Archive for NCAA
While it seems like only yesterday, it was in fact all the way back in November of 2009 when New Mexico Lobos soccer player Elizabeth Lambert enchanted the internets and made the hearts of catfight lovers everywhere go pitter-patter with her rough and tumble style of play which boasted violent hair-pulling and ruthless kidney punches among its featured finishing moves.
In case you do not recall the slightly sexy display of girl-on-girl aggression, the somewhat arousing video follows.
MS Paint Is Fun!
In a groundbreaking move of marketing savvy and rudimentary mathematical skills, the Pac-10 announced that the conference will be rebranded as the Pac-12 once Colorado and Utah officially join the conference in 2011. Genius!
Pac-10 Commissioner Larry Scott, during a press conference in New York touting the brand new look of the revitalized Pac-10, also took a thinly-veiled jab at the stubborn-as-friggin’-mules (and arithmetically-challenged) overseers Big Ten conference, whose division has had eleven teams since Penn State formally began participating in the athletics conference in 1993 (via an AP report):
“We will be mathematically correct going forward,” Scott said Monday at a news conference at a Manhattan hotel.
Zing! The West Coast conference will also be making substantial changes on other fronts as well. Above is the brand new logo for the Pac-10, which I assume will be changed to look exactly like I have represented it when the 11th and 12th teams officially become members. Unless they happen to have better graphics programs available to them than I do, which I suppose could be possible, likely even.
There may have been a little more to the interview process whereby University of Georgia President Michael Adams named Frank Crumley the interim athletic director to replace ousted drunky good time party guy Damon Evans, who recently resigned from the post of AD in a white-hot blaze of shame and red-pantied embarrassment, but my guess it did not require much more than that. From the Atlanta Journal Constitution:
Adams also appointed a search committee to look for the new AD. Adams said it would not surprise him if the search takes six to 12 months.
Adams said the intention is to first look outside the UGA staff for Evans’ permanent successor, although he did not rule out Crumley and other current staffers from becoming candidates.
Crumley has been excutive [sic] associate athletics director under Evans and has gotten much credit for the department’s strong financial performance.
Best of luck to Mr. Crumley in his new capacity as interim athletic director, although one has to believe that the bar as to what is expected has got to be set pretty low at this point.
Adams names Frank Crumley interim AD [Atlanta Journal Constitution]
USA Rugby Must Really Hate Mormons
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But who doesn’t, amirite? Just kidding. I’m sure Mormons don’t hate other Mormons – at least some of them.
Ranked sixth in the nation, the B.Y.U. women’s rugby team is on a roll right now heading into this weekend’s game in the national college playoffs. But whether or not they manage to beat Wisconsin-Milwaukee in the quarterfinals on Saturday, their season ends after the game. The reason? B.Y.U. will unfortunately have to forfeit their next game because USA Rugby scheduled the games in the next round on Sunday, and I guess Mormons aren’t allowed to do stuff on Sunday.
Via The New York Times:
“We’re obviously just very frustrated,” said Siebach, a senior. “We don’t want to put USA Rugby in a bad light, but at the same time we feel like we’ve been treated wrongly.”
Ashley Voss, a spokeswoman for USA Rugby, said scheduling the round for Sunday was not intended as a slight to the B.Y.U. team. “It’s in no way a move to disregard their religious beliefs,” she said. “We want them to be able to compete. We want them to be here.”
Two things: first, women’s rugby? Yowsers. Probably not the best looking ladies on campus. Second, who knew Mormons couldn’t participate in sports on Sunday? Wasn’t Steve Young a practicing Mormon during his NFL playing days? He played on Sundays all the time. Hypocritical non-believer, that guy.
Head coach Tom Waqa, B.Y.U.’s head coach, is justifiably pissed. When reached for comment, Waqa said, “I told that fuck down at the league office…I told that anti-Mormite a fucking thousand times that we don’t ball on the Sabbath!”
Nah, he was much more reserved than that, Mormonically speaking. He said his squad “will be playing with a heavy heart, not being able to participate any further.”
Shomer Sabbath!
B.Y.U. Women’s Rugby Team Will Forfeit if It Reaches Sunday Game [The New York Times]
Among several rules changes for next season, the NCAA has decreed that players will not be allowed to display messages on their eye black anymore, waiting just long enough to enact the rule that should have been enforced for years now.
What a miraculous bit of timing by the NCAA – a blessing really, to borrow a term Tebow frequently employs ad nauseum – waiting to ban eye black messages until Tebow moved on to the pro ranks. I suppose it was in the NCAA’s best interest to delay the banning, lest they upset the devout followers of Tebowanity, and we all know that’s never a good idea. My only question is how are Florida fans going to know what Bible verse to read every Saturday without Tebow spreading the Good Word to them? Ah, who am I kidding? Florida fans can’t read anyway.
NCAA bans wedge blocks, eye black with messages [AP]
(previously at the Sportress: It’s A Blessing To Know That Tim Tebow Feels So Blessed)
New York Post columnist Phil Mushnick, in one of the best examples of a “Get Off My Lawn, You Damn Kids!” column in recent memory, crabbily bemoans the fact that so many of the hifalutin’ basketball players participating in the NCAA tournament are covered in a bunch of tattoos! Tarnations!
Arguing – in a questionable, somewhat bigoted manner, I might add – that no matter whether you like tattoos or consider them a “mainstreamed gift from our prison systems and street gangs” (ouch), one cannot argue that “half the starters in this year’s tournament were covered with tattoos.” Great googly moogly.
An excerpt from Mushnick’s tirade against tattooism:
Heck, there were three guys who played for Tennessee yesterday whose exteriors looked as if they’d been held down and assaulted by a merciless mob of Etch-a-Sketches.
That makes me wonder. Having covered your arms, legs, chests, backs, hands and necks with permanent patterns and words — some fellas seem to have the Preamble of the Constitution (or Miranda Rights) inscribed down the length of their arms — how do they read what they had written, you know, to check for spelling?
If one is to look down at his tattoo, he sees it upside down. If he tries to admire it in a mirror, he sees it backward. Those grieving fellows who salute in skin art a deceased friend or relative may be startled to look into a mirror and read his memorial as “P.I.R.”
Sheesh, Mushnick might want to take it down a notch. Did the Grumpy Old Man overdose on Metamucil or something? Or did he just get a bee in his bonnet? If I may, allow me to suggest to Mushnick that he prepare himself a nice cup of Sanka, lock the doors, close the blinds and barricade himself in his home, away from the crazy, tattooed world that is quickly closing in on him and the onion tied to his belt.
Body art ‘tattoo’ much of bad thing [New York Post]
Joe Morgan Is A Terrible, Selfish Father
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Just when you thought there couldn’t be more reasons not to like ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball analyst Joe Morgan, the San Francisco Chronicle comes out with a story detailing his possessive, iron-fisted control over his daughters that at the very least deprived one of his daughters a chance at realizing her Olympic dream.
Both of Morgan’s twin daughters, Ashley (above) and Kelly, excel at sports, but Ashley in particular is an incredibly gifted athlete. She is currently attending Stanford University and competing at a high level on their gymnastics team. Ashley’s love for the sport developed at an early age and she had so much potential, an opportunity to compete in the Olympics was a distinct possibility. But unfortunately for Ashley, her mean old dad put the kibosh on that, stamping out her dreams in one heartless move.
From the time she was 8, Ashley was committed to gymnastics. But when she had a chance to get on the Olympic track and train full time in Houston, her parents shot down the idea.
“That wasn’t us,” Joe said. “Family is everything.” Plus, he didn’t want her to be home-schooled, as many Olympic hopefuls are. “I believe you learn social skills by mixing with people,” he said.
Jerk. Face it, as far as social skills were concerned, both of Morgan’s daughters were already at a distinct disadvantage to begin with, given the fact that Joe Morgan was their father – seriously, look at the guy – but does that mean he had to heartlessly crush Ashley’s dreams? I think not. What occurred here wasn’t as simple as the importance of family. No no no. You see, Joe Morgan, if he is anything, is a rabid egomaniac. There was no way he would have been able to share the spotlight by having one of his daughters in the Olympics. Crap, he’s probably pissed off she actually made it to Stanford.
Joe Morgan’s daughter stars as Stanford gymnast [San Francisco Chronicle (via The Big Lead)]
If there’s one thing I have learned in life, it’s that if you want to avoid going completely insane, you have to appreciate the little things in life.
Well, courtesy of Busted Coverage, here is one of those little things: after limiting the comely pole vaulter’s exposure on their website (due to the internet frenzy Miss Stokke has frequently whipped up in the past), Cal has decided to lift the embargo on images of the lovely athlete and has provided us with a current photo of Stokke (above, left).
Okay, it’s not the most revealing photo, but you take what you can get.
And speaking of revealing, I don’t know how I missed it back in January, but BC somehow got their hands on a photo of Stokke in her 2009 Halloween costume. Commence slack-jawed leering:
Leave it to white people to come in and ruin everything. The University of Maryland-Eastern Shore and Delaware State are considered two of the power programs in women’s bowling in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC). Throughout its history, the MEAC has been comprised of traditionally black colleges and universities.
In a lengthy piece for The Washington Post, Jon Brand examined the trend of white students filling up spots on the bowling teams at these institutions of higher learning. And he came out with some interesting observations, which shouldn’t be surprising at all, because bowling is so awesome and stuff.
Bowling was thought to be an excellent way to grow women’s sports in the conference, and a relatively inexpensive way at that. When the NCAA began to accept bowling as a legitimate competitive sport, the United States Bowling Congress stepped in and told schools that the start-up costs to develop a bowling program were minimal: between $20,000 and $25,000. By 2001, all twelve schools within the MEAC had women’s bowling programs. But once the bowling programs began to get their footing, the colleges saw the proportion of white students increase, which is exactly the opposite of what they suspected would occur.
“When the schools got involved, they thought bowling was a predominantly black sport, but that turned out to be a misconception,” Brummell said. “One of the NCAA reps asked me why so many [historically black colleges] were starting programs and I told him I didn’t know. I don’t think it’s a sport that the black community has traditionally had success in.”
Interesting. I am no great bowling mind – but a team I was on did win the league title back in 1998 (good times, heady times) – but when I can’t find my remote and bowling is on ESPN, I cannot once recall seeing a black professional bowler on the Lumber Liquidators PBA Tour. Not that my limited experience should be considered an indicator of anything, but it seems to me that if you were to ask most people, they would say that bowling is a predominantly white sport.
In any event, here is the state of women’s college bowling in the MEAC: 30% of the bowlers competing are non-black, a statistically-significant increase over the general student population at these schools. But in the more successful programs, the proportion of white bowlers is even higher: UMES currently has no black bowlers on its team and Delaware State has only two.
But most importantly, the bowling programs at MEAC schools have been a tremendous success. The programs have boosted interest in women’s sports and increased diversity and enrollment at the schools. Who knew bowling could accomplish so many wonderful things?
And for some reason or another, I could really go for a White Russian right about now. Maybe all of this bowling talk is causing me to think of The Dude, but it’s much more likely that it is simply because I have a raging alcohol problem.
Bowling increases diversity at MEAC’s historically black colleges and universities [The Washington Post]
