maly, too

Sunday, January 3, 2016

Drake Men's Basketball: The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same

Today's score: Illinois State 67, Bulldogs 62

Saturday, January 2, 2016

Stanford Rose Bowl Standout Christian McCaffrey, Who Had a Record 368 All-Purpose Yards In a 45-16 Victory Over Iowa, Is the Grandson Of Dave Sime, a Multi-Sport Athlete Who Was a World-Class Sprinter At the Drake Relays In the 1950s

Dave Sime in his sprinting days

Barry Crist of West Des Moines, a longtime Hawkeye sports fan, filed this interesting Facebook post in the wake of Stanford's 45-16 romp past Iowa in the Rose Bowl football game:

"Childhood memories flooded my mind when Brent Musburger talked about Christian McCaffrey's heritage. I did not know that his maternal grandfather is Dave Sime, a hero of mine when I was a young boy.

"Sadly, the Des Moines Register did not have a feature story on Dave Sime before the Rose

79-year-old Dave Sime now

Bowl, as he is a Drake Relays legend. The Register is now just a local McPaper.

"On a cold rainy day at the Drake Relays in 1956, Dave Sime beat Abilene Christian's Bobby Morrow in the 100-yard dash on a cinder track that had standing water. Mud and water were exploding from their feet as they sped down the track. Sime won in the time of 9.4. I know this because, as a young boy, I was in the stands with my father. The picture of that finish was in the Drake Relays programs for many years.

"Sime later held the world record in the 100- and 220-yard dashes and the 220-yard low hurdles. However, he hurt his leg before the Olympics and Morrow went on to win the gold in the 100, 200 and 4x100 relay in the Olympics in Melbourne.

"Sime was a baseball player at Duke. At 6-3, he was a swashbuckling centerfielder with a shock of bright red hair. He signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers, which thrilled me, as I am a Dodger fan. Either an inability to hit the curveball or the lure of Duke Medical School ended his baseball career. Players in those days did not earn astronomical salaries like they do today. Sime became a successful eye surgeon.

"The Duke football coach asked him to come out for football due to his astronomical speed. Special plays were designed for him and he torched Notre Dame in his first year of football with long plays. He was drafted by the Detroit Lions, but never signed in the NFL.

"Duke University honored Dave Sime as their greatest athlete of the century."

[RON MALY'S COMMENTS--Well done, Barry. Great memories of long ago, when Dave Sime starred at the Drake Relays. I've got to hand it to Brent Musburger, too--or at least the

Christian McCaffrey in the Rose Bowl

researchers at the ESPN network--for calling viewers' attention to the fact that Christian McCaffery, the Stanford back who stole the offensive show at the Rose Bowl, is the grandson of Dave Sime [pronounced Simm]. ESPN kept showing former NFL standout Ed McCaffrey, Christian's father; Lisa McCaffrey, Christian's mother, and another son of Ed and Lisa in the grandstand during the Rose Bowl while Christian was running wild against Iowa. McCaffrey scored on a 75-yard pass play with the game only 11 seconds old and set a Rose Bowl record with 368 all-purpose yards. The 19-year-old sophomore became the first player in Rose Bowl history to total more than 100 yards rushing and receiving. McCaffrey looms as the favorite to win the 2016 Heisman Trophy. Barry Crist mentioned that the paper didn't carry a word about the fact that Christian McCaffrey is the grandson of Dave Sime. Obviously, no one at the Register knew about that connection. Furthermore, after Musburger's mention on ESPN of the McCaffrey/Sime family connection, no one in the Register newsroom relayed the information to the two reporters covering the game. That didn't surprise me, and it shouldn't have surprised anyone else. The understaffed paper. and the naive people working there, missed a lot of interesting stuff before, during and after the Rose Bowl. That's just how it goes these days at that place].

Evashevski's 1958 Team Was Iowa's Best

By RON MALY

In the event you were wondering, Iowa's 1958 football team that was coached by Forest Evashevski is still the best the university has ever had.

I realize a couple of misguided folks might have been thinking the 2015 Hawkeyes, who won their first 12 games, perhaps deserved to be No. 1.

No way.

In my book, when you fall behind Stanford at halftime, 35-0, in the Rose Bowl, then lose the game, 45-16, you don't get any kind of No. 1 ranking.

The way I look at it, this season's team--after losing to Michigan State, 16-13, in the Big Ten Conference championship game and then being blitzed by Stanford in the Rose Bowl--ranks No. 6 on Iowa's all-time power list.

Here's my ranking:

1. The 1958 Big Ten championship team that had an 8-1-1 record, including a 38-12 shelling of California in the Rose Bowl. Evashevski's team was ranked No. 1 nationally by the Football Writers Association of America. The Hawkeyes led the nation in total offense. Quarterback Randy Duncan was a consensus all-American, was named the Helms Foundation Player of the Year and received the Walter Camp Trophy. Iowa's Bob Jeter ran for 194 yards and was voted the MVP of the Rose Bowl. The Hawkeyes set Rose Bowl records for total offense [516 yards] and rushing yardage [429].

2. The 1956 Big Ten title team, also coached by Forest Evashevski, that went 9-1 and whipped Oregon State, 35-19, in the Rose Bowl. The Rose Bowl was Iowa's first-ever bowl game, and the Hawkeyes made the most of it. Quarterback Kenny Ploen ran for a 49-yard touchdown and was named the game's MVP. Iowa's Collins "Mike" Hagler scored two touchdowns and totaled 85 yards on the ground.

3. The 1939 team led by Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick that had a 6-1-1 record that included successive home victories over Notre Dame and Minnesota. The team was coached by Dr. Eddie Anderson, a physician who occasionally examined patients at University Hospitals in Iowa City on the same day he conducted football practices. Kinnick, a classic Heisman Trophy winner, took the nation by storm. Many thought the highly-intelligent, smooth-talking Kinnick would someday be the governor of Iowa [perhaps even president of the United States], but a tragic plane crash ended his life during World War II.

4. The 2009 team that went 11-2 and defeated Georgia Tech, 24-14, in the Orange Bowl. Kirk Ferentz's team won road games at Iowa State, Penn State, Wisconsin and Michigan State. Iowa's Brian Bulaga was named the offensive lineman of the year, and Ferentz was voted coach of the year in the Big Ten for the third time.

5. The 1985 team coached by Hayden Fry that went 10-2 and could have been ranked much higher had it not been for a head-scratching 45-28 pummeling it took from UCLA in the Rose Bowl. The Hawkeyes spent five weeks as the nation's No. 1 team. Quarterback Chuck Long was named the winner of the Maxwell Trophy and the Davey O'Brien Quarterback Award. Long and Larry Station were consensus all-Americans.

6. The 2015 team that was pretty good until it got to the Granddaddy Of 'Em All in Pasadena. Again, a mystifying collapse.

The last thing I'm going to spend much time writing about is the Stanford band, which was booed off the field by Iowa football fans at halftime of the Rose Bowl game. Some would call members of the band idiots; some would call them fun-loving college kids keeping up a tradition. I call them goofy. I saw 'em in TV coveragade of the Rose Bowl parade, and I saw 'em on the tube at halftime of the game. Iowa fans were already in a bad mood at halftime because the Hawkeyes were losing, 35-0. ESPN, which broadcast the game, didn't think much of the Stanford halftime show because they quickly cut to a commercial when the band started getting ornery. Not everyone at Stanford likes what the band has been doing because the group was banned from appearing at road games this season duee to unruly off-the-field behavior [I know some football players who've been guilty of that]. I guess the Rose Bowl isn't classified as a road game. Anyway, the band managed to piss off Iowa fans at halftime of the Rose Bowl game by making reference to the Farmers Only TV commercial and displaying a cow costume. After being booed off the field by Hawkeye fans, the band sent this message on Twitter: "Glad you liked our corn show, Iowa! Couldn't tell, was that booing or mooing?" That's the last thing I'm planning to write about the Stanford band. Their football team won the game, 45-16.

Stanford Goofiness

Friday, January 1, 2016

I Say Burn the Game Film

By RON MALY

I'm going to keep this short.

No sense in writing a ton of words about today's Rose Bowl game.

You saw it, I saw it.

Stanford was far and away a much better football team than Iowa.

There's no other way to put it.

That's why the Cardinal won, 45-16.

Stanford had a do-everything, record-smashing back named Christian McCaffrey, who facially looks like the 15-year-old kid who lives across the street from me or from you, and asks if we want him to mow the lawn or shovel the snow.

Christian McCaffrey

But don't let the looks fool you.

McCaffrey has the talents and the smarts of a National Football League player.

Iowa couldn't stop him and couldn't catch up with him on what turned into a day when the Hawkeyes were no-shows on the huge national stage.

The 19-year-old McCaffrey, a sophomore, broke the Rose Bowl record for all-purpose yardage with 368.

That stated, I say burn the game film.

Well, so much for Oklahoma and Michigan State in the collegiate football playoffs. I picked Oklahoma to beat Clemson and go on to win the national championship. The final score was Clemson 37, Oklahoma 17. Shows you how much I know. Michigan State was a huge disappointment. The Spartans' 38-0 loss to Alabama was a total embarrassment. Now I won't be happy unless Clemson beats Alabama for the title. The last thing I want is for Nick Saban [whose team is already a 7-point favorite] to win another game this season.

Happy New Year's Eve. As the tattered game plan is gone through one final time in Pasadena, Calif., it's important to remember this: Getting to the Rose Bowl is not the sole object for Iowa's football team. Winning the game [something the Hawkeyes haven't done since Jan. 1, 1959] is what it's all about. Finishing No. 2 tomorrow to Stanford won't cut it.

JOLTIN' JOE GOT IT STARTED

When Ron Maly was a kid in Cedar Rapids, he wanted to enter an essay contest, and he did. He wrote about Joe DiMaggio of the New York Yankees being his favorite baseball player. For finishing second in the contest, Ron won a Louisville Slugger baseball bat autographed by DiMaggio. Ron later wanted to be the first person in his family to attend college, and he was. He earned a degree in political science from the University of Iowa, and did what all political science majors do. He became a sportswriter. He had, after all, covered high school football, basketball and baseball games for the Cedar Rapids Gazette while he worked parttime during his university days. Ron wanted to sit in the press box and write about an Iowa-Minnesota football game, and he did. It happened while he was the sports editor at the Albert Lea [Minn.] Tribune, and the game was at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis. Ron wanted to cover a World Series, and he did. Also when he was working for the Albert Lea newspaper. Ron wanted to cover Rose Bowls, Sugar Bowls, Orange Bowls, Cotton Bowls, Holiday Bowls, a Freedom Bowl, a Sun Bowl, a Super Bowl and NCAA basketball tournaments, and he did those things after he moved to Des Moines. Ron was a four-time sportswriter of the Year in the state of Iowa [the years were 1977, 1978, 1994 and 1996]. In 2006, he was named a charter member of the University of Iowa's media Wall of Fame in the Kinnick Stadium press box. A photo of the plaque that's displayed in the press box is displayed above this story. Following Ron's retirement from the newspaper business, a publisher asked him if he wanted to write a book about the rich football tradition at the University of Iowa, and he did. The hardback version of "Tales from the Iowa Sidelines" was a best-seller, and so was the revised, softback version. Now he's been asked by his publisher to update the book for a second time. He's in the process of doing that at the present time. Ron considers being asked to update a best-selling book for the second time to be the supreme compliment, considering the Hawkeyes won just four games in the 2012 season. When Ron isn't working on books, he's busy traveling and spending time with his family. Indeed, he attends the athletic, theatrical and musical [both vocal and instrumental] events in which his six grandchildren participate. He also writes about anything that interests him for his many websites. Every chance he gets, Ron proudly wears his America Needs Farmers T-shirt.

The Hawkeyes' Rich Football Tradition, Revisited

I mentioned a while back that I was in the process of updating my Tales from the Iowa Sidelines book. Updating it for the second time. The original hardback edition of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines [pictured at the right] was published in 2003, during the 10-3 season, when coach Kirk Ferentz and his Iowa football team had a 10-3 record that included a 37-17 victory over 15th-ranked Florida in the Outback Bowl and after the Hawkeyes went 11-2 in 2002. That book was a best-seller, so the publishers came to me again in 2005, a season that finished with a breathtaking 30-25 victory over No. 11 Louisiana State in the Capital One Bowl on New Year's Day, 2005. Because buyers had cleaned out the the shelves in the bookstores, the publishers wanted to know if I'd do an updated version of the book. I agreed, The revised, soft-cover edition [pictured at the left] was published in 2005. Warren Holloway, who teamed with quarterback Drew Tate on a miraculous 56-yard touchdown pass to win the Capital One Bowl, was featured on the cover. That book, too, turned into a best-seller, So I had reason to feel very good about my years as a published author. It's not every day that a the original version is a best-seller, and so is the updated version. Then, imagine my surprise when I received an e-mail from a senior editor at the publishing company last fall, wanting wanted to know if I was interested in doing a second updated version of the book. It came at a time when things weren't going well for the Hawkeyes in the 2012 season. They lost their last six games and finished with a 4-8 record. Frankly, the thought of doing a revised edition of the book during a 4-8 season seemed to be a stretch. "Maybe producing a revised edition in a year or two would be a better idea," I told the publishers. "We'd like to do it now," I was told. "Let me think about it," I said. After a few days of thought, I accepted the idea. I talked myself into the idea that this was the supreme compliment--being asked to do a second book update during a 4-8 season showed strong confidence by the publishers in me and in the Hawkeyes' football program. So I got back into the business of interviewing players and coaches again, going to postgame press conferences, weekly press conferences and a scrimmage in West Des Moines. After a press conference in Iowa City, I did a one-on-one interview with coach Kirk Ferentz, and mentioned to him that I was in the process of doing a revised edition of my two best-selling books. I congratulated him on the excellent things he had done for Iowa's football program--all of which contributed to the success of my books. "I think Coach Fry had more to do with it," he told me, bringing up the name of Hayden Fry, his one-time boss at Iowa and a man who brought Iowa's football program back from the dead in the 20th century. That's modest Kirk Ferentz for you. Even though the 2012 season wasn't something Hawkeye coaches, players and fans will recall with any special feeling, Ferentz has a 14-year record of 100-74 at Iowa that includes two 11-victory seasons [2002 smd 2009], two 10-victory seasons [2003 and 2004], plus he's been the Big Ten coach of year in 2002, 2004 and 2009, and national coach of the year in 2002. Indeed, Ferentz has done some wonderful things at Iowa City, and I fully expect his success to continue. I've concluded my writing for the second update of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines, and the senior editor has furnished me with an early look at the book. Not only are the Kirk Ferentz years included in the updated version, but so is the stuff I previously wrote about Howard Jones, Dr. Eddie Anderson, Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick and the 1939 Hawkeye Ironmen, Ronald Reagan, Ozzie Simmons, Ossie Solem, Randy Duncan, Alex Karras and lots of other legends from Iowa's rich football history. I expect the book to be in stores soon. I hope you like it.