The Montgomery Advertiser from Montgomery, Alabama • 13

Hontgomcnj Advertiser Sport Ken Rogers Sports editor Phone (334) 240-0190 Fax (334) 261-1548 200 Washington Ave. Montgomery AL 361 04 Monday Oct. 16, 2000 INSIDE 6B Golf 2B Baseball NFL 4B Rusiness 5B MM'-flffg Jobs growft Mia 1 Sportsline Baseball ALCS Seattle 6, New York 2 NLCS New York 10, St. Louis 6 NFL N.Y. Giants 19, Dallas 14 St.

Louis 45, Atlanta 29 San Diego at Buffalo 27, San Diego 24 (OT) Washington 10, Baltimore 3 Oakland 20, Kansas City 17 New Orleans 24, Carolina 6 Pittsburgh 15, Cincinnati 0 Denver 44, Cleveland 10 Indianapolis 37, Seattle 24 N.Y. Jets 34, N. England 17 Philadelphia 33, Arizona 14 Green Bay 31, San Fran. 28 Minnesota 28, Chicago 16 NHL Edmonton 5, Minnesota 3 Tampa Bay 5, Atlanta 2 Calgary 4, Detroit 2 Chicago 2, Columbus 1 Phoenix 6, Los Angeles 5 BRIEFLY -7, f- I 1 VlfJk 'mas 3S 1 jBwtrt laai Ben Thomas ASST. SPORTS EDITOR Earnhardt still owns Talladega II more than three II hours and 186 laps, 43 NASCAR drivers battled fender-to-fender, door-to-door in what undoubtedly will go down as one of the most exciting Winston Cup races in the history of Talladega Superspeedway.

But in the end new re-strictor plates and all it was the same old story at the finish line. Dale Earnhardt, the crafty king of drafting, came out of nowhere with less than two laps left in the 188-lap event, shot into the lead near the start-fin ish line and roared to his second straight Winston 500 victory and third win in the last four NASCAR races here. The crowd of more than 170,000 went wild as Earn hardt won his 10th Win ston Cup event at Talladega in a most improbable fashion and left nearly everyone stunned. "That guy's just damn good," second place finisher Kenny Wallace marveled of Earnhardt. His words certainly rang true late Sunday afternoon.

Earnhardt was in 23rd place with 13 of 188 laps remaining and had moved up only to 10th with a measly three laps to go. No chance right? Wrong. Dead wrong. "I don't know how I won it, honestly. We moved up, then got pushed back again," Earnhardt said.

"To be that far back and still win is pretty impressive and says a lot for the spoilers and the racing today. I think we were just fortunate to get hooked up with Kenny and Joe Neme-chek and basically that's how I won the race." It sounds simple, but proved to be anything but. The change made to the carburetor restrictor plates cutting the size of the holes in the plate from 1 inch to 15-16th of an inch just 24 hours earlier Owns Page 3B Mickey Welsh Staff Dale Earnhardt Sr. celebrates by spraying champagne in victory lane after winning Sunday's Winston 500 in Talladega. The Intimidator races to impressive Winston 500 win More Winston 500 coverage Winston 500 results 3B Dale risk doesn't pay off in the end 3B Restrictor plates didn't slow excitement 3B Pre-race party sets tone for Talladega race 1A for an unprecedented eighth NASCAR points championship.

"We've got to start having the luck like we did here in Talladega." Labonte, who finished 12th and flirted with the lead in the final 30 laps, need only finish in the top 10 of the final four races to win the 2000 points title. "It's mentally demanding," Labonte said of the final 15 laps following an accident involving four cars. "I've never played chess before but I am sure it would be like that." Following Saturday's practice session, NASCAR officials decided to change the 1-inch restrictor plates to 1516 of an inch, add a rooftop strip and change to a higher rear spoiler after speeds neared 200 mph. The decision was met Dale Page 3B By Tim Gayle Montgomery Advertiser TALLADEGA With five laps left in Sunday's Winston 500, Mike Skinner and Dale Earnhardt were all set for an exciting, down-to-the-wire finish. Dale's father, "The Intimidator," was nowhere to be found, languishing in 18th place.

But Earnhardt has pulled off many memorable victories in a veteran NASCAR career of 671 races. And Sunday's win at Talladega Superspeedway might have been the most impressive of all. While Skinner and Earnhardt, were battling low and others were trying to mount a challenge on the high side of the banked oval, the master of superspeedway racing taught the younger generation yet another lesson with an incredible move through the middle to grab the lead on the next to last lap, then held off Kenny Wallace and Joe Nemechek to take the checkered flag. "Coming from the back to where I've did, I can't compare this to any race I've done," Earnhardt said. "That's one of the greatest, if not the greatest, Talladega races I've ever won." It marked the 10th victory and 27th top 10 finish for Earnhardt in Dale Earnhardt Sr.

his way to his 1 0th David Bundy Staff (3) passes his son Dale Jr. (8) and others on victory at Talladega Superspeedway Who should be Alabama's quarterback? 48.9 Andrew Zow 44.4 Tyler Watts Qs.7 Split time between the two Total Votes: 806 www.montgomeryadvertisar.com Seattle wins Game Mets pound St. Louis Seattle Mariners manager Lou Piniella's pregame message to his team was clear: "Don't let them win it on our turf." The Yankees, who won the first two games of the American League championship series at Safeco Field, were one win away from returning to New York with the AL pennant. But after Seattle's 6-2 victory Sunday, the Yankees instead will return to Yankee Stadium for Game 6 on Tuesday night. Meanwhile, New York pounded the St.

Louis ace with a record five doubles in a four-run first inning and moved within one win of the World Series, beating the Cardinals 10-6 Sunday night for a 3-1 lead in the NL championship series. The Mets will try to wrap up their half of the Subway Series by winning Game 5 tonight at Shea Stadium. Mike Hampton starts for New York against Pat Hent-gen, pitching for the first time in 15 days. St. Louis manager Tony La Russa hopes that works better than bringing Kile back too soon.

Kile, who allowed seven runs and eight hits in three-plus innings. Complete coverage 4B The Associated Press Juli Inkster reacts after winning the LPGA World Championship by four strokes ahead of Annika Sorenstam. Golf coverage 2B Medial ine BASEBALL Playoffs, NLCS, game 5, St. Louis at N.Y. Mets, WCOVFOX, 7 p.m.

NFL Jacksonville at Tennessee, WNCFABC, 8 p.m. COMING TUESDAY The Advertsee's weekly Recreation page will feature Tennis Across America, which gives children a cnance to get a free lesson on xennis. Page edited and designed by Kevin Taylor I' i JllJIJl'I Pll 44 races at Talladega Superspeedway, both tops among all NASCAR drivers. In winning for the third time in the last four races at Talladega, Earnhardt passed Jeff Burton to take over second place in the Winston Cup standings, 210 points behind Bobby Labonte. "We have to gain every race like that," Earnhardt said of his chase ALABAMA AT Tigers try to find way to make plays Tide now turning yur-TMi ijj mt uihiu nun, n.n iuij i wi ij TENNESSEE in right turning our season around with one win," he said.

"We've got to take them one game at a time. "But there's no question a game like this can be used as a turning point, especially if we can come back this week and build on the improvements we made fundamentally the last two weeks." Such a turnaround game couldn't have come at a better time for Alabama. Straight ahead is the third Saturday in October and direction ALABAMA AT TENNESSEE When: 2:30 p.m. Saturday I Where: Neyland Stadium, Knoxville, Tenn. I Records: Alabama (3-3, 3-1 SEC); Tennessee (2-3, 0-3) On the air: TV WAKACBS; Radio WXFX-FM 95.1 long-time traditional rival Tennessee.

Like Alabama, the Vols have struggled to the midway point in disappointing fashion, losing three games. As usual, Alabama-Tennessee is a nationally showcased game, but realistically the game is for little more than pride. Alabama can lose to Tennessee and still win the Western Division and ultimately the SEC. But considering the lofty preseason expectations of the team, those would be considered nice consolation prizes for the Tide. Perhaps more important to Alabama is stopping the Vols' current five-game winning streak in the Tide Page4B By Mike Tankersley Montgomery Advertiser Alabama coach Mike Du-Bose insists his team did little different Saturday against Ole Miss than it had been doing all season.

The plays were the same, the coaches' play calls were the same and the objectives were the same. What wasn't the same was the execution of those plays and the intensity of the players running them. With an extra week to work on fundamentals and perhaps a little soul-searching, Al- DuBose abama finally resembled the team that was ranked No. 3 nationally in the preseason in dismantling the then-25th-ranked Rebels 45-7 at Bryant-Denny Stadium. "I think we improved a lot fundamentally," DuBose said Sunday.

"Of course, the real big thing was, we had people step up and make difficult plays, like the catches Antonio Carter made. Derrick Woods and Sam Collins also stepped up. "We had quite a few young guys step up and make some big plays, and By Jay G. Tate Montgomery Advertiser AUBURN Two weeks ago, Tommy Tuberville was telling Auburn fans to keep from getting too excited about the team's 5-0 start. On Sunday, he was doing just the opposite.

One day after the Tigers (5-2) were blown out 38-7 at Florida Auburn's second loss in a row Tuberville told fans to keep their hopes up. "We're not going to panic," Tuberville said. "We won five games by doing a lot of things right. We were just overwhelmed in the past couple of games. That's just what it comes down to.

To win those games, we would have had to play over our heads. We didn't get close to it." Even that may be an understatement. Auburn had absolutely no chance against Florida Saturday. Though Auburn amassed 322 yards against the Gators, it watched quarterback Ben Leard throw a key interception and lose a fumble. Another interception, a screen pass picked off by Florida's Alex Brown that went for a touchdown but was called back, could have seized what remains of Auburn's offensive credibility.

Sure, Auburn is making LA. TECH AT AUBURN When: 1 p.m. Saturday Where: Jordan-Hare Stadium, Auburn Records: La. Tech (2-5); Auburn (5-2; 3-2 SEC) On the air: TV Pay per view; Radio WLWI-FM 92.3, WMSP-AM 740 in Montgomery; WQNR-FM 99.9 in Auburn and Tallassee yards. But it can't seem to make plays.

Consider this: Auburn's offense has scored four touchdowns in its last three games. One of those scores came on a 1-yard drive set up by a botched punt against Mississippi State. That's three legitimate offensive touchdowns in three games. Remember when the offense said it would carry the defense this season? "It's like we've lost our rhythm or something," said Auburn wideout Ronney Daniels, who caught six balls for 64 yards against the Gators. "Whatever it is, we've got to figure it out Plays Page4B Mickey Welsh Staff Alabama's Antonio Carter, who took over for the injured Freddie Milons, was one of a few players to step up to lead the Tide to an easy win.

we had a lot of older players who played better than they had been playing. And the players seemed to have some fun out there and played with some confidence." DuBose wouldn't go as far as to call the win over Ole Miss the turning point in the Tide's disappointing season. Clearly, though, that thought is somewhere in the back of his mind. "There's still plenty of room for improvement, so we can't start talking about iiWMMWl.a.ll.l..lllllllliL JU UJ El.