Sunday, April 11, 1999
NEIL SCHMIDT'S HIGH SCHOOL COLUMN
All-star options leave Smith torn
BY NEIL SCHMIDT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
There's a tug-of-war going on, and Derek Smith is the rope.
Nearly every summer all-star game seeks the services of Highlands' multi-sport star, and he'll have to turn nearly all of them down. Of the big two — the Kentucky-Tennessee football game and the two-game Kentucky-Indiana basketball series — Smith will almost surely miss one.
“I was asked to be in nearly every one: Kentucky-Ohio basketball, North-South basketball, (Northern Kentucky) East-West football and basketball, and some I hadn't heard of,” he said.
“My (future) football coaches at Kentucky let me know it's all right for me to try to do both the big ones, but it's a better idea to try to limit it. They don't want me getting hurt for next year.”
Of the big two events, the conflict is the calendar. The Kentucky-Ten nessee football game, for which Smith is already invited, is scheduled for June 18 in Knoxville. The first of the two Kentucky-Indiana basketball games is the next night in Indianapolis, the second a week later in Frankfort.
Smith will have to try out for the basketball team, but he has already been told he's a finalist for Mr. Basketball — awarded Friday in Frankfort — and should easily make the team.
Because the football-basketball turnaround is too tight, Smith plans to just do one: basketball. Two other football standouts — Kenneal Jenkins of Madison Central and Petie Spaulding of Campbellsville — are leaning the same way.
“It's not written in stone that I'm going to play basketball (as a walk-on) at UK, so it's a good choice to go out and play one more time,” Smith said. “I have plenty of football ahead of me, but I might not have any basketball ahead of me.”
Smith still hasn't finalized this decision. He recalls media criticism last year when UK signee Dennis Johnson sat out this football all-star game. He knows Highlands girls basketball star Jaime Walz was questioned three years ago when she skipped the Kentucky-Indiana basketball games.
Never mind both players were resting injuries.
“I'd like to please everyone,” Smith said, “but I can't.”
Smith will likely skip all football events, but will play in one other basketball game: the star-studded Kentucky Derby Festival Classic April 24 in Louisville. Among others playing in the game are UK signees Marvin Stone and Keith Bogans.
Highlands classmate Jared Lorenzen, Kentucky's Mr. Football, declined an invitation to try out for the Kentucky all-star basketball team. He will play in the Kentucky-Tennessee football game and also the Northern Kentucky East-West all-star football game.
NAGELEISEN STARS: Georgetown College sophomore volleyball player Noelle Nageleisen, a Notre Dame Academy grad, has earned first team All-Mid South Conference honors. She led the team in kills (333), digs (410) and passing efficiency (91 percent), and also made the conference academic all-star team with a 3.5 GPA.
JOHNSON TRADED: Don't look for Jason Johnson in the Tampa Bay box scores. The right-handed pitcher from Conner High was traded last week to Baltimore for outfielder Danny Clyburn and a player to be named later. Then he was optioned to the Orioles' Class AAA team in Rochester, N.Y., to begin the season.
Johnson, 25, went 2-5 with a 3.70 ERA in 13 starts with the Devil Rays last year, missing the season's last two months after suffering a small fracture in his back. He had been in the Pittsburgh organization before 1998.
CLASSIFIEDS: Thomas More College will have three sessions of boys basketball camps this summer: June 7-10, June 14-17 and June 28-July 1 (9 a.m.-3 p.m. daily). Cost is $80 if registering by May 15; $90 after May 15. For info or registration, call 344-3308.
Neil Schmidt is The Enquirer's Northern Kentucky sports reporter. Send e-mail to nschmidt@enquirer.com.
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