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- 1. Wire Reports RICHMOND, Va.— Joey Logano won the pole position Friday for tonight’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Richmond Inter- national Raceway. The Daytona 500 winner turned a fast lap at 127.071 mph in the third round on the 0.75-mile oval. He easily edged Denny Hamlin for the top spot, with Kurt Busch and A.J. Allmendinger starting in the second row. Hamlin’s best lap in the final round came at 126.796 mph. The pole is the series-high third of the season for Logano in nine races. He will begin the 400-lap race 30 points behind Kevin Harvick for the series lead. The top spot also is “the most surprising pole” Loga- no’s won, he said, because he needed to run an extra lap in each of the first two rounds of qualifying to move on and still was at the back of the 12-car field when the final round began. “When you are sitting 10th or 11th going into the last ses- sion, you can swing for SPRINT CUP Logano on Richmond pole News-Journal/NIGEL COOK University’s Cody Vandehey gets a hit during Friday’s game. By DANNY KLEIN danny.klein@news-jrnl.com DELAND — An unlikely, unpredictable week for University ended with another stunner. Only this time, the Titans were left wondering, not celebrating, when the final pitch was thrown. University committed six errors, walked six batters and lost 12-2 in five innings Fri- day night to Oviedo Hagerty in the District 2-8A title game at Conrad Park. The defeat dampened a surprising run out of the eighth and final spot in one of the state’s toughest brackets. With wins against top-ranked Lake Brantley and Spruce Creek, the area’s best team all season, it’s easy to say few people saw this coming. Coach Frank Martello felt the same way about this game. “What a week,” Martello said. “Talk about highs and lows. As proud as I am that we got here and got into this champi- onship game, I’m equally as disappointed that we didn’t perform up to our level.” Despite the sting, Martello said the Ti- tans should have no problem rebounding. That’s because, for the first time in pro- gram history, University still has postsea- son baseball to play. The runner-up Titans will head to Flagler Palm Coast — winners of District 1-8A PREP BASEBALL Titans’ run at district title falls short SPORTS SECTION B NEWS-JOURNAL SATURDAY, APRIL 25, 2015 STREAK SNAPPED The Yankees ended the Mets’ 11-game winning streak with a 6-1 victory. PAGE 6B MY TWO CENTS KEN WILLIS B ill Safire has been dead for almost six years. Maybe that’s a good thing, because he didn’t have to read this week’s story about Floyd Mayweather and his inflated view of self-worth. Well, you know, not inflated by modern athletic standards (particularly boxers) but inflated by everyone else’s standards. Along with politics, Safire often would venture into the world of language with a column conveniently titled, “On Language.” If he’d read Mayweather’s words this week, he would’ve spit out a column before his coffee cooled. In reviewing his claim of being the best boxer ever, May- weather said, “I’m pretty sure I’ll get criticized for what I said, but I could care less. I could care less about the backlash.” That statement, of course, suggests Floyd could care less. Right about now is a good time to remind everyone ... what Floyd means to say is, he couldn’t care less. You know who you are, so stop doing this. If you could care less, it suggests you indeed care, at least a little. So there’s some daylight between the floor and your level of caring. If you couldn’t care less, it means you don’t care. But as a consolation, at least you know the proper use of the phrase. Linguists like Safire, assum- ing they recovered from that regularly butchered phrase, would’ve been sent into deeper despair by Mayweather’s final line about the subject. “It is what it is.” Yeah, I know, but at least he got that one right. Now, as for the hype about next week’s fight between May- weather and Manny Pacquiao, all together now: I couldn’t care less. AND SO ON ... zzIn catching up with the latest Tim Tebow news, you’ve prob- ably seen the name Tom House, who’s been helping Tebow with his passing delivery. Funny, because House is a former baseball pitching coach, and now he’s working with a quar- terback who has the delivery of Juan Marichal. House also is the answer to a decent trivia question. Al Downing threw the pitch Hank Aaron hit for his 715th homer, but it was House who caught it. He was an Atlanta reliever, in the Braves’ bullpen just over the left-field fence. zzDo the Jacksonville Jaguars pick Leonard Williams at No. 3, solidify an already decent defense and try to win a bunch of 14-10 games, or pick Amari Cooper to give the offense a real receiver? If anyone knows about punt- ing, it’s the Jags, so maybe it’d be best to trade the pick. The offers will come. zzThe 40th annual Gator Day banquet is Monday at the Daytona Beach Resort. Instead of the new Head Gator, Jim McElwain, the local boosters will get defensive coordina- tor Geoff Collins as speaker. I know what you’re thinking. A downer, maybe. But sometimes, second-stringers at the podium turn out to be a regular Shecky Green. And sometimes not. Reach Ken Willis at ken. willis@news-jrnl.com. Twitter: @HeyWillieNJ. Stop being careless with words By BRIAN LINDER brian.linder@news-jrnl.com The high Single-A Daytona Tortu- gas are stacked with top draft picks, hard-throwing hurlers and a couple of guys with pop in their bats. While that has made for a fun time at The Jack this sea- son — Daytona is 8-1 at home — it also means the Tortugas’ stars of today might be gone to- morrow, taking another step up the ladder on their way, hopefully, to the Cincinnati Reds’ lineup. Below is a look at the players who could be first in line to move up to Double-A Pensacola, and the guys who could be coming in from low Single-A Dayton to replace them: MOVING UP Nick Travieso, RHP The Buzz: How good has the 21-year-old been? Daytona manager Eli Marrero said Travieso did not have his best stuff the last time out, and all he did was strike out five in six scoreless innings to get his second win. The Reds took Travieso with the No. 14 pick of the 2012 draft. After a year of rookie ball, he spent the past two seasons putting together solid perfor- mances in Dayton. He can throw his offspeed stuff in the mid-80s for strikes, and follow with a heater he can crank up to 95 mph. He is 2-1 with a 1.47 ERA and 15 strikeouts in 18.1 innings. His portfolio, pedigree and performance make him the favorite to be the Tortugas’ first call-up to Pensacola. Nick Howard, RHP The Buzz: Howard is big (6-foot-4, 215 pounds), can hit 95 mph, and he has been good thus far. The No. 19 pick in the 2014 draft, Howard is 2-0 with a 0.00 ERA. If there is a knock on him right now, DAYTONA TORTUGAS STOCKS ARE UPAfter 2 weeks, some players could find themselves in new places News-Journal file/NIGEL COOK Nick Travieso has a 2-1 record with a 1.47 ERA for the Tortugas. With a few more strong starts, he could find himself at Double-A Pensacola. Up Next What: Toyota Owners 400 When: 7 tonight Where: Richmond (Virginia) International Raceway TV/Radio: Fox/1150 AM Inside Roundup, tonight’s lineup, Friday’s Xfinity results, PAGE 4B JOEY LOGANO earned his third pole position of the season. Inside Friday’s box score at Tampa, PAGE 2B SEE STOCKS, PAGE 2B SEE RICHMOND, PAGE 4B SEE RUN, PAGE 7B 0002128943 Our Customers Come First! See our ad on the back cover of Classified.GaryYeomansFord.com • 888-928-0806