Sports Shorts

By Mike Bushnell

Published May 2, 2008

Tiger fans donate record amount of food

At April 19’s Black and Gold Spring Game, MU fans donated slightly less than 14,000 pounds of food to go with a $2,500 donation from the athletic department. The total more than doubled the previous spring game record of nearly 7,000 pounds. The canned goods will be donated to the Central Missouri Food Bank. Fans were allowed into the game for $3 or a donation of three canned goods. More than 26,000 fans attended the glorified scrimmage, a school record. MU went 12-2 last season.

MU wins border war

Missouri won the trophy awarded to either MU or Kansas’ athletic department for beating the other school more across all sports. The Tigers clinched the award last weekend when the women’s golf team finished ahead of KU’s squad at the Big 12 championships in Stillwater, Okla. MU came in fourth and the Jayhawks 10th. The current total between the two teams is 21-13 Missouri. There are only six more points available to be won. The remaining contests include the Big 12 softball and baseball championships, three baseball games in Lawrence, Kan., and the women’s outdoor track and field conference championship in Boulder, Colo.

Women’s hoops recruit wins awards

The Joplin Globe named incoming women’s basketball freshman Kendra Frazier the girls’ basketball player of the year. She led Labette County (Kan.) High School in Altamont to a 21-3 record and a trip to the state semifinals, averaging 25.3 points per game, top in the state. She was also named the Gatorade Player of the Year for the state of Kansas and was an All-American nominee. She won all-state honors by the state basketball association. As a junior, Frazier was named second team all-state by the two largest newspapers published in Kansas, the Wichita Eagle and the Topeka Capital Journal.

Former MU baseball player shines

Former Missouri and Parkway Central High School pitcher Max Scherzer was perfect in his Major League Baseball debut. Pitching for the Arizona Diamondbacks against the Houston Astros, Scherzer pitched 4 and two-thirds innings, retiring all 13 batters faced and striking out seven of them. The Astros won the game, though, 6-4. Scherzer was initially drafted in 2003 by the St. Louis Cardinals as an 18-year old just out of high school in Chesterfield. But he turned down the Cardinals and pitched for three years at MU. In 2006, Scherzer was drafted again, this time in the first round by Arizona. On the day before the 2007 draft and the day before the Diamondbacks would lose the rights to Scherzer, he signed. Now he is in the majors less than one year later. The Diamondbacks announced Thursday that Scherzer will be entering the starting rotation.