Mar 30, 2003 By Commentary Mike Ciarochi 4 min read

The men’s and women’s basketball teams at California University of Pennsylvania are to be commended for outstanding seasons, but you have to wonder why coaches Bill Brown and Darcie Vincent don’t recruit more players from their own backyard. The school’s other sports teams, particularly football and baseball, recruit heavily in this area. In fact, football coach John Luckhardt got three quality players this season in Uniontown’s Harry Kaufman and the Laurel Highlands duo of quarterback Matt Humbert and receiver/defensive back Antwjuan Cox.

Meanwhile, the men’s basketball team qualified for the PSAC playoffs and the NCAA Division II national tournament, but they also suffered a pair of losses to a Clarion team led by an outstanding freshman guard named Terrance Vaughns.

Many people had said Vaughns could not be an effective Division II player for a variety of reasons, including his small stature. But the Uniontown grad proved them all wrong by excelling at Clarion to the point that he finished second in PSAC Rookie of the Year balloting. Something tells me that he could have helped the Vulcans win another game or two.

On the ladies side, Vincent is a masterful coach who guided the Lady Vulcans to PSAC and NCAA Division II East Region championships. They won a game in the Division II Elite Eight Tournament before bowing to Northern Kentucky Thursday night.

There is at least a little bit of irony in the fact that the Lady Vulcans were beaten in part by Mapletown graduate Kristin Polosky, who made what amounted to the winning free throws for Northern Kentucky.

In fairness to Vincent, she wasn’t Cal’s coach when Polosky was recruited to Northern Kentucky. And Vincent did recruit this area well enough to land Laurel Highlands’ Shelbey Wardman to Slippery Rock as a player and to her staff at Cal as a graduate assistant coach. Vincent also recruited Uniontown’s Beth Lengvarsky.

But there are other players, both boys and girls, who are available to California from the Fayette-Greene county area. Here’s to hoping they get a good look from the coaches and scouts from California.

With the end of Pitt’s basketball season comes spring football practiceand, with that comes to our office the 2003 Football Prospectus. These things are usually filled with stats and profiles of players hoping to win national awards next season, but this year’s edition offered at least one nugget.

Connellsville’s Marcus Furman has switched from offense to defense, where he will compete for playing time at cornerback. The 5-8, 185-pound junior-to-be has played tailback and wide receiver so far and has switched from one to the other numerous times.

Furman is a tremendous athlete and Pitt coach Walt Harris knows he must find a way to get him on the field with more regularity.

Also on the Pitt football roster are Rob Frederick, a redshirt junior center from Southmoreland, and Erik Gill, a redshirt sophomore tight end from Belle Vernon.

It’s not very often that I mention a column written in another publication – why give the competition more exposure? – but I feel compelled to make an exception in this case.

Ron Cook of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette wrote last week that the time has come to do away with the practice of singing our national anthem and waving American flags at athletic events. As convoluted and misguided as it was, his point was that we could avoid situations like fans of the Montreal Canadiens booing our anthem or Manhattanville College women’s basketball player Toni Smith from turning her back on our flag during the anthem.

Both of those events were in protest to our country’s military involvement in Iraq. Both, too, were prime examples of very freedom we are fighting for. For a man who makes a living by putting his opinions in print, you’d think Cook would have a better understanding of freedom of speech.

The national anthem and the American flag are symbols of our country. They are also symbols of our freedom, the very freedom that allows us to protest aspects of our country with which we do not agree.

Here’s an idea, Ron. Instead of banning our flag or our national anthem, maybe we should quit playing the games.

Sports editor Mike Ciarochi may be reached at begin mciarochi@heraldstandard.com.