Friendly Rose Bowl Not Just for Winners

What’s all the fuss about Nebraska playing in the Rose Bowl without having won its conference championship?

It has happened before, many times.

In the first New Year’s Day game played in the Arroyo Seco stadium, in 1923, USC got the bid when undefeated California turned it down. The Trojans’ opponent, Penn State, had a 6-3-1 record. The Trojans won, 14-0.

When the Pacific Coast Conference--now the Pac-10--signed its pact with the Big Ten in 1947, the Big Ten had a rule against the same team playing in consecutive years. So runners-up Northwestern in 1949, Michigan State in 1956, Minnesota in 1962 and Purdue in 1967 got to come to Pasadena. All four Big Ten teams were winners.

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Trivia time: Who is the No. 1 batsman in world cricket?

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Older is better: In a memorabilia auction that included a ball signed by Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, a Met uniform worn by Willie Mays, a Hall of Fame plaque of Cy Young’s and a Federal League ball signed by Eddie Plank, what brought the highest price?

The Plank ball, with a $44,820 bid. Next was Mays’ uniform at $21,835.

According to Baseball Weekly, Plank’s ball went for more than a “Help!” LP album signed by all four Beatles, which brought $35,165.

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Hard to forget: Tom Hammonds, former NBA player turned drag racer, after crashing his pro stock car in an NHRA event: “I feel like I took a hard foul from Shaquille O’Neal.”

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Proofreader needed: The Western Illinois basketball team played several games before someone noticed that on its white home jerseys, the team’s name was spelled “Illinios.”

It even appeared that way in the team picture in the media guide.

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Losing pays: When Randy Hatch, coach of the Carroll Academy Lady Jaguars in Huntingdon, Tenn., bought a Fantasy 5 lottery ticket during a trip to Florida, he chose the numbers of his five starting players.

The ticket, with winning numbers 15, 22, 23, 31 and 35, paid Hatch $113,000.

The starting five had lost every game they had played.

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Cage milestone: When Reggie Miller scored 16 points last Friday against New Jersey, the former UCLA star passed Larry Bird, his former Indiana Pacer coach, for 19th on the NBA career scoring list. Those points gave Miller 21,801.

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Sport priority: NHL star Jaromir Jagr finished fourth in balloting for the Czech Republic’s athlete of the year. The first three were all track and field performers, led by Olympic and world champion javelin thrower Jan Zelezny.

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Trivia answer: Brian Lara of the West Indies, replacing Andy Flower of Zimbabwe.

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And finally: Rudy LaRusso, the Lakers’ former four-time NBA all-star forward, says he used to think he and his 1960s teammates could play with today’s players, but he has changed his mind.

“Don Nelson told me he thought we could beat these modern guys,” LaRusso told Dwight Chapin of the San Francisco Chronicle. “But I said, ‘Don, these guys go above the rim with their elbows!”’