NU family plays together, stays together

[RedCountry]

I hesitate even posting an article from the Lincoln Urinal, b/c they are soo painful to read, but its Husker news nonetheless. But my GOD, have they EVER heard of an EDITOR???? what a rag.

 

 

NU family plays together, stays together

BY BRIAN ROSENTHAL

 

Randy Jordan is Nebraska's only assistant football coach familiar with PlayStation.

 

Ross Pilkington can hit a softball pretty hard. Even a mush one.

 

John Blake and Phil Elmassian are avid fishermen.

 

Titus Adams enjoys performing a little dance after knocking over a bunch of bowling pins.

 

"If Ido throw a strike," Adams said, "Ido a little somethin' ... whatever comes to mind."

 

What do any of these little tidbits have to do with Nebraska football, the West Coast offense, or the Huskers' chances of winning a Big 12 North title this season?

 

Absolutely nothing.

 

And that's just the way Tim Cassidy wanted it.

 

Cassidy, Nebraska's first-year associate athletic director for football, made two rules when planning team-building activities for the Huskers this summer:

 

No talking about football. And no talking about academics.

 

"We wanted to know more about them as kids, more about girlfriends, more what's going on in their lives," Cassidy said. "Abig part of these guys' lives is outside of football."

 

Cassidy, who's one of 10 new faces on the NUcoaching staff, designed the activities - a bowling tournament, a softball game and a PlayStation video game contest - so players would have an opportunity to bond with their new coaches.

 

"At first, when you hear it's a mandatory team function, you think, 'Uh, well, I'll go,'" sophomore linebacker Stewart Bradley said. "But then you get there, and everyone on the team is pretty competitive. You get into it. But it's all light-hearted, so it's fun for everyone. It keeps people interested in the activity. At the same time, you're trying to build relationships with your coaches."

 

Turns out players also learned a thing or two about each other.

 

"I didn't know Mike McLaughlin was such a good bowler,"junior Mark LeFlore said. "He had a chance to roll a perfect game, but he missed a strike."

 

McLaughlin, who has since left the team because of medical reasons, bowled a 270 to win individual honors.

 

"(You learn about) a talent you really don't know someone has," LeFlore said.

 

Or, in some cases, doesn't.

 

"Ithink Fabe swung and missed ... slowpitch softball. Swung and missed," senior guard Jake Andersen said, referring to Fabian Washington.

 

Not that Andersen has any room to talk.

 

"Even myself, I go out there and swing a baseball bat, I look like a fool. Iain't done that since little league," he said. "You see great athletes out on the football field, then you see them step into the ring of something else, and they're just awful."

 

How awful?If you can bowl better than an 84, you'll have a chance to beat Wali Muhammad. And maybe Elmassian, who bowled a 96.

 

The softball game matched the coaches against the players, with each class (freshmen, sophomores, etc.) playing an inning or two. Every pitch was a 3-2 count.

 

"We had these impossible balls," Bradley said. "They were like huge, tape-covered balls. You could barely hit them. You had to swing so hard to get it out."

 

The players rallied to win, 10-5.

 

"Iguess that's good news for the fans," Cassidy said, "that a bunch of old men didn't beat a bunch of young guys."

 

The real victory, though, was some good old-fashioned team bonding.

 

"Last year, we weren't quite as tight as a whole team, as we are this year," Bradley said. "That's been kind of an improvement, definitely."

 

Pilkington, a junior wide receiver, agreed.

 

"Our team really wasn't as much together last year as we wanted it to be, and I think that really helped bring everybody together, and just get that camaraderie that we need," Pilkington said.

 

"Everybody can tell (that)all the team is just really close right now. Even through two-a-days, we're just getting closer by the day. I'm really glad that Coach Cassidy and Coach (Bill)Callahan put those together, because Ithink that's made a huge difference on our team."

 

Players and coaches also attended Nebraska's victory over Texas Tech in men's basketball, and were planning on attending a Husker baseball game together, but weather interfered.

 

Team-building activities won't be as prominent during the season, but some players are already pitching ideas for the next offseason. Among the suggestions are a pool tournament, a ping-pong tournament and a poker tournament.

 

With fake money, of course.

 

"Some of the players suggested we play golf," Cassidy said. "I don't know if any golf course would want 130 guys - which half of them have probably never played golf before."

 

Whatever the activity, junior I-back Cory Ross is game.

 

"It helps a lot, man," said Ross, who defeated Jordan in the PlayStation finals. "I mean, Tim Cassidy, he tries to do anything and everything he can to bring the team together as a unit. My hat's off to the guy.

 

"The tournaments and softball games and stuff like that, we all come together and we realize how close we can be as a team."

 

http://journalstar.com/articles/2004/08/20...ll/10053955.txt