We're Going to the Final Four in Indy......

Great, exciting news: Since a friend of mine in Charlotte, NC, has a very sick puppy (a Yorkie named B.B. King), I have been given tickets to the Final Four in Indianapolis.

To be honest, I'm not sure which section to sit in. The Michigan State Spartans defeated the UVA Cavaliers early in the tourney, so I will not be sitting beside Magic Johnson (his alma mater). The Wisconsin Badgers have a great mascot in Bucky the Badger (top image), but I've only been to that state once and it would feel awkward sitting with their fans.

It would be nice to sit with the Kentucky Wildcats fans, especially if I were somehow close to sitting by actress Ashley Judd, one of the team's superfans, but I'm sure even if that happened, she would have a body guard who looks like Kevin Costner as well as a boyfriend who looks like Kevin Costner. Also, I'm not sure what to make of the team's coach John Calipari. While he is amusing enough to follow on Twitter, he comes across as a narcissist.

This leaves the Duke Blue Devils, coached by Mike Kryzewski who has been with the team since I was ten years old, which was when "Mork and Mindy" was still on the air. They are from the ACC. They are from North Carolina, a neighboring state. Durham, NC, is a pretty cool town, they even made a movie about their baseball team "Bull Durham," which starred Kevin Costner. But, Coach K is a Republican and he's already won four NCAA titles. The Badgers haven't won since Benny Goodman and Woody Herman were on the radio during the Big Band era. But, Coach K did write a letter to little boy in Oklahoma. Somehow, I doubt the other three coaches would have done that.

But, in reality, Kentucky will probably beat them in the NCAA finals, and go 40-0; that's just the way the world works. At any rate, I'm looking forward to driving through West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio to be at the Final Four. It truly is a dream come true!

Note: The bottom image is the jersey of Kentucky basketball great Jamal Mashburn

NCAA March Madness Finale- Angry Birds

1) Delaware Blue Hens (Logo pictured top, Vice President Joe Biden is a fan)

2) Iowa Hawkeyes  (Adam Woodbury, #34, pictured top)

3) Coastal Carolina Chanticleers (Chauncey the Chanticleer is pictured bottom, the school is near Myrtle Beach, SC)

4) Louisville Cardinals*

5) Creighton Bluejays ^

6) North Carolina Central Eagles

7) St. Joseph Hawks

8) Air Force Falcons #

9) Kansas Jayhawks

10) Vanderbilt Commodores #

*-Team advanced to Sweet 16

^- Team has not been eliminated, but is trailing by 20 points at press time

#-Teams which did not make the field of 68 teams

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

March Madness by the Numbers: How Many Games Has VCU Won?

Let's jump in the pool, so we can watch some games ourselves; here are nine numerical facts about the NCAA Tournament, also known as March Madness, or (SPOILER ALERT) in the case of the Ohio State Buckeyes who just lost to the Dayton Flyers 60-59, March Sadness. For more numerical facts, go to our sister blog http://nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com/

1) 21: Number of points scored by T.J. Warren of North Carolina State in ACC semi-final loss to Duke in the ACC semi-finals in Greensboro, NC.

2) 224: Miles between Charlottesville, Va., and Raleigh, NC, where the top-seed UVA Cavaliers face 16- seed Coastal Carolina, the Big South Tournament champs. Akil Mitchell of UVA is pictured top.

3) 20: Number of games the Wofford Terriers (Spartanburg, SC) have won; the 15-seed faces 2-seed Michigan in the big dance.

4) 4: Numbers of years Ed Cooley has coached the Providence Friars; the teams face the UNC Tar Heels in San Antonio, Tex., tomorrow.

5) 35- Number worn by Anthony Cole of Memphis, the eight-seed face George Washington Univ. (Washington, DC) in the tournament.

6) 74: Number of points scored by Iowa State in their Big 12 title game versus Baylor.

7) 27: Number of years, it has been since UCLA coach Steve Alford, who played for the Indiana Hoosiers, lead his team to an NCAA title in 1987.

8) 26: Number of games won by VCU, the team's coach Shaka Smart is pictured on the bottom.

9) 6: Number of games lost by the Cincinnati Bearcats who are playing Harvard right now.

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

http://vcuathletics.com/sports/mbkb/index

College Gymnastics Lists 1 of 4 (The Freshman)

Here is the first entry on this blog dedicated to college gymnasts; we begin with a list of 10 talented freshman. Alas, finding images of freshman gymnasts on the web proved to be daunting, so we offer some of their school mascots instead:


1) Kelly Burak, Pitt (Ron the Panther, pictured top)

2) Sasha Sander, Missouri (Truman the Tiger, pictured center)

3) Amanda Jetter, Alabama (Big Al, pictured bottom)

4) Meggie Lim, Auburn

5) Erin Buchanan, Illionois

6) Alex DeMoura, George Washington U

7) Rachel Daum, Stanford

8) Tenille Funches, Ohio State

9) Kendall Adams, Brigham Young U

10) Leah Lomonte, Denver

http://www.collegegymfans.com

Sports Desk: UNC Edges NC State in Home Gymnastics Meet

Greetings to our blog readers in Canada, Sweden and Mongolia........we do actually hits from there every now and then!

When I first saw the results of the meet in Chapel Hill, NC, yesterday between the home University of North Carolina Tar Heels and the visiting North Carolina State Wolfpack, I mistakenly thought that NC State had won.

Though we try to be completely objective when it comes to college gymnastics, to prevent an influx of hate emails from Athens, Ga., or Tuscaloosa, Ala., but so that no one would be wrong about the outcome we posted an image of the UNC mascot Rameses ** over the NC State mascot Mr. Wuf.

The final score of the meet was UNC 194.975 NC State 193.950.

Amazingly and ironically enough, the Wolfpack actually swept the all-around with Brittni Watkins leading the way with an AA score of 39.325.

Watkins also won the bars  (individual scores) event with teammates Stephanie Oullette scoring a 9.8 and Diahanna Ham scoring a 9.725 on the event. Lexi Cappali scored the highest on the bars for UNC with a 9.875, one of the two events that UNC won along with the floor exercise.

The 'Pack won the balance beam as Hannah Fallanca, who went to Mount Tabor High School in Winston-Salem, a city that is some 80 miles west of Raleigh, winning the event with a 9.925. Haley Watts, who had the top AA score for the 'Heels, came in second on the beam with a 9.900.

On vault, the 'Pack featured strong performances from Watkins (9.875), Oullette (9.825) and Fallanca (9.775). Though NC State won the event, UNC closed the gap on the vault with stand-out scores from Cappali (9.775) and Watts (9.75).

The two teams will see each other again on Friday, as NC State hosts a home meet in Raleigh.

In addition to UNC, traditional Big 10 powerhouse Michigan and Towson University (Maryland) will be heading south to face the 'Pack.

It will be interesting to see if Mr. Wuf * shows up on Friday.

*_Yes, there is actually a Mrs. Wuf as well.

**_ We have Rameses spelled incorrectly in our link.....we forgot the 's' at the end

UVA Beats Virginia Tech in Women's Volleyball

Greetings to our blog-readers in Ireland, Malaysia and Greece.

Though this blog has a slightly pro-Hokie leading (and an even more liberal bias; our apologies to Jonathan V. Last, a senior writer at "The Weekly Standard"), we did want to salute the University of Virginia's women's volleyball for their home win in Charlottesville over the Virginia Tech Hokies from Blacksburg.

The final score was UVA winning 3-1 (23-25, 25-19, 25-18, 25-19) with Natalie Bausback leading the Cavaliers with 17 kills and six blocks. Toni Jonowski had 13 kills for the 'Hoos and Haley Kole had 11 kills. The Cavs' are now 17-13 overall, and 10-8 in the ACC.

For the Hokies, Kathryn Caine had 17 kills and Lindsey Owens had 11 kills. The Hokies remain the team with a better record at 21-11 overall and 9-9 in the ACC.

This was the first time UVA won both matches against Va. Tech since 2005.

SIDEBAR: Our tweet of the night comes from our good friend Ali Arikan, a film and culture writer for "Slant" magazine. Arikan resides in his native Istanbul, Turkey, where it is now 9:30 a.m. (seven hours ahead of New York and Atlanta). Here is his tweet: "Another weird dream last night. I was at a library trying to pick out a book with Elizabeth Banks, Nuri Bilge Ceylan and Peter Labuza."

Banks is an America actress (we believe she played Laura Bush in Oliver Stone's "W"), Ceylan is an acclaimed Turkish film director whose films include the brilliant "Uzak/Distance" and Labuza is a New York-based film critic.

http://www.virigniasports.com

http://www.slantmagazine.com

http://www.weeklystandard.com (not an endorsement)

Kudos to the University of Maryland for Winning the ACC Lacrosse Title

The University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, NC, is perhaps a good six-hour drive from College Park, Md., where the University of Maryland is located but the Terps came through in women's lacrosse with a 12-8 over the Tar Heels on road soil.

Abby Friend scored three goals for the home team, but it wasn't enough to hold off three goals each from Katie Schwarzmann (pictured center), Brooke Grffin, Beth Glaros and Taylor Cummings. Schwarzmann was named the tourney's most outstanding player.

The Terps (19-0) remain undefeated and the loss was one of the very few for the 'Heels (12-3); the title is the fifth straight ACC title for Maryland. 

Incidentally, in case any of you are wondering, Testudo is the mascot of Maryland, a school that is (editorial comment: foolishly) going to the Big Ten in the fall.

SIDEBAR ONE: We want to thank Jack in Truth or Consequences, N.Mex., the only town in America named after a game show. Jack was one of the supporters who called in a pledge to the non-profit progressive tv channel Link-TV today; we sense if Link-TV had given his last name, he might find himself on Gov. Susana Martinez's 'enemies list.' She is, after all, a Republican.

SIDEBAR TWO: We also want to thank today's day sponsor (yes, we are making this up, no one sponsors us!) the Cafe Evolution, a vegetarian cafe in Florence, Mass. We are curious to know if they serve shish kebab without any meat!

SIDEBAR THREE: One sport that the Terps might have trouble with in the Big Ten, particularly since they don't have a team in the sport, is women's hockey. But, we sense that if the Terps had a team on the ice, they would probably lose quite often to the Minnesota Golden Gophers, a team that went a very impressive 41-0-0. The Gophers won a NCAA title in women's hockey on their home ice with a 6-3 win over Boston University several weeks ago.

Amanda Kessel of the Gophers was named the most outstanding player in college women's hockey.

There is now a petition to have the Gophers visit the White House, and a joint letter from Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Al Franken (D-Minn.) was written on their behalf.

SIDEBAR FOUR: Starting tomorrow, we will start Soccer Week. It was a good week for Istanbul powerhouse Fenerbahce, the arch rival of our beloved GalataSaray. The Canaries won a home UEFA game over Benefica of Portugal 1-0 on a goal from veteran Turkish player Egemen Korkmaz.

In domestic play, Fenerbahce won over Kayserispor 2-1 thanks to goals from two of the team's star players Dirk Kuyt of the Netherlands and Cristian Baroni of Brazil.

http://www.umterps.com

http://www.gopherssports.com

http://www.cafe-evolution.com

http://www.linktv.org

Top 10 Things 2 Do in the Next Week (or so..........)

On occasion when something we want to post becomes too complicated, we resort to our proverbial old bag of tricks, which might also work for David Copperfield (for those of you in Tajikistan, he is an American magician).

And, one of our traditional entries, even dating back to our earliest entries way back in the stone ages of 2005, was a Top 10 Things To Do List; this effectively postpones our hopes to make fun of conservative newspaper columnist Cal Thomas.

So, here is our latest installment, we imagine at the BBC, they are never this desperate:

1) Taxes (the reason for the image of the vintages Mr. Professor children's calculators from the 1970s; I don't live in the Chicago suburb of Skokie, Illinois, but if I did, I'd check in with Ronald A. Weiss)

2) Watch a tape of the University of North Carolina-Clemson baseball game that we recorded on Monday from ESPN-U (this is the reason for the image of a tiger; the Clemson mascot is a tiger with no name, but finding a suitable image of that tiger proved to be difficult and time-consuming as is this explanation)

3) Go to West Virginia

4) Eat a gyro

5) Get new library card

6) Read the Torah (It should be pointed out that I am not Jewish, but I did get a copy of the holy book for one dollar at an estate sale; the image below is of a synagogue in the Czech Republic).

7) Go through old records........as in stuff from bands like The Bee Gees

8) Write a poem (for myself, not for a woman- that never seems to work in real life)

9) Get stamps

10) Read the current issue of the Sunday "Washington Post." (We personally love how the woman always says the man that she is hooked up with in 'Date Lab' is never good enough or lives a few many Metro stops away from her!).

Florida Gators Win SEC Gymnastics Meet

In a meet which featured at least three Olympic gymnasts: British national Marissa King (pictured bottom) and American Bridget Sloan (pictured top) of Florida and Canadian Brittany Rogers of Georgia, the Florida Gators prevailed at the SEC Conference Championships in North Little Rock, Ark., last weekend.

The Gators won its ninth SEC title and a second consecutive title as the team prepares to host regionals. Florida, also the nation's number one team, has had a history of disappointing and agonizingly close second place finishes at nationals, making them arguably the most successful women's gymnastics program to never win a NCAA title.

But, Sloan, who tied LSU gymnast Rheagan Courville for first-place in the all-around with a 39.725, helped the Gators edge out two-time defending national champion Alabama (197.8), LSU (197.7) and Georgia (197.325).

The Gators started off awkwardly on vault in the eight-team meet, but the team recouped thanks to strong scores from Sloan, King and Mackenzie Caquatto. The momentum continued as Sloan won balance beam with a 9.925.

The floor event in the last rotation sealed the victory for Florida with powerful routines from Sloan, Kytra Hunter, Randy Stageberg and Kierstan Wang.

Only four schools have ever won titles in NCAA women's gymnastics: Alabama, Georgia, UCLA and Utah though several teams besides Florida have come close, including Oklahoma, Nebraska and Michigan.

The Florida Gators mascots (pictured middle) are named Albert and Alberta.

West Virginia Gymnast WinsBig 12 Conference Honor

Yes, we should point out that we are placing the Tiger mascot for the University of Missouri, which took its up and coming women's gymnastics program from the Big 12 to the SEC as a bit of a joke as conference realignments in college sports have gone quite a bit whacky, which must amuse coaches of Ivy League schools, who will probably never have such concerns.

The Big 12 Conference, which only has three schools with college gymnastics, announced this week that Jaida Lawerence, a freshman from Rocky Hill, Conn., was named BIG 12 Newcomer of the Week.

Lawrence, pictured on top, scored a 9.9 in the vault competition during a home meet vs. EAGL-conference schools Maryland and Rutgers. The Mountaineers had also competed in the EAGL until this year. In fact, the program had the most EAGL titles in the gymnastics-only conference.

The Connecticut freshman also received a  9.725 on bars during the same meet.

The other two Big 12 gymnastics honors for the week went to Taylor Spears, pictured bottom, a junior from Plano, Tex., who is ranked first on the balance beam nationally. Spears had a 9.9 on the beam during a road meet against traditional powerhouse Alabama; the Crimson Tide won that meet by a relatively close 197.725-196.900 score.

Another Sooner Lauren  Alexander, a sophomore from Naperville, Ill., was named Big 12 Specialist of the week for her own 9.9 beam score versus Alabama.


http://www.wvusports.com

http://www.soonersports.com

Sports Desk- ACC Volleyball, Tarheel Named Freshman of the Week

Though we have an image of Rameses, we are focusing on University of North Carolina women's college volleyball player Page Neunfeldt a freshman from Birmingham, Mich., was named ACC Freshman of the Year.

Neunfeldt helped UNC earn home wins over the University of Maryland 3-1 (27-25, 22-25, 25-19, 25-17) on Friday night and against Boston College 3-0 (25-19, 25-10, 25-17). The Tarheel freshman had a combined total of 27 kills and 11 blocks over the weekend.

Here is a list of scores from Fri., Oct, 19 when all 12 ACC were playing; for the results of the Saturday and Sunday games go to our sister blog: http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

Fri, Oct. 19:

*-denotes home team

Miami 3 *Clemson 2

Duke 3 *Virginia 1

*NC State 3 Boston College 0

*Virginia Tech Wake Forest 1

Florida State 3 *Georgia Tech 2

*UNC 3 Maryland 1

http://www.goheels.com

http://www.cvu.com