7/27/2019 MTSU Emerge

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SportsEXECUTIVE SPORTS EDITOR:Greg Pogue | pogue@dnj.com615.278.5170

Titans | C2Scoreboard | C5Saturday, April 19, 2008

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Previewing the PredatorsSunday home game againstDetroit Weekly Prep and BlueRaider notebooks

La Vergne senior Kiki

Yarbrough added four gold

medals to her collection

this week at the Rutherford

County Track and FieldChampionships, which ac-

counted for all but one of

the Lady Wolverines five

first-place finishes over

three days of competition.

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For the big picture,

check out the

Scoreboard

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Lucas Glover -10

Boo Weekley -9

Anthony Kim -8

SCOREBOARD

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2Glover takes one-shot lead

at PGAs Verizon Heritage

Hi

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3Blackman and Smyrna tangled

on the baseball diamond

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5The Blue Raiders began a

three-game series at ULM

Inside

Adam Sparks is the MTSU beat writerfor of The Daily News Journal. E-mailhim at sparks@dnj.com.Page editor: Corby A. Yarbrough

Think MTSUs quarterbackcompetition could get spicy?Not even close.

What if Dwight Dasher wasDwight Stockstill?

Thats the predicamentNorth Texas will soon be in.

UNT will stage a competi-tion this season between in-cumbent quarterback (andreigning Sun Belt freshman ofthe year) Giovanni Vizza andincoming freshman RileyDodge, who just happens to bethe son of second-year UNThead coach Todd Dodge.

That lineage alone could

make UNTs quarterback bat-tle the most intriguing of theSun Belt season.

Both Dodges already see thetrain coming.

Im not so naive and Rileyisnt so naive that we dontknow what the situation is,said the elder Dodge. Riley isused to this. Hes been acoachs kid his whole life. Ri-ley will be given the same op-portunity to play as anyoneelse.

Dodge, the coach, said it ispossible that the conferencestop freshman a year ago couldbe dethroned before his sopho-more season. But Dodge alsosaid he expects Vizza to win

the job. After all, he gave Viz-za the nod over returningstarter Daniel Meager last sea-son to run his high-poweredpassing attack. Vizza had upsand downs, but ultimately setsome freshman passingrecords.

If the younger Dodge meansto swipe the job away, hes gotplenty of work ahead.

Both worthyThe younger Dodge has

been in this situation before.He played for his father atSouthlake (Texas) CarrollHigh, which touted a national-ly renowned offense under theelder Dodges tutelage.

As a sophomore, RileyDodge was beaten out as thestarter by a senior. He won thejob and a state title the nextyear.

But Riley Dodges shot atstarting this season isnt a hottopic just because of his familytree. Hes actually UNTs toprecruit.

Riley Dodge originallycommitted to the University ofTexas before opting to followhis father to UNT. Dodge isthe two-time Texas 5A playerof the year. Vizza was theTexas 4Aplayer of the year.

This is great for the Uni-versity of North Texas, ToddDodge said. Ive always said

that it cant become a quarter-back controversy unless thecoach and players make it acontroversy. This isnt a prob-lem. Its a blessing.

Sound familiar?MTSU coach Rick Stock-

still has no problem dividingtime between two capablequarterbacks. Despite the jug-gling act, Dodge (a formerTexas quarterback) and Stock-still (a former Florida Statequarterback) are both fortunateto have two talented playersunder center.

But Dodge certainly has thetougher situation.

Stockstill can explain deci-sions about playing time in his

office or locker room. Dodgehas to do it over the dinnertable.

ADAM SPARKSStaff Columnist

Preds come home down 3-2

By LARRY LAGEAP Sports Writer

DETROIT The DetroitRed Wings and Nashville

Predators went through a rangeof emotions and only one teamliked the lasting feeling.

Johan Franzen scored 1:48into overtime, lifting Detroit to a2-1 win over Nashville and a 3-2 lead in their first-round series.

Valtteri Filppula, who scored

D e t r o i t sfirst goal,poked thepuck awayand Franzenended upwith it andbeat DanEllis with abackhander.

O n em i n u t e ,

youre on top of the world,Predators coach Barry Trotzsaid. The next minute, you feelreal low.

The NHLs top-seeded teamwas less than a minute fromwinning in regulation, butNashvilles Radek Bonk slipped

through the defense to get off aone-timer that got past ChrisOsgood.

Osgood turned away 20 of 21shots, validating Detroit coachMike Babcocks decision tostart him over Dominik Hasek.Game 6 in the best-of-seven se-

ries is Sunday in Nashville.Ellis kept the Predators in the

pivotal game, making 52 savesbefore he was pulled for an ex-tra skater.

The biggest disappointmentis we wasted that goaltendingeffort, Trotz said. But weforced it to overtime when weprobably didnt deserve it.

See PREDS, page C6

Throneberry

is hoping

Shadowens

the choice

By DAVID BOCLAIRboclair@dnj.com

More than three decadesago, Buford Throneberry wait-ed through two votes that werenot to his liking before the col-lective thinking went the wayhe wanted.

Hes hopeful that historywill repeat itself next week.

Throneberry, a major bene-factor of Mid-dle TennesseeC h r i s t i a nSchool forwhom thefootball stadi-um was namedlast August, isoptimistic thatMTCSs boardof directorswill approvethe recom-mendation ofPhilip Shad-owens for highschool footballcoach. Theboard, madeup of repre-

sentatives ofseveral area Church of Christcongregations, is scheduled tomeet Thursday and, accordingto Throneberry, already hasvoted against hiring Shad-owens twice.

(Shadowens) is one of thekindest men youll ever see,Throneberry said. He getswhat I think he gets out of hisplayers by being the type ofman he is a Christian manand very knowledgeable manabout the game of football.

... I think theyre going togo for it.

Shadowens resigned earlythis month following 15 yearsand two Class 5A state cham-

pionships at Smyrna High

See THRONEBERRY, page C5

Dasher and Craddock battle for the job of starting QB

MTSU FOOTBALL SPRING REVIEW

By ADAM SPARKSsparks@dnj.com

Joe Craddock and Dwight Dasher

are like two perfect political candi-

dates, both waiting for the other to

make a misstep to create a winning

margin in a tight race.

No such errors were made in

MTSUs spring practice, and the pair

appear more like running mates than

contenders for the starting quarter-back job with the season ahead.

I think Ive done what I needed

to do, Craddock said. I think Ive

played up to my potential. Ive

played well, but I think Dwight has

played really good, too. I just leave

that decision to coach.As he hinted before spring prac-

tice began, coach Rick Stockstill will

wait untilfall campto name as t a r t i ngquarter-

back. There was little reason todowngrade either Craddock or Dash-er when spring practice closed lastweek.

Nothing has changed. I thoughtDwight and Joe had really goodsprings, Stockstill said. Im verypleased with their progress and theway they performed. I think Dwightgot a lot better this spring in a lot ofareas, and I think Joe continued toget better, as well.

Im very, very pleased with bothof those guys.

When Stockstill lists his top four

See EMERGE, page C4

Who will emerge?Position breakdownIMTSU beat writer Adam Sparks breaks down

how each position did during the spring, whether

their stock rose, fell or stayed even and what to

expect when fall practice rolls around. C4

North Texashas a real

QB quandry

THRONEBERRY

Contributor to

MTCS wants him

as football coach

Coming SundayWith the high frequency of coaching

changes in Rutherford County this

school year, DNJ staff writer Jared

Hastings explores exactly what school

officials are looking for in the coaching

search process.

SHADOWENS

Dwight Dasher

Joe Craddock

N Nashville vs.

DetroitSunday, 2 p.m.

at Sommet Center

NCh. 4N104.5-FM

PREDSPREDSDetroit wins2-1 after itsovertime goal

Gannett Tennessee photo

Nashvilles Jan Hlavac glides past the Detroit celebra-tion after Johan Franzen scored the game-winning goalfor the Red Wings in overtime Friday in Detroit.