Weekend Winners and Losers

Winners

The Gren Oden debut, almost a month ahead of the publicized schedule, was a big success with a double-double and 5 blocks. The next Ohio State game is Saturday December 9, at home against cupcake special Cleveland State. The game will be carried on ESPN+, ESPN Full Court and Comcast Sports Net. I believe it starts at 4pm ET / 1pm PT

Bucknell: One day after losing at home to Northern Iowa, they flew to DC to play George Mason at the MCI/Verizon center and managed to hold on to a nice neutral-road W.

Florida State: They badly needed to win this game. This was a must-win, otherwise they would need a top 3 finish in the ACC to get an at-large bid. Al Thornton was clutch. This team is so loaded at guard that touted freshman Josue Soto sits on the bench. And no, Andrew Wilson is not eligible this year :-)

Nevada Big neutral-road against California in San Jose.

The Lopez twins: Stanford will be a very different team when they are both healthy.


Losers

Corey Brewer: He was caught by the FSN cameras twice smiling, laughing and blowing kisses while his team was losing by double figures. Perhaps he was enjoying his importance to the team? He will probably get in trouble when Billy Donovan and his Florida assistants review the tape (or DVD) of the game.

George Mason: The glass slipper does not fit this year. As you may recall they had their march madness magic moments at the MCI/Verizon Center in DC last year.


Random Thoughts

You won't find out about this by reading Andy Katz: CBS has new graphics and special effects for its basketball coverage. Of note is the new score tracking bug which resembles the one used by FSN, except the score tracker by CBS Sports is at the bottom of the screen. Not sure if the tracker will be color-coded to match the team's colors or the court. It clearly color-matched the Kentucky-Carolina game.

Coaches Shows are starting to air on local, regional and national tv outlets. Apart from learning more information about your favorite team(s), they also provide comic relief. There's nothing funnier than a head coach drinking orange juice or sampling local produce during the in-show ads.