BECOME A FAN, D2 Ashlands athletes deserve your support.

PITCHER GOES PRO, D2 Ashlands Ajay Meyer inks free agent contract with Toronto. EAGLES FOCUSED HEADING INTO 2011, D3 Football team hopes to lift trophy at end of season.
Sunday,

21 August 2011 section

Horn signs NFL contract, in camp with Indianapolis

Former Ashland wide receiver competing for a spot on roster
CHRIS BILS Sports Editor After he left Ashland University, graduate and star wide receiver Joe Horn had one goal in mind: to make it to the National Football League. When the NFL Draft came and went in April, Horn was left without a team and the lockout meant that it was uncertain when he would get his chance. The hardest part about the lockout, according to Horn, was finding a place to live and work out. Fortunately, Mission Athletic Performance Group in Cincinnati (where he had been training since leaving school last winter) allowed him to keep using their facilities throughout the summer. Horn lived with friends and worked at an ice cream store to pay for gas and food. The lockout ended on July 25, and Horn got his chance the next day. The Indianapolis Colts, the team who had shown the most interest in the Ashland star on draft day, called Horns agent the day that teams were allowed to start contacting rookie free agents. He immediately agreed to join the team. Since then, he has been in Colts training camp at Anderson University in Anderson, Indiana. Its been fun, Horn said. Its everything Ive ever dreamed of. My main goal isnt just to make it this far, I want to make the team. But for right now, being a part of the Colts organization and going out and practicing in front of eight or ten thousand people is a ton of fun. During his career at Ashland,

SUBMITTED

SUBMITTED

Left: Joe Horn catches a pass at Indianapolis Colts training camp at Anderson University in Indiana. Right: Horn throws a pass as he tries to impress the coaches who will decide whether or not he plays on Sundays this fall.

Horn had 170 catches for 2,681 yards and 28 touchdowns, the last two of which are school records. Ashland head coach Lee Owens remembers Horn as much for his character off the field as his ac-

complishments on it. He was a leader on campus, he was an excellent student and he was a two-sport athlete, Owens said. Were looking for that athlete that can be that all-around,

on and off the field representative of our football program and thats what Joe was. Horn counts his favorite memory as the schools first playoff win over Minnesota State-Mankato in

2008, while Owens remembers fondly one of his touchdown celebrations. Now, I wasnt, at the time, very happy with him and I let him know that, because of the pen-

alty, Owens said, remembering Horns Lambeau leap after a score against Lake Erie last season. But as I go back and watch the film, its comical because, as he makes the leap, the fans along the

see HORN, p. D4

Former high school volleyball star sues Ashland

CHRIS BILS Sports Editor Former Canton South High School volleyball star Tierra Moore is suing Ashland University for damages exceeding $25,000 on the grounds that the school unfairly pulled her scholarship earlier this year. Moore, who was named Most Valuable Player of The Northeastern Buckeye Conference last season, signed a national letter of intent in November to play at Ashland and accepted $30,000 in athletic and academic aid. Later that month, Ashland announced that head coach Connie Surowicz would not be returning to the team in 2011. In December, Cassandra Dixon was named as Surowiczs successor. The new coach contacted Moore, and everything looked like it was in order for her to attend Ashland in the fall. A little less than two months later, an email from Coach Dixon ruined Moores Groundhog Day. The email said that Ashland did not have a copy of the letter of intent that Moore had signed three months earlier. Dixon told Moore that the letter may have been lost during the coaching change and that the school would have to draw up a new one, regardless of whether or not she had already turned one in to the school. One month later, on March 3, Moore received another email, this one telling her that she no longer had a scholarship to attend Ashland and play volleyball. Canton South Athletic Director Rick Campbell learned of the situation at a banquet from one of the schools wrestlers, who was also planning to attend Ashland in the fall. Campbell immediately went to the phone in an effort to resolve the situation and get Moores scholarship back. His first call was to Ashlands Athletic Director, Bill Goldring. He said that Goldring told him that Tierra had not been communicating with Ashland and had not met the new coach. According to Campbell, these accusations are false. If anything, he said, it was the other way around. Come on now. It would take one call to me, it would take one call to the coach, Campbell said. And he tried to tell me that they were trying to go through her JO (Junior Olympics) volleyball coach. Come on, the girls in high school every day. I dont buy it, its all a lie. Im very disappointed. Campbell also found the schools accusations that they had never received a letter of intent hard to believe. He said that, in an email sent in November, former coach Surowicz said that everything had gone through and had

MOORE

SUBMITTED

Tyler Remmel (middle) competes at the NCAA Division II Swimming Championships in March. Remmel will be competing at the U.S. Olympic Trials next summer.

Remmel makes Trials cut

CHRIS BILS Sports Editor als. It is also the time that Ashland junior swimmer Tyler Remmel has had written on his dry-erase board 1:04.69; that is the 100 meter for over five years, almost as long breaststroke cut time for the Unit- as he has been swimming comed States Olympic Swimming Tri- petitively. Other goals came and went, being erased from the board as soon as they were INSIDE >> accomplished. That was my high and lofty goal, Remmel said. The goal that I was never going to get to, but I was always going to strive to get there and just hope that someday I got there. This summer, for the first time, Remmels loftiest goal was within reach. More importantly, the summer was setting up perfectly for him to go after the cut. Ashlands kicker-punter A journalism and sport competed at the IFAF World communication major, Remmel landed an internChampionship in Austria D2 ship with Swimming World Magazine. Sending an article to the magazine weekly to be published online, Remmel was able to work on his own time, which meant that he had more time to train than in summers past. He had his sights set on making the cut at one meet in particular, the Iowa City Sectionals. All summer, I had that pegged as the meet that I was going to try to qualify at, he said. Unfortunately, Remmel missed the cut by .30 of a second at Iowa City. When I missed it at Iowa City, I was kind of shocked because I had just assumed that I would get it, he said. Not only did Remmel not make the cut, but an upcoming French class meant that swimming was going to have to take a back seat for a little while. The class started the week after Iowa City, which was see REMMEL, p. D4

Berkshire wins gold!

been forwarded to Goldring. According to Campbell, one of the emails from Coach Dixon says that Goldring told her they had never received the letter, they would have to redo it, and that the new offer would be for less money that the old one. Campbells opinion is that the new coach did not want Moore on the team because she did not think she was good enough. What they did, they cannot do, he said. This girl did nothing wrong, nothing. I truly believe that it was just because this new coach came in, she didnt think maybe she wanted Tierra or maybe she had somebody else, so this was her way of forcing her out. And I think its done at other schools. Neither Dixon nor Goldring were available for comment due to the ongoing legal case. Campbell even went as far as contacting the GLIAC conference office. He says there is a process for handling letters of intent, a process that Ashland did not follow. The school has a certain amount of time, once they get the signed letters, to send them to the conference office to be validated. This is to protect the university, so that players cannot sign elsewhere once their scholarships are validated.

see VOLLEYBALL, p. D4