Columnist Ron Kantowski: Cliff divers to pay a visit to Lake Havasu

Ron Kantowski's notes column appears Tuesday and Thursday. Reach him at [email protected] or 259-4088.

If a sports psychologist -- or even Dr. J -- asked an average fan to play the name association game with the subject being "ABC's Wide World of Sports," he might get a response similar to this:

Jim McKay. Agony of Defeat guy falling off the ski jump ramp. Acapulco cliff diving.

The latter might very well be the quintessential Wide World sport, and its latest reincarnation actually is coming to the region -- minus the Acapulco part, of course.

Red Bull on the Rocks, the first extreme cliff diving competition in the United States since 1991, is set for Lake Havasu over Labor Day weekend.

Divers will launch themselves off a 90-foot perch known as Copper Canyon. First place pays $15,000 (as if that mattered), and 20 divers will be on hand to get the kind of rush that only Robert Downey Jr., could imagine.

One of the lunatics -- er, competitors -- hails from Las Vegas. Dustin Webber, who in 1991 literally took the plunge into marriage (he and wife Becca said their vows on a high dive and then jumped into the water) has competed at Acapulco. It was there he became the first man in history to do a triple somersault off the "low" cliff, which extends some 68 feet above the water.

How's that for Cliff Notes?

* ODDS AGAINST THE REBELS: The good news for recreational gamblers is that you can bet on the Rebels to win the Mountain West Conference this year. The bad news is that you'll have to book a cruise to do it.

English Sports Betting (ESB), an offshore betting operation, has made the Rebels a 30-1 shot to win the inaugural MWC crown. While those sound like modest odds for a team that went 0-11 last season, they're the most remote assigned to the eight MWC secessionists which bolted from the WAC last season. Brigham Young and Wyoming are ESB's co-MWC favorites at 7-2.

For those in the real estate business on Three Mile Island, you can also wager on the Rebels' chances of winning the national championship. UNLV is a 500-1 choice to walk off the Superdome carpet on Jan. 2 with those foam "We're No. 1" fingers pointing skyward.

There's only one team with worse national championship odds than UNLV. Temple is a 700-1 pick.

* MONKEE BUSINESS: Davy Jones, lead singer for the made-for-TV pop group The Monkees who made an appearance at Palace Station last weekend, said he could have been a top-notch jockey had he not starting making hit records in the 1960s.

Well, I'm a Believer.

The diminutive singer, now 50, recently realized one of his boyhood dreams (other than escorting Marcia Brady to the high school dance) when he rode a winner in a horse race for amateur jockeys at Lingfield Park in London.

Jones called the victory aboard Digpast, an 8-year-old chestnut gelding owned by his daughter, British actress Sarah Jones, "one of the greatest thrills of my life."

But judging from this Internet account of one of Jones' more recent outings, Sir Lester Piggott's reputation as England's greatest jock is safe:

"A few seconds before the gates opened Davy, knowing the start was only a few seconds away, could be seen nudging Digpast as if to alert him to be ready. The horse took no notice. When the gates opened, the horse just stood there.

"Davy and Digpast got some exercise, though they could have done it more cheaply at home."'

* RUDES ON ICE: Show me the money ... and a centering pass.

Actors Cuba Gooding Jr., and Alan Thicke were among the Hollywood celebrities who met up with a handful of NHL stars for the annual Bad Boys hockey tournament at the Sahara Ice Palace last weekend. It was fifth time the informal event was held virtually without notice -- which is just the way the participants like it.

All-star defenseman Chris Chelios was the biggest of the NHL names who skated. Others taking a shift included Rob Blake, Luc Robitaille, Chris Pronger, Tie Domi (for whom the event probably is named), Alex Daigle, Joe Thornton and ex-Las Vegas Thunder Jarrod Skalde.

* AROUND THE HORN: If it weren't situated on the ground floor between valet parking and the self-parking garage, the Stratosphere Tower's new race and sports book could proclaim it has the highest odds in town. It opens Monday with Nick Bogdanovich, formerly of the Horseshoe, as the man in charge. ... Las Vegan Lori Harrigan is still pitching with the U.S. National softball team. She added a Pan-Am gold medal to her Olympic one at the just-concluded Pan-Am Games in Winnipeg, Canada. ... Spotted strolling through the "C" gates at McCarran after she got whacked out of last week's TIG Classic in Carlsbad, Calif.: Russian tennis heartthrob Anna Kournikova (or someone who looked identical to her). I guess that's what happens when you get bounced prior to the quarterfinals -- you get out of town as quickly as possible and you fly Southwest.

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