The Montgomery Advertiser from Montgomery, Alabama • 11

Australian Open Prep basketball My Life Classified 2B 3B 4B 7B o) O) Tuesday Jan. 27,2009 Ex-JD star A i takes over A rnv i i ie noons ZL i 7 i i ii i at i i sV 1 v-. L- iJ By Tim Gayle tgayle6gannett.com Philip Pearson had always prepared himself for this day, just not this situation. The former Jeff Davis and Alabama player served for 14 years as Mark Gottfried's assistant, first at Murray State and latef at Alabama. He had applied for several head coaching positions in recent years, but never seemed upset when he was overlooked.

On Monday, he received his first opportunity to serve as a head coach when Gottfried resigned. Athletic director Mai Moore responded by appointing Pearson as the interim head coach through the remainder of the season. "Obviously, this is not what I expected today when I came to work," Pearson said. "Obviously, Mark and I are very close. Coach Moore called me in there today and asked if I would take over the team for the rest of the season.

Certainly, I told him that I would. The Alabama program is something that's very special to me." Pearson, who will turn 38 in 20 days, knows a little about coaching transitions. He was at Alabama for Wimp Sanderson's final three years, then played his last two seasons for former Tide assistant David Hobbs, who was promoted to head coach after Sanderson was forced to resign. He rejoined Sanderson as a graduate assistant at Arkansas-Little Rock in 1994-95, then joined Gottfried at Murray State the following year and has been by Gottfried's side ever since, serving as the team's top re- University of Alabama Interim Crimson Tide head basketball coach Philip Pearson was a standout at Jeff Davis in Montgomery before playing for Wimp Sanderson's Tide teams. Last-place Alcorn hands ASU its first SWAC loss mtr.

Tigers rise in poll as Heels plummet Coach Nell Fortner's Auburn Tigers (20-0), one of two undefeated women's basketball teams left in The Associ ated Press poll, moved up one spot to No. 5 after beating then-No. 10 Fortner Tennes- see on Suridav. After its worst week in seven years, North Carolina made an unprecedented slide from No. 2 to No.

10. The other undefeated team, Connecticut, remained the unanimous-top choice for the ninth straight week Monday after routing the Tar Heels 88-58. Oklahoma moved up to No. 2 for the second time this season. Wire report Cowboys receiver gets reality show DALLAS Terrell Owens hopes to score with a new cable reality show.

The Dallas Cowboys' controversial wide re ceiver will star in his own show on VH1 this summer, living ans a look into his life Owens off the field. VH1 announced Monday that the series takes place in the offseason, and T.O.'s best friends and publicists Mon-ique Jackson and Kita Williams will help him re-examine his personal life. The two will work as "matchmakers and therapists" for Owens. Owens, who caught 69 passes for 1,052 yards and 10 touchdowns this season, was prominently featured on HBO's "Hard Knocks" that tracked the Cowboys in training camp last year. Wire report City amateur will represent U.S.

Montgomery's Jeff Taylor will represent the United States in an international amateur golf tournament after winning a national tournament earlier this month. Taylor will play in the Mercedez-Benz Amateur World Final this fall in Stuttgart, Germany. Earlier this month in Maui, Hawaii, Taylor shot a two-round 139 to beat 21 1 other competitors from around the United States. On Jan. 9, Taylor shot a 70 on the Kaanapali Kai course and won the closest-to-the-pin competition.

On Jan. 10, he shot a 69 on the Royal Kannapali course. Taylor and Smokey Rigdon, also of Montgomery, finished fourth in the team competition. The two qualified last April at a regional tournament at Wyn-lakes Country Club. A.

Stacy Long Strip clubs await sports fans, money TAMPA, Fla. There are, by one count, 43 strip clubs in the Tampa metropolitan area one for each Super Bowl. And the week of Super Bowl XLIII is to Tampa's naughty nightlife what Black Friday is to shopping malls. Now, with at least one spot planning to have a tent in the parking lotto handle the overflow of free-spending tourists, locals expect to profit mightily through kickoff. "Based on what we did last Super Bowl (in 2001), the numbers will quadruple during that weekend," said Nick Po-lefrone, general manager of 2001 Odyssey.

Wire report "Obviously, this is not what I expected today when I came to work. Philip Pearson, Interim Alabama head coach lr montgomeryadvertiser.conv, JaMychal Green talks about Saturday's loss cruiter. He was responsible for bringing many of the area's top players to campus, including Selma's Chuck Davis, Birmingham's Ronald Steele and Montgomery's JaMychal Green. Most recently, he signed guard Charvez Davis, a Florida junior college player who once played at Pearson's alma mater, JeffDavis. Pearson's former high school coach, Wilbert Hamilton, said he thought Pearson would keep much of Gottfried's coaching philosophy in place but wouldn't be afraid to try new ideas.

"I think the basic style will be a lot like Mark's," Hamilton said, "but he has a lot he can build on. You couldn't have a better person, someone who's been loyal to the university. I'm sure he has some new ideas because he saw some things that needed to be changed. But it's a win-win for the university because he knows what needs to be done and there won't be any Tide Page 3B took them for granted because of their record. This is a big wake-up call for us." Alabama St.

women 61, Alcorn St. 43 After a loss on Saturday night, ASU women's coach Freda Freeman-Jackson criticized her team's rebounding effort and defensive intensity. Her Lady Hornets made up for it Monday against Alcorn State. ASU outrebounded the Lady Braves by 15, held them to just 26 percent shooting and won easily, 61-43. Three Lady Hornets scored in double figures, led by Shanice Merritt's 12 points and 10 rebounds.

Jasmine Quinn also had 12 points and L'Teisha Hol-loway added 10. Britney Harris also had nine rebounds. be careful that the students who recruit here understand that. We don't want to be exclusive, but we also need to recruit players who have a reasonable expectation of having success here and earning a degree. We had gotten away from that some recently, but I'm confident Gregg will get us back where we need to be." With the interim tag now removed, Baker said he will begin by evaluating his staff and filling any open positions.

After that, it's very quickly on to recruiting. "We have to move pretty quickly here and make sure we're all set with the staff," Baker said. "Having been here last year, I have a pretty good grasp on what our immediate needs are. We'll start addressing those (immediately)." By Josh Moon jmoongannett.com For the last several games the Alabama State basketball team has been playing with fire, as it turned in uninspired performance after uninspired performance. Monday night, the Hornets got burned.

Alcorn State, the Southwestern Athletic Conference's worst team, shot nearly 50 percent from the floor and out-hustled and outplayed the Hornets in almost every facet of the game. The Braves beat the SWAC's best team, 79-74. "We've been fighting this for several games now," ASU head coach Lewis Jackson said. "We're just not playing good basketball. You could see it sev we got the ball down into Chief and those guys, good things happened for us.

But we just refused to get the ball in there in the second half. We tried to be too fancy instead of getting our points." Alcorn's Troy Jackson made the Hornets pay. Jackson, the SWAC's leading scorer, had 20 points in the second half and a game-high 25 and almost single-handedly held off every ASU rally attempt. When the Hornets cut the deficit to one with five minutes to go, a Jackson bucket pushed it to three. When they cut it to two with just over three to go, two Jackson free throws pushed it back to four.

"They just wanted it more than we did," said Kickingstalli-onsims, who had a team-high 24 points on ll-of-12 shooting. "We ALCORN STATE 79 ALABAMA STATE 74 the lead to five to open the second half, ASU seemed ready to runaway. But the three led to a slew of ill-advised outside shots and not nearly enough inside play. Kick-ingstallionsims got only a handful of touches and took just five more shots in the second half. ASU hit just 2 more of its 9 three-point attempts in the half.

Things went bad in a hurry. Alcorn used an 8-2 run to retake the lead and, after the 13-minute mark, never trailed again. "We had something going down low, but we went away from it," Jackson said. "When New coach made choice 'easy' eral times tonight, with the turnovers, particularly the turnovers on fast breaks. We've got to get ourselves right." The Hornets (9-8, 6-1 SWAC) weren't right from the start against Alcorn.

The Braves (4-16, 2-6) opened the game on an 11-2 run and had a lethargic ASU squad searching for answers. It took until after the midway point of the first half for the Hornets to find one. With its outside shooting failing, ASU turned to its inside game. And center Chief Kicking-stallionsims turned things around. By halftime, Chief had 14 points on 7-of-7 shooting and the Hornets had turned a double-digit deficit into' a two-point halftime lead.

After a quick Tre-maine Butler 3-pointer pushed mm marl ervtyf day morning, they introduced that perfect hire to the players, students and media Gregg Baker. "There wasn't a -candidate who better fit what we were looking for than (Baker)," Faulkner president Billy Hilyer said. "To be quite honest, he had everything we were looking for and he blew me away in his interview." Baker, who was the- head 3V A Photos by Julie Bennett Advertiser Gregg Baker, the new head football coach at Faulkner University, pledged Monday to "move quickly" to prepare for the upcoming season. By Josh Moon jmoon6gannett.com The six members of the Faulkner University search committee tasked with finding the school's new head football coach began the search process skeptical of Gregg Baker. Most viewed Baker, who was tabbed the interim when former coach Jim Nichols left in November, as the "easy choice," and they weren't interested in easy.

The committee members wanted to make a splash, They wanted to meet all of their criteria. They wanted to hire the perfect candidate. At a news conference Mon- i7- i 'A 1 IV? coach at Alabama Christian Academy for two seasons before taking a job as the running game coordinator and offensive line coach with the Eagles last year, will be Faulkner's second head coach and takes over a program that has gone 3-18 in its first two years. "This is a dream come true for me," Baker said. "We have a lot of work to do, but I feel confident that we can accomplish a lot here.

Having worked with these assistant coaches and these players last year, I know what our potential is. The future is bright for this program." More than 100 students, administrators and fans gathered in Faulkner's gym Monday morning for Baker's official introduction. Included in that group were Baker's parents and his grandmother. And sitting front and center was a large group of players, who all seemed to be very happy with the choice. "This was absolutely the right decision for this program," said All-American linebacker Sean Thorn, who sent an e-mail last week to school officials encouraging them to hire Baker.

"I've seen what he has done over the last several weeks as we've gone through workouts and he's met with us. He brings a lot of intensity and he's easy to relate to. He's a guy who's played this game at a high level, and he knows what it takes to be successful." After an All-American high school career at George Washington Carver, Baker accepted a scholarship offer to Georgia Tech in 1985. While that experience certainly doesn't hurt, it isn't what made him so attractive to the Faulkner search committee. Instead, they were more impressed by the relationships Baker built with several local high school coaches over his 17-year coaching career.

"Gregg has a great reputation around the state of Alabama as an excellent football coach, and it became apparent during the process that he was the guy we wanted to lead our program," Faulkner athletic director Brent Barker said. In addition, Hilyer said he felt as though Baker had the best grasp on what type of players should be recruited to Faulkner. "We're a little different here than the normal state Institution," Hilyer said. "We have to Members of the Faulkner University football team applauded the school's decision to hire Gregg Baker..