Clarion-Ledger from Jackson, Mississippi • Page 13

1 SCOREBOARD 2 BASEBALL 3 CLASSIFIED 5-14 THE CLARION-LEDGER 1 JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI MONDAY, MAY 7, 1990 mi SEC standings Earnhardt leaves Sacks in tracks TURNER Staff Writer i The Clarion-Ledger Vols' Halliday thwarts Dogs State is out of the SEC title hunt but has clinched a tournament berth. Engine failure forces Jackson native Lake Speed to quit on lap 41. From Special Reports Conference All Games Georgia 18-6 .750 44-12 .786 LSU 17-7 .708 41-15 .732 Miss. State 15-9 .625 39-17 .696 Auburn 11-12 .478 32-21 .604 Vanderbilt 11-12 .478 23-27 .460 Florida 10-11 .476 26-27 .491 Alabama 9-12 .429 33-20 .623 OleMiss 10-14 .417 22-27 .449 Tennessee 8-16 .333 27-28 .491 Kentucky 7-17 .292 26-25 .510 Sunday's Games Tennessee 6, Miss. State 2 Georgia 15, OleMiss 4 Alabama 6, Kentucky 2 Florida 6, Auburn 5 LSU 7, Vanderbilt 3 By Don Coble Gannett Newt Service Like society, sports fans need to be colorblind It's not something I'm really proud of, but when Patrick Ewing's desperation 3-pointer with 2 minutes, 3 seconds left effectively erased The payday made Earnhardt auto racing's all-time money leader at $10,213,178, bypassing Darrell Waltrip's career earnings by about $12,000.

Jackson's Lake Speed had a disappointing showing. He retired from the race on lap 41 after the engine failed in his Oldsmobile Cutlass. After starting 28th, he finished 38th in the field of 40 cars and won $4,435. Earnhardt and Sacks clearly dominated, pulling away from the field on command. They kept 140,000 Talladega Superspeedway fans on their feet in the closing laps for what promised to be a wild fin-ish.

Those expectations were See TALLADEGA, 3C KNOXVILLE, Tenn. Allen Halliday pitched his fourth complete game of the season to pace Tennessee to a 6-2 Southeastern Conference victory over Mississippi State Sunday. Halliday, 5-6, allowed only four hits over the last six innings to salvage the final game of the three-game series for the Volunteers. State swept Tennessee 13-3 and 9-0 Saturday. Halliday allowed nine hits, struck out four and didn't walk a batter.

State freshman B.J. Wallace, 2-1, took the loss in his first SEC start. Wallace allowed three runs on four hits before being replaced in the fourth. The Bulldogs took an early lead in the third when, with two outs, David Mitchell scored on a wild pitch and Burke Masters came home on a double by Tommy Raffo. TALLADEGA, Ala.

Dale Earnhardt and Greg Sacks spent about 2 hours Sunday setting up a two-car shootout for the Winston 500. Earnhardt then won without firing a shot. After putting himself on Earnhardt's back bumper the final 22 laps to make a late-race challenge, Sacks offered little at the finish line. He played follow-the-leader all the way, allowing Earnhardt to drive away with $98,975. Tennessee responded with three runs in the bottom of the fourth.

Mike DiFelice led off with a walk and moved to third base one out later on Shawn McDonnell's single to right. A Steve Matthews' double scored DiFelice, and McDonnell came home on a balk by Wallace. See BULLDOGS, 3C tap mmy mm In a rematch of the 1 986 final, he outduels Schley Purvis for the one title that had eluded him. By Mike Knobler Clarion-Ledger Staff Writer A uy. i Li It mi i v- 1 ft' 4 'Mil l.wleiii.,a:lifc any chance of a Boston Celtics comeback Sunday afternoon, I was thrilled.

Not that I'm a New York Knicks fan. My team, the Atlanta "Underachievers and proud of it" Hawks, didn't make the playoffs. And by rote, I usually will side with anybody but the Knicks, or any other team from the metropolitan New York area. Yet Sunday, they played the Celtics and a Boston loss meant elimination. It also meant envisioning thousands of long faces across the country.

I'm not speaking to those fans who go back with Boston to the Bill Russell era, those who've been with them through all 16 NBA championships. Just that special sect of Celtic faithful experiencing incredible agony today. The ones that rooted for them not because of the color of their uniforms, but because of the color of their star player's skin. Give Larry Bird his due. He's for real.

He may need to devote some time this summer to working on his reverse dunk, but he's a Hall of Famer for sure. Yet it disturbs me when I perceive that the Celtics have picked up legions of fans because their star is white and the roster is almost half white. And it's equally disturbing that there are those pulling against his team and others for the same reason. Color this matter silly Over the past few years, I've heard some interesting rationales as to why people favor certain teams. In the Celtics' case, the most often repeated was that Bird is the only player they can identify with in the NBA.

Well, some of those people will never be rich, 6-foot-9, able to go to their left off the dribble, nor be able to dress themselves. I don't even want to think about the scores of people Bird has caused to hurt themselves (and others) emulating him at the Y. I don't buy it. But that type of mindlessness transcends the color barrier. I once was chastised by Jackson State football fans and players for picking Northwestern (La.) State (as they called them, "The White over the Tigers as if I'm bound by some unwritten oath to always go with the team with the most blacks.

Forget that Northwestern was about 50-50 black-white. There were blacks I spoke with, who, in the midst of a tremendous American League East pennant race, couldn't pick a favorite between the Baltimore Orioles or the Toronto Blue Jays because both managers were black. And now that the City To Be Announced Raiders have a black head coach, folks who haven't had a thing to do with the team since Jack Tatum paralyzed Darryl Stingley, are flocking to the Silver and Black. It's all so silly. Aren't we above this? Fans will be fans.

They will continue to back whomever they choose. But for people to align themselves with a team simply based on the color of a player or coach is repulsive. Apparently this is a reflection of the times, a society that grows more polarized each day. It doesn't say too much about us as a people, does it? My God does not value one man over another since we all were made in His image. If you don't believe me, dust off your Bibles and look it up.

We all need to get back to the point where when a team walks on the floor, you don't have to wonder if the people in the stands have any ulterior motives, any biases attached to their allegiances. It's time to get back to the mindset where we can respect a player or team on talent alone. Where we can return to some semblance of colorblindness when we watch games without taking into account the number of players of a particular race on the roster. Where we don't so much cheer against a whole class of people than for the individual or collective excellence of a team. Sports has too many other ills to create another one.

Maybe that's too much to ask for, but I'm a dreamer. Then again, you have to be if you like I do practically live and die with the Atlanta Braves. Joe Iupe Jr. had won everything else in Mississippi amateur golf, but he hadn't won the Norman Bryant Colonial Invitational. Iupe first entered in 1980, and he has played almost every year since.

He made it to the championship match in 1986, only to lose to Schley Purvis. Sunday, their rematch went 19 holes. "Every year I've tried a little bit harder," Iupe said. "Schley gave me a chance on the sudden-death hole, and there was no doubt in my mind I was going to take advantage of it." Iupe faced a 5-foot par putt to win the tournament. "It was the kind of putt I've been making all week," he said, minutes after making it.

Purvis' 8-foot, downhill par putt had come to a stop as close to the hole as it could be without falling in the right side. "We played it on the right lip, and it just didn't turn," said caddy Rusty Purvis, Schley's brother. Purvis appeared charmed until that point. Down two holes with two to play, he made outstanding shots from the woods to win No. 17 with a par and No.

18 with a birdie. The gallery surrounding the 18th green was two or three deep, but nobody made a sound as the Purvis brothers tried to read the 9-foot putt that would force the playoff. "If anybody knows anything, y'all can just speak up," Schley said, punching a hole through the tension. "It just got too quiet on 18," he explained later. "I couldn't even concentrate on the putt it was so quiet.

I just had to say something to get some noise." He hit the putt firm and straight in. Purvis pushed his tee shot into the trees on the extra hole, and Iupe joined him. Iupe advanced the ball but stayed in the woods, and his third shot on the par-5 first hole went over the green. That appeared to create an opening for Purvis, but he had troubles of his own. He was lying two on some pine needles in the left rough.

He hit under the ball and left it short of the green. Iupe got up and down; Purvis didn't. Chris ToddThe Clarion-Ledger' Colonial Invitational champion Joe Iupe Jr. of Canton pauses for some family encouragement from wife Sherri and daughter Rachel. to make it to the final day, when he played his best golf of the tournament.

He was 4 under par in a 3-and-2 semifinal win over Tico Hoffman and 2 under in the championship match. Purvis beat Mike Taylor 1-up in the other semifinal. The tournament had one of the strongest fields in its 37-year history. Iupe was 3-down with five holes to play in his opening-round match against Max Maxwell, a match Iupe won on the 19th hole. He beat Mississippi State's Watt Whatley 3-and-2 "My short game was a career best," said Iupe, who has won five Mississippi PGA Invitationals and a State Amateur.

Those wins came before he had children and before Joe Sr. retired from the family clothing store in Canton. Age, Knicks catch up with Celtics Suns beat Jazz on Kevin Johnson's last-second shot. From Wire Service Report did." "We wanted to prove to everybody in America and the world that we weren't quitters," said Ewing, who had not won in this building since carrying Georgetown past Boston College. "Now we're in the history books." So are the Celtics, and they went in kicking and screaming.

To lose a deciding playoff game at home is rare in Boston, and the discouragement in the locker room was palpable. Robert Parish and Dennis Johnson, who had fine games with 22 and 21 points, ducked out the back door. Kevin McHale, who played poorly, was See NBA, 4C playoff series 3-2 in a stunning comeback from being down 2-0. The Knicks will open a best-of-sev-en series Tuesday at Detroit. Ewing's 31 points and 10 assists made the Celtics pay dearly for their strategy of double-teaming the New York center, and made New York only the third team to rally from a 2-0 deficit to win a five-game series.

And here, of all places. The last Knick victory here was 1984. "It was a matter of time," said Maurice Cheeks, the 33-year-old guard who played all 48 minutes for the Knicks and scored 21 points, 17 in the second half. "Anything can happen. And it i r.

i ii -miiii'-ii Mmit --r- m- ff In the end, nothing could save the ancient Boston Celtics, not even ancient Boston Garden. It is a new day in the NBA Eastern Conference, at least in New York. "It's destiny. I told my friends, my family and my children that it would come," Patrick Ewing said Sunday after leading the Knicks to a 121-114 victory against the Celtics, ending a six-year, 26-game losing streak at Boston Garden and winning their first-round The Associated Press New York's Patrick Ewing rejects Boston's Larry Bird. Sunday sports by the numbers TV today The best: It's Charles Barkley against Michael Jordan as the 76ers and Bulls start their second-round NBA playoff series at Chicago at 7 p.m.

on TNT. Also, the Atlanta Rraves invade Wrielev Inside Kevin Haverdink, a Saints rookie last year, has some advice for his former college roomie Joel Smeenge, a New Orleans rookie this season, 2C. The Jackson Mets beat Tulsa 2-0 in the Texas League, 3C. The Detroit Tigers and Toronto Blue Jays lock up in a home run derby, and the Blue Jays prevail, 3C. Mississippi Delta wins the state junior college baseball championship with a 13-2 decision over Gulf Coast, 4C.

Payne Stewart wins on PGA Tour, 4C. IL Two die in marathon Heart problems apparently caused two deaths in the Pittsburgh Marathon on Sunday. Jack Niles, 60, of Silver Spring, and Richard D. Hough, 47, of Pittsburgh were experienced runners. Niles collapsed at the 25-mile mark.

Sunday's race was his 12th marathon. Hough, who collapsed at the 18-mile mark, had run three previous marathons. Despite ideal 50-degree weather, about 500 of the race's 4,200 runners were treated along the route for nausea, dehydration, exhaustion, vomiting and other problems. Reds 5 Cardinals 1 Padres 8 Cubs 3 Texas League Jackson 2 Tulsa 0 State Colleges Tennessee 6 Miss. State 2 Georgia 15 OleMiss 4 Samford4 USM3 Juco State Championship Delta 13 Gulf Coast 2 NBA Playoffs Knicks 121 Celtics 114 Suns 104 Jazz 102 American League Indians 9-3 Rangers 5-0 Blue Jays 1 1 Tigers 7 Royals 7 White Sox 6 Twins 4 Brewers 0 Athletics 4 Red Sox 2 Mariners 5 Orioles 4 Yankees 4 Angels 2 National League Mets 7-7 Astros 4-6 Expos 7 Giants 0 Phillies 9 Dodgers 5 Pirates 6-4 Braves 4-2 Field to take on the Chicago Cubs at 7 p.m.onTBSandWrGN.

The rest: ESPN offers a tape delay of the ARCA Grand National 500 from Talladega, at 1 1 p.m..