FORWARD THINKING
UNM would rather look ahead than back at last year’s loss to the Aggies
As it turns out, we still don’t know exactly how big a deficit the University of New Mexico athletics department accumulated last year.
The athletics department reported to the Journal last month the deficit for the 201617 fiscal year was $208,264. On Tuesday, at a Board of Regents Finance and Facilities committee meeting, UNM Controller Liz Metzger said officials recently determined that the actual number is closer to $372,000, though even that figure won’t be official until the annual external audit is completed in October.
Metzger told the Journal the discovery was made as part of the “normal accounting” process as staff reviewed reconciliations and year-end schedules ahead of the external audit. That audit is separate from the special audit undertaken earlier this summer by the Office of the State Auditor in response to concerns about athletics’ financial management and fundraising practices.
“We just needed to make a couple of accounting adjustments that were entries made last year-end that should’ve gotten reversed in FY17 and did not,” Metzger said.
Based on previous years’ numbers reported by UNM, that would bring athletics’ deficit to main campus to $4.8 million — the sum of the losses athletics has reported in eight of the last 10 years.
While the number grew Tuesday — not only beyond the $208,000 figure from last month but also since the department reported to the Regents in May a projected deficit of $97,000 — it is no indication of wrongdoing, Metzger insisted.
“No, no, no,” Metzger said. “It wasn’t even athletics. No, no, no. That’s not even a concern. It has nothing to do with athletics accounting staff. This is just a normal thing we go through in our controller’s division as we’re closing the books on the fiscal year. So we also found adjustments in other areas of campus
NEW YORK — When her work was done, her first trip to the U.S. Open semifinals since 2010 secured, if just barely, Venus Williams sat in her sideline chair and beamed .
Williams reached her third major semifinal of the season — something she last did 15 years ago — by edging two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (2) on Tuesday night to a soundtrack of thunderous partisan support under a closed roof at Arthur Ashe Stadium.
“I have to say, I felt every single one of you guys behind me — all 23,000,” Williams told the crowd. “I mean, that feels good. It feels amazing. And I didn’t want to let you guys down.”
The 37-year-old Williams, who won titles at Flushing Meadows way back in 2000 and 2001, trailed 3-1 in the third set before digging out of the hole with a little help: Kvitova’s eighth double-fault handed over the break that made it 3-all. And Kvitova’s ninth double-fault got Williams to match point in the tiebreaker.
Williams will face unseeded Sloane Stephens on Thursday in the first allAmerican women’s semifinal in New York since 2002. Stephens advanced with a 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (4) victory over 16th-seeded Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia. It is Stephens’ deepest run at any major since 2013 and the apex of a recovery from foot surgery in January.
Kvitova, seeded 13th, was hoping to prolong her comeback from a knife attack less than nine months ago by reaching the first U.S. Open semifinal of her career. She needed surgery on her racket-holding hand after she was cut by an intruder at her home in the Czech Republic in December. She returned to the tour at the French Open in May, losing in the second round there and at Wimbledon.
Kvitova has said she still does not have full strength in her left hand. But she was often at her powerful best against No. 9 Williams, especially in the last two sets, repeatedly delivering big, flat forehands. Neither woman played with a ton of subtlety, mainly trading stinging groundstrokes from the baseline on exchanges that grew in intensity as the 2-hour, 34-minute encounter went along.
“First of all, everything that she’s gone through — to go through that is unbelievable, and you don’t imagine that you’re going to wake up one day and that’s going to happen,” Williams said. “So it’s so wonderful to see her back and playing amazing.”
Williams, who revealed in 2011 she had been diagnosed with an energysapping autoimmune disease, is the oldest women’s semifinalist at a major tournament since Martina Navratilova at Wimbledon in 1994.
But this sort of throwback run is becoming almost routine again for Williams, who made it to the Australian Open final in January of this year, then the Wimbledon final in July. In 2002, she participated in three Grand Slam finals, losing each to her younger sister Serena.
The older Williams made sure Little Sis got a mention Tuesday, too: When she was asked in her oncourt interview about the success of American women at this U.S. Open — 15th-seeded Madison Keys and 20th-seeded CoCo Vandeweghe play their quarterfinals Wednesday — Venus replied, “Have to give some credit to Serena.”
In the men’s quarterfinals, 12th-seeded Pablo Carreno Busta of Spain had no trouble beating No. 29 Diego Schwartzman of Argentina 6-4, 6-4, 6-2.