FARMERS BRANCH, TX - Like so many youngsters, 16 year old Talia Campbell is spending a lot of her time this summer playing golf. Last week at the Dallas City Junior Championship, Campbell may have surprised herself after she shot a 9-under par 63.
"Oh wow, it's how golf should be played," says Talia. "It was easy. Just hit the fairway, hit the green, get a two putt or a one putt, it was really enjoyable."
Campbell won the City of Dallas open division, ages 16 through 18. Her three day performance included rounds of 63, 72 and a 69.
"At first i thought, that's like a birdie and par every other hole, and then I realized it was my lowest round by at least five strokes," she said. "It was actually my first time to break 70 in a tournament.
That's not bad for someone who switched from soccer to golf in seventh grade just four years ago. "I think i was just burned out of soccer so that window was open," says Talia.
"Talia is definitely a future super star in the making," says Mike Kiesling, director of golf at Brookhaven Country Club in Farmers Branch. "You have a young golfer, especially a female, and if you want to see how it's done, come watch Talia play."
Campbell will be a junior at Ursuline Academy of Dallas where she helped her golf team win back to back TAPPS State Championships. She also won individual medalist honors this year. Her short game has been her biggest improvement.
"It has," she says. "I've really been putting in a lot more time effort this past year, just because that's what I was lacking the most last summer and it's really been coming around as my scores show."
"From a junior golf perspective, there's not a lot of kids with the work ethic that I see in Talia," says Kiesling. "She's here rain or shine or snow. You name it, Talia is out here practicing.
Campbell has won numerous tournaments including an AJGA tournament in Michigan where she will defend her title next week. She just missed qualifying for the US Women's Amateur by two strokes in Houston this week, but considering she's only 16, her opportunities are just beginning.
Monday, July 19, 2010
Sunday, July 18, 2010
TCU's Gary Patterson needs more room for his trophies
FORT WORTH, TX - A quick stop by TCU Head Coach Gary Patterson's office these days reveals a corner filled with trophies. The thing that's really neat to me is when you go back and you find out what all these different awards stand for, says Patterson. For me it's a we thing. Head coaches get far too much credit.
During the off season, Patterson biggest job could easily have been trying to figure out what to do with all of his trophies. Not the Conference Championship trophy which sits in the lobby, but the awards he received for coach of the year. At last count, that number stood at nine.
All of them represent something different in what they were looking for, Patterson says. Again I think you have to have a little luck, it kind of has to be a perfect storm. II think you have to do a lot of things right. It's hard to keep all that group we just talked about in the same year. It was a lot of fum. I'm very apperciative. I'm very humbled by it and I also understand that this year, it doesn't mean anything.
Patterson says he doesn't like to brag about his awards, but when you receive all the major college coach of the year awards, its hard to overlook.
Another windfall were the checks that came with those awards.
The Liberty Mutual award included $50,000. He donated that to the Presbyterian Night Shelter plus another 20-thousand to the TCU Alumni Accosiation.
The Bobby Dodd trophy included $10,000 so he donated that to the Tarrant Area Food Banks.
Its neat that you can do some things that a lot of other people benefit from, so, those are things that showed up and were kind of surprise that it all happened.
Last week Patterson got yet another award when Playboy Magazines pick him as their choice for preseason coach of the year. It's just another honor in a string of recognitions.
In 2009, TCU posted just the second 12 win season in the schools history, matched only by the 1935 National Championship team which also went 12-1. The Frogs had their first undefeated regular season since their 1938 National Championship season.
Here is a list of the trophies that Patterson received:
(1) National Coach of the Year by the Walter Camp Football Foundation.
(2) Associated Press Coach of the Year
(3) American Football Coaches Association
(4) Sporting News Coach of the Year Award
(5) Bobby Dodd Award
(6) Eddie Robinson Award
(7) Liberty Mutual Coach of the Year Award
(8) George Munger Award
(9) Woody Hayes Award
During the off season, Patterson biggest job could easily have been trying to figure out what to do with all of his trophies. Not the Conference Championship trophy which sits in the lobby, but the awards he received for coach of the year. At last count, that number stood at nine.
All of them represent something different in what they were looking for, Patterson says. Again I think you have to have a little luck, it kind of has to be a perfect storm. II think you have to do a lot of things right. It's hard to keep all that group we just talked about in the same year. It was a lot of fum. I'm very apperciative. I'm very humbled by it and I also understand that this year, it doesn't mean anything.
Patterson says he doesn't like to brag about his awards, but when you receive all the major college coach of the year awards, its hard to overlook.
Another windfall were the checks that came with those awards.
The Liberty Mutual award included $50,000. He donated that to the Presbyterian Night Shelter plus another 20-thousand to the TCU Alumni Accosiation.
The Bobby Dodd trophy included $10,000 so he donated that to the Tarrant Area Food Banks.
Its neat that you can do some things that a lot of other people benefit from, so, those are things that showed up and were kind of surprise that it all happened.
Last week Patterson got yet another award when Playboy Magazines pick him as their choice for preseason coach of the year. It's just another honor in a string of recognitions.
In 2009, TCU posted just the second 12 win season in the schools history, matched only by the 1935 National Championship team which also went 12-1. The Frogs had their first undefeated regular season since their 1938 National Championship season.
Here is a list of the trophies that Patterson received:
(1) National Coach of the Year by the Walter Camp Football Foundation.
(2) Associated Press Coach of the Year
(3) American Football Coaches Association
(4) Sporting News Coach of the Year Award
(5) Bobby Dodd Award
(6) Eddie Robinson Award
(7) Liberty Mutual Coach of the Year Award
(8) George Munger Award
(9) Woody Hayes Award
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Marathon runner lucky to be alive
HEATH, TX - Sam Killian is a typical eight year old. He's adventurous and outgoing with one exception.
Sam has Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, a rare disorder that strickens one in every 35 thousand births. It's because of Sam that his father John, became a fund raiser for Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy to help find a cure.
"Sam's muscles when he's running around, he lacks the protein to repair those muscles," says John Killian. "So instead of regenrating muscle tissue when he exercises or does things, his muscles form scar tissue. Eventually, that eventually overcomes the muscles. Boys are usally in a wheelchair by the age of 10 to 14, and eventually effects all the muscles in the body."
Sam's degenerative disease is what lead his father to become a marathon runner. He raises money for the charity by organizing groups of runners to participate in marathons.
Four weeks ago while driving from his Rockwall County to home to White Rock Lake in Dallas for a training run, Killian was involved in wrong way crash on interstate 30, east of downtown.
"I've been driving interstate 30 for 15 years now and every morning i hear something going on at the Ferguson curve," John says. "I finally found out why that morning. Your really driving around that corner blind, and literally, I think the other car was on the highway gonig the wrong direction from downtown out to Ferguson. 5:20 everybody was able to miss her until we met coming around that corner. We really couldn't see anything but I did see it right before the impact, i remember seeing headlights and thinking that's really bad. I don't remember the impact, but I remember the aftermath, the airbag, and was conscious throughout the whole thing."
The Crash killed a passenger in the oncoming car. Killian survived and suffered severe injuries, including a compound fracture of his right leg. To this day, he keeps asking why.
"It's tough to deal with, and there's a lot more emotions than i would expected, that come from that," John says. "I hope the aftermath of this, the only thing that I could hope something positive could come from this is that she turns her life around, the driver of the other car, and I hope somebody along the way sees this or hears about it and says i'm not going to have that drink and go drive."
The crash happened on fathers day morning, the same day that he and his wife were celebrating their 18th wedding anniversary.
"I got the call about 6:15 in the morning, I was asleep and I got a call from Baylor meidal center, and I answered it and it was John," says his wie Stefanie. "My first response was, why are you calling me from a hospital. 27:56 it was pretty scary, but he was calm, he was pretty calm, but it dawned on me later that it was our 18th wedding anniversary. I think that I got the best anniversary because I got John.
Because of the accident, Killian won't be running at all this year. He hopes that part of his life will return sometime in 2011.
"They said expect a year to sort of get everything recovered," says John. "I asked very specifically, will I run again, they said as well as your willing to tolerate the pain, he thinks i'll be able to out and do it again."
"For years, our family and friends have been calling John marathon man because he runs so many marathons, and is so dedicated to his marathons," Stefanie says. "Training and fund rasing is which is actually why he runs marathons, but now they're calling him miracle man instead because he survived this really bad wreck."
While Killian's injuries are expected to heal, the future for his son Sam remains much more uncertain. For John, the fund raising for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy continues.
Sam has Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, a rare disorder that strickens one in every 35 thousand births. It's because of Sam that his father John, became a fund raiser for Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy to help find a cure.
"Sam's muscles when he's running around, he lacks the protein to repair those muscles," says John Killian. "So instead of regenrating muscle tissue when he exercises or does things, his muscles form scar tissue. Eventually, that eventually overcomes the muscles. Boys are usally in a wheelchair by the age of 10 to 14, and eventually effects all the muscles in the body."
Sam's degenerative disease is what lead his father to become a marathon runner. He raises money for the charity by organizing groups of runners to participate in marathons.
Four weeks ago while driving from his Rockwall County to home to White Rock Lake in Dallas for a training run, Killian was involved in wrong way crash on interstate 30, east of downtown.
"I've been driving interstate 30 for 15 years now and every morning i hear something going on at the Ferguson curve," John says. "I finally found out why that morning. Your really driving around that corner blind, and literally, I think the other car was on the highway gonig the wrong direction from downtown out to Ferguson. 5:20 everybody was able to miss her until we met coming around that corner. We really couldn't see anything but I did see it right before the impact, i remember seeing headlights and thinking that's really bad. I don't remember the impact, but I remember the aftermath, the airbag, and was conscious throughout the whole thing."
The Crash killed a passenger in the oncoming car. Killian survived and suffered severe injuries, including a compound fracture of his right leg. To this day, he keeps asking why.
"It's tough to deal with, and there's a lot more emotions than i would expected, that come from that," John says. "I hope the aftermath of this, the only thing that I could hope something positive could come from this is that she turns her life around, the driver of the other car, and I hope somebody along the way sees this or hears about it and says i'm not going to have that drink and go drive."
The crash happened on fathers day morning, the same day that he and his wife were celebrating their 18th wedding anniversary.
"I got the call about 6:15 in the morning, I was asleep and I got a call from Baylor meidal center, and I answered it and it was John," says his wie Stefanie. "My first response was, why are you calling me from a hospital. 27:56 it was pretty scary, but he was calm, he was pretty calm, but it dawned on me later that it was our 18th wedding anniversary. I think that I got the best anniversary because I got John.
Because of the accident, Killian won't be running at all this year. He hopes that part of his life will return sometime in 2011.
"They said expect a year to sort of get everything recovered," says John. "I asked very specifically, will I run again, they said as well as your willing to tolerate the pain, he thinks i'll be able to out and do it again."
"For years, our family and friends have been calling John marathon man because he runs so many marathons, and is so dedicated to his marathons," Stefanie says. "Training and fund rasing is which is actually why he runs marathons, but now they're calling him miracle man instead because he survived this really bad wreck."
While Killian's injuries are expected to heal, the future for his son Sam remains much more uncertain. For John, the fund raising for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy continues.
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