BY PAIGE MCKAY

Contributing Writer

Amongst all the car ads, restaurant ads and other numerous clips shown on the jumbotron during the football games, the “Physics of Football” segment is one that has remained constant the last four years. Starring Mississippi State University’s own physics professor, Josh Winter, and members of the Bulldog football team, Winter and his chosen “assistant” for each video bring to life a physics experiment by using football plays.

The video segment was started four years ago when the former athletic director Greg Byrne approached Winter and asked if he would like to do one segment for one of the upcoming home games. Little did Win-

ter know the segment would be a hit and would still be airing every home game four years later.

“At fi rst it was just going to be one segment, but af-ter that one, the reaction we got from people was very positive, so Greg Byrne asked if I wanted to make one for every game, and I agreed,” he said.

For every home game, Winter writes the script and comes up with the experiment to be conducted.

He even writes what he calls the “corny jokes.” “Coming up with new experiments for the fi rst cou-

ple years was easy because there was so much I wanted to show everyone, but recently it’s been a little more diffi cult to come up with new ideas,” Winter said. “As long as I can keep coming up with new experiments, I’ll be set.”

The idea of this segment is to show the crowd that

physics is everywhere and in every aspect of life, not just the things seen on television and in textbooks.

“I love physics and incorporating it with what oth-er people love, which is MSU football. I like that it reaches a wide audience, and not just people in physics class,” Winter said.

Freshman cheerleader Sydney Simpson said she is a fan of Winter’s segments.

“I didn’t ever think about physics being in football like that but I enjoy watching the videos. I want to take physics now to learn more about it,” Simpson said.

Because nearly all of Starkville sees these segments on game days, Winter said he is easily recognized around town at restaurants and on campus, almost as if he is a small town celebrity.

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POLICY

Reflector THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF MISSISSIPPI STATE UNIVERSIT Y SINCE 1884

FRIDAYSEPTEMBER 21, 2012

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Tent Dawgs take advantage of home games, create business

MSU fourth place for national free speech

BY JAMIE ALLEN

Staff Writer

Students, fac-ulty, staff and alumni from Mississippi State University have a new award to contribute to the univer-sity’s esteem—the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education awarded MSU fourth in the nation for freedom of speech.

FIRE is a “watch dog” organization that reviews policies and procedures in colleges and universities regarding constitutional freedoms for students and others on college and university campuses throughout the country.

Bill Kibler, vice president for Student Affairs at MSU, said some of the policies that FIRE takes into consideration include policies per-taining to expression, assembly, orga-nizational affiliation, harassment and discrimination.

“FIRE reviews a whole range of policies on each campus,” Kibler said. “I believe MSU has had a long histo-ry of assuring that our policies and practices assured the highest level of freedoms permitted by law.”

Philip Poe, assistant professor of communication, said the ratings bring good recognition to MSU, as

well as give the students an equal opportunity to speak out on their beliefs.

“The university has worked to fos-ter an environment of anti-discrim-ination and equal opportunity and the chance to freely express yourself, whether students take that opportu-nity or not is their decision,” Poe said.

According to thefire.org, FIRE reviewed 392 schools, giving only 14 a green light.

Also, 65 percent of universities in the United States received a red light, meaning that at least one policy clearly restricts freedom of speech or denies access to the public regarding its policies about free speech.

In the past, MSU has been given a yellow light concerning this topic. The yellow light means that the insti-tution has policies that could stifle freedom of speech.

“Although we had a yellow rating before, it really only took some fairly minor changes in the language of one or two of our policies to change our ratings to green,” Kibler said.

Mark Goodman, professor of com-munication, said some of the univer-sity policies were unconstitutional and after MSU revised its policy to be more constitutional, MSU received the green light.

Kibler said even though freedoms have remained the same since the Constitution was ratified, there have been many changed in interpretation and application since then.

Kibler

SPORTS | 8

SEE PHYSICS, 2

JAY JOHNSON | THE REFLECTOR

From left: Braden Whitehead, Bryce Bean and Jeff Agre started Tent Dawgs to assist tailgaters on gamedays.

ZACK ORSBORN, JAY JOHNSON AND CAMERON CLARKE | THE REFLECTOR

BY HILLARY LAPLATNEY

Contributing Writer

The Tent Dawgs is making it possible for Mississippi State University football fans to enjoy tailgating without worrying about setup.

The Tent Dawgs is a student-run organization responsible for stor-ing, setting up and taking down customers’ tailgating items during the MSU football season.

Braden Whitehead, Jeffrey Agre and Bryce Bean are the three MSU students who comprise the Tent Dawgs.

Whitehead and Agre, founders of the organization, were setting up tents before a game last season

when the Tent Dawgs was born.Whitehead, sophomore business

marketing major, called himself the entrepreneur of the Tent Dawgs business.

“Last year we were setting up tents for a relative of mine at a tail-gate. They paid us a little money, and after we walked off, I was like, ‘We really need to start setting up tents for people,’” he said.

Agre, sophomore kinesiology major, said he enjoys working as a Tent Dawg and giving back to the community.

“We don’t have to have a full-time job, and we only work seven weeks, so it’s pretty nice,” he said. “We wanted to give back to Mississippi State. We love the tailgating expe-

rience, and we wanted to provide service that’s affordable for people.”

According to TentDawgs.com, “The Tent Dawgs are dedicated to providing all Bulldog fans with the

best tailgating experience.”Its website was created by Bean,

sophomore business information systems major.

The Tent Dawgs has since relo-cated to www.southerngent.com/tailgate.

Whitehead and Agre said their business has been able to expand even more this season because they now live in a house instead of a dorm. The two own a trailer in which their customers’ tents and accessories are stored during the football season.

SEE FIRE, 2 SEE TENTS, 2

DAWGS LOOK TO KEEP RECORD SPOTLESS

Break the bottle without breaking the bankLife | 6

stephanie godfrey | the reflector

NEWS THE REFLECTOR2 | friday, september 21, 2012

2 eggs*, bacon (2 slices) or sausage (1 patty), grits & toast 2 biscuits with sausage gravy and 1 egg*

Golden waffle and 2 eggs* Bacon, egg* and cheese sandwich with grits

BLT and French fries Cheeseburger and French fries

Grilled ham & cheese and French friesNO SUBSTITUTIONS, PLEASE.

809 Highway 12 West - Starkville, Mississippi - Phone: (662) 338-3121

311 Highway 82 - Winona, Mississippi - Phone: (662) 283-3313

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AVAILABLE FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY

The Tent Dawgs arrive at the Junction early on the Friday morning before a home game in order to make sure their clients get ideal tail-gating locations.

“On Friday mornings we get there at 4:30 a.m.,” Whitehead said. “We lay out the tents and claim the spots. We don’t actually put up the tents until 4 o’clock in the afternoon.”

Agre said the work does not stop on Friday, as the group works thoughout game day to ensure customer satisfaction.

“We get there early on Satur-day morning, too,” Agre said. “That’s when we bring the ta-bles, chairs, satellites and TVs so they won’t be out there over-night. We don’t want anything to get damaged or stolen.”

Bean, does advertising for the group and is their website manager.

Bean said their prices are affordable for fans

and create the perfect tailgate experience.“40 dollars a tent, $30 for TV and satellite

and $15 for tables and chairs,” Bean said.Bean also said they receive about 10 hits per

week on their website and are still in the pro-cess of getting it fully launched.

“I work (the site) though a guy that runs Bulldog Junction, Mi-chael Wardlaw,” Bean said. “I’ve been working with him through our website. We still have some more stuff to put on there, but we have the basics down.”

The Tent Dawgs’ website has pricing and contact information and will soon feature recipes and tailgate tips. For more informa-tion on the Tent Dawgs, visit thesoutherngent.com/tailgate/ or follow them on Twitter @

TentDawgs. John Galatas contributed information to

this article.

TENTS continued from 1

On Friday mornings we get there at 4:30 a.m. We lay out the tents and claim the spots. We don’t actually put up the tents until 4 o’clock in the afternoon.”Braden Whitehead

“

“It’s almost surreal seeing myself on the big screen like that, and it’s also weird that when I see people around town, they know me as ‘the physics guy on the jumbotron’,” Winter said. “It’s so strange because teacher and ce-lebrity are two totally opposite things, and it’s like I’m both.”

Freshman biological science major Brooke Brumfield said that she saw Winter in Hilbun Hall one day and once it hit her as to who he was, she was almost a little star struck.

“I knew he was a teacher here, but actually seeing him in person and not on a screen was almost surreal. It was pretty neat, and after watching his clips, I’ve thought about taking physics,” Brumfield said.

Ben Bailey, senior international business ma-jor, edits footage and audio, creates graphics and animations and is the mind behind post-produc-tion.

“I don’t know how (the show) got arrainged, but it’s kind of a joint project among athletics, the television center and the College of Arts and Sci-ences,” Bailey said. “I’ve been editing since episode

one.”Bailey also said Winter is the

mind behind the ideas and keeps the program fresh.

“This last year has been a little bit more difficult, but he keeps coming up with new things,” Bailey said. “Combining different topics, talking about how physics effects football, there’s always more to cov-er as far as the physics, but without

getting too complex.”Seeing that the community’s feedback to the

“Physics of Football” has been positive thus far, the videos will continue their air time at Davis Wade Stadium.

John Galatas contributed information to this article.

“Although freedoms of speech and expression and assembly have been assured since our Constitution was ratified, there have been changes throughout our his-tory in case law coming from the courts that pertain to how these freedoms are interpreted and applied in varying situa-tions,” Kibler said.

Kibler also said that all uni-versities should stay current on these changes so they can be changed and adjusted ac-cordingly.

Poe said stressing freedom of speech is important for any university. People should be able to express their opinions in a peaceful manner.

“It’s an important func-

tion of universities – to foster that beliefs or ideals that this country was built on that peo-ple can have civil discussions about issues in which they have different opinions and we can still get along at the end of the day, we can all wear maroon and go to the football game at the end of the day,” Poe said.

PHYSICS continued from 1

FIRE continued from 1

1. James Madison University 2. The College of William & Mary 3. University of Mississippi 4. Mississippi State University 5. University of Tennessee-Knoxville66. University of Virginia7. University of Pennsylvania

FIRE’S RANKINGOF UNIVERSITIESTHAT PROTECT FREE SPEECH ON CAMPUS AND MAINTAIN POLICIESPOLICIES THAT HONOR FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION.

I knew he was a teacher here, but actually seeing him in person and not on a screen was almost surreal.”Brook Brumfield

“ zack orsborn | the reflector

Clothesline Project | This week, MSU’s Department of Relationship Violence and Outreach hosted its annual

Clothesline Project. The project is a vehicle for victims affected by violence (sexual assault, rape, incest or domestic violence) to

express their emotions by decorating a shirt. They then hang the shirt on a clothesline to be viewed by others as a testimony.

NEWS friday, september 21, 2012 | 3REFLECTOR-ONLINE.COM

BADDAWGS

Monday, September 17• 10:22 a.m. A student reported being struck in the chest by an unknown person near Subway on MSU’s campus.• 7:09 p.m. A student reported feeling threatened by her roommate’s family in Sessums Hall.• 7:15 p.m. Students reported their backpacks stolen from the Sanderson Center.

Tuesday, September 18• 12:21 p.m. A student reported slipping and falling at Hilbun Hall.• 1:09 p.m. A student reported her vehicle missing from Cresswell Hall. • 5:09 p.m. A student reported her backpack stolen from the Sanderson Center.•10:28 p.m. A student reported being assaulted by her roommate’s male friend in Sessums Hall.

Wednesday, September 19• 12:29 p.m. A student threatened to harm herself after a meeting with Financial Aid at Garner Hall.• 1:44 p.m. A student reported his hand gun missing from the trunk of his car while parked in the Swamp Lot behind McKee Hall. A student referral was issued for having a gun on campus.• 10:47 p.m. Students were questioned regarding their involvement surrounding an MSU vehicle at Cresswell Hall.

Thursday, September 20• 4:53 a.m. A non-resident/visitor was acting belligerently and disrespectfully in the lobby of Rice Hall.

Citations:• 17 citations were issued for speeding.• 2 citations were issued for running a stop sign.

Papa John’s Pizza Mobile Coupons. 2 to 4 msgs per month. Message and Data Rates May Apply. To opt-out “Text STOP to 90210” for help “Text HELP to 90210” www.izigg.com/ privacypolicy. For all terms and conditions or additional assistance email myinfo@izigg.com

By SaSha SteinBerg

Staff Writer

Two Starkville natives will be launching a mobile sports application and website later this fall.

Hossein Kash Razzaghi, chief executive officer of Fancred, said he has often re-sorted to text messaging and email when talking Missis-sippi State University sports with childhood best friend and co-founder, Michael Pan. However, about a year ago, they decided being a sports fan was not as simple as they would like and used their ex-periences as inspiration for starting the company.

“During Mississippi State games that we would watch, he was in Chicago and I was in Boston, and we would al-ways find ourselves texting each other and emailing, but it would be a long thread of emails back and forth. There isn’t enough time during the day to spend visiting 15 dif-ferent sports blogs or websites to keep up with the latest in Mississippi State athletics,” he said.

“So, the premise of Fancred is to enhance your life as a sports fan by giving you a sin-gle point of access to the in-formation and content from people you trust: the beat reporters, the blog writers, the journalists. In that same place, we want to give you a forum to have conversations with people you trust and en-joy,” Razzaghi said.

Pan, vice president of prod-uct for Fancred, said while so-cial networks and easy access to the web have allowed a bet-ter way to stay connected, he and Razzaghi said they found despite the technology and apps available today, what existed was not good enough for sports.

“Hossein and I have been lucky enough to be born and raised in a town centered around a great university and sports culture, (but) all the daily things we were doing as sports fans were getting lost in the noise and fragmenta-tion of social media and news providers,” he said. “Sharing and celebrating going to a game at Scott Field seemed less meaningful when it was mixed in with baby pictures

and Farmville requests. With Fancred, hopefully people won’t have to download an-other sports app again and they’ll finally have one place to go to for their sports life.”

The mobile app is expected to be launched in early Octo-ber or late November, just in time for football bowl season and college basketball, and a full web experience will be launched several weeks after that, Razzaghi said.

“We’re going after college sports first because college sports fans are usually the ones that are more likely to use social media, have sports conversations and be in-the-know about their teams,” he said, “But it’s (Fancred) really a tool for any kind of sports fan, regardless of which sports they like or where they live.”

Razzaghi said there will be no cost for consumers to access or use the mobile app and website, and anyone in-terested in getting involved with Fancred is encouraged to do so.

“There are different types of fans out there, and some are really active and always want to promote themselves or talk sports,” he said. “Oth-ers just want to spend a few minutes and find conversa-tions and content that they can be sure is credible, so I think Fancred will help both kinds of fans.”

Landon Howell, who is based in Birmingham and serves as the voice behind Fancred’s Twitter, said his role with the company primari-ly involves communication and outreach, and he said he agrees sports fans have no app to call their own.

“We’re looking for avid football and basketball fans who would like to be first us-ers. We will be inviting a se-lect group of Beta users mid-fall before opening Fancred to all,” he said. “Anyone who is interested in being a Beta user can reach out to me at landon@fancred.com or @fancred on Twitter.”

Along with Razzaghi, Pan and Howell, the Fancred team is composed of Craig Johnson, vice president of engineering and Jeremy Mer-le, chief experience officer.

Unlike on sports blogs and forums where people can

post under a username, Raz-zaghi said Fancred users will have to first log into either Facebook or Twitter for ver-ification purposes.

“When you log in, we’re authenticating you to make sure you really are who you say you are,” he said. “The coolest thing about it is if you are a passionate sports fan, you probably already told Facebook or Twitter that you like Mississippi State, and so, we’ll be able to know which teams you like and we can immediately give you con-tent for those teams and hook you up with people that are like-minded.”

When measuring the ev-eryday life of a sports fan, Razzaghi said each user will be given points, or Fancred, which can be tracked.

“We’ve created an algo-rithm that essentially takes into consideration anything that we believe you can do as a fan, and that algorithm will always be changing because there are always new things that people do to show their

. For every action you take, there’s a weight we will assign to it, he said.”

“We’re not asking you to do anything you don’t do already. Some of the things that you do as a fan, in my opinion, are more impressive than others. For instance, if you go and read a blog about Mississippi State sports, you get points for that, but if you actually go to a game or travel to an away game, that’s even more impressive. You can use that score as a tool to find other people or you can use it as a tool to sort of brag about your fan-hood Razzaghi said.”

Users will be informed about what they can do to increase their Fancred, Raz-zaghi said.

While Fancred has already begun to gain a lot of trac-tion and his team has done quite a number of press tours, Razzaghi said they will be do-ing a lot more, including a full SEC press tour, to make sure people know about the launch.

“The encouraging thing is that most sports fans get that their life is fragmented when it comes to being a fan and they get that their life is prob-ably not as easy as it should be so it hasn’t been too hard convincing them that this (Fancred) is something they need, he said.”

Overall, Razzaghi said he is greatly anticipating the ini-tial launch as well as what the future may hold for Fancred and its users.

“I think through time, we’ll be able to do a lot of differ-ent things and provide a lot of features and functionality. We’ll launch and see how people like it,” he said. “I think, at the end of the day, most fans will agree that their life is just too busy when it comes to sports and the way they get their information, and that’s the problem we’re trying to solve.”

Starkville natives launch new sports app, website

Correction: In Tuesday’s The Reflector, the iPhone 5 feature article stated the new product lighter because it is completely out of alu-minum and glass, when it should have read the new phone is lighter because new technology in the screen gives the phone less mass and a new anodized backside is no longer made of glass. The Reflector regrets this error.

jay johnson | the reflector

OPINION the voice of MSU studentsInDesign is very

4 | FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2012 THE REFLECTOR

CONTACT INFORMATIONEditor in Chief/Hannah Rogers

325-7905 editor@reflector.msstate.edu

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sent to the Meyer Student Media Center or mailed to The Reflector, PO Box 5407, Mississippi State, MS. Letters may also be emailed to edi-tor@reflector.msstate.edu.

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CORRECTIONSThe Reflector staff strives to maintain the integrity of this paper through accurate

and honest reporting. If we publish an error we will correct it. To report an error, call 325-7905.

Editor in ChiefHannah Rogers

Managing EditorKaitlyn Byrne

News EditorEmma Crawford

Campus News EditorJohn Galatas

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Life EditorZack Orsborn

Sports EditorKristen Spink

Opinion EditorMary Chase Breedlove

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Copy EditorCandace Barnette

Copy EditorRachel Burke

ReflectorThe

Hey, ladies. I’ve just heard groundbreaking news from an upperclassman

friend of mine: A new classmate of hers informed the class at the start of the school year all college girls should invest in some Com-fort Colors shirts in order to fi t in.

I’m so glad she shared this news with the impressionable freshmen because if not for this gem of in-formation, the campus commu-nity might have been able to tell them apart and distinguish them as individuals. I don’t know if she ment ioned this part, but you are going to need to get those shirts in a bigger size, girls. In order to know what size, use this simple two-step system worldly scholars have developed for your convenience:

1. Take your weight (your ac-tual weight, not what you tell the lady at the DMV so you can forever have 110 lbs. stamped on your driver’s license) and multiply it by 2.5.

2. Now you have your virtual sorority girl weight. When shop-ping for your new garb, pretend like you weigh that much. And

leave a little extra room in case you want to get crazy and eat a cupcake.

I know some of you may read fashion magazines and articles about the cut of clothes and how they fl atter the human fi gure.

Most of these observe wearing large, oversized garments actually make you appear bigger rather than smaller. In order to bypass this unfortunate side effect, you may want to cinch your top with a belt around the natural waist. However, if others are not doing

the same, do not put on the belt. I repeat: if you do not see the oth-er Comfort Color crit-ters wearing

belts, do not do so. Reserve your actual, presentable clothing for nighttime events only. And even then, consider carefully the situ-ation for which you are putting on real pants. Symphony concert? I don’t think people even dress beyond pajama-like clothes for those. Late night at the bar? Now we’re talking. Get those stilettos out and hit the town because there will be people there who are worth impressing. I mean, dress-

ing for class isn’t really benefi cial to you. Sure, you’re here to get an education and all, but you could learn naked, hypothetically. I guess your teachers are getting to know you and may judge you on how you present yourself to the world, but they know you care on the inside.

Of course, I can’t carry this article satirically the whole way through. It hurts my fashion-fo-cused mind too much, almost as much as it hurt my eyes for three years to watch hundreds of fe-males not care about their attire every day. Appearances matter, people.

If my teachers came to class dressed in Nike running shorts and oversized T-shirts, I would feel like I wasn’t worth the effort. I would especially be confused see-ing a man in Nike running shorts. Regardless, they don’t dress this way.

They dress professionally; if we as college students want to be treated as young professionals, we fi rst have to dress like adults. Long quotes are sometimes bor-ing and superfl uous, but Clinton Kelly from TLC’s “What Not to Wear” eloquently stated in an NPR interview why style is im-portant:

“This is about coming to terms

with the body that you have right now, and dressing it the best that you possibly can, so that you are treated with the utmost respect. And I think that’s really what it boils down to. How you dress tells the rest of the world how you expect to be treated. And I hope that you expect to be treated with some level of respect.

When you cover yourself in a hoodie and an oversized sweatshirt and sweatpants and a cross-training sneaker, that’s not telling the rest of the world that you feel good about yourself. That’s saying that you want to hide from the rest of the world and you’re saying, please ignore me.”

Learn how to express yourself as an individual and set yourself apart. You owe it to yourself and your future.

THE GOLDEN THREAD | WENDY MORELL

Comfort colors bestow ultimate approval

Many people, scien-tists included, make incorrect judgments

about how things work be-cause they mis-attribute caus-es and effects. Many fundamental advance-ments in science are due to a new understanding of the causative relationships being studied. Unfortunately, it is easy to mistake causation with correlation.

Correlation is when two phenomena are observed si-multaneously or in sequence, sometimes repeatedly, but without any proposed mech-anism to assert causation, or responsibility of one event for the other.

Without a good deal of sci-entifi c testing, theres is diffi -culty sometimes to establish the real, causal nature of the way certain things work, lead-ing many people to come to erroneous conclusions.

It is important in everyday life and in scientifi c research to understand correlation does not imply causation.

One way to emphasize this is by looking at examples of correlated events with a third event which is the actual cause of the two results in question.

A good example put forth by Carl Sagan in his TV show “Cosmos” is pulsars, regularly pulsing stars that emit unwav-ering radio signals multiple

times a second. An argument could go like

this: “Intelligent humans can create regularly pulsing radio signals, I see a regularly puls-ing radio signal in space and, therefore, there is an intelli-gent being right there.”

B u t that line of rea-soning is f l a we d , as sci-e n t i s t s h a v e d e t e r -mined it is actually a type of neutron star that rotates rapidly on its axis, causing the pulsating ra-dio signal that we see.

A famous example to help prove correlation does not necessitate causation is the Church of Pastafarianism’s facetious claim that “Piracy has decreased, and the aver-age global temperature has in-creased; therefore, the decrease of piracy is responsible for global warming.” Scientists know increasing temperatures are due to physical effects like the sun’s cycles and the green-house effect, entirely unrelat-ed to piracy.

Scientists often employ clever tricks to separate cor-relation from causation, such as using control experiments and placebo testing.

In pharmaceutical trials, the drug in question is given to half the participants while a plain sugar pill (called a pla-cebo) is given to the other half and the results are gathered.

If the drug has any effects beyond the psychological ben-

efi t of thinking you are b e i n g g i v e n a func-t i o n -al pill ( c a l l e d the pla-

cebo effect), then the research-ers can conclude something in their drug worked.

If a scientist were to only look at his or her experiment without taking into consider-ation outside variables, then what he or she thought they were discovering could be completely wrong.

As pointed out by Carl Sa-gan in “Cosmos,” Aristotle is a wonderful example.

He noticed a rock falls to the ground faster than a feath-er, and so he determined it must be because the rock is heavier than the feather, concluding heavy things must fall more quickly than light things. But this is wrong, feathers and rocks fall at the same speed in the ab-sence of air resistance.

Galileo approached this cor-

rectly; taking two differently weighted objects, a large and a small cannon ball, and dropping them from the leaning tower of Pisa.

Galileo correctly determined all things accelerate at the same speed under the infl uence of gravity, and he actually got pretty close to developing New-tonian mechanics, supplying Newton with the groundwork to do it instead.

Understanding appearances can be deceiving is important because many decisions we make day to day are governed by our immediate reactions to what appears to be causing what goes on.

Without knowledge of the real workings and a healthy sense of doubt and curiosity it is easy to be get it wrong and nev-er know a decision is based off an erroneous assumption.

Wendy Morell is a senior majoring in communication. She can be contacted at opinion@reflector.msstate.edu.

WENDY MORELL

Learn how to express yourself as an individual and set yourself apart. You owe it to yourself and your future.”

“

Bicycle helmet laws necessary, affect others

Cameron Clarke is a sophomore majoring in physics. He can be contacted at opinion@reflector.msstate.edu.

CAMERON CLARKE

In a recent article “Wear-ing helmets should be a choice,” Matt Taylor pre-

sented some legitimate points on why the government shouldn’t be the one to tell us how we should protect our-selves. In my opinion, how-ever, there are more aspects of this helmet ordinance that affect us on more levels than just limiting our personal choices.

I ride a motorcy -cle about six miles to school twice a day. By law, I am required to wear a De-par tment of Transportation-approved motorcycle helmet. While I have several options, I choose to wear a full face, completely

padded, DOT-approved hel-met.

This means I sacrifi ce com-fort and a lot of air fl ow for safety, and I do it for my own benefi t, not because some-one told me to. The reasons I choose this helmet are abun-dant, and also affect the aver-age Mississippi State student on a bicycle.

I am going to assume most of us stu-dents on c a m p u s still claim our par-ents health insurance. Because of that, your parents are r e s p o n s i -ble for any

medical bills you may assume due to bodily injury.

This also means if you ob-tain any kind of brain or head

injury on your bike, parents are responsible for the thou-sands of dollars of medical bills that you caused.

In addition, when cyclists are hit, most don’t die. They are instead heavily injured, resulting in massive medical bills.

Every time you ride a bike without a helmet, you are inherently saying “I am af-fecting other people with this decision.”

In the case you aren’t on your parents’ medical plan, think about trying to pay for those medical bills by yourself while you can’t even work be-cause of injury.

According to the SNELL Memorial Foundation, every year the estimated number of bicycling head injuries requir-ing hospitalization exceeds the total of all the head injury cas-es related to baseball, football, skateboards, kick scooters,

horseback riding, snowboard-ing, ice hockey, in-line skat-ing and lacrosse. Although a helmet may not protect from every injury, you are much better off by wearing one.

With the way bicycle hel-mets are created in this day and age, cyclists have the best helmets we have ever seen. Most helmets are relatively cheap, lightweight and small, thus staying out of the way of the cyclists and not interfering on hot summer days.

There is absolutely no rea-son to forgo a helmet in favor of a $15 ticket that would cost more than a helmet would in the fi rst place.

With cars speeding by with-in a few feet, your hair or the temperature should be the last thing on your mind.

I’m no law student, but could you imagine trying to sue a negligent driver for hit-ting you when you were also

breaking the law? An easy argument by the

driver would be to say you as-sumed the risk of not wearing a helmet before even hopping on that bike and heading out on a public road.

Helmet use has been esti-mated to reduce head injury risk by 85 percent according

to the insurance institute for highway safety.

Instead of being upset with the local government, we should appreciate them for caring about our safety on the roadway, especially with the way some people drive around this town.

If the government is more concerned about our lives than we are, people are mov-ing in the completely wrong direction.

COMMON SENSE | ERIC EVANS

WHO SPEAKS FOR EARTH? | CAMERON CLARKE

Eric Evans is the multimedia editor for The Reflector. He can be contacted at opinion@reflector.msstate.edu.

ERIC EVANS

Instead of being upset with the local government, we should appreciate them for caring about our safety on the roadway, especially with the way some people dive around this town.”

“

Causation does not imply correlation SA constitution campaigning rules outdated, need revision

Without a knowledge of the real workings and a healthy sense of doubt and curiosity, it is easy to get it wrong and never know a decision is based off an erroneous assumption.”

“Last year, I found myself

skimming the Student As-sociation Constitution and

its various amendments for some organization business.

I forgot almost all of it ex-cept the parts I was interested in, but seeing the article in The Refl ector on Tuesday about the proposed campaigning changes reminded me of something I no-ticed about the current election rules. Title 400, Chapter 402.4 D states, “On Election Day, campaigning shall not be allowed within twenty-fi ve (25) feet of the building of any poll-ing place.” A quick jot down to 402.9 A re-veals that a polling sta-tion is de-fi ned as “any computer lab on campus” or “one or more computers orga-nized for the purpose of voting on or off campus”.

Now that the SA has con-verted the entire process to an online system available through myState, I think that these rules become diffi cult to interpret.

As any student’s laptop is now capable of being a computer

used for the purposes of voting, does this mean that your com-puter creates an invisible 25-foot radius around you, which press-ganged pledges on the Drill Field must fl ee from or become the subject of a campaigning viola-tion? An extreme example, but amusing nonetheless, and I cer-tainly would not mind getting across the Drill Field without being harassed by competing swarms of Comfort-color-coded freshmen during Homecoming voting.

Regardless of whether or not we’ll be able to use our lap-tops as shields come October, I think this ex-ample helps outline some of the issues with the current elec-tion code.

Ho p e f u l l y, Wynn will suc-

ceed in his goal of making the elections process much more sane and respectable, making this a moot point.

But should we all have to en-dure one more Homecoming election cycle under the old sta-tus quo, we might as well make it interesting and see if the above statutes are worth anything.

As any student’s laptop is now capable of being used for the purposes of voting, does this mean your computer creates an invisible 25-foot radius around you?”

“

LETTER TO THE EDITOR | BAILEY HANSEN

BICYCLE SAFETY STATSFrom the US Department of Transportation: Traffic Safety Facts - 2010 (most recent)

618 bicyclists died on US roads in 2010.

Bicyclist deaths represented 2 percent of all 2010 traffic fatalities.

From the Snell Memorial Foundation In bicycle crashes, 2/3 of the dead and 1/8 of the injured suffered brain injuries.

95% of bicyclists killed in 2006 reportedly were not wearing helmets.

ZACK ORSBORN | THE REFLECTOR

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2012 | 5

BULLETIN BOARDCLASSIFIEDS POLICY

The deadline for Tuesday’s paper is 3 p.m. Thursday; the deadline for Friday’s paper is 3 p.m. Tuesday. Classifi eds are $5 per issue. Student and staff ads are $3 per issue, pre-paid. Lost and found: found items can be listed for free; lost items are listed for standard ad cost.

HELP WANTED

Bartending. Up to $300 / day. No experience necessary. Training available. Call 800.965.6520 ext. 213.

Part-time position for professional audio engineer(s) for nights and weekend work. Typical shift 8 to 12+ hours. Average hours per week between 0 and 16. Late hours. Inquire at www.ameaudio.com or email scott@ameaudio.com.

FOR SALE

Classic comics and albums. The largest collection of comic books and albums in the area. Also movie posters, sports memorabilia, DVDs, CDs and beer signs. Located in Ziggy’s Buy & Sell, 434 Highway 12. Details on Facebook.

CLUB INFO

The deadline for Tuesday’s paper is 3 p.m. Thursday; deadline for Friday’s paper is 3 p.m. Tuesday. MSU

student organizations may place free announcements in Club Info. Information may be submitted by email to club_info@refl ector.msstate.edu with the subject heading “CLUB INFO,” or a form may be completed at The Refl ector offi ce in the Student Media Center. A contact name, phone number and requested run dates must be included for club info to appear in The Refl ector. All submissions are subject to exemption according to space availability.

WESLEY FOUNDATION

Insight Bible study and worship on Tuesdays at 8 p.m. at the Wesley Foundation Worship Center on East Lee. Boulevard next to Campus Book Mart.

MSU CATHOLIC STUDENT ASSOCIATION

The MSU Catholic Student Association invites you to join us for Sunday mass at 5:30 p.m. at St. Joseph Catholic Church, 607 University Dr. All are welcome to $2 Tuesday night dinner at 6 p.m. in the Parish Hall. Like us on Facebook: facebook.com/msstatecsa

HOLMES CULTURAL DIVERSITY CENTER

“Salsa in the Streets.” Come dance the

night away in front of the Colvard Student Union on Sept. 21. Lesson starts at 7 p.m. and open dance is at 8 p.m. Lessons and music will be provided by the MSU Ballroom Dance Club. Rain date is Oct. 12 at 7 p.m.

SIGMA GAMMA RHO SORORITY, INC.

RHOad Side Service! Come out Sept. 22 to the Dawghouse at 9:45 a.m. to do community service with Sigma Gamma Rho. Lunch afterward.

MSU STUDENT CHAPTER OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF

MICROBIOLOGY

Contact msuasm@yahoo.com or like us on Facebook, “MSU ASM,” for membership information.

SOCIOLOGICAL STUDENT ASSOCIATION

SSA will be holding its fi rst offi cial meeting on Sept. 27 in Bowen Hall room 250. All students, including those in BSIS with a sociology specialization, sociology majors/minors and all interested students are welcome to join. We will be ratifying our constitution, electing offi cers and much more. For more information, email Dr. Shannon M. Lane at lane@soc.msstate.edu.

REFLECTOR-ONLINE

9-21-12AN IN-CLASS DISTRACTION ...

Solutions for 9-18-12

Call 325-7907Call 325-7907

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LIFE & ENTERTAINMENT6 | FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2012 THE REFLECTOR

BY CASEY SMITH

Staff Writer

Scotty’s Wine and Spirits lo-cated on Highway 12 is now open for business.

Owner Scott Gault is tak-ing his 45 years of previous retail experience and put-ting it to the test with the opening of his fi rst business. Gault said he traveled to liquor stores around the state to devise the perfect for-mula for his store.

“I looked at a lot of different stores and wrote down what I did not like about each store,” Gault said. “The main thing I did was talked to a lot of people and asked them to tell me what they did and didn’t like about their expe-riences shopping for wine and spirits.”

He said the biggest issue customers found with other wine

and spirit stores was the lacklus-ter customer service and the small amount of walking space between aisles.

“The number one thing people wanted was space,” he said. “Cus-tomers are sick and tired of going into crowded, small stores.”

When customers walk into Scotty’s, he said they want to be known not only for their impec-cable presentation, but as a store that takes care of clients as soon as they walk in the door. Upon walk-ing into the store it is easy to see the staff have accomplished their goal. The friendly staff greets peo-ple with a smile. The selection of 600 different wines are displayed on beautiful wooden racks, which are lighted for better reading. To the side of the store, a comfortable couch awaits tired shoppers.

He said he wants customers to be able to take their time and en-joy the experience of shopping for wine.

“You can shop for groceries, you can shop for clothes, why not be able to go somewhere and spend 20 minutes in a relaxing at-mosphere?” he said.

Jennifer Gregory, chief operat-ing offi cer of the Greater Starkville Development Partnership, said she is happy about the arrival of a

new business in Starkville. “Any time a new business opens

in Starkville, there is always a lot of excitement because of the poten-tial sales tax revenue which can be generated, “ she said. “Lately, with the climate of record sales tax col-lections in the community we are seeing more and more businesses opening up, and we really think it speaks to the positive economy we are experiencing in Starkville and Oktibbeha County.”

Gregory said she is also excited because Scotty’s will be provid-ing all the wine for the Unwine Downtown event today. She said it will be a good opportunity to get the business’s name out to new clientele and a great way for the GSDP to partner with a new busi-ness in the community. She also said she was not worried about the potential competition it will provide for other wine and spirit stores.

“From what I understand, they are marketing towardspeople who are looking for specifi c types of wine and then just your everyday liquor purchases, “ she said. “We think it will compliment the other mix of wine and spirit stores we have in Starkville.”

Although the presentation is upscale, Gault said they do not

want to be known as a high-end store because their products and prices are comparable to other stores.

“We are not an expensive, up-scale store,” he said. “We just have a nice look and I was concerned about the perception of people sticking their head in the door and saying they can’t afford it.”

Amber Smith, a graduate stu-dent studying accounting, said she is pleased Starkville now has a wine and spirits store with the ability to cater to the individual needs of the consumer.

“Starkville has needed some-thing like Scotty’s for a while,” she said. “Somewhere you can go and meet with a knowledgeable staff and have a diverse selection.”

Gault said all students (ages 21 and up) are welcome at the store and when customers come on their 21st birthday, they take a picture of the birthday boy or girl and put it on their Facebook page.

Scotty’s is located on the west side of town only six minutes from campus. The store is closed on Sundays and Christmas day. Scotty’s will soon have a website and Twitter, but in the meantime check out their Facebook page at Facebook.com/ScottysWineand-Spirits.

New liquor store offers luxurious atmosphere

“What’s in Your Netfl ix Queue?” is an entertainment feature open to all students, faculty and staff. Submit your queue at life@refl ector.msstate.edu.

BROOKE CANNONsenior industrial engineering major

You can see how they make frozen french fries, underwater robots, hypodermic needles and manhole covers. How could aTV show be any cooler?

What’’ In Youu

Queue?NETFLIXthe good,the bad,the shameful

These guys are more woman than I will ever be. Shantay, you stay, Ru, shantay, you stay.

It is a movie about being inside of John Malkovich’s mind and entering through a trap door. Why would this not be in my queue?

R.I.P. Li’l Sebastian.

1. “How It’s Made”

2. “Being John Malkovich”

3. “Parks and Recreation”

Have ideas about an entertainment feature like “What’s in Your Netfl ix Queue”? Let us know at life@refl ector.msstate.edu.

want to be known as a high-end store because their products and prices are comparable to other

“We are not an expensive, up-scale store,” he said. “We just have a nice look and I was concerned about the perception of people sticking their head in the door and saying they can’t afford it.”

Amber Smith, a graduate stu-dent studying accounting, said she is pleased Starkville now has a wine and spirits store with the ability to cater to the individual needs of the consumer.

“Starkville has needed some-thing like Scotty’s for a while,” she said. “Somewhere you can go and meet with a knowledgeable staff and have a diverse selection.”

Gault said all students (ages 21 and up) are welcome at the store and when customers come on their 21st birthday, they take a picture of the birthday boy or girl and put it on their Facebook page.

Scotty’s is located on the west side of town only six minutes from campus. The store is closed on Sundays and Christmas day. Scotty’s will soon have a website and Twitter, but in the meantime check out their Facebook page at Facebook.com/ScottysWineand-

New liquor store offers luxurious atmosphere MICAH GREEN | THE REFLECTOR

LIFE FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2012 | 7REFLECTOR-ONLINE.COM

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9/30/2012

BY ALEX MONIÉ

Contributing Writer

Signs of blue police boxes and sonic-screwdrivers have become increasingly familiar across our campus the last few years. While many have no clue what these objects mean, those who do know they originated from the wildly popular British television show “Doctor Who.” Many Netfl ix subscribers have probably seen it pop up on their instant queue and had no idea what the show is, which is fair.

Believe it or not, “Doctor

Who” is the longest running television series currently on air, celebrating its 50th anni-versary next year.

The protagonist of the se-ries, the Doctor (currently por-trayed by Matt Smith, the 11th actor to have the role) and his companions, are not bound by any setting.

One episode can begin in ancient Rome, and the next can see the group on a distant planet thousands of years in the future. They could be sav-ing William Shakespeare one week or rescuing dinosaurs on a spaceship the following.

With “Doctor Who,” the viewer is never quite sure what he or she are going to see from week to week, and that has increased the longevity of the show by decades.

The question is why this show is crossing the Atlantic Ocean and resonating with American audiences.

American entertainment has taken shows like “The Offi ce” and “Skins,” which originated in Britain, and transformed them into our own versions. “Doctor Who,” on the oth-er hand, has been embraced wholly and unchanged.

The show is not overly British, but it is extremely cheesy at times. The only re-source the Doctor has at his disposal is his cleverness.

This characteristic is what crosses the cultural divide, however. Americans especial-ly love rooting for the under-dog in a situation.

Whether the Doctor and his companions are facing down an alien fleet or an an-gry village mob, they always manage to come out on top.

Every viewer, no matter heritage, age or gender, un-derstands fear, and this is

what we learn to overcome through these characters.

The voice of the Ameri-can peo-ple is not lost on the show e i t h e r . The last three se-ries have seen an increasing n u m b e r of stories featuring America’s history.

Episodes have showcased time periods such as the

1969 moon landing and the American Old West. Com-ing up, the Doctor will vis-

it present-day New York in an episode promis-ing to be heart-felt for current viewers (fare-well, Ponds).

So, give the show a shot on Netflix. Fair warning, the

first few episodes show their age, but give the Doctor time and the series could become an instant favorite.

‘Doctor Who’ visits America, increasing historical events protrayed

BY CATIE MARIE MARTIN

Staff Writer

Y’all. Brandon Flowers. The man is amazing. On Tues-day, he and the rest of The Killers released Battle Born, their fourth album since 2004. Reminiscent of 80s style rock and roll, The Killers have put forth a refreshing sound with every new CD without straying too far from the sound fans adore. But really, when you have a voice as memorable as Brandon Flowers, how could you possibly desert that classic synthetic pop sound? Flowers recently told NME music blog, “People are going to be able to relate to and understand these songs. Pound for pound, this is our strongest record, and I’m really excited about it.”

Long-time fan Helen Geary, sophomore undeclared major, said she agrees.

“Brandon’s done it again. This album slays so hard,” she said.

The album’s cohesiveness is its most remarkable quality. It covers every emotion felt by American youth: Young love found and lost, the disillusionment that accompanies the search for the ever-elusive American dream, and the decision to continue searching for a meaningful life all blend together to create an album with a soul, one that dreams and feels and gets knocked down and picks itself back up again. This is the kind of music that incites excitement and passion in its fans. Tracks like sta-dium-fi ller “Runaways” beg fans to put their lighters up and sing along, and heartfelt power ballads like “The Way It Was” and “Heart of a Girl” show Brandon’s more sensitive side.

Crank up the volume. This is one fi ne work of art.

a review

THE WHIGS

BY DANIEL HART

Contributing Writer

The Whigs’ new album Enjoy the Company was offi cially re-leased Tuesday; yet the band has been offering it up for sale on this year’s Fall tour stops (including a night in Oxford on Sept. 7). The album has had time to fl oat around speakers for a while. The fourth album from these Athens, Ga., natives has revealed itself to be the band’s fi nest work thus far, a mature venture fi lled with risks and pure enjoyment, as the title suggests, for the rest of us.

The album opens with an eight minute call to arms as “Staying Alive” storms out of the gate. In straying further than ever from the band’s early-career stylings of guitar, bass and drums in short bursts, the cries of a horn section jubilantly reveal itself. A little past the three-minute mark the song suddenly slows, as only a quiet guitar riff and Parker Gispert’s vocals remain and the song slowly reconstructs itself. Clattering symbols return and the gui-tars begin screaming urgently, only to be reconciled by a slow descent and Gispert’s fi nal whisper: “Staying alive, staying alive.”

The album continues to surprise; after rollicking verses, the chorus of “Tiny Treasures” contains the fi rst strains of acoustic guitar on the album and begins to sound like an orphaned Wilco track. Pianos periodically tinkle on “Couple of Kids,” and elec-tric guitars are found wholly absent on “Thank You” but replaced with gentle acoustic strums.

The album’s lyrics exist at a relational level, as on previous Whigs’ efforts, but these words are of a different tone: this album is a celebration both musically and lyrically. Of the small mo-ments of domesticity (“Scream if you get bit by the snake in the yard” sings Gilbert, ready to aid, on “Thank You”) as well as that holy grail of rock and roll, as found on the transparently titled “Rock and Roll Forever” and the infectious tension of “Waiting”.

“Enjoy the Company” exudes an infectious joy. A true state-ment of intent, the joys of the smallest things in life set to ex-uberant rock music with innovative, surprising touches. “Enjoy the company, take a look around you, smell the roses,” the Whigs seem to say, and as play is pressed, this is exactly what happens.

A REVIEW

THE KILLERS

Every viewer, no matter heritage, age or gender, understands fear, and this is what we learn to overcome through these characters.”

“

@LIFEREFLECTOR

FOLLOW THE LIFESECTION ON TWITTER.WE’RE FUN.@LIFEREFLECTOR.

8 | friday, september 21, 2012 THE REFLECTOR

SPORTS Stat of the day: 8- the SeaSon-opening unbeaten

Streak of the mSu Soccer team, tying a School record

NfL oN the tube:New eNgLaNd at

baLtimore

suNday, 7:20 p.m. NbC

Undefeated Bulldogs prepare for Jaguars of South Alabamaby ray butler

Staff Writer

Before turning their attention back to SEC opponents, the Mississippi State Bulldogs will face the South Alabama Jaguars Saturday at Davis Wade Stadi-um.

MSU (3-0) is fresh off a non-conference road scare a week ago at Troy. The Bulldogs were plagued by missed tackles and dropped passes throughout the game and yielded a grue-some 572 yards of offense to Troy; yet, the Bulldogs found a way to escape the game 30-24 victors.

Head coach Dan Mullen said the team had to clean things up at practice this week.

“There were opportunities to do things better and a lot of moments where we really could have seized the momentum on both sides but we didn’t,” Mul-len said.

Still undefeated and ranked No. 23 in the latest Associated Press poll, State will look to fix its miscues against South Ala-bama, a non-conference oppo-nent currently in the process of transitioning to a FBS league. Previously an independent team, the Jaguars, whose foot-ball program began in 2009, will play a full-FBS schedule be-fore officially becoming a mem-ber of the Sun Belt in 2013.

Through three games this season, the Jaguars have a 1-2 record that includes a win against Nicholls State and loss-es to Texas San Antonio and

North Carolina State. In practice this week, MSU

coaches and players have put great emphasis on fundamentals in hopes of sharpening prepa-ration in future games. Fresh-man wide receiver Joe Morrow said some of the offensive woes against Troy were due to a lack of focus, which is something else the Bulldogs have worked on during practice this week.

“We weren’t locked in,” Mor-row said. “This week, we’ve been framing up catches and catching more balls. We’re going to fix it.”

Defensively, Mullen said MSU had 22 missed tackles and 18 missed assignments against Troy. Senior defensive tackle Josh Boyd said this can be cured by correcting different tech-niques throughout the game.

“Sometimes we were just fo-cused more on making plays instead of reading our keys,” Boyd said. “We just made some careless mistakes. It was a disap-pointment, but it’s something we have to correct.”

Although MSU’s defense gave up big plays to Troy, the unit also produced big plays, creating four turnovers. Senior cornerback Darius Slay, who accounted for three of the turn-overs, said State’s big plays on defense against Troy were able to balance out several of the miscues throughout the course of the game.

“We’re not used to (mis-cues),” Slay said. “We’re used to making big plays, stopping the run and getting three-and-outs. The defense wasn’t very consis-tent, but we made a lot of big plays to turn the game around.”

Slay also said MSU’s ability to win games while struggling with execution is a sign of the magnitude of team the Bulldogs are this season.

“Playing a sloppy game like that lets us know that we have a good team when we still pull out a win,” Slay said. “This week we’ve come back in, got better and fixed our correc-tions.”

For South Alabama’s of-fense, success is dictated large-ly by the play at the quarter-back position. Sophomore C.J. Bennett and junior Ross Metheny have combined for over 600 yards passing in the Jaguar’s three games and

added three touchdowns.On the other side of the ball,

USA is anchored by senior Jake Johnson. The middle lineback-er has racked up 30 tackles, four tackles for loss and a sack so far this season. As a whole, the Jaguars’ defense averages one takeaway a game and will certainly be looking for more against MSU on Saturday.

Mullen said South Alabama will try to spread its opponent’s defense out in a very similar way to Troy.

“Defensively, (South Ala-bama) is pretty stout,” Mullen said. “They’ve given up 300 yards a game. They’re a very sound defensive team and they play hard.”

Saturday’s game is set to kick off at 6 p.m. at Davis Wade Stadium. All students and fans attending the game are encour-aged to wear white.

Location: University Square Shopping Center 602 Highway 12 E. Starkville, MI 39759

Date: Friday, Sept 21th Saturday, Sept 22th

Time: Friday, 10am - 4pm Saturday, 11am - 4pm

The TaxSlayer.com Gator Bowl bus is

coming to Starkville! Stop by University Square to

submit your photo for a chance to win scholarship cash*, and

spin our wheel for more prizes!

Win a $10,000 scholarship

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No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited by law. Open to legal residents of the U.S. who are currently enrolled in one of the Universities participating in the Southeastern Conference (“SEC”). The “Snap, Vote & Win” Photo Contest is sponsored

by TaxSlayer.com Gator Bowl. For Official Rules, which govern, visit www.taxslayerplayer.com. Contest

begins 12:00 a.m. ET on 9/7/12 and ends at 11:59 p.m. ET on 11/17/12. *Scholarship awarded

in the form of a check

No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited by law. Open to legal residents of the U.S. who are currently enrolled in one of the Universities participating in the Southeastern Conference (“SEC”). The “Snap, Vote & Win” Photo Contest is sponsored

by TaxSlayer.com Gator Bowl. For Official Rules, which govern, visit www.taxslayerplayer.com. Contest

begins 12:00 a.m. ET on 9/7/12 and ends at 11:59 p.m. ET on 11/17/12. *Scholarship awarded

in the form of a check

Can’t make it by the bus? Just visit the website above and upload your own photo showing off your school spirit!

Try our new Turkey

Roasters!10% Off with MSU I.D.

Longest Student Health Center Wednesday, September 26 at Noon Room 350 A light lunch will be provided. For more information: Heather Richardson hbrichardson@saffairs.msstate.edu

If your life or a loved one’s has ever been touched by

cancer, we invite you to the Cancer Care Group Lunch and Learn series.

SEC SATURDAY

jay johNsoN | the refLeCtor

Freshman Derrick Milton has been an asset in the backfield this season, assisting LaDarius Perkins in the run game. The two backs have combined for 418 rush yards on the year.

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SPORTSREFLECTOR-ONLINE.COM friday, september 21, 2012 | 9

Soccer team hosts Vanderbilt, Tennessee in first SEC home games

By Austin ChAnCe

Staff Writer

After an 0-2 start in con-ference play, the Mississip-pi State volleyball team is looking for its first win in conference play. This week-end, the team travels to Ox-ford, seeking that crucial first SEC win against rival Ole Miss.

The Bulldogs’ last win was two weeks ago in the Allstate Sugar Bowl Clas-sic against Tulane. Since that victory, State has lost three matches, winning just two of its last 11 games in those matches. After losing to Georgia and Auburn last weekend, the Bulldogs find themselves in a tie for last place in the SEC West with LSU and Ole Miss.

This weekend’s game has more on the line than just a conference win. In-state bragging rights will also result from the match. Ole Miss is looking for its first conference win after losing to both new teams in the SEC, Missouri and Texas A&M, who are currently both undefeated in SEC play. Motivation will not be an issue for either side in this match.

The atmosphere at prac-tice this week has been different from most oth-er weeks. Freshman libero Roxanne McVey said this week’s practice has been in-tense in preparation for the Rebels.

“We are coming in with a new positive attitude so we can go up to Oxford and beat Ole Miss,” McVey said.

A l t h o u g h Ole Miss has the same con-ference re-cord as State (0-2), having the game in Oxford may turn out to be an advantage for the Rebels. Not to men-tion Ole Miss is currently undefeated at home, win-ning all three of its matches in the school’s annual Mag-nolia Invitational. With the Rebels’ current winning ways at home, this could be extra motivation for State to win its match on Friday, as if they needed more reason to fight for the victory.

Last season, MSU won three matches on the road against SEC opponents. Ole Miss was one of those three teams. After beat-

ing Ole Miss in Oxford, the Bulldogs went on to win two out of their next three matches, including a win against Kentucky in Starkville, which became the first win over a ranked opponent in the program’s history.

This year, with a victory over Ole Miss, State would separate itself from last place

in the divi-sion, while also placing the Rebels in the last place spot.

S o p h o -more de-fensive back Alex Scott said everyone

on the team understands the importance of this game.

“We have to win. This is a big deal for all of us,” Scott said.

A win against Ole Miss would also be the first step in achieving something State has not done since 2009—sweeping the se-ries against Ole Miss in a season. Last season, the Bulldogs came away with a victory in Oxford but were defeated three games to zero when the Rebels came to Starkville.

The match tonight is no ordinary match. This is a battle for supremacy in Mississippi, a chance to win the first game of conference play against a rival and the gaining of momentum for the rest of the upcoming season.

For freshmen such as Scott and Alex Warren, the rivalry is a thrill they have yet to experience. Howev-er, even though this will be the first match Warren will play against the Rebels, she said she still understands the importance of this match.

“This is personal. We have to win this, no ques-tions asked,” Warren said.

The experience of up-perclassmen Chanelle Bak-er and Paris Perret will be crucial for MSU. But aside from these two girls, only underclassmen have seen much playing time this sea-son.

Compare this to a Reb-el squad that has either a junior or senior currently leading the team in kills, digs, assists and blocks.

Adversity is present, but the Bulldogs are not shying away from the opportunity at hand. Game time is set for tonight at 7 in Oxford.

Rivalry renewed in search of first SEC win

By Forrest BuCk

Contributing Writer

The Mississippi State soc-cer team is seeking better results this weekend as Van-derbilt and Tennessee come to town.

MSU entered last week-end with high hopes as the team took an undefeated record on the road to be-gin SEC play with games at South Carolina on Friday and Kentucky on Sunday. Overall, the weekend did not go as planned, and the girls returned home with no victories, going 0-1-1 in the two games.

However, this past week-end was not a complete fail-ure. Even though MSU did not win the game against South Carolina, head coach Neil MacDonald said the girls played well as they tied in double overtime against a stingy South Carolina de-fense.

“We were excellent Friday. We played some really good soccer,” Macdonald said. “We created a lot of good opportunities in the game, and I felt we were a bit un-lucky that we didn’t win the game.”

The players agreed with their coach. Senior captain Madison McKee said the girls were happy with the way they played last Friday.

“We always want to win, but a 0-0 tie against them at their home in double over-time was a positive feeling,” McKee said.

Things did not go as well for the following game on Sunday as the Bulldogs trav-eled from South Carolina to Lexington, Ky., to play the Wildcats. The Dogs lost the game 3-0. The Wildcats got out to a 2-0 lead early, and State could never recover.

Macdonald said fatigue played a role in the way the team played against Ken-tucky.

“I thought we came out very flat,” he said. “We looked very tired from the travel and the fact that we

played 110 minutes on Fri-day night in the game that went into double overtime.”

MSU struggled offen-sively in this game, as well. State did not possess the ball very much, and because of this, the Bulldogs’ opportu-nities for offense were few and far between. Kentucky controlled possession the majority of the game, and it showed in the final box score as Kentucky had 21 shot at-tempts to MSU’s six.

Macdonald said the team’s lack of possessions was a rea-son for its offensive strug-gles.

“We didn’t create much offense because we didn’t have the ball,” Macdonald said. “We have to earn the right to play with the ball.”

The most surprising factor in the Kentucky game was the amount of points State allowed. MSU came into the game with six straight shutouts, which is a school record, but then gave up

three goals to the Wildcats. Despite the disappointing

performance, goal keeper Skylar Rosson said she is still optimistic about the team’s potential moving forward.

“We’re past that game, and we’re getting ready for this weekend,” Rosson said. “I still have just as much confidence in us as I did be-fore.”

State has no time to dwell on this past weekend with a Vanderbilt team coming to town Friday to which MSU has dropped four out the last five games. After that game, MSU hosts an even tougher opponent in No. 23 Tennessee. Vanderbilt and Tennessee played each other last weekend and tied.

The Bulldogs have the op-portunity to find out where they stand in the conference and make a case for SEC and NCAA Tournament appear-ances with two big wins over the Commodores and Vol-unteers.

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ian prester | the reflector

Freshman middle blocker Alex Warren will play in Oxford tonight for the first time in her career as the Dogs take on the Rebels.

ian prester | the reflector

Senior Zehra Syed and her Bulldog teammates have a chance to make some noise in the SEC this weekend as they host Vanderbilt tonight and No. 23 Tennesee on Sunday.

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We are coming in with a new positive attitude so we can go up to Oxford and beat Ole Miss.”Roxanne McVey,freshman libero

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