Kreativecke » Jay Johnsons players dance in the dugout an

KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- After departing the celebration in victory lane at Kansas on Sunday, Kevin Harvick reflected on how his Stewart-Haas Racing team always seems to rally when its back is against the wall.Chase Elliott and Brad Keselowski just may need to follow suit.Harvick dealt with a mechanical issue a week ago at Charlotte that put him in a big hole heading to the second stop in the Chases round of 12. But he rebounded by winning the Sprint Cup race at Kansas, not only locking up his spot in the next round but taking the pressure out of Talladega.Things are going to happen, said Harvick, who also rebounded from a poor Chase opener to win at New Hampshire. Things can break and you just have to be able to rebound from them.Elliott and Keselowski are in precisely that situation.While several contenders were busy wrapping up top-10 finishes -- Carl Edwards was second, followed by Joey Logano, Charlotte winner Jimmie Johnson , Kyle Busch and Austin Dillon -- Elliott and Keselowski had been snared by late-race trouble that leaves them in desperation mode.Elliott was running near the front when his left rear tire began rubbing on his fender, forcing a stop that left him a lap down. He managed to get back on the lead lap, only to have the same issue with another set of tires that forced him into another unscheduled stop.I dont know if we got the left rear getting up on the track or something, and it got into the fender and it cut it down. I dont know, Elliott said. We had such a good car today.He wound up finishing 31st and is now 25 points out of the eighth and final spot in the next round, which basically turns the unpredictable race at Talladega into a must-win scenario.Race our hearts out and try to win, I guess, he said. Thats about all we can do.Keselowski had a similarly dreadful day. He began wiggling with 78 laps left and Denny Hamlin was unable to check up in time, the gentle tap sending the No. 2 car shooting down the track. He slammed into the grassy turf and tore up the front of his car.Keselowski wound up 38th, putting him seven points out of the final Chase spot.I like Talladega. Talladega has been good to me, said Keselowski, who has won four times there, including earlier this year. Im going to drive my butt off and at the end of the day I have faith that if it is meant to be, it is meant to be. We cant get down. There is a long way to go still.Things are more comfortable for other Chase contenders.Edwards ran up front all day and thought he had the car to beat at Kansas before Harvick pulled away from him on a late restart. He still finished second to move up two spots in the points race and now has a 24-point buffer between himself Logano in eighth place.Of course, that was of little solace to the Missouri native. He considers the speedway just across the Kansas border his home track and always has thousands of fans in the stands. Hes wanted to win at Kansas more than anywhere else on the circuit but has yet to reach victory lane.Theres so many people that come to this track that support me, he said. Maybe a day or two will pass and Ill be more excited about the points situation going to Talladega.Martin Truex Jr. had issues with the refueling mechanism that forced him to pit out of sequence and wound up 11th. Kurt Busch finished two spots back in 13th after having to go to his backup car following a spin in practice. Hamlin dealt with an issue with the front splitter and was 15th.As a result, Logano sits in the tenuous eighth spot in points -- tied with Dillon and six ahead of Hamlin -- as the Chase heads to the elimination race at Talladega.We came out swinging. Thats what we had to do. We did everything we were supposed to do, Logano said. Its not comfortable being tied with Austin going into next week but thatll be fun. Stitched Soccer Jerseys . After slipping from the summit during the week, the Gunners overcame struggling Crystal Palace 2-0 on Sunday thanks to Alex Oxlade-Chamberlains second-half brace. Soccer Jerseys Outlet . Ronaldo produced a spectacular individual performance on Tuesday, scoring all three goals and guiding Portugal into the next years World Cup in Brazil with a 3-2 victory in Sweden. The Real Madrid forward has scored 66 goals in 2013, but the last three may be the boost he needs to upstage Messi after FIFA unexpectedly extended the voting period for the Ballon dOr to Nov. https://www.soccerjerseyschina.us/ . -- Ryan Getzlaf grabbed the three pucks wrapped in tape and held them up to his chest in the Anaheim Ducks dressing room for a celebration nine seasons in the making. Replica Soccer Jerseys . Reassurance came from Paul Tesori, his caddie and close friend whose newborn son is in intensive care in a Florida hospital. "Paul sent me a text this morning, just told me he loved me and wanted to go out and fight as hard as I would any other day," Simpson said Sunday after doing just that. Wholesale Soccer Jerseys .Y. -- The Buffalo Sabres have placed centre Cody Hodgson on injured reserve and recalled two players from their AHL affiliate in Rochester. OMAHA, Neb. -- The long talk came after an out-of-conference game at Arizona State in April. Sandwiched between important home series against Washington State and Stanford, Arizonas late rally fell short and freshman outfielder Alfonso Rivas finished the game on the pitchers mound.First-year coach Jay Johnson kept the Wildcats in left field for close to an hour. And after 30 games on the job, Johnson finally let it out. He told his team he wanted to win the national championship.That was the first time I ever heard about that, senior second baseman Cody Ramer said.This was heady stuff for the Wildcats, who had missed the NCAA postseason in each of the past three years. After a 3-0 win Monday over Coastal Carolina in Game 1 of the College World Series finals, they stand one victory away from the programs fifth title.Game 2 is set for Tuesday night at 8 ET on ESPN.Another Arizona win in the best-of-three series would make Johnson, 39, the first college baseball coach to win a championship in his first season at a school. Four others have played for the crown and lost.Already, after four straight Arizona wins in Omaha and five wins in six games, Johnson has lept from being an emerging name to a figure front-and-center in the sports landscape.He implores the team to attack the game with a Navy SEALs intensity, but also to shrug off the pressure of the moment and try to relax.Johnson is the son of a longtime high school track and field coach from Oroville, California. Hes an overachiever who ran his own Division I program for two seasons at Nevada before Arizona athletic director Greg Byrne picked him to take over when Andy Lopez retired last May.Johnson got his Division I start as an assistant at the University of San Diego. His boss there, Rich Hill, said the young coach blends top-shelf work ethic with integrity and intelligence.Thats what separates him from everybody else whos coaching college baseball right now, Hill said.Hyperbole? Maybe not.Johnson played at Point Loma Nazarene, an National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics school, and took over at his alma mater in 2005 at age 27. After one year, Johnsons college coach, Scott Sarver, convinced Hill to hire Johnson at San Diego.Trust me, Sarver told Hill. Hes special.Johnson helped USD climb to new heights in his eight years as an assistant there. The Toreros made six NCAA regional appearances and signed the No. 1- and 2-ranked recruiting classes nationally in 2008 and 2010, respectively, according to Baseball America.Johnson carried the torch, Hill said, in landing Kris Bryant, a raw talent out of Las Vegas who blossomed into the 2013 Dick Howser Trophy winner at USD and the 2015 National League Rookie of the Year with the Chicago Cubs.Bryant hit three homers Monday night for the Cubs in Cincinnati as Johnson moved one step closer to a spot among coaching royalty at the College World Series.I dont think my night could get any better, Johnson said after the game.At Nevada, Johnson finished 72-42 with one Mountain West crown. The Wolf Pack won 41 games in 2015 but missed the 64-team tournament. That miss ate at Johnson, who dreamed of a spot in the CWS during a late-season trip last year when Nevada played Creighton in a two-game series at TD Ameritrade Park.That was the No. 1 motivating factor to be at a place where [the Wolf Pack] had won before, Johnson said.In the minutes after finishing exit interviews with 24 players last season, Johnson received a text message from an associate of Byrnes. Would Johnson be interested in talking about the Arizona job? Of course he was interested.Later tthat night, Byrne and Johnson talked on the phone.dddddddddddd A few days later, they met in San Diego.Byrne said he received strong endorsements on Johnson from Lopez, the retiring U of A coach who won a title with the Wildcats in 2012, and Mississippi State coach John Cohen, whom Byrne hired when he was AD at MSU in 2009.About 30 minutes into the first meeting with Johnson, Byrne said, I knew I had to hire this person.Byrne was struck by Johnsons passion, his focus and his plan for Arizona. His strong recruiting ties in Southern California also impressed the AD.One of the things that Jay told me when I hired him was that the Arizona job was like the New York Yankees, Byrne said Monday night outside the victorious locker room. Hes a West Coast guy, and he fits extremely well at the U of A.That said, Johnson earns a base salary of $160,000 with additional income that reportedly pushes him close to $300,000. Several Pac-12 coaches earn in excess of $500,000. Salaries get considerably higher in the SEC.Ive never talked to that guy in my life, Greg Byrne, said Hill, the San Diego coach, but he looks like the smartest AD in the world. He could have hired anybody he wanted. And at the same time, I know hes smart enough to do everything he can to hold on to Jay.Because theres no hotter commodity in the country right now than him.Notably, Texas remains without a coach after the retirement last month of Augie Garrido, who won a national championship 21 years ago at Cal State Fullerton and left a year later for the riches of Austin.If youre the University of Texas, you do everything you can to pay [Johnson] $1 million, Hill said. You do a backroom deal, so he cant use it as leverage or anything else, and you get it done. I know who Jay is. Anywhere he goes, that organization will be the best it can be. If you put him at a place like the University of Texas with unlimited resources, watch out.The 44-year-old Byrne is no newcomer to this business, with coaches Sean Miller and Rich Rodriguez on his payroll.The way I look at it, Byrne said, is that Id much rather have a coach thats in demand than have one who youre trying to figure out if its the right fit or not.Johnson wore the same look Monday night as he did when the Wildcats beat UCLA in a March series and lost three straight at Utah.His dad, Jerry Johnson, the former coach, is having the time of his life in Omaha. Jay Johnsons players dance in the dugout and throw water when they score. But their coach is unwavering.This is the guy who said he peers at WarrenNolan.com, an RPI-tracking site, 17 times per day.I guess you would call it an addiction, Johnson said.Not an addiction, said Hill. Its steely focus.Hes got a different motor than anybody else you come in contact with, Hill said. Hes always going.The San Diego coach recalls visiting Johnson a few years ago at his Point Loma home, near Hills favorite surfing spot. Hill inquired about Johnsons refrigerator, oven and washer-dryer set, none of which looked like they had ever been used.But Johnson had two dry-erase boards -- one full of NCAA regional scenarios and the other color-coded and lined with recruiting prospects.I was like, Dude, no wonder youre single, Hill said.Johnson is growing. He met Maureen Marshall at Nevada. Theyre getting married. The couple has yet to set a date.With one more victory here, perhaps Marshall can temporarily pull his attention away from baseball. And theyd have more than a marriage to celebrate. ' ' '