The Los Angeles Loyolan, Volume 77, Issue 1 - September 2, 1998

Features: _ £ The enduring controversy over Nabokov’s Lolita in print and film. Page 6 A&E: Summer film wrap up: what was hot and what was not. Page 8 Fall Preview Page 16 Sports : Crew's Shell House Sinks, Program Suspended ■ Athletics: Men’s and women’s crew face loss of entire season. by Jasmine Marshall News Editor No giant iceberg sent the crew team’s shell house to the ocean floor. The culprit was instead a small, inconspicuous piece of metal which has now dashed the hopes of a success¬ ful season for LMU’s rowers. At approximately 7 a.m. on Aug. 14, workers from the Department of Operations and Maintenance discovered the 33 year old shell house flounder¬ ing in the waters of the marina and sinking fast. An alarm had notified work¬ ers that a bilge pump in the crew team’s shell house had seized. According to David French, business affairs man¬ ager, “The workers attempted to fix the problem, and discov¬ ered the shell house was sink¬ ing. They then had to evacuate the shell house. After that, it went down pretty quick.” With it, the shell house took all of the team’s boats, oars, training equipment and crew team memorabilia, leaving the LMU men’s and women’s crew teams high and dry for the opening of the 1998-99 school year and their training season. French said the seizing of the bilge pump was not the cause of the sinking, nor was the age of the structure, which was constructed in 1965. The actual cause of the sinking has been attributed to the detach¬ ing of a clip which held the shell house to a pillar. “When the clip broke loose, it punc¬ tured the building,” French noted. “Had it not been for the clip, the structure would still be standing and in use.” Hopes of raising the shell house from the waters were dashed when work crews dis¬ covered the structure was sim- INDEX News 1 Features 5 Perspective 6 Arts & Entertainment 8 Classifieds 13 Sports 16 Q__n___t_b_e W_e_b_j www.lmu.edu/stuaffHoyolan ply too heavy to be raised by cranes. According to French, the situation forced the demoli¬ tion of the shell house, which was carried out by several local contracting firms. Both French and William Husack, LMU’s athletic direc¬ tor, emphasized that the total estimate in terms of monetary loss will not be available for several weeks due to ongoing insurance investigations. “The estimated loss in terms of dob lar amount is significant,” Husack said. “We lost all the boats, our memorabilia and several training machines, as well as maintenance equip¬ ment .” Late Monday Afternoon, Crew Coach Jan Mazgajsky was informed by Athletic Director William Husack that the crew program would be sus¬ pended for the 1998-99 season as a result of the loss of the shell house, “I’m not certain what the issue behind the deci¬ sion was,” Mazgajsky said. “We have had many offers from other schools for loans of equip¬ ment, and UCLA, even offered to share their shell house with our team.” Husack emphasized that the suspension is only for the 1998-99 season. “We are not eliminating the program. We are suspending it for the sea¬ son because of loss of equip¬ ment, budgetary issues, consid¬ erations of leadership of the program, and trying to do what’s best for the program on a whole.” Husack added, “We will honor our scholarship com¬ mitments to our student ath¬ letes.” In response to UCLA’s offers of sharing facilities, Husack said, “There were some fees involved, as well as considera¬ tions with timing and safety.” Members of the men and women’s crew teams expressed anger and disappointment at the athletic department’s deci¬ sion. Junior women’s rower Ashley Farasopoulos said, “I think it’s ridiculous, and not well thought out at all. It makes me very mad. There’s so much tradition and dedication for both the teams, and the ath¬ letic department has taken that away from us.” Senior men’s rower Mark Mason expressed concern about how the suspension will affect the future of the team. “If we lose this year, we lose all the novice rowers we have gotten Crew: page 2 ши Ж»». -Jak 1 ||1рй21||В * ш рщ KATIE SEUSS / LOYOLAN Debris from the crew team's sunken shell house floats in the waters of Marina Del Rey last week. Blue Chip Class of 2002 Makes Tneir Move by Roy Rufo Asst. News Editor The streets were packed with cars. The campus came alive, and first-year residence halls took on a whole new look. It can only mean one thing — * the class of 2002 has arrived. Although the heat did put a damper on the orientation activ¬ ities, the excitement of begin¬ ning a college career was evi¬ dent in the first year students. Split into various orientation groups, the freshmen engaged in numerous social activities, including ice breakers, the O’Lympics, O’Fest, and the very competitive lip sync between the four different colleges. Numbering 985 students, this year’s freshman class is the biggest ever at LMU. Participation from parents has greatly increased this year as well. The number of parents attending this year’s orientation sessions broke all previous records. “Before, the maximum number of parents we had attending orientation was 100 for every 150 students,” said Matthew Fissinger, director of undergraduate admissions. The gender breakdown of this group remains exactly the same as last year’s freshman class, with 57 percent of the group being female and 43 per¬ cent being male. As usual, a large portion of the students hail from California, Hawaii, and Arizona. This year there was a significant increase in the number of students coming from Washington State and Oregon, The most popular majors within the College of Liberal Arts are psychology, liberal New Class: page 2 0ENISE ESPINOZA / LOYOLAN First year students check out work study options at job fair (top) and show their enthusiasm during O’Lympics last Sunday (bottom).