March Madness Finale: NCAA Tourney Teams with Women's Gymnastics Programs

We conclude our five entries dedicated to the NCAA Tournament, also known as March Madness, with a look at ten schools who made the Big Dance that also happen to have women's gymnastics programs. In total, 30 schools of the men's basketball field have women's gymnastics team. Of the ten teams listed here, only three are still in the tournament:

1) Florida Gators * (pictured top: Florida gymnast Kytra Hunter. Amazingly enough, the Gators are ranked number one in both sports)

2) Nebraska Cornhuskers (The team's mascot Lil' Red is pictured center)

3) Western Michigan Broncos ^ (We couldn't find an image we could use of the basketball team, so we went with an image of the Broncos' hockey goalie Lukas Hafner instead).

4) Ohio State Buckeyes. ^

5) Arizona State Sun Devils

6) UNC Tar Heels

7) Michigan State Spartans *^

8) Michigan Wolverines *^

9) Oklahoma Sooners (The Sooners have a solid chance of winning the NCAAs in gymnastics)

10) North Carolina State Wolfpack.

*-Teams still in the NCAA Tournament

^- Teams that also have men's hockey programs

http://www.collegegymfans.com

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

Feline Nicknames and Mascots Amongst College Basketball Teams

Zappa the Family Cat lives in New Haven, Conn., but he roots for the Princeton Tigers instead of the Yale Bulldogs because of the Tigers' nickname (actually, unlike ESPN, we are not based in Connecticut).

Here is a look at ten schools with feline nicknames and the names of the mascots, not all of these teams made the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament.

1) Pittsburgh Panthers. Roz the Panther*

2) Auburn Tigers. Audie the Tiger (pictured top)

3) BYU Cougars. Cosmo the Cougar (pictured center)*

4) Cincinnati Bearcats. (pictured bottom)

5) Villanova Wildcats. Will D. Cat.

6) High Point Panthers. Prowler the Panther.^

7) Princeton Tigers.

8) Kentucky Wildcats. Blue the Wildcat*

9) Arizona Wildcats. Wilbur and Wilma Wildcat.*

10) Houston Cougars. Shasta the Cougar.

*-Teams which made the NCAA Tournament

^-Teams which made the NIT
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/college-basketball/mens-tournament/

NCAA Nicknames: Schools with Odd Nicknames

The University of  California Santa Cruz Banana Slugs were our first choice, but they are apparently a Division 3 school. Here are ten schools with strange nicknames. Eight of them made the NCAA Tournament; one of them made the NIT:

1) Stephen F. Lumberjacks. Nacogdoches, Tex. Soutland Conference. (pictured top, the team plays VCU tonight)

2) Tulsa Golden Hurricane. Tulsa, Okla. Conference USA (pictured center with star player James Woodard. The team is coached by '80s college basketball great Danny Manning. They play UCLA today)

3) San Diego State Aztecs. San Diego, Calif. Mountain West Conference (pictured bottom, the school won over New Mexico State last night. These are the team's two mascots).

4) Iowa State Cyclones. Ames, Iowa. Big 12. The Team plays North Carolina Central tonight.

5) Wichita State Shockers. Wichita, Kan. Missouri Valley Conference. The Shockers are undefeated (34-0) and a one-seed; they play the 16-seed Cal Poly Mustangs today.

6) UL-Lafayette Rajun Cajun. Lafayette, La. Sun Belt Conference. The team plays the 3-seed Creighton Bluejays this afternoon.

7) UC-Irvine Anteaters. Irvine, Calif. Big West Conference. The team lost to the SMU Mustangs in the NIT.

8) Eastern Kentucky Colonels. Richmond, Ky. Ohio Valley Conference. The 15-seeed plays the Kansas Jayhawks this afternoon.

9) Providence Friars. Providence, R.I., Big East. The 11-seed plays traditional powerhouse UNC tonight.

10) Presbyterian College Blue Hose. Clinton, SC. Big South.  The team had a losing record this year.


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

http://bleacherreport.com/

http://www.sportingnews.com/

NCAA March Madness by the Numbers: Who is Levelle Moton?

Today, we are focusing on three teams from the 919 area code, which includes Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill. There are four teams from this area code in the NCAA Tournament, also known as March Madness. The teams include Duke, UNC, North Carolina State and North Carolina Central (Like Duke, the school is in Durham, NC). All of the images above are in reference to three of those teams; alas we don't have room for an NC State image, but we wish the Wolfpack well as they face the St. Louis Billikens.

Here are some numerical facts for the tourney, for more numerical facts, go to our sister blog http://politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com/

Here we go:

1) 20: Number of points scored by Jabari Parker of Duke against NC State in ACC semi-final tournament game in Greensboro, NC (Parker is pictured top)

2) 160-Number of miles between 16-seed Coastal Carolina from Conway, SC (Myrtle Beach) to Raleigh, NC, where they will meet top-seeded University of Virginia tomorrow.

3) 25- Number of games won by two-seeded Michigan Wolverines, the team faces the 15-seeded Wofford Terriers (Spartanburg, SC), today.

4) 11- Number of years Roy Williams has coached at UNC (The Tar Heels' mascot Rameses is pictured center)

5) 33- Number worn by Paris Maragkos, from Greece, for the George Washington University Colonials, the D.C-based school, a nine-seed, plays Memphis in the NCAA Tournament. GWU is one of six Atlantic-10 school in the tourney.

6) 71- Number of points scored by N.C. Central in the MEAC final vs. Morgan St (Baltimore, Md.) played in Norfolk, Va. The N.C. Central Eagles are coached by Levelle Moton (pictured bottom)

7) 26- Number of years it's been since Tulsa coach Danny Manning took Kansas to an NCAA title in 1988; Tulsa, a 13-seed, plays UCLA in the first round. The Bruins' coach Steve Alford, who played for the Indiana Hoosiers, was also a college hoops star.

8) 31- Number of games won by Stephen F. Austin University (Nacaogdoches, Tex.); the Lumberjacks, a 12-seed, play the 5-seed VCU Rams (Richmond, Va) in the big dance.

9) 4-Number of games Ivy League champs Harvard, a 12-seed, has lost; they are currently playing the Cincinnati Bearcats right now. Harvard is seeking second consecutive upset in the tourney; they surprised New Mexico, then coached by Steve Alford, last year in the first round.

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

http://nccueaglepride.com/splash.aspx?id=splash_70

Kudos to Radford University Highlanders for Winning Big South Volleyball Crown

Greetings to our blog-readers in Slovenia, Israel and Algeria.

Tonight, it is with great pleasure that I report that Radford University, my beloved alma mater, won the Big South Women's Volleyball tournament in Clinton, SC, yesterday, by defeating Coastal Carolina University in straight sets. However, the game was a very tight one as the Highlanders won the opening set 36-34! Typically, in order to win a set one team has to reach 25.

Radford U (25-9), located in Radford, Va., and the top seed in the tourney, won the game over CCU, a school from Conway, SC (near Myrtle Beach), and the second seed by a score of (36-34, 25-23, 25-22).

For the Highlanders, Cheyanne James had 16 kills, and Rachel Wiechecki and Emma Denninger had 11 kills each. Wiechecki was also named tournament MVP.

The Big South title is the fifth overall for the Highlanders, and the first for the school since 2000.

As an alumni, I must profess that I still miss Rowdy Red (pictured top) our old mascot.

SIDEBAR ONE: Our tweet of the night goes to "Writer's Digest," a magazine centered on helping both pro and amateur writers write: "#midnightprompt Your spouse is in bed asleep but you can't sleep. There's a knock at the door. The person changes your life forever."

SIDEBAR TWO: Cartoonist Terri Libenson's strip "The Pajama Diaries" is not in the Sunday comics pages of the two Sunday newspapers I read most weeks, but her work is quite remarkable. In a strip that will be published on Tuesday, there is a touching scene between an adult daughter and her mother.

Libenson also posted a blog entry with the strip which she candidly admits to suffering from writer's block at times. She said life distractions, such as her daughter's Bat Mitzvah, are one of the most difficult obstacles to overcome.


http://www.ruhighlanders.com

http://www.writersdigest.com

http://www.pajamadiaries.com

SPOILER ALERT: Kudos to Florida on Winning NCAA Women's Gymnastics Crown

The University of Florida Gators are only the fifth school to win a NCAA Women's Gymnastics title; they join the ranks of UCLA, Utah, Georgia and Alabama. Each of those schools, except Utah, qualified for the Super Six finals.

In victory, the Gators edged out second-place Oklahoma, third-place Alabama, the two-time NCAA champ and fourth place UCLA, the host school. LSU finished fifth; Georgia came in sixth.

For Gators' Coach Rhonda Faehn, a UCLA alum in her 11th year as coach of Florida after a coaching stint at Penn State, the title comes after years of heart-breaking near misses, includes last year's NCAA Championships in Georgia.

The Gators team consists of two Olympians: British national Marissa King, who also celebrated a birthday on Saturday and American Bridget Sloan, who is a freshman from Pittsboro, Ind.

Other stand-outs on the squad include Kytra Hunter (pictured top), Randy Stageberg (pictured bottom), Ashanee Dickerson and Alaina Johnson.

Here is the order of finish:

1. Florida 197.575

2. Oklahoma 197.375

3. Alabama 197.100

4. UCLA 197.100

5. LSU 197.050

6. Georgia 196.675

We issued a SPOILER ALERT because the meets airs on ESPN-U at 8:00 p.m. on April 30th.

For a look at the individual results from today's competition, go to our sister blog:
http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com