Daily bubble talk (Wednesday)

Bubble Talk

Thanks to the CAA Hoops blog for the link! The CAA Hoops blog covers Colonial Assocation basketball. Yes, that's the conference that produced George Mason. Speaking of the CAA, this week's episode of CSTV's Crystal Ball features Hofstra's coach Tom Pecora as a guest coach. (CSTV usually brings in active coaches during their March Madness coverage, so you may see more of him - unless of course he is busy with post-season action.

Daily TV listings are posted below, Comprehensive March Madness listings here (or the link on the left-hand column)

Austin Peay needed overtime to stay alive and prevent itself from becoming the first NIT automatic bid.

Jay Bilas was lecturing on the negatives of the RPI and the need for a replacement, but he didn't provide any replacement alternatives. Are there any?

Cry me a river: Jim Boeheim was criticizing teams for playing tough schedules and increasing their SOS/RPI because they lose to tough oppoenents (he said). Well Jimmy at least they didn't stay at the Carrier Dome and ate cupcakes. You can't have 20+ guaranteed wins every year by getting 10 guaranteed cupcakes wins at the Carrier Dome and at the same time have a high SOS/RPI. Not happening Mr Boeheim, unless you are appointed by the NCAA to redesign the RPI formula :)


How large is the bubble?

There are 34 at-large bids and 6 "bcs" automatic bids. Of those I project (based on current records _and_ a projection of what will happen) that 27 of them are guaranteed to be given to BCS teams. The remaining 13 bids (best case scenario assuming conference tourneys are won by "tourney locks") will be split between 21 "bcs" teams and all the other conferences. The pool will be further reduced by secure bids from so.illinois/creighton, a combination of AF/UNLV/BYU/SDSU since they can't all win their conference tourney. So a reasonable best-case scenario is a bubble of around 10 teams. This will get smaller if Memphis, or Nevada lose in their conf tourneys and the MVC tourney winner is someone other than Creighton/S.Illinois. This will get further reduced if the "bcs" conference tourneys are won by anyone other than the "bcs" locks. A bid is lost regardless but if a bubble team wins the automatic bid, the bubble gets smaller. If a non-bubble team wins an automatic bid, the bubble pool remains the same size. So if your team is on the bubble here is who you should root for: 1) the "locks" to win 2) the bubble teams to beat non-bubble teams when automatic bids are at stake (eg conference finals, or no locks remain in the field)


Not Bubble Talk

Conspiracy theory nominee Was the whole Vitale/Noah/Horford/NBA-scouts controversy a motivational ploy by Billy Donovan to fire up Noah? Everyone knows that Vitale can't keep his mouth shut... (and it didn't work last night). What makes this conpsiracy theory nominee sounds quasi-reasonable? Pitino is known for using motivational ploys and Donovan is a Pitino disciple.

Blast from the Past: Towards the end of FSN's "In Focus" series on the Duke/Carolina rivarly it was alleged that Coach K told Ole Roy (at Kansas at the time) after he beat him in the Final Four: "If you come to Carolina I'll beat your ***". Well Coach K that's not happening. Ole Roy is beating you handily recruiting-wise and on the court too as of late...

Revisited: Thad Matta's gum putback (3 second or 5 second?) and Appleby's refusal to shake hands with Oregon's Aaron Brooks (following the incident in last year's pac-10 tourney)


Mini-review of the Pistol Pete Diaries on Fox College Sports

An excellent original six-part series presented on Fox College Sports

It covers the life of Pistol Pete, the stories being told by Mark Kriegel, author of the latest book on Pistol Pete.

The only problem I have is that Fox College Sports has a problem with volume adjustment. The Diaries are much lower than the commercials, so you end up with a sonic boom when you get loud commercials.

Episode I: Mostly Pete's dad's story (Press Maravich), starting from his days in Steeltown

Episode II: Dad's story continues, including John Wooden and Clemson, and Pete's early years

Episode III: NC State, and Pete's first two years at LSU

Episode IV: debuts next week

Check my daily tv listings or your local tv listings for airtimes or read the book for all the details.

TV listings: Wednesday February 28, 2007

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust elsewhere...

LIVE games or new shows

4pm, villanova at uconn, espn. prediction: uconn wins!

4pm, indiana at northwestern, espn2. prediction: purple wins!

4pm, seton hall at cincy, fullcourt/CSN, prediction: seton hall wins!

5pm, 3am, rice at marshall, cstv. prediction: Morris Almond scores 45

6pm, Texas A&M at Texas, ESPN2. Offense vs defense. Acie Law vs Kevin Durant! Wow! It's awesome baby! Prediction: Muddy crystal ball, I predict two overtimes, 51 points by Kevin Durant, but I can't see the winner.

6pm, Maryland at Duke, espn. Go Gary! Go Terps! Go Turtles! Beat the Dooookies!!!!!!! Prediction: Duke wins on a last second controversial basket (sadly it happens so often that I am afraid my prediction will come true).

9pm, tulsa at smu, cstv. SMU, fire Matt Doherty before he ruins your program. Look at what he did at/to NC. Fire him now! prediction: tulsa wins

9pm, 9am, college gamenight, espn.


Classic games and repeats

9am, lake love (oops lake oswego) at mater dei, fox college sports. UCLA-bound super prep Kevin Love plays

9am, 4pm, episode III of the Pistol Pete Diaries, an original fox college sports presentation

11am, from 2001, duke at maryland, espn classic.

12pm, arizona at arizona state, fox college sports

5pm, 3am, Hardwood Heavens, on INHD. Contradictory listings, it's either the Carrier Dome or the (Dean) Smith Center

7pm, 1030pm, portland at sf, csn

5am thur, sacred heart at monmouth

Daily Bubble Talk returns!

You probably won't hear about this on ESPN for obvious reasons, but Dick Vitale got in trouble (if that's possible), by saying that Billy Donovan told him in confidence that NBA scouts would make a mistake if they rank Noah ahead of Horford. The AOL Sports blog has the story

An excellent website, http://www.truthaboutduke.com to visit and bookmark! For example, a comparison between Dean Smith and Coach K (aka AMEX). I would also like to point out that the American Express tv ads with Coach K are major recruiting violations because Coach K was essentially recruiting everyone watching by saying things like [I want you to play for me, and be passionate, and be successful and similar type of bs]. Even more so because those ads aired during a quiet period (recruiting wise). But the NCAA is not going to do anything about that. Instead they'll take it out on Rick Majerus for buying a $7 sandwich instead of a $5 sandwich for a player who had just suffered a major family tragedy (Van Horn). Or they'll take it out on "directional small state school" for giving the players one too many drinks of gatorade, while they'll slap Kelvin Sampson on the wrist with a feather for making over 500 excessive recruiting calls. Fair and Balanced Mr Myles Brand?. More on the AMEX commercials.

Comprehensive March Madness and Championship week TV listings post, continually updated as listings become available and get updated by the broadcasters.

I have created a new and continually updated post to cover all things NIT since the NIT doesn't get as much love as the NCAA. NIT Central. It's also a link towards the top of the left-hand column.

Tuesday games on TV are posted below

A concerned Butler fan told me that the NCAA's official RPI is counting Butler's split-crowd games at Conseco against the other Indiana schools (Domers, Purdue, Indiana) as home games. This is clearly not fair, as these games are essentially NCAA tourney-type games, and since they involve in-state teams they should be considered neutral court games. This is similar to the Big 5 games in Philly played at the Palestra in front of bi-partisan crowds.

Today's issue of (the print and presumably the online as well) edition of USA Today has expanded college basketball coverage (every Tuesday). Today's edition has a cover story on Winthrop (this year's George Mason?), Jim Tressel's impact on the Buckeyes basketball team, a comprehensive coverage of upcoming conference tournament games/schedules, and features on Arizona's flip-flopping, and Pat Summitt. No room for Dick Vitale this week presumably because of the expanded conference tourney coverage. Also mentioned in the paper were the overnight TV ratings for two college basketball games: The #1 vs #1 slugfest of Wisconsin at Ohio State got a 3.1 rating (2.4m households), CBS's highest this season. This beat the NBA game on ABC (Bulls vs Pistons) who got a 2.3 (1.8m households). Meanwhile the Florida at Big-Baby-less LSU got a 2.0 rating (1.5m households).

Thanks to Neel Mehta blog for the link!

The TheBracketBoard has been updated today. Also make sure you bookmark their One Stop Shop page with comprehensive coverage of all conference tourney brackets in a very readable format! Click on each conference at the bottom of the page to see its brackets.

Meanwhile the latest brackets posted by Joey Brackets are as of Monday. Joey Brackets being the street name for ESPN's Joe Lunardi. By the way, the "Dr Bracketology" segment on Sunday's College Gamenight was great. I hope ESPN continues and expands on it!

March Madness All Season has comprehensive conference tournament previews posted. An index of all their previews

Jerry Palm's top seeds presented on CSTV's Full Court Press: UCLA, Florida, Ohio State, and Wisconsin.

New book on Cinderellas and George Mason

New book on March Madness: Cinderella: A Season inside the Rise of Mid-Major College Basketball (Hardcover), by Michael Litos, 275 pages, currently at $15.61 on Amazon and eligible for free shipping (with orders over $25)

The book foreword is written by Jay Bilas (yes the Dookie Jay Bilas).





Here is the book description from Amazon
Cinderella is an inside look at the NCAA's mid-major basketball programs, which fight for one shot to battle the association's elite teams for the national championship. The rise of mid-majors has been one of the biggest sport stories of the past few years, and never more so than now.

Michael Litos spent the 2005-06 season on the frontlines of the Colonial Athletic Association. With complete access to coaches and players, he found expected tales of pressure and passion. He also found the unexpected: a player being shot; another accused and eventually acquitted of rape. And he was there for George Mason's historic run to the Final Four.

In what was dubbed "The Year of the Mid-major," Cinderella delivers the ultimate story of what it means to be an underdog, and how the sport of college basketball is being transformed.

NIT Central

Last update: Wedn 3/14/07

You can watch NIT games on the ESPN family of networks, but you can also watch some NIT games online via XOS Live Streaming! (I do not know if it is free to watch them online). Details and schedule at the official NIT page


NIT at-large field projections at:

NITology.com

The Bracket Project

The Backboard

NIT Selection show to air on ESPN2 this year!
Great job by the NCAA since taking over the NIT!. They are making it more like a smaller-scale NCAA tourney by cutting down the teams to 32 (instead of the unbalanced number of 40), and now they will be having a selection show broadcast on ESPN2, on Selection Sunday, 2 hours after the NCAA brackets are announced. The "NIT Selection Show" will air on ESPN2 at 6pm pacific/9pm eastern, on Selection Sunday, Sunday March 11, 2007. Check my March Madness TV listings for comprehensive tv coverage of both championship week and march madness (NCAA and NIT tourneys).

The 32 NIT bids will be awarded as follows:

To all the regular season conference champions who do not earn an automatic NCAA bid or at-large NCAA bid. Each conference's tie-breaker system will be used to determine who gets the automatic NIT bid.

The remaining spots will be filled by the best available teams using similar principles as those used by the NCAA tourney selection cmte and by trying to minimize travel for teams.

NIT Automatic Bid Projections: EIGHT (8)

Austin Peay (Ohio Valley)

East Tennessee State (Atlantic Sun)

Marist (MAAC)

South Alabama (Sun Belt)

Toledo (MAC)

Vermont (America East)

Delaware State (MEAC)

Miss Valley State (SWAC)

Realistically two conference tournaments remain that could result in an NIT at-large bid. One more if BYU loses and they are not given an NCAA at-large bid. So the size of the NIT at-large pool is much more predictable right now...

At this point a number of regular season conference championships have been decided, and the conference tourneys are around the corner. So the regular season champions who are not considered for an NCAA at-large bid, they have an "NIT safety net" in case they fail to win the automatic NCAA bid by winning their conference tourney and they don't get an NCAA at-large bid.

These are the NIT "Safety-Net" teams:

Big West: Long Beach State

Independents: They do not qualify for an NIT automatic bid. Utah Valley State has the best record among them

Ivy League: Their regular season champion gets the conference's NCAA bid, so judging from the language in the NIT selection regulations (see link below), they can't get an automatic NIT bid (they can still get NIT at-large bids if their teams are deemed to deserve them)

Mountain West: BYU

Southland: Texas A&M CC


The remaining conferences do not get an automatic NIT bid because their regular season champions are projected to be safe NCAA at-large teams:

The six "BCS" regular season conference champions (whoever they maybe)

C-USA: Memphis

Missouri Valley: Southern Illinois

WAC: Nevada

Conference standings at Yahoo! Sports

So the maximum of NIT automatic bids to be given are 21, and the minimum is zero. Thus the NIT at-large bids will be from 11 to 32. The "bcs" teams who usually take the NIT for granted will have to earn it this time around, and they have to root for the regular season mid-major conference champions to get their conference NCAA at-large bid so they don't eat up an NIT automatic bid.

With this in mind, take a look at
NITology.com that has a breakdown of the NIT at-large field.

The official NIT website has details and dates of the NIT tourney games. These are the official NIT Selection Procedures

To refresh your memory, these are the results and TV coverage of the 2006 post-season NIT tourney

TV listings: Tuesday, February 27, 2007 (college basketball)

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***

LIVE GAMES and new shows

look for increased college hoops coverage on all the ESPN daily shows such as Cold Pizza, PTI, Around the Horn, Jim Rome, ESPN News, etc...

USA Today (the newspaper) has extended college basketball coverage in the sports section every Tuesday

2pm, Full Court Press, CSTV. Highlights from coaches press conferences.

4pm, Michigan at Michigan State, ESPN. In-state rivarly and NCAA implications at the same time. Michigan can help their cause by winning. Prediction: Izzo State wins comfortably

430pm, Pistol Pete Diaries, Episode III on FoxCollegeSports, an original 6-part series.

6pm, Florida at Tennessee, ESPN. After Florida's road woes (@Vandy, @LSU) this game just got more interesting. TN is strong at home, and Bruce Pearl is excited about winning an Oscar for makeup for his body-paint performance at a recent women's bball game (Oscar was awarded by the ESPN Gamenight crew). Prediction: Florida reminds everyone (on national tV) that they are the defending national champs. Possibly an instant classic game! Pat Summit alert!!!: Pat Summit has promised that she will do something in return to Bruce Pearl's painted body appearance at the women's game. Pat has dropped a hint perhaps, she said she was a cheerleader when she was young.

6pm, 9pm, 7am Wedn, BYU at Air Force, CSTV. Two of the top four teams in the MWC battle it out in a game with serious NCAA implications. Bzdelik got in trouble with the MWC beauraucrats for criticizing the schedule, which probably means that he struct a nerve. Prediction: AF wins!

6pm, Kansas State at Oklahoma State, FullCourt/CSN. Bubble Game!. A win would be more beneficial for Huggins since it would be a road win.

9pm, 9am Wedn, College Gamenight, ESPN


Classic and Repeats

7am, 12pm, Washington at Oregon, FoxCollegeSports

9am, 9pm, 430am Wedn, North Carolina at Maryland, FoxCollegeSports Good game!

11am, Cal at USC, FoxCollegeSports

11am, from 2000, Tennessee at Florida, ESPN Classic

130pm, 3am wedn, Arizona at Arizona State, FoxCollegeSports

3pm, 8pm, overnight, Crystal Ball on CSTV. Includes an Xs and Os analysis of Carolina's secondary break offense by Steve Lappas and Hofstra's Tom Pecora. Highly recommended show!

330pm, 9pm, Stanford at UCLA, FoxCollegeSports

6pm, Hardwood Heavens: Allen Fieldhouse of Kansas, INHD (high definition channel)

1130pm, Portland at SF, CSN

Monday Night Quarterback

Rumors

Flip Saunders (NBA head coach at the Pistons, formerly of the MN T-Wolves) to take over the Monson-less Golden Gophers???

Fact, not Fiction

56 is the current streak of made free throws by Gonzaga's Derek Raivio. Puke's JJ Redick couldn't get past the 40s...

Coach K on how to win road games: "Have more talent than the opponent". This from his own coaches show. A nominee for the Master of the Obvious Oscar category! I can't believe it!!!

AAU-style battle in the paint but in college: First half of Louisville at UConn, with Derrick Caracter going after Thabeet of UConn.

A Bo Ryan joke on officiating (paraphrased): "A coach finds a cell phone after a game. He grabs the official and tells him that he dropped his phone. The official asks how do you know it's my phone? The coach says... it has 10 missed calls.

Creative Fans segment: USF fans were holding signs advertising their team's webpage (on ESPN's Big Monday).


Opinion segment O'Reilly style

Great job by the NCAA since taking over the NIT!. They are making it more like a smaller-scale NCAA tourney by cutting down the teams to 32 (instead of the unbalanced number of 40), and now they will be having a selection show broadcast on ESPN2, on Selection Sunday, 2 hours after the NCAA brackets are announced. The "NIT Selection Show" will air on ESPN2 at 6pm pacific/9pm eastern, on Selection Sunday, Sunday March 11, 2007. Check my March Madness TV listings for comprehensive tv coverage of both championship week and march madness.

The 2007 McDonalds All-American rosters have been announced. As usual there is plenty of controversy with a handful of selection, most notably Taylor King, Jai Lucas and Nolan Smith. (Two of them Dookies, the other one recruited by Coach AMEX). More coverage at Recruiting Wars

Is LSU a better team without Big Baby?. They looked so in their last two games (Kentucky, Florida)! There was great movement, great blend of shooters/penetrators (Tasmin, Martin, Mason), and stability from Lazarre. LSU without Big Baby = Lazarus???

Memo to ACC schedulers: You are crazy! Carolina vs Maryland games are instant classics based on style of play, yet they only play once in the regular season! This is crazy! Do whatever you need to do and make it so that they play each other twice in the regular season. And no, I'm not interested in excuses :)

If I was voting in the polls I would not give Ohio State a #1 vote after that horrible slugfest against Wisconsin. This is how the Big 10 gets its reputations as unwatchable. It takes two to play a fun game, don't blame Ohio State (hint: blame Wisconsin and most of the other teams in the Big Eleven). That game was supposed to be the game of the week, yet both the Louisville at UConn and North Carolina at Maryland were much more watchable games. Speaking of Louisville, is Pitino copying the AASAA offense from his friend Calipari who copied it from Vance Walhberg? There were a couple of plays by the Cardinals late in the game (at UConn) that looked like textbook AASAA offense (although one can also point out that passes and skip passes are not exclusive to the AASAA offense)

Beating 13 RPI 101+ teams is wonderful if you want to pile up hundreds of wins throughout your career, but it won't get you to the NIT, let alone the NCAA. Why? Because RPI 101+ teams do not get at-large bids in the NCAA or the NIT. (Yes, I am talking about you, UConn!)

Desperate times at Duke as Coach K (on his coaches show) was listing all his players playing professional ball, not just the NBA but also in the Euroleague and everywhere else. Translation: "Come play for me and you will make lots of money as a basketball pro". Thankfully fewer and fewer top caliber recruits are buying into his vaporware these days.

Is the Air Force team wearing down because of a short rotation? This also happened to Arizona earlier in the season when Lute Olson was playing five players most of the time.

The proposed requirement to have a 50-50 or better conference record before a team can be considered for the NCAA is invalid because most of the major conferences play unbalanced and uneven schedules. The way to make the selection more fair is to include deserving teams, not to make up more rules as a workaround.

Should Bill Self be fired if Kansas loses in the NCAA 1st round for the third year in a row? That's an interesting question, and an answer may not be easy to come up with...


Media Segment

ABBA's song "Fernando" was discovered by a new generation of Wisconsin Badgers fans as it was re-recorded (by fans) as a tribute to "Alando" (Tucker)

Props to ESPN for featuring Doris Burke as a men's basketball analyst. For some reason it's considered okay for men to coach/analyze women's games, but the other way round seems to be a big issue. When Doris is a sideline reporter she usually makes the more basketball-savvy comments compared to the in-game color analyst (eg Vitale) and even the in-studio analysts. So it's great that she also gets a chance to be the in-game analyst.

TV listings for Championship week and March Madness in progress

FSN needs to learn how to count! They showed Washington's Appleby with 14 points and 5/6 on three-pointers. Someone forgot to press the recalc button!

Tim Brando is still struggling to properly pronounce the name "Vasquez" (Maryland's talented freshman). How hard is it? And this from TB: "inducing a foul". Come on! And CBS is using this guy for the NCAA tourney?

Mike Patrick did it again, this time he described the Jamar Smith accident as "bizarre". Len Elmore was speechless after he made that comment. I would describe it as sad, tragic, unfortunate, an error in judgment, a mistake, but bizarre? Where did that come from?

But they were perhaps both outdone by Bob Wenzel when he referenced "the RPI poll". RPI is a poll? WoW :-)

New TV ads with Dick Vitale!, with Hooters and an old-school Vitale in a new (it's not delivery, it's) DiGiorno.

Are TV commentators scared of Jim Calhoun??? Both Dan Bonner and Kevin Harlan (who imho is one of the most solid play-by-play guys) were talking as if UConn was an NCAA bubble team. Are they that clueless or perhaps they were afraid of drawing the ire of Jim Calhoun? (insert "appeasing the lion" here). UConn was a Big East tourney bubble team until recently, and they are barely an NIT bubble team according to NITology.com

In or Out with Digger Phelps: If it's a Big East team, you can predict the answer: IN!

You know you watch too much ESPN when you can tell which ones of the features they are showing are stock footage (eg Tom Izzo's free throw story)

March Madness TV Listings

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***
*** FSN/FoxCollegeSports games may be regionally aligned. YMMV ***
*** by the law of averages, I am bound to have some incorrect listings ***
*** please double-check with your local listings ***
*** this is a work in progress, it will be updated frequently ***
*** updated March 13, 2007


2008 update!
Just posted, the 2008 March Madness TV listings.


2007 March Madness TV listings
The post below covers the 2007 NCAA March Madness tv listings.

Tuesday March 13, 2007

Three classic NCAA upsets on ESPN Classic

classic games on CSTV

4pm, NIT game, Utah State at Michigan, ESPN2

430pm, Florida A&M vs Niagara, NCAA Opening Round game from Dayton, Ohio, ESPN

630pm, NIT game, Alabama at UMass, ESPN

10pm, College Gamenight, ESPN


Wedn March 14, 2007

Four classic NCAA upsets on ESPN Classic

classic games on CSTV as well

4pm NIT games on both ESPN (South Alabama at Syracuse) and ESPN2 (Fresno State at Georgia)

8pm, NIT game, Austin Peay at Air Force, ESPN2


NCAA Tourney CBS TV schedule

Detailed schedule with tip-off times and announcer teams

Easier to read, less detailed CBS schedule

General CBS Sports tv schedule

To find out which games will be shown in your area, check the website of your local CBS affiliate.

New this year: Two NCAA games will be shown on CSTV as follows:
* Thursday 2pm PT/5pm ET: Vandy vs George Washington
* Friday 9am PT/noon ET: Albany vs Virginia (upset alert!!!)

more coming soon...




Daylight Saving Time Alert!: The time change will happen earlier this year, namely at 1:59:59am on March 11 the clocks will spring forward to 3am. Because of this some of the TV listings you may find online are one hour behind for listings on March 11 and later. My TV listings are adjusted for DST. So please keep this in mind if you are looking at TV listings before March 11...

ESPN News Alert!: All ESPN family of networks games (80+ games) of Championship week, March 1 through March 11 will be broadcast for free online at espn360.com. Thanks to ESPN for making all these exciting games available to fans on the net for free! Thank you ESPN :-)

NCAA Tournament available free online!: The NCAA tourney will be available for free online (just like last year). Details at NCAASports.com



Selection Sunday, Sunday March 11, 2007

9am, Road to the Final Four (1 hour), CBS

2pm, Bracketology (1 hour), ESPN.

230pm, Crystal Ball (30 minutes), CSTV

3pm, Brackets Revealed on CBS (1 hour)

3pm, Sportscenter with bracket updates as they are revealed, ESPN

4pm, Bracketology (2 hours) - analyzing the brackets, ESPN.

4pm, March Madness Bracket Breakdown (1 hour) on CSTV.

6pm, NIT Selection Show (30 min), brand new this year! on ESPN2.

630pm, ESPN2 changed their upcoming listings from SportsCenterU (ESPNU's version of Sportscenter) (90 min) on ESPN2 to Bracketology. Not sure at this moment if this is a different Bracketology show than the one shown on ESPN earlier on. The ESPN version will be two years long.




Championship Week, March 1-11 2007
Tuesday February 27

11pm, MVC Tournament Preview, Fox College Sports

Thursday March 1

10am, 12pm, 6pm, 8pm, four CIAA Quarterfinals on ESPN Classic

Friday March 2

3pm, 530pm, two CAA round one games, ESPN Full Court

4pm, and 8pm, CIAA Semifinals, ESPN Classic

730pm, 930pm, two MAAC Round 1 games, Iona vs Rider, Canisius vs St. Peters, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

Saturday March 3

9am, Classic game, the 1985 NCAA final, Georgetown vs Vilanova, CSTV

11am, Big South final, VMI vs Winthrop, ESPN2.

1230pm, 130pm, 430pm/1230am, 7pm, MAAC quarterfinals, Siena vs Manhattan, Marist vs Canisius/StPeters, Niagara vs Iona/Rider, and Fairfield vs Loyola Maryland, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

1pm, Atlantic Sun final, ESPN2.

3pm, Southern final, Davidson vs ApplSt/CoCharleston, ESPN2

5pm, Ohio Valley conference final, ESPN2

5pm CIAA final, ESPN Classic

Sunday March 4, 2007

9am, 11am, America East semifinals, ESPN Full Court

11am, Missouri Valley final, CBS

1230pm, 5am, Sunshine State final, a division 2 conference in Florida, FoxCollegeSports.

1230pm, 230pm, CAA semifinals, ESPN Full Court

3pm, 530pm, MAAC semifinals, FoxCollegeSports

630pm, 830pm, WCC semifinals, Gonzaga vs TBD, then Santa Clara vs TBD, ESPN2

Monday March 5, 2007

4pm, Colonial (CAA) final, ESPN

430pm, 7pm, SunBelt semifinals, ESPN Full Court

6pm, WCC final, ESPN

6pm, MAAC final, ESPN2

Tuesday March 6, 2007

4pm, Midcontinent final, Oakland vs Oral Roberts, Oral Roberts gets an automatic NIT bid if they lose this game. ESPN

6pm, Horizon final, Wright State vs Butler, Wright State gets an automatic NIT bid if they lose this game. ESPN

6pm, Sunbelt final, North Texas at Arkansas State, ESPN2. The winner will be a candidate to play the NCAA Opening round game next Tuesday. ESPN2

Wedn March 7, 2007

9am, 11am, 4pm, 6pm, Big East Round 1 games, ESPN.
* 9am #9 Villanova vs #8 DePaul
* 11am (1120am really) #12 UConn (wow! they was #1 last year) vs #5 Syracuse
* 4pm #10 Providence vs #7 West Virginia
* 6pm (620pm really) #11 St Johns vs #6 Marquette

4pm, NEC final, #2 Sacred Heart vs #1 Central Connecticut State, ESPN2. If Central Conn St loses, they have an automatic NIT bid.

6pm, Big Sky final Weber State/Portland State vs NAU/Montana, ESPN2. If Weber State loses they have a guaranteed NIT bid.

6pm, 830pm, Pac-10 first round games, FSN/FoxCollegeSports
* 6pm, #8 California vs #9 Oregon
* 8pm (820pm really) #7 Washington vs #10 Arizona State


Thur March 8, 2007

9am, 11am, 4pm, 6pm, Big East quarterfinals, ESPN

9am, 11am, 130pm, Big 10 first round, ESPN2

10am, 1230pm, 4pm, 630pm, and overnight repeats, Conference USA quarterfinals, CSTV

12pm, 230pm, 6pm, 830pm, Pac 10 quarterfinals, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

4pm, ACC Round 1 Game 3, ESPN2

6pm, Big 12 Round 1 game, ESPN2

this is probably the craziest day of all of championship week with dozens of games on TV

ESPN Full Court Games
* 9am, 11am, 6pm, ACC Round 1, Games 1, 2 and 4
* 9am, 11am, 4pm, MAC quarterfinals
* 930am, 12pm, 4pm, Big 12 Round 1 games
* 10am, 1215pm, 430pm, 645pm, SEC Round 1 games
* 11am, 130pm, 5pm, 730pm, WAC quarterfinals



Fri March 9, 2007

9am, 11am, Big 10 quarterfinals one and two, ESPN

9am, 11am, 4pm, 6pm, ACC quarterfinals, ESPN2

130pm, Patriot final, ESPN2

4pm, 6pm, Big East semifinals, ESPN

4pm, 630pm, Conference USA semifinals, CSTV

6pm, 830pm, Pac-10 semifinals, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

6pm, 830pm, Mountain West semifinals, CSTV


Sat March 10, 2007

830am, Conference USA final, CBS

9am, America East final, ESPN2

1030am, 1230pm, ACC semifinals, ESPN

1040am, 1250pm, Big 10 semifinals, CBS

11am, 1pm, Big 12 semifinals, ESPN2

3pm, Pac-10 final, CBS

3pm, Atlantic-10 (14 really) final, ESPN

3pm, MEAC final, ESPN Classic

4pm, MAC final, ESPN2

4pm, Mountain West final, Versus (formerly OLN)

6pm, 12am, Big East final, ESPN (a rare (these days) game repeat on ESPN)

6pm, WAC final, ESPN2

8pm, Big West final, ESPN2

Sunday March 11, 2007, Selection Sunday

see on top of the post for Selection Sunday shows
*** updated to reflect early DST change ***

10am, SEC final, CBS

10am, ACC final, ESPN

11am, Southland final, ESPN2

12pm, Big 12 final, ESPN

1230pm, Big 10 final, CBS


Monday March 12, 2007

Four classic NCAA upsets on ESPN Classic




The 2007 NCAA Tourney!

The games will be on CBS (except for the opening round game on ESPN). Some games may be available in HD (high def)

DirecTV (subscription satellite service) and NCAA sports (free online) have access to every single game played

Opening round game in Dayton Ohio: Tuesday March 13, 630pm on ESPN

Round 1, Thursday and Friday March 15, and 16

Round 2, Saturday and Sunday March 17, and 18

Sweet 16, Thursday and Friday March 22, and 23

Elite 8, Saturday and Sunday March 24, and 25

Final Four, Saturday March 31

The Final, Monday April 2


The 2007 NIT Tourney!
A preliminary NIT schedule can be found at the official NIT website


*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***


If you find these listings useful, you can encourage this blog to continue posting them by making your Amazon.com purchases via the affiliate link here or the Amazon logos in the blog.

TV Listings: Monday February 26, 2007 (college basketball)

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***
*** predictions are not the most likely outcomes ***
*** predictions attempt to catch the randomness of each game ***
*** FSN/FoxCollegeSports games may be regionally aligned. YMMV ***
*** by the law of averages, I am bound to have some incorrect listings ***
*** please double-check with your local listings ***


LIVE GAMES and NEW SHOWS

Later Today: Comprehensive March Madness TV listings, starting with Championship Week (March 1 to 11), Selection Sunday, the NCAA and the NIT. The listings will be a work in progress and they will be frequently updated, so double-check the day of the game with your local provider/listings to be sure.

4pm, Georgetown at Syracuse, ESPN, just like the old days of Boeheim vs Thompson and Ewing, except it's TNG. Prediction: Boeheim cunningly steals this one

5pm, 8pm, 11pm, and more overnight repeats: Crystal Ball on CSTV, with Seth Davis, Lappas, Pete Gillan, Brian Curtis (of Taking Issue fame), Greg Amsinger (their version of Rece Davis) and Seth Greenberg

6pm, Kansas at Oklahoma, ESPN. Also part of Big Monday. Prediction: Kansas by 22

7pm, Gonzaga at San Diego, FoxCollegeSports. Prediction: Zags by 8

7pm, Portland at SF, CSN. Prediction: SF

9pm, Long Beach State at Pacific, ESPN2. The Big West gets a rare Big Monday appearance in the west coast slot, usually devoted to the Zags

9pm, 9am Tue, College Gamenight, ESPN

Repeats and Classic Games

9am, Southern Miss at Tulane, CSTV

11am, from 1991, Syracuse vs Georgetown, ESPN Classic

11am, 5am, Arizona at Arizona State, the duel in the dessert with FSN's Marques Johnson and Steve Psychioc, FoxCollegeSports

11am, BYU at SDSU, CSTV. Two at-large hopefuls from the resurgent Mountain West Conference

12pm, 1pm, Stanford at UCLA, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

130pm, 930pm, 3am, North Carolina at Maryland, FoxCollegeSports. It's a shocker that these two teams play only once in the ACC. ACC schedulers are you crazy?. These games are instant classics! Whatever you do make sure they play twice in the regular season

3pm, 1am, Cal at USC, FoxCollegeSports

530pm, Iona at Manhattan, FoxCollegeSports. Jeff Ruland is not a happy camper.

11am Tuesday, from 2000, Tennessee vs Florida, ESPN Classic


If you find these listings useful, you can encourage this blog to continue posting them by making your Amazon.com purchases via the affiliate link here or the Amazon logos in the blog.

All you can eat Fridays

Why did Oregon sweep Washington State?. Because Ernie Kent made a big discovery that escaped all other coaches: You score more points on Washington State by hoisting wild shots from all over the court than by going up against their set half court defense. The proof? Oregon is the only team (so far) to beat Washington State twice, and the only team to beat them at Pullman!

Complete weekend (saturday and sunday) TV listings of college basketball games on CBS, ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, FSN, CSN, and Fox College Sports are posted below. No ESPNU.

Props to Fox College Sports for covering the winter university games. I'm not a fan of winter/snow sports, but covering them was a great idea by FCS. Having three channels seems to be a great way to cover events like the Olympics, with multiple competitions going on in parallel. Something other tv networks should look into when they are covering the Olympics or March Madness...

New drinking game idea: Every time Lorenzo Mata makes (or misses) a free throw shot. This was inspired by the "hot dog/combo meal friendly bet" between the FSN commentators during the Cal-UCLA game. And by drinking I mean milk, or soy milk, or green tea or carbonated water, or orange juice or vitamin water :-)

A review of this week's edition of Seth Davis Generation Next on CSTV.

One more opening this spring: New Mexico. Failing to turnaround New Mexico to Pit past glory days standards, McKay will be bought out at the end of the season. Apparently the Lobos AD wants to have an early start on the pool of candidates. Mike Montgomerry might listen if you are willing to hand over the team to his son after 5-10 years. After the success of Tony Bennett at Washignton State, this may be the year Monty can force a deal of this nature. But let's not forget that Tony Bennett was his own man, he worked under other coaches (not just his dad) and he even had a brief stint in the NBA, while Monty's son is just a five-year senior at LMU.

Wild March Madness Prediction: Washington State to the Final Four. If you watched last night's game at Oregon, you may have been surprised by two relatively new players in their rotation, guard Hopson (Hobson?) (jersey #1) who recently became eligible, and guard Cross (jersey #21). Let's not forget Dick Bennett made it to the Final Four (like father like son). This Cougars team is actually intriguing to watch, a rag tag group of efficient and effective players, and teamwork is everything. With the NCAA games being played tightly, they get an advantage. And unlike Dick's slow teams, they can speed it up so they are not necessarily doomed if they fall behind.

Speaking of the Pac-10, UCLA may seem to be going faster this year, but leave it to Ben Howland to use fastbreaks for defensive purposes. If you pay close attention you will notice that sometimes UCLA runs on fastbreak not to score, but simply to put pressure on the defense and then run their own offense. To the casual fan it may appear that UCLA is running. But Ben, you can't fool everyone :-)

Home Winning streaks: Memphis 16, Winthrop 14, Ohio State and Bucknell: 11


Of Brackets and Men

Latest RPI numbers at KenPom RPI. You can also see some interesting things by looking at the teams at KenPom's: ranked by SOS, and ranked by non-conference RPI

Updated as of today, The BracketBoard, along with their Lockbox.

College Basketball TV Listings: Weekend edition (Sat/Sun February 24, 25)

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***
*** predictions are not the most likely outcomes ***
*** predictions attempt to catch the randomness of each game ***
*** FSN/FoxCollegeSports games may be regionally aligned. YMMV ***
*** by the law of averages, I am bound to have some incorrect listings ***
*** please double-check with your local listings ***



Judgment Week: Saturday February 24, 2007

730am, Basketball Weekly with Bob Wenzel, CSTV

8am, College Gameday, AM edition, ESPN

8am, Three point club, CSTV. SEC preview

8am, Siena at Marist, ESPN2. Watch or tape this game if you have not seen Jared Jordan play yet. You will sound like a genius when you discuss the upcoming NBA draft with your friends. This guy is a potential triple-double, although he doesn't look it.

830am, Courtside with Rick Pitino, CSTV. Includes some very basic Xs and Os breakdown of upcoming Big East opponents, of interest to hoop junkies and current/aspiring coaches

9am, Syracuse at Providence on ESPN. Zone Wars 2007!. Both teams are known for their zone defense. Prediction: Providence wins!

9am, Oklahoma State at Texas Tech, CBS. A Big 12 bracket buster game! Prediction: Texas Tech!

10am, College of Cremins at Georgia Southern, ESPN2. College of Charleston was a mid-major darling before mid-majors became mainstream darlings (eg Gonzaga).

11am, Pitt at Georgetown, ESPN. NCAA seeding is in play!. Prediction: Georgetown delivers a beatdown and exposes Pitt to those who think Pitt is an elite 8 team :-)

11am, Illinois at Penn State, ESPN. Prediction: After two moral victories against Oden State, the Fighting Paternos get a real W against the off-court troubled Illini (injuries, accidents, DUI, NCAA-deemed-offensive mascot).

1230pm, regional action on ABC: , Georgia Tech at Virginia, Marquette at Notre Dame, and Gonzaga at San Francisco. Predictions: All three road teams win! After the games are over "Free Ticket Inside College Basketball" airs (3pm). Airtime may vary depending on timezone.

1230pm, Pistol PEte Diaries, FoxCollegeSports

1pm, Florida at LSU. This sounded like a great game when CBS came up with their schedule. Now it's the Desperate Bradys vs the Galloping Gators. Prediction: Florida by a lot

1pm, Rutgers at Nova. Mr Jersey is a couple of years away from being competitive and fending off schools like Nova from grabbing the top level Jersey-area talent. Prediction: Nova by a lot

1pm, Texas at Oklahoma, CSN/FullCourt. Prediction: Texas wins, Kevin Durant triple double with 32 points, 13 rebounds, 11 blocks, 7 assists, 4 steals, 6 turnovers.

1pm, 630am Sun, Southern Miss at Tulane, CSTV. Post-Katrina Tulane faces post-alcoholic Turnaround Larry Eustachy. Prediction: Southern Miss by 8

2pm, The Valley of Darkness:, Wichita State at Creighton, ESPN2. Prediction: Debbie Downer-Whiner (aka Mark Turgeon) would love to win this game. But he won't because Creighton got the funk!

2pm, 1am, Florida International at Western Kentucky, FoxCollegeSports. Prediction: Home team wins!

3pm (or a bit later), Free Ticket Inside College basketball presented by Chase Freedom on ABC. Featured: Wisconsin Badgers

3pm, Iowa State at Kansas, ESPN. Prediction: Kansas wins by 44!. Iowa State coaches cries in a towel like Josh Cry-Baby McRoberts.

3pm, midnight: BYU at SDSU, CSTV. Prediction: A MWC bracket buster game. SDSU must win this game and they will.

3pm, 1am, 5am, Stanford at UCLA. Prediction: The Lopez twins are strong enough to protect the paint, the threes are not falling for the Bruins and they lose their first home game of the season.

5pm, 11pm, Cal at USC, FSN/CSN/FoxCollegeSports. Prediction: USC wins but just barely. The whispers of DeVon Hardin making a return get stronger and they are not attributed to the 420 cloud hovering above Berkeley ;-)

5pm, Gameday pre-game edition, ESPN. With Bilas, Phelps, Davis (Rece and Hubert), Katz, Erin and Dookie Vitale.

6pm, Indiana at Michigan State, ESPN with Dick Vitale. Izzo starts crying again. It worked the last time when they beat Wisconsin as it got his team a lot of media attention and got him lots of interviews on ESPN and such. Prediction: Izzo wins and cries too.

7pm, McNeese at Lamar, FoxCollegeSports

730pm, 7am, Washington at Oregon, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. Both teams need the win. They want the win. Prediction: Oregon will get it.

730pm, Santa Clara at Loyola Marymount, CSTV. Dick Davey won't go away quietly. Prediction: SCU wins on the road.

9pm, Midnight Madness, ESPN. The day is not over until Tom Brennan, Doug Gottlieb and Dave Revsine recap the action and provide a fresh(er) perspective from the tired and predictable (to some) routine of Vitale, Bilas and Phelps.

ESPN Full Court: 20 games today! Check the ESPN website or local listings for channel numbers and airtimes. Games shown: Cincy at DePaul, Purdue at Northwestern, Tennessee at Arkansas, Clemson at Boston Collage, Missouri at Nebraska, Baylor at Texas A&M, Michigan at Minnesota, all three regional ABC games (great idea ESPN, I wish CBS did this with CSTV), Texas at Oklahoma, Kansas State at Colorado, Auburn at Alabama, Ole Miss at South Carolina, Arkansas State at Arkansas Little rock, South Florida at Seton Hall (someone has to win), Wisc Milw vs Green Bay (no Brett Favre), Illinois Chicago vs Loyola chicago, Fresneck State at New Mexico State.



Judgment Week: Sunday February 25, 2007

6am, Game of the Week replay, ESPN Classic. The ESPN braintrust selects the game for replay. The game chosen is sometimes announced at the end of Midnight Madness on late Saturday

830am, Hardwood Heavens: Allen Fieldhouse of Kansas on INHD with Brett Musburger.

9am, Louisville at UConn, CBS. UConn wants the win so they can make the tourney (the Big East tourney that is). Prediction: L-Ville continues to roll and squeaks by the young huskies.

11am, Duke at StJohns or Houston at Memphis, CBS. Prediction: Duke and Memphis, but Norm Roberts please beat the Dookies!!! Memo to CBS: I'd rather watch the Memphis game. Please show the alternate game on CSTV now that CSTV is part of CBS Sports. It's common sense! ESPN does it with ABC regional games on ESPN Full Court.

1pm, GAME OF THE WEEKEND!, Wisconsin at Ohio State. The last game of the CBS triple-header. Ohio State has been shaky (see two Penn State games) while Wisconsin has shown they are not invincible. Prediction: Ohio State with Oden getting his first triple double in double overtime.

1pm, repeat of yesterday's Fresno State at New Mexico State, CSN. Your chance to watch the Reggie Theus all-transfer squad before they play in the NCAA/NIT tourney.

2pm, ACC Sunday Night Homer Hoops, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

230pm, North Carolina at Maryland, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. While the Wisconsin/Ohio State game promises to be the game of the week, this promises to be the most entertaining game of the weekend. Prediction: Carolina wins 105-101 (no overtime)

5pm, Arizona at Arizona State, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. Normally a one-sided non-rivarly rivarly game but after Iona Tech got its first victory and Arizona is stumbling even at home, this may actually be competitive (perhaps for a half). Prediction: Arizona wins.

530pm, Iona at Manhattan, FSN/FoxCollegeSports/FullCourt. Prediction: Manhattan wins and Jeff Ruland gets even angrier inside.

9pm, 130am, College gamenight, on ESPN. It gets a rare late night repeat even.

ESPN Full Court: 3 games today: Boston U at Albany, Kentucky at Vandy (payback game?), Iona at Manhattan
If you find these listings useful, you can encourage this blog to continue posting them by making your Amazon.com purchases via the affiliate link here or the Amazon logos in the blog.

College Hoops on TV: Friday February 23, 2007, Judgment Week!

*** all times pacific; please add +3 for eastern ***

Weekend (Saturday, Sunday) TV listings will be posted later today

11am, from 1988, LSU vs Florida, ESPN Classic

12pm, Stanford at USC, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

1230pm, Outside the Lines: Georgetown feature!. Today's Centerpiece feature on OTL is on "Second Generation", the sons of Big John (John Thompson) and Patrick Ewing (and they have the same first names) at Georgetown. OTL details

230pm, Big 12 Preview show, CSTV

330pm, Basketball Weekly, CSN/CSS. Preview of the weekend action with Bob Wenzel

4pm, 2am Sat, Seth Davis Generation Next, CSTV

430pm, LIVE GAME!, Sacred Heart vs Monmouth, Fox College Sports/ESPN Full Court PPV

9pm, College Gamenight, ESPN2.

9pm, Pistol Pete diaries, episode II, FoxCollegeSports

midnight, division 2 game from Wisconsin, FSN/FoxCollegeSports

3am Sat, Washington State at Oregon, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. A nicely played game that actually finished in less than 2 hours.

Weekend (Saturday, Sunday) TV listings will be posted later today

Mid-week repor(t)

Good news, NC State coach Sidney Lowe is released from the hospital

Will Oregon officially change its name to "the Nike Ducks?" Their new AD (athletic director) is a very very very generous booster who recently sold his insurance company for many many many millions. He is close with Phil Knight (Nike's founder) but the new AD has no experience in managing intercollegiate athletics. No, the insurance company in question is not Aflac (the duck non-connection)

How do you rate a conference? Is it the conference with the best teams on top? the conference with the most NCAA-worthy teams? the conference with the most NCAA/NIT-worthy teams? Or the conference with the best teams top to bottom? Using the last one would point at the SEC where LSU and South Carolina are presumably the bottom two teams of the league, and they are not that bad, when compared to the bottom four of the Big East, the bottom two of the Pac-10, Big 10, Big 12 or the ACC.

Big Brother Says.... The "NCAA on Campus" documentary has an "Ask Myles" feature where students ask NCAA czar Myles Brand a question and he answers plainly and truthfully without any spin. This month's question was: "Will Division 3 players be allowed to redshirt again?". To paraphrase Myles's answer/spin: "NO!".

Bob Knight was smart. He made his comments on "one year NBA players in college" before they got beat by Texas. That way he wouldn't sound like a sour loser", but rather just "bitter and jealous".

What happened to FSN's Countdown to Signing Day? Bobby Cremins returned to coaching but i'm sure they can find another coach/expert to sit next to Dave Telep. Has it been cancelled or simply not carried by Fox College Sports anymore? Anyone?

OJ Mayo mania today!. On ESPN2. Check the tv listings below for details. OJ Floyd will be watching for sure (tape-delayed since his team is playing tonight)

This on CSTV's Crystal Ball (a highly recommended weekly show on college hoops): According to Seth Davis, Mark Few is struggling on what to do with Josh Heytvelt, Theo Davis situation. He has been calling many coaches in the profession for opinions.

Why is Fran Frachilla so reluctant to talk about teams on the bubble? Because as a coach he spent too many years on the wrong side of the bubble. Counselling may be necessary!

Fake Plastic Trees:: Coach K is a bad actor. His act of "OMG I didn't know it was my 700th win" wasn't convincing.

Mid majors want more coverage but with that you have to take both the good and the bad. Mark Turgeon sounded like "Debbie Downer-Whiner", whining version of SNL's Debbie Downer during his press conference after a loss. This was shown nationally on CSTV's Full Court Press. How things change: Last summer he would have commanded more than a million a year in salary at a BCS school but he turned them down. And who is George Mason again?

Mid-major NCAA bracket-buster candidates: Texas A&M Corpus Cristi, North Dakota State and Appalachian State. More on mid-majors at the Mid-Majority Repor(t)

Will Nancy blame Bob Huggins for this too?: Cincinatti football program is trouble after alleged sex-tape scandal involving football recruits. Time for the people of Cincinatti to come up with signs like "Fire Nancy, rehire Huggins!"

Image Improvement Attempt. Bo Ryan tried to show some personality by joking around during his halftime interview with Holly of ESPN (at Michigan State). An attempt perhaps to put Wisconsin on the map and get them some respect since most people still don't consider them a national championship contenter.

Dick Vitale gave some juicy details on his firing from the Detroit Pistons during his weekly call-in appearance on Mike & Mike. Apparently Vitale was trying to tell the Pistons owner how to run the franchise and his wife told him "you are going to get fired", but Dickie V didn't believe it until it happened baby. The Pistons loss is college basketball's gain!



Judgment Week: Louisville and Kentucky
It's only fitting to talk about those two bitter rivals together:
Louisville: In the summer Louisville looked very good on paper, with depth, talent and some experience. The optimism from the fall Canadian trip quickly faded as new and old injuries took their toll on Padgett, Palacios, Jenkins, and McGee (among others). Louisville was struggling and a rerun of last season was possible, or even worse, not even an NIT trip (eight fewer invites this year). But the injuries healed, and the freshman started to deliver, first Earl Clark and now the program-changer of this class, Derrick Caracter. Now Louisville looks like a hot team that could make a run to the Final Four providing no one else gets (re)injured and Caracter continues to make progress. However Pitino teams have been known to have highs and lows, and this could simply be their high. But some patterns of the classic Pitino teams of the 90s were barely visible in recent games, such as effective pressure, and turnover margin/efficiency. The Cardinals blew out St Johns without the three pointer, another positive sign. If At Louisville continues at this rate, they are going to be a top 8 seed (top 32 teams) (currently projected as a 7 seed by Joe Lunardi)

Kentucky: Kentucky's season was the opposite of Louisville. Kentucky started under the radar, their four-man recruiting class flew under the radar because of the all-star caliber recruits elsewhere, Randolph Morris was largely ignored because of his NBA non-draft. Slowly but steadily the Wildcats managed to string up some wins and crept back into the spotlight. However a losing streak burst that bubble, and the team almost lost to a baby-less LSU team. A "one-game losing streak" can create a stir in Lexington, so when it's more than one, one can imagine the stir... Kentucky is in the NCAA tourney (barring an 0-for-rest result) but their seed is not going to be high. While the four freshmen look like a good foundation class, the rest of the roster is not "Kentucky-caliber". Bradley looks like a 3rd guard that should come off the bench to provide a spark, not a starter. Crawford is not living to his expectations and even for a college tweener he looks a bit slow/heavy. Morris posts good numbers, but he is not a game-changer inside like one would expect from someone of his size and experience (compare his game-impact (not numbers) in the paint to Greg Oden's). Perry, Thomas, Obrzut are good rotation players but none of those guys are PTPers. However, if they listen to Tubby and play ball-line defense as he teaches them to, and if the four freshmen give them an offensive spark, they could make the Elite 8 and could even take down a number 1 seed along the way (eg as an 8/9 seed).


These Voting Records are public!
ESPN Personalities/experts (Bilas, Katz, Vitale, Lunardi, Gottleib, Schlabach, Glockner, and Howie Schwab) vote their Top 16 Power teams. Here is their voting record. If you look at Schwab's and Vitale's list, well, someone is cheating :-) The latest Power 16 is here. Since we are talking about ESPN, here are the latest brackets from Joey Brackets (aka Joe Lunardi).

College Basketball TV Listings: Thursday, February 22, Judgment week!

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***
*** predictions are not the most likely outcomes ***
*** predictions attempt to catch the randomness of each game ***
*** FSN/FoxCollegeSports games may be regionally aligned. YMMV ***
*** by the law of averages, I am bound to have some incorrect listings ***
*** please double-check with your local listings ***

LIVE GAMES, new shows!

4pm,OJ Mayo mania on ESPN2!. Huntington of West Virginia has two of the top players of the class of 2007 hosts Saint Patrick's of New Jersey. The other top player being also the top uncommitted player of the class, Patrick Patterson. More at Recruiting Wars

4pm, Rice at Memphis, ESPN. High-scoring machine Morris Almond of Rice goes up against the AASAA Tigers of John Calipari. A road trip for the (Midnight) Madness trio of Tom Brennan, Doug Gottlieb and Dave Revsine. Prediction: Memphis by 22

430pm, 730pm, 12am, Seth Davis Generation Next, Episode IV, on CSTV.

5pm, 9pm, 1am, Temple at Saint Joseph, CSTV. Goon-Gate but without the two protagonists of Goon-gate. Fran D is actually letting the players run and gun a little bit more than Chaney ;-)

6pm, Duke at CLEMSON, ESPN. Go Clemson! Beat the Dookies! Because if you don't beat the D00kies, it's Hello NIT!. Prediction: Duke wins on a controversial call at the end of the game (sounds familiar?) Unlike Arizona or Oregon who have better chances of surviving a losing end of their season because of signature out of conference wins, Clemson has 17-0 vs the cupcakes. And as we have seen from years past the selection cmte will give the edge to the teams with the toughest schedule.

6pm,Washington at Oregon State, FSN/FSN+/FoxCollegeSports. For all of today's Pac-10 games the listings can be sketchy, so check with your local stations to find out exactly what is shown in your region. All four Pac-10 games are available nationwide on Fox College Sports tonite. Prediction: Washington wins because they must.

730pm, California at UCLA, FSN/FSN+/FoxCollegeSports (FCS). A 30-minute pre-game show (7pm) and a 30-minute post-game show will air on FCS and some regional FSNs. Prediction: CALIFORNIA PULLS THE UPSET!. Most likely outcome: UCLA wins by 19

730pm, Stanford at USC, FSN/FSN+/FoxCollegeSports. Interesting game on paper. Could turn into a slugfest. Prediction: Stanford bigs beat up the Trojans and win!

8pm, Washington State at Oregon, FSN/FSN+/FoxCollegeSports. Must win game for the Mighty Ducks of Nike. They beat Georgetown and Nebraska is slugfests so they have it in them this year. Can they do it against the Fighting Tony Bennetts? Prediction: Yes!

9pm, 9am, College Gamenight, ESPN. The west-coast-bias edition (or so they claim)


Repeats and Classics

No classic game at 11am today on ESPN Classic

11pm, from 2000, USC vs UCLA, Lavin vs Bibby. Fox College Sports

9am Friday, USC at Arizona State (aka Iona Tech), Fox College Sports

11am Friday, from December 1988, LSU at Florida, ESPN Classic


If you find these listings useful, you can encourage this blog to continue posting them by making your Amazon.com purchases via the affiliate link here or the Amazon logos in the blog.

College Hoops TV Listings: Wedn February 21, 2007 (Judgment week)

*** all times PACIFIC; add +3 for eastern; please adjust appropriately for other time zones ***

LIVE GAMES, new shows

9am, 8pm, Pistol Pete Diaries, Episode II, FoxCollegeSports. An FCS original six-part series.

1030am, NCAA on Campus, ESPN Classic. A magazine show from the world of NCAA sports, with the stamp of approval of Big Brother (the NCAA). It would be ironic if content on this show caused an ...NCAA violation.

4pm, Boston College at Virginia Tech, ESPN. To those who think the ACC will get nine bids think again. Games like this make it impossible. Why? Because some teams have to lose. Just like the Pac-10, there are not enough wins to go around to support that many teams. Prediction: The Greenies rise to the occasion, the VaTech fans do their Coca Cola ritual all night long, and they storm the court at Blacksburg!

4pm, St Johns at Louisville, ESPN2. Watch out for the Rick Pitino Express!. The injuries (Palacios, Padgett, Jenkins, McGee) are healing, Derrick Caracter is delivering. Prediction: Cardinals by 22

430pm, 1130pm, 230am, Taking Issue with Brian Curtis, CSTV. A 30-minute weekly show taking a look at some of the controversial and high profile issues in college sports.

5pm, Penn State at Ohio State, CSN/FullCourt. In what is now becoming a consistent theme, can the Buckeyes deliver two top-level halves? If not, their March Madness chances would not be as good. Prediction: Ohio State wins

5pm, 9pm, 3am, Southern Miss at Central Florida, CSTV. Two of the most underappreciated teams in Conference USA. Turnaround Larry faces one of the largest universities (in student population). Can UCF upgrade its program to parallel its size? Prediction: Turnaround Larry wins!

6pm, Texas A&M at Oklahoma State, ESPN2. The undermanned Suttons face the overflowing bench of A&M. It's amazing how well the Cowboys played with just seven players, however NCAA bids are given based on how a team plays, and they badly need this win. Prediction: OKi State squeaks by and gets an NCAA-bid-saving win.

6pm, NC State at North Carolina, ESPN FullCourt. Prediction: Payback time or "getting owned"? The TarHeels failed to deliver a "payback" when they got swept by Virginia Tech who matches up well with the TarHeels because of their athleticism, depth and tall, strong, experienced guards (Gordon, Zabian Dowdell). However NC State has a very short rotation and I predict a payback beatdown by 30+

10pm, College Gamenight, ESPN, 20-minute edition


Repeats and Classic games

11am, from 1994, Florida State at South Carolina, ESPN Classic

12pm, from 2001, USC at UCLA, FoxCollegeSports. Steve Lavin vs Henry Bibby. The "glory days of SoCal"?

1pm, Texas Arlington at Texas A&M Corpus Cristi, FoxCollegeSports. This (A&M CC) is a team to watch. They created a big splash with some high profile wins as an independant and now they are ruling their own conference. Look out for their 6-5 mobile agile space-eater (whose name I forgot). March Madness Bracket Busting Team Alert!

5pm, 330am, Hardwood Heavens: Allen Fieldhouse, with Brett Musssburger, INHD

7pm, San Francisco at St Marys, CSN

8am Thursday, Duke at Maryland, FoxCollegeSports. Thank you FoxCollegeSports for re-airing the manhandling of the Dookies by the TerraGarys!

No classic games on Thursday on ESPN Classic

Silly News Alert: New Hooters TV ad with Dick Vitale!

Dick Vitale has a brand new Hooters TV ad airing on ESPN and other places. Perhaps Dick Vitale would rather be in the "Hall of Hooters" than the (basketball) "Hall of Fame"? Good luck getting the "Billy Packer" votes after this new ad :-)

College Basketball TV listings: Tuesday February 20, 2007 (Judgment Week!)

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***
*** predictions are not the most likely outcomes ***
*** predictions attempt to catch the randomness of each game ***
*** FSN/FoxCollegeSports games may be regionally aligned. YMMV ***
*** by the law of averages, I am bound to have some incorrect listings ***
*** please double-check with your local listings ***


LIVE GAMES, and new weekly shows

12pm-3pm, the Hot List, on ESPN News. Usually has some college basketball coverage with game previews and guest apperances by Andy Katz, Doug Gottlieb and Joe Lunardi (Mondays and Fridays). (You may have noticed the new ESPN News marketing blitz by ESPN turning Michael Kim of Stanford into an ESPN ad star)

2pm, 2am, 3am, Full Court Press, CSTV. A one-hour highlight show of college basketball coaches's press conferences.

4pm, Wisconsin at Michigan State, ESPN. Prediction: Wisconin wins in overtime. Drew Neitzel cries in a towel like Josh "Big Cry-Baby" McRoberts

4pm, DePaul at Notre Dame, ESPN2. Prediction: Don't count out the poor man's Zen Master. No, I'm not talking about Mike Dookie Brey. I am talking about Jerry W of DePaul. DePaul wins!

430pm, Pistol Pete Diaries, Episode II on FoxCollegeSports. This is an FCS original six-part series revisiting the life of Pistol Pete Maravich. It will repeat throughtout the week. Check my daily listings for airtimes.

5pm, Kentucky Wesleyan at Western Kentucky, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. Prediction: Western wins

6pm, LSU at Kentucky, ESPN. Somebody has to win which is a relief for these two coaches because they know that exactly one of the two will come out with a win tonight. Prediction and upset alert!!!, LSU steals one at Rupp Arena

7pm, 12am, 7am, Air Force at UNLV, CSTV. The Fighting Krugers want to win this game badly because they want to dance in March. Prediction: UNLV on a buzz beater

9pm, 9am, College Gamenight, ESPN


REPEATS and CLASSIC games

10am, Oregon State at California, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. Overtime game, with time-management non-controversy getting Oregon State an extra 2 seconds that got them a "Hail Mary" three pointer that led to the overtime.

11am, 1994, Kentucky at LSU, ESPN Classic

12pm, Oregon at Stanford, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. A close game until Stanford shifted gears and roasted the ducks. (I hope PETA is not reading this!)

430pm, One 2 One with Rick Pitino, with Seth Davis on CSTV. Seth Davis does a good job of covering Pitino's career in 25 minutes.

6pm, Hardwood Heavens: Assembly Hall, with Brent Musberger, INHD (high definition channel)

630pm, 530apm, USC at Arizona State, FSN/FoxCollegeSports. Iona Tech gets its first conference win. They could have made history by being the most critically acclaimed team not to win a conference game, but they screwed up by beating USC. You may want to skip the first half because it is a slugfest of major proportions. The score was stuck at 2-2 for quite a few minutes.

11am Wedn, 1994, FSU at South Carolina, ESPN Classic

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NIT as a post-season "safety net"

This year's NIT will have 32 teams (as opposed to 40 the previous years). On top of that, this is the 2nd year the NIT will hand an automatic bid to the regular season conference champions who do not get an NCAA bid. This is a great idea by the NCAA and the NIT people. That way a team gets rewarded with guaranteed post-season play by winning their regular season conference. Great idea!.

This means that fewer "bcs" teams will get a chance to play in the post-season NIT, and this is a good thing because a number of them had taken NIT for granted or dissed the NIT or stumbled their way through it. Now they have to really earn it.

So let's look at some NIT "safety net" bid candidates. NIT is their post-season "Safety net" if they don't get an NCAA invite. These are teams leading their conferences (or they have a chance to win the regular season championship), but they are not likely to get an at-large bid.
You will see some of these teams in the post-season NIT:

Vermont or Albany

East Tennessee State or Belmont

Rhode or UMass or Xavier

Weber State

Winthrop or High Point

Long Beach State or CSF

VCU or ODU or Hostra or Drexel

Wright State (Butler would get an at-large)

Utah Valley State (although I don't know if the Independents count as far as NIT automatic bids)

The Ivy League gives their champion the automatic NCAA bid. I do not know if the 2nd place teams gets an automatic NIT bid

Marist or Siena or Niagara

Akron, or Kent State, or Miami (Ohio) or Toledo

Oral Roberts

Delaware State

BYU or UNLV (Air Force is an at-large)

Central Conn St

Austin Peay

Holy Cross or Bucknell

Appalachian State or Davidson

Texas A&M CC or Sam Houston State

Jackson State or Texas Southern or Miss Valley St

South Alabama

Santa clara, Gonzaga or SF

New Mexico State or Utah State (but Nevada has a two-game lead and they are a lock)

The six BCS conference leaders, the regular season champ of the Missouri Valley (S.Illinois or Creighton) and Memphis are not included because they are very likely to get an NCAA at-large bid.

Standings at Yahoo Sports

For a breakdown of NIT at-large bids, check NITology

The latest from the Injury Repor(t)

The complete report from the Sports Network via Detroit News.

Some significant injuries/unavailabilities:

Aaron Bruce, Baylor, two weeks

Toney Douglas, Florida State, 2-3 weeks

Josh Heytvelt, Gonzaga, herbs/mushrooms, out

Miami might as well shut it down, unlike the Boston Celtics they won't get the #1 pick in the ACC Draft. A. King, Thomas, Nass and Hicks are unavaiable

Mike Anderson (coach's son), Missouri, DUI/out

Jamel White, Nebraska, out/violation of team rules

Aaron Gray, Pitt, questionable for today's game with Seton Hall

Bamba Fall, SMU, 2-3 weeks

Armondo Surratt, SF, questionable for tonight's Big Monday game on ESPN2

Chad Gray, South Carolina. The Fighting Odoms went into so much trouble to get him eligible but now he is out for one week (toe injury)

Anthony Goods, Stanford. Doubtful which also describes the Cardinals chances at sweeping the SoCals without him :-)

Sports and SciFi

Sports fans are also big scifi fans, so you might be interested to find out that a couple of DVD sets are on sale at low prices at Amazon. Firefly at $20, also Lost Season 2 at $30, and the Stargate movie (ultimate edition) for $6, all eligible for free shipping.

Judgment week preview

ESPN coined this week as Judgment week where the fate of a lot of teams will be determined or significantly affected.

Here are some TV games of importance:

Mon: Villanova at Marquette. Detailed TV listings below. Check this blog for daily TV listings covering ESPN, ESPN2, FSN, Fox College Sports, ESPN Classic, CBS, ABC, Versus, CSTV, and Comcast Sports Net. No ESPNU listings are provided because Comcast does not carry ESPNU. Comcast add ESPNU now :-)

Tue: Wisconsin at Michigan State, DePaul at Notre Dame, Air Force at UNLV

Wedn: BC at VaTech, Texas A&M at OKlahoma State

Thur: Duke at Clemson. MUST win for NIT-bound Clemson!

Fri: nada

Sat: Oklahoma State at Texas Tech (in or out game), Syracuse at Providence, BYU at SDSU, Washington at Oregon, and many more

Sun: Wisconsin at Ohio State (#1 tourney seed in play), North Carolina at Maryland


Judgment Week: Arizona
Numbers don't lie. Arizona suffered their two worst point-margin losses at home this year during the Lute Olson era. Numbers don't lie. This team looked very impressive early in the year when they played the five ball-handlers almost all the time. But other teams caught up, the five players wore down, and the Silver Fox did not develop his bench early in the season (granted all but two non-conference games were against NCAA/NIT-competitive teams). Their strong SOS (currently #1) and their brand name recognition in the tourney will make it very hard for Arizona to be left out of the NCAAs and unless they don't win another game they are in. However, this team is starting to look like the team that lost to Louis Orr and Andre Barrett (Seton Hall) a couple of years ago than the team that had a 12-game winning streak earlier in the season. The root cause? Arizona is a defense-optional resort :-)

Judgment Week: Gonzaga
Without Heytvelt the Zags faced Memphis in a very important game for their at-large hopes. The game started as most people expected with Memphis having a lead and the Zags trying to bite but never able to tie or take the lead. This was the expectation. However the Zags managed to not only make it a game but send it to overtime and have a chance to win it at the buzzer. On top of that, this became the Game of the Week on ESPN Classic. This bodes well for the Zags at-large hopes, but they have to win games from now on. Since they are likely to be a #1 or #2 seed in the WCC conference tourney they have very little margin of error in picking up Ws, they will only play one or two games in the WCC conference tourney. If they win all their WCC games and lose the WCC conference final to Santa Clara, they could get an at-large bid since Santa Clara has quitely climbed up on the Respect-RPI. Anything else for the Zags means NIT or win the conference tourney or Heyvelt returns...

College basketball TV: Big Monday February 19, 2007, Judgment Week!

*** all times pacific; add +3 for eastern; adjust for other time zones ***
*** predictions are not the most likely outcomes ***
*** predictions attempt to catch the randomness of each game ***
*** FSN/FoxCollegeSports games may be regionally aligned. YMMV ***
*** by the law of averages, I am bound to have some incorrect listings ***
*** please double-check with your local listings ***

LIVE GAMES and new shows on Judgment Week (nice term coined by ESPN)

4pm: Villanova at Marquette, ESPN. Two nicely matched Big (y)East teams squaring off on Big Monday presumably with Bilas/Raftery/McDonut. Prediction: Marquette in triple overtime with Damion James scoring 30 points with 7/11 in three pointers. (now that's what I call a prediction!)

5pm: Pitt at Seton Hall, CSN/FullCourt. Prediction: Even without Aaron Pitt, the Grays will win :-)

5pm, Texas Arlington at Texas A&M Corpus Cristi, FoxCollegeSports

5pm, 8pm, 9pm, 10pm+ Crystal Ball on CSTV. Brand new one hour episode covering all things college basketball with Seth Davis, Greg Amsinger, Steve Lappas, Pete Gillan, Seth Greenberg (the highs and lows of this season!), and Brian Curtis among others. Highly recommended! I wish ESPN would do something like this as well!

6pm: Kansas at Kansas State, ESPN. Prediction: Huggins vs Self, the newcomer vs the established, no Billy Walker, no win for Huggie-Bear

730pm, high school game from wisconsin, not sure who plays, FoxCollegeSports

9pm: SF at St Marys, ESPN2. Wow a WCC game on ESPN without Gonzaga! Prediction: St Marys by 11

9pm, 9am, College Gamenight on ESPN.


REPEATS, and CLASSICS

11am, from 1991 Big East Conference tourney, quarterfinal, Pitt vs Seton Hall, ESPN Classic

11am, 330am, USC at Arizona State, FoxCollegeSports. First conference W for arIzONA Tech (blend of Iona and Cal Tech).

11am, 3am, UAB at Houston, CSTV

2pm, texas at baylor, FoxCollegeSports. Not sure if this will actually be shown. Could be a listing error.

630am Tue, Oregon State at Califorina, overtime game, FoxCollegeSports

11am Tue, from 1994, Kentucky at LSU, ESPN Classic


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Basketball Hall of Fame 2007: IN or OUT?

Hall of Fame Nominees - In or Out?, an opinion. Complete list of 2007 nominees at the official Hall of Fame website

The 1966 Texas Western (UTEP) team: IN!. Their accomplishment was significant above and beyond the basketball court. (Don't blame them for Tim Hateaway's comments).

Dick Vitale: IN!. He may be loud, obnoxious, self-promoting and inappropriate at times, but he is also the face of college basketball on and off campus. I was a bit surprised that he didn't make it the previous two times (2004, 2006) he was on the ballot. I suspect the reason is that a segment of "basketball purists" such as Billy Packer are not particularly thrilled with "the Dickie V show" taking the focus away from the game.

Phil Jackson: IN!. He is the Zen-Master, he got the Rings, he got the super-stars. I wonder how he would do without two superstars though... But regardless winning with two superstars is not easy. It's like asking Madonna to sing backup vocals to Whitney, or Mariah to sing backup to Celine Dion.

Roy Williams: IN!. He was considered by the "screening committees" before, but this is the first time he is a finalist on the ballot. His national championship in 2005 may have not been what got him nominated, but rather his 2005-2006 performance after the massive exodus of the 2005 champions to the NBA. As we are seeing this year, two other Hall of Famers, Coach K and Jim Calhoun are struggling mightily in a similar situation, yet Roy was cooking with gas. Roy was the fastest to 500 wins and has the highest winning percentage of active coaches with 10+ years, along with 10+ years as Dean Smith's prized pupil. At the rate the Zags are losing he may pass Mark Few in the under-10-years category as well.

Eddie Sutton: OUT!. I personally do not consider the personal issues (alcohol) a reason to exclude him. However, even if the basketball-related scandals are taken out of the equation, he is still on the bubble as a Hall of Famer in my opinion. He should definately be in the upcoming "College Basketball" hall of fame, but his record along with the basketball scandals are not enough in my opinion for the "Basketball Hall of Fame". He may get in if the "John Chaney co-efficient" is given significant weight (taking kids everyone else gave up on, giving people 2nd/3rd chances and succeeding with most of them, etc, etc).

Adrian Dantley, Chris Mullin: BUBBLE!. I don't have a strong opinion either way. Dantley is probably a step ahead of Mullin.

Bobby Hurley Senior: IN!. If you are not sure, read the book, The Miracle of Saint Anthony. (this is a basketball book, not to be confused with books on religion with similar names). Also available as a $5.49 bargain hardcover (Bargain hardcover books are brand new - but with marks/stamps that they are overstocked books, not to be sold at full price).

I only have an opinion on those who I am very familiar with. For the rest, I do not know, thus no In or Out.

Weekend Rewind

An exciting round of Bracket Busters with an ESPN2 marathon on Saturday. Rick Majerus was featured on the spotlight game of Southern Illinois at Butler and how appropriate since both teams are big on basketball fundamentals. Is Chris Lowry the next Bill Self? A number of teams helped themselves (especially the ones with road wins), the biggest one perhaps Appalachian State, no longer just a stop along the ...Trail :-)

One more reason not to have your son on your team if you are the basketball coach of a high profile "bcs" program: D U I (Mike Anderson of Missouri). Also a good reason not to give your son the same name :-) And let's not forget the "daughter" comments, even from Jim Rome (The Jungle) when Tubby's son played on his team.

What do blind resumes of teams do? They expose the limits of RPI, SOS and win/loss records as exclusive evaluation tools.

The Lasme show! This player made a splash in his freshman year when UMass was quasi-relevant in the grand scheme of things, but after UMass/Lappas continued to struggle, Lasme fell off the radar. But no more! He's back on the spotlight with three triple-doubles so far.

Never too early for senior night. Arizona's Shakur and Radenovic played their last home game last night. More on Arizona later on.

Ben Howland is a REBEL! At least that's what the card he was holding said.

17 is the magic number this season. Keep this number in mind when filling your brackets in March

What's this new trend with coaches mixing it up with players? First it was John Beilein (who also had an incident at a Pitt airport last summer) vs Pat Ewing, this time it is Kevin Stallings vs Joakim Noah. Funny that the players behaved more like mature adults in both situations!

Media Segment

Only Phil Martelli could do this: He (mistakenly) mentioned matter of factly that Bob Dylan is dead. This on his weekly Hawk Talk coaches show airing nationally on CSTV.

Fake basketball analysts: Please stop using the 20-win rule of thumb to decide if a team is in or out. Crossing 20 doesn't work anymore. Who did you play, when, where and how well? That's what matters. Lining up a dozen of cupcakes (or more since everyone can host an exempt tourney at their home court nowadays) in the out of conference schedule can even give a team who may not make the NIT 20 wins. So please stop saying "they need 20 wins". Stop! Stop! Stop! :-)

ESPN was trying to advertise a Duke Lacrosse game without actually mentioning the words "Duke" and "Lacrosse" together. I wonder why...

While this is not an "E!" blog, (and no I don't have any pictures of a shaved head Britney) one would have to try hard not to avoid noticing what Brett Musburger was wearing during the NASCAR promos. Was that a blend of Nascar-GQ with Golf-TV?