January 27, 2012

Lohse struggles in Cards loss

The Baltimore Orioles scored early and often and once the Cardinals fell behind there was no catching up as Kyle Lohse gave up two long balls in the second inning during the Cardinals 11-3 loss on Thursday afternoon.

After a scoreless first inning, Lohse ran into problems giving up two homers.  Both came with one on and two outs.  The first was to Justin Christian.  Then after Lohse allowed another baserunner, left fielder Nolan Reimold went deep to give the Orioles a 4-2 lead.

The Cardinals took the lead in the first on a double by Yadier Molina up the left field line.  After Baltimore grabbed the lead, they got three more in the third off Ian Ostlund who walked two and gave up three hits.

Albert Pujols and Rick Ankiel did not play today.  The Cardinals will travel to play the Mets tomorrow.  Todd Wellemeyer will make the start.

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Bill talks Mizzou hoops, baseball, and old QBs

I’ll cover a little bit of everything on this week’s press box podcast.  First, the Missouri Tiger basketball team.  Impressive 94-74 win over K-State, I think you need to start giving some credit to the Tigers.  17-0 at home.  They play great at home, but how will the younger players rally around Carroll, Lyons and Lawrence on the road and come Big 12 and NCAA tournament time.  Hear from Mike Anderson.

The Kansas City Star reporting MU AD Mike Alden talking contract extension w/Mike Anderson. Alabama could offer Anderson up to $2 million for their coach job.  Gotta get that done.

Middle of the week here in Missouri, temperature was 65.  I got the kids home from school and we were playing catch and pitching and hitting whiffle balls, it felt great to put the ball glove on again.  It was perfect day with spring training starting for the major leaguers.  I find it odd that rarely will you have an outfielder try to learn 2 nd base.  An outfielder may move into to try third and most of the time first, but almost never 2 nd base.  I can’t think of any other converted OF playing 2 nd base, but the Cardinals and Royals are trying it.  Skip Schumaker with the Cards, Mark Teahen with the Royals. 

Listen to Skip and Mark talk about their first day at second base.

The guy I feel for is Mark Teahen, two errors yesterday.  His first came when he threw wide of the bag at 2 nd base to start a double play.  led to three unearned runs in yesterday’s 12-5 loss to Texas.

I think Schumaker will make the adjustment a little better.  I think he’s more athletic than Teahen and LaRussa may have a little more patience with Schumaker because of his lead off abilities and what he can do offensively.  I almost get the feeling with Teahen, this is like a last ditch effort to save his career in Kansas City.  Great kid, I hope he does well.

Old quarterbacks are getting the axe left and right in Missouri.  A day after the Chiefs cut Damon Huard, the Rams let go 38 year old St. Louis native Trent Green. 

This story is amazing, Kansas City Power and Light tried pushing through Worlds of Fun tickets for employees, meals at Royals games, and tickets for the Chiefs and Royals as legitimate business expenses for customers to pay, apart of the 17 1/2 % increase.  Now the company has withdrawn those parts of the rate increase request.

Download/listen to Press Box Podcast (6:18 mp3)

Southwest Baptist earns MIAA season title

The #4 SBU Bearcats clinched a share of their third MIAA regular season title in the last four years with a dominating 81-58 win over the Northwest Missouri State Bearcats. The SBU Bearcats jumped out to a 20-2 lead, behind four early treys, and never trailed in the contest. 

D’Ante Harris led SBU with 21 points, one of four SBU Bearcats in double figures. Harris connected on 5 treys and was 8-of-14 from the field and led the team with five assists. Tomas Brock had 13 points and Wendell Mardis added 11. Matt Rogers had another double-double with 12 points and 11 boards, along with 7 blocks.  SBU was 15-for-37 (41%) from long range and out-rebounded Northwest 37-28. 

SBU (23-3, 16-3 MIAA) led by as much as 19 in the first half and was up 45-30 at the break. They extended the margin to as much as 28 points on two occasions in the second half. Northwest drops to 12-14 and 7-12 in the MIAA.

SBU hosts Missouri Western at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday evening, looking to clinch the MIAA title outright and aiming to extend their Division II best 29-game home court winning streak.

Central Missouri sets home wins record

Junior guard Alex Moosmann set career highs of 11 assists and seven rebounds to go with his 17 points in leading the No. 12 Central Missouri Mules to an 84-66 senior night win over Missouri Western on Wednesday.

The win also broke the school record for home MIAA wins in a season, going 10-0. The 2006-07 Mules went 9-0 in MIAA play. The 15 overall conference wins also ties a school record set by that 2006-07 team.

Central Missouri (22-4, 15-4 MIAA) got a hot start from senior guard De’Andre Byrd, who tallied nine of the team’s first 13 points. The Griffons (12-14, 9-10 MIAA) quickly closed an early seven-point deficit with a 15-4 run to give them an 18-14 advantage with 12:56 left in the period. Senior guard Lonnel Johnson led the Griffon charge in the early going with eight points, including a couple threes in the run.

The Mules answered with a 14-1 run, started and ended by buckets from senior forward Esian Henderson. That gave UCM a 31-21 lead with 6:06 to go, and it never trailed again, coasting into the half with a 42-33 lead.

The Mules pushed their lead to as many as 17 by the 14:58 mark of the second half and after the Griffons used a 9-0 run to get the margin to five with 8:26 to play,  UCM answered again, this time a 12-2 spurt put them back up by 15.

UCM will travel to Kirksville, Mo. on Saturday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. to face the Truman Bulldogs in the regular season finale.

Tigers return favor to K-State

DeMarre Carroll Matt Lawrence had a big first half hitting all three of his long range attempts and DeMarre Carroll (photo by Bill Greenblatt, UPI) led five Tigers in double figures with 21 points as Mizzou cruised to a 94-74 win over Kansas State at Mizzou Arena.

Mizzou (24-4) had an early 12-8 lead when Matt Lawrence came in and got hot.  He banged in two three pointers and a free throw to extend the Tigers lead to 19-12 with 11:38 to play in the first half.

Justin Safford came off the bench and had a huge slam then grabbed an offensive rebound and picked up a foul which put Missouri in the bonus with 8:43 left.  Safford made one of the two giving the Tigers a 24-13.  Mizzou then scored 25 points in the final six minutes including Laurence Bowers who scored six points in the final minute to give the Tigers a 55-32 halftime lead.

Lawrence had 12 at the half, Bowers and Tiller with 10 apiece.  The three point shooting that was key in K-State’s first win disappeared as the Wildcats were just 2 of 10 from three in that first half.

The Tigers pushed their lead to 70-38 up to the first TV timeout of the second half, then K-State went on a 15-0 run as Mizzou got a little careless midway through the half.  Head coach Mike Anderson talked about how K-State came out and punched Mizzou in the first game and the Tigers didn’t punch back.  Tonight, the Tigers came out swinging and never stopped until the game was well in hand.

Earlier in the week, Anderson called Carroll, the "heart and soul" of this team and called him the ultimate warrior.  One thing about Carroll is he scrapes and claws for every rebound, loose ball and defensive stand. 

The energy the Tigers showed tonight will be the same type of effort needed this Saturday at Kansas.

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