optimist_2004-11-19

OPTIMISTTHE

Department of Journalism and Mass Communication Abilene Christian University Serving the ACU community since 1912

FRIDAYNovember 19, 2004

Vol. 93, No. 261 section, 10 pages

www.acuoptimist.com

Held in check:The Chess Club will spon-sor a tournament Saturdayin the Campus Center.

Page 7

Back to the ‘Futures’:Jimmy Eat World released its new album,Futures, which does not stray far from the band’ssignature sound.

Page 5

Off and running:The men’s basketball teambegan its season by defeat-ing Rhema Bible College.

0

By JONATHAN SMITHEDITOR IN CHIEF

Kevin Watson, chief administrative servicesofficer, spoke to Student Congress onWednesday night and answered questionsregarding the university’s meal plan policy.

Watson talked to students for 30 minutes,answering questions that ranged from why stu-dents cannot swipe their cards multiple timesper meal to if there are plans to extend somefood vendors’ hours of operation.

Much of the conversation centered on howthe university budgets for students’ meals and ifthe students received their money’s worth.

When asked why students could no longeruse multiple meal plans at any given meal,Watson said it would likely increase the numberof meal plans used, effectively increasing theprice of the meal plans.

“When we price our meal plans, we pricethem expecting you to eat between 75 to 80 per-

cent of those,” Watson said. “If meal plan usagegoes up, we have to start charging more for it.”

Because ACU outsources food services toARAMARK, the university pays a fee for eachmeal plan used. Watson said using ARAMARKseemed to be more cost-effective than if the uni-versity managed food services.

Watson said individual students could havelegitimate arguments against the current mealplan system, butthe current sys-tem in placeprovides themost cost-effec-tive service tothe most stu-dents.

The Students’ Association also discussed abill creating guidelines for a future scholarshipfor student leaders on campus. However, asdebate brought the meeting near 7 p.m. andCongress drew close to losing quorum, mem-bers opted to table the bill until a later time.

The bill would have created the structure fora committee to select recipients for the scholar-

ship. The amount of the scholarship each yearcould depend on how much money was givenfor the fund.

The bill, presented by junior Sen. SarahCarlson and Rep. Ashley Downhour, BiblicalStudies Building, would have also set guidelinesfor selecting the scholarship recipient. Thescholarship would be for students involved as aleader in at least two campus activities and

maintain atleast a 3.0 gradepoint average.

Some mem-bers ofCongress ques-tioned thewording of sev-

eral other of the scholarship’s requirements,including that recipients never have been arrest-ed except for civil disobedience and never beenon academic probation.

Rep. Chris Smith, Foster Science Building,suggested replacing such phrases as “never

SA tables plan for scholarship meantfor student leaders on campus

Watson discusses meal plans with Congress

By MALLORY SHERWOODSTAFF WRITER

Lizz Alvarez has a chance.She went to nationals four years ago and

placed 14th. Now she is looking to go again, thistime to win.

This weekend, ACU’s nationally ranked foren-sic team, a competitive public speaking anddebate team, is expecting several of its membersto receive a bid this weekend at the tournamentin Minneapolis, Minn., to go to nationals inAkron, Ohio, in the spring. Alvarez, senior polit-ical science major from McAllen and captain ofthe forensic debate team, only needs to place fifthin this tournament to continueon to nationals.

“Debating is what I reallylove to do,” Alvarez said. “Weare working really hard, and Iexpect more than one of us willget our nationals’ bid this time.”

Graduate assistant NicoleRyerson, graduate student inhuman communication, saidshe agrees with Alvarez thatmany could make it to nationals next weekend.

“It’s really difficult to say how many, but theteam is full of really talented individuals,”Ryerson said.

Alvarez joins a team of around 14 studentsthat competes on the weekends in places such asConnecticut, Indiana, Nebraska and Houston.She said many people at ACU don’t know aboutthe forensic team, but the team is known andrespected across the nation, as having membersthat are nationally ranked.

ACU debates against teams from Concordia,University of Texas, Western Kentucky and

Several members could receive bidfor tournament this weekend

Debate teamto contendfor nationals

By DEE TRAVISARTS EDITOR

The Service Action Lead-ership Team is preparing tofeed more than 50 families inneed Monday for the Thanks-giving holidays.

For the third consecutiveyear, SALT has worked in con-junction with Taylor Elemen-

tary School and UniversitySeminar classes to make thisservice project happen.

“It’s amazing to watch stu-dents and faculty come togeth-er in service,” said WadeHolmes, senior marketingmajor from Arlington andcoordinator for the Thanks-giving Meals Delivery project.

SALT asked every U-100class to donate money to feedone or two families forThanksgiving. Holmes said themeals are big, full Thanks-giving meals, so $45 feeds onefamily. Therefore, in a class of20 people, everyone was askedto donate $2.

“Most of these families arenear-homeless,” said Holmes.“It’s pretty cool that two dol-

SALT collecting money to provide 50 familieswith Thanksgiving meals during next week

“I was freaked out,” saidGentry, now an assistant pro-fessor of political science. “Ihad never been to the MiddleEast before … and I was quiteanxious.”

As part of her doctoral dis-sertation on female terrorismin the 1960s, Gentry visitedJordan to interview LeilaKhaled, who first gained famein the late ‘60s for hijacking

two airplanes. Gentry receivedher master’s degree from theUniversity of St. Andrews inScotland in international secu-rity studies, and Dr. PaulWilkinson, her doctoral super-visor, suggested she study thefemale terrorist. She said thatas she researched, she foundthe female terrorist portrayedas a “demonic, rage-filled, non-rational, brainless, evil entity,”and she did not agree with thisportrayal.

“These women are still justas rational as male terrorists,”she said. “They’re driven by thesame causes.”

Gentry came to ACU in thefall of 2003 and teaches in theDepartment of Political Scienceand the Honors Program. Shesaid that she would one daylike to see a course on terror-ism studies; until then, sheuses her knowledge and expe-riences in her current classes,like International Relations.

As a framework for herstudies, Gentry used the NewSocial Movement Theory,which argues that certainmovements are cultural identi-ty movements, like the Civil

Gentry targets terror in Middle East

By MALLORY SHERWOODSTAFF WRITER

For 200 freshman womenin Gardner Hall, it all camedown to their gobble—andthey should start practicing.

On Thursday, Gardner Hallresidents participated in a gob-bling contest as one of theactivities during a special

Thanksgiving meal given byGardner staff in appreciationof the women. The meal,catered by ARAMARK for twomeal plans, was in the HiltonRoom in the Campus Center at5:30 p.m.

“The RAs [resident assis-tants] have been thinking ofideas of activities to do and

thought a gobbling contestwould be fun,” said PamCarroll, assistant director inGardner Hall and senior com-posite interdisciplinary majorfrom Hampton, Va. “They’llprobably see who is the loud-est or who sounds most like aturkey; it should be reallyfun.”

Although this is not thefirst year a Thanksgiving meal

Gardner Hall residents treated to Thanksgivingmeal Thursday by staff in show of appreciation

EMILY CHASTAIN/Staff Photographer

Dr. Caron Gentry, assistant professor of political science, looks at photographs she took of the landscape in the Middle East. She said the highlight of thetrip for her was riding on a camel. Gentry visited the Middle East to conduct interviews for her doctoral dissertation.

An attitude of gratitude

BRIAN SCHMIDT/Chief Photographer

Kevin Watson, chief administrative services officer,speaks to the Students’ Association on Wednesdayabout the university’s meal plan policy.

See DEBATE Page 9

See SALT Page 8 See GARDNER Page 8

See GENTRY Page 8

See SA Page 9

By CHRISTY GOWERFEATURES EDITOR

Six months after Sept. 11, 2001, Dr. CaronGentry decided to go to the Middle East. Americahad recently invaded Afghanistan to remove alQaeda and the Taliban. The fear of further attackson Americans was still fresh. She went by herself.To meet with a well-known terrorist.

Campus Court closingCampus Court will be closed from EN

18th to EN 20th beginning Friday at mid-night and ending Monday morning.

Alvarez

“There’s nothing wrong with setting a high standard for people you are going to pay.”

Bob Parsons, Administration Building representative for SA

Calendar Events20 Saturday19 Friday

21 Sunday

Friday, November 19, 2004

CAMPUS

23 Tuesday

25 Thursday

The Optimist maintains thiscalendar for the ACU communityto keep track of local social, aca-demic and service opportunities.

Groups may send ann-ouncements directly to [email protected] or to the Page2 Editor, ACU Box 27892, Abilene,TX 79699.

To ensure that an item willappear on time, the announce-ment should be sent at least 10days before. The Optimist mayedit items for space and style.

Corrections and clarifica-tions of published news articleswill be printed in this space in atimely manner.

ChapelCheck-UpCredited Chapels to date: 64

7Credited Chapels remaining:

About This PageVolunteer Opportunities

22Monday

&DAY

Keegan Chumley senior recital, 8p.m., Williams Performing ArtsCenter Recital Hall.

24 Wednesday

The Student-Athlete Ad-visory Committee needs volun-teers for a Habitat for Humanityproject Saturday at 8:30 a.m. Vol-unteers will meet at the house at1726 N. 7th St. For more informa-tion, contact the athletics office atExt. 2353.

The counseling center needsa graphic design student to vol-unteer creative talents and servicesto assist with designing bulletinboards. The boards will function inthe residence halls to provide edu-

cational information on differenttopics for students. If interested,contact Steve Rowlands at Ext.2876 or e-mail [email protected].

The Service Action Lead-ership Team is raising money topurchase Thanksgiving mealsfor at least 50 families from TaylorElementary School. Each mealcosts $45, and student donationsare needed. Students are encour-aged to bring donations of anyamount to the Volunteer and Ser-vice-Learning Center by Friday.

Thanksgiving holiday begins.

Campus Center closes, noon.

Portland, Ore., Spring BreakCampaign recruiting, all day,Campus Center tables.

Purple Friday, 9 a.m.-3 p.m., LivingRoom.

Leukemia and Lymphoma Societybake sale, 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m.,Campus Center tables.

Tiffany Hamilton Run T-shirt sales,11:30 a.m.-3 p.m., Campus Centerticket windows.

National Association for the Ad-vancement of Colored People bakesale, 11:30 a.m.-2 p.m., CampusCenter tables.

Reservations Only, 6-7:30 p.m.

ACU Opera Theatre’s Marriage ofFigaro, 7:30 p.m., Cullen Auditor-ium.

Thanksgiving holiday.

Campus Center closes, noon.

Chess Club, 8 a.m.-2 p.m., HiltonRoom.

Philharmonic Concert, 8 p.m.,Abilene Civic Center.

ACU Opera Theatre’s Marriage ofFigaro, 7:30 p.m., Cullen Auditor-ium.


Venture Out product sales, 11:30a.m.-1 p.m., Campus Center tables.

Campus Life Administration Coor-dinators’ meeting, 2-4 p.m., Faculty-Staff Dining Room.

Social club officers’ meeting, 5-6:30p.m., Living Room.

Thanksgiving holiday begins afterevening classes.


Recreation Area closes, 4 p.m.

Faculty Women’s meeting, 11:30a.m.-1 p.m., Faculty-Staff DiningRoom.

26 FridayThanksgiving Holiday.

Campus Center Closed.

Friday, November 19, 2004 ADVERTISEMENT

Friday, November 19, 2004CAMPUS NEWS

By SUSAN SPIVEY STUDENT REPORTER

In an effort to raise aware-ness about long-term missions,the Institute for Missions andEvangelism will provide a din-ner from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Nov.30 in the Williams PerformingArts Center.

Dr. Sonny Guild, director ofthe Institute for Missions andEvangelism, said the dinner,“Team Quest 2004: A Calling toMissions,” will celebrate ACUstudent mission teams that aregetting ready to go to Boston,Miami, Thailand, Tanzania, theCzech Republic, Belgium, Aust-ralia, El Salvador, Sudan andPeru.

The dinner also will informstudents about teams that areforming and highlight sites thatneed missionaries, Guild said.Faculty will pray over the mis-sion teams and bless them, hesaid.

“It’s a thanksgiving kind ofcelebration,” he said.

Guild said students interest-ed in missions or church plant-ing are invited to Team Quest atno cost. The deadline to sign upis Sunday at the Institute forMissions and Evangelism in theBiblical Studies Building. Guildsaid the institute has reserved150 seats, and the location canhold up to 200.

Guild said that Team Questis the first public announce-ment about the new missionteams.

“Many mission teams havecome together at ACU, but notmuch has been done to publiclycelebrate it,” he said.

The institute wants to en-courage students to pursuelong-term missions, Guild said.He said interest in long-term

missions has decreased becauseshorter trips have become sopopular.

“Echoing Jesus’ words, weneed workers to go out into theharvest field,” Guild said.

One of those workers is RuthAshley, junior social workmajor from American Samoaand a member of the missionteam to Australia, who will berecognized at the dinner.

“There’s such a need there,”Ashley said. “People tend not torealize that because it’s such anadvanced nation, but Chris-tianity is almost nonexistent inAustralia.”

Ashley has not told manypeople about her upcomingmission trip, but her family andfriends have been supportive.

“Especially on a college cam-pus, it’s important that peoplebe aware of missions and theneed for missions,” she said.

Ashley said she becameinterested in the Australia mis-sion team because she grew upin American Samoa, where herparents were vocational mis-sionaries. She tried to convincea friend to join the team butinstead ended up convincingherself, she said.

The team began forming lastOctober and hopes to leave forNewcastle, Australia, in early2007, Ashley said. She said thestudents plan to plant a churchand do other types of outreachministry with campuses andyouth.

The 11-member team ismade up almost entirely ofACU undergraduates, includingfive couples and Ashley. All ofthem have made a commitmentof at least five years, Ashleysaid.

“Personally, I could seemyself staying indefinitely,”Ashley said.

By JENNA LUCADOSTUDENT REPORTER

Dr. Gregory Straughn isteaching his 4-year-old daugh-ter, Eva, a new word: D-I-S-S-E-R-T-A-T-I-O-N, a word thatStraughn says he is proud tohave accomplished.

“Eva knows that there are alot of changes going on in mylife,” said Straughn, instructorof music.

Since the fulfillment of hisdoctorate at the University ofNorth Texas, Straughn willtake on a new challenge: chairof the Music Department.

“In December, I will begraduating with my own capand gown, hang the graduationcap on the door handle, and inJanuary, I will put on the hat ofchair of the Music Depart-

ment,” Straughn said.In the spring semester of

2004, Dr. Paul Piersall, currentchair and professor of music,informed Dr. Colleen Durring-ton, dean of the College of Artsand Sciences, that he wantedto step down after nine years aschair.

Piersall said he has felt for-tunate to be chair during sucha historical time in ACU’s his-tory with the planning andconstruction of the new Wil-liams Performing Arts Center,but it is time for a change.

“When I took over the posi-tion [of chair], I never intend-ed to be a career administra-tor,” Piersall said. “My firstlove is working with the stu-dents and in the classroom ona full-time basis.”

In January, Straughn willtake over the position whilePiersall takes a semester-longsabbatical to work on aresearch project, developingaccompaniments of musical

compositions from the 17thand 18th centuries that havenever been performed.

Piersall said that by step-ping down as chair, he hopesto sing more and focus on hisnew position as governor ofthe National Association ofTeachers of Singing, an organi-zation that consists of voiceteachers from Oklahoma,Texas and New Mexico whohelp develop singers throughcompetitions, workshops andmore.

Though Straughn will takeon the responsibilities of chairfor the spring semester of2005, he will not officially berecognized as the chair of theMusic Department until thefall semester of 2005.

“It is good that Dr. Piersallwill still be around next semes-ter so that I have someone todraw on,” Straughn said.

Straughn already had aslight taste of what it will belike as chair when he attended

some of the Thursday eveningchair meetings this semester.

“It’s pretty intimidating,”Straughn said. “I put my train-ing wheels on for a few of themeetings. Come January, Iguess I will be forced to takethem off.”

Though the role may appearintimidating, Straughn said thefaculty is very supportive.

Durrington individually in-terviewed the faculty for theposition, and they had theopportunity to express theiropinions about who might bebest qualified for the job. Thedean had the final say.

“I understand that severalfaculty, me included, were con-sistently mentioned as possiblecandidates, so I think the fac-ulty’s wishes were respected,”Straughn said.

Straughn said one aspectthat gave him an advantage inthe decision process was thefact that he teaches generalcourses as opposed to many of

the other teachers who special-ize in areas, such as instru-ments and voice. Instructorsfor general courses might havethe ability to offer more timein an administrative role,Straughn said.

Although Straughn willhold the position of chair, hewill not have to entirely giveup his job as an instructor.

“I like the idea of workingwith the administration andfaculty, yet not cutting myselfoff from the students,”Straughn said.

Balancing the classroomand administrative jobs will bea learning process Straughnsaid he is willing to face.

“I think in order to be agood chair, you have to have agood sense of what the facultyneeds, what the present stu-dents and future studentsneed, and what the administra-tion needs,” Straughn said.“You are in the middle of a tri-angle.”

For the future, Straughnsaid he hopes to continue toincrease the number of outsideartists or performers who visitthe ACU campus.

“Getting great artists oncampus inspires our studentsto be great artists,” Straughnsaid.

Another long-term goal ofhis is to pursue and help fur-ther an idea that Piersall hadsuggested: a center for Chris-tianity in the arts. This centeris still in the brainstormingstages but may include thepossibilities of recording stu-dios, classes geared towardmusic business and musictechnology.

“We have space for that,”Straughn said. “I feel stronglythat ACU should have a centerfor Christianity in the arts tohelp teach students of ways thearts can reflect Christianity.”


Marcellina, played by Tracie Smith, senior music teaching major from Houston; Count Almaviva, played by Travis Branam, senior musicteaching major from Canyon Country, Calif.; Dr. Bartelo, played by Travis McGuire, senior biblical text major; and Don Basilio, played byZach Tabers, sophomore vocal performance major from Abilene, sing in “The Marriage of Figaro” at the dress rehearsal Wednesday. ACUOpera Theatre will present the opera Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in Cullen Auditorium.

By JENNA LUCADOSTUDENT REPORTER

One of the largest food andclothing drives in Abilene willtake place Friday from 7 a.m.to 7 p.m. at Arrow Ford, anAbilene car dealership locatedat 4001 S. First St.

Mission Thanksgiving is theonly fund-raiser for Love andCare Ministries, an Abileneoutreach ministry to the poorand homeless. Last year itraised $21,000 and filled oneand one-half 18-wheelers withfood. Five hundred volunteersworked at the event, but MarkHewitt, founder and executivedirector of Love and CareMinistries, said more are need-ed this year.

“We can never have enoughvolunteers,” Hewitt said.

Volunteers direct cars asthey drop off contributions.They also load the 18-wheelerswith the donations and workthe next day to help unload thetrucks at The Mission, thechurch Hewitt pastors.

“We have volunteers fromthe ages of kindergarten all theway up to the sweet elderlyladies that collect money dona-tions,” said Brooke Miller, vol-unteer coordinator of MissionThanksgiving.

Tracie Williams, director ofmarketing for Arrow Ford, saidCooper and Abilene highschools sent two school busesof football players to help loadthe trucks last year.

“We really needed those bigguys to help with all of theheavy loads,” she said.

Mission Thanksgiving hassix 18-wheelers to fill this year,

and several radio and broad-cast stations are helping.Cumulus Broadcasting, KTXSand KGNZ are promoting theevent and updating listenersabout items still needed theday of the drive.

Love and Care Ministriesand Arrow Ford have beensponsors of the event since itbegan six years ago. Hewittwas a friend of Arrow Ford’sowner, who was looking for away to reach out and help thepoor of Abilene.

“It started out like a smallseed but has really grown,”Williams said. “Sort of like thebread and the fish–Jesus tooksomething small and multi-plied it.”

Last year, food raised fromthe event lasted four months,while clothing donations weredistributed six months afterMission Thanksgiving. Wil-liams said food and winter

supplies are the most-neededitems.

After the food and clothingis stocked at The Mission,Hewitt and others will distrib-ute the items to the poor andhomeless three nights a weekand through service projects,such as the preparation of 100boxed dinners given atChristmas.

“They are very hands-on,and people can rest assure thatthe majority of their money isgoing toward the people inneed,” Williams said.

To volunteer at MissionThanksgiving, contact BrookeMiller at 692-9500. To donateitems, drop them off Friday atArrow Ford.

To volunteer for any otherLove and Care Ministries proj-ect, call 670-0499.

New leader takes charge of Music Department in springStraughn chosen

to lead after Piersallsteps down

Students feel callingto mission fields

Upcoming dinner will recognize

teams leaving soon

Mission Thanksgivingbenefits poor,

homeless in Abilene

Food, clothing drive to accept donations Friday

How dare you?

E-mail Lucado at: [email protected]

E-mail Spivey at: [email protected]

E-mail Lucado at: [email protected]

ARTSFRIDAYNovember 19, 2004 OPTIMIST

By JEFF GIDDENSSPECIAL CONTRIBUTOR

-Album Review-

Jimmy Eat World

Futures

Jimmy Eat World has a his-tory of heartbreak. Their 1999album Clarity was a stunningwork of beautifully craftedsongs about longing, despera-tion and lost love. Theyupped the ante for 2001’sBleed American, which rodeCars-esque power pop to afew radio hits and musicvideos for Sweetness and TheMiddle. However sunny BleedAmerican sounded, it resonat-ed with lines like “You rippedmy heart right out” and “Thesweetness will not be con-cerned with me.”

So, what to expect fromtheir new release, Futures?Well, when lead singer JimAdkins sings “Say hello togood times” on the openingtitle track, he is lying throughhis teeth.

Fueled by producer GilNorton’s panache for loudguitars, Futures comes roaringout of the gate with the afore-mentioned title track. Thissong is a virtual primer ofJimmy Eat World’s entire cata-log, from the riff-rock open-ing to the chugging guitars ofthe verse, finally descendingto the ringing, layered bridge.

Just Tonight is a hard-charg-

ing but ultimately forgettablesong that leads into Work, asong that finds Adkins con-vincing his girl to skip townwith him. Fourth track Kill ispretty catchy, segueingsmoothly from an acousticintro to a rollicking chorus, asAdkins declares, “I’ve alwaysbeen the easy kill,” as if wecouldn’t tell already.

Jen is a particularly poppysong, with Adkins putting aname to the girl before, yetagain, trying to convince herto “jet across the country.”Lead single Pain laments “akiss with open eyes” overmore group-shouted vocalsthan a Def Leppard tributeband.

The album hits a low pointwith the utterly abysmal (andabsolutely predictable) Drugsor Me. This painfully slowsong consists of standard fareguitars supporting Adkins’desperate plea for a loved oneto avoid said vices. The songis not inherently horrible, butits slow pace does not helpdisguise the fact that JimAdkins’ heart is on his sleeveand bleeding all over theplace. To make matters worse,this carnage goes on for sixand a half minutes.

Luckily, Polaris picks upthe slack, with Tom Linton’sechoing guitars pushing thesong forward. Nothing’s Wrongharkens back to Clarity’s YourNew Aesthetic, with its off-kil-ter hook and plethora ofshouted vocals.

The runaway theme con-tinues in Night Drive, as Ad-kins takes his girl out to thedesert. The song’s simpledrum machine beat, insistentacoustic guitar and hauntingbackground vocals actuallymake it rather appropriate fora drive at night.

Unfortunately, Adkins dro-ps lines such as “Do you feel

bad, like I feel bad?” whichmake me want to swerve offthe road. Futures ends aboutas epic as this band gets.Where Drugs or Me failed withits longevity, 23 succeeds,building strings, piano andmore of Linton’s ambient gui-tar work to reveal deeper lay-ers of sound as the track pro-gresses.

Futures does not stray farfrom Jimmy Eat World’s sig-nature sound or its repeatedthemes of cars, girls andregret. The album title seemsout of place to me. If I didn’tknow any better, I wouldthink he was a freshman in

college, the way he longs forhis high school glory days.However, for every cringe-worthy lyric, he has twocatchy pop hooks up hissleeve. Although some maycriticize the band for stickingto its guns, the blend of loudguitars, quiet droning pas-sages and Zach Lind’s alwaysexcellent drumming contin-ues to work well.

Although Futures mightnot be great, Adkins’ strongear for melody makes it unde-niably good.

Jimmy Eat World goes back to the future

E-mail Giddens at: [email protected]

The Box Office

Figures are for the week-end of November 12-14 andare in millions. Total grossesin parentheses.

1 The Incredibles—$50.3 ($143)

2 The Polar Express—$23.3($30.6)

3 After the Sunset—$11.1 (new)

4 Seed of Chucky—$8.77 (new)

5 Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason—$8.68 (new)

6 Ray—$8.41 ($52.5)7 The Grudge—$7.01

($99.2)8 Saw—$6.44 ($45.8)9 Shall We Dance—$4.02

($48.7)10 Alfie—$2.74 ($11.1)

New York TimesBest-Selling

Fiction Novels

Numbers indicate: currentposition, last week’s positionand total weeks on the list.

1/-/1 Janet Evanovich, Metro Girl2/1/2 David Baldacci, Hour Game3/4/86 Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code4/2/2 Danielle Steel, Echoes5/5/59 Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet InHeaven6/3/4 Nora Roberts, Northern Lights7/6/7 Philip Roth, The Plot Against America8/-/1 Fannie Flagg, A Redbird Christmas9/8/4 Anita Shreve,Light on Snow10/10/7 Stephen King, The Dark Tower

Today’s MoviesNational Treasure—starring

Nicolas Cage, Sean Bean; direct-ed by Joel Turteltaub.

Cage plays a man who bel-ieves the founders of Americahid a treasure and that the treas-ure map resides on the back ofthe Declaration of Independence.

Overnight—directed by TroyMontana, Mark Brian Smith.

This documentary film showshow Miramax’s Harvey Wein-stein helped turn Boston bar-tender Troy Duffy’s screenplayfor The Boondock Saints into asuccessful feature film.

The SpongeBob SquarePantsMovie—directed by ShermCohen, Stephen Hillenburg.

Based on the popular Nick-elodeon show, SpongeBob em-barks on his first big-screen jour-ney to return King Neptune’sstolen crown.

Album Rating 67 out of 100

This isn’t comparable to a67/F on a test, but insteadmeans the album falls in thetop 33 percent of all existingalbums.

Top-Selling AlbumsNumbers indicate: current posi-tion, last week’s position andtotal weeks on the chart.

1/-/1 Various Artists, Now 172/-/1 A Perfect Circle, eMOTIVe3/5/8 Nelly,

Suit4/6/33 Usher, Confessions5/4/3 Rod Stewart, Stardust... The Great AmericanSongbook Vol. III6/7/5 George Strait, 50 Number Ones7/8/10 Ray Charles,

Genius Loves Company8/2/2 Trick Daddy, Thug Matrimony: Married To TheStreets9/10/3 Ray Charles, Ray 10/1/2 R. Kelly & Jay-Z,Unfinished Business

Photo courtesy of WWW.FLOWERBOOKING.COM

The four members of Jimmy Eat World pose in a rather unconventional promo shot. Their latest album,“Futures,” never strays too far from the band’s typical sound that fans have grown to love.

Other Jimmy Eat World AlbumsHere are some the band’s previ-ous releases:

•Pain•Believe In What You Want

•Maximum Eat World•Bleed American•Singles•Clarity•Static Prevails

During every school break, Ihold my breath and monitormyACU for mass e-mails fromDean Barnard, hoping that

everyone re-turns toschool safely.It seems thatmore wrecksand moredeaths occurduring schoolbreaks, so I’malways nerv-ous untilMonday whenmost studentsare back inclass.

As a stu-dent, I alwayspray that myc l a s s m a t e sand friendswill be pro-tected. As ajournalist, Ialways hopethat my co-

workers and I won’t have tocover another story about adeath.

This holiday season, howev-er, the roads seem to containsome new obstacles, especiallyinvolving animals.

A story by the AssociatedPress on Thursday announcedthat last year, 210 people diedin collisions with animals,which is 40 more people whodied than the year before. Thewrecks peaked in Novemberand mostly involved deer; thismonth is mating and huntingseason, so deer are more active.

Another report by theAssociated Press said this weeka 44-year-old woman was hos-pitalized after a group of teensallegedly threw a 20-poundfrozen turkey through her carwindshield while she was driv-ing down the road. The womanis in critical condition, and po-lice are looking for the teens sothey can question them.

Whether dead or alive,frozen or still breathing, ani-mals and other road hazardscreate a perilous environmenton the highway, and accidentsreadily occur.

But many of the wrecks andthe deaths can be prevented.Simple things like driving thespeed limit and paying atten-tion to surroundings can pre-vent collisions. And the Insur-ance Institute for HighwaySafety said most of the animal-related deaths last year couldhave been prevented by wear-ing a seatbelt in a car or wear-ing a helmet on a motorcycle.

So during these holidays,whether driving 30 minutes tograndma’s house or 10 hours tosee friends, be careful on theroad and watch out for ani-mals—of the live and the fro-zen kind.

On Veterans Day, an aver-age 7.7 million watched theuncut, unedited and R-ratedSaving Private Ryan on ABC,

even though66 of ABC’smore than 220affiliate sta-tions, nearlyone-third ofthe country,pulled the mo-vie out of fearof indecencyfines from theFederal Com-m u n i c a t i o n

Commission.The FCC slammed CBS

affiliates with a record$550,000 fine after Janet Jack-son exposed herself during theSuper Bowl halftime show, areprimand television stationsare being all-to-careful toavoid. According to MSNBCnews, the FCC could impose afine of up to $32,500 on eachstation that aired Ryan. It ruledthat U2’s Bono’s using an

expletive at the 2003 GoldenGlobes was indecent and pro-fane, a ruling in direct contrastwith its previous stance thattook the context of the profan-ity into account, as in whetherit was deliberate or gratuitous.

That the FCC has thismuch control in scaring mediawith indecency fines showsthat its regulations and cen-sorship have gotten out ofhand. That the media suc-cumbed to that fear shows thestate of our blindly politicallycorrect society.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.,a former prisoner of war inVietnam, introduced the film,and parental advisory warn-ings were aired periodicallythroughout the broadcast ofStephen Spielberg’s Oscar-winning film that opens witha violent depiction of D-Day

and portrays the harsh reali-ties of war.

ABC aired the film in itsentirety in 2001 and 2002. It’sinteresting they aired the filmwhen America wasn’t at war,but now that we’re in Iraq, withAmericans dying by the day, wecan’t stop and recognize thebrutalities they face. Profanityand violence in war are allowedon the battlefield, but how dareyou make us watch it on TV.

To quote Frank Rich of TheNew York Times, “In our newpolitically correct Americanculture, war is always heck.”

The 2001 and 2002 airingsgarnered audiences of 17.9million and 8.9 million, re-spectively. Obviously, theaudience this year would havebeen larger had it not beenpulled from so many stations.In all three airings, according

to Nielsen Media Research,children between the ages of 2and 11 made up 4 percent ofthe viewing audience.

Nearly the entire audiencethis year—7 million out of7.7 million—was over the ageof 18, with the largest segmentover the age of 50.

By these statistics, it seemsthe commission needn’t worryabout young children viewingindecent material duringprimetime television hours. Ifan 8-year-old is watchingwhat they want to watch at 8p.m. by themselves, then thatis the issue at hand —notwhether or not the programshould be on television in thefirst place.

Adults should be allowedto decide what they them-selves are old enough towatch. Parents should do theparenting—not the govern-ment.

Recently I read an article onNewsweek.com in which theauthor, Melinda Henneberger,criticized political commenta-tors who blame Teresa HeinzKerry for her husband’s loss inthis year’s presidential election.Throughout Kerry’s campaign, Iwatched as Teresa traveled thecountry to speak on her hus-band’s behalf and was veryimpressed with her honesty andpassion. It’s a shame she wascriticized for being too loud,outspoken and confident tobecome the next first lady.

Why were Americans soafraid of her personality andviewpoints? Perhaps it is be-cause the woman knows whatshe is talking about and is notafraid to speak her mind, some-thing rare even in our modernculture. The reactions Teresareceived are quite ironic for anation that prides itself on “free-dom of speech” and “equalityfor all.” Oh wait I forgot—thatmeans equality for all men and“freedom of speech” for thosewho do not oppose mainstreamvalues and opinions. So what ifthe woman has a fortune andhad a life before she marriedJohn Kerry and is not afraid toacknowledge those things? Sheshould be praised for doing so,and as Henneberger points out,she could be wasting her moneyon buying shoes but insteadchooses to use her resources tofight for better health care andeducation reform.

We really need to get overour inhibitions and sociallyconditioned ideas of genderroles, and begin embracing theintelligent, courageous andoutspoken woman of the 21stcentury.

April Cordero sophomore electronic media

majorfrom Abilene

“Ramen noo-dles and gush-ers.”

It’s interesting, now that we’re in Iraq, we can’tstop and recognize the brutalities troops face.

A few of our favorite thanksAs Thanksgiv-

ing draws near,thoughts of turkey

and pie fill the mindsof the Optimist staff,

making it impossible for usto think of anything but the

coming holiday. Here’s a taste ofwhat we’re thankful for:

Few things make me morethankful from our readers thanthose who know how to appro-priately disagree with the Op-timist. Opinions are put forth inthis space each issue, and readerswho understand the editorial pol-icy printed at the bottom of eachopinion page write infinitely bet-

ter responses toopinions they dis-agree with. Thesekinds of respons-es—whether cor-rect or misconceived—push us tobe better journalists and make usbetter able to serve the reader.

-Jonathan Smith

I am grateful for the friendswho have invited me into theirhomes for Thanksgiving. This willnot be the first short holiday that Ihave spent with friends instead ofrelatives, but after each longweekend, I return to ACU withnew memories. Whether it’s afriend asking me what will make

Thanksgiving feel more home-like, or a friend’s mom making mean Easter basket, I have experi-enced Christian love by not beingable to travel home on holidays.

-Jaci Schneider

Post-it Notes save my sanityon a daily basis. As I write this, Ihave 18 stuck to my computermonitor, reminding me of impor-tant phone numbers, errands torun and T-shirts to order, amongnumerous other things. They

stare at me as Isit at my deskand help me re-member vitalin format ion.

I’m thankful that these happy-yel-low little strips of paper jog mymemory and keep my life in orderfrom day to day.

-Lori Bredemeyer

This semester I have beenthankful for phone conversationswith my brother in L.A., myfriends and family’s continuedsupport, Dr. Aquino’s Philosophyof Religion class, Jon Stewart andthe entire cast of The Daily Showand The West Wing, especially

reruns from the first two seasons,which are perfect.

-Sarah Carlson

I am thankful for the opportu-nities that God has given meupon finding and coming toACU. I am able to begin my ca-reer and continue the learningprocess while in an upper-levelstaff position at the best collegenewspaper in the state, the Op-timist. I am thankful for the amaz-ing staff that I get to work withevery day. Despite the abundanceof stress and the lack of free time,I would not give up what I amdoing for the world.

-Brian Schmidt

In Your Words

VIEWSFRIDAY OPTIMIST November 19, 2004

OPTIMIST Editor in ChiefJonathan Smith

Managing EditorLori Bredemeyer

The Optimist Editorial Board

Opinion EditorJaci Schneider

Copy EditorSarah Carlson

Faculty AdviserDr. Cheryl Bacon

Ad ManagerChristi Stark

Published by the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication,

Abilene Christian University

Editorial and letter policyUnsigned editorials are the opinions

of the Optimist Editorial Board and may notnecessarily reflect the views of the universi-ty or its administration.

Signed columns, cartoons and let-ters are the opinions of their creators andmay not necessarily reflect the viewpoints ofthe Optimist, its Editorial Board or the uni-versity.

The Optimist encourages reader re-sponse through letters to the editor but re-serves the right to limit frequent contributors

or to refuse to print letters containing per-sonal attacks, obscenity, defamation, erro-neous information or invasion of privacy.

Please limit letters to 350 words orfewer. A name and phone number must beincluded for verification purposes. Phonenumbers will not be published.

Address letters to: ACU Box 27892

Abilene, TX 79699E-mail letters to:

[email protected]

Optimist contact informationNewsroom:(325) 674-2439

Sports desk:(325) 674-2684

Advertising office:(325) 674-2463

Photo department:(325) 674-2499

Subscriptions ($45/academic year):(325) 674-2296

Online:www.acuoptimist.com

In My Words Daniel Barcroft

What are you thankful for thisThanksgiving?

I am thankful for the amazing staff I get towork with every day

The issue:Thanksgiving is lessthan a week away.Our view:Although it mayseem unoriginal andtrite, the Optimistfeels thatThanksgiving truly isa good time toremember the waysGod had blessed ourlives. So the EditorialBoard members haveshared what they’rethankful for.

Cash Teaguefreshman youth and family ministry majorfrom Dallas

THE

Government shouldn’t play role of parents

E-mail Carlson at: [email protected] or [email protected]

Sarah Carlson

I am theEnemy

Embraceintelligentwomen

“EverythingGod has givenme.”

Jennifer Lunasophomore criminal justice majorfrom Dallas

“I’m thankful forelectricity when itgets turned on afterbeing shut off forthree days.

Krystal Kriegjunior youth and family ministry majorfrom Plano

Chief PhotographerBrian Schmidt

E-mail Bredemeyer at: [email protected] or [email protected]

“Comic booksand beautifulwomen.”

David Chisolmjunior English and sociology majorfrom Memphis, Tenn.

Drive safe,watch outfor turkeys

LoriBredemeyer

Lori’s Story

Last year 210

peopledied in

collisionswith

animals.

“I’m thankful thatwe actually have abreak and achance to gohome.”

Miaya Harriesophomore art majorfrom Lubbock

“I’m thankful fora roommate whowill take me to hishouse and let mestay with his fami-ly.”

Phillip Jacobsjunior physics majorfrom Santa Monica, Calif.

YOUR VOICEYOUR VOICE

“The biggestthing God hasblessed me withis my family.”

Jared Brockingtonsophomore biology and pre-med majorfrom Friendswood

By BRIAN SCHMIDTSTUDENT REPORTER

The revived Chess Club issponsoring a chess tournamentSaturday from 9:30 a.m.- 2 p.m.in the Hilton Room. Cost toplay is $2 with a guaranteedprize of at least $15.

The Chess Club, which hasexisted at ACU for about sevenyears, was never really activebut has been revived in the pasttwo years by members, and itnow sponsors tournaments andserves at local elementaryschools, said Jeff Haseltine, clubadviser and assistant dean of theCollege of Arts and Sciences.

“It had been on-again, off-again for several years, but thelast couple of years it has beengreatly rejuvenated by ChaseWatters and Wesley Anderson,”he said. “The idea is that a lot ofpeople like chess and want tohave the opportunity to play inan organized fashion, and theclub is a means of getting themtogether.”

The club’s purpose is to pro-vide an environment for peopleto be able to get together andplay chess, Haseltine said, aswell as teach others how to play.

“What many people don’tknow is that while the membersare competitive individually,they are also very interested inteaching the game of chess toothers,” he said. “Many studentsdon’t want anything to do withthe club because they feel thatthey are not experts. However,the club has really given more ofan effort than in the past towardhelping others learn.”

He said chess can be an easygame to learn and a fun game toplay, even for beginners.

“In chess, there are ways thatyou can handicap the game toinsure a competitive game be-tween a strong and a weak play-er,” Haseltine said. “Handicapsmake the game fun for bothbecause the stronger player hasto find new ways to win, and the

weaker playerhas a goodchance towin.”

A big cha-nge that theChess Club,and much ofthe chess com-munity, hasundergone is

the sharp increase in the popu-larity of a new form of chess,called speed chess.

“Recently we have experi-enced the escalation in the phe-nomenon of speed chess,where, instead of a game takingone or two hours, it is possibleto play a game of chess in 10minutes,” Haseltine said. “Youcan make the time parameterswhatever you want by using a

chess clock, and it is an easyversion to learn.”

Chess used to be a morepopular game, he said, but withthe advances in technology, ithas lost popularity. However,chess’ loss of mainstream popu-larity has had little effect onthose who still enjoy it, exceptfor the fact that they have towork harder to bring in newpeople to the game.

“Chess is not the most popu-lar thing on campus, but it isreally fun for those who do stillplay,” said Wesley Anderson, se-nior history major from CorpusChristi.

Anderson said chess is agood activity for him that heenjoys playing, and it is a goodway for him to use and sharpenhis mental skills.

“I’m not very big on a lot ofactivities; chess is simply some-thing I’m good at, and it’s fun atthe same time,” he said.

Members of the Chess Clubcan often be seen in theCampus Center playing chessafter Chapel. Their goal withthese games, which are playedwith the speed chess rules, issimply to attract more people

to the game and to show whatthe newly popular form ofchess is like.

“We play in the CampusCenter to advertise that we stillexist, to attract new membersand simply just for fun,” saidChase Watters, junior biologymajor from Clovis, N.M.

The Chess Club also servesthe community and spreads itspassion for the game off cam-pus, hoping to spark a renewedinterest among the youngercommunity. Several membersgo to Taylor Elementary on afairly regular basis to help withthe school’s chess club and toteach students how to playchess, Watters said.

The club, which meets from5 to 6 p.m. Mondays andFridays in the Bean Sprout, hasthe goal of simply increasingparticipation and knowledge ofthe game on campus, Watterssaid.

“We want to encourage peo-ple to come out, have fun, makenew friends and strengthentheir mind,” Haseltine said.

By KELLY DENNISSTAFF WRITER

National Broadcasting So-ciety district director J.R. Kes-sler and regional director Su-zanne Kessler traveled withseven students to Houston forthe NBS Regional Conventionon Nov. 12 and Saturday.

Michelle Ordener, EdenAdkins, Sarah Reid, ShaVonneHerndon, Katy Rowan, JohnKincaid and Chris Tarrant at-tended the event. Students whodid not attend were allowed tosubmit pieces for judging.

This year, ACU’s chapterhosted the convention, whichwas at the DoubleTree Suitesnear the Galleria. Almost 200students and faculty membersfrom schools in Arkansas,Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana,New Mexico and Coloradowere present.

“The main reason for havingthe convention is to provide anopportunity for students tomeet media professionals intheir fields,” Suzanne Kesslersaid. “We have a panel of guestspeakers come and speak to the

students. That helps the stu-dents to find out what it’s like toreally work in the industry andif they really like it.”

Though the schedule wastight, it did provide for some in-teraction between the studentsand the speakers as the speakersgave their business cards to thestudents and opened the floorto questions after lectures, saidTarrant, junior electronic media

major from Arlington. “It was really cool because I

got to talk with Wendell Ed-wards,” Tarrant said. “He grad-uated from ACU in ’92 and is areporter for Channel 11 Newsin Houston.”

Other speakers included in-dependent film producer Pat-rick Roddy of McNeese State U-niversity; Madd Hatta, the discjockey of the No. 1 radio morn-ing show in Houston; and CarolHerrera, manager of the city ofHouston Municipal Channel.

NBS president Sarah Reid,senior electronic media majorfrom Abilene, said she was too

busy organizing the conventionto attend all of the lectures;however, she was able to talkwith some of the speakers andthank them for coming.

“We had a lot of people saythis was the best regional con-vention they had attended, andwe had the biggest turnout ofpeople,” Reid said.

The convention also offeredthe students a new view of the

industry. Kessler said Herreraarranged for the students totour the city’s TV studio.

“We got to see things goingon in real life; it gave us a differ-ent perspective,” said Ordener,senior electronic media majorfrom Waco.

Regarding the competition,students could submit workfrom 2004 to be judged by pro-fessionals of that field. Sub-mission categories were videoproduction, radio production,web design and script writing.

Reid received awards for sev-eral pieces she submitted forjudging. Her package for the

Prickly Pear about Home-coming won first place in theFeature Pieces category. In thearea of Documentary, her filmTo Have, To Hold, a story aboutBritish war brides, won firstplace, and her project on SingSong for the Prickly Pear earnedsecond place.

Ordener won second placefor a music video she made toThe Starbucks Song, written byBrandon Kinder, junior youthand family ministry major fromMemphis, Tenn.

Marla Flippen, senior elec-tronic media major from LeagueCity, and Gary Hamilton, whograduated in the spring, did notattend the competition but sub-mitted award-winning pieces aswell, Kessler said.

Kessler said she hopes thestudents feel encouraged andrecognize the quality of theirwork. Kessler said she views thecompetition from the large stateschools such as West TexasA&M as a positive challenge forthe students.

“We always try to take ACU’sname with us wherever we go,”Reid said. “We want to repre-sent ACU and show everyonewhat we could do.”

Friday, November 19, 2004 CAMPUS NEWS


Phillip Jacobs, junior physics major from Santa Monica, Calif., and Chase Watters, junior biology majorfrom Clovis, N.M., play chess in the Campus Center Thursday to attract potential members to the ChessClub, while Aldo Raeliarijaona, freshman engineering physics major from Madagascar, and WesleyAnderson, senior history major from Corpus Christi, play speed chess in the background.

By TODD MROZEKSTUDENT REPORTER

December graduates willreceive awards and scholar-ships from Campus Life andthe Alumni Association at theSenior Dinner on Dec. 10 inthe Teague Special EventsCenter.

The dinner is scheduledprior to the commencementceremony at 5 p.m., and tick-ets may be bought for $15 bycontacting the Alumni officeat Ext. 2622.

The B Sherrod Scholarshipaward, a $500 scholarship tobe used for graduate school, isgiven by the Campus LifeCommittee to recognize a stu-dent’s overall contribution tothe university.

Lisa Maloney, assistant tothe dean in Campus Life, saidthe committee, which is com-prised of faculty, staff and stu-dents, met this week andchose the recipients and howmany scholarships will begiven.

“We look at the nomina-tions we get and then make adecision,” Maloney said. “Wegave two at the May dinner.”

Faculty and staff had untilnoon on Monday to submit

student names to the CampusLife office for B SherrodScholars’ nominations as wellas Honor Man and HonorWoman, awards that recognizescholastic ability. A studentmust have a minimum 3.25GPA to be eligible to receivethe Honor Man or HonorWoman award.

The Purple and White a-ward, given by the Alumni As-sociation, is presented to fourstudents who exemplify hon-esty, integrity, service anddependability.

Jama Cadle, alumni eventscoordinator, said nominationswill be accepted until Tuesday.

“I’ve received a bunchalready,” Cadle said. “It’salways tough to narrow itdown to four students be-cause we get so many greatnominations.”

Cadle said solicitationswere e-mailed to faculty andstaff for nominations of stu-dents who met the criteria.

Gary Gaines, head footballcoach, said honoring studentsin this way is a great idea andsubmitted one of his playersfor nomination.

“Anytime we can honor ourstudents like this, it’s just agreat gesture,” Gaines said.“It’s rewarding for them and itlooks good on their resume.”

By ELIZABETH NEWMAN STUDENT REPORTER

The Ministry, an a capellagospel music group withmembership including stu-dents and graduates of ACU,will conduct its first publicconcert at 7 p.m. Saturday atthe Chapel on the Hill.

The eight-member groupsings for organizations andindividuals in the communitywith the goal of ministering topeople and spreading the mes-sage of God through song.The concert will be free, anddonations will be accepted tohelp support the group’s fu-ture work.

“We decided we wanted toput on a concert so we couldsing for the ACU community,and the community at large,”said Marie Thomas, residencedirector of Nelson Hall andmember of The Ministry. “Also,we can raise money so we cantravel and continue to do min-istry in the community.”

The group has sung atplaces including HendrickHome for Children, localchurches and for individualswho are sick, and they havealso traveled to sing atNorthside Church of Christ inJacksonville, Fla., and at aHarding University multicul-tural event.

“Music and melody areable to touch people’s heartsand heal people in a way thatother things aren’t able to,”

Thomas said. “It draws anattention and makes peoplewonder why you are comingto sing for them, and they cansee Jesus in you, so it’s anopportunity to minister.”

Thomas and her sisterjoined the group last year,which is now in its secondyear. The original groupformed out of an idea fromKasey Adams, a former mem-ber of The Group who gradu-ated from ACU in May, andMiquel Pernell, a former stu-dent of ACU. “They had avision of getting a grouptogether that wasn’t so muchabout sound, but about whowanted to go into the commu-nity.” Thomas said. “Our pur-pose is ministry oriented; it’snot about performing.”

Thomas said the grouphopes to create cards or fliersto help make it more accessi-ble to the community and alsorecord a CD in the future.

“We are trying to movetoward recording a CD, sowhen we do put on a concert,or we go out and sing, andpeople ask if we have arecording, we can give themsomething that they can holdon to and keep with them,”Thomas said.

She said the group is alsoconsidering conducting an-other concert next semester toraise money to help send agroup of teen mothers inYoung Life, an organizationthat teaches teens about Jesus,to a camp next summer.

Playersto makea move

Chess Club to giveprize money at its

tournament Saturday

December grads earnscholarships, awards

Seniors to receive honors before

commencement

Gospel music groupbegins to spread God’s message

National BroadcastingSociety earned

awards in Houston

E-mail Schmidt at: [email protected]

E-mail Mrozek at: [email protected]

E-mail Newman at: [email protected]

E-mail Dennis at: [email protected]

Haseltine

“We had a lot of people say this was the bestregional convention they had attended.”

Sarah Reid, senior electronic media major from Abilene

Broadcast organization plans regional convention

New singers give firstpublic concert Saturday

Rights movement and thoseduring the Vietnam War era.

Some movements reach a re-volutionary dimension. Whenthey falter, it eventually hits anapex and then crumbles. Thedeterioration creates violentactions, which typically defineterrorist groups.

She said terrorist groups canbe divided into three genres.The first group, which is thegroup she studied, fights forideological reasons, and thesecond group fights for nation-al interests. The third group,which includes groups like alQaeda, fights for religious caus-es. Each group has differentdimensions and should betreated differently.

Not only are genres differ-ent, but terrorism has changedsince the ‘60s. She said that ter-rorists have changed the extentof violence they are willing toimpose.

“They’re much more ex-treme. They’re more willing totarget civilians. They’re morewilling to killmore people,”she said. “Astime has goneon, terroristshave takenmore andmore steps tobe more andmore extreme.”

In an article recently pub-lished by Terrorism and Poli-tical Violence, a publication ofSt. Andrews, she says part ofthe incorrect portrayal offemale terrorists is related totraditional views of genderroles.

After studying the involve-ment of men and women in ter-rorist organizations that grewout of movements in the 1960s,Gentry argues that the femaleterrorist is driven by ideologyas much as the male terrorist.

“If it was true, what the re-search was saying was thatfemale terrorists are devoid of

ideology, then they would neverhave been involved in ideolo-gy,” she said. “They wouldn’twrite it, they wouldn’t speak it,they wouldn’t read it and theywould just somehow jump inthe action when it got violent.

“Instead, you see men andwomen being tracked very sim-ilarly,” she said. “They both en-tered in the same way, devel-oped their ideology in the sameway. They’ve developed theiractions and level of violence inthe same way.”

Gentry said she was upsetthat she was unable to inter-view anyone other than Khaledfor her dissertation. She wantedto talk to women in Germanyand America involved in socialmovements in the ‘60s. How-ever, many of the women inGermany she wanted to inter-view are now dead, and theAmerican women she wantedto interview turned her down.

“One was in prison, but shewas up for parole, so she wasrefusing contact at that time,”she said. “They are taking pro-tectionist measures because

they have no idea what I will dowith that information.”

To get the interview withKhaled, who works as a politi-cian for the Popular Front forthe Liberation of Palestine,Gentry had to endure severalmonths of scrutiny by AndersStirndberg, one of Gentry’sfriends in the same Ph.D. pro-gram who knew Khaled.

“There’s a reputation that[female terrorists] won’t be por-trayed well,” Gentry said. “Hewanted to make sure I wouldunderstand her and not totallytick her off.”

She said Khaled was going tointroduce her to other women

in the organization, but thatended up not happening be-cause Israeli Prime Minister Ar-iel Sharon sent tanks into theWest Bank for the first time.

“Leila and the other womenin the organization were busydealing with what would hap-pen with that, so I did not get tomeet anyone,” she said.

Before this, though, Gentryspent 10 days in a “whole newworld” just east of Israel andwest of Saudi Arabia—Jordan.

Although she was there lessthan two weeks, she still getsexcited remembering her expe-riences and the reactions of thepeople there.

Gentry stood out in the Mid-dle East. She did not speak thelanguage, though she did learnsome words, like no. She is fair-skinned with light red wavyhair, which is in stark contrastwith the typical Jordanianwoman.

“Here I am, a young whitewoman traveling alone in theMiddle East and staying at abusiness man’s hotel,” she sayswith an almost mischievous

grin on herface. “Theydidn’t knowwhat to makeof me at all.The first cou-ple of days Iwas there, theywere just like,

‘We’ll get you a taxi, thank youfor leaving, don’t come downfor breakfast, eat in your room’kind of attitude.”

All that changed the day ofGentry’s interview with Khaled,who is regarded as somewhat ofa hero and very beautiful at age60.

“She’s walking in the door,and the two men at the frontdesk just kind of freeze,” shesaid. “And they’re staring at her,and then they look up and real-ize that I’m coming down togreet her and meet her, andthey’re shocked. Their mouthsare hanging open, their eyes arereally big. They’re just, like,

‘Whoa!’ You kind of feel thisreaction of, ‘What is this whitewoman doing with Leila Kha-led?’”

After that, she said the hotelworkers bent over backward tohelp her. They offered the useof the Internet, which was notavailable to customers. Theyeven lectured taxi driversbefore she left, saying, “OK,you take her here, you take thisroute. If you charge her morethan blah blah blah dinar,you’re wrong, and she’ll tell us,and we’ll get the money backfrom you.”

On the streets, she said shegot similar reactions of bewil-derment.

“I remember walking downthis one street, and this manwas walking out of a building,and we both were wearing sun-glasses,” Gentry said. “And hestopped, in the middle of thesidewalk. His body was facingone way, but his head wasswiveling as I walked past. Hekind of lowers his sunglasses,and it was full-on staring.

“It wasn’t sordid, and it was-n’t scary,” she said. “I almoststarted laughing. I don’t knowhow we would describe whatwe would do that for, someonewho’s blue or someone who justso completely does not belong.”

She said the Jordanian menwere never rude to her, but thewomen were, and she said thatis what she hated most.

“I study women, and mymain focus is women, and I’m awomen’s advocate, and it wasthe women who were reactingso negatively to me,” she said.“I think they had to be. I thinkbecause they had to say, ‘I’m notwith her; I’m not like her.’ Andthat was hard.”

Gentry said her experiencesand research into terrorismmade her agree with a differentapproach on dealing with mostterrorist organizations.

“Fighting is simply notenough,” she said. “There hasto be some groundwork laid.There’s a reason why people areengaging in this violence.”

She says most terrorist situa-

tions can be tempered withunderstanding, like the situa-tion between the Catholic andProtestant communities inNorthern Ireland and England.She said the region has peacebecause both sides were willingto make concessions and meetin the center, alienating thosewho believe violence is the onlyanswer.

“The violence they commitis seen as a bad thing, and theyare not finding that supportanymore within that society,”she said. “Instead of taking analienated majority, we have re-incorporated the majority intocivil life and alienated that mi-nority.”

She said she does not thinkterrorism will ever go away.

“But the more we fight, theworse it’ll become,” she said.“It’s like pouring acid on anopen wound instead of under-standing why that wound hasbeen opened in the first place.”

Friday, November 19, 2004FROM THE FRONT PAGE/CAMPUS NEWS

E-mail Sherwood at: [email protected]

lars can go toward feeding afamily that wouldn’t have ameal otherwise.”

Holmes said he goes toTaylor Elementary every yearand asks the principal aboutfamilies in need within theschool. The children of thosefamilies receive a letter totake home to their parents,and the school then collectsthe responses. As a result,about 50 families are fedevery year.

Holmes said the projectwas conceived his sopho-more year, and he was part ofthe team that helped theproject succeed initially andhas been the project coordi-nator ever since.

Holmes said his favorite

part of the project is actuallydelivering the meals in per-son.

“A few people from eachclass pick up the meals fromHEB and then take them tothe families,” Holmes said.“The kids are always so excit-ed to see people at theirdoors, not to mention morefood than they’ve seen in along time.”

In the past, the project hassolely involved U-100 groups,but Holmes said SALT isexpanding the project’s reach.

“We’ve had some opportu-nities this year for studentsto donate in Chapel, we sentletters to faculty membersasking them to contributeand we’re considering con-tacting social clubs,” Holmessaid.

Eric Gumm, assistant di-rector of the First Year Pro-gram and assistant director ofthe Office of AcademicAdvising, has led a U-100class for the last several yearsand has participated in theThanksgiving project everyyear.

Gumm said his classenjoys getting involvedhands-on and is even writingnotes to the families to putwith the meals.

“It’s been really positive,”Gumm said. “It’s a neatopportunity for students toget involved for very littlemoney and time.”

SALT: Group expands its reachContinued from Page 1

has been offered to Gardnerresidents, this is the first timethe dinner will celebratemore than the holidays.

The meal is being providedbecause the staff wants tothank the residents, Carrollsaid, and she thinks the din-ner will be great.

ARAMARK, the university’sfood service company, willprovide a traditional Thanks-giving meal, including smokedturkey, stuffing, mashed pota-toes, cranberry sauce, greenbeans, candied yams, rolls andfresh fruit salad, as well aspumpkin and pecan pie.

This meal is expected to bea time of fellowship, Carrollsaid.

“We did it this year to real-ly thank the residents just be-cause we love serving andworking with them so much,”Carroll said. “It is a time to bethankful together. We aregrateful for our jobs, and it is

truly a privilege to workhere.”

Last year, more than 200women went to the westlobby, grabbed their food andate in their rooms, Carrollsaid. This year, the womenhave been invited to eattogether and to fellowshipwith one another as a family.

“We think of this place as aministry, and within a min-istry, we are a family,” Carrollsaid. “This is our way of shar-ing with our girls our love forthem.”

Jessica Vaughn, freshmannursing major from Earth andGardner resident, said she isgoing to continue meetingpeople in her hall even as thesemester comes to a close.

“I’m attending this meal so

I can meet other girls that Ihaven’t yet,” Vaughn said.“I’m so thankful for the girls Ihave already met, and I wouldlike to have a meal with all ofus there. I think it will bringunity in Gardner.”

She said Thursday shouldbe a time of thankfulness forthe women as well as the staff.

“There are a lot of thingsthat I’m thankful for,” Vaughnsaid. “I’m thankful God gaveme the parents he did, that hegave us his son, and I am verygrateful that I was allowed tocome here and meet all thesepeople.”

Gardner: Meal to unite residentsContinued from Page 1

Gentry: Female terrorists compelled by same ideology as males Continued from Page 1

E-mail Travis at: [email protected]


EMILY CHASTAIN/Staff Photographer

Dr. Caron Gentry, assistant professor of political science, displays a tapestry that women in the MiddleEast cross-stitched by hand. She said she fell in love with the colors and patterns, and she now has twoor three in her office. Gentry wrote her doctoral dissertation on the topic of female terrorism.

“I’m a women’s advocate, and it was the womenwho were reacting so negatively to me.”

Dr. Caron Gentry, assistant professor of political science

“We think of this place as a ministry, and within a ministry, we are a family.”

Pam Carroll, assistant director in Gardner Hall

RUBEN J. GONZALEZSTUDENT REPORTER

Those in need of working upa good appetite for Thanks-giving Day may want to abstainfrom food the day before.

Or, they can take part in theAbilene Runners Club Thanks-giving Day Turkey Trot 5K runat Nelson Park beginning at8:05 a.m.

“It will be a good way to startoff the Thanksgiving Day,” saidDr. Jerry Whitworth, chair ofthe English Department andAbilene Runners Club vice pres-ident. “It’s also a good way tomake a little room for Thanks-giving dinner.”

Whitmore said he expectsabout 50 runners to take part inthe race that will present afirst-, second- and third-placeaward for both male and femalerunners in six different age cate-gories, including an overallaward for males and females. Anentry fee of $15 is required fornon-members and $10 for cur-rent members.

Dawn Scovel, senior com-munication disorders majorfrom Colorado Springs, Colo.,and a member of the club, saidthese races are for everyone whowants to make an effort.

“Even if you’re not a runneryou should come out and do it,”Scovel said. “You could run it,skip it, walk it and jump it—anything. You’ll see the faces outthere supporting you, and itmakes it all worth it.”

Scovel has been a membersince 2002 and is currentlytraining for the Dallas WhiteRock Marathon on Dec. 12.

Megan Loehman, seniorcommunication disorders majorfrom Monahans, will run in the5K race and said the club hasbeen an integral part of her new-found enjoyment in running.

“I was never a runner beforethis semester,” said Loehman,who is also training for theWhite Rock Marathon. “Westarted training with 3 miles andincreased to 5, and I think doing

that in a smaller group washelpful because, having noexperience, that support systemwas really important.”

Whitmore said the club hasplanned a Christmas LightsRun, where participants will runthrough neighborhoods of illu-minated streets, and theSteamboat Mountain Half-Marathon, Half-Marathon Relayon Jan. 29.

Whitmore also said the clubis always trying to add mem-bers, in particular, ACU stu-dents.

“We’d like to see more ACUstudents participate and join theclub,” Whitmore said. “We’dprobably do more designedspecifically for students if wehad more students in the club.”

The club meets on the firstMonday of every month at 6:30p.m. at the Red Bud YMCA.

Dashing toward the turkeyAbilene Runners Clubto host Thanksgiving

Day Turkey Trot 5K run

E-mail Gonzalez at: [email protected]

“It’s also a good way to make a little room for Thanksgiving dinner.”

Dr. Jerry Whitworth, chair of the English Department

Nationals: ACU faces tough opponentsFriday, November 19, 2004 FRONT PAGE/SPORTS JUMPS

Victory:Cats to hosttournament

not in the league as the topthree teams. How those threeteams finish in the end is yetto be seen, but Murray saidthe Colorado teams bring adecided advantage because oftheir prestige.

“[Adams and Western] arejust really good programs andalways run well at the nation-al championship,” said Mur-ray, who added that ACU’sveteran runners will need toget over the awe of runningagainst the two best programsin the history of Division IIcross country.

“The good thing about ourteam is that because we’re sonew, five of those guys havenever run against Adams andWestern,” he said. “All theyknow is that they have to getout and run the best theycan.”

The newcomers who hadan effect this season are fresh-men Nicodemus Naimaduand Laurent Ngirakamaro andtransfer Lucky Hadebe. Nai-madu, Ngirakamaro, Man-

irakiza and junior MartinO’Kello have each been theteam’s No. 1 runner at somepoint this season, whichMurray points out is a posi-tive thing.

“How they do will deter-mine a lot of our success,” hesaid.

But the story of the nation-al cross country meet hasalways come down to a simplelesson, all too often recog-nized in hindsight: No onecan have a bad day. Each run-ner has to do his part, becauseteam points are sacrificedwith each opponent that pass-es that individual.

“You have to have fiveguys. It will come down to thefourth and fifth guy and howthey match up,” Murray said.“I would hope this team has alittle better depth. If that istrue, it will show up at thenational meet.”

Three women will don thepurple and white on Saturday,having qualified individuallyfor the national meet withtop-five finishes at the SouthCentral Region Champ–ion-

ship. ACU’s best hope for itsfirst women’s individual titleis junior transfer AdehMwamba, who has been oneof the top Division II runnersall season. The only thingslowing her down could be aslightly injured back, but sheremains a top contender.

Also running for the Wild-cat women are sophomoreOlha Kryv’yak and juniortransfer Trina Cox. Murraysaid he has a straight-forwardobjective for the threewomen.

“One of my main goals isfor them to be all-America,which is top-25,” he said.

The three women will havetheir hands full, however,with a field that includes therunaway favorite Adams State,expected to place all sevenrunners in the top 20 finishersfor its ninth title in 12 years.

The men’s race will beginat noon Saturday, with thewomen’s race to follow at1:30 p.m.

Continued from Page 10

1994. ACU will get more helpdown low this weekend withthe return of senior forwardStephanie Riles. Riles sat outthe first game, in a mostlyprecautionary move, with aninjured ankle. Freshman

point guard Alex Guiton willalso be available this weekendafter sitting out Monday withflu-like symptoms. WhileLavender is hoping to seeimprovement on both ends ofthe court in the Wildcats’ twoupcoming games, the main

thing she is hoping for is toreturn to Abilene with a 3-0record.

“That’s what our plan is,”Lavender said.

Road Trip: Team anxious for winsContinued from Page 10

Cook led Rhema with 16 and17 points, respectively, butthe Wildcats forced them into23 turnovers, and they shotjust .219 from the field in thesecond half after shooting 15of 29 in the first half.

The Wildcats will play intwo games at the ACU TipoffClassic this weekend at home.On Friday, the team will faceCameron at 8 p.m., whichgives the Wildcats an earlylook at one of their Lone StarConference South Divisionfoes. On Saturday, they playWiley College at 4 p.m.

“This weekend is anotherearly-season learning experi-ence,” Carr said. “It’s twomore games to help the team’schemistry, and after that weget a week of rest whereeverybody can get healthy aswe get ready to make a cham-pionship run.”

Continued from Page 10


Junior forward Hakim Rasul goes up for a shot against RhemaTuesday. Rasul finished with 21 points, 10 rebounds and four blocks.

E-mail Gray at: [email protected]

E-mail Robarts at: [email protected]

E-mail Holt at: [email protected]


Wildcat sophomore guard Kristal Robinson drives past Falcon guard Crystal Atkinson in the 99-70 winfor ACU Monday at home. The team will play next in the St. Edwards Classic in Austin Friday and Saturday.

University of Michigan and stillmanages to be competition,Alvarez said.

“We have debate junkiesthat find us entertaining andfollow ACU around at the tour-naments,” Alvarez said.“Coaches from schools sendtheir kids to follow us and keepup with what position we holdand debate; some people evenkeep records of everything wedebate and argue because theyreally want to beat us.”

To remain ahead of the restof the competition, Alvarez saidthe debate team practices all thetime.

“I practice every morningfrom 5:30 to 8 a.m. to be pre-pared for my debates,” Alvarezsaid. “Most people on the teamwill spend 10 hours to 15 hoursa week researching or writingdebates.”

Although it would seem thatthey practice a lot, Alvarez saidit is really different debatingfrom a private school instead ofa large public school.

“Public schools receive morefunding to travel to tourna-ments and they have graduateassistants to work with the stu-dents individually,” said SallyGary, assistant professor ofcommunication and director offorensics.

Some schools also have

lenient attendance require-ments for classes, said Alvarez.

“Students can spend all dayresearching debate topics andall weekend at tournaments,”Alvarez said. “They don’t haveto go to classes like we do be-cause they don’t have GPArequirements either. Most of thestudents on our team havescholarships that are dependenton their GPA, so they have tokeep up with schoolwork first. Iguess it just makes us a well-rounded team.”

James Garrison, freshmanfinance major from Abilene,joined the debate team this yearand is learning to juggle his pri-orities. He is one of the team-mates who Alvarez said couldreceive a bid to nationals.

“Oh, I don’t know aboutthat,” Garrison said. “I wouldlike to be at that level and thereis always a chance that I canplace high enough to get a bid,but I just haven’t seen enoughof my competition to see howwell I would really do.”

He is not joining his team-mates in Minnesota this week-end as finals are around thecorner.

“I would like to go, but Ireally need to focus on my stud-ies this time,” Garrison said.

As for Alvarez, this could beher lucky ticket in.

“I have been waiting mywhole life for a national cham-pionship,” Alvarez said. “I onceplaced in it, but I have neverwon first. It is my personal goalthis year to win first, and I havea chance.”

Her coach, Ryerson, is opti-mistic as well.

“Lizz is a phenomenal de-bater,” Ryerson said. “She hasan amazing grasp of thespecifics of debate and shekeeps up on her current events.Seeing as how she graduatesthis year, we would all like tosee her back at nationals.”

Alvarez plans to practice asmuch as she can to go for firstthis time.

“I’m not going to say that Iwill win because there is a lot ofchance involved,” Alvarez said.“My goal is to do the best I canand to try to place higher than Idid last time.”

Debate: Preparing for competitionContinued from Page 1

been” with “not be” so thecommittee would be able toconsider special cases, likethat a person might havechanged their ways. Severalothers agreed.

“When you put absolutestatements in, you take awaythe power of the committeeto choose,” said freshmanSen. Brandon Smith.

Others saw no problemwith setting absolute require-ments.

This person should nothave been arrested,” saidRep. Bob Parsons, Admin-istration Building. “There’snothing wrong with setting ahigh standard for people youare going to pay.”

The proposed changefailed in a vote.

To keep the bill alive,Congress must bring it backup by Dec. 1, the next andlast meeting of the semester.

SA: Leadership bill not passedContinued from Page 1


E-mail Smith at: [email protected]

“When you put absolute statements in, you takeaway the power of the committee to choose.”

Brandon Smith, freshman senator for Students’ Association

“I have been waiting my whole life for a national championship.”

Lizz Alvarez, senior political science major from McAllen

By KYLE ROBARTSSPORTS EDITOR

Fresh off of the school’s onlyconference tournament cham-pionship in history, the Wild-cat volleyball team heads to itsfirst Southwest Regional Tour-nament appearance this week-end in Carney, Neb.

Head coach Brek Horn saidthe team’s emotions are incon-sistent after last weekend’s vic-tory over Cameron that clinch-ed the tournament title.

“I think they’re emotionallydrained coming off of theexcitement this weekend,” shesaid. “It’s not something I’mstressed about though.”

The Wildcats couldn’t haveasked for a better situation atthe regional tournament, Hornsaid. For one, they are playingSt. Edwards, a team they haveplayed and defeated twice al-ready this season.

“We’re very pleased with thebracket, the draw we got,” shesaid. “We get to play first onFriday so we don’t have to wait

and watch other matches whilewaiting to play, and after ourmatch, we get to watch ournext opponent.”

Assuming the Wildcats dobeat their first-round opponentin St. Edwards at noon onFriday, Horn is referring to thematch between No. 2-seed FortHays State and No. 7-seedRockhurst that will be playedat 2:30 p.m.

Not only is Fort Hays Statethe No. 2 seed in the region,but in Tuesday’s AmericanVolleyball Coaches’ Asso-

ciation Top-25poll, Fort HaysState is No. 12with a 29-4record.

The Wild-cats know,however, thatthey must getpast St. Ed-ward’s first.ACU has been

successful this season againstthe Hilltoppers, winning all sixgames in two matches on Sept.21 and Oct. 12.

“An advantage we have overSt. Edwards is that we know

their tendencies,” she said.“But we have to respect thatthey know ours, too.”

The ACU players have anadvantage this week in deal-ing with their first trip to theregionals. Both Horn and ass-istant coach Sarah Carthelhave had experience in theSouthwest Regionals as play-ers.

Horn played in the firstround in her freshman year atAngelo State, and her teamfell to West Texas A&M;however, Carthel not only par-ticipated in the tournament,but the West Texas A&M grad-uate moved on and was a partof the 1997 national champi-onship team.

“She can help control someof the anticipation and thenerves,” Horn said. “She’ll also

help keep mecalm.

“We’ve beentelling them firstthat we’re notgoing to the tour-nament just to behappy about be-ing there,” shesaid, “but we’regoing to the tour-nament to win it.

Our team earned their No. 3seed, so they need to play withthat aggressiveness and confi-dence.”

E-mail Robarts at: [email protected]

By STEVE HOLTSPORTS WRITER

Running in the shadow ofDivision II cross country’s Col-orado behemoths for nearly adecade, the Wildcat men haveinched closer and closer witheach season to an elusive nat-ional championship.

In 2000, the men placedsecond to Western State. In2001, second. In 2002, anotherrunner-up finish. Last year,more of the same, this time los-ing to Adams State.

This year, however, ACU’s“streak of seconds” very wellcould come to an end.

If everyone does his part atSaturday’s NCAA Division IICross Country Championshipsin Evansville, Ind., the ACUmen would have their best shotever at taking home a champi-onship trophy.

“I think we’re in the best

shape we’ve been in all year.We’re injury free and everyoneis running really well,” saidhead coach Jon Murray.“Everyone’s optimistic abouthow we’re going to do.”

A major part of the nationalsuccess the last three seasonshas been Bernard Manirakiza,who finished fifth at the 2003national meet but watched histeam place second to AdamsState. Manirakiza, now a sen-ior, said this year is when thestreak will be broken.

“This year we have a bigchance to win,” said Manir-akiza, a four-time all-Amer-ican. “This team is lookinggood.”

Almost everyone agrees Sat-urday’s competition will be athree-team race: No. 1-rankedWestern State, Adams State andACU. Harding University andCalifornia State-Chico will bein the mix as well, but probably

Cats prepare for first regional tournament

Cross Country team tocompete in nationals

By WARREN GRAYSPORTS WRITER

The ACU women’s basket-ball team will look to im-prove on a good start to itsseason this weekend at the St.Edwards Classic in Austin.

The Wildcats will play twogames in the tournament—the first against IncarnateWord (1-0) at 2 p.m. Friday.On Saturday, the Wildcatswill take on St. Edwards,which lost to a Lone StarConference team, Midwest-ern State, in its first game ofthe season.

ACU head coach ShawnaLavender said that playing ateam that has already playedan LSC opponent will givethe Wildcats an idea of howthey compare to at least oneother conference foe. Theteam will also get a chance tosee where it stands regionally.

“They’re both regionalgames,” Lavender said. “It

will be a good test to seewhere we stack up.”

ACU will look to improveon taking care of the ball onoffense while keeping up thedefensive intensity in Austin.Despite a big win against Tex-as-Permian Basin on Monday,the Wildcats committed 21turnovers, a number Lav-ender said has to come down.

“We’re stilltrying to geteverybody ingear and im-prove on thethings we’vetalked a-bout,” Laven-der said. “Wehad a lot oft u r n o v e r s

that weren’t forced.”Junior center Jamie Boles

said the Wildcats just need tobe a little more patient onoffense.

“We’re still just kind oflearning about each other onthe court,” Boles said.

Boles, who was behind

standouts Melanie Carter andLynsie Blau on the depthchart last season, averagedonly 2.6 points a game in2003-04. With Blau and Car-ter gone, Boles has seen herminutes increase and tookadvantage by scoring 16points in the season opener.

“I came out with a lot ofconfidence,” Boles said. “Myrole has changed a lot sincelast year; I have to be more ofa leader now.”

In a season when theWildcats were expected to bemore perimeter-oriented,Boles and the other Wildcatposts dominated PermianBasin. Junior Haley Ham-mond came off to score 24points, and freshman AshleeBarr added 13 points in ateam-high 28 minutes.

Their efforts keyed a goodshooting night for the Wild-cats, who made 66.7 percentof their 2-point attempts.Although ACU turned theball over 21 times, it stillmanaged 32 assists, one awayfrom the school record set in

By KYLE ROBARTSSPORTS EDITOR

The men’s basketball teamshook off a slow first-half startagainst Rhema Bible Collegeto rebound for a 78-61 win atMoody Coliseum on Tuesdaynight.

Junior forward HakimRasul was the game’s highscorer with 21points, adding10 reboundsand four blocksto help giveACU its firstwin in the reg-ular-season op-ener. Juniorguard DionteGill added 16points and eight rebounds forACU, and junior forwardMauro “Blessed” Matai had 9points and 10rebounds.

S e n i o rguard DavidBaxter is usedto being ontop of theWildcat scor-ing list, butlast night hes t r u g g l e d ,shooting 3 of 12 from the fieldand just 1 of 6 from the 3-point line. However, Baxterstill found ways to contributeas he led ACU with six assists.

The team had 18 assistscollectively, and head coachPleasant said he was pleasedwith the ball movement.

“One of our goals this sea-son was to have at least 15assists a game,” he said. “Lastyear the team who led theconference had 15.8, so I waspleased with our effortsthere.”

The Wildcats had somerough times as they had 18turnovers. Junior point guardJoe Carr, who added fivepoints, four assists and threesteals in just 13 minutes ofplay, had hoped for a betterperformance overall fromACU.

“It was a rough contestbecause of the style of basket-ball they presented,” Carrsaid. ‘We were pretty disap-pointed in ourselves; our in-tensity was bad, and welooked lame at the beginningof the game.”

“We had some typical first-game things like unforcederrors,” Pleasant said. “Out ofour 18 turnovers, 14 wereunforced, but those are thingsthat are correctable. Onething I like about this team isto be able to coach a group ofguys like Joe who understandthat they have things to workon; guys who understand thatwe haven’t arrived yet.”

Jeremy Reamer and Adrian

SPORTSFRIDAY

Team to face familiarSt. Edwards in first

round on Friday

Wildcats tryto avoid fourth-straight

second-place finish

Cats face regionalopponents in two-gametourney this weekend

Wildcats beginregular season 1-0

with strong second half

VVolleyballolleyball

Cross CountryCross Country

LSC SouthStandings

Men’s BasketballTeam Div. Tot.ACU 0-0 1-0Angelo State 0-0 1-0E. New Mexico 0-0 0-0A&M-Kingsville 0-0 0-0West Texas A&M 0-0 0-0A&M-Commerce 0-0 0-0Midwestern State 0-0 0-1

Women’s Basketball

Team Div. Tot.ACU 0-0 1-0E. New Mexico 0-0 1-0Midwestern State 0-0 1-0A&M-Commerce 0-0 1-0West Texas A&M 0-0 0-0Texas Woman’s 0-0 0-0A&M-Kingsville 0-0 0-0Angelo State 0-0 0-1

This week inWildcat sports...

(home events in italics)

Friday, November 19 VB: at St. Edward's, noon WBB: at Incarnate Word, 2p.m. MBB: Cameron, 8 p.m. Saturday, November 20 MCC: at NCAA II nationals,10 a.m. WCC: at NCAA II nationals,10 a.m. MBB: Wiley, 4 p.m. VB: at Regional Semis, 5p.m. WBB: at St. Edward's, 6p.m.

ScoresMondayWomen’s Basketball:ACU 99, UTPB 70TuesdayMen’s Basketball:ACU 78, Rhema Bible College 61

WWomen’omen’s Basketballs Basketball

Men’Men’s Basketballs Basketball

Team heads to Austin

Cats roll overRhema College

See ROAD TRIP Page 9 See NATIONALS Page 9

See VICTORY Page 9

OPTIMIST November 19, 2004


Junior middle blocker Amanda Slate cheers on her team Saturday inLawton, Okla., as ACU won its first conference tournament in history.


Junior point guard Joe Carr goes up for the lay-in against Rhema’s Jeremy Reamer on Tuesday night inMoody Coliseum. The Wildcats won 78-61 and will play two games this weekend in the ACU Tipoff Classic.

Rasul

Horn

Boles

Carthel

Gill

American VolleyballCoaches’ Association Top 25

SchoolRecord1. Nebraska-Kearney (33) 36-02. UC-San Diego (1) 28-13. Truman State, Mo. (1) 32-04. Baryy, Fla. 28-15. Cal State-San Bernadino 24-36. Concordia-St. Paul, Minn. 30-27. Minnesota-Duluth 23-48. North Florida 30-59. Tampa, Fla. 24-510. Central Missouri State 29-611. Central Washington 26-012. Fort Hays State, Kan. 29-413. Hawaii Pacific 20-314. Grand Valley State, Mich. 26-615. Washburn, Kan. 29-616. Ferris State, S.C. 25-617. Northern Michigan 21-618. Florida Southern 27-819. North Alabama 24-620. Armstrong Atlantic State, Ga. 29-721. Northwood, Mich. 19-922. Augustana, S.D. 17-923. Chaminade, Ha. 16-624. Rockhurst, Mo. 26-925. Ashland, Ohio 25-5Others receiving points and listed on two ormore ballots: Abilene Christian 33; Cal StateBakersfield 23; Cal Poly Pomona 22;Minnesota State-Moorhead 19; Harding 18;Nebraska-Omaha 16; South Dakota 12;Western Washington 9; Dowling 8;Southwest Minnesota State 5; Queens (N.Y.) 5

optimist_2004-11-19

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