Newspaper Page Text
MONDAY
February 12, 2001
Vol. 108, No. 102 | Athens, Georgia
Rain.
High 46 | Low 41 | Tuesday 62
ONLINE: www.redandblack.com
An independent student newspaper serving the University of Georgia community
ESTABLISHED 1893, INDEPENDENT 1980
GAME, SET, WIN
> Women’s tennis team
defeats Baylor in a Top 25
showdown. RAGE 6
Michigan falls to
No. 4 Gym Dogs
By GENTRY ESTES
gestes@randb.com
Facing their toughest compe
tition so far this season, the No.
4 Gym Dogs had their backs
slammed against the wall before
responding with a narrow
196.675-196.625 victory over
eighth-ranked Michigan at
Stegeman Coliseum Saturday
night.
While the score was Georgia’s
best of the season, the feeling
was that the Wolverines (7-5)
lost it more than the Gym Dogs
(10-0-1) won it.
After leading all night,
Michigan fell off the beam three
times to let Georgia make up a
1.225 deficit on the final rota
tion. After Michigan hit its first
three beam routines, coach
Beverly Plocki didn’t cut down
on difficulty to protect her
team’s
lead. The final three Wolverines
all fell, costing them an upset
victory.
“Our last athlete that went
up, I could have very easily had
her water down that dismount,”
said Plocki of junior Shannon
MacKenzie, who suffered
Michigan’s third fall on a missed
landing. “I guess, in this type of
meet, you can’t underestimate
the type of pressure that these
kids are under. Sometimes,
when you’re trying to stay on,
you’re thinking more about
needing to stay on than what
you need to do on the routine.”
Plocki’s troops are an unim
pressive No. 22 nationally on
beam, but Georgia certainly
didn’t expect the Wolverines’
sudden collapse.
“It looked like curtains for
sure. I really didn’t think that we
would win,” said Gym Dog coach
Suzanne Yoculan, who stressed
that she would have “absolute
ly” called for easier routines in
Plocki’s situation. “(Michigan)
couldn’t handle the pressure of
winning. I’ll tell you one thing,
we wouldn’t have three falls at
the end of a competition if we
were that far ahead. Three falls,
on the last event, when you’re
ahead that much — I don’t know
what you call that.
“I respect Bev’s decisions,
and she’s going to say that
they’re more concerned with the
end of the year and they need to
do that difficulty. I used to be all
about that, too. After you lose
enough meets that way, you get
smart real fast. The percentages
just get you when you do a lot of
difficulty.”
MacKenzie’s crucial mistake
meant senior Suzanne Sears
could win it for Georgia with a
9.95 to close the floor lineup.
Sears, the defending NCAA floor
champion whose shin splints
kept her out of the two earlier
home meets, made her
Stegeman debut a special one.
She lit up the crowd with an
electric 9.975 to make Georgia
an unlikely, last-second winner.
An unprecedented third con
secutive sellout crowd went nuts
when Sears finished, but, not
knowing the overall score
because of malfunctioning
scoreboards, it booed when the
routine wasn’t a 10.
“That is one of the loudest
(times) I’ve ever heard them,”
said Yoculan of the crowd. “It’s
too bad they didn’t know what
we needed to score.”
Georgia caught the
Wolverines on the wrong night.
Michigan posted an amazing
nine career highs on the evening,
including season-bests as a
- team ~o» vault and floor. The
Gym Dogs, on the other hand,
counted a fall on two separate
rotations.
The falls were not as much a
► See UNBEATEN, Page 6
a Above, freshman
Cory Fritzinger hur
tles over the vault
to start what would
be one of her finest
meets. Left, Coach
Suzanne Yoculan
cheers as Kathleen
Shrieves puts the
finishing touches
on a near-perfect
uneven-bars
routine.
PHOTOS BY KENDRA WAYCUIUS, STEPHEN MINES The Red * Buck
Robberies
could be
connected
By SAMIRA JAFARI
sjafari@randb.com
The three armed robberies of
University students held up at
gunpoint last week may be com
mitted by the same pair of
assailants, police said Friday.
The most recent robberies
reported occurred Thursday
night and early Friday morning,
within an hour.
Matt Hembree, a freshman
from Oakwood, and his friend
were robbed by two armed,
masked men in front of his
Barrington Drive residence.
“They came out of nowhere —
it was scary,” Hembree told The
Red & Black Sunday. “They
both had guns.”
Hembree told Athens-Clarke
County detectives one of the
gunmen — described as a slim
black male wearing a ski mask —
made him and his friend lie face
down on the ground and took
their wallets.
“The guy said, ‘Give us your
wallets. Don’t be heroes. Lay
down or I’ll blow your f***ing
heads off,’ ” Hembree said.
Hembree and his friend told
police the other suspect stood
concealed in nearby bushes, and
appeared shorter and more ner
vous than the first suspect.
He described one of the guns
as a silver semi-automatic and
told police the robbers ran
toward Hilsman Middle School
— off Gaines School Road —
after taking the wallets.
“I thought I felt safe. I didn’t
think something like that could
ever happen around here,” he
said. “I’ll be more cautious going
outside at night.”
Less than an hour later,
Travis Bach, a freshman from
Lawrenceville, and a friend were
robbed outside Bach’s residence
off China Street — about three
miles away from Barrington
Drive.
Bach told police he noticed
one man was wearing a ski mask.
Both robbers drew handguns,
took the victims wallets and ran
behind another building.
Earlier last week, Joe
McLaughlin, a graduate student
from New Jersey, reported being
robbed at gunpoint by two
masked men who demanded his
wallet near the Physics Building
off Sanford Drive. He was
stopped by the men at about
10:45 p.m. Tuesday night while
he was walking home from a late
class at the Grady College.
A-C Detective Mark Durham
said Friday A-C police, in con
junction with University police,
suspect the three incidents
could be related. Durham said
the gunmen’s robbing methods
are “a little bit the same.”
University Police Chief Chuck
Horton said some leads have
emerged in the first incident, but
didn’t elaborate on the case.
Police stressed the impor
tance of students being aware of
their surroundings at all time,
especially at night.
“Don’t be blind to your sur
roundings,” Durham said. “Walk
in groups — predators look for
easy prey.”
Steppin’ Up
BECKY REID | The Red * Buck
▲ The Alpha Kappa Alphas took the
stage at the Greek step show
Saturday night. Story, Page 2
Beer bill tastes bitter to Georgia House
Representative to motion to reconsider
By JUSTIN B. RUBNER
jrubner@randb.com
Hope still looms for Georgia’s bat
tle-tested beer bill, which would raise
the current alcohol limit to 14 percent,
even though it was defeated in the
House.
House Bill 224 was squelched Friday
108-60 — a complete reversal from last
year, when a similar bill passed with
virtually no debate, but later failed in
the Senate.
A legislative aid to Rep. Stephanie
Stuckey’s (D-Decatur) bill said that
Stuckey will present a motion to recon
sider in the House today, after her
opposition suddenly “came out of the
woodwork” Friday.
“Quite honestly, the debate on the
floor was an absolute blood bath,” Kirk
Miller said Friday. “I was stunned it
was defeated by such a large margin.”
If the motion passes, it will be
kicked back to where it started — the
Rules Committee. If it fails, the bill will
be dead for the year.
“It dealt us a major setback,” Miller
said. “Over the weekend, we need to
find 31 votes.”
Ironically, the bill might have suf
fered at the hands of compromise when
some of its strongest supporters actu
ally voted against it. In a move to
appeal to opposition, Stuckey added
an amendment which would restrict
grocery and convenience stores from
selling higher-alcohol beers.
Miller said that when the amend
ment was presented, some of the bill’s
supporters voted against it, because
they think legislators shouldn’t dictate
who can and can’t sell these products.
He described the debate on the
House floor as “heated.”
“It was pretty ugly,” he said. “It
became a forum for the moral high
ground.”
Rep. Kathy Cox (R-Peachtree City)
led the debate against the beer bill.
She said that if passed, it will increase
underage drinking, DUIs and alco
holism. Cox plans on voting against the
motion today.
“There is a beer drinking culture
here in the United States,” Cox said.
“To say that Europeans drink this beer
in a certain matter doesn’t mean
Georgians will. Most people in Georgia
don’t stop drinking just because
they’re (intoxicated).”
Cox said many Georgians will not
realize how strong these beers are until
its too late.
“A couple of these beers — and a
person is going to be legally drunk,”
she said.
Cox said personal responsibility or
consumer choice isn’t as important as
safety, and that the state government
does have a legitimate concern in legis
lating public policy in this issue.
“I’m not a Libertarian,” she said.
“I’m not a Prohibitionist, but I am a
realist. (Alcohol) affects everybody —
families, relationships, jobs. It affects
everything.”
Currently, 38 states allow the sale of
these European-style beers. Georgians
can legally consume higher-alcohol
beers, but must purchase any beer
with an alcohol content above 6 per
cent out-of-state.
Some Athens merchants said that if
the bill passes, they will sell these beers
— many of which cost $12 or more.
Jennifer Lang, manager of The
Globe, said that the ATF recently
seized beer with a 7.2 percent alcohol
content from the bar’s distributor. She
remains a strong advocate of the bill
and supports the amendment to
restrict certain stores from selling high
er-alcohol beers.
“It’s a very backward choice they
made,” Lang said. “We’re missing a lot
of quality products. It’s keeping
Georgia in the dark ages.”
Anwar, Timmons promoting diversity
By SAMIRA JAFARI
sjafari@randb.com
Edttor's Note: This is the second
part of an eight-part series of fea
tures profiling the candidates for
Student Government Association
president and vice-president.
Elections will be held Peb. 21-22.
Students are the chicken
nuggets of the University combo
meal — at least that’s what
Student Government Association
presidential candidate Asma
Anwar and her running mate Lisa
Timmons say.
Their slogan, “Don’t Forget the
Nuggets,” is the duo’s way of pro
moting diversity and unity on
campus — the main leg of their
campaign platform.
“It’s like when you go to a
drive-through and order chicken
nuggets, you’ll notice some of
SCHEDULE OF PROFILES
► Richard Butter, Susan Maples —
Friday, Feb. 9
► Asma Anwar, Lisa Timmons —
Monday, Feb. 12
► George Azih, Aaron Tullar —
Tuesday, Feb. 13
► Lhoris Wilson, Trapper Key —
Wednesday, Feb. 14
► Chuck Richardson, Dixon Greenwood —
Thursday, Feb. 15
► Haylee Vance, Allie Smith —
Friday, Feb. 16
► Timothy Chen, Taylor Hunt —
Monday, Feb. 19
► Tunde Ezekiel, Daniel Carnegie —
Tuesday, Feb. 20
them are dark, some are light,
some are crispy, some are soggy —
but they’re all delicious,” Anwar, a
junior from Athens, said. “It’s a
very simple, funny slogan, but the
idea behind it is pretty serious.”
Anwar and Timmons, a junior
from Richmond Hill, said they are
serious about increasing minority
recruitment at the University.
The running mates promise to
form a committee of campus
minority leaders who will visit high
schools and recruit minorities —
“non-athletic minorities,” Anwar
said — to attend the University.
“(Our slogan is) a light way of
us expressing our wishes to have
more diversity at the school,”
Timmons said, “and not just to
have more diversity, but to try to
unify people who are minorities
and come from very different
backgrounds.”
Anwar and Timmons also said
they don’t want the newly imple
mented $1,000 total stipend given
each semester to SGA presidents
and vice presidents — they say
they will put the stipend toward
minority scholarships.
In addition, Anwar said she
wants to extend the 15-minute
break between classes, saying a
25-minute break will reduce park
ing problems and campus transit
Congestion.
And how does the pair plan to
bring the promises to fruition?
Step on some administrative
toes, of course.
“A lot of people don’t want to
cross boundaries and step on
toes,” Anwar said. “But we’re
ready to do that and step all over
the administration’s toes — we
want to get something done.”
But the candidates aren’t just
promoting their platform on the
two-week campaign trail — they
want to improve SGA’s image
along the way.
“If we don’t win this election, I
don’t think we’ll be heartbroken,”
Timmons said. “It would be nice
to actually just give SGA some
publicity, because frankly the
more publicity (it) gets the more
respected it will be.”
For a two-time candidate like
Anwar, SGA publicity is no
stranger — she recalled 2000’s
televised SGA presidential
debate, when she told then-candi
date Garrett Gravesen to take his
“Push It Up” slogan and “push it
up (his) ass.”
“(SGA members) take them
selves so seriously — they have no
sense of humor,” Anwar said.
“Saying ‘push it up your ass’ to
Garrett gave him lots of publicity
— I’m sure it helped him win.”
Humor is what Anwar and
Timmons believe will help stu
dents relate to their campaign
and also participate in SGA.
“Anything is better than stu
dent apathy,” Timmons said.
“(They may) love or hate SGA,
but if they don’t know us, they
can’t have an opinion.”
MEET THE
CANDIDATES
SGA
2001
ANWAR TIMMONS
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