Area Olympians Take Their Shots On Court, In Boat Or Behind Gun, Northwest’s Best In Line For Gold

From Dream Teamers to Decathlon Dan to virtual unknowns, Washington and the Inland Northwest will be well represented at the 1996 Olympic Games.

On the U.S. team, the biggest Northwest delegation will be in rowing. Seven athletes who either grew up or attended college in the state will participate, and three of those - sisters Elizabeth and Mary McCagg of Kirkland and Gonzaga University graduate Monica Tranel Michini - will be in women’s eights.

A number of athletes with area ties will compete for other nations, mostly in track and field. Former Washington State Cougars Michael Joubert (400 meters, Australia), Francis Dodoo (triple jump, Ghana), Tony Li (high hurdles, China), Christos Pallakis (pole vault, Greece) and Chantal Brunner (women’s long jump, New Zealand) are expected to be in Atlanta. Tawanda Chiwira, a 400 runner at the University of Idaho, will run for Zimbabwe.

Former Cougars basketball player Camille Thompson is a member of the Canadian national team.

An update on three area Olympians:

John Stockton

The beatings have begun. Forty-one points over the Australians. Sixty-one over the Chinese.

Once the Olympic Games begin, Dream Team III could well match the record for wretched excess set by Dream I when it won basketball gold in 1992 by an average of 44 points a game. But John Stockton has already seen a difference.

“I don’t know if it’s going to be more competitive,” he said, “but in terms of teams being less awestruck, yeah, I think they’ll come at us a lot more.

“Last time, they just wanted autographs. They were thrilled to be out there. Now that’s finished - at least from the teams that have played us before.”

One other difference: In Barcelona in 1992, Stockton was sufficiently anonymous - compared to his famous and conspicuous teammates, that is - that he could shoot home video among the tourists in the Las Ramblas district and not be recognized.

Not much chance of that in Atlanta.

Beyond that, if you want to play that-was-then/this-is-now, you’ll probably have to play without the 12-year National Basketball Association veteran from Spokane. Stockton is a proud alumnus of the original - some might say the only - Dream Team.

“People say compare them and I won’t compare,” said the 34-year-old Utah Jazz guard. “You had three legitimate legends on that team. This team has some legends to be made, possibly.”

Possibly Stockton.

In terms of championship braid, no, he doesn’t rank with the Bird-Magic-Jordan trinity of Dream Team I. But he is the NBA’s all-time leader in assists and steals, due in no small part to his durability - he’s missed just four games in 12 seasons.

And included in his Hall of Fame resume upon his eventual retirement will be not one, but two gold medals. Counting the one the U.S. is about to win, of course.

Only five Americans have played on back-to-back gold medal basketball teams: Burdette Haldorson (1956-60), William Hougland (52-56) and Bob Kurland (48-52) for the U.S. men, and Anne Donovan and Teresa Edwards for the 1984-88 U.S. women. That number will double this year, since Stockton, Karl Malone, Scottie Pippen, Charles Barkley and David Robinson all return from the original Dreamers.

The foregone conclusion of a gold medal starts with the naming of the team, but Stockton said that feeling is hardly as overwhelming as the first couple of practices.

“At the beginning when everybody comes in, there’s just so much talent that there doesn’t seem like any way you’re going to get it together to play as a unit,” he said. “So you kind of just throw it out there and let the talent take over.”

Karen Kraft

She’s sponsored by the Newport Kiwanis Club, but it’s not as if Karen Kraft’s rowing career was christened in the Pend Orielle River.

The roots are recent: Her parents moved to Newport from California, and siblings Heidi and Erich attend Newport High School. But Kraft’s route to Atlanta has taken her around the globe.

She took up rowing while an architecture student at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo, hooked up with her pairs partner at U.S. Rowing’s training center in Chattanooga, won a silver medal in the world championships in Finland last year and detoured to Australia to find the fast track to the Games.

Now she and partner Melissa Schwen are Sports Illustrated’s pick to win the gold in women’s coxless pairs, the finals of which are scheduled July 27 at Lake Lanier some 55 miles outside of Atlanta.

It’s been a rapid rise for Kraft and Schwen, who met in 1994 and won the U.S. trials for the world championships the next summer. Last September, they decided to leave the women’s training center in Chattanooga to train in Australia because they felt national coach Hartmut Buschbacher’s attentions were concentrated on the women’s eight, which had won the 1995 world championship. In Australia, Kraft and Schwen worked with Dick Garrard, who is recognized for his expertise with small crews.

In the process, they took a huge chunk off their 2,000-meter time - and came home to whip all comers in the Olympic trials.

Eric Uptagrafft

To twist an old expression, Eric Uptagrafft still shoots with the gun he brung.

It’s an Anshutz 1813 - “the original rifle I bought in 1983,” said the 30-year-old University High School graduate.

“I don’t know if that’s unusual - there are some pretty fancy rifles out there now. But this shoots as well or better than those. It’s a lot to do with what you’re used to, and since I don’t spend all my time training, I don’t think it’s a good idea to tinker with positions all the time the way some guys do.”

Some of those guys are staying home, too, while Uptagrafft takes his shot at Olympic gold.

His turn comes July 25, when the 50-meter free rifle prone competition begins at the Wolf Creek Shooting Complex - the site where Uptagrafft won the U.S. Olympic Trials last April.

Though he tried out for the team in 1984 - just out of high school - Uptagrafft didn’t shoot in either the 1988 or ‘92 trials. He attended Texas A&M out of high school, quit to join the Army, then returned to school at West Virginia “when I decided Army life wasn’t for me.

“I only had two years of (shooting) eligibility left at West Virginia and when that was over, I guess I was tired of shooting,” he said. “I was kind of bummed out on it, so I decided I was retired.”

Six months later, he unretired.

“It’s good to take breaks, I think,” Uptagrafft said. “The full-time shooters at the Olympic Training Center or the Army marksmanship unit - they’ve got so much riding on this. It’s their whole life. It’s not for me, and that takes a little pressure off.”

An aerospace engineer for Lockheed-Martin in Colorado, Uptagrafft started competitive shooting with the Foresteen Junior Rifle Club in Spokane, “in an old building downtown that got condemned,” he remembered. Another Foresteen alum, Launi Meili of Cheney, won Olympic gold in rifle shooting in 1988.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 3 Photos (2 Color)

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: Area Olympians Following is a list of U.S. Olympians from around the area: Washington Dawn Allinger, Atlanta (Washington State University), team handball Lance Bade, Ridgefield, trapshooting Kelly Blair, Prosser, track and field (heptathlon) Jennifer Devine, Portland (University of Washington), rowing (double sculls) Jacob Heiveil, Bothell, exhibition wheelchair (1,500) Aretha Hill, Seattle, track and field (discus) Allen James, Sacramento (Western Washington University), track and field (race walking) Kasey Keller, Olympia, men’s soccer Karen Kraft, Newport, rowing (pairs) Roger Mar, Seattle, pistol (rapid fire) Elizabeth McCagg, Kirkland, rowing (eight with coxswain) Mary McCagg, Kirkland, rowing (eight with coxswain) Monica Tranel Michini, Billings, Mont., (Gonzaga University), rowing (eight with coxswain) Peter Newton, Bellevue, kayak (sprint) Gary Payton, Seattle, basketball Marcus Schneider, Everett, rowing (lightweight four) Jason Scott, Seattle, rowing (fours without coxswain) Adam Setliff, Seattle, track and field (discus) Scott Shipley, Poulsbo, kayak (slalom) John Stockton, Spokane, basketball Rebecca Twigg, Seattle, cycling (pursuit, time trial) Eric Uptagrafft, Lakewood, Colo. (University High School, Spokane), rifle (prone)

Idaho Dan O’Brien, Moscow, track and field (decathlon) Greg Randolph, McCall, cycling (road)