The Junction City Blue Jays got rushing touchdowns of 25 yards from Tanner Lueker and 50 yards from Daquan Davis enroute to a 21-12 victory over the Shawnee Heights Thunderbirds  at Al Simpler Stadium.

The Blue Jays overcame two turnovers to get the win.  They also benefited from three turnovers by Shawnee Heights included an interception in the Junction City end zone early in the fourth quarter that stopped a potential Thunderbird scoring drive.  The Blue Jays also blocked two Shawnee Heights’ PAT kicks following touchdowns.

For the Blue Jays it was their first win of the 2013 season following close losses to Hays and Seaman. Shawnee Heights fell to 1-2 on the season.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) – It’s been a tough week for Texas coach Mack Brown.

The Longhorns (1-2) have lost two straight games and will open the Big 12 season Saturday night at home against Kansas State (2-1). Then came Thursday’s revelation that a school regent and a close friend talked in January with Alabama coach Nick Saban’s agent about the possibility of luring Saban to Austin if Brown retired. The friend followed the phone call with a meeting with Brown to ask him if he was ready to retire.

No, Brown said, and that was that. But only until two straight losses to BYU and Mississippi sparked a new flurry of questions about his future at Texas.

The Wildcats have won five straight against Texas, which has key injuries on offense.

 

The Junction City Lady Jays finished second in the Hays Invitational with a team score of 83 points, behind only Garden City who had the winning low team score of 22 points. Leading the way for Junction City was Rosie Hollis with a fourth place finish in 16:33. Deisjambra Bisio finished eighth in 16:56.

In the varsity boys competition Junction City finished fourth ouf of nine teams with a score of 106 points. Liberal finished first with a score of 54 points.  For Junction City Jonathan Lucas finished 15th in 18:25.

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The Junction City Middle School 8th grade volleyball team competed in a quadrangular at Washburn Rural.  The Wildcats lost to Emporia 25-23, 25-16, to Shawnee Heights 25-10, 25-15, and to Washburn Rural 25-16, 25-11.

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The Fort Riley Middle School seventh grade football team lost to Abilene 34-14. The FRMS 8th grade football team fell to Abilene 26-6.

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The Saint Xavier Middle School Lady Rams volleyball team lost to Victory Christian Academy of El Dorado 25-19, 25-11, 25-12.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – The Kansas City Chiefs have released fullback Toben Opurum and signed safety Bradley McDougald to their practice squad in a swap of former Kansas standouts.

Both players joined the Chiefs in May as rookie free agents.

McDougald was active for last Sunday’s win over Dallas but did not play. He was released from the active roster and brought back to the practice squad on Wednesday.

The Chiefs made room by releasing Opurum, who had spent the first two weeks of the regular season on the practice squad.

 

Work on a feasibility study for a proposed sports complex in Junction City will begin Thursday.

The Geary County Convention and Visitors Bureau Advisory Committee set a goal at the end of last year to get the proposed project off the ground last year according to the advisory committees chair, Adam Wilkey. ” Our number one goal that we set as a committee was to get this project somewhat off of the ground. Whether or not it could get done or what not,” Wilkey said.

Sport Facilities Advisory, a Florida based company, was hired to conduct the feasibility study for the project. Two SFA representatives are scheduled to arrive in Junction City Wednesday night. “They will be here for the next couple of days and we will be looking forward to actually sitting down with them and actually giving them a physical market tour of not only of Junction City but the surrounding areas.”

Wilkey hopes that SFA will be able to give the CVB an idea of good locations for the complex,”In our tours we will be looking at some potential sites. That’s sort of where their expertise comes in as well because they will have a better feel of what kind of acreage we will need and such.”

Wilkey believes that a potential location should be somewhere near the I-70 corridor,” Obviously the thought is you want to have some visibility from I-70. I think that’s what attracts the big tournaments, I think just the convenience and the location. I think we’ve got to utilize that corridor.”

The feasibility study is expected to take between two and three months to complete.

MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) – Running for 41 yards on 23 carries wasn’t going to cut it in Bill Snyder’s offense.

After all, running the ball has been a cornerstone at Kansas State ever since Snyder arrived on campus in the late 1980s. The school has produced standouts such as Darren Sproles and Daniel Thomas, and last year had one of the nation’s top rushing quarterbacks in Collin Klein.

So when the Wildcats produced 41 yards rushing in a season-opening loss to North Dakota State, it was time to regain their focus. And the result has been 479 yards rushing in a pair of wins, including 329 yards against Massachusetts last week.

The Wildcats hope to keep it going this coming Saturday night at Texas.

 

The Saint Xavier Rams high school volleyball team fell to Chapman on Tuesday by the scores of 25-3, 25-11, ad 25-6.

The Junction City Blue Jay boys soccer team fell to Seaman at Al Simpler Stadium Tuesday 5-0. Junction City is 2-6 on the season.

In volleyball the Lady Jays went 1-2 Tuesday evening. They defeated Topeka West 25-19, 21-25, 19-17. They lost to Shawnee Heights by the scores of 25-12, 25-17, and the Lady Jays fell to Washburn Rural 25-11, 25-15.  Junction City is 4-4 on the season.

The Kansas State Wildcats open Big 12 play Saturday on the road against the Texas Longhorns.

K-State does hold a five game winning streak against the Longhorns however they can’t let that enter their minds. ” Last year was last year and I’ve said so many times dynamics are so different every year and what you’ve done in the past has no bearing on the future,” Head Coach Bill Snyder said Tuesday.

The Wildcats will be facing an offense that plays at a faster speed than they have seen so far this year. Snyder mentioned,” Texas is playing at a far greater rate of speed or faster tempo than they ever have before.” He used Texas’ spring game as an example saying that at times they were snapping the ball between 9, 10 or eleven seconds after the ball was blown dead. “That’s extremely fast. The fast teams don’t go that fast.”

Snyder said that the number one challenge with facing an offense that fast will be,” Being able to get yourselves lined up and then be able to make adjustments that take place when they have movement.”

Jonathan Truman, Starting Linebacker, said that it has been fun watching film on the Texas offense,”They’re a really talented offense, we’ve been studying them and it’s really fun to watch film on them and they do have up tempo and a lot of speed.” Truman stated that it will be a challenge for the defense Saturday but, “A good challenge for us.”

Junior Jake Waters will once again get the start Saturday however Snyder did say we can expect to see Sophomore Daniel Sams getting snaps under center still,”Daniel will certainly play, I mean that’s quite obvious, as I’ve said it hasn’t changed week in and week out there are certain things that you would like to be able to do and you have kind of a “plan” in place. But that will be dictated by the University of Texas as much as anything.”

Saturday’s game in Austin, Texas will kick off at 7 p.m. and will be televised nationally by ABC.

 

Briana Elliott captured the gold medal in No. 1 singles play at the season opening Chapman Tennis Quadrangular. Briana went 3-0 in competition, defeating opponents from Abilene, Wamego, and Concordia. She helped lead Chapman to a first place finish in the team competition in the quadrangular.

In recognition of her play the Chapman High School junior is being recognized as the McDonald’s Athlete of the Week, sponsored by the Talk of JC, 1420 KJCK. Briana will receive a framed certificate, recognition on display boards at the two McDonald’s Restaurants in Junction City, and on both KJCK AM, The Talk of JC and online atJCPost.com.