AI returns to Philly

The most beloved figure in Philadelphia sports' past ten years came back for the first time since he was traded, and as the first Denver player introduced, received a 2 minute standing ovation and seemed to be in tears as he saluted the fans from every angle he could. AI was the hardest working athlete in Philadelphia, even as he avoided practice; he put his body on the line every night as he threw himself at NBA 4s and 5s trying to draw fouls, and Philadelphia fans like sacrifice, even though it was a terrible ending when he didn't attend fan appreciation and was indefinitely suspended. Fans knew AI wanted to win, and it wasn't the Sixers' time.

Now fortunes have traded places. Andre Miller, one of the players the Nuggets gave up to get AI, went 13-21 from the field and finished with 28 points and 12 assists to lead the Sixers on his 36th birthday. Iverson finished with 32, but he couldn't get one to fall on the Nuggets' final possession of the game, and the other AI, Andre Igoudala, dribbled out the clock for the streaking Sixers, winners of 10 of their last 11. The Sixers have energized their fan base and seem to be working up quite the following after a few years of mediocrity. This could be the year that fills up some of the luxury boxes that were abandoned after 5 year deals ran out in 2006 (they were bought in 2001 after the run to the Finals), and this young team is playing pretty damn well. Judging from last year, you would expect the Nuggets to run all over the Sixers, but the Sixers picked their spots to run the break and milked the shot clock as much as they could.

The Nuggets, on the other hand, looked pretty crappy. Carmelo continued to cherry pick and avoid playing defense, and no one else on the Nuggets was too concerned with defense either.

However, Samuel Dalembert goaltended a Carmelo lay-up near the end of the game, and I think that might be reviewed later and lead to the game being replayed before the season ends. The Nuggets need everyone they can get, especially with how tough the West is right now.

NCAA Picks:

East

2nd Round: 

UNC over Indiana, Washington State over George Mason, Louisville over St. Joe's, Tennessee over Butler

Sweet 16:

UNC over Washington State, Louisville over Tennessee

Elite Eight:

Louisville over UNC

Midwest

2nd Round:

Kansas over UNLV, Clemson over Vanderbilt, Wisconsin over Kansas State, Georgetown over Davidson

Sweet 16:

Kansas over Clemson, Georgetown over Wisconsin

Elite Eight:

Georgetown over Kansas

South

2nd Round:

Memphis over Oregon, Pittsburgh over Michigan State, Marquette over Stanford, Texas over St. Mary's

Sweet 16:

Pittsburgh over Memphis, Texas over Marquette

Elite Eight:

Texas over Pittsburgh

West

2nd Round:

UCLA over BYU, UConn over Drake, Xavier over Purdue, Duke over West Virginia

Sweet 16:

UCLA over UConn, Xavier over Duke

Elite Eight:

UCLA over Xavier

I want to clear something up with you as you read these picks: I AM NO RICK NEUHEISEL. I am not good at picking these things, I have good years, but this year is so wide open. I'm really excited for this tournament. I'll end with my favorite tourney "fun" fact:

FUN FACT: Power forward Rob Jones, a 6-5, 230-pound freshman, turned down football offers from such traditional powers as Notre Dame, Miami and Oregon to pursue a basketball career. He is the grandson of Jim Jones, the leader of the Jonestown jungle compound where more than 900 people were killed in 1978 in a mass murder/suicide.

Good dancing to one and all!

"Next year" is all I can say

I don't think anyone can describe my excitement after the Marquette game. Kristof showed some non-Europeanness as a players, Donte Greene realized that he was 6'11" and his defender was 6'3" so he (/GASP!) started posting up, Johnny was on fire, Arinze was on fire, Scoop and Rick were playing well off the bench, and Paul Harris was getting his. And a chance to play 'Nova at a neutral (Wachovia Center in Philadelphia is essentially a neutral site, with a 1:1 'Nova: visitor ratio)? If I were Terry Schiavo, this would be the time to check if I needed a change of pants (Luckily I did not). So Wednesday came, and Syracuse shut down as it always does when Syracuse has a game during the day on a weekday: no one at Wegmans (source: mother) and people staying home from work (source: Steve, who hosted my viewing of the contest), as well as classes not being taught (source: Steve's brother, who provided text message commentary, and came up with the idea that Harris gets his in order to pad his stats). The ugliest start to a college basketball game I've seen (no score until 17:43 left and just a ton a loose ball scrums and terrible shots) led to Syracuse getting control with 28-19 lead with 2:27 left. And then the second epic collapse went down. 'Nova scored eight unanswered to end the half. The second half started with a little back and forth, but 'Nova was hot, and Syracuse was not. They shot 8-9 from 3 in the second half. Every team has trouble shooting free throws at that clip, and they were hitting 3s like they were lay-ups. Not to mention that Paul Harris set a career-high for 3s in a game with 10 minutes left in the first half, so he stopped driving and started to settle for jumpers, taking away more chances of a comeback. Not to mention that panic mode started with about 8 minutes left, and panic mode got ugly. Steve went to work and I left with 3 minutes left. The NIT is next, and I ain't too happy, but this team literally had nothing to be expected of it. Two ACL tears, one aloof point guard, and only 8 scholarship guys left, one who isn't allowed to play because he is that bad (I'm talking about you, Sean Williams) and you have a worst-case scenario for a season, and you can't ask a team to be the best. I'm proud of the effort, and I really can't wait for next year with Devo and Rautins back, Mookie Jones hopefully being good, and Donte learning how to do more stuff than Steve Novak does (Yes, I believe his year made him the new Steve Novak, another guy who settles for 3s despite a height advantage), Johnny Flynn being able to take a few breaks (even though he could play every minute next year, but he'd probably burn out pretty damn fast), and Arinze hopefully learning to make shots outside the lane. This is going to be a damn good team, and I think they should have a bye in the BET next year as well as a more comfortable position for an at-large to the Dance.
I'll be back for some bracket analysis on Sunday, along with some terrible picks that will make you lose all your money. Until next time, don't try to fuck prostitutes without condoms. Spitzer learned how risky that business is, and I hope I'm not the one who teaches you that lesson. It should be his idiotic speeches given beside his wife and past as being "hard on johns" that hammer that lesson in. And knowing Bill O'Reilly had to change his pants after this story broke and probably forced an assistant to do it.

EHHHHHHHHHHH

If this blog had a mood option, I would make sure it indicated Jim Boeheim's mood after that game. Tonight's victory over Seton Hall: shitty. Scoop played well and did what no one else would do: dribble against the weird zone press. Arinze was strong, Tim Higgins' nose is purple, Donte is sort of/kind of improving, but not really. It looked like a repeat of Saturday was in store, and Bob Wenzel and Dave Pasch sure wanted to make sure, if you were just tuning in, that SYRACUSE CHOKED ON SATURDAY! Replays, 18-2 run by Pitt to end the game, when will it stop? This is just another example of ESPN talking down to people. Anyone who watches this game is the following: not from Jersey unless they have some sort of association with Seton Hall or a Syracuse fan who already knows about the worst loss since the DePaul drubbing of 2006. In terms of disheartening. Bob Wenzel might know a lot about basketball, but he gets extremely confused some times, like when cross-promoting to talk about the NBA's "deadline of the day of trade." He is a poor man's Bill Raftery who should only be on ESPN Regional coverage, not nationally televised games. Unless sounding extremely stupid is the goal of ESPN2 basketball coverage. 

Officiating was sloppy once again. On Donte Greene's 4th foul, Brian Laing caught the ball, turned around, and jumped. When he landed, Greene reached for the ball. Now, when he lands, usually a referee will call traveling. Somehow, not one referee could think of that. A bad sign that the college game is evolving to be called like the NBA. It should be different, otherwise I'm not sure I can stomach watching games played the same damn way. I gotta piss. I hope to be at the BET next week, but I probably won't be able to make it. In any case, Saturday is a game that Syracuse NEEDS to win, and I think you will see at least 30,000 there. In desperation, 'Cusans will unite. 

And Semi-Pro is the worst basketball movie ever made. Using the alley-oop as a comedy ploy? I didn't ruin that movie for anyone, I SAVED them from it. Will Ferrell needs to work on his consistency, he's beginning to look like the Donte Greene of acting.

Genius!

Caught this in my Sports Industry class daily e-mail:

Fathead today at the NFL Hardlines Summit in Miami unveiled its line of “Fathead Tradeables,” which consists of 5-by-7-inch variations of its life-size Fathead products (Fathead).

Wow, giant trading cards! Much more portable than a Fathead, but much less portable than a regular size trading card! I see no appeal and Fathead shortly forgetting about it.

"Hey, Coach! Play this kid!"

Thanks to Awful Announcing for posting exhilarating CBS footage of today's Georgetown-Marquette game. 

This video is enough evidence to put a memo on Les Moonves' desk recommending that Gus Johnson be teleported to games with exciting finishes. But who gets people more pumped for March? Not even Pitino, the master motivator. And especially not Jim Nantz and Billy Packer. If there is an exciting Final Four game this year, and Moonves doesn't make this move, I pray that Gus just shows up in San Antonio, knocks out Nantz with a blow dart, and just steals the show. That would kind of take away from the student athletes, but I'm all about the entertainment. I'm off to check out Semi-Pro.

Funnier things

To go against my post about the Pitt game (I'm still irrational, so I can't even talk about the time before the meltdown in any way because it meant nothing.), I bring you this video from IFC's 

Framed. 

I saw this on IFC without seeing the opening credits about two months ago, and I figured out it was Baron and I lost it. This shit is just ridiculous.

BULLSHIT! 100% BULLSHIT!

I just watched an 11-point lead go down the drain with the help of three officials. There was too much good play from Donte, Paul, Johnny, and Arinze earlier in the game, but I have forgotten it after Keith Benjamin received his 3rd no-call of the game (he basically committed 2 fouls within the first minute, and when Johnny Flynn grazed him while jumping for a loose ball near midcourt, it was enough to warrant a call even though the game that was being played was of MEN'S BASKETBALL)  as he obviously fouled Paul Harris before getting the ball out of his hands and got it back to make the go-ahead lay-up. He essentially held Harris as he reached, and it was if the referees were oblivious to the basketball game going on. It might be my partisanship, but that really does need to be reviewed by some higher-ups, because 'Cuse got HOSED! I was actually excited to not have Burr or Cahill working this game, but I guess Donato, Hess, and whoever the fuck the other dude was also wanted to see how much they can fuck with Syracuse fans. What a joke.