Sports, Monday, June 1st

By: Nathan Bloechl — sports@kilj.com 

High School Baseball and Softball Begins Today:

After nearly a three-month hiatus, high school sports resume in Iowa today with the beginning of practice for high school baseball and softball.

Today marks the start of a truncated, two-week practice schedule that leads up to the first games being played on June 15th.

There have been no events since the end of the boys’ state basketball tournament.

Area teams getting underway today include: Mount Pleasant, Winfield-Mount Union and New London.

WACO co-op’s with Mount Pleasant.

Iowa Finalizes 2024 Schedule:

The University of Iowa has added Troy University to its 2024 football schedule. The announcement was made Friday by the Iowa Athletics Department.

The addition of Troy visiting Kinnick Stadium on Sept. 14, 2024, completes Iowa’s 2024 schedule and marks the first football game between the two programs.

Additional non-conference games include Iowa hosting Illinois State to open the season Aug. 31, and Iowa State visiting Kinnick Stadium on Sept. 7 for the annual Iowa Corn Cy-Hawk Series contest.

The date of the Iowa State game had not previously been announced. Iowa visits Iowa State on Sept. 6, 2025.

In addition to the contract completing the 2024 schedule, Iowa also announced a change to the 2023 schedule.

Home dates with Western Michigan and Utah State have been exchanged from previous contracted dates.

Utah State will visit Iowa City Sept. 2, 2023, with Western Michigan playing at Iowa on Sept. 16.

Iowa’s Big Ten Conference schedule in 2024 includes home dates with Northwestern, Maryland, Wisconsin, and Nebraska, while the Hawkeyes travel to Purdue, Rutgers, Illinois, Indiana, and Minnesota.

UNI’s King Named Track and Field All-American:

UNI track and field junior Darius King was named an indoor track and field All-American in the shot put by the USTFCCCA Tuesday.

King qualified for the NCAA Indoor Championship in the shot put after throwing a career-best mark of 19.58m (64-feet-3) while breaking the facility and UNI record at the Jimmy Grant Invite hosted by the University of Iowa on Dec. 14.

He closed the season ranked 14th in the NCAA and earned AA honors for the first time of his career.

He won the MVC title, leading the UNI throws crew who took five of the top seven spots.

King is one of just two Missouri Valley Conference athletes to earn All-American honors, the other being Southern Illinois’ Alexis Roberson in the female weight throw.

MLB Proposes 114-Game Schedule:

The Major League Baseball Players Association delivered a return-to-play proposal to MLB on Sunday that includes a 114-game season, deferred salaries in the event of a canceled postseason and the option for all players to opt out of a potential 2020 season due to coronavirus concerns, ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports.

The 114-game season, which under the union’s proposal would run from June 30 to Oct. 31, is expected to be immediately dismissed by the league, Passan reports.

MLB proposed an 82-game season and suggested that the more games teams play this year, the more money they lose.

The union remains steadfast that players should receive their full prorated salaries, while MLB’s plan included significant pay cuts that affected the highest paid players the most but covered all levels.