Early March Madness Tweets: Will UMass Get to the Next Round

There are 16 basketball games being played today in the NCAA Tournament, and there is much excitement about it here in the USA. So, let's get to some tweets that were posted between 11:00 p.m.-midnight last night. We have the comic strip "Dilbert" in the center because today is likely going to be the least productive day in offices from Portland, Maine, to Honolulu, Hawaii.

Here are the tweets:

1) Reed Avers: This Tennessee-Iowa game is everything MarchMadness is supposed to be (Tennessee won the game in overtime; they will next face U-Mass)

2) Travis O'Dell: "My mom thinks I'm sleeping, but she's crazy, it's March Madness"

3) Robbie Litchfield: "My top four teams are Florida, Mich St, Arizona and Louisville."

4) Hailey Morgan: Finally got all my brackets filled out.

5) Cam Marnouch: This game means nothing, both teams will beat UMass in the next round. BUT I AM SO STRESSED ABOUT IT.

6) Chris Bowie: Hey! Tomorrow is Irish People Go Back to Work Day! (Well, Notre Dame is not in the NCAA Tournament)

7) News-Observer (Raleigh, NC, newspaper): See 88 images from the practice by NC State in Orlando.

8) Carolina Basketball: The Tar Heels have landed in San Antonio.

9) VCU Ram Nation: Vegas odds for title....VCU No. 21

NOTE: The top image is of Florida Gators coach Billy Donovan; the team is the top-seed in the tournament.

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/tournament

http://www.dilbert.com

Sports Desk: Princeton Tigers Go to Lynchburg and Win

Earlier in the season my alma mater Radford University, a Big South school, faced the Cornell Bears, an Ivy League team, and won. But, given that Big South schools stretch from Lexington, Va. (VMI) to Charleston, SC, (Charleston Southern), and Ivy League are from the northeast, the two conferences don't play with each other that often.

But, on Saturday, the Princeton Tigers in their last game before the start of conference play, headed down to Lynchburg, Va., to face the Liberty Flames on Saturday in the first meeting in men's basketball between the two schools.

And, it was Princeton (11-2), a team which traveled from New Jersey, which prevailed with an 80-74 win that was propelled by T.J. Bray (pictured) who almost matched his career-high with 24 points and his teammate Ben Hazel who added 18 points. For Liberty, John Caleb Saunders scored 25 points.

SIDEBAR: There was a shocking upset in Winston-Salem, NC, on Sunday night, as the home court Wake Forest Demon Deacons shocked the University of North Carolina Tar Heels, ranked 19th in the country at the time, 73-67.

The win was the first for Wake Forest over UNC since 2001 in a series that the Tar Heels have dominated in more recent years. Senior Travis McKie from Richmond, Va., lead the home team in scoring with 16 points, and he shot 7 for 11 from the floor.

SIDEBAR 2: Well, when the West Virginia Mountaineers joined the BIG 12, geographic rivalries went out the window as the closest conference school to Morgantown, WVa., is (we believe) Iowa State, located in Ames, Iowa.

Tonight, WVU traveled even farther away as they headed to Lubbock, Tex., and got an 89-86 (OT) win over the Texas Tech Red Raiders.

Juwan Staten lead WVU in scoring with 25 points, and Terry Henderson hit a crucial three-pointer with :18 left to play in regulation.

Quote of the Day/Week- Michael Jordan

Today, we continue to quote American athletes who won team or individual medals, with a quip from the great basketball legend Michael Jordan.

Jordan won six NBA titles with the Chicago Bulls, a NCAA title with the North Carolina Tarheels in 1982, and two Olympic medals for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics (as an amateur) and the 1992 Barcelona Olympics (as a pro, yes that was the Dream Team).

Here is his quote:

"I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can't accept not trying."

Sweet Sixteen by the Numbers- It's Really Been a Long Time for Badgers Fans

We found out some interesting things while researching this piece: It has been a very, very long time since the Wisconsin Badgers won a NCAA title in men's basketball and Kenny Belton, a senior for the Ohio Bobcats, a team that will face the UNC Tarheels in the Sweet 16, graduated from Dudley High School in Greensboro, NC, so perhaps he even rooted for the 'Heels growing up!

And, yes, we realize that Ramsey, the UNC Tarheels' mascot doesn't really go with our entry title, but we are not exactly "The New York Times" here!

Here we go:

71: Years since Wisconsin won NCAA title; the Badgers took it all in 1941.

52: Years since Ohio State won NCAA men's basketball title

50: Years since the Cincinnati Bearcats won title, they won back-to-back titles (1961 and 1962) with Oscar Robinson.

34: Number of points that Florida beat Norfolk State by in the round of 32.

32: Number of miles between Chapel Hill and downtown Raleigh

31: Number of games won by the UNC Tarheels

29: Number of games won by Ohio University; years since North Carolina State last won NCAA tournament.

21: Number of points scored by junior Walter Offutt in the Ohio Bobcats' upset over South Florida in the round of 32.

14: Numbers of points that UNC beat Creighton by in the round of 32; years since Kentucky last won NCAA tournament; number of schools from major conferences in Sweet 16.

13- Number of teams in Sweet 16 that have won NCAA titles in men's basketball before

8- Number of players from North Carolina on UNC's roster

7- Number of Sweet 16 teams from my brackets which actually made it to the Sweet 16!; number of titles won by Kentucky.

6- Number of Ohio Bobcats players from Ohio; number of NC St. players from North Carolina (including star player sophomore C.J. Leslie from Holly Springs, NC); number of points that Ohio beat South Florida by; number of coaches in Sweet 16 who've won the NCAA title; number of schools in Sweet 16 with women's gymnastics programs.

5- Number of titles won by UNC.

4- Number of teams from Ohio in Sweet 16; number of teams from the Big 10; number of teams from the Big East

3_ Number of UNC players from the Greensboro/Winston-Salem, NC area; number of international players for NC St. (Australia, Belgium and Canada); number of teams with feline nicknames; number of teams with bird-related nicknames.

2_ Number of school from old Metro Conference in Sweet 16 (Louisville and Cincinnati); number of ACC schools in Sweet 16; number of SEC schools; number of Big 12 schools; number of schools that are not from super conferences.

1_ Number of schools with dog-related nicknames (NC St. Wolfpack); number of schools that also made the Sweet 16 in NCAA men's hockey (Michigan State Spartans).

My NCAA Brackets....with a Twist

For many years, we have wanted to fill out the NCAA brackets simply based on the teams we liked best, or the teams that we would like to see in the Final Four.

So, this year, I decided to make a 'real bracket,' in which top-seed Syracuse prevails over the 16-seed underdog of underdogs, the UNC-Asheville Bulldogs from the Big South Conference, and one in which the Bulldogs pull the college basketball upset of the century.

There is a dose of reality in my 'fantasy bracket' as I just picked the Bulldogs as the lone 16-seed to knock off a Goliath. In addition, I have the 15-ssed Norfolk State beating the two-seed Missouri Tigers.

Thus, when all is said and done, my Elite 8 comes down to the unlikely match-up of ten-seed West Virginia, with Turkish player Deniz Kilicli, and 12-seed Harvard with Brandyn Curry from Huntersville, NC, in the east region. In the midwest, my dream match-up is not too implausible as it has 3-seed Georgetown taking on the top-seed UNC Tarheels (in the 'real version' two-seed Kansas plays North Carolina).

In the south region, there is a very realistic match-up between one-seed Kentucky and two-seed Duke. But, in the west, we have another fantasy match-up between ten-seed Virginia and 13-seed Davidson, a team that did in fact shock the world and make the Elite 8 a few years ago.

Thus, the 'dream Final Four' pits Harvard against Georgetown, and Duke against UVA. And, the final comes down to Harvard and UVA, with the Ivy Leaguers from Cambridge, Mass., winning it all.

Of course, it would be fittingly ironic if my fantasy bracket turns out to be more true than my 'real one!'

SIDEBAR: A fair number of the 68 teams in the NCAA tournament (actually as of writing, there are 66 remaining), have competitive teams in other sports. In wrestling, from the schools in the field, Ohio State, Misouri, Michigan, Lehigh, UVA and Purdue are all nationally-ranked.

In men's lacrosse, UVA, Loyola (Md), Syracuse, Notre Dame, UNC, Lehigh, Duke and Georgetown are all ranked.

Similarly, in women's lacrosse, UNC, Duke, Florida, Syracuse, Vanderbilt, UVA, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Georgetown and Loyola (Md.) have teams ranked in the top 20.

Sunday Sports Desk

All the talk in this part of the country, well between Maryland and South Carolina, has been on the Duke-UNC game in Chapel Hill last night in which the UNC Tarheels defeated the Duke Bluedevils 81-67.

But, we wanted to congratulate the UNC-Asheville Bulldogs for winning the Big South championship over Coastal Carolina University by a 60-47 score in Conway, SC (Myrtle Beach) yesterday.

My alma mater Radford University and my mom's alma mater Winthrop University are also Big South teams, so I always hope they do well in the NCAA tourney, as Winthrop did a few years back. Of course, it would be nice if Radford could win the tourney every year!

We also like to keep tabs on Turkish soccer (my late father was from Turkey) even though I haven't watched a game in two years. This weekend, the scores were as follows: Manisa 2 Kayseri 1; Ankaragucu 2 Konya 0; Gaziantep 3 Sivas 1; Eskisehir 1 Bucaspor 0; Bursaspor 1 Istanbul BB 1 (tie); GalataSaray (Istanbul) 0 KDCK 0 (tie); Trabzonspor 2 Besiktash (Istanbul) 1.

For more info, on the games, you can check out Ahmet Bob Turgut's Twitter feed at (twitter.com/turkish soccer).

Lastly, our very favorite sport is women's collegiate gymnastics and there were many meets of interest this weekend.

Due to space and time constraints, we will focus on just two of them.

For starters, Florida (#1) edged Utah (#5) in Salt Lake City thanks to stand-out performances from Gator gymnasts Alaina Johnson, Marissa King and Mackenzie Caquatta.

But, for the home team Utes, Fumina Kobayashi and Cortni Beers finished in a three-way tie for first place on the balance beam with Ashanne Dickerson of Florida, who also scored a 9.9 on vault.


And, our home state North Carolina State Wolfpack gymnastics team won a key road meet over Pittsburgh today thanks to a stand-out performance from Jess Panza, who scored a 9.925 on the balance beam. Panza's score was the highest single event score for a Wolfpack gymnast this season.

The image above, by the way, is of the late, great Howard Cosell (1918-1995) who would have perhaps been horrified to find out that in 2011, due to modern technology, there are many more things to do on a Monday night than watch NFL football on tv. In fact, if one desires, they can play World of the Witchcraft with their 'friends' in Australia for 48 hours in a row.

Yeah, I think that's a bad idea too, but those guys (well, I suppose women can get addicted to WOTWC too) do make us bloggers appear to be people who have real lives.

Things We Learned on Twitter Tonight- NC State Wins in College Basketball

Since I did not attend either the University of North Carolina or their rival North Carolina State, it's only fair that I cover the Wolfpack as well as the Tarheels on this blog. Of course, this will still irk alumni of Duke and Wake Forest!

I must profess with college football season is full-swing, it's hard to believe that college basketball season is getting underway as well. Of course, in places like Lawrence, Kansas, and Lexington, Kentucky, folks are fully aware of this.

Tonight, in Raleigh, NC, the NC State Wolfpack won a surprisingly competitive game with Tennessee Tech by an 82-69 count according to a tweet from WolfpackWire.

C.J. Leslie lead the Wolfpack with 21 points, and his teammate Scott Wood added 11 points to help NC State prevail.

Zac Swansey scored 13 points for the losing Golden Eagles.

The Wolfpack only lead 37-34 at halftime, and the Golden Eagles were winning the game early in the first half.

The Wolfpack's chief rival UNC (ranked #8) beat Lipscomb 80-66 in Chapel Hill tonight as well.

Virginia Tech Gets Snubbed from NCAAs

Virginia Tech men's basketball coach Seth Greenberg must be steamed that his Hokies were not invited to the Big Dance, but he has played it cool publicly. Though his star player Malcolm Delaney tweeted that he was so depressed that he would in fact not watch a single game of the NCAA tourney!

But, the Hokies are a top seed in the NIT and they will Quinnipiac University from Hamden, Conn., tonight in Blacksburg, Va.

Other NIT games of interest include UNC vs. William and Mary, which will be on ESPN tonight, Memphis vs. St. John's, South Florida vs. North Carolina State and UAB vs. Coastal Carolina.

Quote of the Week- Orson Welles

"When you are down and out, something always turns up_ and it is usually the noses of your friends."

SIDEBAR- In Charleston, SC, tonight the College of Charleston pulled a stunning upset over the ninth-ranked University of North Carolina Tarheels in men's basketball. the final was 82-79 in overtime.

Bruce Piephoff Releases New CD

My good friend Greensboro, NC, folk singer Bruce Piephoff, who is undoubtedly celebrating UNC's national championship, will be releasing a new cd entitled "Clockwork" soon. It will be his 17th release.

Piephoff will hold a cd release party at the Lindley Park Filling Station on the corner of Walker Ave. and S. Elam Street in Greensboro on April 24 from 6 to 10 p.m. Phone: 336-274-2144

He will also be peforming at the Backstreet Buzz Coffee House in nearby Reidsville, NC, on April 18, at 7 p.m. The establishment is located at 234 SW Market Street in downtown Reidsville. Phone: 336-348-2899.


Useful Links:

http://www.brucepiephoff.com