Michigan bounced back from its loss to Northwestern in last week's Louisville tournament (which would be considered a non-conference game), by routing the Wildcats 11-4 in the teams' Big 10 opener in Evanston. The Wolverines showcased their youthful talent, with contributions from three freshmen, hitters Roya St. Clair and Angela Findlay (the sister of slugger Samantha Findlay) and pitcher Nikki Nemitz. For this year's Michigan softballers, their slogan may have to be modified from "Go Blue" to "Baby Blue!"

In Pac 10 opening action, Arizona State bedeviled UCLA, 6-0, and the University of Arizona blanked Washington by the same score.

This upcoming weekend of college softball will arguably be one of the best of the entire regular season. This assertion rests on three points:

1. League play begins in the Big 10 and Pac 10, meaning that all four "power conferences" (the Big 12 and SEC being the others) have now entered this stage.

2. As elaborated below, the Big 10 and Pac 10 each have some excellent match-ups for their opening weekends of conference action.

3. The Big 12, which opened conference play last week, will feature a "Clash of the Titans," with Texas A&M playing at Oklahoma in single games Saturday and Sunday. Saturday afternoon's contest will be televised on ESPN2.

Let's go back to the opening of conference play in the two remaining conferences. In the Big 10, Northwestern hosts Michigan for games on Friday and Saturday afternoons. Just a few days ago, the Wildcats defeated the Wolverines in extra innings at the Louisville tournament. UM and NU have each played in the championship round of the NCAA Women's College World Series in recent years, the Wolverines edging UCLA for the 2005 national championship, and Northwestern falling to its namesake Wildcats of Arizona for the 2006 title.

The Pac 10's docket for this weekend, from the composite schedule on the conference's softball page (see links section on the right), is shown below. It's easiest to think of Pac 10 scheduling in terms of geographic "traveling pairs," such as the Arizona schools (U of A and ASU), the Oregon schools (UO and OSU), and the northern California schools (Stanford and Cal-Berkeley). For example, unless they're playing each other, Arizona and Arizona State will either both be at home or both on the road in the same general location. If the Arizona schools were each playing one of the Oregon schools to start off a weekend, they would then switch opponents to close it out. The one little quirk to the system is that USC and Washington State don't field softball teams, so UCLA and Washington serve as partners to each other. With that in mind, the following schedule should make perfect sense!

Fri., Mar. 30
ARIZONA at WASHINGTON, 1 p.m.
ARIZONA STATE at UCLA, 1 p.m.
CALIFORNIA at OREGON, 3 p.m.
STANFORD at OREGON STATE, 3 p.m.

Sat., Mar. 31
ARIZONA at UCLA, 2 p.m.
ARIZONA STATE at WASHINGTON, 1 p.m.
CALIFORNIA at OREGON STATE, 1 p.m.
STANFORD at OREGON, 1 p.m.

Sun., Apr. 1
ARIZONA at UCLA, 1 p.m.
ARIZONA STATE at WASHINGTON, 1 p.m.
CALIFORNIA at OREGON STATE, 1 p.m.
STANFORD at OREGON, 1 p.m.

As can be seen, Arizona and ASU, the two highest-ranked Pac 10 teams nationally, travel to the UCLA/Washington duo, and the "NorCal" schools travel to the Oregon schools. Another complexity is that each team plays three games on its trip, two against one opponent and one against the other; for example, Arizona plays two games at UCLA and one at Washington. However, UCLA and U-Dub will later travel to the Arizona schools, with UCLA playing once at U of A and Washington playing twice there. In the end, Arizona ends up with three games each against UCLA and Washington. In order to work as a scheduler for the Pac 10, you have to pass a test of differential and integral calculus (just kidding).

Below Arizona and ASU, four teams -- UCLA, Washington, Oregon, and Stanford -- are ranked in comparable positions nationally, in the vicinity of 10-15, with the specifics varying by which poll one looks at. The remaining two teams, Oregon State and Cal, have been somewhat disappointing thus far, but with the opening of conference play, hope springs eternal.

Perhaps playing at home will allow UCLA and Washington to do some damage against Arizona and ASU. We shall see!

Eat my Dust You Insensitive Buck

Stephanie and I walk from my office to AAC. We heard that 15 minutes after tip-off, all tickets are dramatically discounted. This is not true. So we resort to scalpers. One scalper has a pair of tickets on the floor but they're $110 each. We tell him we have $30 each. 15 minutes later, he caves and we get the tickets. Stephanie gets the credit for driving a hard bargain. We're not sure exactly where Section 111 is but we find out it is where the mAAniacs are. Only we pass them on our way down to Section 111, Row AAA, Seats 1 and 2. That's those folding chairs next to the basket. Here's my view from our seats and a very vague glipse of Dirk before he got hurt. I actually majored in photography at one point in my life. You would never know because I obviously keep my mad camera skills very well hidden.




We got in at the end of the first quarter. It unreal how close we were. That Avery Johnson has got a set of lungs on him. Also, right as I made the comment "I'm afraid they're gonna put us on the jumbotron right as we're making dumb faces" Stephanie looked up to see us on the jumbotron.

The weirdest part was that we were right there and neither of us saw how Dirk got hurt. We watched the replay as well and still couldn't see it. He did not look like he was in pain at all. My money was on a minor case of food poisoning but obviously the ankle injury is always the safe bet.

Stephanie high fived Champ the mascot when he was walking back to the tunnel and we learned that the cheerleaders will not give shirts to people like us. But I also witnessed firsthand Jason Terry's ability to whip the crowd into a frenzy and it is unreal. Also unreal was how for the last 3 minutes of the game, the place was going nuts. Everyone was on their feet. I've never heard such a deafening mob before in my life. The gasps that went up each time Diop or Stackhouse missed one of their free throws in those last two minutes were terrifying. But in the end, the Mavs won and we all got free tacos. Also, I got an Acme Brick sign and a foam finger and they were passing out posters of Avery Johnson. It's a triple exposure picture of him first yelling, then acting pensive then sort of half-smiling and it says THE GENERAL on the bottom.

The only con of the night (other than Dirk's "ankle" injury) was the security guard by the score table. More than any Mavs player or mascot or cheerleader or coach, I wanted to say hello to Bob and Mark mostly because I feel like certain overused phrases of theirs have made it into my everyday vernacular. So we went by the score table while they were off air during the post-game locker room comments. Our main goal was to tell Bob that indeed, one of these nights one of those will go in. We're standing there a few rows behind them when Mark looks over at us and stares for a solid 10 seconds during which our only recourse was to smile back and try to not look demented which I think we acheived. Then Mean Security Guy comes up and talks to us like we're there for a retard convention. His actual quote, "Bob and Mark are working. They have to work now and you need to leave." But I took a picture as we were being ushered out which is another jewel in my photography crown:

Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue

ARMY OF ONE? More like just a big group of assholes.

While everyone gets their panties in a knot about SUPPORTING THE TROOPS, this kind of shit is not only allowed but condoned. Here's the deal: I feel very sorry for kids who were too poor to afford a higher education or who fell for the whole WMD/"they hate our freedom" schtick and signed up to fight and die just to line some already wealthy people's pockets. I can only hope that the Veterans Services get their act together to take care of the ones that survive and come back.

That being said (and I may add that I come from a military family full of Army veterans), just because you're in the military does not mean you automatically get my respect. In fact, the infrastructure of the US military seems to be composed mainly of bigoted and/or small minded douchemonkeys.

I can only imagine what kind of hard sell the US Army's gonna have to come up with after this clusterfuck of a war has exposed just how shoddy the Army is.

That's nice. Only 9 other times in NBA history since 1954 has a team swept a 6 game road trip. There's got to be someone keeping track of which records the Mavs have broken night by night.

I like it when the Mavs margin of victory is larger than the number of years I have been alive. Is it weird that the most thrilling moment of the whole game was the ally oop dunk Croshere pulled off early in the 4th quarter? I know part of the impetus for me starting this blog was to mourn the loss of Keith Van Horn and for a while I thought Van Horn's skill-less spirit would live on in the form of Austin Croshere. But he's really improving and growing on me.

Devean George is still rusty but it's so good to see him back in there. It's also weird to see Ager on the scoreboard.

I can't promise anything but I *MAY* be at tomorrow night's game against the Timberwolves. So if you've kept up with any of my sign ideas I've discussed here on my blog you will know which signs to look for on TV tomorrow night. Keep Austin Weird has not ceased being hilarious to me.

During a break in one of the March Madness NCAA basketball games this afternoon, I was doing some channel surfing and came upon a Fox Sports cable telecast of the finale of this weekend's Alabama-LSU softball series. The Tigers won today's game 3-0, although things were a little more precarious for LSU than the score suggests, as Alabama got multiple runners on base in the top halves of the sixth and seventh innings. In fact, the Crimson Tide's offensive totals in the box score reflected the unusual situation of a team getting 10 hits, but no runs. Alabama hurler Chrissy Owens (16-1) absorbed her first loss of the season. With the win, LSU took the three-game series, 2-1.

Elsewhere in the SEC, Florida swept its series with Georgia in a battle of nationally ranked squads, No. 1 Tennessee continues to roll (sweeping Arkansas this weekend), and Kentucky's Brooke Marnitz (facing Mississippi this weekend) continues her hot hitting. In statistics as of Saturday that I found on the UK athletics website Sunday night, Marnitz has a batting average of .432, an on-base average of .484, and a slugging percentage of .963.

It's still a while away, in late April, but two LSU-Tennessee games will be televised on ESPN2.

***

Around the nation, in the Louisville tournament, Michigan rebounded from its tough Saturday to beat the host Cardinals, leaving U of L at 3-1 for the tourney. Northwestern also finished at 3-1 in the event. In theory, one could award the tournament title to the Cards, as they beat the Wildcats head-to-head, but the Louisville softball page made no mention of the final standings, as best I could tell.

In the Big 12, Texas slowed down Oklahoma's momentum a bit, defeating the Sooners in 10 innings.

Next weekend, the Big 10 and Pac 10 start their conference seasons!

That's right, 27 days left until the playoffs start. 17 games left for the Mavs. And they are two victories away from tying the franchise season record for wins.

All that said, there was no excuse for the slip-up in the middle of the 4th against Atlanta. The Mavs lead should have never gotten below 15 much less tied. They dominated the whole game and the Hawks are the lowest scoring offense in the NBA. I guess they can afford to phone a few in and as long as they're ready for April 1 against Phoenix. The good news there is that as I type this, Sacramento aren't cutting Phoenix any breaks.

I don't know if I've really made my feelings clear on this issue but let me go ahead and say it. I don't think that Dirk has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that he deserves the MVP. I think Dirk is an amazing player and some of the things that he can do as a 7 footer are astonishing. I adore the fact that (though it is probably not helping him in the MVP race) he doesn't showboat. I savor those fadeaway jumpers that he sinks with such ease most games. But the Phoenix game on March 14th did show me that Steve Nash is truly an amazing player who is capable of single-handedly turning a game upside down. Clearly I love the Mavs as I can't imagine someone creating a blog to discuss a team they are not passionate about. And I can't stress how highly I regard Dirk Nowitzki. But frankly, I think he's made it clear that the MVP race is not a high priority for him which only makes me respect him more. I like my team because they are a team and the greatest reward in a team sport is a championship. So I kind of wish people would knock off all the MVP talk. Give it to Nash. He deserves it and he's not an asshole (there's a couple of stories there for another day) so I say give it to him.

Though I may check on the availability of the URL for jasoneugeneterryformvp.com sometime in the next 27 days.

A few results for the day...

Michigan's offense took off on spring break, as the Wolverines went 15 consecutive innings, combined over two games, without scoring a run. As a result, UM dropped decisions to Northwestern, 2-1 (9 inn.), and to Liberty, 2-0, in the Louisville tournament.

The host Cardinals (3-0) appear well positioned to win the tournament, with only a Sunday game left against Michigan to conclude the event. Northwestern is 1-1, with games left tomorrow against Cal and Liberty. However, even if Louisville lost and Northwestern swept its two games, the teams would end up tied at 3-1, and Louisville defeated Northwestern head-to-head on opening day. Michigan is 1-2, as are Liberty and Cal.

***

Oklahoma (No. 3 and 4 in the two national polls) continued its roll, blanking Texas 7-0 in Austin.

LSU split a doubleheader with No. 2 nationally ranked Alabama. Here's a summary of the rest of SEC action (nothing much out of the ordinary).

Yesterday, Oklahoma's surging Sooners came into Lubbock and swept a rain-delayed doubleheader from Texas Tech, 7-0 and 7-3.

According to the OU webpage's summary of Game 1, Sooner pitching ace Lauren Eckermann "recorded her 20th win of the season. The junior added to her perfect record with a season-high 12 strikeouts and only gave up five hits while recording her seventh shut out of the season."

Oklahoma next faces Texas in Austin in Saturday and Sunday contests.

A little further down the road, the nation will get to see a match-up of the top two teams in the Big 12, as ESPN2 will televise the visit of Texas A&M to Oklahoma on Saturday, March 31 at 2 p.m. Central.

***

Today in Louisville, Kentucky, the Women 4 Women tournament got underway. Michigan and Northwestern are both in this tournament, and it seems a bit odd to have two teams from the same conference in such a small (five-team) event. The Wolverines and Wildcats will face each other Saturday morning in Louisville, then just six days later, they start a two-game series to open Big 10 play, with UM travelling to Evanston for games on Friday, March 30 and Saturday, March 31.

In today's opening action in Louisville, Michigan beat Cal, but Northwestern fell to the host Cardinals.

I think parquet floors only look appropriate in hotel ballrooms. I know it's kind of Boston's "thing" but it really just looks like their contractor did the old bait and switch when it came time to lay the floors down.

God, Jason Terry is rad. These Eastern Conference games are messing me up because I don't get adequate post-work decompression time before game time. But if it gets us 70 wins by the time the regular season is over, I guess it was worth it.

We won. LeBron sucked. I discovered that "Cavs orange" is my least favorite color. Devin Harris' three pointer with 0.6 seconds left in the first half was rad. Especially as it was the third Mavs 3 in a row. Not that exciting of a game but after the Phoenix game, I guess I should savor these lazy games.

Imagine if part of your job description was "must be able to coerce Dirk Nowitzki into lip synching and wearing an Amish beard while playing jingle bells." Sometimes when I think my job is really cool, I remember that there's some girl in Dallas who gets to make the Mavs do retarded things all in the name of cheap jumbotron entertainment.

Alright folks we have another record. The Mavericks have now tied the all-time NBA season record for most games won in a 45-game stretch with 41 victories heading into their first 6 straight road games trip since 2000.

Last night's game was funny to me if you think of it in comparasion to the Golden State game last week. The Knicks are dwelling in the bottom of the playoff-contenders rung in the Eastern Conference yet I can't say they had much of an answer for the any of the Mavs calls. Yet Golden State, who also reside in the bottom of the playoff gang in the Western Conference, owned the Mavs last week. You can say "Well, the Mavs really have a hard time against Golden State. And Don Nelson knows the Mavs too well." But it really proves to me that the West is really just a much tougher conference.

All that being said, I actually like Stephon Marbury. As insignificant as it is in the long run, the idea that an NBA player would actually endorse a shoe for kids who can't afford Jordans or whatever is pretty rad in my book. And though I've never been a sneaker kind of gal, the shoes are pretty sweet too. The fact that he isn't paid to endorse them and only takes a cut of sales is good too. And the fact that he gave a free pair to every high school varsity player in NYC. Basically, he's not Jason "I beat up my wife" Kidd or Ron "I abuse my dogs" Artest.

Devean George and Greg Buckner are game-time decisions for Friday's game in Boston. I've missed them. As long as Buckner NEVER wears that mask again. And party/bonus, Cleveland lost in overtime to Charlotte.

Oklahoma won the Judi Garman Classic in Fullerton, California, shutting out Arizona 11-0 in a five-inning, run-rule game. According to this article from the OU athletics site:

It was the first time the Wildcats had been run ruled in 12 seasons when they lost to UCLA on April 16, 1995 (6-1 in six innings).

The Sooners really had to eke one out in eight innings in their semifinal game against DePaul.

Oklahoma will be here in Lubbock this Thursday, March 22 to open Big 12 conference play with a double-header against Texas Tech.

DePaul, a participant in the 2005 NCAA Women's College World Series, had five losses in the early weeks of the present season, but went on a 10-game winning streak before losing to Oklahoma. I have added a link to the Blue Demons' team page in the right-hand column.

***

Here's your Sunday SEC round-up. There did not appear to be any upsets in confernce play today.

SXSW 2007: Bringing Down Austin One Elks Lodge at a Time

Wednesday March 14

Get to Austin and check into my Motel 6 room that I have to stay in for one night. They give me a handicapped room. The sink is approximately 2 feet from the ground. I have to sit down to brush my teeth. It's raining really hard. A few coworkers and I have a team meeting at the Hilton on the covered porch. While we're sitting there, a group consisting of four dudes dressed up like Grateful Dead roadies or cosmic cowboys or whatever the fuck they think they look like are standing across the street being interviewed by a TV crew and having their picture taken from multiple angles. One of my coworkers point out that they look like douchebags. I agree but there is a nagging suspicion that I know the douchebags in question. I feel bad for calling them douchebags when they turn up at The Theater Fire soundcheck and I realize they are VietNam. I broke up a fistfight between Josh from VietNam and my friend Mark back in 1998. I digress.

Go back to Motel 6 for a shower and watch the first half of the Suns-Mavs game. Go to Room 710 for the Theater Fire showcase. They have the game on. I realize that I can't handle a double overtime game in conjunction with South by Southwest. I choose to watch the game until the bitter end. I am sad when we lose. I get drink tickets and I am a little more happy. Then I find this written on the wall in the women's bathroom:



Mike is the lead singer of the Riverboat Gamblers and also an apparently underloved man. Brothers and Sisters play at 1am but there are few people there and they sound pretty bad. Lots of Allman Brothers Band references are made, mostly by me. Then back to the Motel 6 where I fall asleep watching ESPN.

Thursday March 15

My mission statement for this year's South by Southwest was to be in the same room as Zach Galifinakis as much as possible. I kick off this mission by going to the Filter party. I walk into the bar and proceed to knock back a few morning beers (well, it's actually a little after 1pm at that point) sitting next to Zach. Free Miller Lite = "breakfast" thanks to Filter. It's about 85 degrees outside with 198474658% humidity. I have already heard all the jokes Zach does at the Filter party and even he admits that "it really sucks to stand up here and try to make people laugh at 9 am in the hot sun."



I write notes on coasters about how bad the bands are. I leave the Filter party and go to Waterloo Ice House. After the Theater Fire set, we find ourselves hanging out in the parking lot drinking beer next to the Theater Fire van which in turn is parked next to the Albert Hammond Jr./Kings of Leon van. I say hello to Albert Hammond Jr. who I kind of knew a few years ago and still share some mutual friends with. Then the Scion people give us all free baseball hats which leads to this:



I like to think that my friends are a lot more fun to hang out with than some guy from the Strokes or Kings of Leon. My theory is further proven when Sean spits chewed up french fries at Nick's wife Kara. I check into my much nicer new room at the Sheraton on 11th then meet my coworkers at the Snocap party at the Four Seasons. Open bar. My boss takes us to some sports bar where we eat BBQ sandwiches and watch the Duke-VCU game. I was rooting for Duke because I think underdogs are overrated.

Went to Emos where I saw the two of the three best sets of the entire festival by the Octopus Project and Voxtrot. I also see the Gossip whose records usually bore me. But I can't deny that they put on a good show. Beth takes off her dress and sings the final song of the set wearing nothing but black bra and panties. Despite what you think of her "big girls need love" thing, you gotta admit that in this "thinness is next to godliness" world we live in, it takes serious balls to be that comfortable with your weight. But it also reminds me that the Gossip seem to be more about personality and crazy live shows than actual songs. Hung out with my old boss during the Voxtrot set and ate something from a wagon/stand/vehicle as I stumble back to the hotel after the show.

Friday March 16

Headed out at noon to Red 7 for the Mess With Texas party. There is a line about 400 people deep and the doors haven't opened yet. I go to Beauty Bar next door and thirty minutes later the line has dwindled. I get in and have another beer breakfast. I see what turns out to be by far the best set of the entire festival by Dark Meat. It's Polyphonic Spree without the sunshine and rainbows but instead in their place are songs about bad acid trips and getting in trouble at school. Turn around and realize that Michael Showalter and I have the same sunglasses. He gives me a "yeah we're pretty awesome" sort of nod which is all the validation I need. Go inside to hear Andrew WK's lecture on happiness which is not as funny as it seems on paper. He is followed by stand-up sets by Eugene Mirman who proclaims himself a "taste maker" and determines what is cool and what is not cool. Goes over a few things that are cool and a few that aren't cool then takes "cool" questions from the audience. Someone yells out "Rick Moranis" to which he responds that Rick Moranis is actually the only completely neutral thing in the world or as he said "Rick Moranis is like an alkaline and a base" which I thought was pretty true. Michael Showalter did a set in which he played "guilty pleasures" on his iPod most of which were truly awful. One of the songs was "Drops of Jupiter" by Train. This leads to David Cross telling a story about an ex-girlfriend of his who used to sleep with one of the guys from Train and a voicemail the guy from Train left on her phone in which he describes a party he's attending as "beautiful."

I kiss up to the door guys so I can come and go as I please and skip the line. It works so I head to the Noisepop party which is hosted by Zach Galifinakis. I witness him eat a grilled cheese sandwich with such speed that half of the cheese and crumbs end up in his beard. I actually help him get the crumbs and cheese out of his beard which is like braiding the hair of a million strawberry scented unicorns in my girl brain. He does more jokes that I've heard a bunch but it's an excuse for me to stand on the side of the stage and giggle. And to take another picture of him in all his pudgy glory.



Go back to Mess With Texas where I end up seeing the Gossip again. I have had more than a few beers which leads me to give Beth a hug and tell her that I'm from Georgia too. While she had every right to tell me to never touch her or speak to her again, she instead gave me a big hug and we chatted about being from Georgia and she tells me what Jarvis Cocker's cologne smells like. When I start talking about what Jarvis Cocker's cologne smells like at length, it's time to go back to the hotel and take a nap.

I wake up and head to Cafe Mundi for The Theater Fire and O'Death. O'Death are also one of the top sets I see. Go back to my hotel in time to watch The Good The Bad and The Queen from the patio of my hotel. They are truly awful. End up at a Sony BMG party on the top floor of my hotel. Kelli and I decide to bartend because it seemed like a good idea at the time. Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine is at the party but seemed uninterested in testing my Cocktail-esque skills. Kelli and I set up a tip jar and made some money. The cops come multiple times and finally around 4am, Austin's finest decide to rage against the party machine and shut it down. Shouldn't Tom Morello be more angry about this brutal abuse of police power? Aparently this is the face I make when someone from Rage Against the Machine is at the same party I am at:



Saturday March 17

Wake up feeling like I had been to a rave followed by boot camp followed by a kegger. Went to The Theater Fire instore at Bella Blue and am told that David Fricke from Rolling Stone is record shopping next door. He actually saw the Theater Fire play at Beerland last year so I take a CD to give to him. He hits on me which is what we call "taking one for the team." Go to OK Mountain Gallery party where I see Weird Weeds and Peter and the Wolf. Stand in what is essentially a backyard drinking keg beer and wondering if this is what my Dad pictured when I told him last week that I was going to a convention in Austin. Back to the hotel for a nap. Find out that I have scored a pass for the Vice after party at the Elks Lodge. Watch a totally unfunny Saturday Night Live then watch the first half of the Stooges set at Stubb's from the hotel patio. Sing along to the killer version of "Gimme Danger" in the car on the way to the Vice party.



This is where things get interesting. The Vice party is at capacity within a few minutes of us getting in. A few of us take to the dance floor for a fit of bad white kids dancing to Chromeo which smoothly transitioned into Technotronic's "Pump Up the Jam" which causes us to garner the attention of a Vice photographer. That's never a good sign. We take refuge on the rooftop patio and are yelling at friends in the now-100 people long line when I hear what I think is a car crash in the driveway. Then security starts running to the front of the building and we are all told to move back as quickly as possible. Someone says that a guy has fallen off the roof. What had in fact happened was that THE MOTHERFUCKING BALCONY HAD PARTIALLY COLLAPSED AND SENT METAL AND BRICKS PLUMMETING TO THE GROUND! Which leads us to speculate whether balcony collapse is a DO or DON'T. Once we find out that miraculously no one had been hurt, the apathy of the partygoers reached a fever pitch as pictures were taken and balcony collapse jokes were made with plenty of references to the Simpsons episode where they play tennis in the benefit for victims of Balcony Collapse.





Me, Kelli and Eric Courson celebrate the fact that we did not die at an Elks Lodge:



Everyone took refuge at the Purevolume party where we met a man from Lakeland, Florida who did the following things in no particular order:
- tell us that he found out his fiance was fooling around with his brother
- gathered us for a huddle where we piled our hands on each other's and yelled things
- showed us his picture ID repeatedly to prove he was 22 years old

As we left the party headed for our respective hotels, there was a very passionate group sing-along to "You Got Lucky" by Tom Petty. Because nothing's luckier than not dying on a rooftop.

Sunday March 18

Check out of the hotel and head home. Jamie Kennedy is on the radio in Austin clearly still very very very drunk. He's talking about coming to SXSW to hang out with his friends the Polyphonic Spree. Really? Do they travel in similar circles? Seriously? My mp3 player dies ten minutes outside Austin which leads me to navigate the vast wasteland of central Texas terrestrial radio. With a four day bender coming to a close and Movin' 107.5 finally coming in clearly around Waco, I had to agree with Movin' in their observation that "music makes you feel good." Chicken nugget kid's meals help too. Got home and commenced my yearly tradition of gathering all the random junk I have accumulated in my purse throughout the week and taking an inventory.

The picture above contains all of the following:

3 unopened Bud Lights
1 room service jar of grape jelly
17 condoms from the Vice party
1 SXSW wristband that someone left in my car
2 kazoos
8 parking garage validation tickets


Lessons I learned this year:

1. SXSW wristbands or badges are a complete waste of money
2. Brian Posehn hates me
3. Staying in a hotel downtown is totally worth the extra money
4. I wish I had the foresight to open a skinny jeans and ballet flats store on 6th
5. Damon Gough (Badly Drawn Boy) seems to be constantly confused and wanders around his hotel lobby with a street map
6. Balconies are not 100% reliable
7. Datarock, Dark Meat, Voxtrot, the Octopus Project, O'Death and The Stooges are all very good bands.
8. Without a wristband or badge I had *EASILY* the best time I've ever had at SXSW this year. And I spent about $50 total on cover charges to get into the few bands showcases that I really wanted to see or had missed their set at a free party. SXSW will never trick me into wasting $200+ dollars again.

Evening

Here's how things stand regarding the quest for the championship of the Judi Garman Classic (copied and pasted from tournament website).

CHAMPIONSHIP BRACKET (Field 1)
GAME 1: Michigan 1, Arizona 2
GAME 2: Louisiana-Lafayette 6, Penn State 5
GAME 3: Oklahoma 8, Cal State Northridge 0 (5 inn.)
GAME 4: DePaul 4, Fresno State 1

Arizona (V) vs. Louisiana-Lafayette (H), Sunday 8:30 a.m.
Oklahoma (H) vs. DePaul (V), Sunday 10:30 a.m.

Championship Game, Sunday 1 p.m.

As a University of Michigan graduate (Ph.D., 1989), I have to say that the loss to Arizona would seem to be a major missed opportunity for the Wolverines to strengthen their seeding potential for the NCAA tournament later this spring. The UM did not play a non-conference schedule that would get it too many games with top Pac-10 teams, so this could have been a big win. The Wolverines then dropped a 5-2 contest to fellow Big 10 team, Penn State, in an extra round presumably designed to let teams that lost their openers on Saturday get an extra game.

***

Here's tonight's SEC round-up. The conference's highly ranked teams held to form against their less-heralded opponents. One noteworthy development is LSU's doubleheader sweep over Florida; the Gators have been a bit of a roadblock to the conference's best teams thus far, taking a game each from Tennessee and Alabama earlier on.

Early morning

Louisiana Lafayette defeated Notre Dame in the late game last night, so today's match-ups in the championship brackets of Fullerton's Judi Garman Classic are set (copied and pasted from tournament website):

CHAMPIONSHIP BRACKET (Field 1)
GAME 1: Michigan (A1) vs. Arizona (D2), Saturday 9 a.m.
GAME 2: Louisiana-Lafayette (B1) vs. Penn State (C2), Saturday 11:15 a.m.
GAME 3: Oklahoma (D1) vs. Cal State Northridge (A2), Saturday 1:30 p.m.
GAME 4: DePaul (C1) vs. Fresno State (B2), Saturday 4 p.m.

CONSOLATION CHAMPIONSHIP BRACKET (Field 2)
GAME 5: Florida State (A3) vs. NC State (D4), Saturday 9 a.m.
GAME 6: Arizona State (B3) vs. Cal State Fullerton (C4), Saturday 11:15 a.m.
GAME 7: Pacific (D3) vs. Washington (A4), Saturday 1:30 p.m.
GAME 8: Texas (C3) vs. Notre Dame (B4), Saturday 4 p.m.

Such is the depth of college softball that some quite good teams are in the consolation bracket. In fact, if you didn't see the labels "championship" and "consolation," it might be difficult for someone taking the equivalent of a "blind taste test" to say which bracket is which, just from the listings of teams.

Late night

The big story from the Judi Garman Classic at Cal State Fullerton is that highly ranked Arizona State (No. 2 and 4 in the national polls) dropped two games. The Sun Devils lost first to Fresno State by a 6-1 score, and then to Louisiana-Lafayette, 2-0 in eight innings.

There's one more game still going on tonight, between Notre Dame and Louisiana-Lafayette. This game evidently has implications for the standings of Pool B, which are needed to complete tomorrow's schedule. This can be seen in the schedule below, which I've copied and pasted from the tournament website.

CHAMPIONSHIP BRACKET (Field 1)
GAME 1: Michigan (A1) vs. Arizona (D2), Saturday 9 a.m.
GAME 2: Pool B First Place vs. Penn State (C2), Saturday 11:15 a.m.
GAME 3: Oklahoma (D1) vs. Cal State Northridge (A2), Saturday 1:30 p.m.
GAME 4: DePaul (C1) vs. Second Place Pool B, Saturday 4 p.m.

CONSOLATION CHAMPIONSHIP BRACKET (Field 2)
GAME 5: Florida State (A3) vs. NC State (D4), Saturday 9 a.m.
GAME 6: Third Place Pool B vs. Cal State Fullerton (C4), Saturday 11:15 a.m.
GAME 7: Pacific (D3) vs. Washington (A4), Saturday 1:30 p.m.
GAME 8: Texas (C3) vs. Fourth Place Pool B, Saturday 4 p.m.

***

An item I just discovered tonight, but should have noticed earlier, is that No. 1 Tennessee suffered its second loss of the season on Wednesday, a 5-4 setback to the University of Mississippi. I'd like to say you can chalk this omission up to a serious case of March Madness. In reality, though, I tend to approach upcoming games by scanning schedules and trying to pick out games that match two big-name teams with each other. That's probably why I missed this Tennessee game; even with the win, Ole Miss is just 10-16.

Morning

In late action Thursday night in the Judi Garman Classic at Cal State Fullerton, Oklahoma took a big step toward inclusion among the nation's elite teams, knocking off Arizona, 6-2. The Sooners are now 30-1.

Several games have been completed today in the Judi Garman Classic at Cal State Fullerton.

The headline story is Arizona State's Katie Burkhart pitching a perfect game in the Sun Devils' 3-0 victory over Notre Dame.

In other action, Michigan upped its record to 21-1 with a 6-3 win over Washington. The widely anticipated game between Arizona and Oklahoma is scheduled to start at 8:30 Pacific, but tournaments often run behind. Given that I'm in the Central timezone, I probably won't have a score tonight, but you can check the tournament website (linked above) or either of the teams' sites (in the links section on the right).

Evening

I just finished listening to the conclusion of Game 2 of the Alabama at Florida doubleheader via the Crimson Tide's internet radio service.

Bama won the first game 6-2, but Florida rebounded to hand the Tide its first loss of the season in the nightcap. An eight-run Gator inning somewhere in the middle of the game was more than enough to "swamp" Alabama, 8-4. The Tide had the tying run at the plate in the top of the seventh with two out, but a grounder to the pitcher ended matters.

Alabama's top pitcher, Chrissy Owens, apparently was not the starter in Game 2, as the radio announcer alluded to Owens' coming in to relieve another pitcher.

The Alabama and Florida team pages (see links section on the right) should have summaries of tonight's action posted at some point later in the evening. These would probably be the best places to seek more details.

Morning

It's an unusually busy Wednesday this week, with a major tournament starting tonight and a potentially big series taking place in the SEC.

The tournament is the Judi Garman Classic, a 16-team competition hosted by Cal State Fullerton. Unlike some of the other "tournaments" this season, the Garman Classic will actually have championship brackets after pool play, instead of only prescheduled match-ups.

The host Titans take on Texas tonight (not a bad alliteration, if I do say so myself) in the opening game of the tourney (and in fact, the only game of opening day). The heavy volume of pool play occurs all day Thursday and Friday, with bracket play to follow (check the tournament webpage, linked above, for details).

No. 6 Oklahoma (in a pool with No. 5 Arizona) and No. 7 Michigan (in a pool with No. 13 Washington) will face some of their toughest competition thus far this season, in the Garman event. No. 16 University of Louisiana-Lafayette, whom some people refer to as "Oo La La," has already faced the likes of Alabama, Baylor, and Georgia, and will get an added challenge from being in a pool with No. 4 Arizona State (the aforementioned rankings are from the ESPN/USA Softball poll, which is the more up-to-date of the national polls at the moment). There should also be some excellent battles beyond pool play when the championship rounds begin.

In the SEC series I alluded to, Alabama, 24-0 and ranked No. 2 nationally in the ESPN/USA Softball poll, travels to Gainesville for an evening doubleheader against Florida. The Gators, of course, handed Tennessee its first loss of the season, this past weekend. Tide pitcher Chrissy Owens has a microscopic 0.42 ERA. The radio broadcast of these games will be available over the Internet, as described at the bottom of the linked article.

Ok, I guess I shouldn't get so cocky about these things. God, the Mavericks just couldn't get anything going. Or as Bob Ortegel said, "It's like the Warriors have magnets in their hands that just draw the ball towards them."

How many turnovers did the Mavs commit? My abacus is in the shop and I lost count when Golden State had eaten up 20 points on turnovers. Even Pops was playing like a JV towel boy. And Dirk getting a technical from the bench was, while technically amusing (har har), not a good sign. Devean George is out again. Fuck.

At least we go into the Phoenix game tied with them for winning streaks. And if one more person mentions how "If you watch no other Mavs game this year, you have to see Wednesday's game against the Suns" I may call in a suspicious package at the AAC.

Did anyone notice that Don Nelson looked sober-ish? I'm going to just assume that yesterday was "Opposites Day" and put my liver in a jar next to my bed tonight to save it from itself for the next 5 days.

Phil Jackson sleeps alone tonight

About 5 minutes into the first quarter, I said "this is gonna be a tough game."

I was right. It was a very tough game for the Lakers. Tough and tragic for the Lakers.

Don Nelson, here we come. Hey Phoenix, 17 victories in a row is not *THAT* hard.

Completely Non-Sports Related Local Scene Rant Post

Apparently, "SAVE DEEP ELLUM" is a mildly popular rallying cry these days. To that I say, "No thanks".

I have heard so much nostalgia about the supposed halycon days of nightlife in Deep Ellum. While everyone's entitled to their opinions, I can't say I'll miss Deep Ellum. I started going to shows in Deep Ellum in 1997 when I was 16 years old. My first show I went to was the Pavement/Bis show at Trees in 1997. My mom went with me to get me in and then leaned on a "tree" by the merch booth reading a book while I lost my little teenaged indie-infested mind. So it's now been ten years of my life that I have spent in a four block by seven block radius, though more like 9 because I've pointedly tried to stay away from Deep Ellum for the past year or so.

Deep Ellum just happened to be where the venues were. I never fell for what I felt was a delusional vision of Deep Ellum as some sort of East Village NYC early 1960's scene, Carnaby Street/Swining London of the mid 1960's scene or even a Sunset Strip early 1980's scene though the Hollywood cheese metal vibe seemed to bear the closest resemblance to Deep Ellum. For every cool local underground show there were 15 Hellafied Funk Crew/Pimpadelic/Reverend Horton Heat/Spoonfed Tribe shows. And for every Trees, Gypsy, Orbit Room, Club Clearview or even Galaxy Club there were many more Spiderbabies, G-Spot, The Rock, Curtain Club, Liquid Lounge or The Bone. Deep Ellum Live was a miserable place to see a show despite drawing some monumental acts.

All of that aside, the neighborhood has run its' course and is now just a horrible combonation of underage dance clubs, blocked off streets and abandoned storefronts. There's a good number of venues around town that provide a decent atmosphere and a fairly solid concert calendar and not a single one is in Deep Ellum. I still wish there was a venue in East Dallas that could draw some of the bands who have now either automatically written the metroplex off and just pass through on their way to Houston or Austin. Or at least a Dallas venue that could be considered comparable to the plethora of Denton indie venues.

From an economic development standpoint, I hope that some commercial development does start to happen in Deep Ellum if only for the fact that the D/FW suburban sprawl is not only enviornmentally detrimental but also wasteful resource-wise. There is an abundance of lovely older buildings downtown that could potentially be developed into multi-use structures that could include cheaper, hip apartments and condos for people my age as the older family-types are still afraid of downtown. Developers have learned that the penthouse condo buyers are all going to flock to Uptown. So the only way they can fill those downtown or Deep Ellum dwellings and re-engerize the area is to offer cheaper units (and the option to rent or own) to young professionals and artists. Mark my words: if Deep Ellum and Downtown ever manages to pull itself out of its' self-imposed slump, it will be due to new development not due to the efforts of some aging hipsters attempts to hermetically seal the area off and try to continue the party like it's 1999.


On a completely unrelated note, I have to complain about one other thing. The Theater Fire were lucky enough to be accepted to showcase at SXSW again this year. Bitchin'. Their showcase is Wednesday March 14 at 10pm at Room 710. What? Yeah that's right, their showcase is going to occur at the exact same time as the 4th quarter of one of the most highly-anticipated game of the Mavs entire regular season. If anyone is at The Theater Fire showcase on Wednesday night and hears someone yelling for a song called "Goaltending", that's me.

Late night

I had been checking the Arizona State and Texas Tech team pages tonight to find out the score of their game this afternoon, but neither site had any results. Fortunately, the user-updated "Scoreboard" thread on Ultimate College Softball had frequent updates, and I got the score I was looking for: ASU 12, Texas Tech 3 in 5 innings (presumably shortened due to the run/mercy rule).

The UCS page also brought to my attention Arizona's visit to Baylor for a tournament, which yielded three games between the Wildcats and Bears. I hadn't been paying attention to either team this weekend. As I learned, Baylor more than held its own against Arizona, which sent Baylor's coach "over the moon." From the Baylor article:

"We took our program to a new level today," [said] head coach Glenn Moore. "To win two-of-three over a softball program like Arizona is huge. It was probably the best weekend in Getterman Stadium history."

Finally, here's your official SEC round-up of today's action. Highlights included Tennessee taking its series against Florida, and Alabama remaining undefeated.

Early afternoon

In a late result from last night's Pac-10/Big 12 Challenge, upstart Texas Tech took a 6-2 lead after 3 1/2 innings against highly ranked Arizona State (No. 3 and 6 in the two national polls), only to have the home Sun Devils score 2 in the fourth and 3 in the fifth to prevail 7-6.

Earlier in the day, Tech defeated the University of Washington, 3-2. The Red Raiders had lost to both ASU and U-Dub on the first day of competition.

Missouri, the other Big 12 participant, had an identical portfolio to Texas Tech's --a 1-3 record, with the win coming against Washington -- but via the tie-breaker system, it will be the Red Raiders getting a rematch with ASU in today's "marquee" match-up.

No. 1 Tennessee suffered its first loss of the season, splitting today's doubleheader with Florida as league play opened up in the Southeastern Conference. The official SEC softball page summarizes all of today's action in the league, so with no further ado, check it out.

The major story in college softball this weekend, in my view, is the opening of conference play in the SEC, a good 2-3 weeks before the other major conferences start their league play. As gleaned from the composite schedule on the SEC softball page, this weekend's match-ups are as follows:

March 10
Mississippi State at Alabama* (2) 1/3 pm
South Carolina at Arkansas* (2) 1/3 pm
Auburn at Kentucky* (2) 12/2 pm
Tennessee at Florida* (2) 12/2 pm
[Georgia at Florida State Tournament TBA]
LSU at Ole Miss* (2) 1/3 pm

March 11
Mississippi State at Alabama* 1:30 pm
South Carolina at Arkansas* 1 pm
Auburn at Kentucky* 12 pm
Tennessee at Florida* 12 pm
[Georgia at Florida State Tournament TBA]
LSU at Ole Miss* 1 pm

Vanderbilt does not field a softball team, leaving one SEC school without a conference opponent at any given time. As I've bracketed above, Georgia will not be involved in conference play this weekend, instead participating in the Florida State tournament.

Tennessee (a consensus No. 1 in both national polls) and Alabama (No. 3 and 4) are both undefeated. LSU is also in the top 10 (No. 9 and 10). Florida, Tennessee's opponent this weekend, is ranked 19th and 24th.

***

Further west, Arizona State will host the four-team Pac-10/Big 12 Challenge. ASU and Washington, representing the Pac-10, will play a bunch of games against Texas Tech and Missouri, representing the Big 12.

The games between Texas Tech and the University of Washington, in particular, will be interesting, as former Husky coach Teresa Wilson is now in her third season at the helm of the Red Raiders (AP article from a few years ago on Wilson's hiring at Tech). This article from the Texas Tech athletics site explores the impact of Wilson's role at both schools. Among the ripple effects of Wilson's move was the transfer of catcher/infielder Robyn Wike from U-Dub to Tech (note the article's interesting spelling of the word "enticing").

In what looked to be one of the better midweek match-ups thus far in the season, UCLA headed down to Cal State Fullerton tonight to take on the Titans. Fullerton senior pitcher Candice Baker had just received national player of the week honors from two separate organizations for her superb outings in wins over Stanford and Oregon State.

A trifecta against Pac-10 opponents was not to be for Baker, however, as the Bruins lit her (and the scoreboard) up. UCLA scored seven runs in the 3 2/3 innings Baker pitched, en route to an 8-1 victory. In all, the Bruins belted five homers.

According to the linked article in the previous paragraph, the game drew over 1,000 fans, a nice development for the sport.

So my first Mavs game I ever attended was in Jason Kidd's rookie year. I remember that Sassy magazine had declared Jason Kidd the "New Sports Hottie" so when our youth group went to the Mavs game, most of my time was spent giggling about how cute Jason Kidd was. Which is odd because a mere 14 years later, I find myself wondering how I ever found him to be anything other than an unattractive jackass. Oh 1990's, you were such a wacky time!

Let's work backwards....

Devin Harris is running down the clock to what will obviously be a 10 point Mavs win and shoots a haphazard three pointer which actually goes in.

I was actually most impressed with the Mavs ability to block shots tonight.

I feel like pointing out that when the Mavs are in a tight situation or even three minutes from victory with the other team trying their hardest they can always just toss the ball to Dirk for something good to happen. To be honest, there's a lot about sportscasting terminology that I don't actually know how to effectively and accurately use so I can't really say anything about "clutch playing" until I take a class or something. I just heard the free throw line called the "pity stripe" the other day and laughed like a baby seeing Peek-a-Boo for the first time.

Every time I watch the post-game show and hear what new record the Mavs have set, I immediately compile my own personal montage. Usually it's from a not-yet-filmed straight-to-video 'tween movie starring Jay Thomas called something like Ball Hoggs wherein the Scranton Hoggs youth basketball team comprised of various scrappy social outcasts has some sort of special chemistry and suprises all the naysayers by coming from being last in the league to the championship finals. With the help of their coach's no-nonsense approach to teamwork and competition, though he is actually coaching the team as part of his community service for his multiple alcohol-related foibles, the Hoggs end up taking home either taking home the trophy or learning the keys to confidence and self-esteem. And I *think* Will Smith's son is the point guard for the team. Is that already a movie? Or is it just an mishmash of every sports movie?

Timberwolves beat the Lakers in double overtime! Jay Thomas! Remember when his character on Cheers was killed off in a Zamboni accident? I do.

Illinois State, which has been right on the border of the national top 25, with a No. 25 ranking in the ESPN.com/USA Softball poll and a position just outside the top 25 in the USA Today/NFCA poll, should be moving on up after this weekend's games. The Redbirds played in the Stacy Winsberg Memorial Tournament at UCLA and went 4-1, including a win over the host Bruins and two over nationally ranked Florida; the one ISU loss was to Cal State Long Beach, which the Redbirds avenged later in the tournament.

UCLA went 3-1 in the same tournament, with two wins over Loyola University Chicago and one over Florida. The Bruins gave up only five runs in the four games. However, reflecting some difficulties experienced in previous weeks by Anjelica Selden, now in her third year as the Bruins' No. 1 pitcher, there's a thread on the UCLA sports discussion board asking the question, "What's wrong with Jelly?" The initial commentary presents a number of statistics about Selden's performance over the years, followed by several replies.

Cal State Fullerton pitcher Candice Baker turned in another strong performance against a Pac-10 opponent, tossing a two-hit shutout against Oregon State (No. 11 and 13 in the national polls), with the Titans winning 1-0. Expectations for Oregon State were high going into this season, coming off the momentum from last year's Women's College World Series appearance, with the Beavers being ranked as high as No. 6 in the nation early in the season. The Beavers' record of 11-7 at this time may strike some as disappointing, but a lot of softball remains.

LSU lost another game to Washington in the Husky Classic, 6-3. I believe the original schedule said LSU and U-Dub would play two on Sunday, but they only played once today.

The 2005 NCAA champion, Michigan, has been out of the limelight of late, probably a combination of star pitcher Jennie Ritter (and a few other seniors) completing their eligibility last season and the Wolverines' absence from the top tournaments of the current season. For what it's worth, Michigan has now won 16 straight games and is 20-1 overall, having just finished play in the Jacksonville, Florida tournament. Frosh pitcher Nikki Nemitz is providing added depth in the circle, along with Stacy Delaney and Lorilyn Wilson.

Before arriving in Jacksonville, the Wolverines, ranked No. 9 and 13 in the two national polls, swept a doubleheader from Florida State in Tallahasse, giving their coach, Carol "Hutch" Hutchins, her 1,000th win.

Ahhhhhhhhhh mater! Want Jet to always score 30!

You know how in Peanuts cartoons when any character got too excited or mad or frustrated they went "%*&$//"!!!


$%&%^#@#%;owefnq"#@req@(#u@ y^&@(*#$ *^y#$%q@(

That was in-fucking-sane! I can't hate Dwight Howard too much because I thought the sticker thing at the All-Star game was pretty rad. And any game that includes Austin Croshere getting a dunk, Jason Terry scoring 29 points and Dirk hitting 2 threes (or was it 3 threes?) in a row in the last two minutes to pull the Mavs out of their slump is a good game in my book. At 7 pm tonight I was thinking to myself "Who really wants to see the Mavs vs. Magic? I'm here near downtown so maybe I should cruise over to AAC and see if there's any cheap tickets left? Naaaaaah, I just bought some sun-dried tomato hummus and a clay face mask so I'll just go watch it at home since it will probably be a snoozer anyways."

Mark F. just pointed out that "some people" have said that the season is getting boring because the Mavs just keep winning. To that I say: "some people" also have sex with horses. I like winning. I never get bored of my team being better than every other team in the league. I have never gotten bored seeing which zany new franchise or league record another victory will shatter.

It brings to mind a bit of commentary from the Cavs game on Thursday. One TNT commentator (I haven't really bothered to learn their names since I have only within the last year quit referring to the guys back in the studio as "Charles Barkley and those other guys") said:

"Well, here's the Mavs record month by month this season and as you see they did not lose a game in February. I really don't think they're gonna improve as far as their record on a monthly basis going into March."

I totally agree.

Some highlights from this weekend's play thus far, starting with heroics in the pitching circle...

Cal State Fullerton's Candice Baker threw a no-hitter against nationally ranked Stanford (No. 8 and 9 in the two polls) on Friday, with the Titans winning 1-0.

Also, Tennessee pitcher Monica Abbott shut out Tennessee Tech 4-0 on Saturday, to break the NCAA Division I career wins record with her 152nd victory.

And a quick check-up on some of the nation's other highly ranked teams...

LSU lost to Washington, 3-1 in nine innings, in the teams' first meeting of the Husky Classic.

Arizona St. lost for only the second time this season, falling 8-7 to UC Santa Barbara on Friday.

Texas A&M is undefeated so far in the tournament it is hosting, but needed a walk-off grand-slam from Amanda Scarborough to beat Illinois 7-5 on Saturday. Scarborough, who played first base in this game, is also a pitcher.

After three straight weekends of large tournaments, each featuring several of the nation's elite teams, the intensity seems to be lower this weekend, with a bunch of smaller tournaments and head-to-head series.

Perhaps the best match-up of the weekend will occur as part of the Husky Classic in Seattle, as LSU, No. 6 and 7 in the two national polls, will take on its first ranked opponent in the University of Washington (No. 14 and 15). After LSU plays a pair vs. Portland State, the Tigers and Huskies will play three times (LSU schedule).

No. 1 Tennessee travels from Knoxville to Chattanooga for the Frost Classic, against what appear to be heavily overmatched opponents. As noted in the linked document, an individual milestone may occur during the event:

History could also be made in Chattanooga as Lady Vol senior pitcher Monica Abbott stands just two wins from breaking the NCAA Division I career victory mark of 151 held by former Southern Miss hurler Courtney Blades. The 6-3 lefthander enters the weekend with 150 triumphs in her three-plus years wearing the Orange & White after opening the 2007 season at a perfect 11-0.

To see what other leading squads are up to, take a look at the team-specific webpages in the right-hand column.

Game? What game? Where's my truck?

I gotta level with you. I watched the game last night. We won by 3 which was too close of a margin for me. I remember LeBron's two desperate last minute attempts at a three pointer with like 8 seconds left. I know they were not sucessful. I remember that crazy dunk he had in the first half.

Then I went to the Roky Erikson tribute at Doublewide. Then I woke up in my bed thanks to the kindness of the Strange Boys. And now I look look and feel like Roky. Actually, I'm pretty sure Roky is feeling a little less damaged than me today.

Victory hurts. Not as bad as that Livingston knee injury but bad enough for me to have started out today laying on the kitchen floor because it was marble and cool.