Baton Controversy Fuels Already Heated Rivalry

It’s a classic case of he said, she said, except in this case, it’s she said, she said.

The Pacific 10 Conference women’s track and field championship came down to the final event Sunday at Berkeley, the 1,600-meter relay. USC’s Kinshasa Davis was on the third leg and had the lead. UCLA’s Adia McKinnon was making a big move and passed Davis as they hit the final turn.

As McKinnon went by, the baton flew out of Davis’ hand. By the time Davis picked it up, the Trojan junior had lost too much ground and UCLA raced to the victory, clinching its fifth consecutive title.

Davis claimed McKinnon, with her elbow, had knocked the baton out of her hand. McKinnon denied the accusation.

Track officials determined that no foul had been committed.

USC Coach Ron Allice filed no protest but Monday, he still was feeling the sting of a victory that got away.

“All I saw was the baton go up in the air,” Allice said. “If a football is fumbled, generally the person to blame is the person who loses the ball. Our athlete felt she got hit.

“It’s the officials who didn’t see it. There was no flag and as a result, anything that I would have done would have been moot.”

UCLA Coach Jeanette Bolden spoke with McKinnon immediately after the race and the freshman from Flossmoor, Ill., said she hadn’t touched Davis.

“I asked some non-biased people, people not with either UCLA or USC, and they said that she did not knock the stick out of her hand,” Bolden said. “I have to believe my athlete.”

The controversy has added fuel to a smoldering fire that will culminate in next week’s NCAA meet at Eugene, Ore. Allice, a tireless promoter of the sport, says that’s a good thing.

“It’s terrific,” he said. “It’s so very, very important and very healthy for Southern California that both our teams do well and that hopefully these athletes [we recruit] will want to be part of this.

“It’s an intense rivalry and it should be intense.”

The rivalry has heated this season. On the men’s side, USC ended a 22-year dual meet losing streak to UCLA by edging the Bruins by one point May 5 at Cromwell Field.

Both women’s teams, which have been ranked Nos. 1 or 2 all season, figure to be in contention for the NCAA title and again it could come down to the 1,600 relay--the very event that determined UCLA’s 85-79 dual meet victory two weeks ago, as well as the Bruins’ conference triumph Sunday.

On Sunday, USC appeared to have avenged that defeat until the mishap. Besides the baton incident there was another key factor in the Trojans’ loss. Sprinter Angela Williams, the two-time defending NCAA 100-meter champion, false-started in the 100 preliminaries, then was edged in the 200 final by Arizona’s Brianna Glenn.

“You can’t make mistakes at this level,” Allice said. “Small mistakes have tremendous consequences. When both teams are just about even and a couple of your key performers don’t come through, it’s difficult to overcome that.”

Bolden said that despite the escalating rivalry, neither school can focus simply on defeating the other next week at Eugene.

“All of us will be focusing on winning the NCAAs and not beating USC or UCLA,” she said. “I mean, you’ve got South Carolina, LSU, Texas, Arkansas, Florida. If I just focused on beating USC, there are those schools that could just slip right by.”

College Division

In 1998, Nicole Duncan was an unhappy and underachieving track athlete at Iowa Wesleyan College. In 2001, she is making up a lot of ground.

Duncan, now a junior at Cal State Los Angeles, ran the nation’s fastest times among Division II schools in the 100 (11.59) and 200 meters (23.84) at the California Collegiate Athletic Assn. championships May 12. She will be the favorite in both at the NCAA meet starting Thursday at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.

Duncan, a native of Kingston, Jamaica, is also a threat to win the long jump. She already has won two Division II indoor titles.

Cal State L.A. Coach Kevin McCarthy said confidence has been the main issue with Duncan, who admits she doesn’t have a lot of self-esteem, even though she was one of the top two high school sprinters in Jamaica.

“I told her that you have to start thinking of yourself as being unbeatable,” McCarthy said.

It also took a move from Iowa to lift her spirits. Duncan, 23, was originally set to attend the University of Iowa after high school but needed to go to Iowa Wesleyan for a year to make up some classes.

“I just hated the weather,” said Duncan, who weighs 105 pounds. “It was too cold for me. I couldn’t bear it.

“It was the worst experience of my life.”

Fulfilling baseball Coach John Verhoeven’s mandate at the start of the season, Biola (45-11) qualified for its first National Assn. of Intercollegiate Athletics World Series, even though the Eagles lost their best-of-three super regional to Western Oregon.

They qualified by earning one of the two at-large berths in the 10-team tournament, which begins Friday at Lewiston, Idaho. Seven super-regional winners and host Lewis and Clark State also qualified.

Verhoeven said making the World Series was a great achievement for the program.

“I haven’t been since I was a player in 1974, so it’s been 27 years for me,” he said. “I can’t wait. We’ve got a 7 a.m. flight on Thursday and I’ll probably be up by 2.”