The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 48

0 los Sngrlrs Cimrs Simmons and Kings I I i i If lit I Pi Finish Strong, 3-3 Backup Goalie Shuts Out Sabres in Last Two Periods and L.A. Rallies for a Tie BUSINESS FINANCE CC PART III FRIDAY, MARCH 10, 1978 BY DON MERRY Timtt Staff Wrlttr BUFFALO There were three surprises in store for the Buffalo Sabres Thursday night. Not necessarily in the order of their importance, they were (a) Dave Taylor, (b) Gary Simmons and (c) the final result Taylor, the steadily improving rookie, scored two goals; Simmons, the forgotten man in goal behind Rogie Vachon, made his first start in 48 days and shook off an early attack of stage fright to keep the Sabres from mak JAf MURRAY Tl I he I our is Her Kitchen rv i A SLAP HITTER Buffalo goalie Don Edwards in Thursday night's game. Bert Wilson of the gets his stick on a Kings shot and saves a goal Kings gets reaay to duck. Kings tied babres.

AP Wlrepholo WILKES STILL UP Nobody Knows the Troubles Jamaal's Seen BY TED GREEN Timtt Staff Wrlttr No one would have blamed Jamaal Wilkes for avoiding the Golden Gate Bridge during the 1976-77 NBA season, his last with the Golden State Warriors. His teammates were feuding, management refused to renegotiate his contract and the media came down hard on him for playing out his option. He was the target of a paternity suit (he was ruled not to be the father), his infant daughter died and he separated from his wife. Now, less than a year later, no one would blame Wilkes for bellyaching about the foulup in his anticipated fresh start with the Lakers. His return to Southern California, where he had grown up and been a UCLA Ail-American on the Walton Gang, has been spoiled by, in order: his changed role after Kareem Abdul -Jabbar's injury; the losses and personnel moves that followed; criticism that he was overrated and overpaid; a strength-sapping viral infection, and, finally, a broken finger that kept him out of the lineup for 16 games and cost him his starting job.

Wilkes came back to the Lakers last week as a reserve. And on a team that has been winning regularly without him, he may be viewed as merely an expensive luxury item, at a reported $360,000 a year. That's not necessarily a reflection on Wilkes, who was hurt just when the Lakers were beginning to get healthy with their new roster. But the fact remains that they've been the league's hottest team (17-5) the second half of the season with Don Ford at Wilkes' forward spot, and athletes are sensitive to such flip-flops in fortune, no matter how coincidental they may be. To his credit, Wilkes isn't bellyach-Please Turn to Page 13, Col.

1 ing it a rout, and the Kings fought from behind twice to earn a 3-3 draw. Taylor, who has 18 goals to rank as the club's No. 3 man, behind only Butch Goring and Marcel Dionne, produced the only goal of the third period when he intercepted Jocelyn Guevremont's pass deep in the Buffalo end and drew Sabre netminder Don Edwards out of position to get the Kings permanently even. Thus a trip which once seemed forbidding has taken on happier overtones. With their 5-1 success at Toronto Wednesday night and the stalemate here, the Kings already have three points on a journey many predicted would produce none.

Stops at Montreal and Boston remain before the club returns home. Taylor, playing on a line with Dionne and Danny Grant, has had three goals in two nights but he sighed wearily, stared into a crowd of newsmen and said, "I could have had at least a half-dozen goals the past two nights. "Playing with a guy like Marcel, the chances to score come automatically. I didn't set any kind of goals at the start of the season except to make the team because not many people gave me much of a chance. I guess now I'll have to hope for 20 goals, at least." Simmons, giving Vachon a breather so the regular goaltender could rest up for Montreal on Saturday night, was making his first start since Jan.

20 when he was a 5-2 loser to Colorado. "I felt like a guy who had spent six months in a body cast and was learning to walk all over again," Simmons said with a face that was radiating good cheer throughout the dressing room. And for the opening moments Simmons played like somebody in a cast. Ninety-eight seconds into the game, Simmons was caught out of position behind the net by Craig Ramsay, who pinned him against the boards while sweeping the puck out in front to Don Luce. Simmons made a remarkable recovery and got a stick on Luce's first shot but the Buffalo player shoved in his own rebound.

Ten minutes later Andre Savard beat Simmons with a 20-footer from the Please Turn to Page 6, Col. 1 THE TIMES POLL More Favor Big A Than Coliseum as Rams7 Home BY CHARLES MAHER Timti Staff wrlttr No one stadium is favored by anything approaching a majority. While Anaheim Stadium is the most popular among the general public, its 3 margin over the Coliseum is not statistically decisive. There is a margin of error of about 3.5 in a survey of this type. So it is conceivable the positions of the two stadiums could be reversed in a survey of every adult in both counties though of course it is also conceivable Anaheim Stadium would finish farther ahead.

Here are the stadium preferences when those who say they have attended games are separated from those who haven't: Attended Anaheim Stadium 32 Coliseum 33 Rose Bowl 14 Dodger Stadium 15 Doesn't matter 2 Not sure 2 No answer 1 Haven't 23 18 18 12 14 14 9 Austin Shoots a 68 and Leads by Two Strokes BY SHAV GLICK Tlnws Staff Wrlttr For years the trademark of the Ladies PGA tour was a three-day 54-hole tournament format. Except for once or twice a year, the great players of women's golf such as Patty Berg, Babe Zaharias, Mickey Wright, Kathy Whitworth, et al, made their reputations in three-day competitions. Only in the LPGA championship and the U.S. Women's Open did they move up to 72 holes the men's standard four-day figure. Things are changing.

This year the LPGA is playing 72-hole tournaments on 15 occasions, including the Sunstar tournament under way at the Rancho municipal course in West Los Angeles. Although the players are pleased at the influx of money which has upped the total LPGA purse from $550,000 in 1968 to $3.5 million this year, not all are happy with the added work. "To be honest with you, I don't care for 72 holes," said Debbie Austin, whose four-under-par 68 Thursday gave her a two-stroke lead. "1 know it's better for the sponsors to get that extra day of revenue but during the summer it's going to get very tiring." Austin is the hottest commodity on the LPGA tour this year, having won the season opener last month in Miami and the Australian Women's Open last week in Sydney. Both were 54-hole events.

"Before the tournament started I didn't know what to expect after the long flight from Australia and all that," Austin said. "I felt like if I could shoot par for 72 holes I'd sit in the clubhouse and wait for the celebration. That sounds kinda funny after shooting a 68, doesn't it?" Tied at 70 over Rancho's course are three veterans, Joyce Kazmierski, Betty Burfeindt and Jane Blalock. Kazmierski, in her 10th year on tour without a win, says it is difficult adjusting to four-day events. "I'm not opposed to 72 holes because it means there's more money to shoot for but 1'rn more geared for 54.

There's no time to rest now. It's six Please Turn to Page 10, Col. 1 Reggie Smith Has a Drive That Shows in the Clutch (Note: Columns do not total 100 due to rounding off.) Here are stadium preferences when Please Turn to Page 12, Col. 1 BY ROSS NEWHAN Timti Staff Wrlttr "Golf widow" is a term we are all familiar with. It's used to designate a woman whose husband's real bride is a golf course, a spouse who's in absentia whether he's playing a round at the club or the Masters in Augusta.

We are used to seeing them on the tour knitting on the clubhouse porch in Georgia, or walking the treacherous roughs and fairways of the Open, watching hubby knock the new refrigerator into the water on 18, or slicing the new station wagon or fur stole out of bounds on 14, or sometimes, three-putting the new den furniture. What is not so common is the modern counterpart of the melancholy figure, the version of the golf counterpart of the melancholy figure, the version of the golf widow who shaves every day, talks baritone, and can't get into the ladies' locker room, but who lives in fear over every golf shot struck by his spouse. Walter (Yip) Rankin knows exactly what Winnie Palmer, Barbara Nicklaus, Polly Crenshaw or Valerie Hogan ever felt like. Yip Rankin is Mr. Judy Rankin.

Judy Rankin is the Jack Nicklaus or, at least, the Tom Watson of women's golf. There is a tendency on the part of the public to think of the married partner of a famous woman as a kind of lounge lizard, the traditional Hollywood husband who carries the poodle out, mixes the drinks and does the grocery shopping. And, you would think, in golf especially, it would be the woman who wears the pants in the family. But Yip Rankin goes 6-2, 205, and comes from the most macho part of Texas, West Texas, and played linebacker for Texas Tech and was drafted by the Dallas Cowboys. Yip Rankin doesn't walk anybody's dog.

When he married the golfer, he was more famous in Midland, where they met, than she was. She was then Judy Tor-luemke, bedeviled by a snap hook and not at all to be confused with Mickey Wright or Kathy Whit-worth. She had a swing only a lover could, love. Yip Rankin fell in love with the girl, not the golf. She was going to quit the tour anyway and, when she got pregnant right away, that cinched it.

Yip had, and still has, a successful insurance business in Texas. Judy was petite, only 103 pounds, she wore hair ribbons all the time and she was as shy as a robin. Right after the Rankins' son, "Tuey," was born, the women's tour came through Midland for the Tall City Open, the event at which Yip had met his bride the year before. "She had just had a baby, but she went out and shot a G6 the last day and took third," he recalls. "Then she went over to Dallas and finished third again.

Then she won her first-ever tournament at Corpus Christi, and I began to think it might be unfair to make her stay in a kitchen. "She was striking the ball so well, Bob Toski told me I was doing the girl a great injustice if I didn't let her play golf. She was 22 at the time and Toski told me, 'By the time she's 27, she'll be the best golfer in the United Yip's linebacker friends disapproved when Judy went back on the tour. So did his father, a rancher, "Bull" Rankin, who had also backed up a line for Texas Tech and for the Chicago Cardinals in the only years that they ever won the NFL championship, 1947-48. "It was hard," says Yip.

"People get the idea you're a gigolo or you're just around to open doors and clean clubs, that she had married a caddy, Then, I said, Please Turn to Page .1, Col. 1 The Rams would not be bucking popular sentiment if they left the Coliseum, a Los Angeles Times poll indicates. More of those interviewed would favor moving the Rams to Anaheim Stadium than would like them to stay put, even though about 80 of the respondents were from Los Angeles County and only about 20 from Orange County. This does not mean, however, that a majority would prefer Orange County to L.A. County as a home base for the Rams.

About 49 said they would prefer one or another of three L.A. County locations the Coliseum (21), the Rose Bowl (16) or Dodger Stadium (12) while 24 would prefer Anaheim Stadium. These opinions, it should be emphasized, are those of the general public, most of which docs not attend football games. If opinions are solicited only from those who say they have attended Ram games, the Coliseum ranks slightly ahead of Anaheim Stadium. The Times Poll included eight questions on sports.

Among other findings: The Rams made a good choice when they rehired George Allen as head coach. Football, as many would guess, is the sport people most like to read about and baseball is next. Tennis, usually farther down in such polls, is third. The question about where the Rams should play after their Coliseum lease expires in 1979 was put this way: There has been talk that the Rams may move their home games jrom the Los Angeles Coliseum to either Anaheim Stadium, Dodger Stadium or the Rose Bowl. Which of these jour stadiums would you like to see the Rams play in? The results: Those All with surveyed opinions Anaheim Stadium 24 28 Coliseum 21 26 Rose Bowl 16 19 Dodger Stadium 12 15 Doesn't matter 11 12 Not sure 5 No answer 11 'excluding "not sure" and "no SOUTH AFRICAN ENCLAVE IS OUT AS FIGHT SITE From Tlmas Wirt Strvlctt Heavyweight champion Leon Spinks was suspended for 90 days by the Nevada State Athletic Commissiona suspension that holds weight with the World Boxing Council and a proposed rematch against Muhammad Ali in a new African nation was thrown out because of an outcry against it.

Johnny Mangiaracina, executive officer of the Nevada State Athletic Commission, a member of the World Boxing Council, said the 90-day suspension was for medical reasons. Dr. Donald J. Romeo, chief examiner for the commission, had recommended the suspension after consulting with two doctors who treated Spinks for a rib injury allegedly suffered before he dethroned Ali Feb. 15.

Under the Ne-Please Turn to Page 6, Col. 1 The year also showed another side of Smith. He twice went to the mound to attack pitchers he thought had deliberately thrown at him, and he charged the stands in Chicago, saying a fan had hurled a racial slur. Smith, talking in an interview about the confrontations with pitchers John Denny and Rick Reuschel, said the Cincinnati Reds have "destroyed themselves out of foolishness," said "there is no doubt in my mind but that I will accomplish the things I accomplished last year," and said, "I will never allow myself or my team to be intimidated." The subject of intimidation, he said, is likely to come up often this year since teams gear up against the champion and pitchers have a tendency to pitch the champion's hitters with alarming tightness. Smith experienced it in Boston in 1968 after he had helped shape the Red Sox's impossible dream of '67.

"We didn't repeat in '68," Smith said, "but we were in the race until Please Turn to Page 11, Col. 1 VERO BEACH-He did not bring his drums to spring training but he did bring his tennis racquet, golf clubs and fishing gear. He did not bring his scuba equipment but he did come with an ability to fly, cook, sell real estate, train quarter horses and play seven musical instruments. The drive that has led Reggie Smith to turn himself into a one-man hobby show was seen in other ways last summer. After Los Angeles manager Tom Lasorda convinced Smith that he had untapped potential, the right fielder responded by aggressively rubbing out his reputation in some quarters as a malingerer and troublemaker.

Smith had his biggest season ever, and was the National League champions' most consistent player. His performance won Smith votes in balloting for the league's Most Valuable Player award (he finished third) and brought him the "ultimate accolade recognition among my peers for being a pressure player." UCLA PLAYERS LEAVE THE COURT-JESTING TO OTHERS But That Doesn't Mean They're Not Enjoying Themselves in Their Low-Key Sort of Way BY MARK PURDY rant behavior at UCLA, where the bench cess. Bruin assistant coach Larry Farmer, a stead of vice versa. Although head coach Timti staff writtr often looks like it is occupied by the school player from 1970-73, recalls walking into Gary Cunningham usually confines the often looks like it is occupied by the school stead of vice versa. Although head coach Gary Cunningham usually confines the accounting team, for all the enthusiasm the Astrodome locker room after the 1971 They say it happens to almost every players to the motel premises on trips, the most popular activity seems to be game-show watching, not traditional college pursuits such as water fights, In short, the impression is that no one is having much fun, The players disagree, saying that it is fun to compile a 24-2 record and win the Pacific 8 championship.

They even confess that an occasional ice-throwing contest has been held behind motel room doors. But they concede that it would be easy to get the wrong impression. "The atmosphere kind of shocked me, loo, when I first came here," Greenwood says. "People only viadc a big deal if we lost. flense Turn to Page 8, Col.

1 shown. In all likelihood, it will be that way Saturday at Eugene when the Bruins play Kansas in an NCAA first-round tournament game. "I know our bench isn't emotional," says rcscrye guard Brad Holland. "I just think it's the UCLA atmosphere or something. Maybe it has to do with our confidence, that wc feel that most of the pressure is on the other team to beat us.

Or maybe it's the whole LA. scene the guys are all cool and calm." Whatever it is, two things are certain. First, it has been this way at UCLA for quite a while, undoubtedly as an outgrowth of the school's unmatched basketball suc national-championship victory and being somewhat surprised because the atmosphere "was just like we'd won another game. It was my first experience with winning an NCAA tournament, and 1 was really excited, but most of the other guys had been through it before and if they were excited, they didn't show it." Secondly, the phenomenon is not confined to the bench or locker room. Practices are almost always short (60 to 90 minutes), quiet and intense.

If anyone is clapping or yelling, 99 out of 100 times it is a coach. On the road, bus and plane rides arc about as rowdy as a church service, and stewardesses often end up teasing the players in UCLA player when he is young, when he is a freshman. David, Greenwood remembers when it happened to him. "My first year here, I was sitting on the bench one night when we were playing Notre Dame," he says. "Marques Johnson made some great move around Adrian Dan-tlcy for a shot, and I said, 'All and jumped up.

Everybody else on the bench just sat there and kind of looked at me. It was like they were thinking, 'He's supposed to do that. What are you Greenwood was doing what a lot of other players on a lot of other teams do a lot of the time. He was showing excitement, But as he discovered, this is regarded as aber.