By Cheval John

The Sam Houston State baseball team started the 2014 season on the right foot.

The back-to-back Southland Conference regular season champions defeated the University of Northern Colorado 5-3 at Don Sanders Stadium in Huntsville, Texas.

This was the first time that the Bearkats have won an opening season game under head coach David Pierce.

Hayden Simerly went 2 for 3 with two runs batted in.

Colt Atwood got two hits out of four at-bats with an RBI.

Though starting pitcher Chris Hammer shut down the Bearkats’ offense for the first three innings, Tyler Eppler equaled his counter part with four shut out innings.

That allowed Sam Houston to strike first in the bottom of the fourth with two runs to give them a 2-0 lead.

The Bearkats played small ball and got some offensive production from the veterans on the squad at the right time in the fourth.

Atwood jump started it with a double down the right field line and advanced to third on a ground out by Anthony Azar.

Simerly’s sacrifice fly scored Colt Atwood from third that made it 1-0.

After Carter Burgess hit a long double to left field, he scored from second on a single by Ryan O’Hearn.

The Bears cut the lead to 2-1 on a RBI single up the middle by Jake Ekman.

Sam Houston created some cushion after scoring two runs in the bottom of the fifth for a 4-1 lead.

Ryan Farney started the party after reaching first on an error by Brandon Vaughn.

He advanced to second on a single by Corey Toups.

Atwood’s RBI single scored Farney from second base while Toups advanced to third and Atwood advanced to second on the throw home to the plate.

Then Toups scored from third on Azar’s RBI ground out.

It appeared as if the Bearkats were in control when they brought in reliever Alan Scott in place of Eppler in the sixth inning.

After getting the first two outs, the Bears strung together some runners and then
Ben Netzel hit a two out, two-run triple to pull them within 4-3.

The Bearkats didn’t panicked and increased their lead to 5-3 on an RBI single by Simerly.

Scott settled down and shut down the Bears in the final three innings to get the save.

Eppler went five innings and got the win.

Scott was only supposed to pitch up to the eighth inning, but he told his coach that he was responsible for giving up those two runs and wanted to make it up to the team.

That alone shows that they understand that they are playing for each other and are determined to start the season off right.

Game 2 of the four game series will be tomorrow at 6:30 p.m.

By Cheval John

Nobody expected Oklahoma State to lose to Texas Tech 65-61 on Saturday night.

The reason was because coming into this matchup, the Red Raiders were 3-6 in the Big 12 and 11-11 overall while the Cowboys held the No.19 position in the Associate Press poll.

It’s bad that they lost.

It’s even worst in the way that they lost.

You see, with 06.2 seconds left and the Cowboys still trailing by a possession, sophomore Marcus Smart fell into the stands after defending a dunk.

After a fan jabbed his mouth at him, Mr. Smart did the most unthinkable thing: He shoved the fan which resulted in a technical foul.

It resulted in him getting a technical foul that put the Red Raiders at the line.

I honestly think that Mr. Smart’s actions were uncalled for because he thought about himself instead of his team.

Yeah, the obnoxious fan said something to him that may have offended him and even crossed the line.

That is no excuse for him to retaliate at him because he not only represent the team, but is an ambassador to the entire student body, alumni, teachers, etc. of Oklahoma State University.

What Mr. Smart demonstrated is that he can’t handle the pressure of being a student-athlete at the moment.

Sure, he still young and will mature.

But the truth of the matter is that when he graduates and is possibly looking for a job or even decides to go to the NBA, many representatives will ask him about that incident and want to know if he will be able to handle his cool in any given situation.

They will look at the video of the game that was televised on ESPNU and see the disgraceful display in front of a national viewing audience.

This is Mr. Smart’s black mark for the rest of his life.

By Cheval John

Sam Houston State Bearkats pummeled the Lamar Cardinals 84-70 on Saturday night at Johnson Coliseum.

With the win, Sam Houston hold sole possession of second place in the Southland Conference with a 9-2 record and are 17-6 overall.

The Bearkats shot 48.2 percent from the field and went 47.1 percent from the arc.

Though Sam Houston had strong showings throughout their games, it has always been difficult for them to keep the intensity going.

It wasn’t that long ago when Sam Houston had built a 48-31 lead against the McNeese State Cowboys.

The Cowboys kept themselves in the matchup and chipped away at the lead.

It got to the point that McNeese State almost stole that game away from the Bearkats.

However, Sam Houston was able to hold on for the 86-81 win over the Cowboys.

Though this wasn’t as dramatic, it helped that Sam Houston had built a 48-27 lead at halftime.

The reason was because Sam Houston was outscored by Lamar 43-36 in the second half.

Bearkat coach Jason Hooten understands that his team still have to make improvements, especially with finishing out opponents.

“That part is kind of disappointing,” Hooten said. “We talked about it at halftime of not getting sloppy and not doing the things we need to do. You just hope that kind of stuff don’t come back to bite you.”

I definitely agree with coach Hooten because with seven games remaining that includes a re-match with league leader and arch-rival, Stephen F. Austin, they got to play their best basketball if they want to keep their momentum going before the Southland Conference Tournament begins.

By Cheval John

If someone would have told me that the Seattle Seahawks would have destroyed the Denver Broncos 43-8 to win Super Bowl XLVIII, I would have laugh.

But in reality, that was the case because of the defensive play of the “Legion of Boom” featuring Richard Sherman, Kam Chancellor, etc.

It seemed as if this would have been a great match-up because the Broncos came into this game as the No.1 offense in the National Football League (NFL), led by Peyton Manning, who had a record 55 touchdowns.

However, the Seahawks defense set the tone with a safety after a bad snap by the Broncos went into the endzone on the very first play of the game.

It got worse for the Broncos as they committed two costly turnovers courtesy of interceptions by Manning that resulted in Seahawks touchdowns by Marshawn Lynch and a pick-6 by Malcolm Smith.

To put an exclamation point, Percy Harvin, who didn’t play much in the regular season, returned a kickoff 87 yards for the touchdown to open the second half.

The Broncos finally got on the board with no time left in the third quarter after Manning connected with Demaryius Thomas for the touchdown.

One thing we learn after this epic route is that no matter how good the offense is, defense will always find a way to shut you down.

The Seahawks proved it and they are now the Super Bowl Champions.