What an embarrassment yesterday as Michigan got completely destroyed by #1 UCLA. Was I expecting a win? No way. But you had to expect a little more than this. It was basically garbage time with 10 minutes to go. Good coaches don’t get crushed like that, I’m sorry. Thirty Seven points? Unacceptable!! I’d rather watch Desmond Howard breaking down the Holiday Bowl than suffer through the second half of that game again. The good news? It appears as though the football team, which has arrived in LA, didn’t have to watch this debacle and risk infection. From the LA Times: No special outings were planned, and the team did not expect to attend the UCLA-Michigan basketball game at Pauley Pavilion on Saturday. “We’ve got about 120 players,” spokesman David Ablauf said. “I don’t think there are enough UCLA season-ticket holders who would give us their seats.”
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Bless Her Heart
Check out this letter to the editor, printed in today’s (12/1/06) Wall Street Journal. Ms. Deanne Weber of Northfield, MN was commenting on a recent piece on the Michigan – Ohio State game, then she recalled this piece of “history”: When I started dating my husband in college, I was a huge basketball fan and considered myself quite knowledgeable about the sport. He, on the other hand, is more of a football junkie. His dorm had a pool for the NCAA basketball tournament, and..he picked Michigan to win it all. He showed me his pick sheet, and I tore it apart. “You picked Michigan? Michigan?” I said incredulously. “They just fired their coach, and they’re starting five freshman! No way. Pick another team.” Well, that was 1989, and you know the rest of the story. Luckily, he still married me. Don’t forget about the roles Cazzie Russell and Tractor Traylor played on that epic run, Deanne!
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Michigan to Rename Basketball Arena
ONEKAMA, MICHIGAN It appears as though the University of Michigan will suspend a long-standing policy to keep major corporate sponsorship out of its arenas and stadiums. In a move that Madison Ave is calling brilliant, U of M has accepted an offer from automaker Daimler-Chrysler to change the name of its famed basketball arena from Crisler Arena to “Chrysler” Arena. It is estimated that the auto giant paid a one-time lump sum of $1.5 million. The name change will take effect before the 2007 basketball season. Before making the move the Athletic Department conducted an extensive phone survey of distinguished alumni and donors, and flat out asked the question: “Should the basketball arena permanently be named Chrysler Arena?”. Overwhelmingly the response was affirmative, so the athletic department ran with it. Fan reaction has been mixed. “I hope they use this money to fix that patch-work quilt of a roof on Crisler, umm, I mean Chrysler”, said Jan Mussman, a 22-year season ticket holder. The AM sports talk radio station 1050AM WTKA is already using the new name in advertisements and emails, and the initial reaction has been pretty quiet. MVictors.com did find this mention of the new name in WTKA’s November 16 “TKA Ticker” email: Given the success of this project, the school is currently negotiating with Ted Yost, owner…
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Bracket Perfection a mere 65,000 to 1?
Ann Arbor News cites odds of perfect bracket, Webmaster cringes SALINE, MICHIGAN MARCH 18, 2006 The March 16, 2006 Ann Arbor News published a front page piece featuring local Saline resident and ESPN.com NCAA Tournament statistical guru Pete Tiernan. Mr. Tiernan has poured over NCAA tourney data for years and plugged it into his old school Apple PC. With a flick of the mouse, he has come up with all kinds of statistical trends that can be used to predict how the tournament field will fare. One troubling item in the Ann Arbor News piece: one of the stats under a table they called ‘Tiernan’s Tips’ said that “The chance of correctly filling out an entire tournament bracket is 1 in 65,636.” This was instantly troubling. For starters, I’ve been in the ESPN.com NCAA hoops tournament pool each year that attracts several million contestants and I don’t recall anyone ever getting it perfect. Last year’s winner on ESPN.com got 55 out of a possible 63. This 65,000 to 1 figure couldn’t possibly be correct. I thought it over, prayed on it, and decided to go to the source. MVictors.com contacted Tiernan, who immediately replied and stated that figure was incorrect. He didn’t give me an exact figure, but cited that if you treated each game as a 50/50 prop, the…
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Brent Petway Harrassed By Spartans
AirGeorgia@umich.edu – Brent Petway received all kinds of nasty emails from Spartan fans after the first game between these teams, stemming from a collision between he and Ager. Tormenting a guy on when he is on the court is one thing, but phone calls/emails to athletes is way overboard and should be considered a crime. I know it happens all the time but it is pretty sad. I’m not singling out Spartan fans; there have been several stories about Michigan fans sending hate emails to Chad Henne. Wondering how everyone gets the email address of these guys? No problem, for whatever reason Michigan publishes a link to its entire directory on umich.edu. Check it out. In many cases, the U provides not only university address, phone and email, but also home addresses and phone numbers.
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Not Worthy of NCAA Bid
Amaker and Michigan lose again, looks like it is back to Crisler for NIT SALINE, MICHIGAN MARCH 9, 2006 NCAA Tournament bid? Ha! Not for these guys. Michigan made lowly Minnesota look like the Pistons. Another Tommy Amaker team will be denied an NCAA Tournament bid due to a complete collapse at the end of the season ruined a promising season for the Wolverines. Michigan will be able to “redo” the Senior Night disaster against the Indiana Hoosiers last Saturday as Michigan will be one of the NIT favorites and play another game at home. The silver lining: the last Michigan play on the first Senior Day was Graham Brown doinking his desperation full court pass off of the Crisler Arena scoreboard. Funny, because I threw the TV remote at the television right about the same time. Now we’ll both get a chance to retrieve our dignity as the Wolverines prepare for a memorable NIT run.
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MSU, Izzo, Shows Who is Boss
Spartans coast after Hot Michigan Start SALINE, MICHIGAN FEBRUARY 18, 2006 Michigan State withstood a quick Michigan start and slowly crushed the Wolverines for their 9th straight victory over the Blue at Breslin Arena. Shannon Brown was the player of the game, epitomizing the gap in talent the Spartans have over Michigan. Brown tossed in acrobatic lay-ups and dropped deadly threes to keep the game out of reach. The struggling Blue now need an upset win over Illinois and/or Ohio State to be considered for a NCAA berth. This is shocking considering where they sat just a couple weeks ago, firmly planted in the Top 25. But loss to a very weak Purdue team and bad losses to Ohio State and Iowa have left the Wolverines wondering what could have been. For the Spartans, they have struggled as well but have enough quality wins to give Tom Izzo a lock on another NCAA bid. State seems to have the tools to engineer another solid tournament run if he can get consistency out of Brown and Maurice Ager. They certainly had it working today, as they rung up 90 on the defenseless Wolverines. Had they broke 100, that would have meant half-off big rigs at Paul Revere’s Tavern in East Lansing. More takes: Son, Clean up Your Act – For those…
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Hippies Displace Michigan Hoops Team
SALINE, MICHIGAN MAY 31, 2004 The Wednesday May 26 issue of the Ann Arbor News had a piece on the disturbing state of Michigan’s basketball facility. Check out this excerpt: “At the center of Michigan’s issue is a practice facility. The men’s and women’s teams share the Crisler arena court with each other – and whatever other events are scheduled. Before leaving for the NIT tournament last March, Michigan was forced to practice at the IM building because of the 32nd annual Dance for Mother Earth PowWow at Crisler Arena.” Are you kidding me? This is the state of Michigan basketball?