Salute to NCAA College Sports (3 of 3)

The six student athletes pictured here are: 1) Tacko Fall, a 7'6 freshman from Senegal, Central Florida, men's basketball; 2) Nikki Taylor, women's volleyball, Hawaii, 3) Nick Fields, men's lacrosse, Johns Hopkins, 4) Amanda Leveille (from Canada), women's hockey, Minnesota, 5) Dante Holmes, men's basketball, North Carolina Central; 6) Johanny Sotillo, women's gymnastics, Iowa

Things We Learned on Bing Today_ All Things Washington DC

Hmm.........we suppose if Bill O'Reilly or some fringe right wing tv or radio personality is reading this, he might be wondering why we have a photo of President Barack Obama with Bulgarian Ambassador Elena Poptodorova; well, O'Reilly can read below to find out in this edition of 'Things We Learned on Bing Today.'

1) Elena Poptodorova, 52, is the Bulgarian ambassador to the United States; she took office in 2010.

2) Cong. Ralph Hall (R-Tex.), 90, a former Democrat, is the oldest active member of the House of Representatives; Cong. John Dingell (D-Mich.), 86, is the oldest Democrat in the House.

3) Cong. Patrick Murphy (D-Fla.), 30, is the youngest member of the House.

4) Mayor Vincent C. Gray, 70, is the current mayor of Washington, DC. The office was previously held by Adrian Fenty.

5) Coach John Thomspn III, 47, has been the head coach of Georgetown University's men's basketball team since 2004. Thompson, the son of legendary Hoyas coach John Thompson, previously coached at Princeton University, his alma mater.

Links:

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.cq.com

http://www.c-span.org

http://www.bulgaria-embassy.org

http://www.guhoyas.com

Sweet 16 Road Trips_ Meet Me in St. Louis

In an amazing coincidence, both the North Carolina Tarheels men's basketball and women's gymnastics teams are going to be traveling to many miles to either meet up with or potentially meet up with (they have to beat Kansas first) their rivals the North Carolina State Wolfpack.

Both schools' basketball teams are headed to St.Louis for the NCAA Sweet 16 regional; both schools' gymnastics teams are heading to Pittsburgh for the EAGL championships.

The UNC men's basketball team will face the Ohio Bobcats (pictured, the image is of player D.J. Cooper) while the Wolfpack basketball team faces Kansas in the Arch City.

The Sweet 16 also has a pair of at least one set of brothers as senior Tyler Zeller will lead the 'Heels, and his freshman brother Cody Zeller will try to help the Indiana Hoosiers upset top-seed Kentucky.

So, with all these things in mind, we decided to mapquest some miles and figure how long it will take a dedicated to drive or arrive by bus; yes, we realize many will probably opt for a Delta Airlines flight.

Here, we go:

1,115- Miles between Raleigh and Lawrence, Kan., where the Kansas Jayhawks are based.

836- Miles betwen Raleigh and St. Louis, where the two teams will actually play.

806- Miles between Chapel Hill and St. Louis

641- Miles between Chapel Hill and Bloomington, Ind., where Cody Zeller plays.

505-Miles between Raleigh and Pittsburgh, should the Wolfpack's gymnastics fans choose to go Greyhound.

500- Miles between St. Louis and Athens, Ohio, where the Ohio Bobcats play.

476- Miles between Chapel Hill and Pittsburgh, should the Tarheels's gymnastics fans decide to go Greyhound.

380- Miles between Chapel Hill and Athens, Ohio.

284- Miles between St. Louis and Lawrence, Kan.

32- Miles between Chapel Hill and downtown Raleigh.

For this survey, we choose the following seven places:

1. Aya Sofia Cuisine, a Turkish restaurant in St. Louis

2. August Wilson Center, an arts venue in Pittsburgh

3. Irish Lion, an Irish pub in Bloomington, Ind.

4. The Raven Bookstore, Lawrence, Kan.

5. Internationalist Books- Chapel Hill, NC

6. The Pit, a barbecue diner in downtown Raleigh, NC

7. Jackie O's Pub and Brewery, Athens, Ohio.

My NCAA Brackets....I'm Picking Those Pesky Wildcats

I haven't seen what every single one of my friends is projecting for the NCAA final, but I am inclined to agree with both President Barack Obama and ESPN college basketball commentator Dick Vitale that Kentucky and North Carolina will meet for the championship game.

But, even though I am a Democrat who lives in North Carolina and a Tarheels fan (ok, I'm a band-wagoner_Virginia Tech is the team I have been rooting for 95-percent of my life), I have to agree with Vitale that the Kentucky Wildcats will prevail.

Assuredly, if this does come true, actress Ashley Judd, an unabashed Wildcats fan and UK alumnus will be very happy.

In my Final Four, I am also projecting Florida State to win the east region, Michigan State to win the west region, to complete the brackets.

The four teams I have in the Elite 8 are Duke (South; losing to Kentucky), Missouri (West; losing to Michigan State), Kansas (Midwest; losing to UNC) and Syracuse (East; losing to FSU).

In the first round of games which start tomorrow, I am picking the following upsets: In the south, I am picking Colorado (#11) to upset UNLV (#6); in the west, I like Davidson (#13) over Louisville (#4); in the east, I like Harvard (#12) over Vanderbilt (#5) and lastly, in a tough call, in the west, I am going with North Carolina State (#11) over San Diego State (#6).

In addition, I am picking one nine-seed St.Louis to beat an eight-seed Memphis, in the west. And, conversely, I like the ten-seed West Virginia over seven-seed Gonzaga (east region) and ten-seed Purdue over seven-seed St. Mary's (midwest region).

SIDEBAR: Quite a few of the 68 schools in the tournament (well, technically it is now 66 as of this writing), have nationally-ranked teams in other sports. There are four tournament schools with Top-20 men's hockey teams (Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame and Harvard). Similarly, there are seven schools with Top-25 women's gymnastics teams (Florida, Alabama, Ohio State, Missouri, North Carolina State, Michigan and Kentucky). In addition, there are four NCAA tournament teams with top-20 teams in women's water polo (San Diego State, Michigan, Indiana and Long Beach State).

SIDEBAR 2: We want to congratulate Lori Anne Madison, age 6, of Woodbridge, Va., for being the youngest person ever to reach the finals of the National Spelling Bee. For her sake, we hope she isn't asked how to spell "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" (yes, that "Mary Poppins" term is now in the dictionary!...we believe).

Silly Photo to Fill Space_ John Harvard

Today, we turn our attention to Ivy League sports since the men's basketball team for Harvard University (18-2) is nationally ranked, and really kicking butt. The school mascot is indeed John Harvard!

The Harvard Crimson (that is the school's nicknamed, we double-googled) beat arch rival Yale University on the road in New Haven, Conn., for just the second time in 13 ties by a 65-35 score. The team then turned around and won another road game at Brown by a 68-59 score.

Steve Mioundou-Missi, a junior from Cameroon (yes, we double-googled his name too), was named the Ivy League men's basketball player of the week.

Surprisingly, Harvard's men's hockey team had a home game against Yale on Friday, and the ice guys were also victorious as they beat the Bulldogs 4-3. The Crimson then beat Brown at home by a 3-1 margin on Saturday.

Harvard also has a strong women's hockey team this year, and they beat Yale 8-0 and Brown 6-0 (both road games) over the weekend.

This lead to Kaitlin Spurling, a junior from Byfield, Mass., being named as Harvard Athlete of the Week. Spurling scored four goals against Yale and two goals against Brown.

The men's basketball team will face Princeton on the road for nationally televised game on ESPN-U on Sat., Feb. 11 at 7:00 p.m. The last Ivy League men's basketball team to make the Final Four were the Pennsylvania Quakers in 1978.

Harvard also has water polo team's for both men and women, and recently the women's team traveled to Hungary.

Road Trip (2 of 20)- March Madness Journey from Kansas to Utah

We have not had an entry to this blog series since we started it on Feb. 16, 2011, but in our second installment here we will let you guess the driving distance between Kansas State's hometown of Manhattan, Kan., and Utah State's campus in Logan, Utah.

Now to make this EVEN more confusing, we are not going with the distance between the schools themselves. Instead, we have chosen to go with Hamilton Steakhouse in Logan and Kite's Bar in Manhattan (Kan.)instead.

As for the schools, Utah State is nicknamed the Aggies (as is another NCAA tourney-bound school Texas A & M), and they are one of 18 schools in the men's basketball tournament with women's gymnastics programs.

Lyndsie Boone (pictured above), a senior from Winthrop Hills, Ill., was recently named Aggies' student-athlete of the week. Boone, who has a 3.7 GPA, will join her teammates in the last regular season meet which is the WAC Championships in San Jose, Calif., on Saturday.

As for the men's basketball team, which had a 30-3 record this year, Brockeith Pane, a junior from Dallas, Tex., was (like Boone) recently named Aggies' athlete of the week as well.

Utah State also offers a dairy-processing degree program, and one can find the Aggie Ice Cream Shop, which offers ice cream in 26 different flavors, according to a story that was posted on mentalfloss.com today.

As for Kansas State, the school is mostly known athletically for its men's basketball program, which has been to the Final Four four times. The Wildcats are known for their fiery basketball coach Frank Martin (pictured here, we don't know what the story here is either!) and the team features several stand-out players. including Freddy Aspirilla who is from Colombia.

But, there are only two Wildcats' players who are actually from Kansas, including Victor Ojeleye from Ottawa, Kan., and Alex Potuzak from Clyde, Kan.

Kansas State is one of the very few schools in the NCAA with just one official color that is purple. And, they are one of 12 teams in the 2011 men's basketball tournament which feature some of sort of feline nickname (others include the Clemson Tigers and the Penn State Nittany Lions).

So, here is our question:

Just how long does it take to get from Logan, Utah, to Manhattan, Kan.?

Is the answer:

A) 14 hours even
B) 15 hours even
C) 16 hours even
D) 18 hours even

The answer to our last road trip quiz was B) as it takes 85 hours and 20 minutes to get from North Pole, Alaska, to Key West, Florida. Now, that is one long trip!

As for the game between Kansas State and Utah State, it will tip off on Thursday night at 9:57 p.m. New York time from Tucson, Ariz. The Wildcats are a 5-seed and the Aggies are a 12-seed.

I sense personally that this will be a close game, in which the Wildcats will prevail by six points.

Things We Learned on Twitter Today- Clash of the Titans

I fully expected that UNC and Duke would meet today in the ACC Tournament final in Greensboro, NC, but I didn't realize until I checked Twitter that it would for the eleventh time.

UNC holds a 6-4 advantage over Duke in the ACC final, but the Blue Devils have won the last two ACC finals over the Tarheels.

A Duke basketball tweet said that Kyle Irving, one of Duke's star players who has been injured, was practicing before the game.

Ian Williams, a columnist for "The Daily Tarheel," the UNC student-run newspaper has a humorous column called "Why I Hate Duke," and as one might expect the Town Hall Grill in Chapel Hill tweeted that they were supporting the 'Heels.

Duke beat Virginia Tech 77-63 yesterday to reach the final, and Hokies' coach Set Greenberg tweeted last night that he is anxiously awaiting the NCAA tournament selection committee's decision regarding his team, which has narrowly missed getting into the Big Dance several times before.

In other North Carolina news, WXII-TV in Winston-Salem tweeted that a dog's life have been saved through CPR. There were details. I guess we will have to wait for 'the film at 11.'

Kudos to the Duke Blue Devils!

The Duke University Blue Devils are the new NCAA national champion in men's basketball following their dramatic 61-59 victory over underdog Butler, a small school with just over 4,000 students in Indianapolis, which almost made a sports fairy tale come true--- and, in their hometown no less!

"We knew it was going to be a 40-minute war," Duke player Nolan Smith said. "Everybody played a great game."

Since we are based here in North Carolina, we are happy for the Blue Devils, a team that earned a coveted fourth national championship. Their arch rival, the University of North Carolina Tarheels won the 2009 men's basketball championship.

The Blue Devils were also helped out by standouts Jon Scheyer, Kyle Singler and Brain Zoubek.

The Butler Bulldogs, a team that my cousin Mike from Rock Hill, SC, had in his Final Four (though he thought they would lose to Kansas; they lost to Northern Iowa in the second round of the tourney) were helped out by Gordon Hayward, Shelvin Mack and Matt Howard. Hayward narrowly missed a half-court last second shot which would have won the game for Butler.

The game reminded of the sports documentary "Harvard Beats Yale 29-29" which profiled a famous football game in the late '60s that saw Harvard come back from being far behind in the waining minutes of the game.

Duke also has a competitive women's lacrosse team, which is ranked third nationally. The Lady Blue Devils host Boston College at Koskinen Stadium on the Duke campus in Durham, NC, on 1 p.m. on Saturday.

Shakespeare Likes the Wildcats, the Wildcats, the Panthers and the Blue Devils

The American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, Va., began this cheeky campaign last year to say which team William Shakespeare would have picked to win the Final Four.

Since their pick, The University of North Carolina Tarheels, proved to be correct, they are at it again this year, but much to the probable chagrin of 'Heels coach Roy Williams they are assuming that The Bard would pick their rival team Duke to make it to the Final Four.

The stage company, which is currently producing "Twelfth Night" as one of their four on-going productions (the play ends April 3rd), also projected that the Northern Iowa Panthers, Kansas State Wildcats and Kentucky Wildcats would make it to the proverbial 'final act' (we couldn't resist!).

Among the performers in "Twelfth Night" are Sarah Fallon (Olivia), Benjamin Curns (Sir Toby) and Miriam Donald (Viola).

The Bard will pick 'his' national champion next week.

ACC Basketball Games for this Weekend

The UNC Tarheels will be playing their first game since a road loss to Clemson as they face the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in a home game that will be broadcast on ESPN tomorrow at 2 p.m. I think the 'Heels will win by four points. If you're in Chapel Hill, NC, for the game tomorrow, you may want to stop by Chapel Hill Comics which has a special fundraiser going on for the Haiti earthquake disaster.

Other ACC games include the following:

Clemson @ North Carolina State- noon

Maryland @ Boston College- 4 pm

Virginia Tech @ Florida State- 6 pm

Miami (Fla) @ UVA- 8 pm

Wake Forest @ Duke- 8 pm (Sun)

I like Clemson, BC, Virginia Tech, UVA and Duke in these games. I think the Clemson-Nc St. game will be very close as the Wolfpack seem to be an improved team over last season.

Two major Big East games will take place this weekend too as Syracuse goes to Morgantown, W.Va., to face West Virginia U at noon (another ESPN game). On Sunday, Georgetown goes to Philly for a noon-time game with Villanova. I'll go with WVU and Georgetown though the 'Hoyas would pull an upset if they beat 'Nova.

UPDATE: All three of the teams featured in images for this blog lost that weekend. The UNC Tarheels' men's baskeball team is actually in the middle of a three-game losing streak as of today (1/25)