Massachusetts Daily Collegian: Oct. 1, 2015

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Seven University professors named to Reuters list List notes researchers who are highly cited

By PATrick JohnSTon Collegian Correspondent

Seven University of Massachusetts professors recently found their names on a list of the most influential scientific minds of our time.

The list, compiled by Thomson Reuters, one of the largest information firms in the world, acknowledges researchers who have been engaged in research that has had a significant impact in their

respective fields, and has led many to their papers being in the top one percent of cited works among their colleagues. Many of these papers have received multiple thousands of citations as well as high praise.

One of the seven UMass professors, microbiologist Derek Lovly, wrote a paper in 1988 that is still among the most consistently cited works in the field of microbiology.

“I’m really happy to have made that distinction,” Lovley said when asked how he felt about being put on the list. “It’s gratifying that that paper

still has relevance.”

Food scientist David Julian McClements shared the feelings of his fellow scientists, saying, “It’s nice to get recognized by your peers. It’s sort of like getting a platinum disc album.”

Both expressed that the reassurance that there work is appreciated and relevant outweighs any added pressure of being so highly cited.

But the professors also expressed that those observing such lists should take caution. Astronomer Mauro Giavalisco stated that citations “do not tell

the whole story.”

This was a sentiment shared by chemist Vincent Rotello who explained that, like any statistical evaluation, the Reuter’s list has strengths and weaknesses.

Rotello said he liked the impersonal nature of the survey used to create the list, saying it was more “cold and analytical, and (it) gives a different perspective than many other awards.”

However, Rotello also acknowledged that the number of citations is not by any means the only measure that should be taken into account when

evaluating a scientist and his or her work.

Po ly m e r scientist Thomas Russell expressed not only that number of citations wasn’t the only aspect that should be evaluated, but that it may even be misleading. He pointed out that many on the list have opened up new areas of study in their fields.

“It’s like you’re going into an orchard,” Russell said. “You get to pick the low-hanging fruit.”

He explained that such breakthrough works lead to a great amount of citations and such works don’t necessarily indicate the

greatest influence, because the work that comes after must be built off it regardless of how deep into the new area the original work goes. When asked if he thought the existence of the Reuters list was positive and significant, he was unconvinced.

“The everyday person doesn’t look up the most highly cited people, the top 10 maybe,” said Russell, adding that the list would be more helpful to graduate students looking to make a decision on colleges to attend for research, than the average person, even see

REUTERS on page 2

Iron Horse: Home Student leader: auguSta lord to music history Music Hall a venue for all performers

By TAylor WhiTe Collegian Correspondent

The club has been able to showcase an exceptionally broad range of artists, ranging from African folk performers to classically trained violinists, all while attracting audiences large enough to keep the venue at capacity.

Acts are not picked for their ability to draw crowds, but for the authenticity of their music and for the energy they put forth during a performance. The Horse has hosted famous singers like Dar Williams as well as start-up musicians whose names are largely unknown, but that does not deter the crowds.

University of Massachusetts student Michaela Dunn attended a performance of Crystal Bowersox, a former competitor on season nine of American Idol, without any prior knowledge of the main performer or the opening acts. Dunn said her unfamiliarity with the artist was a surprise, not a negative impact on her experience.

“I would say it made it even better because I was so impressed at the level of talent the place brought in,” Dunn said.

Not only does the Horse offer exceptional musical entertainment, but its food is outstanding. Keeping with their commitment to provide a warm and folksy atmosphere, they provide a gourmet twist on classic American fare. Tickets are also priced affordably, which allows local college students to attend.

From the outside, the storefront is unassuming and could be dismissed as just another quaint shop in downtown Northampton. The Iron Horse, however, is no ordinary venue. Behind its doors lives a room rich with the history, culture and diversity of generations of musicians.

The music hall has occupied its space in Northampton since 1979, conceived by founders Jordi Herold and John Riley. Its extensive and unique history is palpable in the atmosphere of the main room, with autographed pictures of past performers adorning the walls. Livingston Taylor, Suzanne Vega, John Mayer and Tracey Chapman are just a few of the faces that hang above the audiences.

The Iron Horse has, over the years, fostered an environment of creativity and unity across expansive bounds of musical genres and styles.

The owners of the club attribute this singular success to the small town of Northampton.

Current owner Eric Suher attributes some of the club’s notoriety to a special run

by WGBY on the club’s 35th anniversary, but locals have helped its popularity.

“If you step back and look at the history of the Iron Horse and the history of Northampton, it’s a very symbiotic relationship. They both kind of grew up togeth- Taylor White can be reached at er,” Suher said. tdwhite@umass.edu.

ROBERT RIGO/COLLEGIAN

Iron Horse Music Hall sits at the epicenter of Northampton’s music scene

BEN ROSS PHOTOGRAPHY/COURTESY OF AUGUSTA LORD

UMass senior Augusta Lord participated in a national ‘dressing’ competition with ‘Solstice in Montague.

Equestrian champion competes on national level in dressage horseback riding

By ShelBy AShline Collegian Staff

To the outside world, Augusta Lord seems to ride atop a dancing grey horse.

A senior at the University of Massachusetts, Lord balances school, two jobs and competing in dressage, a type of horseback riding that involves the horse performing elegant movements.

Just last Sunday, Lord could be seen competing at Xenophon Farm, an equestrian facility in Montague.

Together with her horse Solstice, more affectionately called Grey because of his color, she took home the title of reserve champion, earning the second highest number of points amongst her competitors.

However, Lord’s involvement in dressage stretches much farther than attending local shows. She travels as far as three hours away to compete on a national level through the United States Dressage Federation and rides the descendant of an international dressage champion.

Outside of her dressage success, Lord is a math

major with a concentration in actuarial science while also pursuing a minor in education. After graduation in May 2016, she intends to have a career as an actuary, an insurance employee who compiles and analyzes statistics and uses them to calculate insurance risks and premiums.

Although horseback riding and actuarial science seem unrelated, Lord said that she even chose her major with horses in mind.

“I felt that it was more worthwhile for me to get a degree in something I could really make money in so that I would have the funds to be able to compete and train, because it’s expensive,” she said. “I can always ride, and I never wanted to be in a position where I wasn’t able to give my horses 100 percent of what they needed.”

In addition, Lord feels her education minor will be useful in the future, when she hopes to coach other dressage riders. Her college life is in fact carefully crafted in order to help her fuel her passion

for horses.

This extends to work as well. In order to fund the hobby, Lord works two jobs. She spends roughly 15 hours per week working as a bartender at UPub and as a peer adviser for the math and statistics departments.

Combined with trying to get to the barn five times per week and taking four classes, Lord maintains a very busy lifestyle.

“It’s a difficult balancing act, kind of, but I like it and I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she said. “I’m happiest when I have horse time … so in my opinion there’s really no other way to do it.”

Lord manages to pay for the upkeep of her horse without parental help, while also funding her trips to shows, which can cost upwards of $1,000 between hotel fees, gas and entry fees. Lord is thankful to have sponsors who provide her with riding apparel and dietary supplements for her horse.

“I just feel an overwhelming sense of gratitude because I’ve done this on a really, really minimal

budget,” she said. “It’s required a lot of people to have faith in me and kind of believe in me.”

Because so many people have contributed to her success, including her coach, Brenna Kucinski, and the owners who have allowed her to compete with their horses, Lord aims to give back to other young riders who are not able to afford horses.

For example, she has donated riding equipment to Dressage4Kids, a nonprofit organization that provides educational and competitive opportunities for young riders.

Lord’s highest achievement during her time competing has been attaining a bronze medal for consistently competing and scoring high in her level. The year-end award was given on a national scale through the USDF. Lord continues to have high hopes for the future, saying that her personal goal is to compete at the international Grand Prix level before she turns 25. see

LORD on page 2

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THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

Thursday, October 1, 2015

CALENDAR

WEEK END

REUTERS

DailyCollegian.com

continued from page 1

if they had an interest in science.

Other professors saw the list differently.

Giavalisco said he thinks it’s important that organizations outside the scientific community take notice of what’s going on in various fields and care enough to make lists like this one. McClements also said “universities buy into it,” insisting that such a designation, while not an end all be all for a scientific career, is taken into account by educational institutions when evaluating their scientists.

“It changes the way I

work, I think,” he said when asked about the possibility of getting on lists like the one Reuters put out.

This sentiment was not shared by Russell.

“You don’t pay attention to all the hype and statistics,” Russell said.

“I don’t live and die by Reuters.”

Over 3,000 researchers internationally were named to the Highly Cited Researchers list this year.

All seven UMass professors were also on last year’s list.

Patrick Johnston can be reached at pejohnston@umass.edu.

BEN ROSS PHOTOGRAPHY/COURTESY OF AUGUSTA LORD

Lord rides atop ‘Solstice,’ a decendent of an international champion

LORD

continued from page 1

Having come as far as she has, Lord believes that anything is possible with the right mindset.

“There are always going to be people who tell you you’re not good enough,” Lord said.

“If you ever lose faith in yourself and believe you’re not good enough at something, you’ve lost all your chances.”

Shelby Ashline can be reached at sashline@umass.edu or followed on Twitter @shelby_ashline.

FRIDAY STEPHEN TEPPER Stephen J. Tepper, a leading writer and speaker on U.S. Cultural policy, will discuss how art can transform public universities and public life. 7:30 at Bezanson Hall in the Fine Arts Center

A MAYAN TAPESTRY A wide collection of paintings, photographs, video and youth art depict daily life, cosmology, the impact of colonization and the modern world. Open Friday 1 to 5 in the Augusta Gallery

SATURDAY

THE MACHINE PERFORMS PINK FLOYD

The Machine has been covering Pink Floyd’s music for over 20 years.

Show opens at 8p.m. at the Calvin Theatre in Northampton,19 King St.

UMASS VS. FIU UMass Football returns to McGurik Stadium for its first home game of the season.

Gather in the Southwest parking lots for a pre-game tailgate. Kickoff is at 3 p.m.

SUNDAY

OPERA: CUATRO CORRIDOS

Cuatro Corridos, an hour-long chamber opera about human trafficking, will be performed by soprano and Grammywinner Susan Narucki. Show starts at 4 p.m. in Bowker Auditorium

LIBRARY RECEPTION The 17th Annual Fall Reception at W.E.B. DuBois features a performance by Auereldon Henderson, founder of the Boston Jazz Society.

Reception starts at 3 on the library courtyard

More Clinton emails released

By Evan HalpEr Tribune Washington Bureau WASHINGTON _ Hillary Rodham Clinton has lately positioned herself on the forefront of gay rights, but tucked into a newly disclosed batch of her emails is a reminder that she had long taken a more cautious approach to the issue.

While secretary of State, Clinton personally intervened in early 2011 to reverse a policy change at the State Department that had been a symbolic gesture to nontraditional families, the messages show. She fretted that the change would give fodder to Fox News to attack her.

The email is one of 3,849 the State Department released Wednesday, as required by a judge in ongoing litigation over Clinton’s email. About 55,000 messages she sent or received from a private account are being vetted for classified information and disclosed in monthly batches.

On Wednesday, the fourth such batch was posted on the department’s website. As with previous Clinton email disclosures, most of the messages involved mundane matters of day–to–day government business. But every so often, a message sheds new light onto the life of one of the world’s most powerful women.

An email involving passport applications was notable for the raw nerve the issue of gay rights seemed to touch.

Clinton expressed anger that the application form had been changed from its reference to traditional parents, and she demanded to know who was behind it.

“Who made the decision that State will not use the terms ‘mother and father’ and instead substitute ‘parent one and two’?” she wrote.

“I am not defending that decision which I disagree w and knew nothing about in front of this Congress. ... We

need to address this today or we will be facing a huge Fox generated media storm led by Palin et al.”

The form was changed.

The message was particularly revealing, but it was not the only one in which Clinton and aides exchanged thoughts on the type of media attention she might get.

A staffer forwarded to Clinton’s personal email account a gushing December 2010 note from magazine editor Tina Brown, making her pitch for how the secretary of State’s image could be enhanced with a cover story in Newsweek.

In another note, Clinton’s communications adviser at the department, Philippe Reines, alerted her to her 67 percent approval rating, and then remarked, “This is why we cooperate with so many profiles.”

Other messages further see

CLINTON on page 3

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Russia launches airstrikes on Syria Analysts question Putin’s intentions

By Patrick J. McDonnell, W.J. Hennigan anD naBiH Bulos Los Angeles Times

BEIRUT _ Russian warplanes launched their first airstrikes Wednesday against opposition targets inside Syria, signaling a new and uncertain turn in the long conflict there.

Russian officials said the attacks in support of the government of President Bashar Assad targeted positions of Islamic State, the al–Qaida breakaway faction that has seized control of vast swaths of Syria and neighboring Iraq.

However, Syrian opposition activists and some U.S. officials said the areas hit were in the hands of other rebel factions, including some fighting under the banner of the Free Syrian Army, a loose grouping that has received aid from Washington and its allies.

The rebel–held pocket north of the city of Homs struck by the Russian warplanes is also reportedly a stronghold for a number of hard–line Islamist militias, including the Nusra Front, the official al–Qaida affiliate in Syria, and Ahrar al–Sham, which also has al–Qaida connections.

In New York, U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry said Washington would not object to Russian action targeting Islamic State or al–Qaida–linked factions. But Washington would have “grave concerns,” Kerry said, if the Russian strikes were aimed at other opposition groups.

In a televised address, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russian forces were supporting the Syrian military “in its legitimate fight with terrorist groups.”

The Syrian government routinely refers to all its armed opponents as “terrorists.” Washington maintains that moderate rebels with a democratic agenda are among the insurgents fighting to topple Assad.

Syrian state media reported that Russian warplanes, operating in cooperation with the Syrian air force, attacked seven areas housing Islamic State “dens” north of Homs, “achieving direct hits and inflicting heavy losses upon the terrorist organization.”

U.S. officials seemed to view the Russian offensive an effort to help sustain the besieged administration of Assad, Moscow’s longtime ally, whose forces are thinly stretched.

“We are seeing the Russians ramp up their support for President Assad,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters in Washington. “It’s clear they’ve made a significant military investment now in further propping him up.”

Moscow gave the United States advance notice of its intentions in Syria, Washington said.

A Russian official in Baghdad informed U.S. Embassy personnel that Russian military aircraft would begin flying missions Wednesday targeting Islamic State in Syria, State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a statement. The Russian official requested that U.S. aircraft avoid Syrian airspace during the missions, Kirby said.

A U.S.–led coalition has been carrying out airstrikes against Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq for more than a year. But the U.S.–led effort has not coor-

dinated with the forces of Assad. The Obama administration and its allies have called on the Syrian leader to step down and have aided various armed groups seeking to topple him.

But Putin made it clear in an address before the United Nations in New York this week that Moscow’s aim is to assist Assad’s beleaguered government and army, which is facing manpower shortages in the punishing conflict that began in 2011.

The Russia airstrikes are targeting Islamic State military equipment, communication centers, vehicles, arms and fuel depots, a Russian military spokesman in Moscow said.

The airstrikes came just two days after Putin and President Barack Obama met in New York about coordinating military efforts aimed at Islamic State.

Officials at the Pentagon view Russia’s decision to carry out the strikes as a rebuke to those talks.

“It bypasses every bit of legitimate discussion we’ve had so far,” said an official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. “We were in the process of working out the particulars of the agreement.”

A pro–opposition monitoring group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, reported Wednesday that at least 27 people had been killed, including five women and six children, on airstrikes in the opposition–held towns of Al Rastan and Talbisah, as well as in the village of Al Zafaraaneh, all north of the city of Homs. But the group did not specify if Syrian or Russian warplanes had struck the area. Syria’s air forces routinely strike rebel–held areas.

The U.S. military was aware of reports of civilian casualties as a result of the Russian attacks but had not been able to confirm because there are limited aerial surveillance assets in the city, officials said.

On social media, pro– opposition Syrian activists were quickly denouncing the “Russian invasion” and condemning Moscow’s support of Assad.

Syrian state media reported Wednesday that Russia’s stepped–up military involvement in Syria “came at the request of the Syrian government.”

Russian authorities have described their military efforts in Syria as a response to an official invitation for assistance from Assad’s government.

Moscow says this is in contrast to the “illegal” U.S.– led air campaign in Syria, which was undertaken absent a request or permission from the Syrian government and which, in the view of Moscow and Damascus, violates Syrian sovereignty.

Earlier Wednesday, Putin asked for and received parliamentary approval Wednesday to use Russian armed forces in Syria in the fight against Islamic State, the Kremlin’s chief of staff told journalists.

“The operation’s military goal is exclusively air support of the Syrian armed forces in their fight against ISIL,” Sergei Ivanov said, according to the Tass news agency, using a common acronym for the Islamic extremist group.

Russia has deployed warplanes, helicopters, tanks and naval forces to western Syria in recent weeks in a move that Western leaders feared might signal the Kremlin’s intent to deploy forces to protect Assad’s government.

Thursday, October 1, 2015

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US backs Aghanistan forces Taliban spreads its reach to key cities

By DaviD s. clouD anD cHristi Parsons Tribune Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON _ The U.S. military launched airstrikes and rushed special forces advisers to Kunduz on Wednesday as the Afghan army struggled to retake the strategic provincial capital from the Taliban and fighting spread outside the city, a crisis that is forcing the White House to rethink plans to withdraw most U.S. forces from Afghanistan next year.

Pentagon officials said the Taliban’s capture of a major Afghan city for the first time since the U.S.–led invasion in 2001, and the retreat of pro–government forces to an enclave at the airport, has strengthened their argument that leaving only a few hundred troops after 2016 would shake the Afghan government’s confidence and reinforce the insurgency.

White House officials already were “looking carefully” at several options offered this month by Gen. John Campbell, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, including keeping about 8,000 troops in place. The fall of Kunduz has “made them even more nervous” about leaving entirely, a senior Pentagon official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.

President Barack Obama has pledged to end America’s longest war before he leaves office in January 2017. But some senior officials and lawmakers warn that the Taliban rout of Afghan security forces at Kunduz suggests that Afghanistan could follow the disastrous path of Iraq, which saw Islamic State extremists overrun major cities last year after the U.S. withdrawal there.

The White House indicated Wednesday that it is reconsidering its withdrawal plan after the insur-

CLINTON continued from page 2 illuminated Clinton’s fumbles with modern means of communication. She could not figure out why messages she was sending to one aide were going to the woman’s Gmail address instead of her government account.

Clinton said she did not know she even had the aide’s Gmail address, then jokingly blamed the confusion on Chinese hackers infiltrating her server.

The irony was quickly noted by GOP opposition researchers Wednesday. They have charged that Clinton’s use of a personal server for government business put the State Department at risk of a security breach _ and here Clinton was joking about the possibility.

In another exchange, Clinton expressed exasperation with a White House operator who did not believe it was her on the phone.

“I’m fighting w the WH operator who doesn’t believe I am who I say and wants my direct office line even tho I’m not there,” Clinton wrote in February of 2010. “I just (gave) him my home # and the State Dept # and I told him I had no idea what my direct office # was since I didn’t call myself and I just hung up.”

Clinton might have invoked a s lang term commonly used in government to describe a situation in which everything has gone wrong, but a later email revealed she was unfamiliar with it.

“What does fubar mean?”

gents’ success in an area once considered so secure that President Ashraf Ghani’s year–old government had cited it as a model for a country struggling to emerge from decades of war.

Obama has “routinely noted that conditions on the ground influence that policy process,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said in response to questions about Kunduz. “That would be the case in this circumstance as well.”

Administration critics portrayed the challenge far more starkly.

“If we were to remain on the withdrawal schedule, we run the risk of Afghanistan experiencing a meltdown like Iraq,” said Lisa Curtis, a former State Department and intelligence officer now at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think tank. “This puts a lot of pressure on the White House to drop this arbitrary deadline ... and commit to keeping forces there.”

Vanda Felbab–Brown, a senior fellow at the centrist Brookings Institution, said Obama must decide between those who say America has sacrificed enough in Afghanistan and those who say leaving will undermine that sacrifice.

“There’s a strong sense at the White House that the president’s commitment has been to end the U.S. participation in the two wars,” she said. “On the other hand, military leaders and allies say, ‘Look, all that has been accomplished cannot be lost. Now is not the time to pull the plug and run.’ “ But an abrupt change in U.S. policy may not be necessary, argued Colin Cookman, research program officer at the congressionally funded United States Institute of Peace, who has studied the Taliban buildup around Kunduz.

“My expectation would be that Afghan security forces do eventually retake control of Kunduz with the current levels of relatively limited international support,” Cookman said.

He said Ghani’s admin-

istration would “definitely like to see U.S. support continue, particularly in terms of air power that could disrupt Taliban attempts to mass forces.” But its bigger concern is continued U.S. financial support, he said.

Washington has provided about $5.7 billion to Kabul this fiscal year, including $4.1 billion for the military. The U.S. government has given about $100 billion to Afghanistan since 2001.

That does not include the cost of U.S. military operations in the country.

The White House had planned to cut the U.S. force from 9,800 troops to about 5,500 this year. In March, after Ghani visited Washington, Obama backed down and agreed to keep all 9,800 in place this year, but said he would leave only a few hundred after 2016.

Campbell and Ghani are urging Obama to reconsider again, citing the growing threat not just from the Taliban but from insurgents claiming allegiance to Islamic State, the Sunni Muslim extremist group that has declared a caliphate in parts of Syria and Iraq.

Several hundred Taliban fighters captured Kunduz, a city of about 300,000 residents, early Monday.

Since then, U.S. forces have conducted five airstrikes near the airport, including three Wednesday, to “eliminate threats to coalition and Afghan forces,” according to Col. Brian Tribus, a spokesman for the U.S.–led military coalition.

Clashes between the Taliban and government forces have spread to outlying areas of Baghlan province, south of Kunduz.

U.S. officials were harshly critical of the performance and leadership of the Afghan army, a departure from the normally confident assessments issued by senior U.S. commanders and other officials.

“The retaking of Kunduz is not going to be easy or clean,” said a senior U.S. official in Kabul, the capital, who was not authorized to speak publicly.

He said Afghan troops have been “in a defensive crouch” since Kunduz fell.

“Having said that, they haven’t given up the fight and are still in it trying to recapture lost ground.”

Afghan forces retook the police headquarters and main prison, according to the Defense Ministry in Kabul, after the Taliban reportedly freed more than 600 inmates on Monday.

Although some reports indicated the Taliban did not intend to hold the city, a senior Pentagon official said militants appear to be “digging in” to make a counteroffensive as bloody as possible.

Several thousand Afghan troops are now deployed in or near Kunduz, U.S. officials said, including members of a well–equipped mobile strike force sent by commanders in Kabul.

The United Nations says more than 6,000 people have fled the city. It called on both sides to ensure that civilians were protected amid reports of kidnappings and trapped residents.

“The reports of extrajudicial executions, including of health workers; abductions; denial of medical care; and restrictions on movement out of the city are particularly disturbing,” said the U.N. special representative in Afghanistan, Nicholas Haysom.

The Taliban’s capture of Kunduz comes as the insurgents have begun operating more freely in Afghanistan’s south and east, where U.S. forces suffered heavy losses during more than a decade of combat.

They have mounted high– profile assaults on lightly defended targets in Kabul and regained ground in Helmand province in the south, where they once were largely defeated.

Afghan security forces remain plagued by problems with equipment, logistics and tactics. Many troops see their main duty as manning checkpoints rather than conducting offensive operations against insurgents.

Policy rejects Guantanomo prisoner transfers to US Naval forces will remain in Cuba By carol rosenBerg Miami Herald

Congress’ latest defense policy bill rejects the White House vision of moving Guantanamo’s last captives to the United States but doesn’t invest in new prison guard housing even as it makes it tougher to release captives.

It also forbids the Pentagon from spending a cent on withdrawal from the U.S. Navy base in southeast Cuba, effectively answering Raul Castro’s demand that President Barack Obama evacuate the outpost as part of normalization of diplomatic relations.

It has yet to be adopted by the full House and Senate.

Obama has threatened to veto the legislation because it uses emergency war funds to exceed Congress’ mandated spending caps, which critics call a budgeting gimmick.

The 1,915–page version of the National Defense Authorization Act, unveiled jointly Tuesday by the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, illustrates the push–pull in Congress over whether to plan for Guantanamo prison operations in the long run. The legislation codifies the request by Sen. John McCain, R–Ariz.,

for a comprehensive Obama administration blueprint on closing the detention center currently holding 114 captives _ to include proposed U.S. construction and endgame plans for each captive.

At the same time, it ratchets up restrictions on releases of the prison’s remaining captives, who still cannot be moved to the United States for any reason. The new law, additionally, would require Defense Secretary Ash Carter to adopt a higher certification standard _ demonstrating a national security imperative _ before releasing a captive to another country.

The threshold would effectively halt releases with one exception: It allows captives to leave Guantanamo if a court orders it, meaning the Obama administration could orchestrate a release by ordering the Justice Department not to oppose a detainee’s habeas corpus petition.

The legislation also includes a section that does not allow the Department of Defense “to relinquish control of Guantanamo Bay to the Republic of Cuba,” something Castro demanded as recently as this week in his address to the United Nations General Assembly. Obama administration officials have said withdrawal from the 45– square–mile base is not currently up for discussion.

Perhaps in a reflection of

uncertainty over the prison’s future, however, it does not include a $76 million housing complex that the House Armed Services Committee chairman had earlier added to draft legislation from the wish–list of Marine Gen. John F. Kelly, commander of the Southern Command, who oversees prison operations.

Kelly has proposed building the housing _ Southcom calls it a barracks; a Capitol Hill staffer who saw the plan described it as a “big dorm” _ near a new $12 million cafeteria being built for the 2,000 or more troops and contractors assigned to the prison, mostly soldiers on nine–month rotations.

Last year, Congress funded the cafeteria and an $11.8 million detainee health clinic, both championed by Kelly, but rejected his proposal for a new $69 million prison for Guantanamo’s 14 former CIA captives, six of them awaiting death–penalty proceedings. Separately, Congress has funded a new $65 million base school for the children of troops and contractors who live there.

At Southern Command in Doral, Army Col. Lisa Garcia said the headquarters did not ask for the “barracks,” though added it “would add to improving the quality of life and morale for our troops, which is one of Gen. Kelly’s top priorities.”

Opinion Editorial THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

“Vile weed!” - Newman

Thursday, October 1, 2015

Editorial@DailyCollegiancom

Pursue passion, Keep a journal to learn about yourself not a job If I had a dollar for every The focus has turned time someone told me that I away from encouraging stushould look into engineer- dents to follow passions to encouraging us to follow the John Zawali path of least resistance. I understand the incentive for ing, or maybe accounting, I public schools to encourage could probably afford to buy young students to explore from a local bookstore this math and science, as we semester. Not that being need talented minds to keep an engineer is a bad thing, advancing the work we’ve because it isn’t. I sit here done, but there is an undetyping away on a laptop that niable under-emphasis on weighs less than a brick, the liberal arts in schools. in a T- shirt mass-produced It’s no secret that arts by advanced machinery, funding gets cut first, but while listening to music on why do we shy away from a phone that could look up encouraging kids to pursue any fact recorded in his- areas of study that they tory if I bothered to stop might be good at because sending Snapchats of my it’s harder for them to find face from weird angles for employment? Take anthroa minute. All of this is made pology, for example: a major possible through the won- that consistently ranks

“The focus has turned away from encouraging students to follow passions than encouraging us to follow the path of least resistance.” ders of Science Technology Engineering Mathematics graduates.

But I was never meant to be one of the builders of this generation. Anything that I would try to design would have the structural integrity of a wet noodle.

When it comes down to it, my strengths just do not have anything to do with the “desirable career fields” for graduates. Science generally befuddles me and math just frustrates me, yet over the years of high school I have been subjected to countless adults telling me all about how the STEM fields are where jobs are. When I was in high school, engineering students from the University of Connecticut were paid to go around the state and make presentations on how great engineering was as a major.

Engineering is a great major and the economy backs that up. “What society rewards in economic terms has moved away from softer majors. It’s become about how much math you do,” said Dr. Anthony Carnevale, head of Georgetown’s Center on Education and the Workforce.

But engineering and STEM in general is not for everyone. I know I’m not the only student who can’t tell you the difference between a quark and an antiquark.

Yet I still had to sit through a presentation on the wonders of a STEM career.

It feels as though we are encouraged to pursue our dreams, but only within limits.

among the bottom in terms of graduate unemployment and beginning salary.

According to Forbes, unemployment for anthropology is 10.5 percent. This statistic is used to scare students out of pursuing anthropology as a major, but why don’t we use it to say that if there were 10 anthropology majors, you only need to be better than one to find a job?

Shouldn’t we instead encourage students to pick something they like and work hard at it instead? A common complaint levied against millennials is our tendency to crave instant gratification. We want Facebook to load in a second, our grades to come back immediately with a huge “A,” and a job right when we graduate.

But we are taught to want by our role models, and it’s our schools that have instilled this lack of patience in us. The urge to find a job easily and immediately has been instilled in us for years. I think it’s time to try and ignore that programming to an extent.

Pursue the things you are good at and like doing, even if it takes some time. If it’s math, that’s awesome.

If it’s drawing, that’s wonderful. Most times, we love the things that we are good at. So go out and do what you’re good at, because if you are truly good at something, there will be opportunities for you to do it.

John Zawawi is a Collegian columnist and can be reached at jzawawi@ umass.edu.

If you really love your- could, which doesn’t make self, you’d keep a journal. any sense, right?

Bold statement, I know, but Don’t we usually think of embarrassment as an Becky Wandel emotion we only feel in a crowd, an emotion that I mean it. comes as a direct product The ultimate act of self- of being judged? Why then love is self-expression. It is did the thought of keeping a confidently believing that journal, that was only ever your thoughts, both silly meant for me, embarrass and serious, are worthy of me to the point of giving note – no exceptions. up for most of my life? Why I assume I’m not alone does the same thought still in having spent a childhood and at least half an adolescence sporadically trying to keep a regular journal and failing at it consistently. Even as a little girl, when shame and inhibition should’ve been influencing exactly zero percent of my deci- keep many adults from joursions, the act of keeping a naling to this day?

I think it’s because we diary filled with my daily ourselves more thoughts and feelings felt judge frivolous and embarrass- harshly than anyone else ing and I never succeeded ever could. In our (at least at writing more than one or ideally) merit-based socitwo entries before I gave up. ety, we’re taught that the I was perfectly fine danc- good ideas are worth sharing like a fool in the aisles at ing and the bad ones are church or confidently yell- worth keeping to ourselves, ing wrong answers out in that the good songs should class, but something about get on the album and the the act of journaling embar- bad songs should get left on rassed me like nothing else the cutting room floor. Now

I’m not arguing that the bad songs should make it onto the album, I’m just saying that you’re never going to write a good song until you write a couple of bad ones.

In your journal. Without being embarrassed about it.

We all deserve a place where we can be free to create without fear of judgment from anyone, including ourselves.

A journal is a place to

sketchbook or a bunch of voice memos on your phone – it doesn’t matter.

But whatever form it takes, journaling is a way to get to know the truest, most vulnerable iteration of yourself. It’s scary and intimate and weird but it’s all worth it. So much can be learned by taking the amorphous mush of thoughts and ideas and feelings and memories in your mind and materializing them in any way you can. And so much can be gained.

Don’t believe me? Try it.

I dare you.

I dare you to keep a journal that you write in every day. I dare you to love yourself one sentence at a time. I dare you to show yourself that your voice is worthy of being heard, even if the only person hearing it is you. I dare you to sit alone in a crowd and applaud for every one of your own bad songs, blissfully indifferent to their destiny to be left on the cutting room floor.

“It’s a place where you show yourself compassion by not holding yourself to a single standard other than production, a place where you make and document and keep and ramble.”

keep all your bad songs, all your embarrassingly terrible love poems and all the mundane details of your day. It’s a place where you show yourself compassion by not holding yourself to a single standard other than production, a place where you make and document and keep and ramble – each word you write, a self-affirmation of your own right to Becky Wandel is a Collegian columbe heard. Your journal can nist and can be reached at rwandel@ be notebook or a blog or a umass.edu.

Why is parking at UMass so expensive?

Parking around the University of Massachusetts campus is quite expensive. While the overburdening expenses

Ian Hagerty at school mount up for students, we face more and more fees at every possible avenue while in attendance.

You could argue that taking the local public bus system is an adequate and cheap way for off-campus students to get to class. In fact, it’s free for students to ride. However, realistically for students that work full or part-time and go to class, it can be quite a challenge to navigate your entire schedule without a car. The bus system can add hours to any commute and in college, time is almost always of the essence.

For UMass students that do decide to drive to class, whether out of need or privilege, it costs dollars a day and can easily add up to over $100 a month if you park in certain lots like the garage on campus.

The garage charges $1.75 an hour during the day from 5 a.m. until 5 p.m. and $1.00 an hour at night. At the same time, the parking garage located in downtown Northampton, nothing short of an affluent and busy business community and tourist destination, only charges 50 cents per hour. It’s even free for the first hour.

For metered or pay station parking on campus, the charge is $1.50 an hour.

Take a couple of classes with some time in between and that can easily add up to three or four dollars. It may all sound like only a small charge when you pay

day-to-day with change, but when you suddenly can’t find any change in your house, something seems a little bit off.

In downtown Amherst, metered parking is only 50 cents an hour. I once found parking 10 feet from Miami Beach for 50 cents an hour.

Why is parking so expensive on our campus? It’s just hard to contemplate why students should ever have to pay more in day-to-day expenses on campus than in the real world. Tuition and fees are already gigantic for students, and most of us end up in debt by the time we leave school. Anyone who knows how to save will tell you that every little bit counts, and parking adds up quickly.

“Believe it or not, it’s cheaper to park at a metered space in downtown Boston than it is at UMass, at $1.25 an hour.”

expensive real estate market of New Haven, right off of the green. All we had to do was show our school ID. It seems a little bit backwards that this was the situation at the lower-tier, inexpensive community college.

Parking fees are entirely understandable. Parking lots need to be maintained – even dirt ones. It’s just the fact that the fees don’t line up to the community at large. Parking at school shouldn’t cost more than it does in every town in the surrounding community. If we are attending a state university riddled with grants and funding and constant architectural development, why are students still bearing the brunt? Believe it or not, it’s cheaper to park at a metered space in downtown Boston than it is at UMass, at $1.25 an hour.

New York City costs more, but only in downtown Manhattan. The rest of Manhattan costs the same at UMass and the boroughs are all cheaper.

Maybe the school is charging students so much to make up for losses in other areas. Maybe maintenance just costs more than I know. Maybe the University just thought of another way to make money.

Whatever the case, the discrepancies cast doubt. To those who walk, take the bus or ride their bike to campus: more power to you, it’s the best way to do it.

But for those who often decide to drive, the costs can be daunting and in the scope of things, they should be less.

Of course, the University offers the option of pay-per-year parking with most of the available lots located on the edge of campus. The permits for these lots cost between $248 and $671. The least expensive option gets you a dirt lot near parking services while $671 gets you the upper garage.

I attended a public community college in New Haven, Connecticut several years ago. It was a very inexpensive school to attend. By going to the school, students are automatically entitled to park for free in the school parking Ian Hagerty is a Collegian columnist and can be garage, an independent building in the reached at ihagerty@umass.edu.

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The Massachusetts Daily Collegian is published Monday through Thursday during the University of Massachusetts calendar semester. The Collegian is independently funded, operating on advertising revenue. Founded in 1890, the paper began as Aggie Life, became the College Signal in 1901, the Weekly Collegian in 1914 and the Tri–Weekly Collegian in 1956. Published daily from 1967 to 2014, The Collegian has been broadsheet since January 1994. For advertising rates and information, call 413-545-3500.

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Arts Living THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

Thursday, October 1, 2015

“I’ve loved my 20s, but I would never repeat them.” - Kelly Clarkson

Arts@DailyCollegian.com

Poetry spotlight ‘Straight Outta Compton’ concludes of the week summer with biographical drama FILM REVIEW

Poems by Aly Nichols

N.W.A. experiences emotional beginning

Foolishness Sing her the song of the heart without words, pull us miles and miles apart without words.

Tell little girls about what dreams they have, dance into the dark, how tart, without words.

In miracles, often, reaped what was sewn, alone at the end, a poison dart without words.

Shambling events scatter with the wind, the gust given a head start without words.

I tried, oh I tried, to show you I cared, oh how foolish, oh how smart, without words.

Silly child, what are you doing in here?

Making fools out of the art without words.

By Tyler Movsessian Collegian Correspondent

The summer of 2015 saw a lot of blockbusters, such as “Ant-Man” and “Ted 2,” but surprisingly enough, “Straight Outta Compton” is in the conversation for best summer hit as well.

“Straight Outta Compton” is a biographical drama about the formation, rise and fall of early 1990s hip-hop group N.W.A. F. Gary Gray directed the film, which stars O’Shea Jackson, Jr. as Ice Cube, Corey Hawkins as Dr. Dre, Jason Mitchell as Eazy-E and Paul Giamatti as N.W.A. manager Jerry Heller.

Heller is really sneaky, and he only gives Eazy-E his money, swindling the rest of the group. Ice Cube and Dr. Dre notice this and pursue very successful solo careers instead. Then, Eazy-E realizes that Jerry is still not being truthful and that Jerry is hiding more than he originally claimed. Eazy-E fires Jerry and attempts to reunite N.W.A, but that dream is cut short when tragedy strikes.

The film’s casting was amazing. O’Shea Jackson, Jr. is most notable in his role as Ice Cube. The rapper’s son bears an uncanny resemblance to his father, but his performance is about more than just having the right look. He digs into the part, and the entire cast around him commits to portray the story of N.W.A. exceptionally well. Everyone looks the

Anxiety

UNIVERSAL PICTURES

The film highlights the lives of the members of the N.W.A., in Compton, before the rise of the hip hop group. part, sure, and they have the acting chops to boot.

“Straight Outta Compton” provides an eye-opening look at these young men’s lives in Compton before the explosion of N.W.A. I couldn’t imagine living in the kind of situation the soon-to-be N.W.A members faced. At one point, the young musicians leave a practice and get wrestled to the ground by a cop and inspected for drugs, a huge violation of their rights. Sometimes members of N.W.A would simply be standing on the sidewalk and they would be arrested, which was confusing to me.

As a fan of rap, I really appreciate what N.W.A started because they came in the late 80s and used moving lyrics that really demonstrated

their life struggles. N.W.A certainly led the way for great artists such as Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent and Eminem.

Without N.W.A, I doubt that present day rap would be as popular as it is.

I also appreciated that the film worked in a “Bye Felicia” – a reference to the movie “Friday.” This might be one of the most popular movie quotes of the 90s – especially because Ice Cube delivered the original line.

Its appearance in “Straight Outta Compton” is not only hilarious but also perfectly timed.

“Straight Outta Compton” portrays a coming of age story for Dr. Dre. The climax of the story comes when Dr. Dre’s brother Tyree (Keith Powers) is killed in a fight.

This is the first time we see Dr. Dre’s inner emotion reveal itself through his hardened shell. He reconnects with his mother and becomes a better man through this devastating experience, at least according to the film’s version of events.

I had no idea what to expect going into the film. Its two and a half hour runtime makes it feel like a marathon, especially because it is a biopic and not an action movie. Surprisingly though, the movie was not dry.

“Straight Outta Compton” follows a satisfying narrative in which the members of N.W.A essentially re-write American popular culture.

Tyler Movsessian can be reached at tmovsessian@umass.edu.

BOOK REVIEW

‘The Heart Goes Last’ is not loveable

By Mike Fischer Milwaukee Journal Sentinel In the gritty initial chapters of Margaret Atwood’s “The Heart Goes Last,” an epic “financial-crash business-wrecking meltdown” has triggered an equally devastating implosion of civil society.

Homelessness is endemic.

Marauding bands rape, rob and kill. Murders go uninvestigated; “only rich people can afford to have police.” And most of them have left the crumbling building, to live offshore on “tax-free sea platforms.”

There’s no such plush platform awaiting Stan and Charmaine, hardworking Americans who married each other because it was safe, in a world where nothing is sure. But when they lose their jobs and then their home and begin living out of a car, their seemingly solid if stolid marriage begins to fray.

That makes them easy marks for the Orwellian types running the town of Consilience and its prison, Positron. Those who choose to move there get to spend six months each year in comfy

homes. But every other month must be spent as a Positron inmate. One’s “civilian” home is shared with a second couple, who occupy it during the months one spends in the slammer.

It’s not quite as bizarre as it sounds _ not when one considers the number of Americans working toxic, dead-end jobs involving too many hours and too little money, all so they can spend their remaining hours in the homes for which they work.

We trade freedom for apparent security. Every day.

Atwood has been exploring how that trade-off works _ as well as just what sorts of trades we’re willing to make _ for a long time, especially in the novel to which this one is bound to be compared: “The Handmaid’s Tale” (1985), in which the theocracy of Gilead enslaves women in the name of protecting them.

The Positron Project, as it’s called, adapts a similarly cloying, creepy and ultimately controlling approach toward its subjects. To “avoid overexcitement,” there’s no rock, hip-hop or porn. The 1950s have been chosen “for the visual and audio aspects,”

because people then were allegedly happier.

There’s technology, but it all operates on a closed circuit; one can’t communicate with the outside world. And after entering this world, one isn’t permitted to leave. Ever.

“The whole town is under a bell jar,” we’re told, and it’s hard to miss the allusion to Sylvia Plath _ in a novel demonstrating Atwood’s customary awareness that women have it worse off in dystopia, just as they do everywhere else.

But unlike “The Handmaid’s Tale” _ a richer book with much more textured characters _ “Heart” often seems to exist within a similarly airless bell jar, under which characters like Stan, Charmaine and everyone else enact a contrived and cartoonish plot, unspooled with a jaunty, even snarky insouciance.

It’s as though Atwood can’t quite bring herself to take these characters seriously. Or, perhaps, she’s trying to convey what happens when we reduce people to commodities _ capable, here, of being continually repurposed and repackaged. Are

we, as one character asks, no more than a few plasticized features and gestures? If so, what makes us human? And if so, can literature matter?

Interesting philosophical questions, but the way they’re presented here undermines what could have been a much better novel. Instead we get satire that’s too broad to bite and too self-consciously clever for readers to care.

And we really should care, given that topics covered in “Heart” not only include the inverse relation between freedom and security, but also sex slavery, trafficking in body parts, brainwashing, artificial intelligence, censorship, how relationships work and why marriages fail. For starters.

Atwood’s novel is ultimately a nonstarter because it fails to practice what her title rightly preaches: Even in a world gone to hell, the human heart offers us hope of something more and better. When one’s characters become as heartless as the robots they build, reading about them gets reduced to mechanically going through the motion of turning the pages.

I say, ‘I can do this’ and you say, no you can’t.

I breathe deep and taste the air and you catch breath in your throat and choke.

I am confident and you are intimidated.

(Will my confidence finally scare you away?)

The world does not wish to harm and you know that, but still you look at everyone I meet with fear and suspicion.

(They don’t want to hurt you, they just want to talk; they are not judging your words unless you let them.)

I just want to walk in the sun without your clouds hanging over me.

Leave me alone, I beg.

But you are lonely, and I am your only friend.

Six Inches Six inches Between happiness and heartache Reaching, stretching, every muscle aching Every heartbeat sounds as a drum Empty space Never before has it had feeling Now, it is cold And heavy So close Yet the distance grows farther With every passing second Six inches All that stood between my fingers And your love You took a step Seven inches

Poem of the week California Prodigal By Maya Angelou The eye follows, the land Slips upward, creases down, forms The gentle buttocks of a young Giant. In the nestle, Old adobe bricks, washed of Whiteness, paled to umber, Await another century.

Star Jasmine and old vines Lay claim upon the ghosted land, Then quiet pools whisper Private childhood secrets.

Flush on inner cottage walls Antiquitous faces, Used to the gelid breath Of old manors, glare disdainfully Over breached time.

Around and through these Cold phantasmatalities, He walks, insisting To the languid air, Activity, music, A generosity of graces.

His lupin fields spurn old Deceit and agile poppies dance In golden riot. Each day is Fulminant, exploding brightly Under the gaze of his exquisite Sires, frozen in the famed paint Of dead masters. Audacious Sunlight casts defiance At their feet.

6

THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

Thursday, October 1, 2015

Comics Put

a book uPside down.

where

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WE WANT YOUR COMICS! Put your comics in front of thousands of readers.

Questions? Comments? Email us: comics@dailycollegian.com

did it go?

Mystery Dungeon

r oBBie W orlD

B y r oBert g roDie

F roStBitten

S hark M alarkey

B y J ack B raDy

B y M egan n icole D ong

HOROSCOPES aquarius

Jan. 20 - Feb. 18

If sugar is sweet, then why is it that when I try to eat a fistful it tastes like salt?

pisces

Feb. 19 - Mar. 20

leo

July 23 - aug. 22

Sometimes I walk like a runway model, but then I trip on my thighs.

virgo

aug. 23 - Sept. 22

Birds are the world’s natural comedians.

I didn’t like beards at first, but then they started to grow on me.

aries

libra

Sept. 23 - Oct. 22

scorpio

Oct. 23 - nOv. 21

Mar. 21 - apr. 19

If beef and steak are from the same animal, then why is it called beefsteak?

taurus

apr. 20 - May 20

gemini

May. 21 - Jun. 21

Boot covers are just shoes for your shoes

Have you bought an entire cake for yourself recently? No? Well, do it.

You like chick flicks don’t you, Scorpio?

sagittarius

nOv. 22 - Dec. 21

What if our lives are just a dream, but our dreams are real life?

You are the death feigning beetle of my heart, Sagittarius.

cancer

capricorn

Jun. 22 - Jul. 22

You never appreciate your eyebrows or eyelashes until they are gone.

Dec. 22 - Jan. 19

Every morning I try so hard to write horoscopes, and every morning I fail.

THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

DailyCollegian.com

CAGGIANO Caggiano battled Lucas for placekicking duties before UMass coach Mark Whipple named Lucas the starter after camp ended.

Caggiano saw the field for the first time as a Minuteman early in the second quarter against the Fighting Irish last Saturday. Following a 1-yard touchdown run by freshman running back Sekai Lindsay, Caggiano lined up for his first extrapoint attempt and converted to trim Notre Dame’s lead to 14-13 at the time.

Caggiano said that while he was inevitably nervous when lining up on what he called the “No.1 college football stadium in the country,” he had no trouble maintaining focus.

“Every kicker is nervous on their first kick especially when it’s in front of all those people on national television. But it was definitely fun for my first time,” he said. “I just let all the nerves go away, locked everything out and pushed it through.”

Caggiano added that he was not given much warning prior to taking the field.

“I found out I was kicking on that drive. I just got to the net, did some dry runs and got out there,” Caggiano said. “Then I got off the field and looked back and was kind of like, ‘Alright, first kick out of the way.’”

Lucas finished 1-for-1 on field goals and 4-for-6 on PAT attempts before being removed from placekicking duties. He will continue to be the Minutemen’s kickof f specialist, according to Whipple.

Laurent, Caggiano’s new competitor, finished 4-for-6 on field goals and 13-for-18 on PAT attempts in a part-time role last season. While Caggiano hasn’t attempted a field goal yet in his college career, he said the approach won’t

continued from page 8

Charan Singh to start in place of Khary Bailey-Smith Whipple said Tuesday that senior safety Khary Bailey-Smith will miss the remainder of the season with a knee injury, and will have surgery on Friday.

Redshirt freshman Charan Singh will start in his place Saturday against FIU, according to Whipple.

After an ankle sprain limited Singh coming out of fall camp, he recorded three tackles in an enlarged role against Notre Dame, with Bailey-Smith, who had 18 tackles and an interception this season, sitting out of the trip.

“He’s a really good athlete and he’s always made plays on the ball,” Whipple said.

“He’s always been around the ball and we’re hoping for the same thing.”

Senior Joe Colton, who was playing in a linebacker role, will transition back to safety as well against the Panthers. He started at safety all of last season.

Aside from Bailey-Smith, defensive back Kelton Brackett and defensive lineman Sha-Ki Holines have also missed time in practice this week due to injury. Brackett was seen in pads and a knee brace Wednesday while Holines did not participate in drills.

According to Whipple, the decision on whether they will play against FIU will come later this week.

Anthony Chiusano can be reached at achiusano@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @a_chiusano24.

Khary Bailey-Smith will miss the rest of the season with a knee injury.

MLB

Cardinals clinch division crown A season defined as much by the wins the Cardinals collected as the players they lost to injury along the way culminated Wednesday night with Tyler Lyons’ exceptional start against the Pittsburgh Pirates. One win against Pittsburgh away from claiming their third consecutive National League Central crown, the Cardinals received seven shutout innings from a lefty a week ago tried to prove himself as a reliever.

Thrust into a start as a replacement, Lyons sped through the Pirates on the way to a 11-1 drubbing.

The Cardinals, already in the postseason for the fifth consecutive season, secured a spot in the division series. They will face the winner of the PiratesCubs wild-card game next Wednesday. They will have home-field advantage throughout the NL playoffs,

should they advance to the NL championship series.

The win Wednesday _ part of a doubleheader _ was the Cardinals’ 100th of the season. They are the first team in baseball to win 100 games since the 2011 Philadelphia Phillies.

Lyons faced the minimum through 6 2/3 innings thanks to two double plays.

He held the Pirates to two hits, both singles, and did not allow a single baserunner to reach second base safely in his seven innings.

Jason Heyward backed Lyons with a grand slam in the third inning. He reached base three times in his first four plate appearances, and he had two catches to aid Lyons. One was a diving snare of a sinking liner, and then he fell against the 21-foot high right field wall to steal extra bases away from Michael Morse.

Matt Carpenter scored three runs, walked twice, and had a triple and a double.

JUDITH GIBSON-OKUNIEFF/COLLEGIAN

Mark Dunphy (27) tries to fend off a University of Vermont defender.

“The older guys, the guys that have been around the block here, will know that

AWAY

7

continued from page 8

be any different than his three extra-point conversions last weekend.

“Mentally, it’s all the same scenario,” Caggiano said.

“Field goal, extra point, every kick has to be the same kick no matter where you are on the field.”

COLLEGIAN FILE PHOTO

By deRRick Goold St. Louis Post-Dispatch

CONFERENCE

Thursday, October 1, 2015

the intensity and commitment levels are ratcheted up a notch or two come

conference time, so we just have to make sure our first-years are ready for that type of intensity.”

Although the Minutemen yielded negative results so far this season, O’Leary believes playing non-conference opponents such as Boston University (4-21), University of Vermont (5-3-1) and Utah Valley (7-2) have helped his team gain valuable experience that could translate into victories down the stretch.

“If you look, it was a very tough non-conference schedule,” O’Leary said. “The vast majority of the teams have winning records, and significantly strong winning records.

“I think we have a better understanding of how we want to play,” he added. “We’re fitter, we’re stronger and we’re putting together consistently strong efforts.”

Now that he feels his team is getting more competitive, O’Leary feels it is time to take that next step forward.

“We’ve got to take that leap from being competitive to winning,” he said.

“It’s not an easy leap to make, but Saturday would be a great time to start it.”

Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.

Saturday at Sweeney Field.

Jason Kates can be reached at jkates@umass.edu and followed

continued from page 8

son.

“We feel confident going into the weekend,” she said. “We never underestimate anyone. These games are opportunities to practice what we need to work on, and we just want to finish and make good plays.

“We have a lot of strong leadership, so many of these girls have stepped up this year,” Farrell added.

Farrell acknowledged the senior leadership of Allie Sabia and Carlino, as well as rising talents Hawkshaw and Nicole

Kuerzi, who have provided great depth to the Minutewomen roster.

“We’re focused on ourselves as a team,” Tagliente said. “We played well against Stanford, they just outshot us. We’re really coming together nicely as a unit, and are improving each and every game.”

Faceoff is set for 3 p.m.

Friday afternoon in Saint Louis.

ROBERT RIGO/COLLEGIAN

Collin Wiedersheim can be reached at cwiedersheim@umass.edu.

Izzie Delario attempts to hit the ball in a game versus Dartmouth this year.

WOMEN’S SOCCER

Minutewomen hope to get revenge against La Salle Thursday afternoon UMass ready for conference opener

By AdAm Aucoin Collegian Staff

The last time the Massachusetts women’s soccer team took on La Salle, it walked off the field in defeat after a 3-0 loss in the Atlantic 10 quarterfinals last year.

UMass (3-3-2) now has its chance for revenge Thursday as the Explorers (3-4-2) visit Amherst in what will be the first A-10 conference matchup for both teams.

The Minutewomen last defeated La Salle during the 2011 season, when they went 14-5-2 and beat the Explorers 1-0 in the semifinal of the conference tournament.

Only five current players were on the team at that time.

“La Salle has eliminated us a lot over the years,” coach Ed Matz said. “It will definitely be motivation for the seniors to want to beat them. If anyone is in need of any motivation, this is it.”

“It was a tough loss last year,” senior defender Madison Smith added.

“There will be a lot of emo-

tion because of that and that will give us all the motivation we need to come out strong Thursday.”

UMass enters this game riding a three-game winning streak, outscoring their opponents 6-0 in that span.

“We’ve been reinforcing good things we’ve seen on the field and fixing up the little things that we need improvement on,” Matz said. “I’m glad we’re on a streak, but with conference play, it’s a new season, so we can’t get complacent.”

La Salle has had an upand-down season and is currently on a two-game losing streak. It is coming off a season where they went 14-6-2 and qualified for the NCAA Tournament.

This season the Explorers are going into this one without their all-time leading goal scorer Kelsey Haycook, who scored 60 goals during her career, 20 of which came in 2014.

Despite the loss of Haycook, La Salle has a few players who have stepped up offensively this season.

Senior Fia Jonsson from Sweden has three goals for the team, while junior for-

ward Marykate Bateman has tallied two goals of her own.

“La Salle lost several players, but their tendencies are still the same,” Matz said. “They are very well coached too, so you know they will be ready to play Thursday, no matter who is on the field.”

In practice this week, Matz stressed putting pressure on the midfielders as being a major focus for the game. He is looking for his players to limit the space the Explorers have to operate to reduce scoring chances.

Even if the defense has trouble stopping La Salle’s offensive attack, they have arguably the best goalkeeper in the conference behind them to cover up any mistakes.

Cassidy Babin continues to impress for the Minutewomen in goal.

The sophomore currently sits ninth in the nation in goals against average, with a 0.40 average. Babin has not allowed a goal in the last 352 minutes and 58 seconds, dating back to

“When you have a group of seniors like we do, you always have confidence that your team is going to succeed. ” Ed Matz, UMass coach the Yale match on Sept. 6.

With A-10 play finally here, Matz and the team are very confident they will have success in conference play.

“When you have a group of seniors like we do, you always have confidence that your team is going to succeed,” Matz said. “The team is going in the right direction and we’re hitting our stride right in time for conference play. From this point on, it’s a ten-game season and we will do everything we can to get into the A-10 tournament.”

“This is where it really counts,” Smith added.

“If you do well now, that will only improve your chances to go far in the conference tournament.”

Thursday’s game starts at 4 p.m. at Rudd Field.

Adam Aucoin can be reached at aaucoin@umass.edu and followed on twitter @aaucoin34.

ROW I N G

UMass to begin season in Oklahoma

By RyAn Ames Collegian Correspondent

The waiting is almost over for Massachusetts rowing.

Nearly five months after placing 20th in May’s NCAA Championships, the Minutewomen will open their fall schedule with the Head of the Oklahoma this weekend.

This meet will feature over 1,000 athletes as well as over 40 collegiate and community clubs, including prominent programs such as University of Southern California, and Southern Methodist.

Now that the season is here, coach Jim Dietz is excited for his team to compete in Oklahoma and gain valuable experience.

“It’s a nice experience for the ladies in that you’re competing on an international

level course that was specifically built and designed for rowing,” he said.

The first meet can always bring some unknown challenges, but Dietz believes his team will perform well in the early part of the season.

“We’ve got some really good skullers,” Dietz said.

“Sophomore Carly Zanatta won the singles last year and also won the doubles with senior Krysten Menks, then they combined with senior Sam Kolovson and won the quad so every year we start okay.”

Dietz also added that the number of returnees from last year’s squad is a reason to be excited. UMass lost only three seniors to graduation on a team that won the conference title, with some talented

freshmen that Dietz hopes can make an immediate impact.

“We have Daniella du Toit coming in from Zimbabwe who is an incredibly good skuller and Jill McGill who is a fabulous skuller that both have desires to perform well,” he said.

Dietz added that some of his athletes, including Zanatta, have goals to make their respective countries national teams, which can only benefit the Minutewomen’s success even more.

“There’s always the diamond in the rough of what you don’t know you have in the walk-ons that we identify on campus that were extremely successful in other sports that are trying rowing for the first time,” Dietz said. “That helps build the base here and that’s

what’s important for success here long term.”

After this weekend’s meet, Dietz points to the Head of the Charles in Boston as another crucial meet for the team. He pointed out that his team has qualified four boats from last year, and the fact that they will be racing against alumni from past years who moved on to different clubs.

Dietz explained his goals are not much different from past years.

“My goals for the fall are simply let’s just go to the races, have a good time, see how we’re doing and build the base so when it’s imperative that we win, we deliver the results.”

Ryan Ames can be reached at rames@ umass.edu.

THE MASSACHUSETTS DAILY COLLEGIAN

Weekend

October 1, 2015

Sports@DailyCollegian.com

@MDC_SPORTS

FOOTBALL

UMASS vs FIU SATURDAY 3 P.M.

MCGUIRK STADIUM

do or die for the minutemen UMass set to face FIU

Caggiano ready for shot at PK

Minutemen will be back at McGuirk Stadium Sat.

Freshman anxious to prove himself on field

By Andrew Cyr Collegian Staff

The Massachusetts football team hasn’t reached its goals to start the 2015 season.

UMass has lost its first three games, including blowouts against Colorado and Notre Dame and a blown fourth quarter lead against Temple. Now, with their backs against the wall, the Minutemen have forced themselves into a pivotal game against Florida International Saturday.

“Everyone knows this is a must win for us. We can’t lose in our house,” UMass senior safety Joe Colton said.

UMass (0-3) makes its return home to Amherst to face the Panthers (2-2) in its first game of the season at McGuirk Stadium. Last year, the Minutemen went 1-2 in games on campus, including a 24-10 win against Ball State in which quarterback Blake Frohnapfel suffered a leg injury that sidelined him for the rest of the year.

Now, UMass makes its return to its actual home where it hopes to use Saturday’s game as a way to start fresh before heading into conference play.

“It’s a good experience being back home,” cornerback Randall Jette said. “It’s an actual college atmosphere. Gillette’s a great atmosphere, but I think it’s more of a family oriented one. Now you’re seeing a lot of your classmates and faculty supporting you so that’s a completely different vibe.”

Jette added: “We all understand that we are trying to start a new season. The first quarter of the sea-

By Anthony ChiusAno Collegian Staff

COLLEGIAN FILE PHOTO

UMass will play its first game of the season at McGuirk Stadium this Saturday against FIU. son we didn’t do what we wanted to do or expected to do, so it’s important we protect our own field. We want the fans to come out win.”

After allowing 62 points and 681 yards of total offense last Saturday against Notre Dame, UMass has shifted its focus to tightening up its mental mistakes on defense. The Minutemen suffered a plethora of injuries highlighted by Whipple’s announcement Tuesday that starting safety Khary Bailey-Smith will miss the rest of the season with a knee injury.

Defensive lineman Sha-Ki Holiness and linebacker Peter Ngobidi, who both suffered injuries against the Irish, did not practice Wednesday and their status for Saturday is unknown.

Cornerback Kelton Brackett – who spent Wednesday’s practice trying on a series of knee braces to aid his ailing knee – has a chance of playing against FIU, according to Whipple.

Sliding into Bailey-Smith’s spot

“It’s a good experience being back home.

It’s an actual college atmosphere.”

Randall Jette, UMass cornerback will likely be redshirt freshman Charan Singh, who dealt with an ankle sprain in training camp that limited his actions through the Minutemen’s first few weeks of the season. Singh saw his first action of the year against Notre Dame, where he registered four tackles.

“Charan’s doing really well. He’s had a great week of practice. He’s stepping up, and he has to step up, he has to play good at (free safety) because I sure didn’t last week,” Colton said.

UMass has placed extra attention this week on dual threat-quarterback Alex McGough, who has thrown for 1,014 passing yards and nine touchdowns with only two interceptions.

He’s coming off a performance

against Indiana where he completed 21-of-37 passes for 249 yards and three touchdowns.

“He makes a lot of good throws.

He throws the deep ball really accurate,” Whipple said. “They have good timing (on routes). You watch Indiana and he makes a bunch of good throws. They got behind last week and brought them back a little.”

Saturday’s game at McGuirk is set to start at 3 p.m. and will take place during the University’s family weekend.

Andrew Cyr can be reached at arcyr@umass.edu and followed on Twitter @Andrew_Cyr.

MEN’S SOCCER

FIELD HOCKEY

UMass looking to start 1-0 in A-10

Minutewomen travel to Saint Louis on Friday

Notre Dame Stadium and its sold-out capacity of 80,795 seats may not be the easiest place to begin a college career as an opposing kicker, but that’s exactly the position Massachusetts freshman Mike Caggiano found himself in last weekend’s 62-27 loss in South Bend, Indiana.

Caggiano relieved senior Blake Lucas at placekicker after Lucas missed his second consecutive point-after-attempt, and immediately converted on all three of his extra-point attempts in the nationally televised matchup.

The New Jersey native now looks to solidify his role as the Minutemen’s placekicker, as he finds himself in a competition with starting punter Logan Laurent for the role in advance of Saturday’s game against Florida International at McGuirk Stadium.

“I just have to go out there every day as if I’m trying to protect my spot,” Caggiano said after Wednesday’s practice. “I’m just out there for a good competition.”

This marks Caggiano’s second kicking competition since arriving in Amherst. Throughout fall camp prior to the regular season, see

CAGGIANO on page 7

Minutemen ready to kick off A-10 UMass set to embark conference play in Philadelphia on four-game road trip

By Collin wiedersheim

By JAson KAtes

Collegian Correspondent

Collegian Staff

Often in college athletics, the start of conference play signifies a fresh start for teams that did not fare well in the non-conference portion of their schedules.

For the Massachusetts men’s soccer team, which has lost nine of its 10 non-conference matchups so far, Saturday night’s conference opener against Saint Joseph’s presents just that: a fresh start.

“Well, we’re 0-0 in the conference,” UMass coach Fran O’Leary said when asked about the mindset of the team heading into Atlantic 10 play.

“We played a very tough non-conference schedule and haven’t gotten the results maybe our performances deserved at times,” he added.

The Minutemen (1-9) will head to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to face off against the Hawks (2-7), who have also struggled this year and are coming into this one following a 3-0 loss to the University of Pennsylvania.

O’Leary, as well as his players, knows how important it is to start off 1-0 in the A-10.

JUDITH GIBSON-OKUNIEFF/COLLEGIAN

Casey Hamill (left) defends a University of Vermont player last Friday in UMass’ 3-0 loss.

“If we can kick off with a win, we’re sitting (at the) top of the conference come Saturday night,” he said. “I think the guys know it’s a big game and we’ve got to prove that we can go on the road and put in the type of performance that we’ve consistently put in at home.”

As he has said in the past, O’Leary mentioned his team’s ability to get “first contact” in the penalty areas as one of the main things to look for this weekend.

“A lot of stuff goes on between the 18s, but the vast majority of goals are scored inside the penalty area and it’s usually the team that gets the first

contact on the ball,” he said.

“In the attacking end if we get first contact we’ll likely get something. In the defensive end if we get first contact we’re going to keep our net in tact.”

Last year, UMass was defeated 1-0 by Saint Joe’s at Rudd Field on a cold, rainy day in the 86th minute on a goal by Mark Colville.

Despite this defeat, O’Leary said there hasn’t been much talk about this being a “revenge game.”

“I haven’t heard anything,” he said. “I just know that the guys understand the importance of it and the intensity level we’ll need to bring. see

CONFERENCE on page 7

After back-to-back tough home losses to No. 9 Stanford and conference rival Richmond, the Massachusetts field hockey team aims to have its offense take charge and pave the way to victory this weekend, starting Friday against Atlantic 10 opponent Saint Louis.

“We’ve got a big, scrappy game this weekend and our goal is to get the win,” UMass junior defenseman Hannah Farrell said. “We’re working on getting more shots in game, we’re not all that dangerous in the circle or the last 25.

She added: “Our attack is doing well, we are able to create a lot of good plays, but we just have to finish by getting shots on goal.”

In its last two contests, the Minutewomen (5-4) have struggled to put shots in or around the net. In its game against the Cardinal (7-3) last Sunday, UMass only mustered five shots and just five penalty corners.

“The offense is struggling on a game-by-game basis,” Minutewomen coach Carla Tagliente said. “We’re great at creating opportunities for our forwards, but we’re just struggling to

get shots off and pulling the trigger.

“We’re looking to get our midfielders involved in the offense as well. We’re improving game by game and our team is in a good place. You’ll see a bigger and better performance from us this Friday.”

UMass plans to depend on a diverse offense, relying on many midfielders and forwards for goals. Izzie Delario, Melanie Kreusch, Sarah Hawkshaw and Nicole Miller head this attack.

Delario leads the team in points (12) and assists (eight) while Kreusch holds the most shots (21) and is tied with Hawkshaw for most goals (five). Miller is right behind them, with four goals of her own.

The Minutewomen’s offense will look to complement the defense, which has been solid for UMass throughout the first half of the season. Minutewomen goalkeeper and senior captain Sam Carlino provides the foundation on the defensive end and kept the team in a close fight against Stanford, tallying nine saves.

Saint Louis heads into Friday’s matchup at 0-11 with only seven combined goals for the season so far. Farrell admitted that UMass is confident heading into their third A-10 matchup of the seasee

AWAY on page 7