June 11, 2004

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Palo Alto Online

Another hoop coup possible

by Nathan Kurz

Stanford men's basketball coach Trent Johnson may be up to his old tricks once again.

According to the TheBootleg.com, Stanford is heavily pursuing Omar and Jordan Wilkes, a pair of brothers from the Los Angeles area-a coup that would conceivably rank up there with the greatest acquisitions in Stanford basketball history.

Omar is a 6-foot-4 freshman shooting guard who just obtained his transfer from Kansas while Jordan is still a high school junior.

The two, of course, are the progeny of former UCLA, Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Lakers great (Keith) Jamaal Wilkes.

It appears that this is a project undertaken by Johnson, who also plucked the Collins twins out of nowhere in the fall of 1998 after revelations about recruiting violations by then-UCLA head coach Jim Harrick became public.

Omar recently voiced his wish to transfer to a school on the West Coast, close to his Southern California home. Jordan, meanwhile, was scheduled to make an official visit to Palo Alto last week but decided to delay the visit until he had finished the Stanford application and had been admitted by the school.

Before Mike Montgomery left Stanford for the NBA, he reportedly went to visit the Wilkes brothers in Los Angeles in early April.

The 6-foot-11, 205-pound Jordan was ranked the No. 4 junior center on the West Coast, according TheInsiderHoops.com.

As a freshman with the Jayhawks, Omar averaged only 3.5 minutes and 1.4 points and appeared in only 21 of Kansas' 33 games. He was recruited lightly by Stanford two years ago, never made an official visit and chose the Jayhawks over the Cardinal, Bruins and Washington.

California and the Huskies are the other two schools believed to be in the running for the Wilkes brothers.
Women's Tennis For the second straight season, Stanford sophomore Amber Liu captured the NCAA singles title in tennis. And, for the second straight year, Liu has been named the ITA National Player of the Year. Liu is the fifth woman to receive ITA National Player of the Year honors in consecutive years, joining ex-Cardinal players Patty Fendick (1987-88) and Laura Granville (2000-01) as well as Trinity's (Texas) Gretchen Rush (1984-85) and Florida's Lisa Raymond (1992-93).

Liu captured her second straight NCAA singles title last month while also helping Stanford to the team championship. The native of La Mesa, Calif. beat Jelana Pandzic of Fresno State in the NCAA singles final, 6-4, 0-6, 6-3.

She went 25-4 in singles this season and also finished at No. 1 in the ITA national rankings. Liu wrapped up the season with All-America and First-Team All-Pac-10 honors. In her two years on The Farm, she has compiled a 58-14 singles record.

Liu also has been named the nation's most outstanding athlete in tennis, according to results of national balloting among NCAA member schools, and will receive the Honda Award, given annually to the top woman student-athletes in 12 sports.

She will be honored at the ITA All-Star Outing and Awards Luncheon, presented by the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, on Aug. 27 at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, N.Y.

With the Honda Award, Liu is also automatically nominated for Collegiate Woman Athlete of the Year honors along with athletes in the sports of cross country, field hockey, soccer, volleyball, gymnastics, basketball, swimming/diving, golf, lacrosse, and track & field.

The Collegiate Woman Athlete of the Year will be determined by separate balloting involving all NCAA-member institutions and will receive the Honda-Broderick Cup on June 21 in New York.

The ITA National Player of the Year award goes annually to the individuals who have had the most outstanding years in both individual and team competition, as determined by an ITA committee.

Liu wasn't the only member of the Cardinal tennis team to be honored. Stanford's Lauren Barnikow and Erin Burdette were named the 2004 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Women's Doubles Team of the Year.

Stanford's Barnikow and Burdette went 32-3 this season and finished No. 1 in the ITA Rankings. The 16.94 point difference between the No. 1 and 2 doubles teams was the second-largest margin between the top two spots in the final rankings since 1984.

Barnikow and Burdette held the top ranking in eight of 10 rankings this season (and three times in 2002-03). Barnikow is a senior from Woodbridge, N.J., and Burdette is a junior from Jackson, Ga. They are the second Cardinal pair to receive this award, joining 2002 winners Lauren Kalvaria and Gabriela Lastra.

The ITA National Doubles Team of the Year award goes annually to the team that has had the most outstanding year, as determined by the ITA.

The ITA All-Star Outing and Awards Luncheon, presented by the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, in August will also honor the 2004 Arthur Ashe/ITA Leadership and Sportsmanship Award winners (for Division I) and several of the top-ranked collegiate players from all divisions in the ITA Rankings.
Men's volleyball

Stanford put seven student-athletes on the 2004 All-Mountain Pacific Sports Federation academic team, the most of any school.

Juniors David Vogel (3.43 GPA) and Patrick Bomhack (3.33) were joined by sophomores Chris Ahlfeldt (3.27), William Clayton (3.82), Jeremy Jacobs (3.28), Nick Manov (3.82) and Ben Reddy (3.45) as honorees.

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