The Litter Box

...The Litter Box will have running, close-to-everyday mini-features on both Wildcat basketball teams. It's something I'm excited for as a chance to learn these new-look teams the best I can, and to help you do the same. Brian Fogel, the women's coach, is also on board, so come Oct. 15 (when the NCAA allows teams to start practicing), we'll get to take a look at how Fogel and Greg Clink are preparing for the upcoming season.

As a sidenote, I'll be the guest on the E-R's new live chat feature Thursday, Oct. 9 (tomorrow) at 1 p.m. to entertain your Wild(cat)est thoughts. Ouch, that was bad. Anyway, check it out. You can ask about or give your opinions on Chico State sports, and I'll do my best to be your expert.

Posted by Travis Souders at 07:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Once again, Friday night football — at my high school alma mater, even — left me wishing the E-R would string some writers for the prep beat so I can be more accessible to mine. The thought process isn't difficult. First of all, it rained like The Flood in Paradise, a 41-0 disaster of a game, while down in assuredly toasty Acker Gym the volleyball team dug up its fourth straight victory with a huge 3-2 knock-off of No. 12 UC San Diego.

At least I'm not bitter about it.

What will be interesting now is to see what the Wildcats can do from here. They've basically needed each of the last four matches they've played, and have gotten wins in each to put themselves back in CCAA contention. I know it's early; however, just like in fantasy-league baseball (damn you, Travis Hafner), you might not be able to win your league early, but you can definitely lose it. Cody Hein had said after the win over Cal State Stanislaus that Chico State was in danger of letting the season slip away, just because of the amount of talent in the conference. The Wildcats dodged that bullet for now. Let's see if they can jump back into the top 25.

I'm going to guess that Sonoma State will lose its grip on first today and fall to Cal State San Bernardino, and I'll put money on UC San Diego taking care of Cal State Stanislaus in three. Cal Poly Pomona should also beat Humboldt State. If my skills as a prognosticator are any good (we'll know in a few hours), that would translate to a three-way tie for second place at 6-2, while Chico State is at 5-3 with its next two matches at home against those underachieving Bay teams next week (I won't see it. More football). Realistically, the Wildcats could reel off six in a row.

I'm going camping.
Well, it's not quite training camp once cuts are made, but it will be the beginning of preseason practices for the basketball teams soon — more specifically, Oct. 15 is when the men will start. The Litter Box and the E-R (I just referred to myself in the third person from two mediums) will be stopping in routinely to see how those teams shape up with a host of new players and new head coaches Greg Clink (men) and Brian Fogel (women). Keep your eyes on this URL for more info as it comes along.

Names of fame.
A week from today (Oct. 11), Chico State will hold its 2008 Hall of Fame banquet and 23rd induction ceremony at the BMU Auditorium. The last time I was there for any reason was my freshman year, when I saw Jim Breuer. This might not be as funny or smell like liquor-breathed undergrads as much, but it should be pretty cool. Among the personally interesting highlights for me will be the honorary induction of Puck Smith and the honoring of the Chico State Athletes of the Year, Scott Bauhs and Audriana Spencer. As is usually the case with these things, the old-timers don't necessarily mean a lot to me because I don't really know who they are, with the exception of Antone Curtis. If anything, it could be a chance to get some old-school Wildcat knowledge.

Speaking of Audi Spencer, the former Wildcat great was officially named to join departed coach Molly Goodenbour's coaching staff at UC Irvine last week, where the two will also be reunited with Jade Smith-Williams, although on a redshirt basis. Kind of a cool Chico angle, if you're not the kind of Chicoan who holds grudges against people for leaving town in search of awesome opportunities.

Posted by Travis Souders at 04:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tonight I’ll get my first chance to see the Wildcats’ volleyball team in person, at least for a game, this season. I’m looking forward to seeing what this team will look like, what with all its hitters, new-ish approach and a shot to make up ground in the CCAA. Cal State Stanislaus, I dare say, should be a very winnable matchup for Chico State at home, but Friday, the Wildcats will get a strong opportunity to crack that top level of the conference.

They’ll get UC San Diego; the Tritons are the team that knocked off then-No. 1 Cal State San Bernardino last week. Obviously, they’re good, although that 3-0 loss to Cal State L.A. in early September is pretty inexplicable. Interestingly enough for UC San Diego, it’s the only team in the CCAA that hasn’t lost on the road yet.

The Wildcats, at 3-3 in CCAA play, sit squarely in the middle of the conference standings, three games behind upstart Sonoma State, which stands to face a strong possibility of dropping games this weekend with two road matchups at Cal Poly Pomona and Cal State San Bernardino. It’s early, but theoretically, Chico State appears to be in great position to make up at least a game in the standings.

It’s never too early to talk basketball.
At least not for me. Wildcat men’s coach Greg Clink has tentatively agreed to let me update The Litter Box with a running look at his tryouts after first cuts as the first-year coach shapes the team to his liking. I’m excited for this, obviously, and I think it will be interesting to get a glance at who will be the main players for this group moving forward.

Clearly, senior point guard Justin Argenal likely had a spot secured before practices even began, but with the influx of new talent to the Wildcats, I’m guessing there will be a lot of decisions for Clink to make. A look at that process will be the focal point of this, and possibly the women’s team, as well.

Chat with me.
Also, E-R online content editor Ryan Olson has offered to moderate chats with the paper’s assorted columnists, including three of the sports section’s writers, soon. I’ll be one of them, and there will be the chance to give me a piece of your mind on all things Chico State coming Thursday, Oct. 9 at 1 p.m. I’m looking forward to hearing others’ thoughts on Wildcat athletics, and I'll do my best to answer your questions. Definitely check it out; you'll want to bookmark the E-R Web site (as if you haven't already) and visit it to join the chat. Hope to hear from you then.

Posted by Travis Souders at 04:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I can’t help but feel sorry for some of the teams I cover this week. I know, it’s homerish, but I am (contrary to some of my e-mail) a human being, after all.

First, there’s the volleyball team, victims of the Enterprise-Record feature curse. Basically, any time an E-R writer decides to write any kind of non-news piece about a player or team, failure is inevitable. Now, admittedly, I don’t believe in curses or jinxes. Or unicorns. But the Wildcats have lost three straight (two since last Friday’s feature ran) and haven’t been the upstart group that last year’s club was. Curious, since basically every player from that team has returned. Is the CCAA really that much better? Well, yeah.

Cal State San Bernardino is No. 1 in the nation, so a loss there really wasn’t a surprise. Sonoma State, which middled around at 13-14 last year, is the biggest early shocker in the conference at 12-1 and 4-0 in CCAA play. And Cal Poly Pomona and UC San Diego are always tough. Chico State is only 1-3 in conference games, and probably more disconcerting, is 0-2 in road games. Both the Sonoma State and Cal Poly Pomona games were winnable contests — the one against the Seawolves even more so as it was at home — so the early losses will definitely hurt. There’s more pressure now for the Wildcats to beat quality teams, and even Humboldt State has joined that discussion. The CCAA is no cakewalk this year, for anybody.

Also, I’m not quite sure how the NCAA does its rankings, but the No. 17 men’s soccer team somehow wins three games, two in its own conference, the other a 7-1 obliteration, and doesn’t move. At all. Strange, but even stranger when you consider that now-No. 5 Cal State L.A. wasn’t ranked at all last week. Apparently a pair of 1-0 conference home victories, including one over then-No. 4 Cal State Dominguez Hills, is enough to jump from unranked to the fifth-best team in Division II.

I’m a believer in the new Chico State team, and I think they've shown early that it’s entirely warranted. It will be another couple weeks before the Golden Eagles and the Wildcats go head-to-head so we can see just how much those pollsters really know. A more rational version of me concedes that they probably have a pretty good idea, but these rankings without explanations attached are just perplexing.

Posted by Travis Souders at 06:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Boy, those pollsters sure do like perfect records.

Don’t believe me? Check out the most recent NSCAA/Adidas Division II rankings, which have the Chico State men’s soccer team up three spots to No. 17 after a 4-0 start under spankin’ new coach Felipe Restrepo.

Part of this ascent — actually, a pretty large part — is senior Zac Crim, who has been involved in every game-deciding goal the Wildcats have scored in their so-far-perfect season. He’s already got 11 points, including four goals. He’s been the headliner of Chico State’s offense, no doubt. I remember him really seeming to like the Restrepo hire earlier in the year because there was that promise of opportunity for success. Well, it’s manifesting itself now, and Crim is responding by playing a prominent part in just about every offensive sequence the Wildcats string together.

In other Wildcat-related news today, the CCAA announced that it will add another team to the conference next year, Cal State East Bay. Meh, I say. I have mixed feelings on the East Bay in general, and none of them are particularly good. CSUEB is the Pioneers, which is just stupid geographically. Don’t pioneers discover things? East Bay folks all have navigation systems, everybody knows that. Let’s change the mascot to a white college guy in an Abercrombie polo, Bluetooth headset and a BMW driving home to his parents' house from Whole Foods instead.

I’ve been meaning to give the volleyball team a little bit of love and haven’t really gotten the chance to. Lindsay Macias and Erica Brick obviously have been getting theirs, but it’s nice to see that Chico State is going other places with its attacks now a little more. Gillian Heydorff, Megan Cape and Crystal Trifeletti, namely, have stood out as some surprise sources of kills (although Heydorff showed last year that she’s a legitimate threat, so maybe “surprise” isn’t the best word for her). But I’ll bet you can’t name the team’s leader in the stat so far ... unless you’re Luke Reid. Then you probably can.

If you’re not, though, it’s freshman Makenzie Snyder, with a nice, round 100. Yes, it’s early. But this kind of balance is the kind of thing that makes it both interesting and nerve-wracking for a team that’s been so dependent on Macias to be the hammer. She and Trifeletti both have 92 kills and Cape has 85. Maybe it’s Macias’ growing defensive responsibility (we saw a career-high in digs against Sonoma State last week).

To give an idea of just how rare it is for anyone else to play as significant of a role as she has, just look back at her three-year figures: She’s accounted for right around a quarter of the Wildcats’ attack scoring. In 2005, she put down 27.5 percent of the team’s kills and in 2006, it was 23. Last year she jumped right back up to 26.5 percent.

This year it seems to be all about Balance, with a capital B (in case you missed how I capitalized “Balance” just then).

Posted by Travis Souders at 06:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I kind of feel like it’s cheating to give the Chico State women’s soccer A’s across the board after one game, especially when that one game came against what E-R prep writer Leland Gordon referred to as the “sacrificial lamb” of the Wildcats’ schedule, Notre Dame de Namur.

But obviously Chico State played well, earning a 5-0 win over the Argonauts to open up its season, and while the games certainly will get tougher, there are some good things Kim Sutton’s club can take from this one. Let’s not quite call this an official Report Card just yet (despite this entry’s headline). It’s more like a progress report.

UPS
New faces in good places.
I’m starting to think that the Ups/Downs categories aren’t such a good idea, considering that I up-case them both and the “UPS” looks like a random insertion of a parcel delivery company. That’s something for me to work on.

The Wildcats, though, have to get used to the idea of playing without the likes of Katherine Bagwell, Kari Gonzales, Ashley Gunther and Whitney MacDonald, all graduated All-Region players. That is going to be probably a little easier to do if they keep getting solid play from the few additions to the club. Looking at the Chico State roster, there is definitely experience there, but looking at Thursday night’s game, some of the biggest moments came from freshman Lisa Webster (two goals, one assist) and transfer Brittney Doty, who scored on the Wildcats’ first shot of the season. Sidenote: For about 10 minutes, Chico State was on pace to shoot 1.000. Sadly, only five of the 25 shots found the net, but it was neat while it lasted.
Dara Karnofsky, it’s worth mentioning, was dangerously close to a pair of goals, and I don’t think I’m alone in guessing that she could pan out to be a very solid forward for this team.

Movement in the middle.
Sutton would probably write this a lot better than I could, but given that my seat is also right at midfield, I feel somewhat qualified in saying that the Wildcats did a nice job of ball movement. It will be interesting to see if they can win as many balls in the middle once they get playing against stronger opposition, but for now it looks like this will be a strength.
Defensively, Carly Atkins was especially good at parlaying turnovers and defensive play into offensive production.

Reaching deep.
Sutton will be able to spell her starters with quality, it appears. She really crooned about the play of Mallory Maughan, a transfer from Hawaii, and Webster. Kelsey Ikemoto came in and, in less than two minutes, scored a goal; she later added an assist.

DOWNS
Oh, come on.
I’m not necessarily a happy-go-lucky type, but I won’t Scrooge up the place and find things to rag on in a 5-0 shutout. What should I say? New keeper Natalie Bensky should have made more saves? The Argos only got off one shot, and it wasn’t even close to the posts. Sutton mentioned there were some “glaring” things to her that needed fixing — “organizational things” — but I’m not a soccer coach and I’ll assume I don’t know what those things are.
Oh, look, I’m right.

Posted by Travis Souders at 07:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was going to postpone writing this blog until later tonight, but the insufferable Frank Caliendo is lording his pathetic exploits on the office television and I can’t find the remote.

The CCAA apparently thinks pretty highly of Chico State soccer; the women were selected to win the 2008 conference title by CCAA’s head coaches. Why not? The Wildcats have won the North Division three times in the last four years and won the North and the overall conference title last year. It is seemingly based on first-place votes alone, and Chico State received four of them while Cal State Dominguez Hills (No. 13 in the NSCAA/adidas preseason national poll) got three. Curious as to why the Wildcats are No. 24 nationally, but those rankings never stay the same.

What I find interesting is that the Chico State men got a nod for second in the North, which equates to a conference tournament spot should they actually end up there. Apparently the coaches in the CCAA are impressed with the add of Felipe Restrepo at coach and the good nucleus of talent that often inexplicably struggled to score last year. Restrepo, who reminded us in his introductory press conference that he likes to score goals, could be the one to change that trend.

Sticking with our rankings theme, the volleyball squad got a nod at No. 25, which I frankly find to be generous given the way the Wildcats played down the stretch last season. But who knows? Maybe the talent that allowed them to reach the NCAA Division II tourney last year will manifest itself over a more extended period this season. As we found out last year, the CCAA is an absolute meat grinder in terms of volleyball talent, with Cal State San Bernardino at No. 4, UC San Diego at No. 22 and Cal Poly Pomona and Cal State L.A. receiving top-25 votes.

It’s about three weeks until CCAA play starts, but the fall semester begins on Monday and that will signal the first chance to get a look at any of the teams (first assignment is women’s soccer on Thursday). Prepare yourself for the Litter Box’s most infamous misnomer, the Wildcat Report Cards.

Posted by Travis Souders at 04:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just finished up entering the last of the Chico State fall schedules into our local calendar, and it was a really great way to get me nice and pumped for the semester. Women’s soccer is the first to begin, with an exhibition tonight against Sacramento State, and while it’s not official, it officially serves to get us thinking about the rest of the upcoming events.

So, from a schedule-entryman’s (not a word, I don’t care) point of view, here are a few of the more intriguing matchups that we could see this season — at least on paper.

WOMEN’S SOCCER
It’s usually hard to slap an estimate on just which teams are going to be good beforehand each year; luckily, the NSCAA/adidas preseason national rankings do that for us. The Wildcats cracked that list at No. 24 thanks to an NCAA Division II tournament berth and a CCAA title last season, but they’re not returning as favorites in the Far West Region or the conference. Frequent Wildcat nemesis Seattle Pacific (No. 4) of the GNAC and CCAA rival Cal State Dominguez Hills (No. 13) are well ahead of Chico State. The Wildcats will host the Toros on Sept. 10, and get the challenging task of taking on the Falcons in Seattle on Sept. 6.

Seattle Pacific beat Chico State 1-0 last year in one of the best soccer showings Chico got to see in 2007; the Wildcats went 2-0 against Cal State Dominguez Hills. Watch out for Oct. 3; that’s when Chico State will face Cal State L.A., the team that eliminated the Wildcats from the national tourney last year. All told, the season series went 1-1-1, with no regulation goals scored between the two. Bad blood is good sports.
Also, it’s worth noting that the Wildcats finish this year’s CCAA schedule with three straight road games, which may or may not play a factor. Chico State was 10-2 overall in matchups away from University Soccer Stadium, though their last conference contest is against Sonoma State, a club that took two from the Wildcats last year.

MEN’S SOCCER
Because the season itself is going to be one of mystery and at least half of it is going to be the players and new coach Felipe Restrepo feeling each other out, it’s difficult to single out any one game as signigicant. My initial feeling tells me that by the time the men get down to Rohnert Park for preseason-ranked No. 6 Sonoma State — Nov. 2, to be exact — Chico State will be on the fringe of competition and needing to win that game. I don’t see the Wildcats, at first glance, mowing through the CCAA, not with the Seawolves in the North Division and No. 11 Cal State Dominguez Hills also in the mix.

MEN’S GOLF
The Wildcats have a history of inviting strong fields to their home tournament, the InterWest Chico State Invite, at Butte Creek Country Club. Last fall, the event got dumped on with rain, Art Golden, III tore up his knee and Chico State generally felt like it could have done better under new coach T.L. Brown (he was going by Travis at the time; perhaps this will change his luck). The home tourneys, because they’re so rare, are always the ones to watch for, and with Lucas Delgado and Golden coming back, the Wildcats appear to have pretty decent hopes of a top-three showing.

VOLLEYBALL
There is definitely intrigue with this team, throughout the schedule, but what I am itching to look at is trends. As hot as the Wildcats started their season — they were 13-4 at one point — Chico State dropped seven of its last eight matches in what was, retrospectively, a pretty hearty collapse.

The big matches this year will, if you’re going comparatively, be the big schools from Southern California — UC San Diego, Cal State L.A. and Cal State San Bernardino, which at one point was the No. 2 team in the country last season. I say “big” because they sign giant females with long arms who can jump high, the antithesis of Wildcat volleyball and a formula that, when done well, has been tough for Chico State to beat. The early going could make or break the Wildcats before November: Sept. 19 at the Seawolves (who come to Chico on Oct. 25), Sept. 27 at Cal State L.A., Oct. 3 at UC San Diego. The Cal Poly Pomona Broncos aren’t slouches either; they trucked the Wildcats twice last year and will offer chances at revenge well before Chico State’s CCAA stretch run.

That one isn’t pretty, either, as the Wildcats play their final four conference games on the road, not a comfortable place for Chico State in 2007: The Wildcats were 9-10 in gyms not called “Acker.”

Posted by Travis Souders at 05:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

It’s been several months since I’ve had a good old-fashioned adrenaline rush from this reporting business, and that’s expected, I suppose, from the summer months around here. It’s angering, since summer used to be my favorite season and now it’s turned into a giant nap.

So, as you can imagine, it was both pleasantly and excruciatingly harrowing for a good couple of hours Friday to try to track down a real person who would confirm or deny that apparently former Chico State women’s basketball coach Molly Goodenbour is bolting for UC Irvine.

It hasn’t been officially announced yet, but the fact that Bob Olson at UC Irvine OK’d the release of the news means that Monday, the Anteaters and Goodenbour will have a shiny new agreement to sign and a press statement to release. But we media types are impatient people, a hellish mix when sometimes the only thing you can hope for is a return phone call. Luckily, I got that call from Olson.

Crazy blood-pumping aside, what does this mean for the Wildcats? We won’t really know until Monday, but obviously the search for a new coach has a spot near the top of the docket. Is Brian Fogel sticking around? The assistant did apply for the men’s head job, losing out to Clink, and this would make sense since he’s already here and it is a head job.

The Goodenbour news doesn’t exactly surprise me, because you’ve got to figure that it’s going to be difficult to hang onto a coach of that caliber if you’re a Division II school. It’s just the way it works. There are a lot of exceptional coaches at Chico State, to be sure, and that some of the best have stuck around because of dedication to the town/university is admittedly a point of frequent wonder to me. What will get lost in all of this, I’m sure, is that while it’s clear now that Chico State was a stepping stone for Goodenbour, the Wildcats benefited from it just as much, if not more, than she did.

A lot will be made of the controversy that happened while she was here, but it was more than a year ago. What Goodenbour’s legacy should be, in my opinion, is that of a transitional coach who recruited a boatload of talent, left her impression on what Division II basketball could be like in the CCAA and left that talent and vision behind.

Posted by Travis Souders at 10:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As will be seen in the Chico Enterprise-Record on Friday, the CCAA named 36 Chico State athletes as All-Academic Award winners. This is a pretty big deal, if for no other reason than that it gives fans some perspective on how difficult it is to be a student-athlete. Consider how much harder it is to excel at both, though.

Now, to be a varsity letterwinner is no easy task, but let’s face it: Not every athlete is created equal. The ones that really impress me are the ones listed in the article (Katherine Bagwell, Jade Smith-Williams, Cody Dee and Erica Brick) because they’re top-flight competitors not only in the CCAA, but in the whole Far West/West/Pacific Region(s).

Not sure why they’re not the same regions for every sport ... anyway.

A couple semesters ago, I had a sociology class with Smith-Williams (I hate having to say this, but don’t be freaked out; I’m just really good with names and faces) before I knew her on any level. Chico State wasn’t my beat yet, but obviously I figured out who she was in time. The next semester, when I went out to Acker Gym to do the women’s season preview, I chatted her up a second for her take on things.

“How’d you end up doing in that Kaiser class?” I asked her. Then she kind of shrugged and nodded her head, probably because it’s bad etiquette to just knuckle someone’s teeth when you think they’re inferring the obvious.

“Oh, I got an A.”

The way she said it just gave me the impression that she fully expects to give that answer any time anybody asks her about something school-related. Now, I’m not familiar with the curriculum of college athletes, and I’m sure at larger schools it’s just as cake as everyone implies it is, but it’s not like she has some gimme degree. She’s a criminal justice major (there’s that creepy memory again) and she excels in it — clearly. On top of that, she is arguably the best point guard in the region and one of the best in Division II.

My point is that there is a lot to like about people who are more multidimensional than they appear, and for 36 athletes at Chico State to qualify for this award is pretty impressive. I consider myself a pretty motivated individual, but I pick my battles — these Wildcats fight ‘em all, and win.

Posted by Travis Souders at 09:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)