (26.50) and third in the javelin (119-8).

Johnson, a 2006 graduate of Western Oregon, holds the Wolves' record in the heptathlon at 5,080 points and was a NCAA Division II All-American after finishing fourth at the NCAA Championships. After college she competed for the Team XO post-collegiate club until it disbanded last summer.

And You Thought Our Last Meet Was Big...

We are still living off the glow of what was a terrific Northwest Conference Track & Field Championships. Pacific put on a great meet and great show and we have received a lot of great compliments about how everything came together.

After the meet, I commented to a couple of people about how once the NWC Championships were done, I could start winding down and taking a few deep breaths.

I shouldn't have spoken so soon because, as Head Track & Field Coach Tim Boyce said, "clearly this has grown way beyond the intended fun final meet for Pacific athletes."

Saturday's Pacific Twilight meet has grown into one very large meet. A total of 23 teams will be represented at the meet, representing every level of collegiate athletics. We will have Division I schools (Portland State & Portland), Division II schools (Alaska-Anchorage, Central Washington, Northwest Nazarene, Seattle Pacific & Western Washington), Division III schools (Pacific, George Fox, Linfield & Puget Sound), the NAIA (Corban, Concordia, Northwest, Cascade, Warner Pacific) and a slew of community colleges and club teams.

The meet grew big time on Friday when we accepted the five Division II teams in the field who were affected by the cancellation of the GNAC Championships due to Western Oregon's Swine Flu scare.

What does that mean? Whoever comes to watch the meet will be in for an exciting afternoon and evening of high caliber action. Here are some of the athletes to watch...

• Jernise Saunders (Portland State) - Stadium record holder in the 100 and 200 meters. Has season best times of 11.88 in the 100 and 24.14 in the 200.
• Ellie Siler (Western Washington) - Season best of 56.18 seconds in the 400 meters. The top-nine competitors in the 400 have times under a minute, which will make for some fast performances.
• Irene Johnson (George Fox) - She won the 100-meter hurdles at last week's NWC Championships and will run the same event on Saturday.
• DeShawn Shead & Peter Jason Tait (Portland State) - Times of 14.57 anf 14.63 seconds, respectively, in the 110-meter hurdles.
• David Kiplagat (Alaska-Anchorage) - One of the top small college distance runners in the nation, he brings a season best og 9:01.76 to the steeplechase.
• Angie Miller (Pacific) - The Pacific record holder in the long jump will look to add to her Division III provisional qualifying mark.
• Lauren Sexton (Concordia) - One of the nation's best collegiate javelin throws. She was amongst the field at last summer's Olympic Trials.

The complete performance list can be found here (beware...very lengthy).

We hope to see you here on Saturday!