Author: David Shama

Lane Kiffin, the former Bloomington Jefferson alum, is in the news because he’s the new head football coach at Tennessee and his dad, former Vikings assistant Monte, will be joining the Volunteers staff.  But his gorgeous wife Layla is a search engine favorite, too.

PGA player and Wayzata native Tim Herron (aka “Lumpy”) and wife Ann will launch the Lil’ Lumpy Leadership Initiative tomorrow at the Kimberly Lane Elementary School gymnasium in Wayzata.  The initiative teaches kids leadership skills through golf.  The Herrons will congratulate students for taking part in a essay challenge on leadership and recognize the school for its commitment to teaching leadership skills.  The school will be the first in Minnesota to be placed atop the “Lil’ Lumpy Leaderboard.”  More at www.lillumpy.com

It will be a downer for the golf industry, including next summer’s PGA at Hazeltine National Golf Club, if Tiger Woods sits out 2009 to rehab from his famous knee surgery.

The Timberwolves Al Jefferson donated $25,000 to Miami Dade College earlier this year to start a scholarship in honor of his late father.  Jefferson’s sister Jazma is in her second year at the school.

Kate Smith, formerly Kate Riley, was recently named director of marketing for Gatorade.  Kate, who was inducted last month into the Edina High School Athletic Hall of Fame, was an all-state basketball player for the Hornets and later played for Illinois where she was a four-year starter and team captain.  Her parents are Dick and Carolyn Riley, both of whom have been active volunteers for the United States Tennis Association.

Congratulations to former Patrick Henry coach Don Swanson and wife Barb on their 50^th wedding anniversary this Friday.

“Day In The Life: Nick Schultz” will debut on the NHL Network beginning at 6 p.m. local time tomorrow.  The 30-minute episode follows Schultz for the entire game day of December 5 when the Wild played Vancouver at home.  NHL Network will also re-air the show on Saturday at 3 p.m. and Sunday at 3:30 p.m.

In 21 games this year Pavol Demitra, who left the Wild after last season to play for Vancouver, has 10 goals and eight assists for the Northwest Division leading Canucks (tied with Calgary).  Minnesota, which has lost both of its games to Vancouver, misses his point production.  The Wild have four goals in their last five games, all losses.

The anticipation and determination was evident in Saul Smith’s words.  The Gophers assistant basketball coach was talking about next Saturday’s game against No. 9 ranked Louisville in Glendale, Arizona.

Although the Gophers are 9-0, this will be Minnesota’s first game against a nationally ranked team and only the second time playing a school from a major conference.  But there’s more to it.  Louisville is annually among the royalty of college basketball and coach Rick Pitino, eight years with Louisville, and before that coaching teams like Kentucky, the Boston Celtics and New York Knicks, will one day have the tag “legendary” associated with his name.  Pitino won a national championship at Kentucky and then was succeeded by Saul’s dad Tubby, who won an NCAA title in Lexington.  Tubby was once an assistant coach for Pitino at Kentucky.

No wonder the Gophers figure to be focused and excited for Saturday’s game which is the first of a doubleheader in the University of Phoenix Stadium (the Desert Shootout also includes Arizona State versus Brigham Young).   Saul told Sports Headliners the Gophers are determined to be prepared for the game that starts at 1 p.m. Minneapolis time and will be televised on FSN.

“We’re gonna know a lot about them,” Smith said.  “We’re dedicating…all three (assistant) coaches toward this scout(ing).  Usually it’s just one.  Everybody is going to get a shot at trying to scout against this team and put their wisdom into it. And we’re gonna call around (info from other teams)…and watch every film that they’ve played in the last year or so.  We’re going to try and dissect them.

“We want to win this game. We circled this game in the summer as a measuring stick to where we were.  We knew they were going to be a top 10 team in the nation. So this is where we’re going to measure ourselves against.”

Smith expects Pitino to be “relentless” in his preparation for the Gophers. That’s often a good word to describe Pitino teams on the court, too.  Louisville is known for its relentless defense (68 steals to opponents 39) and so far this season is giving up 56.1 points per game while averaging 80.  The Cardinals are 4-1 with their only loss to Western Kentucky (5-3) in Nashville, 68-54.

Louisville’s leading scorer is 6-8 freshman center Samardo Samuels, a Jamaican by way of New Jersey who is a former USA Today prep player of the year and is averaging 17 points per game for Pitino.  The Cardinals may have the best front court in the country with Samuels, plus forwards Earl Clark and Terrence Williams.  Clark, a slashing offensive player, supposedly returned for his senior season rather than become a first round NBA draft choice last spring while Williams, another senior, often gains attention for his playmaking.

It didn’t take long in a conversation for Smith to bring up the Samuels name and how the Gophers will try to counter with their own freshman center, Colton Iverson.  “I think he’s (Samuels) a future pro,” Smith said.  “He’s very strong down there. I think the match up with him and Iverson is going to be critical when it comes down to who is going to win the game. …”

Smith used the word critical, too, when talking about Minnesota’s Damian Johnson guarding Clark who is Louisville’s second leading scorer at 11.6 points per game.  Johnson, a 6-7 junior forward, is probably Minnesota’s best defender.

Smith said the Gophers want to be undefeated in nonconference games (two home softies remain after Louisville) but there’s more to it than that.  A win in December over highly ranked Louisville will help the Minnesota resume in March when selections are made to participate in the NCAA tournament.  “No question, because we feel like Louisville is a team that’s gonna make some noise in March,” Smith said. “And we feel like if we can come in and beat a team of that caliber we feel confident about our team.  …”

The Gophers will look back in March and know whether they had the reputation building satisfaction of beating a school that Smith said has its name in “capital letters” on the Minnesota schedule.

After the Vikings recovered a fumble, made an interception, returned a punt for a touchdown and scored three other touchdowns to take a 28-0 lead against Arizona yesterday, former Viking Mike Morris said on KFAN radio that the Purple had played the best half of football in Brad Childress’ three seasons as coach.

Marcus McCauley had an active rookie season last year after being drafted in the third round by the Vikings.  He started nine games at nickel back and was a regular for four of the final six games at left cornerback, replacing the injured Antoine Winfield. This season he’s started one game, participated in eight of 14 and didn’t even have a tackle until yesterday when he came up with three solo and one asssisted.

Ryan Longwell, the Vikings’ 34-year-old place-kicker, is also the team’s backup punter.  He hasn’t punted in an NFL game since 2006 when he kicked once for 27 yards.  Longwell, who was all-Pac-10 as a punter and place-kicker at California, practices punting in training camp but not during the regular season.  Although he averaged 41.9 yards per punt in college, he said the hang time on his punts wasn’t NFL caliber.

Mike Sherels told Sports Headliners that his brother Marcus had a disappointing season because of the right shoulder injury he incurred in the Indiana game on October 4.  Marcus missed one game and when he did play his effectiveness was limited as a tackler from his cornerback position.  Mike said post-season surgery on his brother’s shoulder is a possibility.  He also said Marcus had been named to a mid-season all-Big Ten team and that despite the injury didn’t give up a touchdown reception this season.  Marcus, a senior next season, could be one of the Big Ten’s best cornerbacks in 2009.

Gophers athletic director Joel Maturi was able to switch the start of the Minnesota-Michigan State basketball game on December 31 from a 5 p.m. start to 11 a.m. to avoid conflict with the Insight Bowl (Gophers and Kansas kickoff at 5 p.m.) but the move sparked both criticism and praise from Williams Arena ticket holders.  The new start time will be an inconvenience to some fans and an enhancement for others but regardless of your position Maturi is encouraging the Big Ten to adopt a future policy that will initially have to-be-determined start times for basketball games that are scheduled on the same day as conference bowl games.

The Insight Bowl is televised by the NFL Network which the majority of cable subscribers in this market don’t have as part of their programming package.  Although the NFL Network has allowed local market TV stations to televise the game in previous years, nothing has been announced for Minneapolis-St. Paul by the University or bowl officials.

Insight Bowl representative Matt Winter told Sports Headliners on Friday that this is the fourth year of an eight year deal between the network and the bowl.  The Insight Bowl used to be televised by ESPN but when bowl officials wanted the game played on New Year’s Eve the network couldn’t do so because of prior commitments, Winter said.

University president Bob Bruininks said he expects an event in the Phoenix area during the time of the bowl game to thank major donors to the new TCF Bank Stadium.  He also said eight of the school’s 12 Board of Regents will travel to the Insight Bowl.