As heard on KMAN Wednesday, two former K-State recruits were released from their current schools with interest in coming to Manhattan.  Garden City native Brodrick Smith didn’t waste much time, he tells GoPowercat.com that he will transfer to K-State.  He says he will come to K-State on Monday to make it official during a meeting with Coach Snyder.  Smith spent this past season at Minnesota, where he played in all 12 games, and caught 5 passes for 50 yards and a touchdown.  Smith is a close friend of Wichita Northwest standout Chris Harper, who will leave Oregon, where he split his freshman year as a quarterback and wide receiver.  Smith says his gut tells him that Harper will also join him in Manhattan.  Harper threw for one touchdown and two interceptions as a QB for the Ducks, and had nine catches for 122 yards and two touchdowns.  Both players would have to sit out the 2009 season due to NCAA transfer rules, and would have three years to play three starting in 2010 at K-State.

Five star prospect Latavious Williams has finally made a college choice, and K-State wasn’t in his final group of choices according to Rivals.com.  According to his travel team coach, Williams picked Memphis over Georgetown, with Florida International being a distant third.  K-State had recruited Williams throughout the entire process, being listed among his final four schools.

K-State’s Big 12 pitcher of the year A. J. Morris is starting to gain some national attention.  Morris is one of 30 semifinalists for the 2009 Golden Spikes Award, given to the nation’s top amateur baseball player by USA Baseball.  Morris is the first K-State player to ever be a semifinalist for the award.  He’s 13-1 this season with a 1.84 ERA and 98 strikeouts.  A panel of 125 voters will narrow the field to 5 finalists, and the Golden Spikes Award winner will be announced the week of the Major League Baseball all-star game.  Missouri’s Kyle Gibson, Texas A & M’s Brooks Raley, and Oklahoma’s JT Wise are also up for the award.  Over the weekend, the College Baseball Foundation also named Morris one of five finalists for their pitcher of the year award.

Manhattan High boys golf finished 6th at the 6A State golf meet at Shawnee Country Club in Topeka.  The Indians shot 321 as a team, with a low round of 79 from Preston Rumford.  Host Washburn Rural won the 6A state title with a 304, Blue Valley North was second with a 305, and Shawnee Mission East was 3rd with a 309.

In Class 1A, Frankfort winds up third at the state meet with a 342 at Cherry Oaks in Cheney.  St. John won the state title with a 322, and Quivira Heights was second with a 329.

Riley County finished fourth in the six-team sand greens state tournament in Tipton.  The Falcons shot a 339 as a team, with Brandon Stewart carding the low round of a 75, which was good for 5th place individually.  Tipton won the sand greens state title with a 303, Rock Hills was the runner-up, and Yates Center came in third.

With more interest in the sport every year, the NCAA baseball tournament committee has an ever growing responsibility.  Big 12 Deputy Commissioner and former K-State athletic director Tim Weiser chairs this year’s committee, whose first task is determining the regional hosts.  Weiser says K-State was very close to staying at home this week.  The committee determines hosts, seeding, and the selections themselves on a number of different factors, which RPI, non-conference success, and a team’s final 15 games.  Weiser says teams must prove themselves in non-conference play to be in the NCAA tournament as an at-large, and it’s difficult choosing between a mid major and a BCS school for one of the last few spots in the bracket.

There’s been some public outcry about the Big 12’s eighth and ninth best teams, Baylor and Oklahoma State being in the NCAA regionals.  Weiser says the committee looks at more than the conference standings, as both the Cowboys and Bears made up for their poor conference showing by their early season success.  The NCAA regional tournaments start on Friday, with super regionals next weekend, and the College World Series June 13th thru the 24th.  K-State plays in their first NCAA regional game Friday against Xavier in Houston, Texas.  First pitch is set for 2:00 pm with pregame at 1:30 from the K-State Sports Network.

Manhattan American Legion baseball will be holding summer tryouts this Sunday.  Three teams will be fielded, and players must be born January 1st, 1990 or later.  The season will start June 4th through the 7th with the annual Tournament of Champions.  Manhattan American Legion baseball tryouts are this Sunday at 1:00 pm at the Norvell (Norr-vull) practice fields at the Eisenhower Baseball Complex.  For more information, contact Mark Chalfant (Sholl-font) at 341-9408 or Ivan Wilkinson at 410-7005.

In the most historic season in the 109 years of Kansas State baseball, the Wildcats earned the school’s first NCAA Tournament bid, the Division I Tournament Selection Committee announced Monday morning. The Wildcats are the No. 2 seed at the Houston Regional, hosted by Rice at Reckling Park.  Rice is the No. 1 seed and the host team for the Houston Regional. Joining K-State and Rice at Reckling Park is No. 3 seed and A-10 Conference champion Xavier, as well as No. 4 seed Sam Houston State, which won the Southland Conference.  Rice (39-15), the Conference USA tournament champion, will be hosting its eighth regional in the past nine seasons. The Owls defeated Southern Miss on Sunday in the Conference USA Championship in Hattiesburg, Miss.
Xavier (38-19) joined Kansas State as one of five teams that earned its first regional bid on Monday. The Musketeers defeated Rhode Island on Saturday in the Atlantic 10 Tournament Championship for their first ever conference title.  Sam Houston State (36-22) won the Southland Conference Tournament Championship for the third-straight season as it defeated Texas State on Friday. With the conference title, the Bearkats earned its sixth NCAA Regional bid in school history.  Kansas State was one of a record eight Big 12 schools that advanced to regional play. Other Big 12 schools that earned a bid into postseason play were Texas (No. 1 seed; Austin Regional), Texas A&M (No. 2 seed; Fort Worth Regional), Oklahoma State (No. 3 seed; Clemson Regional), Kansas (No. 3 seed; Chapel Hill Regional), Oklahoma (No. 1 seed; Norman Regional), Missouri (No. 2 seed; Oxford Regional) and Baylor (No. 3 seed; Baton Rouge Regional).

Texas scored single runs in the fourth, fifth, sixth and eighth innings, while Longhorn starter Taylor Jungmann threw a career-high 7.2 innings, as fifth-ranked Texas defeated No. 17 Kansas State, 4-2, Saturday afternoon at Bricktown Ballpark.  With the victory, Texas won Pool 1 and will advance to Sunday’s title game to face the winner of Pool 2. The Longhorns moved to 40-13-1 overall, while the Wildcats fell to 41-16-1 overall and finished the 2009 Phillips 66 Big 12 Championship with a 2-1 record. Texas, K-State and Baylor each finished pool play with 2-1 records, and after head-to-head competition did not produce a winner, the highest-seeded team (Texas) advanced to Sunday’s final.  Jungmann (7-3) scattered five hits on the afternoon and surrendered two runs while striking out four. Austin Wood recorded his 14th save of the season after tossing the final 1.1 innings. K-State’s Matt Applegate suffered the loss after facing just one batter, a walk that eventually broke a 2-2 tie.  Loy paced the Longhorns offensively as the shortstop went 2-for-3 with two RBI. Kansas State’s Adam Muenster extended his hitting streak to nine games with his 2-for-4 outing.

Kansas State head coach Frank Martin announced Thursday the signing of high school standout Martavious Irving to a National Letter of Intent.  A 6-foot-2, 185-pound shooting guard from Boyd H. Anderson High School in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Irving helped the Cobras to 55 wins the past two seasons, including a 25-3 overall record in 2008-09. The squad rose to as high as No. 1 in the Class 6A poll and No. 14 in the ESPN Rise national poll before being upset 54-53 by Miramar in the regional quarterfinals. He was a unanimous selection to the Class 6A-5A-4A All-Broward first team by both the Miami Herald and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. He is rated among the top-20 players in the state of Florida by several recruiting services.   A starter in all 28 games, Irving averaged 15.4 points on 55.2 percent shooting (155-of-281), including 43.7 percent from 3-point range (38-of-87), with 7.3 rebounds and 2.4 steals per game in 2008-09. He ranked in the top-5 in nearly every team category, including first in field goals and two-point field goals (117) and second in scoring, rebounding and steals. He scored in double figures in 22 of 28 games this past season, including five 20-point contests. He poured in a career-high 30 points on 11-of-17 shooting in a 93-56 win over Hallandale in the season opener on Nov. 24, while he posted a career-high 11 rebounds against Hallandale and Dillard during the season. He tallied six double-doubles on the year. As a junior, Irving led the Cobras to a 30-2 overall record and to the Class 6A state title game, where they lost to Miami Norland. He averaged 12.4 points on 51.3 percent shooting (142-of-277), including 43.4 percent (30-of-69) from 3-point range, with 5.3 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 2.2 steals per game. He scored in double figures in 22 of 32 games, including five 20-point outings.  Boyd H. Anderson is the high school alma mater of K-State great Mitch Richmond, whose jersey was retired by the school this past season. Irving joins a recruiting class that has already been judged one of the nation’s best classes and includes Jordan Henriquez (Winchendon [Mass.] School/Port Chester, N.Y.), Wally Judge (Arlington (Fla.) Country Day/Washington, D.C.), Rodney McGruder (Arlington (Fla.) Country Day/Washington, D.C.) and Nick Russell (Grace Preparatory Academy/Arlington, Texas).

Junior guard Buchi Awaji and sophomore guard Fred Brown have been released from their athletic scholarships at Kansas State and will transfer to other institutions, head men’s basketball Frank Martin announced on Thursday.  A 6-foot-5, 185-pound junior from Los Angeles, Calif., Awaji averaged 4.0 points on 50 percent shooting this past season with 1.9 rebounds in 10.8 minutes per game. He scored in double figures four times, including a season-high 12 points against North Carolina Central on Feb. 17.   A 6-foot-2, 190-pound sophomore from West Palm Beach, Fla., Brown averaged 8.1 points on 42.1 percent shooting this past season with 1.6 rebounds and 1.3 assists in 20.4 minutes per game. He was a part of the first trio (along with Denis Clemente and Jacob Pullen) in school history to each tally 50 or more 3-pointers in a single season. He saw time in 61 games in his two-year career with two starts, averaging 6.2 points on 41.4 percent shooting. Both finished the spring semester in solid academic standing with Awaji graduating with a social science degree from the university last weekend.