| Thursday, June 28, 2018 |
| Mississippi State students learn about marketing in study abroad | |
 | Mississippi State University-Meridian student Natalie N. Cartulla of Quitman sees life and business in a different way since returning from her 12-day study abroad trip. The business administration major and mother of two participated in Branding the Isles, an overseas marketing course at Mississippi State University that examined country-specific branding, including products synonymous with the national branding efforts of Iceland, Scotland and Ireland. Eighteen Mississippi State students, including Cartulla, as well as four faculty members, began their trip in Reykjavik, the capital city of Iceland. "I didn't realize the impact that this study abroad course would have until I was there," Cartulla said. "I learned so much, not only about marketing and branding, but about myself, my classmates and professors." |
| Charlotte Tabereaux honored in Meridian with ice cream social at Bulldog Shop | |
| Photo: Marsha Iverson, left, presents one of her paintings to Charlotte Tabereaux during an ice cream social honoring her at the Bulldog Shop in the MSU Riley Center in Meridian Wednesday. Tabereaux, the education director and Any Given Child Liaison at the center, is retiring after 45 years in education this month. |
| Dr. Charlotte Tabereaux retiring from MSU Riley Center | |
 | A woman who has spent her life promoting arts education has announced she's retiring. Friends and co-workers celebrated Dr. Charlotte Tabereaux's retirement with a special ice cream social at MSU-Meridian Wednesday afternoon. She will be retiring at the end of the month. Dr. Tabereaux works as the education director and Any Given Child liaison at the MSU Riley Center. She has been working at the Riley Center since 2005. "I truly believe that my greatest accomplishment is bringing the Any Given Child program to Meridian, Mississippi, and we've been doing it two years now," said Dr. Tabereaux. "Because of that, I'm not going to move away from Meridian, even to where my grandchildren are yet." |
| Campusknot Aims to Revolutionize Education | |
 | Staying actively engaged in a classroom setting is especially challenging in the smartphone age. A group of enterprising graduates from Mississippi State has created a social platform that they're hoping will revolutionize education. Campusknot aims to give professors the tools they need to engage with the students of today. Everybody is already on their phone anyway, right? It's a digital world out there. How do you reach today's students? Well, there's an app for that. Rahul Gopal has been onboard from the very beginning. He says, "All these students are on their phones, on their iPads, and the importance of technology in the classroom has never been more important." Blake Tarver says, "Right now, we are talking to LSU about using this, people at our home university, Mississippi State University, also some others at the University of Southern Mississippi, and we are discussing usage with people abroad as well." |
| Mississippi farmers brace for tariffs' impact: 'We are the ones being hit the hardest' | |
 | North Mississippi farmer Jerry Slocum has first-hand knowledge of China's unfair trading practices that President Donald Trump often criticizes. Slocum has the experience of Mississippi soybeans, including his own, being delayed off the coast of China because Chinese government officials suddenly decided they did not need any more soybeans at the time. "That has been factored in as the cost of doing business with China. But these tariffs are a whole different story," said Slocum, 64, who farms about 1,000 acres of land in Tate County in northwest Mississippi and also owns North Mississippi Grain Co. in Coldwater that purchases crops from other area farmers. Slocum, a Mississippi State University graduate who followed in his father's footsteps and became a farmer, said any trade war between the United States and China will hit hard Mississippi farmers and the Mississippi economy. |
| Steel Dynamics announces $240 million expansion in Golden Triangle | |
 | Steel Dynamics, Inc. announced Tuesday a plan to add an expansion valued at nearly a quarter billion dollars to its Lowndes County facility, which is expected to create at least 45 jobs in the next three years. The steel mill in the Golden Triangle Industrial Park near Golden Triangle Regional Airport will add a third galvanizing line to the facility, which produces flat roll steel products, according to a company press release. Golden Triangle Development LINK CEO Joe Max Higgins said the company will invest $140 million in the new line, while investing another up to $100 million in other improvements and upgrades. Lowndes County and the state have both stepped up to offer financial support and incentives to the new project, with Mississippi Development Authority providing the county with a $1.4 million railroad loan to build a new railroad around the site. |
| Mississippi looks to bring fiber internet to rural areas | |
 | The topic of bringing internet service to rural communities brought 46 Mississippi legislators and more than a dozen electric cooperative representatives to Hamilton, Alabama, Wednesday morning to look at an example of success 14 miles across the state line. Brandon Presley, Northern District Commissioner for the Mississippi Public Service Commission, called the meeting and said a bill is being drafted to come before the state legislature in January that would allow Mississippi power associations to provide broadband internet to rural communities. The federal spending bill passed in March allocated $600 million for electric cooperatives and rural utilities to bring broadband to rural areas, but Presley said state law currently precludes that funding from being used in Mississippi. n the meantime, the lawmakers came to Alabama to learn about how a local electric co-operative had expanded rural broadband there. |
| Rankin County gives Michael Guest, Republicans big boost in District 3 | |
| The hundreds attending Michael Guest's victory party Tuesday night at Mudbugs restaurant most likely left confident Guest would be the next U.S. House member from Rankin County. It was almost as if Guest's November general election foe -- state Rep. Michael Evans, D-Preston -- was an afterthought to the crowd. After all, Guest was introduced to the crowd late Tuesday as the next congressman from Rankin County after he garnered 31,121 votes (65 percent of the total) against Whit Hughes of Madison County in the District 3 U.S. House Republican runoff. Guest, the district attorney for Rankin and Madison counties, performed strongly throughout the district, but Rankin gave him a solid base. It is no surprise that Gregg Harper, also a Rankin County resident, has held the District 3 U.S. House post for the past 10 years, and after capturing the seat in 2008, never faced a serious challenge. |
| Senate faces bitter fight over President Trump's next Supreme Court pick | |
 | The fight over President Trump's next nomination to the Supreme Court began almost immediately after the news broke of the opening on Wednesday. Moments after Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy said he would retire, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said the Senate would act before the midterm election to confirm Trump's next nominee. "We will vote to confirm Justice Kennedy's successor this fall," McConnell said on the Senate floor. Democrats immediately cried foul, arguing the nomination fight should come next year. Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (N.Y.), recalling the bitter fight over Merrick Garland's nomination to the court in 2016, demanded that McConnell hold off until a new Congress is seated in 2019. He said Republicans should let voters weigh in on the choice through the November midterm elections. |
| State hackers sow digital weapons into industrial networks | |
 | The United States pioneered the use of cyberweapons when it shattered Iran's nuclear centrifuges in 2010 but such devastating cyber tools have spread and are now boomeranging to make industrial digital sabotage a growing concern to the United States. The weapons can wreak destruction and kill people. Experts say cyber weapons can turn off power grids, derail trains, cause offshore oil rigs to list, turn petrochemical plants into bombs and shut down factories. Twice in the past eight months, federal authorities have issued public warnings that foreign hackers are seeking to penetrate the U.S. electric grid and other parts of national critical infrastructure. The intent: Insert digital grenades that are dormant until the hacker's sponsor pulls the pin. |
| Survey: Exercise and Obesity Are Both Rising in US | |
 | It may seem like a contradiction, but more adults in the U.S. say they are exercising at the same time more of them are becoming obese. About 24 percent of adults last year said they exercise enough each week to meet government recommendations for both muscle strengthening and aerobic exercise, according to a large annual health survey. That was up from 21 percent in 2015. The same survey says 31 percent of adults indicated they were obese last year, up slightly. Another, more rigorous government study has also found adult obesity is inching up. So if more Americans are exercising, how can more also be getting fatter? Nearly a third of non-elderly adults in Colorado, Idaho, and New Hampshire met exercise guidelines. Only about one-seventh in Mississippi, Kentucky and South Carolina did. |
| Mexico resorts and tainted alcohol: Assaults, blackouts continue | |
 | A year after the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel brought to light a suspicious drowning and other troubling accounts from tourists vacationing at upscale all-inclusive resorts in Mexico, the stories continue to surface. In one recent case, a 51-year-old mother and her two adult daughters blacked out simultaneously after drinking a shot of tequila. In another, a couple in their mid-60s vomited and blacked out after two margaritas. And in yet another, a woman from Los Angeles --- who had not been drinking -- was taken to jail for trying to help a woman who was blacking out in the pool. Since early July of 2017, the Journal Sentinel has heard from more than 170 travelers describing injuries, illnesses and deaths after drinking alcohol at resorts and in tourist towns in Mexico. |
| Public schools, colleges unite to streamline degrees | |
| Public high schools and universities are trying to streamline the path to undergraduate degrees. On Monday, the Mississippi Department of Education and the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning announced a partnership that will provide new opportunities for high school students to earn both college course credit and automatic enrollment into any of the state's public universities. Starting in the fall of 2019, all eight of Mississippi's public universities will uniformly award three hours of college credit for a score of three or higher on an Advanced Placement exam. If a student scores a four or five on an AP exam, he or she could receive up to six credit hours depending on the subject. |
| Patients to pay up to 29 times more over fight between UMMC and Blue Cross & Blue Shield | |
 | If University of Mississippi Medical Center and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi do not agree on a new contract by Sunday, it will be patients who pay --- sometimes 29 times more. Where patients covered by the largest insurer in the state pay $177 for a colonoscopy with biopsy under the current contract, the new bill will be $5,135 if a deal is not made, according to estimates the Mississippi Insurance Department provided the Clarion Ledger. By Wednesday, UMMC and Blue Cross had reached a stalemate, with the teaching hospital asking for higher, set-in-stone payment rates that consider its unique role as the state's only academic medical center. On the other side, Blue Cross says UMMC has been uncooperative in the partnership and has not earned the opportunity to be treated specially. While both entities downplayed the impact on patients in May when they announced that their contract would be terminated July 1, many Blue Cross members who continue visiting UMMC will be charged enormous out-of-pocket costs if the two do not reach an agreement. |
| Julieta Mendez on UMMC international services | |
| Julieta Mendez is director of the Office of International Services at the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC). The Argentina native has been in charge of the program for five years and previously served as program director of the Immigration Clinic at Catholic Charities. Mendez holds a juris doctorate from the Universidad de Mendoza. She recently spoke to Sun Senior Staff Writer Anthony Warren about the office. |
| Accident leads youth toward medicine; teen interning in USM's biomedical research | |
 | A horrible wreck two years ago left a Lawrence County teenager wondering if he'd be able to run again. Now he plans to become an orthopedic surgeon so he can help others. And he runs. Nineteen-year-old Aaron Plunkett, the son of Michelle and Thomas Plunkett, was traveling home to the Divide community from Columbia Academy when he fell asleep and crashed his Toyota Tundra into a tree. After a year of rehab and high school graduation, he enrolled at Mississippi College where he recently wrapped up his freshman year with a 4.0, earning himself a spot on the president's list. With summer approaching, he has his eye on several research positions at several universities like Mississippi State, Ole Miss, Southern Miss and Louisiana State. He spent a weekend with his mother writing essays and completing applications. Plunkett was selected as part of a group of only 34 students in Mississippi to participate in a biomedical research internship through Mississippi IDeA Network of Biomedical Research Excellence Research Scholars program. |
| WJSU manager dies after battle with breast cancer | |
| After she was diagnosed with aggressive triple-negative breast cancer in 2016, Gina Carter-Simmers started empowering survivors to share their stories. Carter-Simmers began the campaign, "Beauty of Cancer," which held its most recent event two weeks ago and collected 80 donated wigs for the American Cancer Society. Carter-Simmers, WJSU's general manager, died Tuesday at age 49 from complications related to the disease. "Gina's professionalism was outstanding and her call to duty was legendary. Gina and I had several talks about her diagnosis of cancer. She was always upbeat and positive even on her not-so-good days. I will personally miss her smile, energy and dedication to WJSU and Journalism and Media Studies," Dr. Elayne H. Anthony, chair of the Department of Journalism and Media Studies, said in a statement. |
| Chuck Abadie retires after nearly 20 years at Pearl River Community College | |
 | A pillar in the community and a legend at Pearl River Community College, Chuck Abadie, Director of Public Relations, is retiring after nearly 20 years on the job. Abadie graduated from Hattiesburg High School in 1970 and the University of Southern Mississippi in 1976. He played some college basketball and baseball but soon realized that he wouldn't get paid for playing sports. Instead, he turned to writing about sports. Abadie started at the Hattiesburg American as a writer and editor and worked there for 28 years. During his time at the Hattiesburg American, he was named Mississippi Sportswriter of the Year in 1986 and 1988. That was until he discovered a love for public relations at PRCC. That was in 2000. After this week, he will be retired. "These 18 years have been fun, and I have enjoyed working with all of the people we have here," said Abadie. |
| Community college students get real life experience at Stennis Space Center | |
 | The engineers of tomorrow, working on the problems of today. Dozens of engineers from community colleges around the country spent Wednesday at Stennis Space Center getting an up-close look some of the projects they may one day work on. It was part of NASA's Community College Aerospace Scholars Event. The 42 students teamed up to build a miniature rover that had to perform various tasks as if it was actually on Mars. Mitch Krell heads up the program, which has been going on for more than two decades. "We take community college scholars from all over the country. They do an extensive five-week online program where they have to do some research," Krell said. "They go through different modules. They take tests. They do a project at the end. If they successfully do all that and they're in the top group of ones that do that, they get invited to an on-site NASA experience." |
| U. of Alabama exhibit celebrates women | |
 | An exhibit showcasing women whose contributions and achievements have had an impact on the University of Alabama will open Friday at the Gorgas House Museum on campus. The "Women of the Tide: 125 Years of Women at The University of Alabama" exhibit will be on display through Sept. 28 at the Gorgas House Museum. The exhibit is part of UA's 125 Years of Women, a yearlong celebration to honor women on campus through awareness, education, service and special events. The celebration marks the quasquicentennial of women's admission to the university as students in 1893. "We want the campus community to understand that this is a milestone year," said Mary Lee Caldwell, chair of the 125 Years of Women organizing committee. Women featured in the event include education advocate Julia Tutwiler and Judy Bonner, the campus' first female president, and civil rights figures Autherine Lucy Foster and Vivian Malone Jones. |
| U. of Tennessee Foundation names new board chair, vice chair | |
 | The University of Tennessee Foundation announced the appointment of Michael Littlejohn and Phil Wenk as the chair and vice chair, respectively, of the Foundation Board, effective July 1. "We are very pleased to have Mike and Phil lead our board and look forward to their contributions," said Kerry Witcher, interim president and chief executive officer of the UT Foundation, in a news release. "Their combined experience as business leaders and volunteers will be invaluable to UT." Littlejohn, who previously served as the vice chair of the board, is a 1973 UT Knoxville College of Business graduate, becoming the first of six family members to graduate from UT. Upon graduating, Littlejohn embarked on a 32-year career with IBM. He held a variety of executive sales positions and retired in 2007. The father of two Haslam College of Business graduates lives in West Knoxville. |
| Texas A&M officials meet with advocate group to discuss handling of sex assault cases | |
 | Several Texas A&M University administrators met privately Monday with a group representing former and current students who have criticized the school's handling of sexual misconduct allegations. The meeting, which was held off campus at a hotel in Bryan, comes about two weeks after a woman took to Twitter to express her displeasure that a student athlete she says sexually assaulted her was allowed to rejoin the swim team. The tweet sparked an outpouring of similar stories from women frustrated with A&M's response to reported sexual assaults and led to the formation of the 12thWoman, a group of "survivors and advocates" dedicated to pushing for change. University President Michael K. Young, Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp and Associate Director for Student Life Kristen Harrell attended the meeting at the request of the group. University spokeswoman Kelly Brown said Provost Carol Fierke and Title IX Coordinator Jennifer Smith were among several other administrators in attendance. |
| U. of Missouri selects Teaching for Learning Center director | |
 | Victoria Mondelli, director of the Office of Teaching Excellence and Engaged Learning at Mercy College in Dobbs Ferry, New York will become the first director of the University of Missouri's Teaching for Learning Center on Sept. 4, MU officials said in a news release Wednesday. MU announced last month a $750,000 investment in the Teaching for Learning Center to provide professional development and teaching assistance programs for MU faculty, teachers and instructors. In the news release about Mondelli's hiring, MU interim Provost Jim Spain said school leaders will "rely heavily on her knowledge and past experiences as we create a resource that is most beneficial to our campus." The Teaching for Learning Center is now online-only but soon will have a physical location on campus, the release said. |
| What Does Justice Kennedy's Retirement Mean for Higher Education? | |
 | Justice Anthony M. Kennedy's announcement that he planned to retire this summer from the U.S. Supreme Court set off legal and political shockwaves on Wednesday in the nation's capital. The open seat will give President Trump an opportunity to appoint the second justice of his term and set the court on a more conservative footing for, possibly, decades. But lawyers and legal scholars have mixed opinions on how much Kennedy's departure could affect higher education. "I think that it really depends on what the new court's agenda is," said Joshua W.B. Richards, a lawyer who helps lead the higher-education practice with the firm Saul Ewing Arnstein and Lehr, in Philadelphia. "If the justices, with a new conservative majority, think they have a mandate to start reversing precedent, they may do so." Early indicators from the court point to a willingness to overturn previous rulings, Richards said. |
| Departure of Justice Kennedy could erase Supreme Court majority backing consideration of race in admissions | |
 | The news Wednesday that Justice Anthony M. Kennedy was stepping down from the Supreme Court could have a major impact on future rulings on the constitutionality of colleges' consideration of race in admissions. Justice Kennedy was the author of the two most recent Supreme Court decisions -- both involving the University of Texas at Austin -- upholding universities' right to consider race in admissions. While the decisions were hailed by college leaders who support the consideration of race, both decisions were narrow, setting limits on how colleges could consider race. And earlier in his Supreme Court tenure, Justice Kennedy was dubious of the consideration of race. Depending on whom President Trump nominates, there may be no immediate indication of how the Supreme Court would rule on affirmative action. The last U.S. Supreme Court decision on affirmative action was in 2016, when the court ruled, 4 to 3, to uphold UT Austin's consideration of race and ethnicity in college admissions. |
| White Supremacists' Use of Campus Propaganda Is Soaring, Report Finds | |
 | White supremacist groups are increasingly using propaganda like fliers and posters to spread bigoted messages on college campuses, a new report by the Anti-Defamation League found. In the past academic year, 292 such incidents were reported -- a 77 percent increase from the previous year, according to the report, which was released on Thursday. The stickers, banners and other physical materials included racist and anti-Semitic messages and often targeted Muslims, nonwhite immigrants and L.G.B.T. people. Spreading propaganda across college campuses has become a popular tactic for white supremacist groups in recent years, said Oren Segal, the director of the A.D.L.'s Center on Extremism. |
| Supreme Court's Ruling Against Public Unions Leaves Murky Outlook for Academic Labor | |
| Public universities and labor experts grappled on Wednesday with figuring out the impact of the Supreme Court's ruling that public-sector employees cannot be required to pay union dues even if they benefit from collective bargaining. In Janus v. American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, No. 16-1466, the court sided, 5 to 4, with Mark Janus, who argued that he should not be forced to pay dues to the union that represents employees at his workplace. Faculty groups denounced the opinion, written by Justice Samuel A. Alito, as effectively turning the entire American public sector into "right to work" status, in which employees cannot be required to join a union or pay union dues. The Janus ruling "is part of a broad assault on public institutions and the common good," according to a statement from the American Association of University Professors. |
| Newspaper carriers fall to internet, trade war | |
| Mississippi newspaper publisher and columnist Wyatt Emmerich writes: "It's one thing to talk theoretically about the impact of a trade war. It's another thing to be caught in the crossfire. But that's where I am. Or more literally, that's where 60 or so independent newspaper contractors found themselves this month when they lost their jobs. Most Canadian wood products are harvested from government-owned lands. The U.S. has long considered this a subsidy. In January, the Trump administration imposed a 30 percent import tariff on Canadian wood products, including newsprint. Prices have risen accordingly, costing my newspaper company $300,000 a year. ...I am writing about this not simply to whine. We all have our challenges in business and life. The newsworthy takeaway is that trade wars do not occur in a vacuum, but have huge real-world effects." |
SPORTS
| Mississippi State places 96 on SEC spring honor roll | |
| Mississippi State has not only excelled in athletic competition this season, but also in the classroom as 96 student-athletes were tabbed to the Southeastern Conference Spring Academic Honor Roll that was announced Wednesday. MSU's women's and men's track and field squads combined to put 54 on the honor roll, with the women's team notching 32 selections and the men's team 22. Softball landed 11 on the list, while the Bulldogs' men's golf team followed with 10. Five women's golfers were named to the honor roll. NCAA quarter-finalist men's tennis had five players named to the honor roll, while women's tennis added four honorees. Coming off an amazing run to the College World Series semifinals, seven members of the Bulldog baseball team were tabbed to the honor roll. |
| Nick Fitzgerald injury: Mississippi State QB eyes big return | |
| A half-dozen black silver-dollar-sized discs are stuck to Nick Fitzgerald's lower right leg and foot. These are hot pads, assistant athletic trainer Thomas Callans says, Fitzgerald looking on from a cushioned training table. Callans gestures to the small, dark patches, each connected by a wire to an unseen contraption. These stimulate the muscles, forcing them to pulsate -- step one in Fitzgerald's 45-minute rehabilitation session on this June day. For the past six months, this sprawling place has been Fitzgerald's home. The Mississippi State sports medicine facility is tucked on the ground floor of the school's five-year-old football building, and inside it are rows of training tables, pairs of whirlpools and dozens of healing tools. "Lots of space," Callans says excitedly, glancing around. "Lots of space," Fitzgerald responds, "to torture us." Mississippi State's starting quarterback can joke now, and he joked then, too, when his right foot dangled off the end of his leg on Thanksgiving night. |
| AD John Cohen relies on experience to hire best man to lead Mississippi State baseball program | |
| John Cohen loves being Mississippi State's Director of Athletics; he also knows it's very different from being its baseball coach, and he's not too proud to admit that. He did just that as he recapped the search that ended with hiring Joe Moorhead as the football coach, letting it be known he talked to as many prominent names in college football as he possibly could. He did the same thing for baseball, but these conversations were different: these were conversations he would be having anyway. "I know he's an AD, but he's probably more baseball guy than AD," new MSU baseball coach Chris Lemonis said. One of many reasons Lemonis was ultimately picked by Cohen and introduced Tuesday was those conversations that Cohen has often in the baseball community. Those were just part of the hiring process that Cohen described after the press conference. |
| Chris Lemonis won't be afraid to talk about winning national championships at Mississippi State | |
| Chris Lemonis was one of many Mississippi State outsiders captivated by its baseball team and its improbable run to the College World Series. He recalls watching Elijah MacNamee's walkoff home run in the Tallahassee Regional while he was with his own team at the time, Indiana, in the Austin Regional. He didn't want to risk losing some of that magic as he took over the team. That's why, among many reasons, Lemonis made it official that he is retaining assistant coach Jake Gautreau in his introductory press conference Tuesday. Lemonis liked the idea of keeping Gautreau after watching the team play in the Nashville Super Regional and College World Series, so he only had one question when he finally met Gautreau. "His relationship with the kids," Lemonis said. "I know he can coach hitting, I know he can coach infield, I know he can recruit; it was the relationship piece, that's what we were looking for." |
| New Bulldogs baseball coach grinds his way to one of top jobs in the nation | |
| The Dispatch's Slim Smith writes: "By 10 a.m. Tuesday, the temperature had already pushed past 90 degrees and the 200 or so Mississippi State baseball fans who had gathered at the right field pavilion at Dudy Noble Field jockeyed for a spot under a tent awaiting the news conference announcing Chris Lemonis as the Bulldogs' new baseball coach. Lemonis, until this weekend the baseball coach at Indiana University, sweated in his gray suit as MSU President Mark Keenum and director of athletics John Cohen addressed the fans. All around them, men in hard hats scurried around Dudy Noble Field, which is in the middle of a $55 million project that will make it indisputably the best college baseball facility in the nation. It wasn't a great day for an outdoor news conference, but despite the heat and the sweat, Lemonis, 48, wasn't complaining. 'All I can think about is, does it get any better than this?' Lemonis said after he was introduced." |
| Mississippi State's Konnor Pilkington inks with Chicago White Sox | |
| Mississippi State pitcher Konnor Pilkington has wrapped up his career in maroon and white and is now a member of the Chicago White Sox organization. Pilkington inked a $650,000 contract on Wednesday after being selected in the third round earlier this month. The 81st overall pick held a slot value of $726,700. The 6-foot-3, 228-pound left-hander from Hurley appeared in 49 games over his college career with 46 starts going 14-12 with a 3.47 earned run average, 260 strikeouts, 95 walks and 254 innings pitched. |
| With Hogs one strike from title, foul-ball gaffe, HR force finale | |
| he stage was literally almost set for the Arkansas Razorbacks to celebrate their first baseball national title Wednesday night. With CWS officials waiting in the first base tunnel holding a portable stage with two outs in the top of the ninth inning, Razorbacks closer Matt Cronin induced a high foul ball from Oregon State's Cadyn Grenier down the right-field line. Three University of Arkansas, Fayetteville players -- infielders Carson Shaddy and Jared Gates and right fielder Eric Cole -- raced toward the would-be winning out with the Hogs ahead by a run. But nobody could make the catch. Given a second chance, Grenier punched a single into left field to score pinch-runner Zach Clayton with the tying run. Trevor Larnach followed with a two-run home run to vault the Beavers to a 5-3 victory before a crowd of 25,580 at TD Ameritrade Park to tie the College World Series championship series at 1-1. |
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