032409

ONE FOR THE UNDERDOG

SCHLOCK OPERA

Gary Williams and the Terps proved the critics wrong this season

The Decemberists’ latest is a bloated, over-ambitious affair

SPORTS | PAGE 8

DIVERSIONS | PAGE 6

THE DIAMONDBACK TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009

99TH YEAR | ISSUE NO. 110

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND’S INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER

U. Senate to vote on grad. prayer

‘THE RESPONSIBILITY OF

BEING GOOD’

Committee members expect heated church and state debate at meeting

BY MARISSA LANG

Marissa Coleman has established herself as an all-time Terp great

Senior staff writer

A proposal to eliminate a prayer at the campus-wide graduation ceremony will be brought before the University Senate next month.

The issue, touching on the controversial issue of the separation of church and state, was originally raised in 2005 and was considered by the Senate last year, but has never actually been put up for a vote.

After a contentious debate yesterday in the Senate Executive Committee — the Senate’s most powerful — over whether the issue merits a vote or should be passed directly to university

BY AARON KRAUT Senior staff writer

When the buzzer signaling the end of warm-ups sounded, most of the Terrapin women’s basketball team jogged to the bench, preparing to begin their NCAA Tournament run Sunday.

Marissa Coleman, though, remained under the basket.

As is her ritual before every game, Coleman took three extra layups — one from the left side, one from the right side and one from directly in front of the hoop — before enthusiastically bouncing the ball on the floor and joining her team on the sideline.

While seemingly meaningless, the three extra shots show why Coleman, whose No. 1 seed Terps plowed through No. 16 seed

President Dan Mote, the committee decided the full Senate should vote on the issue. Senate officials are predicting a controversial and lengthy discussion, they said.

“For every 100 people, you’re going to have 98 different opinions on this,” said Office of Information Technology Policy and Planning Director Willie Brown, who chairs the committee that drafted the recommendation. “But ultimately, I would rather face the music and bring this to a Senate vote.”

The bill calls for the elimination of a prayer invocation at the university’s commencement, which is crafted and

Please See PRAYER, Page 3

Univ. to keep focus on issues, not race State Attorney General’s report advises colleges on legal race-based programs

Please See COLEMAN, Page 7

BY ADELE HAMPTON Staff writer

The University System of Maryland plans to use a report from the state attorney general’s office to create programs addressing minority-related issues, such as college affordability, and achievement and graduation gaps, officials said.

The report, “Strengthening Diversity in Maryland Colleges and Universities: A Legal Roadmap,” which was released

by Attorney General Doug Gansler’s office, outlines ways state universities can incorporate diversity into their academic programs without causing legal controversies over the role of race.

While the report provides advice for all institutions in the state, officials said the university will instead continue to focus on issues that typically plague

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DOUG GANSLER STATE ATTORNEY GENERAL minority students, including disparities in academic performance.

“We’re going to create programs not because they’re race-based, but because they make sense,” said Robert Waters, the university’s assistant vice president for equity and diversity.

“We have great legal advice and scholarship advice. But it’ll help everyone across the board, and it’s nice to know where the state stands,” he said.

Please See REPORT, Page 2

ADAM FRIED/THE DIAMONDBACK

Number of summer jobs dwindles due to economy

BY NELLY DESMARATTES Staff writer

Despite turning in job application after job application and scanning both online and print classifieds, freshman letters and sciences major Alex Reece is still jobless for the summer.

“It has been really hard. You look in the classifieds, and nobody seems to be hiring,” Reece said.

And he’s not alone.

The summer labor market for 16- to 19year-olds hit a 60-year-low last year, according to a Northeastern University

The ever-changing Facebook Constant Facebook changes frustrate students, but site’s appeal has them logging back in

BY JEFF NASH Staff writer

Facebook’s latest makeover has sparked outrage among its users. Just like the previous makeover did. And the makeover before that.

But despite the constant outrage, the site has continued to grow and now has more than 175 million users. The reason, students said, is because regardless of its appearance, Facebook remains a dominant form of communication on the campus.

“I think it’s funny how everyone always flips out when they see a new Facebook layout, but change is good, I guess,” junior government and politics major Justin Perlman said. “I think it’s a continuous cycle;

the next time there’s a change, those people complaining now will be wishing they had this version back.”

Perlman said he actually finds the changes refreshing, because looking at the same design can get boring. But a significant number of people disagree — 1.7 million people have joined a group protesting the new changes, making this possibly the largest Facebook user revolt since the introduction of the news and mini-feeds in 2006.

The new layout changed the homepage from a mash of friends’ status, photo, group, event, link and note activity into a more organized display that focuses on

Please See FACEBOOK, Page 2

Body of infant girl found in lake a mile from campus Lake Artemesia fishermen discover remains in bag

BY NICK RHODES Staff writer

Prince George’s County Police are asking for help from the public in solving the case of a dead infant found in a bag in Lake Artemesia.

While fishing in the lake in Indian Creek Park near Paint Branch Parkway on Sunday at around 3 p.m., two men discovered a black plastic bag with the remains of a newborn infant, police said. The lake is about a mile from the campus, bordering 54th Avenue and the College Park Airport.

Please See JOBS, Page 3

TOMORROW’S WEATHER:

Please See ARTEMESIA, Page 3

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DIVERSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . .6 SPORTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

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NEWSMAKERS BRIEFS Comptroller: Counties should enforce old soda fountain law

ARYLAND

OVERHEARD

REPORT, from Page 1

Triple murderer found dead in Baltimore cell

Oleh Shamshur, the Ukranian ambassador to the U.S., speaks about events in a volatile area of the world. 3:30 p.m., McKeldin Library 6137

“ARE ROBOTS REAL? THE ROBOT AS AN OBJECT OF STUDY”

@M Kirwan: Rulings made universities ‘timid’

ANNAPOLIS – Comptroller Peter Franchot’s team says counties should be enforcing a nearly century-old law that established a $25 to $60 annual soda fountain license fee that many counties haven’t used for years.

Franchot’s office says the fees aren’t just for places where soda jerks work, however. All restaurants, convenience stores and other places with soft drink dispensers would be charged the fee for each soda fountain they operate, according to a recent memo.

The Restaurant Association of Maryland’s Melvin Thompson says food service facility licenses have replaced the soda fountain fee.

State Del. Nic Kipke (R-Anne Arundel) is pushing a repeal of the “archaic” law. Kipke says the measure could cost state restaurants $1.5 million.

UKRANIAN AMBASSADOR LECTURE

“We haven’t had race-based programs at the university for a long time. We have programs that appeal to different affinity groups, but all of them are programs [that] have been open to everyone for the last 15 years, legally.”

This university ran into a legal hassle in 1994 when a federal court banned its Banneker Scholarship on the grounds that the award was only open to black students. Since then, the program has become what is now known as the Banneker/Key Scholarship — an award based on academic achievement rather than race — and the university has not instated any more race-specific programs, Waters said.

The report, which is the first ever to be presented to state institutions that deals with race-based programs, encouraged the state’s colleges and universities to increase their number of minority students within the limits of the law, said Raquel Guillory, spokeswoman for the attorney general.

Q+A

“We did a more-than-a-year study to look into the issues and court cases to create sound advice with accordance to the law,” Guillory said. “We sent it to everyone, trade schools included, because it serves as a good useful resource for them to turn to. In light of several court decisions, there was some hesitation on the part of universities to create diversity on campus in fear it could lead to court challenges.”

The report explains the importance of having a diverse campus, but warns against the legal consequences of having programs and quotas based on race. It also asserts “the time is right for each Maryland institution to consider the meaning of diversity in its overall mission and to establish measures to achieve the diversity goals that best advance that mission.”

A 2003 Supreme Court decision — Grutter v. Bollinger — ruled race could be considered as a factor of admission, but cannot be the determining factor. Despite the high priority placed on diversity in universities nationwide, many have veered away from race-based academic

This talk explores the figure of the robot as an object of study. 12:30 p.m., McKeldin Library B0135

BEST of the BLOGS

“We’re going to create programs not because they’re race-based, but because they make sense.”

ROBERT WATERS ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT FOR EQUITY AND DIVERSITY

programs due to an apprehension of varying legal challenges and limitations since decisions like Grutter v. Bollinger were made.

Because of the legal limits on how programs can incorporate race, universities nationwide began looking for alternatives to race-based programs. But for some, like the university system, these constraints ultimately created an obstacle to achieving certain goals, such as closing achievement and graduation gaps between low-income minorities and the rest of the student population, system Chan-

SCENE + HEARD

cellor Brit Kirwan said.

“In general, higher education across the country became very timid about pressing diversity programs because of the possibility of legal challenges,” Kirwan said. “And there was a lot of animosity about what couldn’t and could be done.

[Universities] were trying to create programs, but were uncertain whether they had the legal right to do so.”

Kirwan said the system aims to increase its diversity-based programs in the future to address minority issues like the achievement gap using the guidance provided by the report.

“Some of these students come from schools that don’t have the same kind of standards that suburban schools do, so they come with educational differences that need to be addressed,” Kirwan said.

“So the ability to have specific programs is going to be absolutely vital. How we will use [the report] is to be able to design programs that go up to, but not beyond the law.” hamptondbk@gmail.com

HAGERSTOWN – A triple murderer who was judged insane but too dangerous for hospitalization killed himself in his maximum-security cell in Baltimore, the state prison agency said Monday.

Kevin Johns, 26, was found unresponsive around midnight Sunday at the Maryland Correctional Adjustment Center, also called Supermax, said Rick Binetti, a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services. Staff attempts to revive him failed, and paramedics pronounced him dead at the scene, Binetti said.

John’s lawyer, Harry J. Trainor Jr. of Annapolis, said Johns hanged himself with a bed sheet.

He said Johns had made at least one previous suicide attempt, but Binetti said prison officials had no record of it and Johns had never been on suicide watch.

Johns was found not criminally responsible in June for strangling fellow inmate Philip Parker Jr. in 2005 aboard a prison bus.

— Compiled from wire reports

Students used to Facebook overhauls FACEBOOK, from Page 1 their statuses and wall-post activity.

“As more and more information flows through Facebook, the need for people to easily discover the most recent and relevant content has grown,” Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote on “The Facebook Blog.” “The new home page will let you see everything that’s shared by your friends and connections as it happens. It will also provide you more control by letting you choose exactly who you see among the people and things you are connected to.”

The new design has drawn comparisons to Twitter, a rival social networking site that allows people to post “tweets” — short statuses or links of fewer than 140 characters.

“The new home page is very similar to Twitter, because it tells

Modern

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“Why would I spend my time looking at something that’s no longer visually appealing to me?”

FELICIA GARAY-STANTON FRESHMAN JOURNALISM MAJOR

you what your friends are doing,” freshman communication major Kaye Schacter said. “But with Twitter, you choose the sources of the statuses and that’s all you see.

On Facebook, I see that two people I haven’t seen in years are wall posting — I don’t care that that’s occurring. It would take too long to go through all of your friends and pick which statuses you care about. Even so, Facebook is still the

best way to stay in touch with friends.”

Sophomore government and politics and criminology and criminal justice major Andrew Fisher wishes Facebook would stop trying to reinvent itself.

“As the old adage goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” Fisher said. “It was okay before but has gotten worse with each update.”

Sophomore communications major Emily Kaplan echoed that sentiment.

“It’s been a little annoying, but I remember I felt that way the last time they changed Facebook. I’m sure after a while I’ll get used to it,” Kaplan said.

In the Facebook blog, Zuckerberg said interface redesign decisions will not be subject to a user vote, because “Facebook is still in the business of introducing new and therefore potentially disrup-

tive technologies. This can mean that our users periodically experience adjustments to new products as they become familiar with them, and before becoming enthusiastic supporters.”

Not all students believe the update won’t stop them from frequently visiting the site. Felicia Garay-Stanton, a freshman journalism major, gave up Facebook for Lent because she thought she spent too much time on the site.

After seeing others use the new Facebook layout, she thinks the change will cause her to visit the site less.

“Without Facebook, I feel like I have more free time,” Garay-Stanton said. “I don’t like how it looks now. Why would I spend my time looking at something that’s no longer visually appealing to me?” nashdbk@gmail.com

TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009 | NEWS | THE DIAMONDBACK

3

Senators expect prayer vote to cause controversy PRAYER, from Page 1 presented on a rotating basis by each of the university’s 14 chaplains, who are instructed to make it as “inclusive as possible.”

Last year, a proposal was brought before the executive committee that would substitute the ritual two-minute prayer with a one-minute nondenominational invocation, given jointly by the university chaplains, followed by a minute of silence. But this proposal was sidelined until the senate committee that drafted the proposal researched the matter more fully and gave a more concrete proposal.

“The idea of a moment of silence was considered a cop out,” Brown said. “We were told we should attack this head-on or not touch it at all.”

Though the Supreme Court has explicitly outlawed the use of prayer at public K-12

schools, there is no clear stance from the Supreme Court regarding public institutions of higher education.

Past federal court rulings on the issue have depended heavily on the context of the situation.

Brown noted that students have the choice to attend or not attend the commencement ceremony, and therefore, it can be argued that the prayer is not being forced upon anyone. But the report notes that none of the university’s peer institutions — University of California, Berkeley, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Michigan, University of North Carolina and UCLA — have prayer at their graduation ceremonies.

Some said the polarizing nature of the issue would create such a fuss that it might obstruct the issue at hand.

“This is an issue that will

go nowhere in the Senate,” Senate Chair Ken Holum said. “It will be endlessly controversial.”

Holum said that Mote was seeking counsel on the issue from the executive committee, and as such, felt the proposal should not be brought to the Senate for a vote.

“This is not a policy proposal,” Holum said. “The president’s office sets the agenda for commencement, and the president has simply asked us for advice.”

But many members of the executive committee disagreed, noting that since the proposal had been put through the senate committee process and was originally brought up by a university senator, it should be a matter of policy given to the Senate general body to vote on.

“If we bring this to the Senate floor, of course it will be controversial,” University

“The idea of a moment of silence was considered a cop out. We were told we should attack this headon or not touch it at all.”

WILLIE BROWN UNIVERSITY SENATOR

Senate Director Reka Montfort said. “But isn’t that the point of shared governance?”

When the senate considered the issue last year, Mote said there were “ways to convey the spirit of the moment without crossing the line” and that “it can be cloudy about what is denominational and what’s not.”

While the report advocates having no invocation is the

best way to “be more sensitive to believers and nonbelievers,” religious student leaders say having a prayer at graduation enhances the occasion for many students and their families.

“I’m going to be graduating in December and I already know I’m going to cry,” senior physical sciences major Jade Williams said. “And having prayer there will just remind me that I’m there because God brought me to this place where I’ve accomplished so much.”

But Williams, who is a member of the Baptist Campus Ministry, added that it would not be a disservice to the religious community if there were no religious invocation at the ceremony, and would support its omission if it made it more enjoyable for everybody regardless of their beliefs.

“As much as I want to say God exists and we should

include Him in the ceremony, I know not everyone believes that,” she said.

“That should be taken into consideration.”

Brown said the proposal was intended to be as inclusive as possible by eliminating what has been perceived to be too scriptural for some, while not imposing any alternative.

“This is a new take on an old issue,” Brown said.

“We’re talking about the complete removal of prayer at commencement. ... There is no right, no wrong, no good, no bad.”

If the Senate votes to approve the proposal on April 6, the invocation will be eliminated from the all-campus commencement ceremony, but individual colleges will still be able to make decisions regarding their own ceremonies. langdbk@gmail.com

Recycle Experts mixed on economy’s impact on internships JOBS, from Page 1

study. A study by the National Association of Colleges and Employers said college graduate hiring will fall about 22 percent for the class of 2009. The overall result will be fewer summer job and paid internship opportunities for students, according to Heidi Shierholz, an economist with the Economic Policy Institute.

“We are seeing employers cut expenses across the board, and what we know is that, if you look at the temporary help industry, you will see that they have seen enormous decrease in its workers, because those are the employees that employers shed first in a recession,” Shierholz

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said. “I would imagine that that would translate into employers, when choosing between whether to have a summer internship program, to just cut that type of program or decrease it.”

Although Shierholz said there were few studies on college student employment trends, she believes they likely follow the job market for temporary workers, which has dramatically declined during the recession.

With the country in a recession and with new hiring in the service industry down sharply, students looking to get a summer job or paid internship are likely going to find more competition for fewer positions, said Megan O’Rourke, the internship coor-

dinator for the university’s career center.

There is more competition for every job opening as the economy continues to worsen.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, in February, there were four unemployed people for every job opening.

At the beginning of 2008, that ratio was about 1.9 to 1.

“It might be tougher for students to enter the job market now than before, especially if students are looking for jobs in the retail and service industry,” O’Rourke said.

“However, I don’t think a decline in teen and graduate employment will necessarily translate into a decline in college student internships.”

Those looking for help from the Obama administration

CRIME, from Page 1 Also in the bag were the after birth and umbilical cord, which seem to indicate the baby did not live long before it was placed in the bag, according to police spokesman Officer Evan Baxter.

The incident is being investigated by the county police’s Homicide Unit and the Maryland-National Capital Park Police.

Upon finding the remains, the men called 911 and both

police and fire departments responded. The infant is described as being an either white or Hispanic full-term female with black hair.

Police do not have much information yet and are waiting for the completion of a full medical examination in hopes that it will give them some clues and leads to the identity of the child or her mother and the circumstances of the crime. Police are optimistic the medical examination will be completed within the week.

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In the press release, police reminded citizens of the Maryland Infant Safe Haven Law which allows a mother to leave her child in the care of any responsible adult at a police station, fire department or hospital anonymously with no questions asked within 72 hours of birth. Currently, all 50 states have some form of this law in place.

Baxter stressed that the community is going to be the police’s best resource in solving the crime and said

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least dollar wise, than hiring full employees and the places that would hire college students are probably still hiring them.”

Despite his own difficulties, Reece said he has plenty of friends who feel secure in getting a summer job, mostly because of parent intervention.

“Not too many of my friends seem to be worried because they have a lot of help from their parents,” Reece said. “I have a lot of friends who work for their parents or with their parents, and so it is a lot easier for them than for people like me who have to go out and find jobs.”

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Police issue reminder about Safe Haven law

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may have to look again, as the $787 billion economic stimulus package passed by Congress, while benefiting 2009 graduates, is unlikely to help students looking for seasonal work, O’Rourke said.

Despite the ominous economic trends, some students are not worried about finding summer employment opportunities.

“I am not really worried much about summer employment opportunities,” said junior physics major Noah Glushakow-Smith, who said he was certain he could find an internship. “The job market [for students], while not better than years before, is probably not much worse as hiring college students is better for companies, at

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police are really pushing the Crime Solvers tip line as an important tool.

Police are asking anyone with information about the mother or the infant to call the Prince George’s County Police Department’s Homicide Unit at (301) 772-4925 or the Crime Solver’s tip line at 1-866-411-TIPS (8477) or text CRIMES (274637). A reward is being offered for any information leading to an arrest and indictment. rhodesdbk@gmail.com

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ORGANIZATIONS WHO WOULD LIKE AN OFFICE:

DATE: March 30 TIME: 5:30pm CONTACT: mjenkins@umd.edu MORE INFO: www.stamp.umd.edu

ONLINE APPLICATIONS FOR THE 2009-2010 SCHOOL YEAR ARE NOW AVAILABLE!

Offices are available in the STAMP Student Union, Student Involvement Suite for ACTIVE Student Organizations (as listed on STARS).

OFFICE APPLICATION INFORMATIONAL SESSION: If you want to create the best application possible or have questions and want to learn more about the application process, please attend this informational meeting Monday, March 30th at 5:30pm in the Thurgood Marshall Room of the Stamp Student Union.

You can access the online application at www.stars.umd.edu/office. Applications are due by

FRIDAY, APRIL 3 BY 2PM Don’t wait until the last minute to submit applications!

Contact Marie Jenkins at mjenkins@umd.edu with questions.

4

THE DIAMONDBACK | TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009

Opinion

THE DIAMONDBACK

STEVEN OVERLY

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Staff Editorial

Guest Column

Picking our poison

A hearing without listening

G

iven the option of paying $320 more in tuition next year or squeezing they’ll wield enough influence to dictate the regents’ final decision.

Regents serve staggered, five-year terms, which by design helps to relieve extra students into a freshman history lecture, many in-state university students and their parents would likely opt to save the money. political pressure, system Chancellor Brit Kirwan said in an interview. The The weak economy has driven a growing number of families to regents’ primary charge is to preserve the quality of higher education in the search for financial assistance as they struggle to pay mounting higher educa- state, and officials have plainly stated a tuition hike will be considered if legislators hack away at state funds. tion expenses. A tuition increase would only stretch pocketLawmakers in Annapolis must realize the likelihood of an books further. increase should they keep the cuts when a final budget is But some higher education officials see matters differently.

While all endorse a tuition freeze in good economic times, Cutting an already tight passed into law next month. They should not rely on a suggestion to keep higher education affordable. Completely funding when presented with the choice of either raising tuition or expanding class sizes and scaling back student services, many budget may be preferable O’Malley’s proposal is the only surefire way to ensure tuition doesn’t budge. say a hike is preferable. to a tuition hike.

But affordability isn’t solely the legislature’s responsibility, At the start of the legislative session earlier this year, Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) proposed providing the University System of Maryland and the system needs to carefully weigh their options should the legislature finalwith an additional $16 million to fund a tuition freeze for the fourth academic ize cuts. Some sacrifices — including slightly larger classes and fewer student year in a row. But the House of Delegates put forth a $21 million cut to the sys- services — aren’t cataclysmic. And in times of economic hardship, a university tem’s budget Friday, and if the House’s proposed cuts are approved, the sys- system with an annual budget of about $4 billion can trim $21 million more easily tem will once again be facing a budget gap. As a result, in-state tuition could than many in-state families can produce a few hundred extra dollars.

While the options are far from ideal, Kirwan asserts — and accurately so — climb at least 4 percent, or about $320.

Legislators said the Board of Regents, a body of gubernatorial appointees that universities in other states are facing much more dire circumstances. who ultimately set tuition, should maintain the freeze and trimming other Even a 4 percent increase here would be modest compared with schools facing areas of the budget. But their suggestion seems little more than an attempt to hikes more than twice that size. He’s right that the state has an advantage in slash funds without appearing to harm students, and it’s unclear whether that regard, and we need to keep it that way.

Our View

Editorial Cartoon: Mike O’Brien

To see an animated version of this cartoon, visit WWW.DIAMONDBACKONLINE.COM

State politics: Moving the movers and shakers

A

common thread I see regarding many meaningful state bills students at the university have advocated over the years is that either they end up failing or they become so watered down that any progress made can only be measured in baby steps.

This is no different in states all over the country. The bold reforms activists push require massive grassroots efforts that fail far more often than they succeed because of political gridlock we often don’t understand. The state’s legislative body is a good case study for why this occurs.

In Annapolis, the General Assembly has a state Senate and House of Delegates. Each of the 47 districts has one senator and three delegates. This means if you’re a state senator, you’re one of 47.

If you’re a delegate, you’re one of 141.

The ruling parties in the senate and house elect leaders who are called the Senate President and House Speaker.

These leaders take the senators and dele-

MATT

DERNOGA gates, and put them on committees that specialize in certain kinds of issues. If a bill gets the majority vote by members on its committee, it goes before either the entire house or senate for a vote.

Each committee has a chair appointed by the leader of the senate or house. The chair decides if a bill is voted on at all.

That’s power. If the chair pisses off the leader, the chair could be demoted or moved to a different committee — so chairs usually only think for themselves when it’s okay with the leadership.

Some committees have more power than others. The Appropriations Com-

mittee makes the multi-billion dollar budget. Ways and Means sets the taxes.

Legislators want to be on these committees and bring cash back home to please constituents. Say I’m on Appropriations and make a lot of noise about an issue against the wishes of the House Speaker.

I get sent back to the Judiciary Committee to debate the death penalty to no end.

This is how the system is gamed. If you march in line with the leadership, you get on the right committees and move up to chair. If you think for yourself too often, you’ll end up on the Environment Committee arguing about a program that Appropriations has to fund anyway. The result is politicians who actually take principled stands and think for themselves are far and few between. Worse, they are neutralized by the leadership.

What we have in Annapolis is a handful of committee chairs in each chamber asking the senate and house leadership which bills to allow a vote on. As a result,

meaningful legislation usually only moves when our Senate President and House Speaker decide they want it to.

Special interest groups know this. All they have to do is target their money and lobbying power into a handful of decision makers. But I’m afraid students don’t understand. And if they do, they lack the cash to sway the real decision makers.

There’s no easy fix. Changing either the campaign finance system or the power structure of the General Assembly is a heavy lift when the people running it don’t want that change. Ultimately, if enough people got behind these kinds of reforms, they would pass. Politicians will only side with political expediency so long as it doesn’t threaten them in the polls. Perhaps voters should do a bit of targeting of our own.

Matt Dernoga is a junior government and politics major. He can be reached at mdernoga@umd.edu.

Jordan: A secret Semite amid anti-Semitism

C

ulture shock is an inherent part of studying abroad, but some countries induce a bit more of a shock than others. Jordan is one of those countries. As a country in the center of the Middle East, Jordan’s culture is largely shaped by the IsraeliPalestinian conflict. Being a Jew, therefore, has proven to be a difficult (but enlightening) part of my experience.

Jordanian history has a large part to play. First, well over half of the country is Palestinian, which means most of the people in Jordan have a personal stake in the conflict. Second, unlike many other countries in the region, Jews have never lived in Jordan. In Jordan, most have never interacted with Jews, save through the media and hearsay. To many Jordanians, a Jew equals an Israeli equals an Israeli soldier who was responsible for the deaths of innocent people in Gaza or who bulldozed a cousin’s house in Ramallah. Therefore, there’s very little wiggle room in conversations when it comes to my heritage.

While some of my close Arab friends

know that I’m Jewish, it is not something I share with many. While I have never had anti-Semitic rhetoric directed at me personally, it’s difficult to spend a full day without hearing a remark or two.

In a recent conversation with a cab driver, our discussion quickly turned toward politics — he wants Palestine back.

According to him, the Israelis don’t want peace. “Look at the war in Gaza,” he exclaimed, “the Jews killed lots of innocent women and children. The Jews are responsible… By the way, what do you think of the Jews?”

The most difficult conversation took place on my way back from Israel. I had spent a long weekend in Haifa visiting a close friend. Returning to Amman, the conversation with my taxi driver quickly turned political. He told me about his relative — a suicide bomber who killed a few Israeli soldiers. He didn’t think that there are any good Jews; he believed that every Israeli can be targeted. I was at a loss for words.

These types of conversations occur regularly, but it’s almost impossible to get

ARI

GORE into them — by the time we’ve begun, I’ve almost reached my destination. But they still reflect a lot about the conflict, like the inability of many Jordanians to distinguish between Jews and Israelis, and the obvious political disconnect between the average Jordanian and those making policy in the political sphere.

At soccer games, a popular cheer is “Uchtik Sharmuta, Abuk Yehudi,” or, “your sister is a whore, and your father is a Jew.” From what I understand, the educational system has changed after peace was established with Israel in 1994. But there is still a very ingrained understanding of “the way things are.”

And while I don’t agree with them, I can understand why many Jordanians are

unable to reconceptualize the qualities of a Jew or an Israeli. Every time fighting breaks out, the media in the Arab countries is just as effective at providing a perspective that emboldens their own national narrative as the Israeli media is.

I haven’t had all bad experiences. I once spoke with a cab driver who lived in Israel during the ’80s and ’90s, spoke Hebrew and told me that every country, including Israel, has a few bad people, though the majority are fine. I’ve had great conversations on religion, politics and culture with my Arab friends who know I’m Jewish. I’ve had an opportunity to teach my friends about Judaism and Israeli perspectives. To most, I’m the first Jew they’ve ever met. On the whole, this level of people-to-people dialogue is alarmingly nonexistent. Perspectives will only change if people are willing to look beyond their television sets for an understanding of the world.

Ari Gore is a junior government and politics major. He can be reached at arigore@gmail.com.

POLICY: The signed letters, columns and cartoon represent only the opinions of the authors. The staff editorial represents the opinion of The Diamondback’s editorial board and is the responsibility of the editor in chief.

ANUPAMA KOTHARI AND JONATHAN SACHS The Thursday before spring break, the University Senate rejected the proposed post-tenure review system, which would have made our professors more accountable to the university. The proposed system would have only punished the worst offenders, who either greatly neglected their classroom work, left it to graduate teaching assistants or did not progress in their research.

The proposed post-tenure review system took into account all of these facts and suggested a very reasonable mechanism: Professors would be reviewed annually (by a committee of their peers), and if they failed the review they would be put on notice for a year. If they fail again, they get another year to recover. If they fail to get their act together a third time, the review committee writes a development plan for that professor to follow. If the professor fails again then they could be subject to a salary reduction. This system is designed to punish only the worst offenders.

Almost a year ago, the senate voted nearly unanimously to support the strategic plan, which mandates the creation of a new post-tenure review policy that includes salary reductions. However, when departments began to hear about possible salary reductions, no matter how unlikely they’d be, a frenzy broke out.

The senate listserv saw a flurry of emails discussing how faculty members are above “employee” status and not subject to review because they pursue higher learning without strict 9-to-5 hours. Accountability to students, the university or the taxpayers of the state was out of the question, according to some.

At the actual senate meeting, the usually bare lecture hall was packed. After spending most of the meeting on amendments, it came time to debate the package. As the senate adjourns at 5:00 p.m., there was a motion to extend the meeting until 5:30 p.m. At 5:25 pm, as the two of us were waiting to speak in favor of the process, a senator motioned for a vote, which put a close to any further debate.

Hence the “debate” was limited to faculty senators lambasting the process.

Not a word was spoken in support of the process. It is not debate and not democratic to silence a viewpoint in a discussion. The senate must amend their bylaws to allow for debate to be equally divided between perspectives and not be allowed to call for a vote without at least hearing from the other side.

There are some very good reasons that make a post-tenure review process a good option. Tenured faculty members are often the least interested in teaching and pass on the brunt of those responsibilities to their graduate students. They are also the worst offenders when it comes to the misuse and in some cases even abuse of graduate students. Most importantly — if the tenured faculty members at this university believe that they are doing a good job, why fear a review (and a very reasonable one) in the first place?

The list of reasons for making this process desirable runs long. The senate meeting, which resulted in a vote against the proposal, was extremely disappointing. In our roles as student leaders, we are committed to pursuing this issue and ensuring that professors are held accountable if they underachieve and rewarded if they are outstanding.

Jonathan Sachs is the Student Government Association president.

Anupama Kothari is the Graduate Student Government president. They can be reached at jjsachs@umd.edu and anupamakothari@gmail.com.

AIR YOUR VIEWS Address your letters or guest columns to the Opinion Desk at opinion.dbk@gmail.com. All letters and guest columns must be signed. Include your full name, year, major and day- and nighttime phone numbers. Please limit letters to 300 words. Please limit guest columns to 600 words.

Submission of a letter or guest column constitutes an exclusive, worldwide, transferable license to The Diamondback of the copyright in the material in any media. The Diamondback retains the right to edit submissions for content and length.

TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009 | THE DIAMONDBACK

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Features HOROSCOPESTELLA WILDER

CROSSWORD 35 37 38 40 41

911 responder Did an office job Online info Flattened Shipboard romance

43 44 46 47

48 What coals become 49 Coffee and steamed milk 50 Port near Kilauea

Canal city Skulks about Loses heat Touch base (2 wds.)

57 Mrs. Kramden ACROSS 58 Lunar valley 1 Auto-parts store 59 Recital offering 5 Excuse me!

60 Portended 9 Revise 14 By word of mouth 61 Mr. Perot 15 Hire a decorator 62 Altar end 16 Slack off DOWN 17 Ticket writer 1 Sahara wanderer (2 wds.)

2 Wrestling venue 19 Cake layers 3 LaBelle or 20 Diligent insect LuPone 21 Take cover 22 Wined and dined 4 Ginger — 5 Rome’s legions 23 Milk sources 6 Crisis points 25 GP’s magazine 7 Adams or 26 Naval off.

McClurg 27 Split hairs 8 Trendy 30 Foolish plus 9 Endeavor 33 Lama’s land 10 Rum drink 34 Small bill (2 wds.)

36 Ice-cream treat 11 Dueler’s sword 37 Outwitted 12 Brain, maybe 38 — scratch 13 Rx givers 39 Reunion crowd 18 German wine 40 Was fond of 22 Written in 41 Poets’ feet the stars 42 Luxuriated in 24 Actress — Russo 44 Bogus Bach 25 Corresponded 45 Deadlocked 27 Put the kibosh on 46 Snowflake 28 Crocus “bulb” 50 Used a strop 52 Pliers or hammer 29 Drawer handle 30 Ugh! 53 Film speed no.

31 Roulette color 54 Courteous 32 A Bronte sister 55 Seedling’s aid 33 Keepsake (2 wds.)

© 2009 UNITED FEATURES SYNDICATE

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RED M I D I A L A S REMAR RE A I RMA F B I P REN T OA S E S SME L L E Y S P AM K ARA T I N T RO P E S K Y

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51 52 54 55 56

orn today, you are never more content than when you are working in a creative way on the issues that affect the world around you.

To say you are socially conscious is an understatement; you are destined to play a major role in the world’s events, even if you are not widely recognized for it. You’re not in it for fame or notoriety; rather, you are content if your efforts have an impact on those around you, and you are perfectly happy to be the unsung hero. You are widely recognized as one who has the best interests of others at heart, and what you do always comes from a place of sincere care for those in need. This doesn’t mean that you ignore your own needs or the needs of family and friends — but there are certainly times in which others, unknown to you, enjoy the greatest benefits of your actions.

Love and friendship are key elements in your life. Once you make a friend, you can be sure that he or she will be a friend for life — even if you don’t see each other for long periods of time. When you do reconnect, it will most often seem as if no time has gone by at all, for you maintain a kind of spiritual connection that matters more than the usual, fleeting, oneon-one relations that others foster.

Also born on this date are: Kelly LeBrock, actress; Steve McQueen, actor; Harry Houdini, magician; Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet and author; Joseph Barbera, animator.

To see what is in store for you tomorrow, find your birthday and read the corresponding paragraph. Let your birthday star be your daily guide.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25 ARIES (March 21-April 19) — You won’t be able to get it all done alone, and it will be essential that you choose your team-

B

mates to suit the task at hand.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20) — There’s nothing to be gained by trying to second-guess the competition. Play your own game as you usually do — and play it well.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20) — A chance meeting is likely to give you the motivation you need to pick up the pace and put more on the line than usual. Success beckons.

CANCER (June 21-July 22) — Keep your heart and mind in balance throughout the day, and there’s nothing you can’t cope with, no matter who tries to step in your way.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) — You may be expecting a routine day, but the truth is that something new is about to happen that changes things quite dramatically for a time.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) — Keep your head in the game.

Even the slightest distraction can affect your performance adversely. Now is the time to focus.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22) — What begins as a game may turn into something quite serious before

the day is done. Are you really willing to make the necessary sacrifice?

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21) — You’ll be in a position to call the shots, but you may want to see just what those around you can do before you start giving orders.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) — Time is on your side, but that doesn’t mean that you should sit back and wait even longer before make a strong start.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) — Seize the day. Your potential is high at this time, and opportunities are many. Focus on doing something you’ve long dreamed of doing.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) — A job left undone is a job that may never get done, simply because you will have so many other things to tend to. Get it done now.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) — Progress can be measured in very small increments; you’ll know at every stage just what you’ve done and what remains to be done.

Copyright 2009 United Feature Syndicate, Inc.

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THE DIAMONDBACK | TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009

Diversions

ONLINE EXCLUSIVE: DOOM — BORN LIKE THIS “Although Born Like This is chock full of material to analyze, the lyrics and beats are not powerful enough to take out any of DOOM’s hip-hop foes.” — Alex Rush RATING: 3 stars out of 5

DOOM drops the MF for his new album.

For full reviews of this, and the other three albums below, just visit:

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REVIEW | THE DECEMBERISTS

online exclusives

Oh, the Hazards of pretension

BONNIE ‘PRINCE’ BILLY — BEWARE “For those who wish to put aside the esoteric interior monologuing meta-drama, there will always be the actual songs on Beware to consider.

Predictably, they are just as beguiling as the reclusive Oldham himself — frequently brilliant, occasionally revelatory and sometimes just lazy to the point of parody. ” — Vaman Muppalla RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

DAN DEACON —BROMST “For Deacon’s latest full-length, he promised a darker tone, a record with less of the party feel-good touch he is known for. But no need to worry — the follow-up to his 2007 breakout Spiderman of the Rings, Bromst is still a lot of fun.”

— Reese Higgins RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

PETE DOHERTY — GRACE/WASTELANDS “It’s not the masterpiece many predicted from the moment Doherty stumbled into the limelight. After all the guy has been through, it seems incredible enough he’s alive, let alone recording any material. But for those who have stood by and never stopped wishing Doherty would eventually get his shit together, Grace/Wastelands is a completely worthy sign of good will. ” — Zachary Herrmann RATING: 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Decemberists undergo a tacky transformation with a hokey rock opera

BY ZACHARY HERRMANN Senior staff writer

When albums such as The Decemberists’ latest, The Hazards of Love, turn up, it really raises the question of why The Who’s Tommy hasn’t gotten more grief.

Until Tommy, the first self-proclaimed rock opera, there wasn’t much of a stigma surrounding so-called concept albums. If you think about it, most great albums have at least some vague concept tying the songs together and rock ‘n’ roll has always depended on theatrics. So it seems natural enough for any ambitious rocker to marry musical theater and rock.

The Kinks pulled off several successful concept/rock operas before 1970s excess spiraled downward toward Pink Floyd’s beloved cheese ball, The Wall — a performance piece that hasn’t aged nearly as well as many Floyd devotees will claim.

Rob Reiner’s landmark mock rockumentary This Is Spinal Tap basically hammered the nails into the rock opera coffin with the absurdly hilarious “Stonehenge” number, dancing dwarves and all. Since the 1984 film, the rock opera has become something of a dinosaur, an old product of too much cocaine and ego that occasionally resurfaces against better judgment (ahem, Green Day’s American Idiot).

This brings us back to The Decemberists, a band that has always sort of edged on the haughtier fringes of indie rock. Colin Meloy’s literary/historical tendencies took a progressive (as in Jethro Tull) turn on the band’s last full-length LP, The Crane Wife, a shift many thought might disappear after the release of the Always the Bridesmaid singles collection.

Alas, the prog rock is back on The Hazards of Love, which would be all well and good if the album didn’t play out like a 58-minute farce in high fidelity.

Meloy and Co. don’t seem to be in on the joke — their latest album is a medieval puppet show of sex, infanticide and forest mysticism set to electric guitars and glockenspiel.

Margaret (voiced by Lavender Diamond’s Becky Stark) ventures into the forest only to be surprised by William (Meloy), a shape shifter who seduces (or rapes, it’s unclear but is forceful either way) and impregnates her between “The Hazards of Love 1” and “A Bower Scene.”

Things gets wilder — the evil queen (Shara Worden of My Brightest Diamond) objects to the relationship, William offs his kids and shows no remorse, etc. — and all is written off with the reprise, “Oh, oh/ The hazards of love.”

Classified CALL

Colin Meloy, center, and the rest of The Decemberists go full-out prog rock on the literary-minded, over-ambitious rock opera, Hazards of Love. COURTESY OF RATTLEMYCAGE.WORDPRESS.COM

Say what you will about Meloy’s occasionally offputting pomp, but the guy has been an ace storyteller in the past. From Castaways and Cutouts through The Crane Wife, he’s built an extremely colorful cast of lovers, soldiers, performers and travelers. But on his latest, it’s too difficult to connect to Margaret or William when the listening experience is so much more real and punishing than anything the characters suffer.

The hard rock riffs on “Won’t Want for Love (Margaret in the Taiga)” and “The Wanting Comes in Waves/Repaid” conjure up everything terrible and Led Zeppelin-inspired, but like any good showmen, The Decemberists save the best for last.

Before leaving off somewhat gracefully with the mournful “The Hazards of Love 4 (The Drowned),” the band fires up a tour de force of tasteless rock opera blunders on “The Hazards of Love 3 (Revenge!)” and “The Wanting Comes in Waves (Reprise).”

Children choirs are always dangerous in rock music (though The Rolling Stones got away with it), but a dead children’s choir, that’s just something you

don’t really hear too often. To its credit, the album really does milk the train-derailing factor — it’s fascinating just how quickly Hazards sinks into unknowing self-parody.

Perhaps what is most unsettling about the album is how it manages to suffocate the interspersed moments of beauty and ingenuity. The musical interludes (“Prelude” and “An Interlude”), though brief, offer the counter-argument: Despite the overall ridiculousness of the album, it’s not without a few redeeming nuggets.

Of course, then, the question becomes how much corny ’70s finger-picked guitar and maudlin crap are you willing to sort through for a few minutes of quality.

The Crane Wife had plenty of fat around the edges, the worst of which (“When the War Came”) hinted at the musical threads of Hazards. But the missteps were completely forgivable in an otherwise strong release.

Why Meloy thought he could bring high art to a low form like rock opera, we’ll probably never know. It was a crazy thought and one he really should have resisted. zherrm@gmail.com

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TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009 | SPORTS | THE DIAMONDBACK

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All In Four Years’ Work April 4, 2006 Nov. 26, 2005 Matched up against No. 1 Tennessee’s Candace Parker, puts up 16 points and grabs four rebounds while limiting Parker to eight points over the final 27 minutes.

Feb. 27, 2009

Scores 10 total points and two in overtime to help the Terps top Duke in the national title game.

Coleman collected 14 rebounds in the final and semifinal game two days earlier against North Carolina.

Scores a career-high 32 points in the team’s Senior Night victory against Boston College, before her No. 25 jersey is unveiled in Comcast Center’s rafters.

March 31, 2008 16 points in 38 minutes of action is not enough as No. 2 seed Stanford runs past the Terps in last year’s Elite Eight regional final.

PHOTO BY JACLYN BOROWSKI/THE DIAMONDBACK

2005

2009 March 1, 2005

March 20, 2007

Feb. 22, 2009

Totals 22 points and eight rebounds as a senior for St. John’s High School in Washington against WCAC rival Good Counsel in the league title game. Despite her 3-pointer to bring St. John’s within three points with seven seconds left, Coleman narrowly misses a 3-pointer to win the game after stealing an inbounds pass.

Scores 20 points on 7-of17 shooting to go along with 12 rebounds in the Terps’ disappointing second round NCAA Tournament loss to Mississippi.

Recorded her 2,000th career point against No. 7 Duke on to become the second Terp to reach that milestone and eighth player in ACC history with at least 2,000 points and 1,000 rebounds.

March 8, 2009 Named the ACC Tournament MVP after recording 28 points, 15 rebounds and six assists against Duke in the ACC Tournament Championship game.

TIMELINE BY SAM STONE /THE DIAMONDBACK

Coleman made an immediate impact COLEMAN, from Page 1 Dartmouth on Sunday and face No. 9 seed Utah in the second round tonight at Comcast Center, is considered one of the best players in program history.

That extra effort, or what Coleman’s father Tony Coleman described as “the work that comes with the responsibility of being good,” is what helped mold the senior’s game from an early age into a player capable of reaching second on the program’s all-time scoring and rebounding lists.

Coleman, who stands at 6-foot1 and whose broad shoulders and long arms make her a physically dominating presence compared to most other college guards and forwards, remembers telling her dad while growing up that she wanted to concentrate solely on basketball — and wanted to be great at it.

“I was probably like 11, 12 or 13 [years old],” Coleman said. “I wrote my dad a letter telling him this is what I want to do. So he sat me down one day, let me know the amount of hard work it was going to take, about having to make sacrifices outside of regular practices, and all that comes with being a great basketball player.”

But Tony, a Prince George’s

County police officer who himself was a successful athlete at Cardozo High School in Washington in the 1970s, remembers his youngest daughter expressing a love for the game at an even earlier age.

When she was 7 years old, Coleman once scored all of her team’s points in a Boys and Girls Club game. The next year Coleman, who was still playing soccer at the time, told her dad, “I want to be really good at basketball.”

Having personally experienced the amount of dedication it takes to excel at a sport, Tony Coleman warned his daughter of the amount of desire one has to show to truly reach that point.

At every step of the way, Coleman accepted the challenge, engaging in long discussions with her father about strategy and training. Coleman recalls running in the summer and taking extra shooting practice whenever possible. Instead of grounding his daughter, Tony Coleman would force her to practice free throws on the court outside the family’s home — and Coleman joked she enjoyed that method of punishment.

As Coleman approached high school age and different area private schools recruited the

Coleman, center, is a leader for the Terps, guiding younger players such as Lynetta Kizer, left, and Marah Strickland, right. ADAM FRIED/THE DIAMONDBACK

Cheltenham native, she began to realize just how good she could be. She eventually attended St. John’s High School in nearby Washington, winning two Washington Catholic Athletic Conference championships before leaving the school as the program’s all-time leading scorer and rebounder.

At the end of her high school career, the result was an invite to the prestigious McDonald’s AllAmerican game and an opportunity to display her work ethic at

an emerging local college program under the direction of Terp coach Brenda Frese.

FROM DAY ONE Coleman came into the program with fellow senior Kristi Toliver, also a high-profile recruit coming out of high school, in time for the 2005-06 season with designs of turning the Terps into a program of national importance.

Frese remembers encountering Coleman and Toliver at the

2005 WBCA High School AllStar game the weekend of the Final Four in Indianapolis.

“After that All-Star game they were telling me, ‘Coach B, next year, we’re going to be playing in the Final Four, winning our own championship,’” Frese said. “I just remember, just thinking it was a pretty bold statement for seniors in high school to make, a year ahead of their freshman year. I guess the joke was on me.”

A year later at the 2006 Final Four in Boston, Coleman recorded double-doubles in both the Terps’ semifinal win against North Carolina and their championship game win against Duke.

The confident freshman, who willingly accepted the daunting task of helping the Terps become an elite program, made two free throws in the final 13 seconds of overtime and grabbed the game’s last rebound to seal the national title.

Along with the picture of Toliver’s dramatic game-tying three-pointer to force overtime, the image of Coleman with her head tilted back, eyes closed and mouth roaring in celebration was featured on highlight shows and plastered in newspapers across the country.

“I think we definitely accomplished what we wanted to, putting Maryland on the map,” Coleman said. “We definitely had our ups and downs, but there’s probably a lot of players who have graduated who would have loved to accomplish what me and Kristi have. But once you accomplish these things, you get greedy.”

That made the next two seasons, in which Terps’ squads loaded with talent and expectations lost in the second round in 2007 and the Elite Eight in 2008, tough to handle.

“We didn’t deserve to win another national championship,” Coleman said plainly, adding that the amount of preparation necessary as a team for a repeat title in the summer before the 20062007 campaign didn’t occur.

So with her senior season upon her, Coleman did what got her here in the first place. She made it a point to shoot 1,000 jumpers every day during the summer and confidently proclaimed herself as the team’s leader before this season, filling in the leadership roles of the departed Laura Harper and Crystal Langhorne, the only Terp in program history with more points or rebounds than Coleman.

The goal in Coleman’s mind for her final season was simple — win everything.

She openly talked of her intent to win the ACC regular season title and ACC Tournament Championship, both of which the Terps hadn’t won since 1989. And being the highly motivated competitor that she is, Coleman made a second national crown a priority.

But with a roster full of firstyear players and a team trying to build chemistry with two new starters in forward Dee Liles and center Lynetta Kizer, this season didn’t start as well as Coleman had hoped.

STARRING SENIOR The Terps never dropped out of the top 15 of the national rankings, but a season-opening loss at TCU raised doubts for the preseason-No. 3 Terps. The team went on to win seven consecutive games, despite some inconsistent performances from Coleman and Toliver.

But in the Terps’ 29-point loss at Pitt on Dec. 7, everything went wrong. Coleman went 3-of-9 from the floor and was benched in the second half by Frese, who called out her star forward in the postgame press conference for a lack of energy and leadership.

Coleman’s response was predictable. She got back to work.

Concerned about her free throw shooting, Coleman shot 200 extra free throws on off days.

Not coincidentally, as Coleman raised her level of play at the beginning of February, so did the Terps, who have won 13 consec-

utive games since their loss at Virginia on Jan. 30.

Coleman established career highs in points per game (17.4) and rebounds per game (8.2) on her way to earning a spot on the All-ACC First Team and being named the ACC Tournament MVP. In the meantime, the versatility and intensity in her game shined. Coleman started to consistently hit her mid-range jumper and frustrated opponents with her bruising ability to dribble-penetrate.

“The thing that impresses me most about Marissa is what opposing coaches say about her,” said ESPN and Westwood One Radio women’s basketball analyst Beth Mowins. “When people compare her talents to those of a Magic Johnson, it speaks to the versatility in her game. She can score in so many different ways, and with her size and strength, she’s just so difficult to try and guard. She probably has the most versatile game in college basketball.”

Coleman’s willingness to help others was never in question throughout this season, according to Kizer, Coleman’s team-mandated “accountability partner.”

“We click well together,” Kizer said. “She’s an emotional player, just as I am. That’s one thing that we like to relate to on the court. We bring it out in each other.”

Coleman and Kizer, the team’s new McDonald’s AllAmerican, do a mock dance ritual during pregame introductions, featuring a karate chop and chest bump.

The almost carefree, no-pressure approach of key freshmen such as Kizer, guards Anjalé Barrett and Kim Rodgers and junior college transfer forward Liles remind Coleman of herself and Toliver during the team’s 2006 national title run.

In the midst of her final tournament opportunity, the powerful small forward said she feels some minor, but eerie, similarities to that 2006 team. Besides the comparable dynamic between experienced veterans and keen newcomers, Coleman cites the national championship triumphs of the Terps’ field hockey and men’s soccer teams last fall.

Both those teams last won the national title in the fall before 2006.

But the senior is aware of the challenges ahead. Even if the Terps (29-4) are able to avoid an upset from the Utes (23-9) tonight and a handful of worthy contenders on the way to the Final Four in St. Louis, they’ll most likely have to beat the undefeated and seemingly invincible Connecticut Huskies for the national championship.

The Huskies feature a player with the same versatile style of Coleman in sophomore forward Maya Moore, the odds-on favorite for national player of the year awards.

In typical Coleman style, the player who always wears a boxer-like hooded warm-up jacket before games said she wouldn’t back down from Moore in a potential heavyweight national championship game matchup.

“It would be a battle,” Coleman said. “Pride would be on both of our sides. Me being a senior, I personally want it a little more.”

That’s not surprising to Tony Coleman, who has always seen his daughter strive for a little bit more in her basketball career.

He attended the Terps’ Feb. 27 senior night against Boston College to see Coleman’s No. 25 jersey honored in Comcast Center’s rafters. He felt proud, and while thoughts of his daughter’s earlier days of hard work and intense preparation flashed through his mind, he also had another premonition.

“Don’t smell the roses,” Tony Coleman said. “We got a lot of work left to do.” akrautdbk@gmail.com

8

THE DIAMONDBACK | TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2009

More Terp coverage online

Sports

Gymnastics makes the NCAA Regionals. Men’s lacrosse is still dealing with a series of injuries. Women’s lacrosse heads to Towson for an alumni battle. Baseball faces a road test against red-hot George Mason. Read about them at www.diamondbackonline.com.

And check out TerrapinTrail.com for more on all Terp sports.

TERRAPIN MEN’S BASKETBALL SEASON RECAP

Resilient overachievers NIT expectations were outdone by scrappy team and embattled head coach

BY MARK SELIG Senior staff writer

As time ticked down, forward Dave Neal teared up.

With Memphis far ahead of the Terrapin men’s basketball team in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, each second that passed was one less in Neal’s career and the Terps’ season.

It was a bittersweet ending for Neal and the Terps. They were dominated in Kansas City by the No. 2 seed Tigers. But it was an accomplishment enough that they were playing Saturday.

“We were a great team,” Neal said. “The way we finished the season — going back to the NCAA Tournament and winning a game in the tournament. I’m gonna miss this team lot. This team has a huge heart.”

Neal, the team’s only senior, embodied the team, using a strong work ethic to overcome a lack of size and athleticism.

The Terps were picked by many to finish near the bottom of the ACC. After a 7-9 conference season that landed them in a seventh-place tie in the league, the Terps won two games in the ACC Tournament to fortify their NCAA Tournament hopes.

By reaching the tournament and winning a first round game, the Terps proved the pundits wrong — which was really one of their objectives throughout the season.

The Terps harped on the lack of respect they received in the media and played with industrialsized chips on their shoulders.

The tension peaked after coach Gary Williams was publicly scrutinized for his ability to recruit top-flight players.

“There’s definitely pride amongst the team,” guard Eric Hayes said. “Everything we’ve gone through this year and all the doubt that we’ve had from the outside, we all knew as a team that we could get to the tournament and have a great season.

And I think we did that.”

The team won 11 of its first 13, including an upset victory over then-No. 5 Michigan State on Thanksgiving in the Old Spice Classic.

But an ominous home loss against Morgan State began a 3-6 skid that incited many outsiders to believe that the Terps would be NIT-bound for the fourth time in five years.

The young Terps rallied around their embattled coach and improved play from their star guard, Greivis Vasquez, the only player from a major conference school to lead his team in points, rebounds and assists. “[When I look back] I’ll be real proud of this year’s team,” Williams said Saturday after the Terps’ second-round loss. “They were incredible in terms of support for me, and their ability to be resilient I think is the thing I’ll remember about this team.”

That resilience was shown on Feb. 21, when the Terps rose from the dead to give their season a new meaning.

Behind Vasquez’s 35 point, 11 rebound, 10 assist performance — the Terp’s first triple-double since 1987 — the Terps upset then-No. 3 North Carolina, putting the underdogs back into the tournament picture.

It was Vasquez’s stubborn confidence — the same confidence that screamed back at taunting home fans earlier in the season and declared that Memphis would be a sub-.500 ACC team before Saturday’s game — that gave the Terps their swagger throughout the year.

“After everything we went through, we came together,” Vasquez said. “I think our chemistry [was] good — this is more than a team, it’s a family. We put everything behind and just started playing hard.”

Hayes and forward Landon Milbourne — both returning starters from last season — flanked Vasquez as the team’s primary scoring options, as both got used to new roles.

Hayes played as a sixth man during the second half of the year, while Milbourne had to adjust from being a small forward to a power forward as a result of the Terps’ lack of interior players.

Sophomore guard Adrian Bowie emerged this season as a key contributor after an inconsistent freshman year. Freshman swingman Sean Mosley and sophomore forward Dino Gregory provided the team with a newfound defensive grit.

The Terps closed out the regular season with an 18-12 record.

Along with wins against N.C. State and Wake Forest in the ACC Tournament, the Terps’ resumé was good enough to garner a No. 10 seed in the NCAA Tournament, where they defeated No. 7-

1

2

3

4

5

6 Preseason expectations were low for the undersized Terps, but in reaching the NCAA Tournament, they proved their critics wrong, a major storyline of the season as a whole. MATTHEW CREGER/THE DIAMONDBACK

seed California in the first round.

Barring a transfer or Vasquez entering the NBA draft, next year’s team will return all players except for Neal.

With the additions of forwards Jordan Williams and James Padgett giving the Terps muchneeded size next season, Williams is eager to see his team play with an above-the-rim style next season.

Because while an NCAA Tournament appearance was an accomplished goal, the Terps’ ultimate objective remains greater.

“We gotta get back to this point and get past where we did [this year],” Milbourne said. “We gotta get further into the tournament next year.”

There will be no next season for Neal, whose senior year will define his otherwise forgettable career.

The 2008-09 Terps will be widely remembered for Vasquez’s histrionics, but no one will remember this season as endearingly as the lone senior will.

“We had a great year overall,” Neal said. “If you look back and reminisce on some of the great wins we had this year against Wake Forest, North Carolina, Michigan State — coming into the season, people didn’t think we had a chance to be a great team. And I think we proved to a lot of people that we were a great team.” mseligdbk@gmail.com

Photo 1: Guard Eric Hayes after a 75-48 loss to Georgetown in Orlando on Nov. 30. Photo 2: Forward Landon Milbourne in a 85-44 loss at Duke on Jan. 24. Photo 3: Foward Cliff Tucker in an 88-85 overtime win against thenNo. 3 North Carolina on Feb. 21. Photo 4: Guard Adrian Bowie in a 75-64 ACC Tournament win against Wake Forest on March 13. Photo 5: Guard Greivis Vasquez in a 84-71 NCAA Tournament win against Cal on March 19. Photo 6: Coach Gary Williams and forward Dave Neal embrace during a 89-70 NCAA Tournament loss to Memphis on March 21. PHOTOS BY MATTHEW CREGER (5, 6), ALLISON AKERS (1, 3), ADAM FRIED (2), JACLYN BOROWSKI (4)/THE DIAMONDBACK

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