College Game Day Tweets (Mostly Women's Gymnastics): The Bruins Hit the Road; the Heels Stay Home

1) Samantah Peszek (pictured, a UCLA gymnast): "It's a travel day for the bruins. Off to NoCal we go." (posted Thurs.)

2) VCU Athletics (Men's basketball team has 11:00 a.m. vs. cross-town rival Richmond): "Be early. Be loud. Wear Black. Wreck HAVOC. Let's Go VCU!

3) West Virginia U Gymnastics: "We host our pink meet Sunday at 3 p.m. at the Coliseum!"

4) Kansas Women's Basketball: "Kwbb hopes to continue its Red Raider dominance in Lubbock, Tex. tomorrow"

5) UNC Gymnastics: "Carmichael Arena is ready and waiting for tonight's meet vs. Pitt! Come cheer us on at 7:00......free admission" (Meet will be televised live on ESPN3).

6) Penn State Gymnastics: "Excited for another BUS trip to Columbus, Ohio, tomorrow." (Posted Thurs.)

7). Florida Gators Gymnastics: "When combined rank of teams is less than the ticket-price- that's a deal! No2 Gators vs. #1 Oklahoma. Tix: $5"

http://www.collegegymfans.com

NCAA Nicknames_ Birds and Cats

Thanks to those of you in Latvia who are checking us out. Today is the start of the NCAA division one men's basketball tournament, and it is traditionally the day in America when the least amount of work gets done, which means Dilbert may take a long break to check out the score of the Davidson-Marquette game.

Here is a look at various NCAA division one team nicknames; most of these schools did not actually make the 68-team field.

Smart Schools

1. Harvard Crimson (Mass.; Ivy League, pictured top-the team's mascot is John Harvard)#^
2. Bucknell Bison (Pa; Patriot League)#
3. Stanford Cardinal (Calif.; Pac-12)*
4.Wake Forest Demon Deacons (NC; ACC)
5. VCU Rams (Va.; A-10)# @

Felines

6. Kentucky Wildcats (Ky;SEC)*
7. Clemson Tigers (SC, ACC)
8. BYU Cougars (Utah, WCC) *

9. Cincinnati Bearcats (Ohio. Big East, pictured center)*@
10. High Point Panthers (NC; Big South)
11. South Alabama Jaguars (Fla.; Sunbelt)

Angry Birds

12. South Carolina Gamecocks (SC; SEC) @
13. Oregon Ducks (Ore.; Pac-12, pictured bottom)*
14. UNC-Wilmington Seahawks (NC; Colonial)

15.Virginia Tech Hokies (Va; ACC) @
16. Texas-San Antonio Roadrunners (Texas, WAC)
17. Miami (Ohio) Redhawks (Ohio, Mid-America)^


#-Schools which are in NCAA Tournament
*-Schools with Div. I women's gymnastics programs
^-Schools with Div. I men's hockey programs
@-Schools that were once in the now defunct Metro Conference

Turkey Loses to USA in Women's Basketball; Team Rebounds Against China

There were high hopes amongst those watching the game live at midnight in Istanbul that Team Turkey would pull off an amazing upset against the top-ranked American team with some of the best women's basketball players in the world.

But, it was not to be as Turkey fell to the United States by a 89-58 score with 18 points coming from Angel McCoughtry, who was a stand-out with the Louisville Cardinals in women's college basketball.

Today, it was a different story for Turkey, which also has a women's volleyball team that won over South Korea on Friday, at the 2012 London Olympics on the court.

Nevriye Yilmaz (pictured) scored 16 points and her unlikely teammate Quanitra Hollingsworth, an American who played for the VCU Rams in college and gained Turkish citizenship to join the team grabbed 11 rebounds, as Turkey defeated China 82-55 with a surprisingly large margin of victory.

Turkey (3-1) will next face Croatia (1-3) in a pivotal game on Sunday.

http://www.tbf.org.tr

Teaser- Here Come the Olympics

The 2012 London Olympics get underway with the opening ceremonies on Friday. Those of us in the United States will once again be relying on the voice of Bob Costas, the NBC sports announcer who broke through as a baseball announcer, to help guide up through an event with 10,500 athletes from 204 countries.

Jordyn Wieber, 17, (pictured above) will likely be one of the American athletes which Costas and company will focus on the most as she is the 2011 all-around champion in women's gymnastics.. Since Mary Lou Retton, 44, gave a break-through performance at the 1984 Olympics, the sport has been among the most popular ones for tv spectators in this country on a continuous basis.

Guor Marial, 28, an Iowa State alum who is a marathon runner, will be one of the very few athletes not representing one of the 204 countries at the summer games as his country South Sudan which broke away from Sudan is not yet recognized in the international sports community. Similary, Marial has not lived in the United States long enough to qualify for citizenship. So, he will be walking in the opening ceremonies under the Olympic flag.

For those of us of Turkish heritage, there is also excitement because for the first time since 1960 Turkey will have teams competing in The Olympics. There are actually two teams from Turkey that will be at the games in both women's basketball and women's volleyball.

Nevriye Yilmaz, 32, the first Turkish woman to play in the WNBA, with her last stint being with the San Antonio Silver Stars in 2004, is one of the most-recognized members of the squad. Yilmaz was actually born in Bulgaria, but her family of Turkish ethnicity emigrated to Turkey when she was nine.

Amazingly enough, one of Yilmaz's teammates for Team Turkey is an African-American basketball player Quanita Hollingsworth, 23, a Virginia Commonwealth Univeristy alum who now plays for the New York Liberty. She obtained Turkish citizenship to play for Turkey's national team.

Hollingsworth said she will have mixed emotions when Turkey plays the United States in group play; the two countries also face each other in women's volleyball (see earlier entries about Turkey and the Olympics..

http://www.aroundthehorns.wordpress.com

http://www.cyclones.com

http://www.jordynwieber.com

http://www.olympic.org

College Schools Nicknames- Retro Metro

Yes, there was once a college basketball conference called the Metro Conference, but it ceased to exist in the mid-1990s. But, today we remember the conference with its member schools (not all were in the Metro at the same time).

Since we are limiting these lists to 12 schools, we had to omit the Georgia Tech Yellowjackets, the first Metro team to defect to the ACC in 1979.

Four of these schools, Louisville, Memphis (the school was called Memphis State in its Metro days), Cincinnati and Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) have reached the Final Four in men's basketball, while Louisville has won two NCAA titles in the sport. VCU has also qualified for this year's NCAA tournament by winning their conference tournament.

Here is the list of Metro Conference schools with their present conferences (note about the image, Virginia Tech has a club hockey team, not a NCAA team in the sport):


1. Cincinnati Bearcats. Big East. Cincinnati, Ohio.

2. Florida State Seminoles. ACC. Tallahassee, Fla.

3. Louisville Cardinals. Big East. Louisville, Ky.

4. Mephis Tigers. C-USA. Memphis, Tenn.

5. Saint Louis Billikens. Atlantic-10. St. Louis, Mo.

6. South Carolina Gamecocks. SEC. Columbia, SC.

7. South Florida Bulls. Big East. Tampa, Fla.

8. Southern Missippi Golden Eagles. C-USA. Hattiesburg, Miss.

9. Tulane Green Wave. C-USA. New Orleans, La.

10. UNC Charlotte '49ers. Atlantic-10. Charlotte, NC

11. VCU Rams. Colonial Athletic. Richmond, Va.

12. Virginia Tech Hokies. ACC. Blacksburg, Va.

Kudos to VCU

Since I went to a relatively small school in Virginia, Radford University, I want to personally congratulate the Virginia Commonwealth University Rams from Richmond, Va., the unlikeliest team to make it to the NCAA men's basketball Final Four in Houston next week.

The Rams pulled a huge 71-61 upset over top-seed Kansas yesterday, amazing everyone in the college basketball universe. The Rams are coached by Shaka Smart, who is only 33. They were helped by 26 points from Jamie Skeen, a senior Wake Forest transfer from Charlotte, NC.

VCU also has a player from my hometown of Roanoke, Va., in Troy Daniels who is an alumnus of William Fleming High School.

We were also hoping the University of North Carolina would join them, but the Tarheels fell to the University of Kentucky by a score of 76-69. The Wildcats won the game in large part because of 22 points from their star player Brandon Knight.

Ironically, the voice of the Tarheels is named Woody Durham (for those of you in Kazakhstan, Durham, NC, is where Duke University is located is UNC's main athletic rival). As it turns out, Woody Durham, 68, was also a childhood friend of Duke's announcer Bob Harris as both are from the Burlington, NC-area which is close to both campuses.

And, speaking of Kazakhstan, they lost a road Euro Cup qualifying game to Germany by a 4-0 score over the weekend. The Germans got two goals each from Miroslav Klose and Thomas Mueller. But, Zhambyl Kukeyev almost scored for the Kazaks in the 71st minute of play.

I must profess that soccer geography is a bit strange as Kazakhstan is not one of the 47 countries in Europe. Nor are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Israel, yet all are competing for slots in the 2012 Euro Cup which will be held in France this summer.

According to NPR, only one of the 47 European countries executed people last year, and that was Belarus, which is run by a ruthless dictator named Alexander Lukashenko. Belarus executed two people last year.

As a life-long death penalty opponent, I regret that the United States of America ranks fifth in the world in executions.

Ironically, Turkey, my late father's home country, which has often been criticized for human rights abuses by Amnesty International outlawed capital punishment well over a decade ago.

The other two teams to reach the men's final four are Butler University, another underdog which also made the semis last year, and the University of Connecticut.

For those who feel politics and sports don't mix, we fully understand. But, the other side (well, right-wingers) seem to have no problems mixing up the two as one can plainly see an NRA billboard at Memorial Stadium where the minor league Salem Red Sox play home games in Salem, Va., and a similar billboard can be found at the Lynchburg Hillcats' stadium as well. So, there ya' go!