Tinny Words

Week 17

2009-03-03T16:24:00.001-06:00

Does anyone still read these?

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 North Carolina                     9.4188    25-3     42    19.32     2 (+1)
  2 Connecticut                        9.4144    27-2     47    14.97     3 (+1)
  3 Pittsburgh                         9.2422    26-3     40    15.00     1 (-2)
  4 Memphis                            9.2379    26-3     55    16.83     5 (+1)
  5 Oklahoma                           9.1330    26-3     39    12.76     4 (-1)
  6 Duke                               9.0688    24-5      6    14.14     6 (0)
  7 Michigan State                     8.8283    23-5      7     9.86     9 (+2)
  8 Kansas                             8.8231    24-5     20    13.03    11 (+3)
  9 Louisville                         8.7982    23-5     17    12.32    10 (+1)
 10 Missouri                           8.6651    24-5     72    15.76     8 (-2)
 11 Louisiana State                    8.5236    25-4     97    11.59    16 (+5)
 12 Xavier                             8.4867    23-5     48    10.36    15 (+3)
 13 Clemson                            8.4791    22-6     27    11.50     7 (-6)
 14 Wake Forest                        8.4464    22-5     73    12.33    13 (-1)
 15 Gonzaga                            8.3724    23-5    119    15.64    18 (+3)
 16 Butler                             8.3315    25-4    127    10.90    20 (+4)
 17 Villanova                          8.3064    23-6     43    10.14    12 (-5)
 18 Brigham Young                      8.2931    22-6     77    13.68    24 (+6)
 19 Washington                         8.1898    22-7     24     9.38    25 (+6)
 20 Purdue                             8.1726    22-7     41    11.52    19 (-1)
 21 Marquette                          8.1507    23-6     74    10.10    14 (-7)
 22 California - Los Angeles           8.1411    22-7     57    12.69    28 (+6)
 23 Illinois                           8.1236    23-7     32     8.83    21 (-2)
 24 Utah State                         8.1163    26-4    181    10.87    22 (-2)
 25 Dayton                             8.0028    24-5    113     7.17    26 (+1)

Dropped out: #17 Arizona State (to #26), #23 West Virginia (to #27)

338 Texas Southern                     2.6001     5-23   232   -10.04   340 (+2)
339 Maryland - Eastern Shore           2.5992     7-21   323   -11.18   333 (-6)
340 Mississippi Valley State           2.5208     6-23   251   -12.55   337 (-3)
341 Grambling State                    2.4752     6-21   331   -10.11   339 (-2)
342 Loyola Marymount                   2.2747     3-27    82   -16.07   342 (0)
343 Southeast Missouri State           1.8524     3-27   214   -12.70   343 (0)
344 Alcorn State                       1.7965     6-23   341   -13.97   344 (0)
345 Sacramento State                   1.6933     2-27   186   -15.45   345 (0)
346 North Carolina Central             1.6169     3-26   203   -20.07   346 (0)
347 New Jersey Tech                    0.8664     1-28   316   -17.83   347 (0)

The complete reports.

Week 16

2009-02-24T10:21:00.005-06:00

Rankings:

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Pittsburgh                         9.5341    25-2     34    16.00     4 (+3)
  2 North Carolina                     9.4716    24-3     31    18.93     2 (0)
  3 Connecticut                        9.3826    25-2     54    15.41     1 (-2)
  4 Oklahoma                           9.3615    25-2     42    13.48     3 (-1)
  5 Memphis                            9.2494    24-3     50    17.07     5 (0)
  6 Duke                               9.0662    22-5      8    14.52     6 (0)
  7 Clemson                            8.9455    22-4     27    12.77     9 (+2)
  8 Missouri                           8.8601    23-4     79    17.11     8 (0)
  9 Michigan State                     8.8112    21-5      9    10.00     7 (-2)
 10 Louisville                         8.7779    21-5     15    12.42    12 (+2)
 11 Kansas                             8.6997    22-5     33    12.74    14 (+3)
 12 Villanova                          8.6113    22-5     30    10.89    13 (+1)
 13 Wake Forest                        8.4697    20-5     62    12.64    11 (-2)
 14 Marquette                          8.4654    23-4    101    11.41    16 (+2)
 15 Xavier                             8.4587    22-5     48    10.22    10 (-5)
 16 Louisiana State                    8.4193    23-4    112    12.11    17 (+1)
 17 Arizona State                      8.3720    21-5     72    11.23    22 (+5)
 18 Gonzaga                            8.3500    21-5    115    16.12    20 (+2)
 19 Purdue                             8.3324    21-6     45    11.78    25 (+6)
 20 Butler                             8.2935    23-4    126    10.85    18 (-2)
 21 Illinois                           8.2922    22-6     35     9.36    15 (-6)
 22 Utah State                         8.2626    25-3    200    11.39    19 (-3)
 23 West Virginia                      8.2546    19-8      6    11.81    24 (+1)
 24 Brigham Young                      8.2183    20-6     77    13.85    21 (-3)
 25 Washington                         8.1313    20-7     26     9.78    27 (+2)

Dropped out: #23 Dayton (to #26)

338 North Carolina - Greensboro        2.6098     4-23   174   -11.19   336 (-2)
339 Grambling State                    2.4996     6-20   335   -10.19   338 (-1)
340 Texas Southern                     2.4219     3-23   191   -11.50   341 (+1)
341 Southern                           2.4027     6-20   340    -9.08   340 (-1)
342 Loyola Marymount                   2.2251     2-26    80   -16.89   343 (+1)
343 Southeast Missouri State           2.0442     3-25   222   -13.07   342 (-1)
344 Alcorn State                       1.9962     6-21   341   -13.74   345 (+1)
345 Sacramento State                   1.9263     2-25   203   -13.96   344 (-1)
346 North Carolina Central             1.5621     2-25   199   -21.48   346 (0)
347 New Jersey Tech                    1.1143     1-26   310   -17.04   347 (0)

The complete reports.

Before I say anything about my teams, I want to express my love and admiration of UConn coach Jim Calhoun.

If your state has budget woes, don't attack the public university's athletics coaches. The reason Jim Calhoun is the highest paid employee in the state is because he's in charge of one of the few things in the state that actually makes money, and women's coach Geno Auriemma isn't too far down the list himself (UConn has one of the very few college women's basketball programs that runs in the black). I've seen too many people caterwauling about how thin-skinned Calhoun is and that he shouldn't have blown up at the guy. Fuck that. You don't play nicey-nice with some pompous jackass whose entire reason for being is to ask idiotic and irrelevant questions of public figures for the sole purpose of scoring cheap political points with the Left's answer to the 101st Fighting Keyboardists. Self-involved morons like this "activist" are why journalism is a dying profession, and he deserved nothing but public humiliation.
Beating Oklahoma does not magically make Texas a good team. Yes, in terms of pure numbers, it was a very good win for the Longhorns, and it probably wrapped up the NCAA bid that was starting to slip away. This is, however, still the same team that lost back-to-back home games and three in a row overall for the first time in some span that I'm too lazy to look up right now, and the same team that will be lucky to make it out of the first weekend. The value of this win will be diminished for us because the best player in the country got bonked on the head and only played 11 minutes, and for the same reason, the loss for Oklahoma (as well as last night's Griffin-less loss to Kansas) will be mitigated when the selection committee is deciding who sits on the top line of the tournament three weeks from now.
The Texas women have lost two in a row to fall out of contention in the Big 12, and in all likelihood will not even get a first-round bye in the conference tournament, considering the difficulty of the remaining schedule. The program is certainly on a turnaround under Gail Goestenkors, though.
The Vanderbilt women's team likely blew their shot at their first-ever SEC championship of any kind with a loss at Ole Miss on Sunday. The Lady 'Dores upset leader Auburn on Thursday to pull into a first-place tie with the Tigers. Auburn beat Georgia to stay in front, and while they finish the season with a home game against a mediocre Arkansas team, Vandy's last contest is on the road in Knoxville, where they are 0-23 all time. I've seen stranger things happen, but this doesn't seem very likely.

Week 15

2009-02-17T12:59:00.003-06:00

Egads. For some reason, I haven't been able to log into Blogger in more than a week. It's been saying that I don't have cookies or javascript turned on, even though I do. Last week's rankings are up on the other site just like always.

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Connecticut                        9.7000    24-1     47    16.40     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                     9.6984    23-2     40    20.20     4 (+2)
  3 Oklahoma                           9.6275    25-1     42    14.19     2 (-1)
  4 Pittsburgh                         9.5405    23-2     31    16.20     5 (+1)
  5 Memphis                            9.2911    22-3     35    16.44     6 (+1)
  6 Duke                               9.0975    20-5      7    15.00     3 (-3)
  7 Michigan State                     8.9956    20-4     11    11.13    10 (+3)
  8 Missouri                           8.9590    22-4     61    17.27    13 (+5)
  9 Clemson                            8.9154    20-4     19    12.29     7 (-2)
 10 Xavier                             8.8431    21-4     21    10.52     8 (-2)
 11 Wake Forest                        8.7452    19-4     53    13.39    11 (0)
 12 Louisville                         8.7183    19-5     15    12.33     9 (-3)
 13 Villanova                          8.7183    20-5     17    11.24    12 (-1)
 14 Kansas                             8.6317    20-5     30    12.40    14 (0)
 15 Illinois                           8.4721    21-5     45    10.19    19 (+4)
 16 Marquette                          8.4500    21-4     96    11.60    17 (+1)
 17 Louisiana State                    8.4263    21-4    113    12.68    22 (+5)
 18 Butler                             8.4243    22-3    145    11.36    15 (-3)
 19 Utah State                         8.3896    24-2    235    11.88    18 (-1)
 20 Gonzaga                            8.3854    19-5     80    14.50    23 (+3)
 21 Brigham Young                      8.3590    19-5     89    14.58    26 (+5)
 22 Arizona State                      8.3517    20-5     71    11.60    31 (+9)
 23 Dayton                             8.3507    23-3    130     8.19    28 (+5)
 24 West Virginia                      8.3004    17-8      4    11.60    21 (-3)
 25 Purdue                             8.2941    19-6     41    11.44    29 (+4)

Dropped out: #16 California - Los Angeles (to #26), #20 Florida (to #37), #24 Ohio State (to #32), #25 Washington (to #27)

338 Grambling State                    2.7295     6-18   334   -10.50   336 (-2)
339 Mississippi Valley State           2.6962     4-21   182   -14.16   339 (0)
340 Southern                           2.6857     6-18   340    -7.96   341 (+1)
341 Texas Southern                     2.4370     2-22   170   -12.67   342 (+1)
342 Southeast Missouri State           2.3630     3-23   202   -12.42   340 (-2)
343 Loyola Marymount                   2.3358     2-24   103   -16.46   343 (0)
344 Sacramento State                   2.0465     2-24   200   -14.12   344 (0)
345 Alcorn State                       1.9306     5-20   341   -14.84   345 (0)
346 North Carolina Central             1.7167     2-23   218   -21.32   346 (0)
347 New Jersey Tech                    1.4046     1-24   303   -16.68   347 (0)

Thoughts:

Well, it seems clear at this point in the season that the Longhorns are exactly what they've shown themselves to be: a decent-to-good defensive team and wrist-slashingly awful on offense. They're not going to get any better than this. The horses just aren't in the stable. They're not great, or even really all that good. They're just an OK mid-table major conference team. I've been saying since the Stetson game that we probably wouldn't make it out of the first weekend of the tournament, and the team hasn't done anything that would dissuade me from that assessment. We'll be seeded somewhere between 7 and 9, and even if we manage to win the opening-round game, we'll be grossly overmatched against the 1 or 2 seed.

On the plus side, even with a likely 20-13 overall, 8-8 in conference finish this season, this is still by far the worst team Texas has had in about a decade. So it's not like the program is in complete disarray (like, for example, Indiana or Oregon) or is pushing against what seems to be a hard ceiling and will rarely do much better than this (like, for example, Virginia Tech or Seton Hall). It's just a down year, and given what I've seen of next year's recruiting class, it's probably going to be a one-time deal. Point guard play will pretty much fix itself as Dogus Balbay improves and Jay Lucas becomes eligible. We already have a couple of offense-oriented wing players committed for next season, which should alleviate some of our scoring woes.

So fret not, Longhorns. This too shall pass.
It'll be hard for me to come up with anything useful to say about Vanderbilt or Georgia Tech. Neither one of them is particularly good this year. In fact, through a quirk of scheduling, there just happened to be a three-team round-robin between Vandy, GaTech, and Illinois-Chicago in early December. Each team played the other two, and the winner of the impromptu mini-conference was none other than the Flames of UIC, which won in Nashville and in Atlanta. Even the Flames are now 12-14 overall, have lost six of their last eight games, and are languishing in a seventh-place tie in the Horizon League (out of ten teams in the conference). The game after getting blown out at home by UIC, Vandy lost by 12 at the Thrillerdome, which was such a non-event that Jason didn't even bother to gloat about it.

Week 13

2009-02-03T08:26:00.002-06:00

Forgot to post these yesterday.

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Duke                               9.9714    19-2      9    19.95     1 (0)
  2 Oklahoma                           9.7762    21-1     16    14.64     3 (+1)
  3 North Carolina                     9.6905    19-2     40    21.67     4 (+1)
  4 Connecticut                        9.6306    20-1     60    17.29     5 (+1)
  5 Pittsburgh                         9.5340    19-2     21    15.95     2 (-3)
  6 Clemson                            9.3126    18-2     29    13.30     9 (+3)
  7 Xavier                             9.2990    19-2     20    11.24     6 (-1)
  8 Louisville                         9.2730    17-3     12    14.40     8 (0)
  9 Memphis                            9.2252    18-3     24    15.67    10 (+1)
 10 Wake Forest                        9.1646    17-2     72    15.84     7 (-3)
 11 Marquette                          9.0573    19-2     74    13.33    14 (+3)
 12 Butler                             9.0104    19-1    131    12.75    12 (0)
 13 Michigan State                     8.9658    17-4      7     9.43    11 (-2)
 14 Missouri                           8.8059    18-4     75    18.45    13 (-1)
 15 Villanova                          8.7479    17-4     31    12.57    27 (+12)
 16 Purdue                             8.7289    17-4     50    14.00    20 (+4)
 17 Kansas                             8.6606    17-4     53    13.33    22 (+5)
 18 Illinois                           8.6255    18-4     47    11.18    15 (-3)
 19 California - Los Angeles           8.5901    17-4     82    15.62    34 (+15)
 20 Minnesota                          8.5857    18-3     73     9.14    32 (+12)
 21 West Virginia                      8.5321    15-6     10    12.67    18 (-3)
 22 Washington                         8.4997    16-5     19    11.14    19 (-3)
 23 Davidson                           8.4760    18-3    140    13.95    30 (+7)
 24 Dayton                             8.4683    20-2    155     9.32    36 (+12)
 25 Gonzaga                            8.4656    16-4    114    17.20    38 (+13)

Dropped out: #16 Florida (to #27), #17 Arizona State (to #32), #21 Oklahoma State (to #33),
#23 Texas (to #29), #24 Georgetown (to #40), #25 California (to #42)

338 Mississippi Valley State           2.9489     3-18   146   -16.14   337 (-1)
339 Furman                             2.8528     3-17   271   -11.50   341 (+2)
340 Texas Southern                     2.8478     2-19   151   -12.33   339 (-1)
341 Southeast Missouri State           2.6224     3-20   220   -12.30   340 (-1)
342 Loyola Marymount                   2.4593     1-22    76   -18.09   342 (0)
343 Southern                           2.3920     4-17   342    -9.24   344 (+1)
344 Sacramento State                   2.3780     2-20   230   -13.73   343 (-1)
345 Alcorn State                       1.9144     4-18   341   -16.27   347 (+2)
346 New Jersey Tech                    1.8103     1-21   277   -16.55   345 (-1)
347 North Carolina Central             1.7703     2-22   235   -21.04   346 (-1)

The complete reports.

Damning with faint praise

2009-01-28T21:44:00.002-06:00

The trailer for Underworld: Rise of the Lycans keeps touting some reviewer who called it "the best of the three Underworld films."

Maybe it's just me and my silly disdain for crappy, braindead movies, but that's a lot like saying that Hitler was the best of the three mid-20th century dictators.

YMMV, I suppose.

Week 12 rankings

2009-01-26T22:03:00.001-06:00

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Duke                              10.2855    18-1      9    20.84     1 (0)
  2 Pittsburgh                         9.7924    18-1     26    17.47     3 (+1)
  3 Oklahoma                           9.7158    19-1     22    15.20     7 (+4)
  4 North Carolina                     9.7069    17-2     33    22.89     4 (0)
  5 Connecticut                        9.6248    18-1     36    16.21     6 (+1)
  6 Xavier                             9.4971    17-2     11    11.16     8 (+2)
  7 Wake Forest                        9.4346    16-1     80    17.71     2 (-5)
  8 Louisville                         9.3528    15-3     10    14.22    10 (+2)
  9 Clemson                            9.2635    17-2     31    13.79     5 (-4)
 10 Memphis                            9.2055    16-3     19    15.42    11 (+1)
 11 Michigan State                     9.1772    16-3      7     9.84     9 (-2)
 12 Butler                             9.0899    18-1    109    13.00    18 (+6)
 13 Missouri                           9.0350    17-3     82    20.25    14 (+1)
 14 Marquette                          8.9731    17-2     81    13.74    13 (-1)
 15 Illinois                           8.9248    17-3     37    13.05    19 (+4)
 16 Florida                            8.7246    17-3     86    14.40    15 (-1)
 17 Arizona State                      8.7075    16-3     84    14.42    22 (+5)
 18 West Virginia                      8.6776    14-5     13    13.11    21 (+3)
 19 Washington                         8.6727    15-4     25    12.11    30 (+11)
 20 Purdue                             8.6453    15-4     45    14.47    34 (+14)
 21 Oklahoma State                     8.6039    13-5     12    11.39    20 (-1)
 22 Kansas                             8.5994    15-4     52    14.16    32 (+10)
 23 Texas                              8.5482    14-4     28    10.94    28 (+5)
 24 Georgetown                         8.5367    12-6      1    10.17    12 (-12)
 25 California                         8.5190    16-4     41    10.95    16 (-9)

Dropped out: #17 Syracuse (to #26), #23 Minnesota (to #32), #24 Villanova (to #27), #25 Ohio State (to #39)

338 North Florida                      2.9713     4-16   253   -15.80   339 (+1)
339 Texas Southern                     2.9250     1-18   115   -13.16   333 (-6)
340 Southeast Missouri State           2.8659     3-18   218   -12.24   341 (+1)
341 Furman                             2.8609     2-15   262   -13.18   342 (+1)
342 Loyola Marymount                   2.7889     1-20    62   -17.62   336 (-6)
343 Sacramento State                   2.4597     2-19   236   -14.05   343 (0)
344 Southern                           2.3839     3-16   339   -10.21   345 (+1)
345 New Jersey Tech                    2.0148     1-19   263   -17.10   347 (+2)
346 North Carolina Central             1.9097     2-21   223   -21.26   344 (-2)
347 Alcorn State                       1.7800     3-17   342   -18.00   346 (-1)

The complete reports.

RIP Kay Yow

2009-01-24T13:57:00.002-06:00

Hall of Fame women's basketball coach Kay Yow died this morning at the age of 66 after a 22-year fight with breast cancer. You want to see what class and dignity in the face of adversity really looks like? Take a gander at Yow.

Yow was one of just seven women's basketball coaches to reach the 700-win plateau, and finished her career with a 737-344 record in 38 years, the last 34 of which were spent sitting in the first chair at North Carolina State. She averaged 20 wins a season during her time leading the Wolfpack.

It's a sad day, even for those of us that have no connection at all to NC State. Yow was one of the most respected and beloved figures in the game basketball.

Week 11 rankings

2009-01-19T19:37:00.002-06:00

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Duke                              10.2132    16-1      8    19.88     1 (0)
  2 Wake Forest                        9.6800    16-0    107    19.25     5 (+3)
  3 Pittsburgh                         9.6660    16-1     39    17.76     2 (-1)
  4 North Carolina                     9.6414    16-2     37    22.83     6 (+2)
  5 Clemson                            9.6269    16-1     31    16.00     3 (-2)
  6 Connecticut                        9.6117    16-1     41    17.29     4 (-2)
  7 Oklahoma                           9.6087    17-1     29    15.22     7 (0)
  8 Xavier                             9.3874    15-2      9    10.71     9 (+1)
  9 Michigan State                     9.3781    15-2     11    10.76     8 (-1)
 10 Louisville                         9.2884    13-3      7    14.19    13 (+3)
 11 Memphis                            9.2359    14-3     14    15.47    11 (0)
 12 Georgetown                         9.1598    12-4      1    12.81    12 (0)
 13 Marquette                          9.1270    16-2     51    14.00    16 (+3)
 14 Missouri                           8.9440    15-3    103    21.78    27 (+13)
 15 Florida                            8.9429    16-2     88    14.67    25 (+10)
 16 California                         8.9250    15-3     24    12.00    10 (-6)
 17 Syracuse                           8.9119    17-2     81    13.11    14 (-3)
 18 Butler                             8.9005    16-1    140    12.24    21 (+3)
 19 Illinois                           8.8710    15-3     36    13.11    18 (-1)
 20 Oklahoma State                     8.8197    12-4     10    12.81    17 (-3)
 21 West Virginia                      8.7849    13-4     19    14.35    20 (-1)
 22 Arizona State                      8.7638    15-3     73    14.89    15 (-7)
 23 Minnesota                          8.7111    16-2     84     9.61    19 (-4)
 24 Villanova                          8.7081    14-3     60    13.53    26 (+2)
 25 Ohio State                         8.6900    13-3     25     9.31    29 (+4)

Dropped out: #22 Texas (to #28), #23 Brigham Young (to #29), #24 California - Los Angeles (to #26)

338 Fairleigh Dickinson                3.0482     2-14   185   -17.69   338 (0)
339 North Florida                      3.0297     3-14   235   -18.12   339 (0)
340 Alabama A&M                        3.0280     3-10   344   -10.15   337 (-3)
341 Southeast Missouri State           3.0250     3-16   250   -11.53   335 (-6)
342 Furman                             2.9869     2-13   295   -11.20   342 (0)
343 Sacramento State                   2.3761     1-18   222   -15.26   343 (0)
344 North Carolina Central             2.2410     2-19   200   -20.67   344 (0)
345 Southern                           2.2002     2-15   340   -11.35   346 (+1)
346 Alcorn State                       2.0468     3-15   341   -17.83   347 (+1)
347 New Jersey Tech                    1.9427     0-18   241   -18.89   345 (-2)

The complete reports.

Weird thought

2009-01-15T15:39:00.003-06:00

When two evangelical Christian universities play each other in basketball, how does God™© decide who wins?

Sorry for not posting any rankings on Monday. Some of my leftover ennui from the end of the football season has spilled over into basketball.

Football rankings, season final (or, How I swallowed my Vanderbilt pride and learned to love the Gators)

2009-01-10T12:55:00.004-06:00

I don't think I've ever gotten so much satisfaction from a Florida win than I did on Thursday night. That they beat Oklahoma by the same margin Texas did only made it that much more perfect. Sadly, I don't think anyone will learn anything from this. Pollsters will still be starry-eyed at every team that runs up the score against drastically inferior competition. Bob Stoops will continue to do so, and continue to fail when he's faced with a team of comparable or superior skill, as he's done over and over again both during the regular season and in his bowl games. The only people that will continue to be surprised every time this happens are the pollsters and OU's coaching staff. Pretty much everyone else has already figured out the Sooners.

The Gators? Eh, they didn't play great, especially not in the first half. Their defense gave up big chunks of yardage, but made the game-saving plays when it came down to the wire. Their two first-half red zone stops (one on an interception, the other on downs) were massively impressive. Then Tebow and Harvin just took the game over after the break. Harvin had explosive plays all over the field. Tebow was unstoppable on third down, even the long ones. And that jump pass touchdown? A thing of beauty. You can see it coming a mile away, but you still can't do a damn thing about it.

In general, however, none of the purported "national championship contenders" really impressed me in their bowl games, except for one. USC played one good quarter. Texas was flat until the third, and then again for most of the fourth, up until the last drive. Oklahoma kinda sucked. The one team that really impressed me? Utah. The Utes came out on the field and immediately punched Alabama in the throat. It was 21-0 Utah before the Tide even got off the bus, and they never recovered.

That having been said, what follows should come as little surprise:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)
  1 Utah                        8.1311    13-0     76    2.14     4 (+3)
  2 Florida                     8.1002    13-1      4    3.38     3 (+1)
  3 Texas                       8.0325    12-1      3    2.26     2 (-1)
  4 Southern California         7.5853    12-1     63    4.17     8 (+4)
  5 Oklahoma                    7.3709    12-2      1    2.09     1 (-4)
  6 Boise State                 7.2438    12-1     90    2.98     5 (-1)
  7 Alabama                     6.9262    12-2     39    2.11     7 (0)
  8 Texas Christian             6.8107    11-2     54    2.97    12 (+4)
  9 Texas Tech                  6.7954    11-2     45    1.57     6 (-3)
 10 Pennsylvania State          6.7168    11-2     66    2.71     9 (-1)
 11 Georgia                     6.3256    10-3      8    1.28    14 (+3)
 12 Ohio State                  6.2486    10-3     15    1.98    10 (-2)
 13 Ball State                  6.0325    12-2    118    1.70    11 (-2)
 14 Cincinnati                  5.9751    11-3     57    1.28    13 (-1)
 15 Oregon                      5.8074    10-3     73    1.49    20 (+5)
 16 Pittsburgh                  5.4979     9-4     11    1.26    15 (-1)
 17 Virginia Tech               5.4831    10-4     20    1.32    24 (+7)
 18 Rice                        5.4813    10-3    105    1.24    29 (+11)
 19 Brigham Young               5.4776    10-3    106    1.56    16 (-3)
 20 Florida State               5.4739     9-4     14    1.66    21 (+1)
 21 Missouri                    5.4473    10-4     29    1.55    25 (+4)
 22 Oregon State                5.4134     9-4     18    1.32    30 (+8)
 23 Mississippi                 5.4133     9-4     24    1.69    31 (+8)
 24 Nebraska                    5.3350     9-4     30    1.24    27 (+3)
 25 Oklahoma State              5.3254     9-4     35    1.45    19 (-6)

Dropped out: #17 Georgia Tech (to #28), #18 Michigan State (to #26), #22 Northwestern (to #32), #23 Western Michigan (to #33)

111 San Diego State             0.2586     2-10    58    0.52   111 (0)
112 Iowa State                  0.1428     2-10    74    0.71   113 (+1)
113 Tulane                      0.1410     2-10    71    0.48   112 (-1)
114 Western Kentucky            0.0346     2-10    83    0.64   115 (+1)
115 Idaho                      -0.0224     2-10    87    0.46   114 (-1)
116 Miami (OH)                 -0.1362     2-10   101    0.56   116 (0)
117 Washington State           -0.3208     2-11    61    0.29   117 (0)
118 Southern Methodist         -0.3993     1-11    42    0.56   118 (0)
119 North Texas                -0.8073     1-11    86    0.42   119 (0)
120 Washington                 -0.8934     0-12     7    0.34   120 (0)

The complete reports.

Thoughts:

As I mentioned, the Longhorns didn't play particularly well in the Fiesta Bowl. So-so play-calling and terrible execution stymied the offense in the first half. Poor defense put the game in jeopardy in the fourth quarter. But they came together and pulled off another dramatic win. Obviously, it doesn't do anything to assuage the pain of allowing a shot at the national championship to almost literally slip through our fingers. Based on the way we played in our bowl game, I don't know if we'd have been able to beat Florida, but I also don't think we'd have quite as badly if we'd gotten to the national championship game. There is some small vindication in being the only Big 12 South team to win their bowl game, but in the current system, that really doesn't mean much. Yeah, recruiting, blah blah blah. I call bullshit on that argument. In reality, recruiting classes are already pretty much set for next year, and by the time future signing periods have rolled around, another season has already gone by. We saw how useful the "I want to win national championships" argument was when Adrian Peterson made it.

Next year is supposed to be the year everything comes together, but that was almost this year. We have to replace Quan Cosby and the entire starting defensive line. The offensive line desperately needs to improve. We need a tight end, probably more than one. We need Sergio Kindle to stay in school, or failing that, to find another hard-hitting linebacker. Next year's schedule is the perfect set-up for a national title run: everyone in the conference except for Texas (and possibly Oklahoma State) are going to take some pretty dramatic steps back. From Missouri, Chase Daniel graduates and Jeremy Maclin has declared for the draft. From Tech, Graham Harrell graduates and Michael Crabtree is reportedly headed for the NFL. Sam Bradford will almost certainly declare as well, since he loses almost his entire offense to graduation (four linemen and two receivers). The only game that looks to be even remotely difficult is the trip to Oklahoma State.
Vanderbilt won a bowl game! Don't get excited, though. It's not a predictor of future success. The only halfway decent player on the team has already declared for the draft, and there's no one behind him. Anyway, it was an exciting game, and Vandy barely saved it at the end. CB Myron Lewis made up for getting burned twice in the passing game on BC's last touchdown drive (once for a big first down and once for the score) by picking off a pass at the sideline to bring the Eagles' last gasp effort to a halt.

Next year won't be as good. Chris Nickson graduates, bringing his career at Vanderbilt to a merciful end, which puts Mackenzi Adams in the starting slot. Adams was decent early in the season, but kinda stunk the rest of the way. The platooning looks to continue with freshman Larry Smith. The defense probably won't be particularly good with the departure of DJ Moore. The 2009 schedule is identical to this year's, just with the conference games swapped between home and away. No joke, the non-conference schedule is exactly the same: Miami of Ohio, Duke, Rice and Wake Forest.
Can't say much about Georgia Tech's performance, as I didn't watch the bowl game. From the box score, it looks like they just imploded after not being able to put up a touchdown in the first quarter. LSU led 28-3 at halftime, but pretty much had it won after converting an onside kick following their second touchdown. The triple-option rushing attack just isn't designed to dig out of a big hole.

Nesbitt and Dwyer are both sophomores, so this team has at least some future on offense.
Fuck the Tennessee Titans. I can't even begin to describe my utter lack of surprise that this team of overrated defense and non-existent offense came out and sucked ass in a playoff game in their own goddamn home stadium. Congratulations, Jeff Fisher, on having absolutely nothing whatsoever to show for being the longest-tenured head coach in the NFL. And thanks for finally taking away the last reason I had to pay any attention at all to professional football. I can honestly say that I won't miss it.

First basketball rankings of the season

2009-01-05T14:45:00.004-06:00

So tonight is the Fiesta Bowl, against Ohio State. I didn't make plans with anyone, so I'm probably going to head up the street to my regular sushi place and watch it there. I don't know, though. I might change my mind and just watch it at home. To be honest, I can't imagine it's going to be much of a game. What little I've seen of Ohio State this season left me pretty well unimpressed.

I'll leave my thoughts on the Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech bowl games for my football season-final post, since I want to get on to the basketball here.

Rankings:

Rkg Team                               Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   Next Game
  1 Pittsburgh                        10.0309    14-0     43    19.43   St. John's (01/11)
  2 Duke                              10.0236    12-1     19    22.69   Davidson (01/07)
  3 Clemson                            9.8607    14-0     60    18.79   Alabama (01/06)
  4 Connecticut                        9.5777    12-1     52    19.38   @ West Virginia (01/06)
  5 North Carolina                     9.5254    13-1     96    24.07   College of Charleston (01/07)
  6 West Virginia                      9.4506    11-2     25    19.85   Connecticut (01/06)
  7 Georgetown                         9.3768    10-2     14    16.58   @ Notre Dame (01/05)
  8 Xavier                             9.2885    11-2      2     8.31   St. Louis (01/08)
  9 Wake Forest                        9.2600    13-0    215    21.15   North Carolina (01/11)
 10 Oklahoma                           9.2557    13-1     69    14.93   Maryland - Eastern Shore (01/05)
 11 California                         9.1845    13-2     30    14.13   @ Washington State (01/08)
 12 Michigan State                     9.1245    11-2     18    11.54   Ohio State (01/06)
 13 Memphis                            9.0706    10-3     13    16.85   Marshall (01/07)
 14 Illinois                           9.0521    13-2     40    13.07   Indiana (01/10)
 15 Illinois State                     9.0023    14-0    191    14.57   @ Bradley (01/06)
 16 Syracuse                           8.9948    14-1    104    14.07   DePaul (01/07)
 17 Texas                              8.9735    11-2     45    13.77   @ Arkansas (01/06)
 18 Arizona State                      8.9583    12-2     71    16.29   Oregon State (01/08)
 19 Louisville                         8.9347     9-3     17    16.00   @ South Florida (01/07)
 20 Marquette                          8.9023    13-2     70    14.40   @ Rutgers (01/07)
 21 Ohio State                         8.9001    10-2     20     8.58   @ Michigan State (01/06)
 22 Butler                             8.8766    12-1    102    12.15   Wright State (01/08)
 23 Missouri                           8.8348    12-2    140    20.57   Coppin State (01/06)
 24 Brigham Young                      8.8274    11-2     88    17.00   Western Oregon (01/06)
 25 Florida State                      8.7890    13-2     32     6.53   Duke (01/10)

Bottom 10:

338 Furman                             3.3288     2-9    305   -10.73   @ Samford (01/08)
339 Loyola Marymount                   3.3257     1-15    50   -17.69   @ Pepperdine (01/10)
340 Mississippi Valley State           3.2956     0-14     7   -25.00   Alabama A&M (01/10)
341 North Carolina - Greensboro        3.2947     1-10   177   -16.91   @ Western Carolina (01/08)
342 North Florida                      3.2111     2-11   209   -18.92   @ East Tennessee State (01/05)
343 Sacramento State                   3.0631     1-14   151   -14.07   @ Montana State (01/08)
344 New Jersey Tech                    2.7795     0-14   107   -18.64   Yale (01/07)
345 North Carolina Central             2.4937     0-16    64   -25.94   Colgate (01/06)
346 Southern                           2.2588     1-12   324   -13.69   Prairie View A&M (01/05)
347 Alcorn State                       2.1470     2-12   329   -20.14   Texas Southern (01/05)

The complete reports.

Thoughts:

The Longhorns are doing OK, but I think we're considerably overrated (ranked #7 in the AP and #8 in the coaches' poll as of today). Defense is going to keep us in a lot of games we shouldn't win, but the often abysmal offense is going to keep us from winning some games we shouldn't lose. Had DJ Augustin stayed for his junior season, this would be a legitimate national championship contender. Without him, though, I'm afraid we're a Sweet 16 team at the absolute best.
Vanderbilt isn't a great team without Shan Foster, but the SEC is so down this year that the 'Dores probably aren't any worse than fourth or fifth best in the league. Opening the league schedule this Saturday with a road trip to Kentucky will be very instructive. My best guess right now is that Vandy will finish third in the East behind Kentucky and Tennessee. The lack of a signature win out of conference (the best win came over Drake in Cancún) and some questionable losses (UIC at home, Georgia Tech on the road) may mean a spot in the NIT instead of the big show.
Georgia Tech hasn't been able to capitalize on their trip to the national championship game in 2004, going just 66-58 overall and 27-37 in the ACC since then. As rough as that conference is going to be this year with the improvement of Wake Forest and Maryland, I don't expect them to do much better than that anytime soon. They're currently sitting at 8-5 with a 12-point win over Vanderbilt as their most persuasive result.
Next week's games:
- Texas visits Arkansas on Tuesday, then hosts Iowa State on Saturday in the Big 12 opener for both teams. Arkansas has, with one notable exception, played absolutely nobody at all. That one exception, however, was a home upset over Oklahoma. Iowa State shouldn't pose much of a threat, though.
- Vanderbilt visits Kentucky in the league opener for both teams. Kentucky isn't all the way back, but they're good enough to take out Vandy in Lexington.
- Georgia Tech hosts Georgia tomorrow night before heading to College Park to take on Maryland on Saturday. The Bulldogs aren't particularly good this year (they got beat at home by Texas A&M - Corpus Christi), but neither are the Yellow Jackets. Maryland is 11-2 with blowout losses to Georgetown and Gonzaga. I'm not ready to declare the Terps "back," yet, but they should be able to beat the Jackets at home.
I'm working on my Division II rankings, as well, but it's going to be a couple of weeks before they're ready.

I have just discovered the best of all possible blogs

2009-01-05T03:39:00.002-06:00

Via Auguste of Pandagon, I present to you the blog known only as Fuck You, Penguin.

This is the awesomest thing that ever came to awesome-town. I hate the internet most of the time, but today it is my best friend.

Ding 80

2008-12-19T03:01:00.005-06:00

My full Armory sheet. Still wearing a few level 70 epic gear pieces, along with some good blue quest rewards, blue reputation pieces and the occasional green quest reward.

I hit the level cap at around 6pm Thursday, while questing in Sholazar Basin. I'm still working my way through Northrend zone by zone, instead of leaving a zone as soon as I'm high enough level to go on to the next one. I figure that since Blizzard spent so much time designing this content, it'd be rather silly of me not to stick around and see it all. I finished all the quests in Sholazar just before I logged off tonight and I'll be moving on to Storm Peaks tomorrow (and ultimately to Icecrown Glacier, the peak-level zone, which from what I've seen is stunningly beautiful), but I still haven't quite finished off Zul'Drak yet. There's a chain of six or eight quests that all require a five-man group, and I haven't been able to find one yet. That'll probably be easier over the weekend, and then I'll be able to satisfy my completionist streak (as well as get the loremaster achievement for completing 100 Zul'Drak quests).

I haven't had much trouble questing at all. Part of that is because I've been overleveled and overgeared for what I was doing, and part is because most of the quests, even some of the designed group quests, are really easy. I was even soloing level 76 and 77 three-man quests at level 79 today, and then I did one or two more by myself after hitting level 80. Instanced dungeons obviously require a full group, though I've only actually done two so far (Gundrak and the Violet Hold). So far, I've found Northrend to be very well designed in terms of sheer visual impact, and when it comes to quest flow and lore cohesion, it's considerably more polished, involved and logical than either vanilla WoW or the Burning Crusade content. And you don't have to wait until you're in endgame content to see some truly glorious lore development. Go to YouTube and search for "the wrath gate opening conflict" to see the in-game cut scene in the middle of one of the major Dragonblight quest chains (it contains major spoilers, however, if you're concerned about that). I got chills the first time I saw it. It's that epic.

On Wednesday evening, I joined a casual raiding guild called Redoubt. There appears to be a Naxxramas ten-man run scheduled for Friday evening. It remains to be seen whether or not that actually happens, considering that the guild leader (and the one who invited me) is not actually level 80 yet. We do have enough level 80 characters to start working on the ten-man raids, though. I've never been in an actual raiding guild before, my brief stint prior to the Wrath release with a frustratingly half-assed weekend Karazhan guild called Hammer of the Emperor notwithstanding. We could barely make it halfway through the instance and never did manage to kill even Shade of Aran, but I ran it in a pick-up group the week after HotE disbanded without so much as a single wipe.

I'd like to post some screenshots of my character(s), but I haven't yet figured out how to do that on my new computer without having to repair and reset the entire program. There seems to be a rather serious problem with the screenshot script, at least on my end. I'll keep fiddling, since I don't like how the Armory avatars (the little square image in the upper left of the character sheet above) don't look anything like my actual characters.

George W. Bush sums up his presidency

2008-12-15T14:11:00.006-06:00

From an interview after the shoe-tossing incident:

Bush: There have been no attacks since I have been president, since 9/11. One of the major theaters against al Qaeda turns out to have been Iraq. This is where al Qaeda said they were going to take their stand. This is where al Qaeda was hoping to take ...

Raddatz: But not until after the U.S. invaded.

Bush: Yeah, that’s right. So what? The point is that al Qaeda said they’re going to take a stand.

Let's set aside for the moment that he doesn't even understand that he's been mortally insulted. Shoes are considered incredibly unclean in Arab cultures, to the point that even accidentally showing someone the bottom of your shod foot could spark a fist-fight. Leave aside, also, that his first statement is a bald-faced lie, with which London, Madrid, Mumbai and pretty much all of our forces on the ground in Iraq would surely beg to differ. The guy may live in a silly fantasy world, but he's inadvertently gotten one thing absolutely spot on here. "Yeah, that's right. So what?" has been the underlying political philosophy of this man's entire time in office.

Mr. President, are you aware that you stole the 2000 election? "Yeah, that's right. So what?"

Didn't we know beforehand that al-Qaeda was planning on making attacks on US soil? "Yeah, that's right. So what?"

Weren't you fiddling as New Orleans drowned? "Yeah, that's right. So what?"

The Iraqi invasion has resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths and the ill-will of the entire world. "Yeah, that's right. So what?"

What about the worst economic depression since 1929? "Yeah, that's right. So what?"

Did you know that we didn't even wait for you to leave office before we decided that you're the worst President in US history? "Yeah, that's right. So what?"

20 January can't get here soon enough. Obama could be a complete disappointment and he'd still be better than the belligerent imbecility we've had to put up with in the Oval Office for the last eight years.

Panic averted

2008-12-12T12:06:00.005-06:00

After a brief, agonzing few hours between late last night and early today, the news appears to be that Will Muschamp is not considering the Auburn job. It seems that a New Orleans-area TV station reported that Auburn would announce Muschamp as head coach sometime today, but pretty much everyone involved is vehemently denying that Muschamp even interviewed for the job, much less accepted it. It smelled a bit fishy to me when I heard it on SportCenter last night, so I'm glad to hear some confirmation that it was just bullshit in the wind.

Week 15 thoughts — end of the regular season

2008-12-10T00:22:00.007-06:00

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Bowl Game
  1 Oklahoma                    7.9033    12-1      6    2.20     5 (+4)    vs. Florida (BCS Championship; Miami, FL, 01/08)
  2 Texas                       7.9002    11-1      4    2.36     2 (0)     vs. Ohio State (Fiesta Bowl; Glendale, AZ, 01/05)
  3 Florida                     7.9000    12-1     16    3.51     6 (+3)    vs. Oklahoma (BCS Championship; Miami, FL, 01/08)
  4 Utah                        7.8806    12-0     97    2.17     3 (-1)    vs. Alabama (Sugar Bowl; New Orleans, LA, 01/02)
  5 Boise State                 7.8282    12-0    107    3.22     4 (-1)    vs. Texas Christian (Poinsettia Bowl; San Diego, CA, 12/23)
  6 Texas Tech                  7.4498    11-1     49    1.70     7 (+1)    vs. Mississippi (Cotton Bowl; Dallas, TX, 01/02)
  7 Alabama                     7.3633    12-1     67    2.40     1 (-7)    vs. Texas Tech (Sugar Bowl; New Orleans, LA, 01/02)
  8 Southern California         7.3155    11-1     87    4.84     8 (0)     vs. Pennsylvania State (Rose Bowl; Pasadena, CA, 01/01)
  9 Pennsylvania State          7.3134    11-1     78    3.23    10 (+1)    vs. Southern California (Rose Bowl; Pasadena, CA, 01/01)
 10 Ohio State                  6.8907    10-2     23    2.15    11 (+1)    vs. Texas (Fiesta Bowl; Glendale, AZ, 01/05)
 11 Ball State                  6.7002    12-1    117    1.96     9 (-2)    vs. Tulsa (GMAC Bowl; Mobile, AL, 01/06)
 12 Texas Christian             6.5676    10-2     73    3.21    12 (0)     vs. Boise State (Poinsettia Bowl; San Diego, CA, 12/23)
 13 Cincinnati                  6.5635    11-2     63    1.35    13 (0)     vs. Virginia Tech (Orange Bowl; Miami, FL, 01/01)
 14 Georgia                     6.1836     9-3     11    1.25    14 (0)     vs. Michigan State (Capital One Bowl; Orlando, FL, 01/01)
 15 Pittsburgh                  6.1098     9-3     19    1.28    16 (+1)    vs. Oregon State (Sun Bowl; El Paso, TX, 12/31)
 16 Brigham Young               6.0597    10-2    110    1.67    15 (-1)    vs. Arizona (Las Vegas Bowl; Las Vegas, NV, 12/20)
 17 Georgia Tech                5.9306     9-3     38    1.39    18 (+1)    vs. Louisiana State (Chick-fil-A Bowl; Atlanta, GA, 12/31)
 18 Michigan State              5.9173     9-3     39    1.19    19 (+1)    vs. Georgia (Capital One Bowl; Orlando, FL, 01/01)
 19 Oklahoma State              5.9099     9-3     43    1.54    20 (+1)    vs. Oregon (Holiday Bowl; San Diego, CA, 12/30)
 20 Oregon                      5.5309     9-3     88    1.50    22 (+2)    vs. Oklahoma State (Holiday Bowl; San Diego, CA, 12/30)
 21 Florida State               5.4320     8-4      7    1.57    24 (+3)    vs. Wisconsin (Champs Sports Bowl; Orlando, FL, 12/27)
 22 Northwestern                5.4016     9-3    101    1.27    25 (+3)    vs. Missouri (Alamo Bowl; San Antonio, TX, 12/29)
 23 Western Michigan            5.3865     9-3    102    1.25    26 (+3)    vs. Rice (Texas Bowl; Houston, TX, 12/30)
 24 Virginia Tech               5.3666     9-4     20    1.27    28 (+4)    vs. Cincinnati (Orange Bowl; Miami, FL, 01/02)
 25 Missouri                    5.3365     9-4     26    1.57    21 (-4)    vs. Northwestern (Alamo Bowl; San Antonio, TX, 12/29)

Dropped out: #17 Boston College (to #26), #23 Tulsa (to #34)

111 San Diego State             0.2040     2-10    55    0.52   112 (+1)
112 Tulane                      0.0780     2-10    71    0.48   113 (+1)
113 Iowa State                  0.0776     2-10    74    0.71   114 (+1)
114 Idaho                       0.0257     2-10    77    0.46   115 (+1)
115 Western Kentucky            0.0077     2-10    82    0.64   111 (-4)
116 Miami (OH)                 -0.0728     2-10    89    0.56   116 (0)
117 Washington State           -0.4197     2-11    62    0.29   117 (0)
118 Southern Methodist         -0.4604     1-11    41    0.56   118 (0)
119 North Texas                -0.9012     1-11    94    0.42   120 (+1)
120 Washington                 -0.9985     0-12    13    0.34   119 (-1)

The complete reports.

Thoughts:

I can't say that I'm completely thrilled about how the rankings turned out. As you can see above, Texas, Oklahoma and Florida are separated by mere thousandths of a point. Even more so than last year, this season is a perfect case for a playoff. Of course, I think that no matter what happens during the season, playoffs are an objectively better solution than the patent silliness that is the BCS. Even the "traditional" pre-1994 system was better than what we've got now. At least back then, no one really cared if the two "best" teams played each other, and a split title was just fine.
I've heard a few people saying that if Texas blows out Ohio State and the BCS championship is a close, ugly game, that the AP poll will move Texas into the #1 spot. Frankly, those people are full of shit. Pollsters are stupid, but they're not that stupid. Texas is below both Florida and Oklahoma in the AP poll, and just like always, whoever wins that game will be the #1 team. This isn't like 2003, where LSU and USC cross-split the first and second spots in the AP and ESPN polls but didn't play each other. In that case, both teams won and both teams remained #1 in the poll they were #1 in before the bowls. This year, the #1 and #2 teams play each other, so realistically, it makes absolutely no difference whatsoever what the #3 team does. Welcome to the BCS, where the #3 and #10 teams can play a postseason game that has absolutely no relevance whatsoever to who wins the national championship.
I'm getting to the point that I just don't care about bowl games anymore. I watch them only because they're football, not because I give a crap how they turn out. There are 34 bowl games this year. Only one of them means a damn thing. The rest either continue to be played because they've always been played, or they're cynical corporate cash-grabs made at the expense of mediocre football teams.
On that note, the following bowl games should be boycotted by anyone who wants college football not to (continue to) make a mockery of itself:
- Independence Bowl, 12/28: Louisiana Tech (7-5) vs. Northern Illinois (6-6)
- Hawaii Bowl, 12/24: Hawaii (7-6) vs. Notre Dame (6-6)
- Papajohns.com Bowl, 12/29: Rutgers (7-5) vs. North Carolina State (6-6)
- New Mexico Bowl, 12/20: Colorado State (6-6) vs. Fresno State (7-5)
- Insight Bowl, 12/31: Minnesota (7-5) vs. Kansas (7-5)
- Humanitarian Bowl, 12/30: Nevada (7-5) vs. Maryland (7-5)
- St. Petersburg Bowl, 12/20: South Florida (7-5) vs. Memphis (6-6)
As for the rest of them, I just can't bring myself to give a damn anymore. Even the prospects of Texas vs. Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl or Vanderbilt reaching the postseason for the first time in 24 years don't excite me all that much.
This'll never happen, but here's what the postseason would look like if we had a 16-team playoff. The bids:
- ACC: Virginia Tech
- Big East: Cincinnati
- Big Ten: Penn State
- Big 12: Oklahoma
- CUSA: East Carolina
- MAC: Buffalo
- MWC: Utah
- Pac-10: Southern Cal
- SEC: Florida
- Sun Belt: Troy
- WAC: Boise State
- At-large bids: Texas, Alabama, Ohio State, Ball State, Texas Christian
The bracket, seeded according to my rankings:
- #1 Oklahoma hosts #16 Buffalo
- #2 Texas hosts #15 Troy
- #3 Florida hosts #14 East Carolina
- #4 Utah hosts #13 Virginia Tech
- #5 Boise State hosts #12 Cincinnati
- #6 Alabama hosts #11 Texas Christian
- #7 Southern Cal hosts #10 Ball State
- #8 Penn State hosts #9 Ohio State
Play it off for four straight weeks. I promise it wouldn't suck.

Week 14 thoughts

2008-12-01T17:00:00.004-06:00

Well, I feel like shit on toast after staying up until 4am puking up the crappy Chinese food I had at the basketball game yesterday. It wasn't a fun night, and I actually went to the ER at around 10:30 because I felt like my pancreas was about to explode. I got through triage before I visited the restroom for a purge, then went home because it was clear that it wasn't serious enough to stick around at the hospital.

Movement doesn't feel good, and I've had a splitting headache and backache all day. It took me about four hours to drag my ass out of bed, where I kept falling back asleep and having the same monotonous dream about things falling from the sky and fulfilling World of Warcraft quest requirements. Then it took me another four hours to drag my selfsame ass off the couch, where I was watching back episodes of How I Met Your Mother, The Big Bang Theory, and Bones off my DVR, and head to the computer to write this post. I'm hungry, but I can't stomach the thought of food.

Anyway, rankings:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (12/06)
  1 Alabama                     7.9658    12-0     87    2.79     2 (+1)    vs. Florida (SEC Championship; Atlanta, GA)
  2 Texas                       7.8987    11-1      4    2.36     1 (-1)
  3 Utah                        7.8839    12-0     94    2.17     3 (0)
  4 Boise State                 7.8433    12-0    103    3.22     5 (+1)
  5 Oklahoma                    7.8220    11-1     10    2.15     6 (+1)    vs. Missouri (Big 12 Championship; Kansas City, MO)
  6 Florida                     7.7316    11-1     26    3.78     4 (-2)    vs. Alabama (SEC Championship; Atlanta, GA)
  7 Texas Tech                  7.4301    11-1     49    1.70     7 (0)
  8 Southern California         7.3745    10-1     78    4.91     8 (0)     @ California - Los Angeles
  9 Ball State                  7.3690    12-0    119    2.25    10 (+1)    vs. Buffalo (12/05; MAC Championship; Detroit, MI)
 10 Pennsylvania State          7.3135    11-1     75    3.23     9 (-1)
 11 Ohio State                  6.8560    10-2     22    2.15    12 (+1)
 12 Texas Christian             6.5451    10-2     72    3.21    15 (+3)
 13 Cincinnati                  6.4627    10-2     69    1.37    13 (0)     @ Hawaii
 14 Georgia                     6.2018     9-3      8    1.25    11 (-3)
 15 Brigham Young               6.0861    10-2    110    1.67    17 (+2)
 16 Pittsburgh                  5.9566     8-3     20    1.20    21 (+5)    @ Connecticut
 17 Boston College              5.9347     9-3     40    1.52    24 (+7)    vs. Virginia Tech (ACC Championship; Tampa, FL)
 18 Georgia Tech                5.9279     9-3     38    1.39    23 (+5)
 19 Michigan State              5.9083     9-3     41    1.19    18 (-1)
 20 Oklahoma State              5.8850     9-3     46    1.54    16 (-4)
 21 Missouri                    5.8152     9-3     53    1.82    14 (-7)    vs. Oklahoma (Big 12 Championship; Kansas City, MO)
 22 Oregon                      5.5333     9-3     86    1.50    29 (+7)
 23 Tulsa                       5.5223    10-2    120    1.69    26 (+3)    vs. East Carolina (CUSA Championship; Tulsa, OK)
 24 Florida State               5.4097     8-4     11    1.57    19 (-5)
 25 Northwestern                5.3977     9-3     98    1.27    28 (+3)

Dropped out: #20 Western Michigan (to #26), #22 Oregon State (to #31), #25 Central Michigan (to #40)

111 Western Kentucky            0.6399     2-9     70    0.69   112 (+1)    @ Florida International
112 San Diego State             0.2048     2-10    52    0.52   114 (+2)
113 Tulane                      0.0963     2-10    67    0.48   111 (-2)
114 Iowa State                  0.0903     2-10    68    0.71   117 (+3)
115 Idaho                       0.0264     2-10    73    0.46   118 (+3)
116 Miami (OH)                 -0.1123     2-10    91    0.56   113 (-3)
117 Washington State           -0.3984     2-11    57    0.29   115 (-2)
118 Southern Methodist         -0.4554     1-11    39    0.56   116 (-2)
119 Washington                 -0.5460     0-11    17    0.37   120 (+1)    @ California
120 North Texas                -0.8852     1-11    88    0.42   119 (-1)

The complete reports.

Thoughts:

Apparently, of the five FBS conferences that are split into two divisions (the ACC, the Big 12, CUSA, the MAC, and the SEC), the Big 12 is the only one whose tie-breaking procedures wouldn't send Texas to the conference championship game given the same situation. I have no first-hand evidence that this is true, as I haven't personally investigated, but I heard one of the talking heads on Around the Horn say it today and I have no good reason to disbelieve it.

So if I ever hear another slackjawed jackhole claim that "the regular season is a playoff" or "the BCS makes every regular-season game matter," this is the case that I will point to. In every possible way, the excellent Texas/Oklahoma game in Dallas on 11 October, 2008, won 45-35 by Texas, was completely and utterly irrelevant to both teams. It might as well not even have been played, for all the impact it had on the big picture of either team's season.

This isn't a playoffs vs. BCS issue. The promise of a playoff wouldn't have helped this situation. This is an issue with the objectively moronic tie-breakers that the Big 12 Conference uses. I'm sure they thought that they'd never need to drill this far down into the procedures so it didn't really matter what they looked like, but the fact that it's the only conference in the country that uses this procedure should have tipped them off to the fact that it was stupid and probably wouldn't work fairly (I have a similar argument when it comes to playoffs, but that's a whole different post). Effectively, the conference changes the tie-breaking rules halfway through the procedure. Every other line-item is an effort to eliminate a team from the tie, while the "highest team in the BCS goes" does exactly the opposite: it selects a team based on criteria that clearly have virtually nothing to do with what actually happened on the field in any particular game. There's no way for that not to be completely arbitrary.

Here's another way to tell that the Big 12's tie-breaking procedures are broken: there are two more steps, after the "highest team in the BCS" step. Line #6 says that the overall record of the tied teams will be compared, and line #7 simply has the championship representative drawn out of a hat. Neither of these lines will ever be implemented, because once it's applied, it's impossible for line #5 to fail to select someone, no matter how randomly or incorrectly. At the very least, lines #5 and #6 need to be swapped. The whole thing is simply a badly designed, poorly thought-out set of rules. The worst part is that this is painfully obvious, yet no one ever thought to change it, or apparently even to revisit it at some annual conference meeting.
Georgia led 28-12 at the half, but then Georgia Tech stormed back for a great third quarter, racking up 26 points on 201 rushing yards. For the game, UGA surrendered the most rushing yardage since 1994. Tech's Roddy Jones rushed for 214 yards, and set a school record with 16.5 yards per carry. Unfortunately, UVA couldn't quite pull off the upset in Blacksburg (although they got really close), so Virginia Tech is headed to Tampa for the ACC championship.
Vanderbilt's quarterback woes continued in Winston-Salem. Adams went 3-10 for 71 yards and an interception, Nickson was 2-8 for just 17 yards and got hurt on his fourth play from scrimmage. Redshirt freshman Larry Smith came in in the third quarter and went 9-17 for 46 yards, and threw for Vandy's only touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter to cut Wake's lead to 17-10. But then after going three-and out on the next possession, Smith threw an interception from his own end-zone to give Wake the ball inside the ten yard line. I don't have the video of the game, so I have no way of knowing if the pick was a bad read or a good defensive play.

Nickson is a senior, so he's gone. I can't say that I'm going to miss him much. He has a glass jaw and can't throw worth a damn. Adams is a junior, and will almost certainly be starting next year, although he's really not much better than Nickson. Given the evidence from this game, however, it seems like Smith might not totally suck. A bit of a mixed bag, which you'd expect from someone who'd never taken a college snap before and was being expected to win a game on the road pretty much all by himself, but it looks like he was able to move the ball a bit more effectively than either Adams or Nickson has done this season.

It appears that there's one less thing I have to worry about, though: Clemson removed the "interim" tag from Dabo Swinney's job title, so Bobby Johnson is probably going to be in Nashville at least a little longer.
None of my three teams is going to their conference's championship game, so we're just waiting for next Sunday for the official bowl bids to come out. I spoke briefly to Texas AD DeLoss Dodds at the basketball game yesterday, and he said we were going to the Fiesta Bowl to play Ohio State. I haven't watched the Buckeyes much this year, but what little I've seen hasn't impressed me much. The Chick-fil-A Bowl is looking at both Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech, which if it happens, will lead to much jawing back and forth between me and my brother (not that I'd really expect Vandy to come even close to winning that matchup). The Liberty Bowl is a more likely destination for the Commodores, though, which I believe would match them up with a CUSA team, probably Rice. Georgia Tech has also received visits from the representatives of the Gator Bowl, where they would face a Big 12 or Big East team (or Notre Dame), and the Champs Sports Bowl, against a Big 10 team.

Week 13 thoughts

2008-11-24T20:53:00.003-06:00

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (11/29)
  1 Texas                       8.0194    10-1      1    2.23     1 (0)     Texas A&M (11/27)
  2 Alabama                     7.9883    11-0     89    2.53     4 (+2)    Auburn
  3 Utah                        7.8819    12-0     91    2.17     5 (+2)
  4 Florida                     7.7345    10-1     25    3.87     3 (-1)    @ Florida State
  5 Boise State                 7.6663    11-0    111    3.01     6 (+1)    Fresno State (11/28)
  6 Oklahoma                    7.6582    10-1     23    2.25     7 (+1)    @ Oklahoma State
  7 Texas Tech                  7.4448    10-1     43    1.74     2 (-5)    Baylor
  8 Southern California         7.3444     9-1     80    4.63     8 (0)     Notre Dame
  9 Pennsylvania State          7.3349    11-1     76    3.23     9 (0)
 10 Ball State                  7.1737    11-0    119    2.27    10 (0)     Western Michigan (11/25)
 11 Georgia                     6.9592     9-2      8    1.31    11 (0)     Georgia Tech
 12 Ohio State                  6.8385    10-2     27    2.15    12 (0)
 13 Cincinnati                  6.5648     9-2     44    1.30    18 (+4)    Syracuse
 14 Missouri                    6.5434     9-2     54    1.96    13 (0)     vs. Kansas (Kansas City, MO)
 15 Texas Christian             6.5378    10-2     77    3.21    19 (+4)
 16 Oklahoma State              6.4987     9-2     58    1.75    15 (-1)    Oklahoma
 17 Brigham Young               6.0865    10-2    105    1.67    14 (-3)
 18 Michigan State              5.8913     9-3     40    1.19    16 (-2)
 19 Florida State               5.8827     8-3     36    1.85    26 (+7)    Florida
 20 Western Michigan            5.8468     9-2    115    1.39    22 (+2)    @ Ball State (11/25)
 21 Pittsburgh                  5.8451     7-3     24    1.19    17 (-4)    West Virginia
 22 Oregon State                5.8034     8-3     42    1.51    25 (+3)    Oregon
 23 Georgia Tech                5.7324     8-3     46    1.46    28 (+5)    @ Georgia
 24 Boston College              5.7277     8-3     49    1.54    27 (+3)    Maryland
 25 Central Michigan            5.5597     8-3     72    0.99    21 (-4)    @ Eastern Michigan (11/28)

Dropped out: #20 North Carolina (to #30), #23 Miami (FL) (to #34), #24 Louisiana State (to #37)

111 Tulane                      0.6679     2-9     64    0.53   111 (0)     @ Memphis
112 Western Kentucky            0.5990     2-9     78    0.69   114 (+2)    IDLE (@ Florida International, 12/06)
113 Miami (OH)                  0.5079     2-10    88    0.56   110 (-8)    Ohio (11/28)
114 San Diego State             0.2131     2-10    47    0.52   120 (+7)
115 Washington State            0.1315     2-10    57    0.28   118 (+4)    @ Hawaii
116 Southern Methodist          0.1107     1-10    32    0.57   119 (+4)    Southern Mississippi
117 Iowa State                  0.1080     2-10    66    0.71   113 (-3)
118 Idaho                       0.0113     2-10    84    0.46   115 (-2)
119 North Texas                -0.4001     1-10    90    0.39   117 (-2)    Arkansas State
120 Washington                 -0.5366     0-11    12    0.37   116 (-4)    IDLE (@ California, 12/06)

Thoughts:

Oklahoma proved what I've suspected about Texas Tech all season: they're monumentally overrated, but fooled everyone (including themselves) into believing they were a national championship caliber team by feeding off of a laughably weak schedule and getting unbelievably lucky that they caught Texas on an off-night. Don't get me wrong, Tech is a very good team. This is pretty easily the best team they've ever had. Michael Crabtree is without question the most talented receiver in the country and ought to win his second Biletnikoff in a runaway. I doubt I'm the first person to declare that he's going to win another one next year, too, and a fourth one should he stay for his senior season. Graham Harrell is one of the more accurate passers I've ever seen at the college level, and as much as it pains me to admit it, Mike Leach is an offensive genius.

Unfortunately, Oklahoma is also proving something else: the pollsters are, both individually and collectively, complete and utter morons. Obviously, everyone has known this for decades (I know from personal experience that Penn State fans still love to whine about 1994, and they do have a case), but it's rare that you get such a clear-cut test case as this. The Big 12 Conference gets a pass in that they aren't allowed to use subjective considerations to resolve otherwise unresolvable three-way ties between with identical overall and conference records. But pollsters are. Logic dictates that if one and only one of the three teams got blown off the field in a game of the three-way round-robin, that team ought to be eliminated from consideration. At that point, you're left with a two-way tie, easily resolvable by considering the head-to-head matchup. And yet not a single one of the human polls has Texas ranked above Oklahoma. The coaches poll even has Oklahoma ranked two spots above Texas.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't think that the participants in the college football "national championship" (which is in itself a whole separate kettle of steaming bullshit, hence the scare-quotes) should be left up to a bunch of magpies, easily distracted by shiny objects which can't actually control the timing of their relative shininess. Being unable to remember anything that happened more than a week and a half ago should automatically disqualify you from doing anything for which being able to remember things that happened more than a week and a half ago is a necessary skill.
Georgia Tech extended their winning streak over the Hurricanes to four games with a first-half steamrolling of Miami's apparently hapless defense. Jonathan Dwyer ripped off 128 yards and two TDs without even getting on the field in the second half, and Tech ended the game with a gaudy 472 yards of rushing offense. The Yellow Jackets take over first place in the ACC Coastal for now and are done with their conference schedule, but they need UVA to beat Virginia Tech in Blacksburg — a tall order — to receive a berth in the conference championship game.
In a matchup of abysmal offense against abysmal offense, Vanderbilt gave up 20 second-quarter points to Tennessee, including a 45-yard interception return and a field goal off of another pick, and was held to a sad and pathetic 25 yards rushing on their own home field. People seem to think that Bobby Johnson has the program moving in the right direction, and I guess bowl-eligibility is a step, but I just don't know where else there is to go from here for Vanderbilt. On the one hand, I firmly believe that Johnson will be coaching at Clemson (his alma mater) next year. On the other hand, I and everyone else on the planet was expecting the 'Dores to go 2-10 this season. On the gripping hand, players like Jay Cutler, Earl Bennett and Jonathan Goff don't grow on trees in Nashville, despite the fact that the Vanderbilt campus is a national arboretum. At a program like this, those are once in a lifetime guys at their positions, but even the three of them together couldn't pull down a sixth win.

I have to put this in perspective, though. Vandy would be far from the first program to reach respectability. Kansas State had a sold run of twelve or thirteen seasons after spending most of the previous 80 years as a national laughing-stock. Northwestern is at least in bowl contention most years nowadays, with similar academic standards. And while I'm loath to make any kind of favorable comparison to the pile of suck that Notre Dame football has become in the last decade and a half, they're no stranger to winning, historically speaking. Even Stanford has the rare flash of competence, although minus anything that could be construed as consistency.

Nevertheless, this season has been an emotional roller-coaster for Vanderbilt fans, one that has left me swinging from gibbering ecstasy to misty-eyed despondency and back in the space of mere minutes (actual minutes, not game-clock minutes). It's not like rooting for Texas, where the only real question is which bowl game we're going to, and a conference or national championship is more-or-less lagniappe. Texas can afford to screw around for a quarter or have an off night or get jobbed by the officials, even if it happens more than once a season, or even more than once a game. Vanderbilt can't. A single decision from the coordinator's booth or the QB or the line judge can literally make or break an entire season. Such is the life of the perpetual underdog. It's been a bumpy ride, and honestly, I'm glad it's going to be over soon.
Speaking of which, next week's games:
- Texas hosts Texas A&M on Thursday. Texas leads the series 73-36-5 but has lost the last two matchups in excruciatingly painful ways. This series tends to be lopsided for long stretches, and I hope we're not entering another run of A&M wins. From 1984 to 1994, A&M won ten of eleven meetings, followed by Texas winning nine of the next eleven. Then there's the last two. We need to utterly destroy the Aggies to have any shot at maintaining our narrow lead over OU in the BCS, and even then OU would probably still have to look like crap and beat oSu by less than a field goal.
- Georgia Tech visits Georgia. Georgia leads the series 59-38-5 and has won the last seven straight meetings. The last time Tech beat UGA more than three times in any reasonably long stretch of time was back in the '50s. And while I don't think Georgia is as good as their 9-2 record would indicate, I don't think they're worse than Tech. Not in Athens, anyway. I wouldn't be totally surprised at an upset, though.
- Vanderbilt visits Wake Forest. Vanderbilt leads the series 7-4 and has won four of the seven meetings since 1990 (the last meeting before that was a 3-0 Vandy win in Winston-Salem five months and a day after I was born). I was expecting Vandy to win last year in Nashville, but it was a blowout the other way. I don't expect a win this year.

Week 12 thoughts

2008-11-18T13:40:00.003-06:00

First, some sad news from the world of sports. Yesterday, legendary basketball coach Pete Newell passed away at age 93. He was one of just three coaches to lead teams to the championships of the NCAA tournament (Cal, 1959), the NIT (San Francisco, 1949), and the Olympics (1960).

Anyway, rankings:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (11/22)
  1 Texas                       8.0976    10-1      3    2.23     2 (+1)    IDLE (Texas A&M, 11/27)
  2 Texas Tech                  8.0641    10-0     69    2.16     1 (-1)    @ Oklahoma
  3 Florida                     7.9576     9-1      8    3.90     6 (+3)    The Citadel
  4 Alabama                     7.9237    11-0     90    2.53     3 (-1)    IDLE (Auburn, 11/29)
  5 Utah                        7.6775    11-0    107    2.19     4 (-1)    Brigham Young
  6 Boise State                 7.6645    10-0    111    3.60     5 (-1)    @ Nevada
  7 Oklahoma                    7.3970     9-1     47    2.18     8 (+1)    Texas Tech
  8 Southern California         7.3721     9-1     68    4.63     7 (-1)    IDLE (Notre Dame, 11/29)
  9 Pennsylvania State          7.0758    10-1     94    3.31    10 (+1)    Michigan State
 10 Ball State                  7.0156    10-0    120    2.43     9 (-1)    @ Central Michigan (11/19)
 11 Georgia                     6.9941     9-2     10    1.31    11 (0)     IDLE (Georgia Tech, 11/29)
 12 Ohio State                  6.8838     9-2     20    1.97    12 (0)     Michigan
 13 Missouri                    6.5867     9-2     51    1.96    14 (+1)    IDLE (vs. Kansas, 11/29; Kansas City, MO)
 14 Brigham Young               6.5719    10-1    117    1.94    20 (+6)    @ Utah
 15 Oklahoma State              6.4930     9-2     57    1.75    15 (0)     IDLE (Oklahoma, 11/29)
 16 Michigan State              6.4635     9-2     59    1.38    17 (+1)    @ Pennsylvania State
 17 Pittsburgh                  6.4122     7-2     49    1.25    16 (-1)    @ Cincinnati
 18 Cincinnati                  6.4014     8-2     58    1.29    18 (0)     Pittsburgh
 19 Texas Christian             6.3652     9-2     85    3.11    19 (0)     Air Force
 20 North Carolina              6.0760     7-3     11    1.60    13 (-7)    North Carolina State
 21 Central Michigan            5.9628     8-2    100    1.02    24 (+3)    Ball State (11/19)
 22 Western Michigan            5.8027     9-2    114    1.39    26 (+4)    IDLE (@ Ball State, 11/25)
 23 Miami (FL)                  5.7510     7-3     40    1.35    28 (+5)    @ Georgia Tech (11/20)
 24 Louisiana State             5.6757     7-3     45    1.29    31 (+7)    Mississippi
 25 Oregon State                5.6752     7-3     46    1.55    34 (+9)    @ Arizona

Dropped out: #21 Florida State (to #26), #22 Tulsa (to #29), #23 Air Force (to #30), #25 Virginia Tech (to #37)

111 Tulane                      1.0937     2-8     79    0.60   104 (-7)    @ Tulsa
112 Louisiana - Monroe          0.8070     3-8    116    0.73   112 (0)     @ Florida International
113 Iowa State                  0.7586     2-9     53    0.70   114 (+1)    @ Kansas State
114 Western Kentucky            0.5882     2-9     71    0.69   113 (-1)    IDLE (@ Florida International, 12/06)
115 Idaho                       0.5153     2-9     80    0.47   116 (+1)    @ Hawaii (11/22)
116 Washington                  0.3089     0-10     2    0.35   115 (-1)    @ Washington State
117 North Texas                 0.1574     1-9     89    0.41   120 (+3)    @ Middle Tennessee State
118 Washington State            0.1352     1-10    31    0.26   118 (0)     Washington
119 Southern Methodist          0.1060     1-10    36    0.57   117 (-2)    IDLE (Southern Mississippi, 11/29)
120 San Diego State             0.0756     1-10    39    0.44   119 (-1)    Nevada - Las Vegas

Thoughts:

Texas posted a very workmanlike 35-7 victory over Kansas in Lawrence to stay in the hunt for an appearance in the Big 12 and BCS championship games. McCoy's completion percentage has cooled off some, but he still threw for 255 yards and two scores, while rushing for 78 more yards and another touchdown. In general, everything looked pretty smooth, which bodes well for the rest of the season.

It's going to be a tense few weeks, though. In order to make the Big 12 championship game, we need to win out and either A) Texas Tech to lose out or B) Oklahoma to win out, Texas Tech to beat Baylor, and us to remain above both Oklahoma and Tech in the BCS standings. I don't think Baylor will even come close to beating Tech in Lubbock, but I hate having to rely on fickle pollsters, whose complete inability to remember anything that happened more than seven days before the ballots are due will almost certainly screw us over. Oklahoma is already above us in the USA Today poll, and will surely separate themselves if they do beat Tech. However, as you can see in the rankings above, I think it's pretty clear who the best team in the country is.
I'm having trouble coming up with something intelligent to say about what Vanderbilt did on Saturday. It's all just a bit surreal. After going winless in the last 19 games that would result in bowl eligibility, Vandy finally managed to make it to the promised land. The only way it could have been sweeter is if it had been Tennessee instead of Kentucky.

Chris Nickson, starting again for an injured Mackenzi Adams, was a bit Jekyll-and-Hyde at times but still managed to helm the Commodore offense to 368 yards of total offense, their best output of the season. But the real story was D.J. Moore. The cornerback and kick returner intercepted two passes, including one to seal the game on Kentucky's final drive, and also hauled in two touchdowns in his first two career collegiate receptions.

Kentucky is already bowl-eligible, but Vanderbilt will almost certainly be selected ahead of them. That puts the 'Dores in the Liberty Bowl in Memphis against a CUSA opponent. If I had to guess, I'd say that they'll face Rice or Houston. I wish I could justify the expense of a trip, but I just can't.
Next week's games:
- Vanderbilt hosts Tennessee. Tennessee leads the series 69-27-5, and has lost to Vandy just once in the last 25 meetings. Tennessee is a program in disarray, however, and their offense may be even worse than Vandy's. The Vols don't really have anything to play for; they can't even be a spoiler, since the 'Dores are already bowl eligible. I'd really like to see a win in this one.
- Georgia Tech hosts Miami on Thursday. Georgia Tech leads the series 9-4, and has won the last three meetings. Tech is 3-1 against Miami since the Hurricanes joined the ACC. Miami has won their last five games, but not by much: the total score differential in those five games is just 39 points. Tech seems to have Miami's number, but we'll see how the 'Canes handle the triple option.
- Texas is idle.
Another quick look at the conference races:
- ACC: In the Atlantic, Maryland still maintains a half-game lead over the rest of the pack, but seems to be slumping and finishes out against two of the other contenders (FSU and Boston College). In the Coastal, Miami has an identical half-game lead, but appears to be on a roll and only has to play one of the contenders (Georgia Tech).
- Big East: Cincy has a half-game lead and holds the tie-breaker over WVU. Cincy hosts Pitt, the other one-loss team, this weekend.
- Big Ten: Penn State clinches Rose Bowl with a win over Michigan State. Ohio State needs to beat Michigan and hope Sparty upsets the Nittany Lions. Michigan State needs to beat Penn State and hope Ohio State loses to Michigan.
- Big 12: Missouri has already won the North. Even if KU beats them on the 29th, the Tigers still hold the tie-breaker over Nebraska. In the South, Texas Tech is still in the driver's seat. See above for the possible scenarios.
- Conference USA: East Carolina has a one-game lead in the East and holds tie-breakers over both Memphis and Marshall, but they have two games left to play. In the West, Houston, Rice and Tulsa are all knotted up at 5-1, with Houston currently in position to go to the championship game. Rice needs to win out and hope Tulsa loses once more.
- Mid-American: All hail Turner Gill! If Buffalo beats Bowling Green this Friday, the Bulls will represent the East Division in Detroit. Still-undefeated Ball State has to play both of the next-best teams in the conference over the next two weeks; they visit Central this Wednesday then host Western the following Tuesday. Any of the three teams can still win the division.
- Mountain West: In a de-facto championship game, Utah plays BYU on Saturday for all the marbles.
- Pac-10: Oregon State still controls their own destiny. Win out and they're in the Rose Bowl.
- SEC: The Alabama/Florida championship game was set last week.
- Sun Belt: Troy and Louisiana-Lafayette meet this weekend to decide the league title and only bowl bid.
- WAC: Boise State clinches their sixth WAC title in the last seven years with a win over Nevada on Saturday. It's only the Broncos' eighth season as a member of the conference.

Week 11 thoughts

2008-11-10T15:06:00.004-06:00

OMG! College basketball season starts tonight! Presbyterian visits Duke to kick off the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic (actually, Division II started playing last Friday).

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (11/15)
  1 Texas Tech                  8.0735    10-0     67    2.16     3 (+2)    IDLE (@ Oklahoma, 11/22)
  2 Texas                       8.0566     9-1      3    2.14     1 (-1)    @ Kansas
  3 Alabama                     7.9940    10-0     77    2.42     2 (-1)    Mississippi State
  4 Utah                        7.9036    10-0     83    2.00     7 (+3)    @ San Diego State
  5 Boise State                 7.8028     9-0    103    3.51     6 (+1)    @ Idaho
  6 Florida                     7.7918     8-1     15    3.60     5 (-1)    South Carolina
  7 Southern California         7.4278     8-1     63    5.65     9 (+2)    @ Stanford
  8 Oklahoma                    7.4269     9-1     46    2.18     8 (0)     IDLE (Texas Tech, 11/22)
  9 Ball State                  7.1768     9-0    119    2.48    10 (+1)    @ Miami (OH) (11/11)
 10 Pennsylvania State          7.1240     9-1     85    3.22     4 (-6)    Indiana
 11 Georgia                     6.9572     8-2      8    1.31    13 (+2)    @ Auburn
 12 Ohio State                  6.8811     8-2     16    2.05    14 (+2)    @ Illinois
 13 North Carolina              6.7012     7-2     25    1.67    17 (+4)    @ Maryland
 14 Missouri                    6.6708     8-2     35    1.91    15 (+1)    @ Iowa State
 15 Oklahoma State              6.4508     8-2     56    1.75    11 (-4)    @ Colorado
 16 Pittsburgh                  6.4368     7-2     47    1.25    20 (+4)    IDLE (@ Cincinnati, 11/22)
 17 Michigan State              6.4105     9-2     66    1.38    18 (+1)    IDLE (@ Pennsylvania State, 11/22)
 18 Cincinnati                  6.4001     7-2     51    1.28    22 (+4)    @ Louisville (11/14)
 19 Texas Christian             6.3932     9-2     78    3.11    12 (-7)    IDLE (Air Force, 11/22)
 20 Brigham Young               6.3588     9-1    117    1.99    16 (-4)    @ Air Force
 21 Florida State               6.3061     7-2     64    1.86    25 (+4)    Boston College
 22 Tulsa                       6.1193     8-1    120    1.96    24 (+2)    @ Houston
 23 Air Force                   5.9979     8-2    101    1.65    29 (+6)    Brigham Young
 24 Central Michigan            5.8337     7-2    106    1.01    30 (+6)    @ Northern Illinois (11/12)
 25 Virginia Tech               5.8243     6-3     21    1.18    35 (+10)   @ Miami (FL) (11/13)

Dropped out: #19 Minnesota (to #38), #21 California (to #29), #23 Georgia Tech (to #30)

111 Kent State                  1.3159     2-7    110    0.82   117 (+6)    Temple (11/12)
112 Louisiana - Monroe          1.2969     3-7    116    0.88   107 (-5)    @ Mississippi
113 Western Kentucky            1.2575     2-8     60    0.71   110 (-3)    Middle Tennessee State
114 Iowa State                  1.0791     2-8     79    0.75   112 (-2)    Missouri
115 Washington                  0.9090     0-9      1    0.35   111 (-4)    California - Los Angeles
116 Idaho                       0.8011     2-8    104    0.50   120 (+4)    Boise State
117 Southern Methodist          0.7237     1-9     29    0.59   115 (-2)    @ Texas - El Paso
118 Washington State            0.7048     1-9     28    0.28   116 (-2)    @ Arizona State
119 San Diego State             0.4180     1-9     57    0.48   119 (0)     Utah
120 North Texas                 0.2629     1-9     72    0.41   118 (-2)    IDLE (@ Middle Tennessee State, 11/22)

Complete reports.

Thoughts:

Mack Brown improved to 11-0 against Baylor with a more-or-less routine 45-21 defeat of the Bears. Things got a little iffy in the second quarter after Baylor scored twice to tie the game at 14, but CB Ryan Palmer returned a deflected pass for a touchdown to seize momentum and Texas ripped off 31 straight points to seize momentum.

There are still some issues. The offensive line has struggled somewhat in pass protection after being damn-near impenetrable for the first eight games of the season. Run blocking is still problematic, to the point that Greg Davis seems to be putting hardly more than a token effort into establishing a running game in the first half. Chris Ogbonnaya has pretty much been stuffed back into his role as blocking back, and Vondrell McGee doesn't seem to be able to get much going at all. Fozzy Whittaker is a bright spot with tons of potential, but the blocking really needs to improve if he's going to be consistently successful. Kick coverage continues to be inconsistent, too. We can go from totally blowing a guy up at the 16-yard line on one kickoff to a "kicker saved the touchdown" moment on the very next one.

The Longhorns moved up to #3 in the BCS after Penn State's loss, so all we have to do is win out and we're at least in the Fiesta. If Tech or Alabama loses? Miami, here we come.
Not much to say about Vandy. I expected them to get dump-trucked, and they did, losing in their fourth straight attempt to become bowl eligible after starting the season 5-0. The offense seems to stink until whoever starts is benched, then it comes to life under the backup. It happened when Chris Nickson was starting, and now it's happening when Mackenzi Adams is starting.
Georgia Tech basically didn't show up at Carolina, and the Tar Heels held them scoreless until there was just 6:14 left in the game. By that time, Tech was already trailing 21-0 and it was way too late for a comeback. Statistically, Tech outplayed Carolina, but turned the ball over three times.
Next week's games:
- Texas visits Kansas. Texas leads the series 6-2. KU's two wins came in 1901 and 1938, and all six of Texas's wins have come since the formation of the Big 12 in 1996. The only modern meeting that was close was the 27-23 victory in Lawrence in 2004. I can't say as I'm horribly worried about this game, but the guys had better show up ready to go.
- Vanderbilt visits Kentucky. Kentucky leads the series 39-37-4, and has won ten of the last 12 encounters including the last four straight. This is one of those series that, as with Georgia, Vandy can usually get pretty close but always finds some way to blow it in the end. Last year, Vandy outplayed the Cats in nearly every respect, but couldn't push in the tying touchdown and turned the ball over on downs with 11 seconds left.
- Georgia Tech is idle.

Quick preview

2008-11-06T15:55:00.007-06:00

Well, then. That was exciting.

Forget about last week, let's just let bygones be bygones. In fact, I think I'm going to be doing a lot of that in the near future.

Anyway, next week's games:

Texas hosts Baylor. Texas leads the series 71-22-4 (42-8-2 in Austin) and has won 14 of the last 15 meetings, including the last ten straight. Baylor could be dangerous if they ever manage to build a team around freshman QB Robert Griffin III, but Texas has a lot of frustrations to take out and the Bears don't have much beyond Griffin to counter them with. However, the Texas offensive line, which sucked ass for the first 40 minutes in Lubbock, just got a little thinner; OL Buck Burnette got booted from the team after posting a racist and possibly illegal remark (which was nasty enough that I won't quote it; you can find it pretty easily if you really want to know) regarding President-Elect Obama — gods, that's sweet to say! — on his Facebook.
Georgia Tech visits North Carolina. Tech leads the series 23-17-3 (but Carolina leads 10-8-2 in Chapel Hill) and has won nine of the last ten meetings, including the last three straight. Almost all of those last ten games have been tight, so despite the lopsided W/L record, it's actually been a pretty competitive series. Carolina's two losses have come by a total of six points, and the loss to UVA came in overtime in Charlottesville. This is a pretty good Tar Heels team, but Tech showed that they still had some fight by (barely) holding off Florida State last week. This is effectively an ACC Coastal elimination game; five of the six teams in the division have two losses.
Vanderbilt hosts Florida. Florida leads the series 30-9-2 (just 13-7-1 in Nashville, though) and has won the last 17 matchups, most of them by very large margins. Vanderbilt last defeated the Gators in 1988, but got utterly cheated out of a win in Gainesville by a totally bogus celebration penalty on WR Earl Bennett three years ago. Not that that matters. Arg blowout. Florida clinches the SEC East with a win.

Another quick look at the conference races:

ACC: The Atlantic is led by Maryland, of all things, which already holds the head-to-head over Wake. They play FSU, the other two-loss team in the division, in two weeks. The Coastal is a mess, with all six teams still mathematically in contention. If I've counted tie-breakers correctly, Miami and Virginia Tech are the only two teams that are in complete control of their own destinies.
Big East: WVU is hitting their stride after struggling early. The 'Eers are 3-0, with Pitt and Cincinnati a game back at 2-1. Cincy visits Morgantown this weekend, while Pitt hosts Louisville.
Big Ten: Penn State has a half-game lead over Sparty, whom the Nits will host to close the regular season. I have no doubt that PSU can win out, but if they do and are still left out of the BCS championship game, there's going to be a riot in central Pennsylvania. Penn State has six undefeated seasons in the selector era, but only two national championships to show for them.
Big 12: Mizzou and Kansas are tied for first at 3-2. The Tigers have a soft two games before the season-ending clash in Kansas City, but Kansas has to get past the visit from the Longhorns next weekend. Tech took over the South lead after upsetting Texas, but still have to play both Oklahoma and Oklahoma State. If the Raiders lose both games (or loses to one and gets beat by Baylor, which would be frickin' hilarious) and Texas wins out, Texas is back in the championship game.
Conference USA: The East will be settled this weekend; ECU and Marshall are tied for first and two games ahead of the pack, and they play Saturday in Greenville. Tulsa lost an out-of-conference game in Fayetteville last weekend to kill their bid for their first undefeated season since 1920, but still holds a half-game lead over 5-1 (and already bowl-eligible) Rice in the West Division. Tulsa would need to lose twice for Rice or Houston to have a shot at the championship game. I don't anticipate that happening. Rice definitely has the possibility of winning out, though; their remaining schedule is Army, Marshall and Houston, all at home.
MAC: Akron and Buffalo play next Thursday for command of the East Division. Ball State is cruising and crushing at 9-0, but Central Michigan shares their 5-0 conference mark in the West. The Cardinals and Chippewas play in two and a half weeks on a Wednesday night in what will effectively be the MAC West title game.
Mountain West: TCU and Utah play tonight for control. Each team still has to play one of the other one-loss teams in the league, though. TCU hosts Air Force after an idle week, while Utah hosts BYU the same evening. Also part of the fight: Air Force and BYU meet in Colorado Springs next week.
Pac-10: While USC is clearly the best team in this weak conference, the team that still holds all the cards is Oregon State.
SEC: The SEC championship game ought to be finalized this weekend. As I already mentioned, Florida clinches the East with a win over Vanderbilt in Nashville. Likewise, Alabama will lock up the West if they beat LSU in Baton Rouge. I think both will happen.
Sun Belt: UL-Lafayette is the only remaining undefeated team in the league. Troy is right behind them at 4-1, and the two teams meet in two weeks in Alabama. That'll probably be the game that decides the conference.
WAC: Boise State is back on top. The only team that's even within shouting distance of the Broncos is San José State, and they lost the head-to-head matchup two weeks ago. Boise would have to lose two of four in a schedule that still includes Utah State and Idaho for SJSU to even have a shot at it. Might as well give them the title now.

Yes we did

2008-11-05T21:29:00.006-06:00

Magnificent. The whole night was just fantastic. The Dog & Duck was packed to the rafters, and they just put in a new HD set in their beer garden. We were watching the CNN election coverage, and Ben, the local organizer of Drinking Liberally, had a big map taped to the wall and was coloring states red and blue as they were declared. When the west-coast polls closed and CNN declared all three states for Obama, then declared the election, the place just erupted. It was amazing. The level of conviviality, catharsis, relief and naked joy was uplifting and inspiring.

I was so proud of myself that I managed to hold in all the emotion...right up until CNN cut to a shot of Jesse Jackson with tears streaming down his face. Then I lost it. I still can't put my finger on what it was about that particular image that choked me up so much, though. I'm old enough to remember when Jackson ran for president in 1988; it's one of my first political memories (I'm not quite old enough to have clear memories of his 1984 campaign), along with the Ollie North Iran/Contra trial. I can't even imagine what must have been running through Jackson's mind in that moment. But everything that he'd worked for, suffered for, hoped for throughout his career was written on his face last night, and it was an incredibly moving sight.

I know that I have (much to my own surprise, even) deeply personalized this election, and it's become tied up with a lot of other things that have been going on in my life the last few years, things that I almost never talk about with anyone. I won't get into them here, either, because to be perfectly blunt, I wouldn't even know where to begin. As one of my compatriots said last night, though, elections are less about what we think and believe than they are about what we feel; it's an inherently emotional activity, rather than an exercise in ideology. I think I just really needed something good to happen, even if it wasn't really happening to me.

I'm also happy and hopeful because I met someone last night, a beautiful, smart, funny, vivacious graduate student from India. I really hope I see her again.

Week 10 thoughts

2008-11-03T21:54:00.004-06:00

I voted on Friday. I am ready for tomorrow, and I'll be out at the Dog & Duck with friends watching the election coverage until something is decided, without regard to the fact that I have to work Wednesday morning. I am ready for the politics of hate and fear to be over. I am ready to respect my country again. I am ready to stop feeling like I want to leave the nation in which I have lived my entire life. I am ready.

I just decided, as I was writing the above, that college football feels all too trivial this week. I put up this week's rankings at my other website, but I'm going to leave it at that, despite the things I'd like to say about the loss the other day. I choose hope over anger, and my national loyalty over my athletic and academic loyalty. Rankings will be back next week.

Week 9 rankings

2008-10-27T12:54:00.005-05:00

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (11/01)
  1 Texas                       8.8164     8-0      6    2.48     1 (0)     @ Texas Tech
  2 Alabama                     7.9919     8-0     71    2.32     2 (0)     Arkansas State
  3 Pennsylvania State          7.8171     9-0     88    3.76     6 (+3)    IDLE (@ Iowa, 11/08)
  4 Boise State                 7.7462     7-0     91    2.89     3 (-1)    @ New Mexico State
  5 Southern California         7.5680     6-1     34    4.67     8 (+3)    Washington
  6 Georgia                     7.5150     7-1     31    1.69     9 (+3)    vs. Florida (Jacksonville, FL)
  7 Texas Tech                  7.4901     8-0    111    2.27    11 (+4)    Texas
  8 Oklahoma                    7.4533     7-1     38    2.14     5 (-3)    Nebraska
  9 Florida                     7.4517     6-1     40    3.54    12 (+3)    vs. Georgia (Jacksonville, FL)
 10 Utah                        7.4349     8-0    112    2.09     7 (-3)    @ New Mexico
 11 Oklahoma State              7.2117     7-1     62    2.03     4 (-7)    Iowa State
 12 Ball State                  7.1317     8-0    117    2.42    14 (+2)    IDLE (Northern Illinois, 11/05)
 13 Tulsa                       6.9205     8-0    120    2.13    15 (+2)    @ Arkansas
 14 Ohio State                  6.8887     7-2     10    1.84    10 (-4)    IDLE (@ Northwestern, 11/08)
 15 Texas Christian             6.8756     8-1     94    3.43    16 (+1)    @ Nevada - Las Vegas
 16 Minnesota                   6.8656     7-1     79    1.65    17 (+1)    Northwestern
 17 Missouri                    6.7435     6-2     16    2.06    19 (+2)    @ Baylor
 18 Florida State               6.7256     6-1     86    2.19    23 (+5)    @ Georgia Tech
 19 North Carolina              6.6275     6-2     25    1.57    31 (+12)   IDLE (Georgia Tech, 11/08)
 20 Michigan State              6.4559     7-2     49    1.37    24 (+4)    Wisconsin
 21 Brigham Young               6.3655     7-1    113    2.16    27 (+6)    @ Colorado State
 22 Connecticut                 6.3015     6-2     54    1.54    40 (+18)   West Virginia
 23 California                  6.0567     5-2     66    1.74    34 (+11)   Oregon
 24 Virginia                    6.0062     5-3      3    0.80    46 (+22)   Miami (FL)
 25 Pittsburgh                  5.9911     5-2     68    1.10    13 (-12)   @ Notre Dame

Dropped out: #18 Georgia Tech (to #26), #20 Northwestern (to #33), #21 Boston College (to #31),
#22 South Florida (to #34), #25 Cincinnati (to #29)

111 Kent State                  1.9254     2-6    103    0.85   118 (+7)    @ Bowling Green
112 Miami (OH)                  1.8972     2-6    105    0.61   106 (-6)    IDLE (@ Buffalo, 11/04)
113 Utah State                  1.8807     1-7     22    0.52   110 (-3)    Hawaii
114 Washington State            1.8606     1-7     26    0.29   117 (+3)    @ Stanford
115 Eastern Michigan            1.8394     2-7     63    0.66   113 (-2)    @ Western Michigan
116 San Diego State             1.5218     1-7     60    0.53   114 (-2)    @ Wyoming
117 Louisiana - Monroe          1.4376     2-6    116    0.86   111 (-6)    Troy
118 Southern Methodist          1.4004     1-8     17    0.57   116 (-2)    IDLE (Memphis, 11/08)
119 Idaho                       1.2026     2-7    107    0.47   120 (+1)    San José State
120 North Texas                 0.7942     0-8     36    0.34   119 (-1)    @ Western Kentucky

The complete rankings. I finally remembered to post the link!

Thoughts:

Well, at least we learned that the Texas rushing defense isn't really that good. That'll be useful information in the future. I don't know. Maybe they needed a game like this, one where you don't play particularly well at times but still win. I'm not really sure what Mike Gundy was doing with his play-calling late in the game, though. We couldn't stop the run to save our lives, but on Oklahoma State's last non-desperate possession, they called three straight passing plays with all of their timeouts left and failed to convert a crucial fourth down. They'd have won if they'd just kept running the ball. As for the Longhorns, well, Greg Davis made his share of odd play-calls. That weird call at fourth-and-goal from the one yard line just made no sense at all. The fact that it was a busted play doesn't really take away from the fact that it wasn't a good play to begin with. I thought at the time that the perfect call would have been a counter back to the wide side of the field. You haven't run it all day, you're spotted all the way on the left hash-mark, and you've been doing pretty well with the straight-up zone read stuff. Line up with three receivers to the right, send all the blocking motion left, and let McGee or Ogbonnaya snap it back the other way. It would have been perfect.

Oh, well. A win is a win.
When you find yourself losing to Duke on your own home field, it's time to go ahead and just pack it in for the rest of the season. Back to my original prediction for the season, 5-7, which seemed insanely optimistic at the time. Now it just feels like failure.

Ugh. The number of games remaining on Vanderbilt's schedule that I think are winnable has officially dropped to zero. Move on, folks, there's nothing to see here.
It looks like Georgia Tech's spread option has been figured out. The numbers have been pretty steadily declining for the past several weeks, and now it's caught up with the Wreck. Tech put up 118 yards on its first two drives, but only managed 141 for the rest of the game. While this loss doesn't mathematically eliminate Tech from the ACC championship game (no one in the Coastal division has more than two league losses), it does mean that they're effectively out of it. Virginia Tech and UVA hold head-to-head tiebreakers already, and the Jackets have to visit North Carolina in two weeks.
Next week's games:
- Texas visits Texas Tech. Texas leads the series 43-14, and has won eight of the last nine meetings, losing in the 2002 visit to Lubbock. Tech always looks terrifying on paper, but has never quite been able to translate that onto the field against the Longhorns. The Raiders look impressive on offense, but have given up a lot of points to some pretty suspect defenses. I'm thinking that it may be a good thing for Texas that the Oklahoma State game went the way it did.
- Georgia Tech hosts Florida State. Florida State leads the series 12-9-1, and has not lost to the Yellow Jackets since FSU joined the ACC in 1992. That accounds for all 12 of FSU's wins in the series, and most of them weren't close. Prior to that, Tech was 9-0-1 against the 'Noles, but they hadn't met since 1975, well before Bobby Bowden turned FSU into a powerhouse program. FSU is playing well right now, and Tech isn't. I doubt the series trend will break.
- Vanderbilt is idle. I expect a loss.

Week 8 rankings

2008-10-19T18:16:00.004-05:00

Pow! Right in the kisser!

Anyway, rankings:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (10/25)
  1 Texas                       8.5894     7-0     18    2.74     1 (0)     Oklahoma State
  2 Alabama                     8.0935     7-0     63    2.24     2 (0)     @ Tennessee
  3 Boise State                 7.6420     6-0     99    3.10     3 (0)     @ San José State (10/24)
  4 Oklahoma State              7.6290     7-0     96    2.26     5 (+1)    @ Texas
  5 Oklahoma                    7.5430     6-1     21    2.26     9 (+4)    @ Kansas State
  6 Pennsylvania State          7.4822     8-0    109    3.86     6 (0)     @ Ohio State
  7 Utah                        7.4562     8-0    106    2.09     7 (0)     IDLE (@ New Mexico, 11/01)
  8 Southern California         7.4473     5-1     43    5.30     4 (-4)    @ Arizona
  9 Georgia                     7.4231     6-1     29    1.79    14 (+5)    @ Louisiana State
 10 Ohio State                  7.3738     7-1     44    2.01    15 (+5)    Pennsylvania State
 11 Texas Tech                  7.2859     7-0    113    2.17    10 (-1)    @ Kansas
 12 Florida                     7.2158     5-1     47    2.96    13 (+1)    Kentucky
 13 Pittsburgh                  7.0969     5-1     51    1.29    21 (+8)    Rutgers
 14 Ball State                  7.0619     7-0    118    2.43    11 (-3)    Eastern Michigan
 15 Tulsa                       6.9487     7-0    120    2.08    27 (+12)   Central Florida (10/26)
 16 Texas Christian             6.9149     7-1     82    3.08    30 (+14)   Wyoming
 17 Minnesota                   6.8460     6-1     74    1.60    25 (+8)    @ Purdue
 18 Georgia Tech                6.6964     6-1     87    2.14    26 (+8)    Virginia
 19 Missouri                    6.6937     5-2      6    1.74    16 (-3)    Colorado
 20 Northwestern                6.6209     6-1     92    1.54    29 (+9)    @ Indiana
 21 Boston College              6.5968     5-1     88    2.24    39 (+18)   @ North Carolina
 22 South Florida               6.5832     6-1     98    2.02    23 (+1)    @ Louisville
 23 Florida State               6.4868     5-1    104    2.33    31 (+8)    Virginia Tech
 24 Michigan State              6.4857     6-2     34    1.33    12 (-12)   @ Michigan
 25 Cincinnati                  6.4469     5-1    102    1.53    33 (+8)    @ Connecticut

Dropped out: #8 Wake Forest (to #29), #17 North Carolina (to #31), #18 Virginia Tech (to #28),
#19 Brigham Young (to #27), #20 California (to #34), #22 Vanderbilt (to #30), #24 Connecticut (to #40)

Bottom 10:

111 Louisiana - Monroe          2.1928     2-5    114    0.84   116 (+5)    Florida Atlantic
112 Alabama - Birmingham        2.1388     2-6     75    0.72   119 (+7)    IDLE (@ Southern Mississippi, 11/01)
113 Eastern Michigan            2.0546     2-6     86    0.70   110 (-3)    @ Ball State
114 San Diego State             2.0172     1-6     62    0.48   112 (-2)    Colorado State
115 Army                        1.9856     2-5    117    0.77   111 (-4)    Louisiana Tech
116 Southern Methodist          1.8786     1-7     22    0.61   114 (-2)    @ Navy
117 Washington State            1.8764     1-7     20    0.29   115 (-2)    IDLE (@ Stanford, 11/01)
118 Kent State                  1.8459     1-6     72    0.68   118 (0)     @ Miami (OH)
119 North Texas                 1.3061     0-7     33    0.33   117 (-2)    Troy
120 Idaho                       0.9954     1-7     91    0.44   119 (0)     New Mexico State

Thoughts:

Um, wow. That was not the game I was expecting.

Whatever questions anyone had about how Texas would handle being the #1 team for the first time during the regular season in 25 years were answered about as well as they could have been yesterday. The Longhorns played a near-flawless game for three quarters before putting in the subs and cruising to a 56-31 victory over the smouldering remains of the Missouri Tigers. Colt McCoy completed 90.6% of his passes (29-of-32) for 337 yards and two touchdowns, and added two more scores on the ground. I called his performance in Dallas "masterful," so I'm not left with much in the way of vocabulary to describe the game he had yesterday. Superlative? Transcendent? Magisterial? I can't yet find a video of the play late in the second quarter, where Colt fumbled the ball after getting some pressure, then calmly picked it up and flicked it downfield to Quan Cosby for a 23-yard gain, but...Jeebus...there are no words in the English language for that kind of performance. None.

Well, one, maybe: Heisman.

But as ridiculous as Colt's performance was, the defense held up their end of the bargain by keeping Mizzou's offense out of the game from the very beginning. Missouri had had only had three three-and-outs the entire season up to this point, but yesterday failed to make a first down on three of their first four drives, and on their fifth drive, couldn't convert a fourth down inside the Texas 10 yard line.

It looks like the poll voters all watched the game (and why wouldn't they?). Texas took all 65 first-place votes in the AP poll, and all but three of them in the USA Today ranking (Alabama took one, Penn State had two). In the Harris Poll, Texas has 104 of the 115 possible first-place votes, Bama has six, Penn State has three, and some random idiot put Utah, of all things, at the top (the Utes are #12 in the poll).
Vandy played Georgia tight again, but couldn't pull off the same upset they did two years ago in Athens. Trailing 21-14 late in the game, Vandy was driving for the tying score when Bulldogs corner Asher Allen tackled receiver Jamie Graham half a yard short of the sticks on fourth down to seal the game. Georgia then put it away with a field goal. Mackenzie Adams, given his first start over increasingly mediocre former starter Chris Nickson, did about as well as can be expected, completing 50% of his passes for 131 yards, two scores, and two interceptions. Nickson got in for one snap, and he managed to fumble it on third-and-one early in the third. It wasn't a blowout, though, which is good. I can't be too broken up about this since it was completely expected, and wasn't one of the games I was counting as winnable at any point in the season.
Georgia Tech struggled a bit, but still pulled out the victory against a reeling Clemson team. The Tigers turned it over six times, and their first-half drive log isn't pretty: punt, punt, fumble, interception, interception, punt, punt, fumble, field goal, interception. Clemson came to life in the third quarter and managed to take a 17-14 lead, but it didn't last. Josh Nesbitt put the go-ahead touchdown into Demaryius Thomas's hands with a little more than five minutes to go, then forced James Davis to cough it up on a hook-and-ladder attempt in the ensuing drive. Clemson's last-second hail-mary was intercepted well short of the goal line to end the game.
I don't talk about the NFL much, but this season is starting to look like fun for Titans fans. They went to 6-0 today and remain the last undefeated team in the league after demolishing Kansas City. They lead the AFC South by 2½ games, and the division isn't anywhere near as strong as it's been in recent years. Now have to run the gauntlet of Indianapolis, Green Bay, at Chicago and at Jacksonville.
A quick look at the conference races:
- ACC: Four teams are tied for the Atlantic Division lead at 2-1, although Wake Forest is on a serious backslide right now and will almost certainly not be able to keep pace. Maryland is schizoid and could do anything at all, so it's probably going to come down to the BC/FSU game in Tallahassee on 11/15. In the Coastal, Georgia Tech currently leads by half a game over UVA and Virginia Tech, but if it comes down to it, the Hokies hold the head-to-head tiebreaker.
- Big East: It's still too early to mean much, but Pitt and WVU are tied at 2-0, with Cincinnati right behind at 1-0. Still a wide open league.
- Big Ten: We'll find out soon. Penn State and Ohio State both demolished their run-up opponents this week, are both 4-0, and play in the Horseshoe next week. Sparty is still Sparty (lost 45-7 at home to tOSU after opening the season 6-1). Northwestern and Minnesota are quietly waiting in the wings at 2-1, although neither plays Penn State this season.
- Big 12: The South is where it's at, as usual. Three undefeated teams, all of which will play each other within the next three weeks. If Texas keeps playing the way they have been, there isn't anyone in the country that can beat them. In the North, Kansas holds a one-game lead over the rest of the field. It's well within the realm of possibility that the North champion will have four league losses.
- CUSA: The East Division isn't particularly good. It's ECU and Marshall currently on top at 2-1. The Tulsa/Houston game in Houston on 11/15 will decide the West Division.
- MAC: Again, the East Division is weak, and may send a four-loss team to Detroit. The West comes down to the CMU/Ball State game in Mount Pleasant on 11/19.
- MWC: It's still kinda wide open, but it'll probably come down to TCU and Utah in Salt Lake City on 11/06. TCU may have an emotional leg up on everyone after exposing BYU last Thursday evening.
- Pac-10: Oregon State currently holds the tie-breakers, but this conference is so mediocre from top to bottom that pretty much anyone except the Washington schools could still win it. USC is probably the best team, if by nothing else than default.
- SEC: The East comes down to Georgia/Florida once again, although Vandy is (surprise!) still in it. Vandy would have to win out and hope Georgia loses twice. The West is pretty much a two-team race, and the only game that really matters is Bama's trip to Baton Rouge on 11/08.
- Sun Belt: Troy and ULL are both 3-0 and play late, but this conference is pointless to predict, since none of these teams are any good.
- WAC: Boise State seems set to reclaim its league dominance, and appears to be by far the best team in the conference. The Broncos visit 3-0 SJSU next Friday. Whoever wins that game will have the inside track on the title.
Next week's games:
- Texas hosts Oklahoma State. Texas leads the series 20-2 and has won ten in a row. It's been pretty nutty lately. OSU has led at the half in five of the last six games, only to see Texas come back to win. The Cowboys have a high-flying offense, but are more run-oriented than Mizzou or Oklahoma. That plays well into Texas's defensive strengths. It also doesn't hurt that Texas is playing like a national champion right now.
- Georgia Tech hosts Virginia. Virginia leads the series 15-14-1 and has won five of the last 16 meetings, including four of the last five. Tech blew out UVA in Atlanta two years ago. The Wreck seems to be rambling, but the Scissorheads are in the midst of another run to save Al Groh's job. For whatever that's worth.
- Vanderbilt hosts Duke. Vandy leads the series 7-3, and has won the last six meetings. The last Duke win against the 'Dores came in 1991, and had 45 points hung on them in Durham two years ago. Vandy is playing at home for bowl eligibility, something that hasn't happened within the lifetime of any current Vanderbilt undergraduate student. That stadium is going to be rocking out.

Week 7 rankings

2008-10-13T13:16:00.010-05:00

That's right, it's the first week of rankings!

But first, we must placate the creepy clown! We beseech you, oh, creepy clown, please do not come to life and kill us in our sleep. Accept this offering of delicious Fletcher's corny dog and be still your hidden rage! We know that you cannot help your extreme creepiness, and beg you not to take it out on us, innocent fair-goers that we are. Please do not follow us, because that would be far too creepy, and we would probably go quite mad at the sight of your shambling, rustling form.

Anyway, rankings:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)   Next Game (10/18)
  1 Texas                       8.2948     6-0     40    3.05     - (0)     Missouri 
  2 Alabama                     8.1893     6-0     50    2.49     - (0)     Mississippi
  3 Boise State                 7.6786     5-0     93    3.00     - (0)     Hawaii (10/17)
  4 Southern California         7.5842     4-1     12    3.83     - (0)     @ Washington State
  5 Oklahoma State              7.5484     6-0    100    2.11     - (0)     Baylor
  6 Pennsylvania State          7.5130     7-0    105    4.12     - (0)     Michigan
  7 Utah                        7.3792     7-0    106    1.98     - (0)     Colorado State
  8 Wake Forest                 7.3311     4-1     17    1.49     - (0)     @ Maryland
  9 Oklahoma                    7.3131     5-1     29    2.48     - (0)     Kansas
 10 Texas Tech                  7.2838     6-0    109    2.26     - (0)     @ Texas A&M
 11 Ball State                  7.1692     7-0    113    2.43     - (0)     IDLE (Eastern Michigan, 10/25)
 12 Michigan State              7.1618     6-1     47    1.78     - (0)     Ohio State
 13 Florida                     7.1617     5-1     46    2.96     - (0)     IDLE (Kentucky, 10/25)
 14 Georgia                     7.0518     5-1     51    1.80     - (0)     Vanderbilt
 15 Ohio State                  7.0417     6-1     62    1.70     - (0)     @ Michigan State
 16 Missouri                    7.0345     5-1     58    2.27     - (0)     @ Texas
 17 North Carolina              7.0295     5-1     53    1.61     - (0)     @ Virginia
 18 Virginia Tech               7.0133     5-1     52    1.33     - (0)     @ Boston College
 19 Brigham Young               6.9219     6-0    119    3.72     - (0)     @ Texas Christian (10/16)
 20 California                  6.8832     4-1     60    2.19     - (0)     @ Arizona
 21 Pittsburgh                  6.8606     4-1     57    1.16     - (0)     @ Navy
 22 Vanderbilt                  6.8077     5-1     73    1.50     - (0)     @ Georgia
 23 South Florida               6.7584     5-1     76    1.85     - (0)     Syracuse
 24 Connecticut                 6.7568     5-1     74    1.48     - (0)     @ Rutgers
 25 Minnesota                   6.7273     6-1     86    1.60     - (0)     IDLE (@ Purdue, 10/25)

The eyes of Texas are, indeed, upon you.

Thoughts:

My poor throat. I hollered myself raw.

That was a great football game. Colt McCoy's performance was masterful, and the offense was clicking on all cylinders for nearly the whole game. Jordan Shipley and Quan Cosby both racked up triple-digit receiving yards (112 and 122 yards, respectively), the first time any receiver tandem had done that in the entire history of the Texas/Oklahoma rivalry. Shipley had an absolutely electrifying kickoff return early in the second half. Chris Ogbonnaya blew up the Sooner rushing defense for 127 yards, including the back-breaking 62-yard run midway through the fourth quarter. The two teams combined for the most points (80) ever scored in the series. Cody Johnson scored three touchdowns on three rushes. Greg Davis had a very nice game-plan going in, and even broke out some formations we hadn't used in almost a decade. We spent much of the third quarter setting up in a "10" formation (one tailback, no tight ends) with Shipley in the slot, and OU defensive coordinator Brent Venables simply didn't have an answer to it.

The Texas defense was pretty solid, completely shutting down the OU rushing attack and stopping the Sooners when it mattered. There were some bad breakdowns early (oh, how I hate thee, inside screen to Manny Johnson!), but DC Will Muschamp shored up the backfield at halftime and really tightened the screws on Oklahoma in the second half. I was actually surprised at how well we managed to hang with the OU receivers in man coverage. If the secondary keeps improving the way they have, this defense will be spitting fire by the end of the year.

All of a sudden, this season looks quite a bit different than what I predicted. The toughest game on the schedule turned out to be a coming-out party of sorts. There's no doubt that Oklahoma has more individual talent than Texas does, but this Longhorns team seems to be working like a well-oiled machine in ways that some of the more talented teams just don't. The other two games I thought we'd lose for sure — Missouri and Texas Tech — look a whole lot less challenging in light of the events of this weekend. On the other hand, I'm now very glad that we get Oklahoma State at home. Mike Gundy has put together a nasty offense up in Stillwater. But while I don't want to get ahead of myself, I think that if the team keeps playing this way, there isn't anyone in the country that can beat them.
Vandy got caught in a classic trap game and put together zero offense in a 17-14 loss at Mississippi State. The Commodores have been winning with smoke and mirrors the whole season, but to only be able to muster 107 total yards (45 rushing and 62 passing) while throwing two interceptions and only converting one of ten third-down opportunities is distinctly unsatisfying. Even the crappy Woody Widenhofer teams of my years in school there could usually do better than that. The defense was so-so, but there wasn't much they could have done to bail out such dismal offense. So all that optimism of last week has gone right out the window. On the plus side, we only need to win one of the next six games to reach bowl eligibility, and at least three of those games are still winnable. If I were to force myself to be totally objective, I would predict a 7-5 season. But I've been conditioned by failure, so I'm half expecting Vandy to go winless from here on out.
Georgia Tech had to block a last-second tying field-goal attempt just to squeak past FCS Gardner-Webb, 10-7. The Jackets' rushing game completely disappeared; they were able to put together only 79 yards on the ground, well below their season average, and fumbled twice in the ground game. Tech was forced to start third-string quarterback Calvin Booker, who stands 6'4", weighs 234 lbs, and is not at all suited to manage a triple-option offense. Booker rushed 19 times for 35 yards, and completed just three of 11 passes for 120 yards, one score, and one pick. Starter Josh Nesbitt is still suffering from a strained hamstring, and second-stringer Jaybo Shaw sat out with a concussion he suffered against Duke last week. Paul Johnson had better hope that either Nesbitt or Shaw are healthy next week.
If you ever get the opportunity to eat chicken-fried bacon, don't. Just trust me on that one. On the other hand, fried beefy queso bites are made of total win and awesomeness.
Next week's games:
- Texas hosts Missouri. Texas leads the series 15-8-1, and has won 13 of the last 14 meetings. Prior to winning in Columbia in 1997, Missouri hadn't defeated Texas since 1916. The Tigers haven't won in Austin since 1896. Oklahoma State made Chase Daniel and his offense look decidedly pedestrian this week, so we'll see if Muschamp can find the key to that on that game tape.
- Vanderbilt visits Georgia. Georgia leads the series 48-18-2, and hasn't lost more than once in a row to Vanderbilt since losing three consecutively in the late 1950s. However, the last two Vanderbilt wins in the series both came in Athens (in 1994 and 2006). Arg blowout. No point in analyzing it beyond that.
- Georgia Tech visits Clemson. Georgia Tech leads the series 46-24-2, and has won three of the last four meetings. Clemson is a program in disarray after Tommy Bowden was fired this morning. Total toss-up.

Week 6 thoughts

2008-10-05T15:52:00.009-05:00

First game played as a ranked team since 1984. First win as a ranked team since 1956. First 5-0 start since 1943. Only the third 3-0 start in SEC play, and the first time since 1950. First three-game SEC winning streak since 1982. First win over Auburn since the 1955 Gator Bowl.

Vanderbilt University Commodores 14, Auburn University Tigers 13. I will never, as long as I live, get tired of seeing that score.

Unless you've actually experienced the football culture at Vanderbilt first-hand, it's almost impossible for you to understand how Commodores fans are feeling right now. The lack of success is all the more painful because we've been right on the verge of breaking through so many times. Even in 2005, the last time Vandy was 4-0, it always felt like catastrophic failure was right around the corner. And, as we expected, it was. This, however, feels different. It finally feels like the team itself no longer expects to fail, so they don't let the adversity they face feed on itself. Proof? Vanderbilt's opponent has scored first in all five games this season. In each contest, the 'Dores have gone on a scoring run of at least 14 points without answer. This is not a team that collapses at the first sign of difficulty. Part of it, surely, is the schedule. Vandy doesn't play Alabama or LSU this year. Tennessee stinks. The Auburn game was at home, and so is Georgia later in the season. But you still have to actually win the games, and the Commodores have done that.

This team is, more than anything else, mentally tough. Starting QB re-aggravates a shoulder injury? Send in the backup and watch him kick ass. A good team drops 13 points on you in the first quarter? Suck it up and keep working. Offense has trouble moving the ball? Tighten up on defense and special teams.

I was in agony that whole second half, but I was so proud of these kids' resilience and effort. And what's more, Vanderbilt is currently all alone in first place in the SEC East. Everyone else in the division already has at least one league loss. Too much to hope for, probably.
No trap game for Texas. Chris Ogbonnaya racked up 186 yards rushing and receiving and two touchdowns as the Longhorns knocked out Colorado early. It's good to see some life out of the rushing game, since we're really going to need that next week. Colt McCoy kept up his outlandishly good performance by going 23-30 for 262 yards and two scores (the two interceptions will ding his efficiency numbers a bit, but one of them wasn't his fault). The Buffs' kicker tied a school record by missing three field goals, and Cody Hawkins was harried and hurried all day, and went only 13-33 for 118 yards before being replaced in the fourth quarter. We finally saw some life out of the secondary, too.

And here's wishing a speedy recovery to Sally Brown, Mack Brown's wife. She fell and broke her arm while hiking outside of Boulder on Saturday morning.
I only caught the last ten minutes or so of the Georgia Tech-Duke game, so I can't say much about what actually happened. Tech led just 3-0 at the half, but cranked up the offense and ran off 24 more points after the break. True freshman Jaybo Shaw made his first start, and did a pretty good job: 9-14 passing for 230 yards and a touchdown. Demaryius Thomas caught all nine passes, good for second on the school's all-time single-game receiving list. Jonathan Dwyer ran for a career best 159 yards, making up most of the Jackets' 224 yards on the ground.
Most of the rest of the country did what they were supposed to; there were no really shocking upsets like last week. The Kansas-ISU game was pretty wild, as was the FSU-Miami contest. Navy beat Air Force for the sixth straight time, setting up a sixth straight Commander in Chief's Trophy (Army should pose no problem at all for the Middies). Wisconsin lost again, effectively knocking them out of the Big 10 race. Pitt beat South Florida on Thursday, demonstrating what I've thought for a while, namely that Jim Leavitt is a mediocre coach who got lucky with his scheduling last year. Missouri beat Nebraska in Lincoln for the first time since 1978.
Next week's games:
- Texas vs. Oklahoma in Dallas, the Red River Rivalry (né Shootout). Texas leads the series 57-40-5, but has only won two of the last eight meetings. Pass defense is going to be a serious problem for the Longhorns, as we'll probably not be able to get much push up front against OU's beastly offensive line. At least I'll get to eat some corny dogs, and I hope they've brought back the fried guacamole bites. Yum.
- Vanderbilt visits Mississippi State. State leads the series 10-7-2, and has won ten of the last 13 meetings. As with Auburn, the two teams have met only infrequently despite being in the same conference. They've played only six times in the last 20 years, including a nine-year gap between the 1989 and 1998 contests. Last year's game was a blowout in Vandy's favor, though, and MSU may actually be worse this year. It won't surprise anyone if Vanderbilt sees its first 6-0 record since 1921.
- Georgia Tech hosts FCS Gardner-Webb. The two schools have never met before. Gardner-Webb is 2-3 against a bad schedule, with their victories coming over winless Austin Peay and D2 Tusculum, who is 4-2. The word "blowout" comes immediately to mind.

Week 5 thoughts

2008-09-28T14:22:00.006-05:00

Chaos! USC = fail. Georgia = fail. Florida = fail.

I was pretty sure that Georgia was going to lose this weekend, but I didn't think USC sucked that bad. Seriously. Their offensive line looked like the banking industry, and Joe McKnight looked like a complete bust. This is now the second year in a row that I've predicted that no one would get within two touchdowns of the Trojans, only to watch them get beat by crappy teams that play in a crappy conference. I'm sure there are going to be people who claim that Oregon State's win means that the Pac-10 is underrated, but it's really quite the opposite. The Pac-10 is an objectively shitty conference, so Thursday's game says more about USC than it does about their league.

Florida losing at home to Ole Miss was a complete shock. I've been saying all season (even before the Vanderbilt loss, for the record) that Mississippi is a bit of a sleeper team this year, but I really didn't expect them to go to the Swamp and make Tebow look moderately silly. Nothing like losing a home game to Vandy to piss off a team.

Wisconsin forgot that they had to play the second half, too, and gave Michigan their biggest comeback win in school history. Navy surprised everyone by knocking off Wake Forest in Winston-Salem, while Maryland didn't surprise anyone by exposing Clemson as the same old horribly coached team they've always been. Nobody can get less out of more like Tommy Bowden.

Parity can be a wonderful thing, and it's a spiral situation. The better that the mid-majors and the non-traditional programs do, the more likely they are to recruit more talented players, and the more likely they are to be able to compete with the national powerhouses.
Texas blew out Arkansas, no thanks to John Chiles. To be perfectly blunt, Arkansas sucked ass. We've played Florida Atlantic, UTEP and Rice, and Arkansas was by far the worst of the bunch. The only time the 'Hogs looked like they had any business on the field was when Mack Brown decided to send Chiles out onto the field.

Let me preface this by saying that I have no personal animosity towards him. But, my god, does he suck at football. He came here being touted as the next Vince Young, but what he is, I think, is the next Marcus Vick. He has occasional good plays, but mostly what he does is to ensure a three-and-out. And twice now this season, he's done something unbelievably stupid that resulted in a turnover. Like, basic stuff: when you're running a lead option, don't pitch the ball when you're being tackled by two guys and your pitch man has stopped paying attention to you. Just go down to the damn ground. A loss of one yard on second down when you're in your own red-zone is better than a fumble return for a touchdown, which you caused because you're trying to score a highlight-reel touchdown on every single fucking snap you take. You're not in high school anymore; you can't just out-talent everyone on the field.

It's just sad the way that the coaching staff is trying to use him, though, because A) the play-calling when he's taking snaps is mind-numbingly predictable, and B) despite his hype as a "dual-threat" (read: running) QB, he's a much better passer than a runner, at least at this point in his development.
The Longhorns moved up to #5 in both polls, and actually picked up a first-place vote from one of the coaches. Vanderbilt jumped to #19 after the idle week and the losses in front of them. USC, ever the pollsters' darling regardless of contradictory evidence, only fell to #9.
Next week's games:
- Texas visits Colorado. Texas leads the series 9-7, and has won five of the last six meetings. The Buffs' one win was a doozie, though, coming in the 2001 Big 12 championship game and knocking Texas out of the BCS title game (where we would have gotten slaughtered by Miami, so I guess it's better that way). Not sure how to pick this game. Folsom Field is a notoriously difficult place to play, but Colorado looked pretty ordinary against Florida State yesterday. This will be the first real test for the Texas defense.
- Vanderbilt hosts Auburn. Auburn leads the series, but surprisingly, the record is only 20-19-1. Auburn has, however, won 13 in a row, with the last Vanderbilt win in the series coming in the 1955 Gator Bowl. Although these two teams have been in the same conference since 1895, they have met only sporadically over that timespan. For most of its history, the SEC played a semi-divisional six game schedule, meaning that the teams now split between the East and West divisions played each other pretty infrequently. This could very well be an upset Vanderbilt win, since Auburn has no offense whatsoever. Of course, neither does Vanderbilt, and Auburn's defense is among the best in the country. The 'Dores defense has been getting clutch turnovers at crucial moments all season, though. If Vandy manages to pull this one off, we're looking at a 7-5 season at the worst.
- Georgia Tech hosts Duke. Georgia Tech leads the series 44-30-1, and has won 16 of the last 18 meetings, most of which haven't been close. Duke beat up on a shockingly terrible UVA squad yesterday, but won't have an answer for Tech's ridiculous rushing attack.

Week 4 thoughts

2008-09-22T11:09:00.011-05:00

Rice still can't even get close. Chase Clement threw 25 of 37 for 254 yards and Dillard caught nine balls for 158 yards, but Texas still won 52-10. There were a couple of things in this game I've never seen before. Jordan Shipley was as wide open as I've ever seen anyone get on a trick play when he scored on a flea-flicker midway through the second quarter. Also in the second quarter, Rice took eleven snaps (including one false start and two seriously bogus pass interference calls) inside the Texas six yard line and didn't score. Really, though, there's not much we can take from this game, considering the competition. The offense still looks basically impossible to stop, and the defense still looks like they're basically incapable of stopping anyone. We'll learn a little more next week against Arkansas, but the trip to Colorado will be very instructive. The Buffaloes are finally starting to show some noticeable improvement, and Folsom Field is never an easy place to play.
Vanderbilt is going to a bowl game this year.

Let me say that again. VANDERBILT is going to a BOWL GAME this year.

Vandy went down to Oxford, forced six turnovers, and held on for a 23-17 win over the Rebs. The 'Dores picked off four of Jevan Snead's passes, stopped Ole Miss on 4th-and-goal at the one yard line on their first series of the second half, forced Dexter McCluster to fumble into the endzone inside the three-minute mark, and got just enough offense (Vandy finished the game with only 202 total yards) to make it to 4-0 for the second time in four years. Bryant Hahnfeldt hit a 40-yard field goal with 31 seconds left to force Ole Miss to go for the hail mary, which came down in the hands of Ryan Hamilton, Vandy's man of the match. Hamilton tied a school record for interceptions in a game with three, one of which he returned 79 yards for a touchdown, and made the score-saving tackle on the 4th-and-goal stop.

And get this! Vanderbilt is ranked! That hasn't happened since 1984. That year, Vandy also started 4-0 before collapsing and finishing the season 5-6. The 'Dores are currently #21 in the AP poll and #25 in the coaches poll.

The magic number is down to two. I have us down beating Mississippi State and Duke, but the way Tennessee is playing (i.e., bad), I think we've got three shots at it. What I'd love to see is this: Vandy wins all three games to get to 7-5, guaranteeing a winning season (and a bowl game) for the first time since 1982, and Phil Fulmer gets fired for sucking for the last five years. Anyway, if this really does happen, I'm going to do everything in my power to make it to that bowl game, up to and including taking off work in the middle of the week.
Georgia Tech had a boring romp over Mississippi State. Jonathan Dwyer scored on a school-record 88-yard rush and the Jackets rolled up 438 yards rushing, the most since 1978, in downing the Bulldogs 38-7. Tech threw a grand total of nine passes the whole game. State turned it over four times and didn't even get on the scoreboard until there were eight minutes left in the game.
I'd have loved to have been at the last game in Yankee Stadium. I'm not much of a professional baseball fan, but I still would have enjoyed that. Glad the Yankees got a win last night, too.
Am I seriously going to talk about golf? Yes, I am. Fun tournament. I'm going to have to start watching the Ryder Cup from now on, even though I still don't understand how match play works. I love that this group of Cup rookies, Kentucky hometown boys, and kooky characters went into Valhalla and upset a European team featuring some of the best all-around golfers in the game, all without Tiger Woods. Paul Azinger really had these guys playing well.
I'm in the process of writing basketball schedules into my spreadsheet. The season begins in just about a month and a half. Everything I've seen has Texas ranked in the top 10 preseason, with UNC at the top of the list. Athlon's prediction for the Big 12 has Texas winning the regular season crown, followed by Oklahoma and — get this — Baylor in third place. Scott Drew has done a remarkable job in Waco, at a school that really deserved something positive after the tragedy and bizarreness of five years ago. Overall, the Big 12 is a bit down this year, but it ought to be a really entertaining race.

This is also the last year that lower-division teams will be able to get into Division I under the moratorium on division-switching. New to DI this year:
- Bryant Bulldogs (Smithfield, RI) of the Northeast-10 in DII.
- California State - Bakersfield Roadrunners (Bakersfield, CA), moving up from the California Collegiate Athletic Association of DII.
- Houston Baptist Huskies (Houston, TX) of the NAIA Red River Athletic Conference. HBU was DI until 1989, when it left the TAAC (now the Atlantic Sun) and dropped down to NAIA.
- North Dakota Fighting Sioux (Grand Forks, ND) of the DII North Coast Conference.
- Seattle Redhawks (Seattle, WA) of the Great Northwest Athletic Conference in DII.
- Southern Illinois - Edwardsville Cougars (Edwardsville, IL) from DII, in the Great Lakes Valley Conference.
- South Dakota Coyotes (Vermillion, SD), also from the North Coast Conference at the DII level.
Bryant will join the Northeast Conference in 2012. The NEC will finally have twelve members, so maybe they'll finally dump that unwieldy 20-game conference schedule they've had for so long. CSU-Bakersfield is a shoo-in for admission to the Big West, although I don't know if they've been invited yet. Houston Baptist has accepted an invitation to the Great West Conference, which has voted to expand to an all-sports conference from a football-only catch-all league at the FCS level. Charter members will be North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah Valley, Houston Baptist, Texas Pan-American and New Jersey Tech. Seattle and Chicago State are being considered as future members, as well. I'm not sure where SIUE will wind up, but they're a geographic and competitive fit for both the Horizon League and the Summit League, as well as the Great West.
Anyway, next week's game:
- Texas hosts Arkansas. Texas leads the series 55-21, but has only won one of the last four meetings. Arkansas has played more games against Texas than against any other school. The 'Hogs aren't particularly good this year, but they really, really hate us, so I don't think this game will be quite as lopsided as Saturday's scores might suggest.
- Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech are both idle.

Well, don't I feel like a moron

2008-09-18T17:27:00.003-05:00

I freely admit that I've done a lot of stupid shit in my life, but I think this one just took the cake.

OK, so I was on the phone with my credit card company because there was a charge I was trying to dispute (that's being resolved, no big deal). But while I was looking at my online statements so I could give the customer service rep the right information about that, I noticed another couple of charges that really confused me. In the last seven months, I found five separate charges from Cingular Wireless, which I dumped for crappy service around four or five years ago. Naturally, I freaked out, because I'd actually had some problems with Cingular when I tried to cancel my original service, to the point that I actually went into a Cingular store and yelled at the guy working there for 20 minutes because they were still charging me money for months after I'd cancelled.

Anyway, I'd spent nearly 45 minutes talking to various people at my credit card company trying to figure out what I was going to do about this, when something the last woman I spoke to said made me realize that AT&T, my current phone company, now owns Cingular Wireless. In fact, they began the process of re-branding Cingular in January of 2007. Why they were billing me as Cingular instead of AT&T (my August charge is under the AT&T name), I have no idea, but the point is that Cingular wasn't still charging me for service I cancelled years ago. They were charging me for the service I have now.

Damn, I feel dumb.

Week 3 thoughts

2008-09-14T01:05:00.004-05:00

The fact that we got precisely zero rain in Austin makes the postponement of the Arkansas game something of an annoyance, but better safe than sorry, I suppose. It's entirely possible that it'll backfire, though, since the game will now be played on the day of the Austin City Limits festival. I'm actually thinking that the hotel/transportation situation may be even worse on the 27th than it was today.
Vanderbilt is 3-0 after defeating Rice 38-21 this afternoon. The teams traded touchdowns in the first half, going into the break tied at 21. Rice then failed to score for the rest of the game. Chris Nickson didn't have much of a game, statistically speaking, completing just seven of his 16 passes for 71 yards and no touchdowns, but he did rush for 85 yards and two scores (take away the one sack, and it was 95 positive yards on 12 rushes). Chase Clement was, as usual, impressive through the air, going 25-36 for 299 yards and a score (with one pick). Jarett Dillard, suprisingly, was not the Owls' leading receiver (that was James Casey), but he did break triple digits. He now has a relatively silly 3088 career receiving yards. He'll need at least another thousand yards to crack the top ten career list, though. I kinda hope he makes it. Too bad he won't get within sniffing distance of the all-time Division IA record: Nevada's Trevor Insley racked up 5005 receiving yards from 1996-1999.
Georgia Tech was held to under 300 yards rushing and lost by a field goal at Virginia Tech. I'm actually kinda surprised how close this game was (I watched the first half). Blacksburg is not an easy place to play, and the Jackets are still working out the kinks in the triple option attack. Once they do, though, this may very well be a dangerous team out of the ACC. They ought to sweep all their home games, and Clemson is as schizoid as always, so that road game could go either way. The trip to UNC on 8 November isn't particularly easy, and then, of course, there's the visit to Athens for the season finale. A 9-3 season wouldn't surprise me, and 8-4 seems like a really good bet.
I watched the USC-tOSU game tonight. Um, wow? Granted, Ohio State is way overrated (and will remain that way for the rest of the season), but they're still a halfway decent team. But Southern Cal went out there and made the Buckeyes look very, very silly.

Unfortunately for the Trojans, though, the rest of the Pac-10 doesn't seem particularly interested in being any good at all. Cal got thumped at Maryland. Washington State got blown out by Baylor (Baylor!) last night. Stanford laid down for TCU in Fort Worth. UCLA ate their worst loss in almost 80 years, a vicious 59-0 beat-down in Provo in which BYU tied a school record for TD passes in a game. Oregon needed double OT to beat a decidedly mediocre Purdue team on the road. Oklahoma went to Seattle and deftly avoided the possibility of yet another Pac-10 reffing crew fucking them out of a win (and in the process, probably put the last nail in the coffin of Ty Willingham's coaching career) by dropping half a hundred on the Huskies. Arizona lost to friggin' New Mexico. Arizona State lost at home (at home!) in OT to a terrible UNLV team. The one and only bright spot in the bunch was Oregon State taking out Hawaii, 45-7, which really only shows you how far (and how fast!) the Warriors have fallen completely off the map.
A prediction: If the BCS championship game contains anyone other than USC and whoever wins the Big 12 title game, I'll eat my hat.

What about the other contenders, you ask? Florida and Georgia both have serious problems on the offensive line, Ohio State is, as previously mentioned, monumentally overrated, and I'm still waiting for LSU to play a meaningful game. Auburn beat Mississippi State, one of the worst teams in the SEC, 3-2 in Starkville today. That's even worse than the 6-4 laugher that Penn State and Iowa played a few years ago. Wisconsin should have blown out Fresno State but didn't, because their QB kinda sucks. No one else is really a contender.
Next week's games:
- Texas hosts Rice. Texas leads the series 68-21-1 and have won 36 of the last 37 contests. Clement and Dillard will get theirs, but this'll still basically be a walkover.
- Vanderbilt travels to Ole Miss. Mississippi leads the series 46-34-2 and hasn't lost to Vandy in Oxford since 1999, but Vanderbilt has won the last two meetings in Nashville. Winning this game isn't absolutely crucial if the Commodores hope to make a bowl game, but it'd really help. Texas transfer QB Jevan Snead has been leading the Rebels offense with respectable success.
- Georgia Tech hosts Mississippi State. Georgia Tech leads the series 2-0, but the two schools haven't played since 1929. I don't expect MSU to put up much resistance to the Tech rushing attack.

Week 2 thoughts

2008-09-07T21:24:00.003-05:00

Well, let's see:

Texas looks pretty good. We're lucky that the offense seems to be clicking on all cylinders, though, because the pass defense is going to be just as much of an "adventure" as it was last season. The defensive line is playing really well so far, and the linebackers have improved with the departure of Killebrew and Derry (and the promotion of Norton and Kindle to the starting lineup), but the backfield...hoo, boy. It ain't pretty. Covering receivers in space appears to be optional at best, and solid tackling out of the DBs is going to be rare. Even the experienced (a relative designation only) guys struggle in coverage. If they don't improve rapidly, the OU and Mizzou games (in consecutive weeks, natch) are going to get seriously ugly.

It's been fascinating to watch the defensive changes under Will Muschamp, though. Clearly, the front seven is far more aggressive than they were last year. And scheme-wise, we're starting to see some non-standard stuff filtering in. I almost fell out of my chair at the FAU game when I realized that we were in a 3-3-5 weak-side rolldown set with Kindle acting as a nominal rush end. We did it a few times in the UTEP game, too, one of which was a 10-yard sack.
Yay, Vandy! Frankly, I thought the 'Dores would be lucky to get to 3-9 this season. Looking at that schedule, you can write three games off immediately: Georgia, Florida and Tennessee aren't going to lose to friggin' Vanderbilt. But the rest of it isn't any less grim: Miami of Ohio was pretty universally selected to win the MAC East; South Carolina, Ole Miss and MSU were all supposed to be improved; the Kentucky game is on the road; Auburn is Auburn; and Wake Forest wouldn't have surprised many people if they won the ACC Atlantic. That leaves Duke and Rice as non-conference patsies in what I'd pretty much assumed was going to be a 2-10, 0-8 season.

But now we can pretty safely look at a 4-win season. Vandy has always skirted with major upsets (and even scored some in recent years), of course, but they've done the same with inexplicable losses (god, I hate MTSU). Like every season for the last four or five years, I'm just not sure where we're going to get two more wins to reach bowl eligibility. Tennessee? Maybe. They have no offense to speak of, but their defense is pretty stout. But if we're 5-5 going into that game, Vanderbilt Stadium will be rocking like never before. Hell, I'm getting all verklempt just thinking about the possibility! Kentucky? They lost most of their offensive firepower from last year, but their defense is OK and the game is in Lexington. Beating Mississippi State seems somewhat likely, given their lackluster performance so far this season.

Maybe. Just maybe. It's going to take some lucky breaks, but the odds are a lot better now than they were before the season started.
So far, Paul Johnson's triple-option experiment at Georgia Tech seems to be working out. We'll know more after next week's trip to Blacksburg. But given the general shittiness of the ACC, it's entirely possible it'll be Wake Forest and Georgia Tech in the championship game again (Wake beat Tech in an ugly 9-6 game in the 2006 title match).
From what I've seen, USC has the inside track to the BCS championship game. They're going to slaughter tOSU next week, and there's a big dropoff between the Trojans and the Sun Devils, the next best team in the Pac-10. And once you get past Oregon, Cal and UCLA, that conference is just plain bad. I'll be surprised if USC doesn't go undefeated into the bowl season, but then again, I sang that same song last year.
Sarah Palin? Seriously? That's the best the Republican Party could do?

I'm getting to the point that I think we're all screwed no matter what we do. If McCain wins, we'll get four more years of the last eight years and the dismantling of the republic will continue unabated. If Obama wins, things will improve dramatically, then in 2012 the Republicans will run on a platform that consists solely of screeching about how Obama wasn't able to singlehandedly undo all of the damage the GOP has done over the last 30 years in a single four-year term, and will win in a horrible, horrible landslide with a ticket even more unabashedly fascist than McCain/Palin. I take some consolation in the fact that in the long run, on historical scales, progressive ideas always win out, but that'll probably be cold comfort when they start rounding up intellectuals and artists. If you want to see what the Republican future really looks like, take a gander at the (largely unreported) police action around the RNC in St. Paul last week.

Jesus, Red! Quit cowering!

2008-09-04T23:47:00.002-05:00

Two years in a row, baby!

The 'Dores are still a 5-7 team at the absolute best, though. We'll beat Rice and Duke out of conference, and then maybe get another conference win.

Jesse wins the internet forever

2008-08-21T18:08:00.008-05:00

In a post about the arcane, convoluted, Rube-Goldbergesque nature of the right-wing noise-machine's latest conspiracy theory about Obama, his identity, and his political career:

This goes along with Barack Obama’s mysterious three-country birth certificate, his ever-changing name and religion, his wholesale manipulation of the entire Democratic primary process, his wife’s hidden radical thesis manifesto, the rather large body of George Soros pet projects he’s the point man for, his ability to singlehandedly preserve infanticide in Illinois, his manipulation of global politics and that whole Crisis on Infinite Kenyas thing. One time, I asked Barack Obama to go pick up a Coke for me at the store. He came back three months later with five preserved and framed shares from the original Coca Cola Company and a Brazillian flag. I didn’t ask, but they all make very nice wall decorations.

The lesson the Right needs to learn from this election cycle is that if you have to make shit up to get your point across, you don't have a point.

My confidence that they will actually learn this lesson is not high.

Is this a dagger I see before me?

2008-07-19T21:54:00.004-05:00

My laptop finally kicked the bucket. I was beginning to expect it, since it's been having problems lately, and there's not much point in taking it back to the Apple store, since it's well out of warranty and would probably cost me as much as a new computer to get it fixed again. Besides, it's more than three years old.

So I am once again sans laptop. But the funny thing is — and I never thought I'd say this in a million years — I'm thinking pretty seriously about replacing it with a PC instead of with another Mac. In just a quick preliminary price-check, I learned that I can get a tricked-out 17-inch Dell for only a little bit more than the bottom-of-the-line 15-inch hardly-worth-the-effort plastic MacBook. Or even a little bit less, if I were to buy it at WalMart. Even if I bothered to get my current laptop fixed, it's still too slow and underpowered to run World of Warcraft, and since that's pretty much the only thing I use it for these days, it seems like a halfway decent reason to upgrade. I've often said that the only reason I'd buy a PC is for gaming.

And speaking of gaming, the Wrath of the Lich King beta-test patch notes are out! Lots of good stuff to look forward to. New areas, new dungeons, new factions, the Death Knight hero class, the Inscription profession, customizable hairstyles, and all the new lore that goes along with it.

Car shopping

2008-06-27T17:57:00.006-05:00

On the way home from work today (well, not literally on the way home, but you know what I mean), I swung by the Honda dealership to take a look at the Civic hybrid. Now, up until the other day, I didn't even know there was such a thing, but I pulled up right behind one at a stoplight on Tuesday evening and it immediatly caught my attention. I'd been looking mostly at the Toyota Prius, since I see them around so often. I went to the Toyota dealership a week or two ago, only to find that not only can they not keep the Prius on lot (not a surprise), but that they also can't even keep the Prius brochures in stock.

Honda also doesn't have any Civics in stock (it's not a bad wait, though: about a five weeks between down payment and delivery), but they at least had the literature handy. They did, however, have one hybrid in the dock waiting for its buyer to come and take it home. The salesman let me take a look at it, and I was quite impressed with the interior. This particular car was the model without the nav system, which would give it a slightly different look, but still, it had a very nice modern feel to it, and didn't look cheap like the Toyota Camry does. Just based on sitting in the driver's seat for a few minutes, I really like this car. It's also about $3-4k less than the Prius.

I'm thinking, though, that since it's already so close to the model year turnover (which will probably happen in October), I'll probably wait until the 2009 models start to come out before I get really serious about buying. But after today, the Civic has jumped the Prius on my want-to-buy list.

Ten years and counting

2008-05-30T15:50:00.004-05:00

On my way to work this morning, my car turned over to 80,000 miles. Not that far for a ten-year-old car, I grant you, but still. A milestone is a milestone.

Been slowly looking at new cars. I'm looking mostly at hybrids, in light of my hunch that gas prices aren't anywhere near close to reaching a price plateau, but there are a couple of high-mileage non-hybrids that I'm starting to consider, as well. Saturn does a pretty good job with it, but I haven't really delved into their literature, yet.

If I had my druthers and money were no object, though, I'd buy an Aston Martin DB9 or V8 Vantage in quite a jiffy. Pretty, pretty cars. And of course, there's always the Bugatti Veyron, with its 1000-horsepower W16 engine and top speed of 253mph. Yowza.

Arg bored

2008-05-29T19:27:00.004-05:00

Blogging from work because I have nothing better to do.

I spent three days beating my head against Love in the Time of Cholera, then gave up. Managed to make it about ten pages in before the words on the page started looking like they were written in Devanagari, so I picked up Skin: A Natural History, by Nina Jablonski, instead. It's about exactly what it sounds like it's about: the largest organ in the human body. It's not particularly well written and it feels pretty rushed and superficial, but I suppose it might hold my attention for a little while in the absence of anything better to read.

On the upside, So You Think You Can Dance is back on the air. Yay for vicariously enjoying physical activities in which I'll never be able to participate!

What is this "blog" you speak of?

2008-05-22T23:27:00.005-05:00

Yeah, I know, it's been a while. Like I said a few posts ago, I just don't have that much to talk about during the offseason. Not enough to fill frequent, multiple posts, anyway.

First of all, yay for California! In a 5-4 decision, the California Supreme Court ruled that banning same-sex couples from getting married is a violation of the state constitution. It brought the wolverines of bigotry out in full-force, of course, but they can go fuck themselves. The "states' rights" conservatives came out of the woodwork, too, but I don't think I'm the only one who's noticed that they don't really care about "states' rights" when a state decides to expand freedoms to more people. Then they're all about using the federal government to uphold the structures of the oppression and white-Christian-male-landowner dominionism they love so very, very much.

So that's awesome.

Hm, let's see...what else...

I've been reading a lot lately. I read another Haruki Murakami novel, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. Strange, like all of his books, but utterly beautiful and haunting in a way that reminded me very much of Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go. Not that the plots or the social commentary are in any way similar, but both books have a gauzy, dreamlike feel to them, as if I were seeing all the action through a fine, bright haze.

After that, I took on another Margaret Atwood: Alias Grace. It's based on the true story of a young housemaid near Toronto who is alleged to have killed her employer and his mistress in 1893. Then, for a complete change of pace, I took on Donald R. Prothero's Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters. Prothero is a mammalian paleontologist by trade, so the focus of this book (as the title says) is on the fossil record more so than the cladistic or molecular evidence for evolution. It's an excellent book aimed at lay readers, with plenty of illustrations (crucial when discussing any kind of physical evidence) and extensive listings of resources for further reading at the end of each chapter.

I keep trying to read Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being, but I haven't been able to make it much more than 30 pages in after two or three attempts. I'm currently reading one of Murakami's shortstory collections, The Elephant Vanishes. It's a bit uneven, as the stories were written over a span of around seven years, but there are some real gems. "The Kangaroo Communique," "Sleep," and "The Dancing Dwarf" were all very entertaining and thought-provoking. I think next, I'll tackle either Mrs Dalloway or Love in the Time of Cholera.

Last but not least, I've been requested to post Armory links to all my Warcraft characters.

Almuqit — lvl 70 Night Elf hunter (male). Skinner/leatherworker. My main character, and still the one I enjoy playing the most. He has over 10k health, which is quite a lot for a hunter. I need to start running some PvP battlegrounds to get some better gear. His name is one of the 99 names of Allah in Arabic: al-Muqit, the Nourisher.
Alqahhar — lvl 41 Dranei mage (male). Enchanter/tailor. He's the only character on my second account at the moment, although I'll probably shift my Horde enchanter over as well, if I ever get around to leveling her. I spent last week and weekend busting him up from level 26 or so to where he is now, by boosting him through appropriately-leveled dungeons with Almuqit. His name is also one of the 99 names of Allah: al-Qahhar, the All-Compelling Subduer.
Gehyrdon — lvl 25 Human paladin (male). Miner/engineer. This is my latest character, and actually my second attempt at a paladin. I originally created a Dwarf paladin (named during my names of Allah kick: al-Musawwir, the Fashioner of Forms), but hated playing him so much that I deleted him. The trick I learned with paladins, though, is that trying to level without a strategy is damn near impossible. Until he hits level 30 or so, I've been dumping all my talent points into the Retribution tree, and I've been twinking the shit out of him. Instead of upgrading my equipment as it comes to me, I've been going to the Auction House every time I ding a new level and buying new equipment. Plus, I've logged Alqahhar to enchant all of his equipment. So much more fun than just going at it willy-nilly. I named Gehyrdon by opening my Seamus Heaney Beowulf translation and picking a random Old English word I thought sounded like a paladin's name.
Muhayminah — lvl 25 Dranei shaman (female). Miner/jewelcrafter. From here down are characters that I don't play all that much, at least not in long spurts. I use them either as banks or as a change of pace when I get bored or frustrated with the three toons I concentrate on. I actually like playing the shaman a lot, but she's currently working in a zone I went through with Almuqit, so doing the same quests all over again is a little tedious. She's the third and last of my characters named after one of Allah's aspects: al-Muhaymin, the Guardian, the Preserver, the Overseeing Protector (with a grammatically feminine ending, of course).
Mondochiwa — lvl 17 Night Elf warrior (female). Miner/blacksmith. Fun to play, but very difficult and nerve-wracking. I'll bet it'd be more fun if I had a priest to partner with. Named after the big, armored protector aliens in The Fifth Element.
Valkrem — lvl 12 Human rogue (female). Miner/engineer. Not really my favorite character to play. I'll bet she'll be more fun at higher levels, though. Named from a friend's email address (with permission, of course), which I thought had a cool, traditional-fantasy feel to it. I even made the character look like her as best I could.
Ætheling — lvl 11 Night Elf druid (male). Miner/skinner. He doesn't seem to have an entry in Armory, despite the fact that he's above level 10 (the terminus ante quem non of the Armory database). I have no explanation for this, unless I've misremembered how I spelled it. Or maybe he's still level 10, in which case he wouldn't be included yet. Didn't have an Armory entry because I hadn't played him in such a long time, apparently. I generally pick each character's professions so that they'll be beneficial to that character, but in this case, since I already have a leatherworker, I didn't see the point in doing it again. If I want to make some new druid gear, I'll just have Almuqit make it and drop it in the mail. Plus, it's easier to keep Ætheling twinked that way, since I already know all the recipes. His name is the Old English word for a king or feudal lord.
Iblîs — lvl 21 Undead warlock (male). Herbalist/alchemist. My first Horde toon. The warlock is pretty fun to play, too, but I don't think I've quite gotten the hang of it. I also talent-specced him before I really started looking into consistent talent builds, so his first 12 talent points were allocated all over the place. The name is an Arabic word for the Devil.
Ansavayah — lvl 11 Blood Elf priest (female). Enchanter/tailor. The priest is probably the most difficult-to-play of all my characters. She does crap for damage and can only wear cloth armor, so her survivability is pretty low even if I'm only fighting one monster at a time. If I pull more than that, she's toast. Plus, I don't really like the Blood Elf starting zone. Her name is totally made up, and doesn't mean a damn thing.

So that's fun. And according to Armory, Ætheling and Iblîs are the only two of my characters that do not have unique names, and those are shared by just one other player-character each in the whole game. It makes me feel very clever and creative that out of ten million WoW characters, none of them have duplicated the names of seven of my nine toons.

Rankings, season final

2008-04-21T14:31:00.004-05:00

I've been too lazy to post these. Plus, I was feeling a bit depressed about our performance (or lack thereof) in the regional final game against Memphis. Well, that, and I've spent my every spare moment playing World of Warcraft. My main character reached level 70 about a week and a half ago, so I've been trying to earn money and improve my gear so I can start doing the really high-level content.

Yesterday, I played about 20 hours of WoW, total. I couldn't sleep, so I logged on at 4am Sunday, then played until almost 5pm. Then I took a little nap, watched some TV (John Oliver's stand-up special was screamingly hilarious), then logged back on at about 10pm and played until 4am this morning. It was a great day. I ran four dungeons: the Mechanar up to the first boss (I three-manned most of the trash with a mage "tanking" after the tank and healer DCed for no apparent reason), then Mana-Tombs, then I ran Sethekk Halls on non-heroic in the early afternoon and again on heroic late last night. The fun never stops!

Anyway, rankings:

Top 25:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                           9.9299    38-2      7    17.98     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.6870    36-3      5    16.05     2 (0)
  3 Kansas                            9.6649    37-3     26    19.03     3 (0)
  4 California - Los Angeles          9.2492    35-4     24    14.54     5 (+1)
  5 Tennessee                         9.1400    31-5      1    11.86     4 (-1)
  6 Duke                              8.8105    28-6     15    13.79     6 (0)
  7 Texas                             8.7129    31-7      2    10.55     8 (+1)
  8 Wisconsin                         8.7048    31-5     66    12.86     7 (-1)
  9 Georgetown                        8.5859    28-6     40    11.50     9 (0)
 10 Xavier                            8.4951    30-7     27    11.70    10 (0)
 11 Butler                            8.4721    30-4    122    10.41    11 (0)
 12 Drake                             8.3625    28-5    119    12.03    12 (0)
 13 Louisville                        8.2620    27-9      4    11.00    13 (0)
 14 Davidson                          8.2494    29-7     98    14.69    14 (0)
 15 Stanford                          8.0423    28-8     53     9.39    15 (0)
 16 Washington State                  7.9675    26-9     30    10.00    19 (+3)
 17 Michigan State                    7.9603    27-9     20     8.64    22 (+5)
 18 Indiana                           7.9026    25-8     63     9.70    16 (-2)
 19 Gonzaga                           7.8883    25-8     96    12.67    17 (-2)
 20 Western Kentucky                  7.8868    29-7    125    10.61    25 (+5)
 21 Notre Dame                        7.8068    25-8     78     9.42    23 (+2)
 22 Nevada - Las Vegas                7.7988    27-8     68     7.40    28 (+6)
 23 Vanderbilt                        7.7846    26-8     54     5.41    18 (-5)
 24 Marquette                         7.7711    25-10    43    11.11    27 (+3)
 25 Connecticut                       7.7622    24-9     48     8.79    20 (-5)

Dropped out: #21 St. Mary's (to #27), #24 Brigham Young (to #26)

Bottom 10:

332 Rice                              2.5457     3-27    65   -13.07   333 (+1)
333 Texas Southern                    2.5036     7-25   238   -11.88   332 (-1)
334 Alcorn State                      2.3533     7-23   330   -11.03   334 (0)
335 Sacramento State                  2.3251     4-24   229   -12.54   335 (0)
336 Loyola Marymount                  2.2772     5-26   146   -16.68   336 (0)
337 Howard                            2.1660     6-26   242   -14.09   337 (0)
338 North Carolina Central            1.9165     4-26   145   -21.97   338 (0)
339 North Florida                     1.8797     3-26   252   -13.34   339 (0)
340 Maryland - Eastern Shore          1.5803     4-28   261   -16.13   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   0.7869     0-29   265   -21.07   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

The national championship game was one of the best basketball games I've ever seen. Wire-to-wire action, clutch plays, heartbreak, poetic irony; it had everything you could ask for and more. Between the two teams, there were at least seven first-round NBA draft picks, and they all played at the top of their game. An instant classic if there ever was one.

In fact, the flow of the game reminded me a lot of the 2005-06 BCS championship between Texas and USC.
About that regional final: We had absolutely no business whatsoever even being on the same court with Memphis. They just manhandled us in every aspect of the game. Games like that are why I don't think we'll be winning a national championship (or a Big 12 tournament championship, for that matter) any time soon. Look at any of the legitimate contenders, and you'll see that they're competitive even in their losses. Even UNC managed to get back to within four points of Kansas late in the game after trailing by 28 midway through the first half. UCLA stayed within spitting distance of Memphis most of the way through the other national semifinal. Texas, on the other hand, gets blown out of the gym after playing maybe five possessions worth of good basketball the whole game. And you never see real contenders losing to teams like Missouri and Texas Tech, or shooting 50% from the free-throw line and missing the front ends of five one-and-ones that could seal a win at home (although I still think Tom O'Neill did his part to steal the Wisconsin game from us with his blatantly and unapologetically wrong charge call on DJ Augustin at a crucial late-game moment).

But I digress. My point is that, at least as long as I've been watching closely, Texas has had at least five or six games a season where the team simply doesn't bother to show up, and distressingly often it happens against obviously inferior competition. Now, I don't have instant recall of the complete schedules for all the recent national champions, but I'm pretty sure none of them had more than one or two of those "play like shit and lose" games in their championship seasons, if that. Kansas certainly didn't have any this season; their worst loss was by nine points at Kansas State.

Rankings, Week 19

2008-03-17T20:38:00.001-05:00

Top 25 teams, 03/17/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                           9.8731    33-1     43    19.06     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.7167    32-2      7    15.97     2 (0)
  3 Kansas                            9.3485    31-3     74    19.88     4 (+1)
  4 Tennessee                         9.2424    29-4      2    12.91     3 (-1)
  5 California - Los Angeles          9.2100    31-3     50    15.00     5 (0)
  6 Duke                              8.9654    27-5     18    14.81     6 (0)
  7 Wisconsin                         8.7690    29-4     85    13.58     8 (+1)
  8 Texas                             8.6883    28-6      6    11.06     7 (-1)
  9 Georgetown                        8.6546    27-5     44    11.75    10 (+1)
 10 Xavier                            8.5800    27-6     34    13.00     9 (-1)
 11 Butler                            8.4999    29-3    151    10.59    12 (+1)
 12 Drake                             8.4956    28-4    121    12.47    11 (-1)
 13 Louisville                        8.1698    24-8     11    10.59    13 (0)
 14 Davidson                          8.0912    26-6    162    15.75    21 (+7)
 15 Stanford                          8.0601    26-7     64    10.09    20 (+5)
 16 Indiana                           8.0559    25-7     63    10.44    14 (-2)
 17 Gonzaga                           8.0186    25-7    100    13.25    15 (-2)
 18 Vanderbilt                        7.9654    26-7     47     6.21    16 (-2)
 19 Washington State                  7.9579    24-8     41    10.00    18 (-1)
 20 Connecticut                       7.9304    24-8     37     9.09    17 (-3)
 21 St. Mary's                        7.9267    25-6    159    12.77    26 (+5)
 22 Michigan State                    7.9204    25-8     45     9.30    23 (+1)
 23 Notre Dame                        7.9116    24-7     91    10.10    19 (-4)
 24 Brigham Young                     7.9101    27-7    108    10.94    22 (-2)
 25 Western Kentucky                  7.8743    27-6    172    11.55    28 (+3)

Dropped out: #24 South Alabama (to #29), #25 Marquette (to #27)

332 Texas Southern                    2.5039     7-25   232   -11.88   331 (-1)
333 Rice                              2.4996     3-27    62   -13.07   329 (-4)
334 Alcorn State                      2.3562     7-23   329   -11.03   334 (0)
335 Sacramento State                  2.3215     4-24   227   -12.54   335 (0)
336 Loyola Marymount                  2.3057     5-26   129   -16.68   336 (0)
337 Howard                            2.1835     6-26   233   -14.09   337 (0)
338 North Carolina Central            1.8946     4-26   140   -21.97   339 (+1)
339 North Florida                     1.8475     3-26   257   -13.34   338 (-1)
340 Maryland - Eastern Shore          1.5708     4-28   264   -16.13   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   0.7977     0-29   259   -21.07   341 (0)

Rankings, Week 18

2008-03-10T17:41:00.002-05:00

Hoo-wee. It's getting that time of year. Championship week! And I'm on spring break, to boot. I'm gonna be watching a lot of basketball and playing a lot of World of Warcraft (I should hit level 60 on my main character by the weekend, if I don't spend too much time playing my alts). I finished the Isaacson biography of Albert Einstein the other night — a great book about an amazing person — and now I'm reading Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's The Mote in God's Eye for the first time since high school. I always loved that book.

Anyway, rankings:

Top 25 teams, 03/10/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                           9.8955    30-1     28    18.94     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.7312    29-2      7    16.90     2 (0)
  3 Tennessee                         9.4882    28-3      2    13.71     3 (0)
  4 Kansas                            9.2666    28-3     92    20.97     5 (+1)
  5 California - Los Angeles          9.1507    28-3     58    15.55     6 (+1)
  6 Duke                              9.1400    26-4     24    15.53     4 (-2)
  7 Texas                             8.7840    26-5     13    11.32     8 (+1)
  8 Wisconsin                         8.7576    26-4     75    13.87     9 (+1)
  9 Xavier                            8.7569    26-5     35    13.81     7 (-2)
 10 Georgetown                        8.7469    25-4     55    12.03    10 (0)
 11 Drake                             8.5023    28-4    120    12.47    15 (+4)
 12 Butler                            8.4617    28-3    145    10.45    14 (+2)
 13 Louisville                        8.3468    24-7     14    11.16    11 (-2)
 14 Indiana                           8.2507    25-6     65    10.81    13 (-1)
 15 Gonzaga                           8.1840    25-6    108    13.90    20 (+5)
 16 Vanderbilt                        8.1573    25-6     39     6.45    16 (0)
 17 Connecticut                       8.1259    24-7     31     9.58    17 (0)
 18 Washington State                  8.0982    23-7     45    10.73    23 (+5)
 19 Notre Dame                        8.0976    24-6     90    10.77    22 (+3)
 20 Stanford                          8.0876    24-6     91    10.60    12 (-8)
 21 Davidson                          8.0636    25-6    157    15.74    28 (+7)
 22 Brigham Young                     8.0564    25-6    107    11.32    24 (+2)
 23 Michigan State                    8.0424    24-7     50     9.74    18 (-5)
 24 South Alabama                     8.0130    26-5    171    11.26    26 (+2)
 25 Marquette                         7.9427    22-8     46    12.20    19 (-6)

Dropped out: #21 St. Mary's (to #26), #25 Clemson (to #27)

Bottom 10:

332 Presbyterian                      2.5354     5-25   235    -6.67   334 (+2)
333 The Citadel                       2.5103     6-24   250   -10.83   331 (-2)
334 Alcorn State                      2.3276     7-23   331   -11.03   337 (+3)
335 Sacramento State                  2.3054     4-24   225   -12.54   336 (+1)
336 Loyola Marymount                  2.2942     5-26   129   -16.68   333 (-3)
337 Howard                            2.2898     6-25   221   -14.52   335 (-2)
338 North Florida                     1.8505     3-26   247   -13.34   338 (0)
339 North Carolina Central            1.7531     3-26   135   -22.86   340 (+1)
340 Maryland - Eastern Shore          1.6628     4-27   261   -16.35   339 (-1)
341 New Jersey Tech                   0.7979     0-29   252   -21.07   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

Texas locked up a share of the Big 12 championship with a tough home win over Okie State. A&M couldn't hold up their end of the bargain and got blown out by KU in College Station on Saturday, so we had to share the trophy with the Jayhawks. We still get the #1 seed in Kansas City, thanks to beating Kansas head-to-head, but I've pretty much given up on winning a conference tournament. Barnes has openly admitted how little he cares about that, and it looks like we peaked a little too early, anyway. We'll face the winner of the 8-9 game between Texas Tech and Oklahoma State. There is still an unlikely scenario in which we'd wind up with a #1 seed in the national tournament, but we'd have to win in KC and at least two or three of the other contenders would have to lose early and badly in their conference tournaments. I'm expecting us to get a #2 seed next Sunday. A #3 seed at the absolute worst.
Vandy couldn't quite take advantage of the chance to claim a first-round bye in the SEC tournament this weekend, losing at 'Bama in overtime. From the highlights I saw, it doesn't look like the 'Dores played much defense in the extra period. I guess it's OK, though, since Kentucky took it from us by beating Florida. Had we tied for second in the East at 11-5, we'd have claimed the E2 seed based on some tie-breaker or another. We'll face Auburn in the E3-W6 opening round game. Vandy is probably a #5 or #6 seed, but I don't see us getting much further than the Sweet 16 this year. Maybe the Elite 8, with a favorable draw and some luck.
This is probably the first time in two decades that the season-ending Penn-Princeton game doesn't mean a damn thing. Cornell won the Ivy by three games. Penn claims third place outright with a win, but since there's no tournament and they've got an overall losing record, they're not going anywhere until next November no matter what happens.
Nothing illustrates just how terrible the officiating has been this year than the last two games played by UCLA. The refs gave them an overtime period against Stanford with a phantom foul on an all-ball block at the last second on Thursday. Then they totally blew the end of the Cal game. The Bears should have gone to the line for two shots after the inbound man got the crap hacked out of him. No foul call there. And if that didn't happen, the ball should have been returned to Cal after it went off two separate UCLA players before going out of bounds. Refs gave the ball to the Bruins. Then, as if that weren't bad enough, Josh Shipp's go-ahead shot over the backboard probably shouldn't have counted. The whole "over the backboard" thing may very well be a stupid rule, but it is the rule. Personally, I think it's silly to have a foot and a half of court behind the backboard, then declare that you're not allowed to shoot from there. Sure, if it hits the back or top of the backboard, any part of the basket stanchion, or the shot clock, that should definitely be out of bounds for obvious reasons, but there's no logical reason to declare that a ball going over the backboard without touching anything but the rim or the face of the glass is out of bounds.

I has voted

2008-03-04T14:30:00.004-06:00

I feel so civic-dutiful. And I'm totally not being sarcastic about that.

After opening for lunch, I used my two hour mid-day break to head to the voting booth. My precinct polling station is at the YMCA two blocks up McNeil from my house, so it was a quick zip there. I wasn't expecting a huge line, since it's right in the middle of that afternoon lull, but when I got there, I was pleasantly surprised to see only two other guys in front of me. It took me less than ten minutes to vote and come back home. About a dozen more people had shown up by the time I was on my way out, though, so it looks like I timed it perfectly. I'm not surprised by the low turnout; this isn't a densely populated part of town. If I'd been on campus, I probably would have had to wait an hour and a half or more. I'm also glad I'm getting off work early tonight (tomorrow is TAKS testing), because I'd like to attend the caucus, as well. I've never participated in a "precinct convention" before, and I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like.

From what I could hear, almost everyone else who was there with me was voting in the Democratic primary, too. The poor folks at the Republican table were just sitting there, looking dejected and bored out of their minds. I chose Obama, obviously, and Dan Grant in CD10 (although I wish we could send both Grant and Larry Joe Doherty to Congress at the same time). I spent some time over the weekend looking up the players in the state and local races, too. Most of those races only had one Democrat running, so it was fairly point-and-click.

For the first time since I've been old enough to vote, I'm actually excited about an election. And I turn 31 next month, so that's thirteen years worth of elections. It's a strange feeling. In the past, I've been much more apathetic (and fatalistic) than this, but I actually got a little bit verklempt as I was driving home. We've all been a bit prone to hyperbole in this election cycle, but I don't think I'm too far off base when I say that November 2008 will probably be the single most important election in American history. McCain has already come right out and said that he wants American troops to be active in Iraq for another thousand years, and he's been rattling his sabre at Iran for a long time, now. A few weeks ago, he came out in favor of torture (or at least, not against it enough to, you know, actually do anything about it), and he's been sucking up to the Christiano-Gileadite Right for years. You don't have to be a genius to figure out that invading Iran would be an unmitigated disaster in every conceivable way. The rest of his special-interest pandering speaks for itself.

Often in the past, when a nation starts off down the path towards totalitarianism, there has been no one to stand up in front of the entire country and say, "No, this is wrong." We are profoundly lucky that we have such a person in Barack Obama, and I sincerely hope that we're smart enough to take advantage of it.

Rankings, Week 17

2008-03-03T20:45:00.006-06:00

I'm starting to become a little apathetic about blogging. All I ever post these days is rankings, and I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who cares about those. It just seems like a waste of time.

Anyway, rankings:

Top 25 teams, 03/03/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                           9.8736    28-1     29    18.34     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.6755    27-2     16    17.34     2 (0)
  3 Tennessee                         9.4733    26-3      2    13.41     3 (0)
  4 Duke                              9.3137    25-3     30    16.36     4 (0)
  5 Kansas                            9.1585    26-3     93    19.83     5 (0)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.1336    26-3     68    16.24     6 (0)
  7 Xavier                            8.9506    25-4     37    14.07     8 (+1)
  8 Texas                             8.8284    24-5      8    11.79     7 (-1)
  9 Wisconsin                         8.7858    24-4     53    13.11     9 (0)
 10 Georgetown                        8.6903    24-4     69    12.36    10 (0)
 11 Louisville                        8.5135    24-6     17    11.63    16 (+5)
 12 Stanford                          8.4731    24-4    108    12.18    14 (+2)
 13 Indiana                           8.4556    24-5     63    11.21    11 (-2)
 14 Butler                            8.4372    27-3    149    10.27    15 (+1)
 15 Drake                             8.3575    25-4    128    11.69    12 (-3)
 16 Vanderbilt                        8.3333    24-5     46     7.03    13 (-3)
 17 Connecticut                       8.3123    23-6     26     9.00    20 (+3)
 18 Michigan State                    8.2815    23-6     47    10.45    17 (-1)
 19 Marquette                         8.2054    21-7     32    12.54    18 (-1)
 20 Gonzaga                           8.1644    23-6     98    13.55    23 (+3)
 21 St. Mary's                        8.1334    24-5    150    13.38    21 (0)
 22 Notre Dame                        8.1228    22-6     76    10.82    19 (-3)
 23 Washington State                  8.1078    22-7     42    11.00    22 (-1)
 24 Brigham Young                     8.0811    23-6     91    11.28    24 (0)
 25 Clemson                           8.0348    21-7     48    10.82    26 (+1)

Dropped out: #25 South Alabama (to #26)

Bottom 10:

332 Canisius                          2.6134     5-24   171   -11.97   331 (-1)
333 Loyola Marymount                  2.5889     5-24   120   -16.45   332 (-1)
334 Presbyterian                      2.5464     5-25   228    -6.67   334 (0)
335 Howard                            2.4748     6-23   226   -15.00   337 (+2)
336 Sacramento State                  2.4215     4-23   221   -12.26   333 (-3)
337 Alcorn State                      2.3459     6-22   329   -11.54   335 (-2)
338 North Florida                     1.8354     3-26   243   -13.34   338 (0)
339 Maryland - Eastern Shore          1.7757     4-26   247   -16.40   339 (0)
340 North Carolina Central            1.7408     3-26   137   -22.86   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   0.7992     0-29   238   -21.07   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

At the end of the Tech game on Saturday, the announcer asked "Who could have seen this coming?" Well, me, for one. And from what I gather, pretty much everyone except for the Texas players and coaches. I've had this pegged as a let-down game for at least two or three weeks. I kind of assumed it was inevitable that we'd lose in Lubbock. So inevitable, in fact, that I was a little surprised in the last two minutes when the team finally started playing like they actually gave a shit. The way most of that game went, I just figured they'd half-ass it all the way to the buzzer and lose by at least 15.

Personally, I think we lost that game the moment the horn sounded at the end of the Tech-A&M game the week before. Any time a major-conference team loses a game by the largest margin in school history, the team they play next might as well just go ahead and forfeit. Save themselves the humiliation and their fans two hours of needless suffering.

And as I type this, TTU is sucking balls against KU. The Jayhawks ended the first half on a 21-4 run. Oh, well. I take some small, bitter consolation in the fact that the Longhorns are good for at least two or three totally inexplicable losses a season. There's something to be said for consistency.
Vandy dropped a game to Arkansas in Fayetteville. Not that surprising. The Hogs are fighting for a tournament berth, and the 'Dores suck on the road (7-0 in conference home games, just 2-5 on the road). Taking out Florida and, for the second year in a row, beating the #1 team in their first week at the top of the polls made me very happy, though. I'm not sure that we'll get a protected seed — the selection committee tends to underseed nouveau riche teams like Vandy — and I definitely fear the five-seed slot. I think last year was the first time in, like, a decade and a half that none of the twelve-seeds won a first-round game.
Off the top of my head, here's an early Final Four prediction: Connecticut, UCLA, Louisville, Tennessee. I reserve the right to be wrong about any or all of these selections.

Rankings, Week 16

2008-02-25T19:30:00.006-06:00

Top 25 teams, 02/25/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                           9.9220    26-1     25    18.81     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.6997    26-2     14    17.61     2 (0)
  3 Tennessee                         9.6884    25-2      2    14.41     4 (+1)
  4 Duke                              9.3668    23-3     21    17.08     3 (-1)
  5 Kansas                            9.1825    24-3     90    20.37     5 (0)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.1010    24-3     69    16.59     6 (0)
  7 Texas                             9.0538    23-4      7    12.44     7 (0)
  8 Xavier                            9.0447    24-4     18    14.21     8 (0)
  9 Wisconsin                         8.7314    23-4     63    13.04     9 (0)
 10 Georgetown                        8.7224    22-4     56    12.77    11 (+1)
 11 Indiana                           8.6467    23-4     74    13.00    12 (+1)
 12 Drake                             8.6414    24-3    122    12.30    10 (-2)
 13 Vanderbilt                        8.4523    23-4     64     7.63    16 (+3)
 14 Stanford                          8.4498    22-4    111    12.73    15 (+1)
 15 Butler                            8.4406    25-3    136     9.61    13 (-2)
 16 Louisville                        8.4298    22-6     29    11.79    19 (+3)
 17 Michigan State                    8.3853    22-5     62    10.70    20 (+3)
 18 Marquette                         8.3248    20-6     46    13.19    21 (+3)
 19 Notre Dame                        8.3235    21-5     73    11.58    25 (+6)
 20 Connecticut                       8.2988    21-6     17     8.70    14 (-6)
 21 St. Mary's                        8.2965    23-4    172    14.56    17 (-4)
 22 Washington State                  8.2074    21-6     57    11.30    18 (-4)
 23 Gonzaga                           8.1160    21-6     95    13.30    27 (+4)
 24 Brigham Young                     8.0186    21-6     96    11.37    26 (+2)
 25 South Alabama                     7.9529    22-5    152    10.78    35 (+10)

Dropped out: #22 Kansas State (to #31), #23 Texas A&M (to #30), #24 Clemson (to #26)

332 Loyola Marymount                  2.7219     5-23   116   -16.71   327 (-5)
333 Sacramento State                  2.6608     4-21   212   -12.96   334 (+1)
334 Presbyterian                      2.6278     5-24   236    -6.38   333 (-1)
335 Alcorn State                      2.6158     6-20   323   -11.81   337 (-2)
336 Eastern Illinois                  2.6088     5-22   300    -6.89   332 (-4)
337 Howard                            2.4838     5-22   219   -15.56   336 (-1)
338 North Florida                     2.0590     3-24   232   -13.59   339 (+1)
339 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.0314     4-24   230   -16.43   338 (-1)
340 North Carolina Central            1.6853     3-26   151   -22.86   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   0.7612     0-29   242   -21.07   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

Tonight's game is huge for us. If we win, we have the conference championship pretty much sewn up. But even if we lose, we still have the #1 seed in hand, thanks to Baylor and Oklahoma State. Boy, was Saturday fun. Not only did we crush OU in what was the single best defensive game I've seen a Rick Barnes Texas team play, but both of our contenders for the conference crown were beaten by South Division teams on the road.
Vandy basically has no shot at a regular-season conference title, since they're currently in third place and would need Tennessee to lose at least three games and Kentucky to lose at least one just to have a shot at a shared East Division crown. But if the 'Dores take out The Vols tomorrow night at Memorial Gym, I'd be perfectly fine with a third-place finish, especially after the merciless shitstomping we gave Kentucky a few weeks ago. Which I'm still cackling about, by the way.
Well, it's official. Penn and Princeton have both been eliminated from Ivy League championship contention. For the first time in two decades, someone else will hold the Ivy title. With four games left to play, Cornell remains undefeated in conference at 10-0 and holds a hefty three-game lead (plus both head-to-head matchups) over second-place Brown. So barring a monumental collapse, the Big Red are going dancing for the first time since 1988.

For what it's worth, Cornell is 0-3 in NCAA play in two trips. They lost an opening round game to Navy (69-67) and a regional third-place game to North Carolina State (65-54) all the way back in 1954, and were blown out by Arizona, 90-50, in their '88 appearance.
If there's one thing that will mark this season in my mind, it's terrible officiating. And this is not just an "all the calls go against Texas" whine. Far from it, actually. In every single game I've watched so far this year, there have been at least five or six just blatantly wrong decisions by the referees. It ranges all the way from obviously backwards block/charge calls, to phantom fouls and uncalled muggings, to whistle-happy ridiculousness (e.g., the end of the Villanova/Georgetown game), to officials simply not paying attention to what's happening on the court (e.g., when Oklahoma, playing here in Austin last Saturday, had a fast-break opportunity taken away from them at midcourt by a very late, and very wrong, shot-clock violation call).

Sadly, no one whose opinion matters will say anything about this. Frankly, if I were Jay Wright (Villanova's head coach), my postgame interview after the Georgetown loss would have been, in its entirety, "I don't care how much they fine me, we just got cheated." Walk away. Of course, he has class and I don't, so make of that what you will.

But still. There is precisely zero transparent oversight of sports officiating. They are, like some kind of poor-man's CIA minus the dashing secret-agent mystique, accountable only to themselves. I think that at least part of the problem is that officials get paid either way, whether or not they actually do a good job. Sure, you always hear analysts say that no official wants to get the call wrong, but I don't trust anyone who can't tell the difference (or worse, intentionally tries to obfuscate the difference) between wanting to do a good job and actually doing a good job. Maybe the NCAA could start docking their pay for making horrible calls.

How to be inspired by politics, Lesson #1

2008-02-21T22:51:00.003-06:00

This is real democracy. This is exactly what the authoritarian wing of the Republican Party fears the most. Students marching for their Constitutionally-mandated voting rights, rights that have been systematically denied them for decades. Prairie View A&M won a federal court case on exactly this issue in 1979, and Waller County still can't be bothered to treat these students like they're fully human. Yes, it's only early voting. Yes, there will be a polling station on campus on election day a week from Tuesday. But this is 2008. What occurred today is exactly the kind of problem that the Civil Rights Act of 1957 was supposed to solve.

I want this to mean something. I want that hope to be fulfilled. My country has been disappointing me for far too long, and I don't want to feel like that anymore. For the first time in my life, I want to be proud of my country. This is a small step in that direction.

Further reading indicates that both of the Democrats running to unseat Michael McCaul (a man whose voting records indicate a high degree of contempt for anyone who isn't a wealthy white heterosexual Christian male, and, at times, a great deal of glee in making the lives of such people as difficult (or, in some cases, as over) as possible) in CD10 marched with the PVAMU students. I've actually met Dan Grant, and will in all likelihood be voting for him on the 4th, although from what little I've read about Larry Joe Doherty, he'd make an excellent congressman, as well.

Rankings, Week 15

2008-02-18T13:41:00.004-06:00

Top 25 teams, 02/18/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                          10.1059    25-0     34    19.44     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.7028    24-2     16    17.81     3 (+1)
  3 Duke                              9.6583    22-2     15    17.29     2 (-1)
  4 Tennessee                         9.6341    23-2      5    14.64     5 (+1)
  5 Kansas                            9.4652    24-2     85    21.19     4 (-1)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.1620    22-3     46    16.12     6 (0)
  7 Texas                             8.9256    21-4     11    11.68    10 (+3)
  8 Xavier                            8.8907    21-4     36    14.44     9 (+1)
  9 Wisconsin                         8.7767    21-4     48    13.32    13 (+4)
 10 Drake                             8.7230    23-2    153    13.04     7 (-3)
 11 Georgetown                        8.7108    20-4     49    12.58     8 (-3)
 12 Indiana                           8.5878    21-4     86    13.56    14 (+2)
 13 Butler                            8.5537    24-2    163    10.42    16 (+3)
 14 Connecticut                       8.5529    20-5     14     9.28    15 (+1)
 15 Stanford                          8.4597    21-4    105    12.84    12 (-3)
 16 Vanderbilt                        8.4505    22-4     59     7.46    24 (+8)
 17 St. Mary's                        8.4245    22-3    191    14.60    17 (0)
 18 Washington State                  8.4130    20-5     60    12.12    19 (+1)
 19 Louisville                        8.3815    20-6     30    12.19    23 (+4)
 20 Michigan State                    8.3485    20-5     47     9.52    11 (-9)
 21 Marquette                         8.3255    18-6     31    12.67    32 (+11)
 22 Kansas State                      8.2725    18-6     53    13.88    20 (-2)
 23 Texas A&M                         8.2564    20-5    103    13.52    18 (-5)
 24 Clemson                           8.2123    19-6     50    11.76    29 (+5)
 25 Notre Dame                        8.2097    19-5     89    11.75    21 (-4)

Dropped out: #22 Mississippi (to #41), #25 Arkansas (to #34)

Bottom 10:

332 Eastern Illinois                  2.7690     5-21   292    -6.85   334 (+2)
333 Presbyterian                      2.7568     5-23   242    -5.93   333 (0)
334 Sacramento State                  2.7491     4-20   216   -12.92   330 (-4)
335 Longwood                          2.6470     7-22   296   -10.45   336 (+1)
336 Howard                            2.6406     5-20   235   -16.08   332 (-4)
337 Alcorn State                      2.2501     4-20   325   -13.21   337 (0)
338 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.1739     4-22   247   -17.35   338 (0)
339 North Florida                     2.0241     2-23   225   -14.68   339 (0)
340 North Carolina Central            2.0010     3-23   134   -24.46   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   0.9505     0-27   248   -21.00   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

Texas and Vanderbilt both barely hung on to wins over the weekend, and the common element was that both teams started clocking the ball with around six minutes left in the game and leads of only 12 points. Both teams proceeded to give back their entire lead, then won because their opponent did something unbelievably stupid. Florida's Nick Calathes was caught in an over-and-back as the Gators were bringing the ball up-court trailing by one. Baylor's Aaron Bruce called a time-out he didn't have and got called for a technical foul with the Bears also trailing by just one point. Vandy's Alex Gordon made four straight free-throws in the final 24 seconds to hold Florida at arm's length. Three Texas players combined to make enough FTs (still one of the glaring weaknesses in the team) to hold off Baylor, who missed three straight three-point attempts in the final 30 seconds.

Here's my problem with this "clock the ball inside six minutes with any double-digit lead" strategy: it's pretty rare that a team doesn't give back their entire lead when they do it. I can't possibly be the only person who's noticed this. It's the exact same problem I have with the prevent defense in football. The way I figure it, a single offensive possession lasts an estimated 25 seconds, on average. Twelve points is four possessions, which lasts about one minute and forty seconds. So in a worst case scenario — that is, if we allow for some extra time for the leading team to screw up their own offensive possessions — it'd take the trailing team about two minutes to come back from a 12-point deficit. In fact, Baylor went on an 14-1 run in almost exactly two and a half minutes on Saturday (at exactly 3:00, the lead was 14; at 0:33, they'd gotten the lead all the way down to one). During that span, Texas committed four turnovers, was credited with zero shots attempted from the field, and shot just 1-4 (including missing the front end of three straight one-and-ones) from the free-throw line in eight possessions.

When you start clocking the ball — that is, when the point guard stationary dribbles through at least half the shot clock with little to no off-the-ball movement by the other players — you're essentially telling your team that it's time to stop playing hard. Now, I can understand doing this if you're milking a 12-point lead in less time than it takes, on average, to come back from a 12-point deficit. Say, for example, inside a minute to play. But if there's enough time on the clock for your opponent to come back from their deficit twice over, dribbling the air out of the ball is not the thing you want to be doing, because they're going to come back on you. It's basically inevitable. You built that lead by running your offense. The best way to maintain that lead is to continue running your offense.

Rankings, Week 14

2008-02-11T12:25:00.000-06:00

Top 25 teams, 02/11/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                          10.0515    23-0     50    20.70     1 (0)
  2 Duke                              9.9233    21-1     23    18.91     3 (+1)
  3 North Carolina                    9.7545    22-2      7    17.63     2 (-1)
  4 Kansas                            9.7261    23-1     79    22.08     4 (0)
  5 Tennessee                         9.6032    21-2      6    14.83     5 (0)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.1564    21-3     42    16.38     6 (0)
  7 Drake                             8.9209    22-1    174    13.87     9 (+2)
  8 Georgetown                        8.8978    19-3     60    13.95     7 (-1)
  9 Xavier                            8.8881    20-4     37    14.96    11 (+2)
 10 Texas                             8.7847    19-4     31    12.35    12 (+2)
 11 Michigan State                    8.7686    20-3     66    11.43    10 (-1)
 12 Stanford                          8.7126    20-3    101    14.09    13 (+1)
 13 Wisconsin                         8.6662    19-4     62    14.00     8 (-5)
 14 Indiana                           8.6053    20-3    126    14.00    15 (+1)
 15 Connecticut                       8.5708    18-5      8     9.78    21 (+6)
 16 Butler                            8.5306    21-2    157    10.52    17 (+1)
 17 St. Mary's                        8.5101    20-3    152    14.35    19 (+2)
 18 Texas A&M                         8.4928    20-4    103    14.29    18 (0)
 19 Washington State                  8.4794    18-5     35    12.22    14 (-5)
 20 Kansas State                      8.4654    17-5     45    13.86    22 (+2)
 21 Notre Dame                        8.4291    18-4     89    12.95    27 (+6)
 22 Mississippi                       8.3642    16-5     28     9.81    16 (-6)
 23 Louisville                        8.3378    18-6     27    12.04    36 (+13)
 24 Vanderbilt                        8.3304    20-4     56     6.25    25 (+1)
 25 Arkansas                          8.2892    17-5     40    10.05    29 (+4)

Dropped out: #20 Marquette (to #32), #23 Rhode Island (to #28), #24 Florida (to #27)

Bottom 10:

332 Howard                            2.8484     5-18   241   -16.30   328 (-4)
333 Presbyterian                      2.7377     4-22   212    -8.27   335 (+2)
334 Eastern Illinois                  2.7244     4-20   289    -7.79   331 (-3)
335 Jacksonville State                2.6756     4-20   310    -6.79   334 (-1)
336 Longwood                          2.6465     6-21   298   -10.44   336 (0)
337 Alcorn State                      2.1833     3-19   321   -14.45   337 (0)
338 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.0090     3-21   266   -18.63   339 (+1)
339 North Florida                     1.9278     1-22   221   -16.13   338 (-1)
340 North Carolina Central            1.8901     2-23   112   -26.00   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   1.1131     0-25   247   -21.40   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

I'm very worried about tonight's game. I'm afraid that if we don't beat KU, we'll effectively be eliminated from the conference race. I think we'll lose by double figures in Manhattan in two weeks time, and I also can't shake the feeling that Baylor is finally going to rear up and take us down in Waco this Saturday. Four losses isn't going to win the league, not this year.
Vandy has won three in a row after opening league play 2-4. I'm not getting too excited, though, since those three wins came over the eighth, tenth and eleventh placed teams in the SEC. I heard several talking heads effusively praising the team after the flukey one-point win over South Carolina on Saturday, but I'm just not seeing how that's such a huge sign of progress. Granted, it's a 20-win team playing in the SEC, but that has more to do with a downy-soft out-of-conference schedule than anything else. The next four games are Kentucky, Florida, Georgia and Tennessee, all at home. I have a hard time imagining that we'll do better than 2-2 over that sequence, even in the friendly confines of Memorial Gymnasium. I hope they can prove me wrong.
I am shocked — shocked, I tell you! — to see an Ivy League team not named Penn or Princeton creep into my top 75. In fact, Penn and Princeton both kinda suck this year. It's been 20 years since the last time someone other than one of those two schools has won the Ivy League title. There was that one tri-championship in 2001-02, when Yale snuck into a three-way tie for first with Penn and Princeton, but other than that, it's been all Quakers and Tigers, all the time. Cornell (who won the conference crown in that 1987-88 season) has a two game lead on Brown six games into the league schedule, and has already beaten the Bears once.
You have to wonder what New Jersey Tech was thinking when they decided to move up to Division I. They weren't even a decent D2 team, and after this dreadful season, they're going to have a lot of trouble finding a conference that wants them. It's not totally out of the question that they can make a little hay out of sucking so badly, though. Savannah State has improved dramatically since they went winless a few years ago, but they still can't get a conference to look at them twice. They're a perfect fit for the MEAC, but that league has already picked its 12th member in Winston-Salem State, which will join next season. That leaves SSU and North Carolina Central, the two remaining independent HBCUs in Division I, on the outside looking in. I wouldn't be totally shocked if the MEAC decided to expand to 14 teams in the coming years, but I can't see the SWAC reaching that far east just to get to 12 teams. Georgia (coastal Georgia, at that) and North Carolina are a bit out of their already far-flung Texas/Louisiana/Mississippi/Alabama footprint, and it'd be a shame to disrupt the double round-robin league schedule the SWAC has had for as long as it's been around.
And what of the other independents? Presby moved up from Division II with an invitation to the Big South already in their back pocket. They'll start playing a full league schedule in 2008-09, but I don't know yet whether they'll be officially included in the standings. CSU-Bakersfield likewise moved up with Big West membership already locked up. I don't think they actually enter the league until 2009-10, though. Utah Valley State still hasn't found a home. I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually moved into the Summit League, since there's already a Utah school in that conference. UTPA and Chicago State will probably never recover from NCAA investigation. For UTPA, it's been ten years since they were booted out of the Sun Belt for allegedly cheating (point-shaving, IIRC), and they've been independent ever since. After being placed on NCAA probation in 2003, Chicago State decided to drop their Mid-Con membership on their own and try to rebuild the program from the ground up. What the future holds for them, no one knows. Current Division II member Bryant College will be reclassifying to Division I beginning next season, and will eventually join the Northeast Conference. Five other lower-division schools are also making the jump to Division I in the next two years: SIU-Edwardsville, North Dakota, South Dakota, Seattle and Houston Baptist. Seattle was once a member of the West Coast Conference before dropping down to NAIA after the 1979-80 season. The WCC has already rejected Seattle's bid for readmission to the league, for reasons that sounded pretty lame to me when I first heard them. Houston Baptist was a founding member of what eventually became the Atlantic Sun Conference back in 1979, before they, too, dropped down to NAIA following the 1988-89 season.
All of this divisional shuffling that's been going on over the last few years has led the NCAA to place a moratorium on schools moving up to Division I. Nobody is quite sure what it's doing to the competitive balance of the uppermost level of college basketball, so they're going to take some time to study it.
I bought a whole case of Thin Mints the other day. They're mine. You can't have any.

Apple 2, Dan 0

2008-02-10T17:48:00.001-06:00

Well, another piece of shit Apple product has destroyed itself from the inside out. Safari just killed my laptop. I made an audacious and failure-destined attempt to use Safari to access the World Wide Web, but instead of actually doing the one thing that it was (allegedly) designed specifically to do, it spun that fucking rainbow cursor at me for 20 minutes, then proceeded to eat my system folder and crash the entire computer, uncrashable operating system and all. It's so thoroughly crashed and trashed that it won't even boot off the system-restore CD.

It amazes me that Apple's development department is so completely incompetent that they can't even write decent software for their own goddamn operating system. Even on my brand new desktop with its brand new (but for some reason quite inferior to its predecessor) operating system, Safari still crashes for no good reason whatsoever at least three or four times a day, on average. Safari, clearly, is proof that people who suck at writing computer software shouldn't be allowed to have jobs writing computer software.

I'm actually a hair's breadth from declaring that I'll never buy another Apple product for the rest of my life. I definitely learned my lesson the last time, though. If this is a problem that requires any kind of replacement, I simply won't do it. I refuse to spend another $900 on a piece of junk computer that isn't even going to last a goddamn year. I'd rather have no computer at all.

A new addition

2008-02-09T14:57:00.000-06:00

I just got off the phone with my college roommate, who made the announcement that Connor Alexander Ost entered the world on January 25 at 11:54 am. Yay!

With mom:

With dad:

Rankings, Week 13

2008-02-04T17:29:00.000-06:00

UPDATE: Some big breaking news just came over on ESPNNews. Bob Knight has apparently resigned. It doesn't appear to have hit any of the sports websites yet, so I can't link an article, and I don't know if it's effective immediately or at the end of the season. But if it's true, this is huge news.

Best. Super Bowl. Ever.

I've watched that crazy Manning-to-Tyree scramble play just after the two-minute warning at least 35 times, now, and it's still unbelievably amazing every time. Just mind-blowing. I've seen great scrambles, and I've seen great catches, but how often do you see a great scramble and a great catch on the same play?

Top 25 teams, 02/04/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                          10.1241    21-0     38    20.29     1 (0)
  2 North Carolina                    9.9541    21-1     21    19.27     3 (+1)
  3 Duke                              9.8422    19-1     35    19.75     4 (+1)
  4 Kansas                            9.6950    21-1     87    22.77     2 (-2)
  5 Tennessee                         9.6595    19-2      4    15.10     5 (0)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.3814    20-2     54    17.95     6 (0)
  7 Georgetown                        9.1888    18-2     60    15.25     8 (+1)
  8 Wisconsin                         8.9435    18-3     59    15.29    15 (+7)
  9 Drake                             8.9398    20-1    176    14.67    12 (+3)
 10 Michigan State                    8.8645    19-3     43    11.27     7 (-3)
 11 Xavier                            8.8322    18-4     44    16.05    11 (0)
 12 Texas                             8.7740    17-4     24    12.76    10 (-2)
 13 Stanford                          8.7171    18-3     79    13.33    18 (+5)
 14 Washington State                  8.6123    17-4     49    12.62     9 (-5)
 15 Indiana                           8.5875    18-3    125    14.86    13 (-2)
 16 Mississippi                       8.5704    16-4     33    10.60    14 (-2)
 17 Butler                            8.5289    19-2    164    11.14    19 (+2)
 18 Texas A&M                         8.5096    18-4     82    14.41    27 (+9)
 19 St. Mary's                        8.4833    18-3    150    14.33    16 (-3)
 20 Marquette                         8.4719    16-4     74    13.90    22 (+2)
 21 Connecticut                       8.4567    16-5     13    10.05    33 (+12)
 22 Kansas State                      8.4194    15-5     37    13.45    21 (-1)
 23 Rhode Island                      8.4008    19-3    132    11.23    32 (+9)
 24 Florida                           8.3524    18-4    138    15.64    17 (-7)
 25 Vanderbilt                        8.3345    18-4     48     6.41    20 (-5)

Dropped out: #23 West Virginia (to #37), #24 Baylor (to #31), #25 Pittsburgh (to #33)

332 Coppin State                      2.9004     4-19   191   -14.13   322 (-10)
333 Grambling State                   2.7842     3-12   336   -14.80   337 (+4)
334 Jacksonville State                2.7738     4-19   301    -7.00   331 (-3)
335 Presbyterian                      2.7089     3-21   196    -9.92   335 (0)
336 Longwood                          2.6485     5-20   279   -11.56   334 (-2)
337 Alcorn State                      2.2887     3-18   316   -14.71   336 (-1)
338 North Florida                     2.1010     1-20   237   -15.05   339 (+1)
339 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.0771     2-20   215   -20.23   338 (-1)
340 North Carolina Central            1.8213     2-23   128   -26.00   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   1.3771     0-23   217   -21.70   341 (0)

The complete report.

'Tis the reason for the season

2008-01-31T11:48:00.000-06:00

Ugh. There's a flu bug going around Lanier. Two weeks ago, one of the kids came in drag-assing, then didn't even come to school that Thursday or Friday. Then one of my co-workers got hit by it, and now it's gotten both me and my boss. He'd completely lost his voice on Tuesday, and didn't even come to work yesterday. And now that bug is just right up there in my sinuses having a grand old time, so no work for me today and probably tomorrow.

Rankings, Week 12

2008-01-28T20:06:00.001-06:00

I'm very proud of myself today, because for the first time in several years, all my clothes, towels and sheets are clean at the same time. I had to stay up pretty late last night to do it, but I got it done. While I was waiting, I watched the Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters for DVD I picked up off one of my Christmas gift certificates and did a bit of money and trade-materials grinding on World of Warcraft.

Anyway, rankings:

Top 25 teams, 01/28/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                          10.0807    19-0     44    21.47     1 (0)
  2 Kansas                           10.0408    20-0     87    24.85     3 (+1)
  3 North Carolina                    9.9302    19-1     21    19.55     4 (+1)
  4 Duke                              9.6422    17-1     53    20.00     5 (+1)
  5 Tennessee                         9.6100    17-2     10    16.05     2 (-3)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.2077    18-2     62    17.00     6 (0)
  7 Michigan State                    9.1427    18-2     36    12.35     8 (+1)
  8 Georgetown                        9.0879    16-2     51    14.50    13 (+5)
  9 Washington State                  9.0733    17-2     58    14.32     7 (-2)
 10 Texas                             8.9489    16-3     37    14.58    12 (+2)
 11 Xavier                            8.9474    17-4     23    16.19    14 (+3)
 12 Drake                             8.9182    18-1    175    15.37    18 (+6)
 13 Indiana                           8.8606    17-2    138    16.47    11 (-2)
 14 Mississippi                       8.7997    15-3     30    11.06    10 (-4)
 15 Wisconsin                         8.7820    16-3     71    15.37     9 (-6)
 16 St. Mary's                        8.7605    17-2    135    14.32    16 (0)
 17 Florida                           8.6141    18-3    147    17.29    27 (+10)
 18 Stanford                          8.6063    16-3     90    13.89    20 (+2)
 19 Butler                            8.5544    19-2    153    11.14    22 (+3)
 20 Vanderbilt                        8.4870    17-3     52     7.50    17 (-3)
 21 Kansas State                      8.4654    14-4     61    14.61    30 (+9)
 22 Marquette                         8.4554    14-4     59    14.17    26 (+4)
 23 West Virginia                     8.3958    15-5     65    17.60    21 (-2)
 24 Baylor                            8.3516    16-3    134    11.79    24 (0)
 25 Pittsburgh                        8.3457    16-4     95    13.75    19 (-6)

Dropped out: #15 Dayton (to #34), #23 Gonzaga (to #31), #25 Texas A&M (to #27)

332 Sacramento State                  2.9478     3-16   242   -13.21   331 (-1)
333 Eastern Illinois                  2.8765     3-17   295    -7.40   337 (+4)
334 Longwood                          2.7988     4-19   220   -13.17   332 (-2)
335 Presbyterian                      2.6975     2-21   136   -12.39   334 (-1)
336 Alcorn State                      2.5346     3-16   307   -15.05   335 (-1)
337 Grambling State                   2.4685     2-12   333   -16.71   339 (+2)
338 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.2970     2-18   208   -21.05   336 (-2)
339 North Florida                     2.2821     1-18   235   -15.68   338 (-1)
340 North Carolina Central            1.7095     1-23   103   -27.17   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   1.5650     0-21   211   -22.33   341 (0)

The complete report.

Oh, the irony...

2008-01-22T16:11:00.000-06:00

I'll just let this one speak for itself:

Hillary Clinton, in her comments with reporters, rejected the notion she had used patronizing or racially charged language against Obama. She has called him, among other things, a "talented" and "young African-American man."

I think this gets the prize for best use of scare quotes in an ostensibly unbiased news article.

Oops

2008-01-22T12:38:00.001-06:00

I just discovered I'd made two decent-sized mistakes in my Division II men's ranking.

When Tiffin moved up to Division II from NAIA over the summer, I put a worksheet for the team into my spreadsheet, but apparently forgot to add a line for them to the overall list that calculates the rankings themselves. So the whole season, I've only been ranking 274 teams in Division II, when there are actually 275. Other than actually including them in the rankings, everything is peachy — i.e., Tiffin's record and statistics haven't been left out of any calculations where they were required — but still a pretty glaring oversight.
I accidentally had the line for Fort Lewis on the overall ranking worksheet linking to a different school's worksheet (I think it was Coker, but I don't remember), so instead of ranking them 31st like they should have been, they were sitting together with whichever school they were accidentally linked to. Like Tiffin, though, there's nothing wrong with the data or the other worksheet links, so it's really just a superficial mistake.

These mistakes have both been fixed and marked with asterisks in the January 21st rankings.

Rankings, Week 11

2008-01-21T16:48:00.000-06:00

Pam has cited some speeches apropos of the day (Martin Luther King Day) and of the zeitgeist. I don't think it's a coincidence that the King that appears in the national pantheon is the soft, cuddly "I Have a Dream" guy from the early '60s, not the increasingly radicalized, openly socialist, 1967-1968 King of "Why I am Opposed to the War in Vietnam" and the Poor People's Campaign.

Pam also makes an excellent point about how all our current politicians want to co-opt King and his message for themselves, but none of them truly embody it. Of course, if you're talking about the Republicans, that's not news. They are, to a man (no girls allowed in the shoddily-constructed GOP tree-fort), actively working against the equality, community and progressive ideals that King advocated. Clinton wants to claim that King would have been nothing without the sympathetic white folks who threw him a bone, which strikes me as nothing more than a shameless invocation of ingrained white privilege. Obama has positioned himself as the most progressive of the major candidates (he can't beat Kucinich for open progressivism, but Kucinich isn't a major candidate anymore, if he ever was) with his speech at Ebenezer Baptist Church yesterday. He still won't support outright marriage equality, but he's the only one who seems to be moving in the right direction on both social and economic issues. My only big problem with him is that he seems to want to have it both ways on foreign policy and war in the Middle East, but even so, he's still better than anyone else I've seen when it comes to Iraq, Iran and Israel.

Well, that was more than I intended to write in a post ostensibly about college basketball rankings. So anyway, rankings:

Top 25 teams, 01/21/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 Memphis                          10.0138    17-0     62    22.65     2 (+1)
  2 Tennessee                         9.9272    16-1     13    17.35     4 (+2)
  3 Kansas                            9.8984    18-0    105    24.33     3 (0)
  4 North Carolina                    9.7774    18-1     36    19.74     1 (-3)
  5 Duke                              9.6138    15-1     59    20.88     6 (+1)
  6 California - Los Angeles          9.2546    16-2     48    17.33     5 (-1)
  7 Washington State                  9.2408    16-1     97    16.65    11 (+4)
  8 Michigan State                    9.2105    16-2     19    12.00    12 (+4)
  9 Wisconsin                         9.1227    15-2     64    17.24    13 (+4)
 10 Mississippi                       9.0793    15-2     42    12.88     9 (-1)
 11 Indiana                           9.0426    16-1    158    17.41    17 (+6)
 12 Texas                             8.9777    14-3     25    14.65    16 (+4)
 13 Georgetown                        8.9282    14-2     83    16.13    14 (+1)
 14 Xavier                            8.9084    15-4     16    15.89     7 (-7)
 15 Dayton                            8.8763    14-2     34     8.63     8 (-7)
 16 St. Mary's                        8.8220    15-2     75    12.82    20 (+4)
 17 Vanderbilt                        8.7706    17-2     60     9.05    18 (+1)
 18 Drake                             8.7419    16-1    225    16.47    25 (+7)
 19 Pittsburgh                        8.6845    15-3     69    14.67    21 (+2)
 20 Stanford                          8.6691    15-3     70    14.39    30 (+10)
 21 West Virginia                     8.5895    14-4     76    19.50    26 (+5)
 22 Butler                            8.5338    17-2    137    10.79    19 (-3)
 23 Gonzaga                           8.4805    14-4     44    12.28    28 (+5)
 24 Baylor                            8.4554    15-2    177    13.18    42 (+18)
 25 Texas A&M                         8.4245    15-3    154    16.39    10 (-15)

Dropped out: #15 Marquette (to #26), #22 Rhode Island (to #28), #23 Miami (FL) (to #33), #24 Arkansas (to #36)

Bottom 10:

332 Longwood                          3.0178     4-17   228   -13.38   332 (0)
333 Kennesaw State                    2.9600     3-15   291    -9.83   331 (-2)
334 Presbyterian                      2.8086     2-20   125   -12.36   335 (+1)
335 Alcorn State                      2.6428     3-14   316   -16.18   337 (+2)
336 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.6359     2-15   204   -21.65   334 (-2)
337 Eastern Illinois                  2.5914     2-17   306    -7.84   336 (-1)
338 North Florida                     2.4944     1-16   236   -16.06   338 (0)
339 Grambling State                   2.3303     1-11   322   -19.67   339 (0)
340 North Carolina Central            1.7917     1-22    96   -27.65   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   1.5522     0-20   235   -22.85   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

Don't look now, but Baylor has cracked the top 25 and is 3-0 in the Big 12. No, that is not a typo. Hey, I told you not to look!
I can't get a good handle on the Longhorns this year. They're too wildly inconsistent to make me confident about their ability to perform in crunch time or to make a deep tournament run. On the one hand, you have very solid wins over UCLA and Tennessee on the road, then you have the brick-fest losses to Wisconsin and Michigan State at home and the defensive no-show against Mizzou. And then there's struggling at home with Colorado, the worst team in the conference by my rankings, and the only Big 12 team that isn't in double-digits in the win column (9-8 overall, 1-2 in league play). I just don't get it. Except for brief spurts once or twice a game, there's a marked lack of intensity on both ends of the court. Finish? I don't know. 12-4? 11-5? It all depends on how badly they want to win.
Vandy is clearly not as good as their record. The blowout at Tennessee was painful (and nationally televised). The 'Dores got back within 8 or so late in the game, then completely fell apart and lost by 20 after a non-stop litany of stupid passes, bumbling turnovers, poor defense, and bad shot selection over the last four or five minutes. Wayne Chism definitely got the better of A. J. Ogilvy in the post, and nobody could hit a three to save their life (a combined 3-21 from outside the line as a team; Shan Foster was 1-11 all by himself. That last stat in itself indicates how Vandy plays: If the threes aren't falling, we lose. The correlation is almost one to one. The next two games are at Florida next Sunday and at Ole Miss the following Wednesday. We'll lose both of those to start conference play 2-4. After that, well, it's a good thing that the SEC is so down this year. I think anything better than 9-7 in the league is icing.
In possibly the single best game of the women's regular season, North Carolina visits UConn tonight. The Huskies are obliterating everyone on their incredibly difficult schedule, which I have as the #2 schedule in the country. Their average margin of victory has dropped to 38.82 points per game after at one point edging up almost to 50 ppg. Syracuse came the closest to them last week, losing by just six points in the Carrier Dome. UNC is beating opponents by a little more than 30 points per game, and their only loss is to #2 Tennessee by four points in Thompson-Bolling in Knoxville. Should be an exciting game.

Major! Major! Major!

2008-01-18T12:11:00.000-06:00

Say hello to the next University of Texas football coach. Major Applewhite was hired yesterday afternoon as the Longhorns' running backs coach. When Greg Davis retires (sooner rather than later, I hope, although he wasn't bad this year), Major will almost certainly be moved up to offensive coordinator. That's assuming, of course, that Mack doesn't retire at the same time. I think his contract is set to expire in 2012.

There was some interesting stuff from this Statesman article that was ostensibly about RB recruit Darrell Scott's commitment status, too: When Major was a graduate coordinator here in 2002 and 2003, Davis told him to work with the offensive line.

"When Major came back as a graduate assistant, I told him I was going to give him the best break of his life," Davis recalled. "I said, 'I'm going to put you with the offensive line.' You can never be a coordinator unless you understand what's going on up there, all the calls they make, the steps they make, the hat placement. ... It was a week after he went into the offensive line group when he came back to me and said, 'Coach, you're exactly right.'"

So it seems that we've been grooming him for the coaching position for as long as he's been here.

Basketball rankings, week 10

2008-01-15T13:34:00.000-06:00

Top 25 teams, 01/14/2008:

Rkg Team                              Rating   Record   SOS   Margin   LW (Chng)
  1 North Carolina                   10.2460    17-0     22    22.12     1 (0)
  2 Memphis                          10.1780    15-0     26    21.47     2 (0)
  3 Kansas                            9.6967    16-0    163    25.13     3 (0)
  4 Tennessee                         9.6134    14-1     35    18.00     6 (+2)
  5 California - Los Angeles          9.5301    16-1     52    18.88     9 (+4)
  6 Duke                              9.3807    13-1    110    22.00    11 (+5)
  7 Xavier                            9.2834    14-3     10    18.41     7 (0)
  8 Dayton                            9.2223    14-1     33     9.93    16 (+8)
  9 Mississippi                       9.1988    14-1     73    14.67     5 (-4)
 10 Texas A&M                         9.1904    15-1    153    20.69    14 (+4)
 11 Washington State                  9.1527    14-1    108    16.73    10 (-1)
 12 Michigan State                    9.1493    14-2     20    12.81     4 (-8)
 13 Wisconsin                         9.1113    13-2     50    17.07    15 (+2)
 14 Georgetown                        9.0443    13-1    142    17.71    20 (+6)
 15 Marquette                         9.0055    13-2     81    18.87    26 (+11)
 16 Texas                             8.9604    13-3     21    15.44    12 (-4)
 17 Indiana                           8.9434    14-1    186    18.33    19 (+2)
 18 Vanderbilt                        8.9204    16-1     89    10.35     8 (-10)
 19 Butler                            8.8846    16-1    118    11.76    18 (-1)
 20 St. Mary's                        8.8647    14-2     62    13.31    24 (+4)
 21 Pittsburgh                        8.8137    14-2    109    16.13    27 (+6)
 22 Rhode Island                      8.7737    15-2     76    12.06    17 (-5)
 23 Miami (FL)                        8.6681    14-1    232    16.67    31 (+8)
 24 Arkansas                          8.6432    13-3     36    11.06    32 (+8)
 25 Drake                             8.6281    14-1    254    18.20    35 (+10)

Dropped out: #13 Syracuse (to #39), #21 Stanford (to #30), #22 Notre Dame (to #31), #23 Ohio State (to #27), #25 West Virginia (to #26)

332 Longwood                          3.2519     4-15   218   -14.05   330 (-2)
333 Prairie View A&M                  3.0588     1-13    99   -21.57   329 (-4)
334 Maryland - Eastern Shore          2.9654     2-13   158   -23.20   333 (-1)
335 Presbyterian                      2.8279     2-20   112   -12.36   337 (+2)
336 Eastern Illinois                  2.8214     2-15   297    -7.35   334 (-2)
337 Alcorn State                      2.5853     2-13   291   -18.40   338 (+1)
338 North Florida                     2.5153     1-15   243   -16.38   336 (-2)
339 Grambling State                   1.8936     0-10   314   -23.70   339 (0)
340 North Carolina Central            1.8154     1-21    95   -28.73   340 (0)
341 New Jersey Tech                   1.7737     0-18   220   -22.72   341 (0)

The complete report.

Thoughts:

My three teams — Texas, Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech — went 1-5 over the weekend. The only team to win was the Yellow Jacket women, who barely beat a bad Miami team, 68-65, on Sunday. The Lady Commodores lost by 11 at LSU, while the Vandy men came back from a 16-point second-half deficit at Rupp Arena, only to lose by six in double overtime after failing to connect from the field in the second extra period. The Texas women blew a late lead at home and lost to Kansas State in overtime. The struggling Georgia Tech men lost by 10 at Miami. Not a particularly good two days for this sports fan.
I have no idea where the Longhorns defense has gone. Giving up 59 points in a half to Missouri? I don't know where that came from. We're not guarding the three-point line, we're not rebounding, and it's way too easy for opponents to twist our defensive assignments into knots no matter what kind of set we're in. It's almost like the first loss of the season broke some of the players. Connor Atchley is back to sucking. Over the last five games, he's tallied a grand total of 33 points and 29 rebounds in 143 minutes of playing time. Like last year, he seems totally lost most of the time. Justin Mason lost his confidence along with his starting job. He's not even shooting anymore, much less scoring. In that same five-game span, he's been even worse than Atchley: just seven points and 15 rebounds in 142 minutes. Both players have seen their minutes cut almost in half since Gary Johnson was cleared to play.
I spent the late morning and early afternoon today watching Bud Selig and Don Fehr testifying in front of the congressional panel on steroid abuse. It was fascinating. I highly recommend catching whatever footage you can find.
My poor car is not aging gracefully. I went to go out on Saturday night, only to find a large puddle of coolant on my garage floor. And as if that weren't bad enough, I then had to drive to the mechanic, which due to the lack of coolant fluid in the system, caused the thermostat to burn out. Then at about 6:45 last night, they discovered a fourth coolant cap hidden behind an engine strut that also needed to be replaced, so I had to leave my car at the Firestone overnight and get a ride home from the manager. Fortunately, they're not going to charge me to replace that one, since they didn't find it in the initial exam. Blea.

Fun with transitivity

2008-01-11T14:27:00.000-06:00

In the 2007 football season: Grinnell beat Lawrence, who beat Knox, who beat Eureka, who beat Concordia (IL), who beat Benedictine, who beat Greenville, who beat Concordia (WI), who beat Wisconsin Lutheran, who beat Kalamazoo, who beat Bluffton, who beat Defiance, who beat Anderson (IN), who beat Taylor, who beat William Penn, who beat Trinity International, who beat Valparaiso, who beat Jacksonville, who beat Morehead State, who beat Dayton, who beat Fordham, who beat Colgate, who beat Towson, who beat Richmond, who beat Wofford, who beat Appalachian State, who beat Michigan, who beat Florida, who beat Kentucky, who beat Louisiana State.

That's a 30-element transitivity chain that begins in Division III, dips into NAIA, then goes through Division I-AA before reaching the BCS champion.

Yay!

Rankings, season final

2008-01-09T20:24:00.000-06:00

Well, here they are. Bowl season went pretty much just as I predicted, meaning that I went 16-16 on my bowl predictions and finished next-to-last in my pick-'em group. So that sucked.

I'm too tired to write extensive commentary like I usually do, plus I got my thumb caught in a folding table tonight at work, so typing isn't particularly comfortable right now. Just imagine that I've written a bunch of incisive, witty and brilliant bullet points, and act accordingly. I'm also half-assing some basketball rankings. They're showing up piecemeal over at my rankings website. I'll probably start posting them here next week.

Top 25, Season Final:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)
  1 Kansas                      7.2115    12-1     79    2.61     3 (+2)
  2 Louisiana State             7.1643    12-2     10    1.94     4 (+2)
  3 Georgia                     7.0571    11-2     12    1.62     7 (+4)
  4 Missouri                    6.9283    12-2     35    1.71     6 (+2)
  5 West Virginia               6.8823    11-2     40    2.19     9 (+4)
  6 Hawaii                      6.6868    12-1    117    1.70     2 (-4)
  7 Ohio State                  6.6774    11-2     60    2.46     1 (-6)
  8 Southern California         6.4844    11-2     73    2.04    13 (+5)
  9 Brigham Young               6.4406    11-2     75    1.62    12 (+3)
 10 Virginia Tech               6.3269    11-3     14    1.79     5 (-5)
 11 Oklahoma                    6.1826    11-3     37    2.08     8 (-3)
 12 Boston College              6.0141    11-3     47    1.39    14 (+2)
 13 Arizona State               5.9176    10-3     53    1.43    10 (-3)
 14 Texas                       5.9065    10-3     55    1.47    20 (+6)
 15 Cincinnati                  5.8282    10-3     62    1.93    19 (+4)
 16 Florida                     5.7691     9-4      2    1.67    11 (-5)
 17 Tennessee                   5.6198    10-4      9    1.19    25 (+8)
 18 Oregon                      5.4806     9-4     16    1.62    27 (+9)
 19 Auburn                      5.4645     9-4     17    1.43    28 (+9)
 20 South Florida               5.4342     9-4     21    1.48    15 (-5)
 21 Illinois                    5.3453     9-4     34    1.28    17 (-4)
 22 Boise State                 5.3249    10-3    111    1.96    16 (-6)
 23 Oregon State                5.2703     9-4     42    1.23    29 (+6)
 24 Michigan                    5.2492     9-4     45    1.27    30 (+6)
 25 Clemson                     5.2410     9-4     46    1.77    18 (-7)

Dropped out: #21 Virginia, #22 Connecticut, #23 Wisconsin, #24 Central Florida

111 Nevada - Las Vegas          0.4354     2-10    36    0.64   111 (0)
112 Alabama - Birmingham        0.1933     2-10    58    0.56   112 (0)
113 Utah State                  0.1139     2-10    65    0.61   113 (0)
114 North Texas                -0.1925     2-10    95    0.55   116 (+2)
115 Minnesota                  -0.2352     1-11    20    0.74   114 (-1)
116 Duke                       -0.3209     1-11    31    0.54   115 (-1)
117 Northern Illinois          -0.5144     2-10   114    0.62   117 (0)
118 Florida International      -0.7106     1-11    67    0.39   118 (0)
119 Southern Methodist         -0.8533     1-11    82    0.71   119 (0)
120 Idaho                      -0.8737     1-11    86    0.58   120 (0)

The complete report.

I resolve...

2008-01-01T00:41:00.000-06:00

...to make no New Year's resolutions.

Crap!

I have been assimilated

2007-12-27T12:08:00.000-06:00

I have joined the World of Warcraft.

I spent about seven or eight hours last night grinding my Night Elf hunter, Almuqit, up to level 11. I'm (apparently) not working this week, so I'll have plenty of time to play. By the time my one-week free trial period is up, he should be up around level 20. I probably still won't have made it out of Teldrassil, the Night Elf home city, though.

The name, in case you're wondering, comes from the 39th name of Allah: al-Muqit, meaning "the Nourisher." WoW doesn't allow non-letter characters in character names, so I had to sacrifice grammatical clarity and smush it into one word. I figured I'd go with something uplifting and nature-related, since he's an elvish animal-trainer.

It's a Non-Ecumenical Gift-Giving Day™ miracle!

2007-12-25T14:47:00.000-06:00

FTW??

2007-12-22T14:27:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I really hate the internet.

(Actual score: 38-35 Michigan with 12:35 to go in the second half.)

(Actual final score: UCLA 69-54 Michigan.)

Way to squander all that good will, guys

2007-12-14T23:37:00.000-06:00

Well, Appalachian State won its third consecutive I-AA national title tonight, completing the season that everyone thought they'd have when they beat Michigan in the Big House in the first week of the season. But given that their entire fanbase rushed out of the stands and onto the field with more than three and a half minutes left on the clock, hindering their own team's efforts to complete the game, they've shown themselves to have minimal ability to win with dignity and class. You'd think that a team winning its third straight national title would be a little less crass and boorish about it. Act like you've been there before. I know that's a horrible cliché by now, but that's only because it never stops being true.

It really is a shame that ASU's fans (and their players, for that matter) couldn't respect that, because they really do have a very good football team. They didn't even need to be dicks about it, since their play and their winning history should have spoken for itself.

Situations like this are where rushing the field becomes less about celebration and enjoying the moment, and more about being a drunken asshole. There are precisely three situations in which fans have a defensible argument for rushing the field (or the court, in basketball):

When a bad team upsets a heavily favored, highly ranked opponent (e.g., Arizona over Oregon in Tucson earlier this year).
When a team beats a close rival after a long string of defeats (e.g., when Texas beat Oklahoma in basketball in 2003 after losing eight straight games to the Sooners; I was personally involved in that court-storm).
When a nouveau riche program gets its first signature win over a highly ranked team, preferably a conference foe (e.g., Rutgers over Louisville last year or Kentucky over LSU this year).

The big caveat to these rules is that they're only invokable on your home field/court. There is one blanket addendum, though, that is always in force: No fans of a team with a long history of winning — like, for example, Appalachian State — should ever rush the field under any circumstances. Because that's what winning with class is all about.

w00t!

2007-12-12T21:25:00.001-06:00

Vandy came back from an 18-point second-half deficit, finished regulation on a 9-1 run to pull even with DePaul, then doubled up the Blue Demons in OT. The final margin was also Vandy's biggest lead of the game. Consequently, the 'Dores are the first team in the country to lock down a 10-0 record on the season (Rhode Island was the first team to reach double-digit wins, which they did with a big-time upset of Syracuse last Saturday in the Carrier Dome).

I hadn't had the chance to see Vandy play, yet (the game was on ESPN Classic). They played pretty poorly in the first half, committing tons of turnovers and letting DePaul have whatever they wanted offensively. But the second half was a different story. The defense clamped down and A.J. Ogilvy exploded late in the second half and in overtime, repeatedly coming open under the basket on cross-screens and blown defensive assignments. When DePaul adjusted and doubled down on Ogilvy, Ross Neltner and Shan Foster killed them from outside.

I'm really happy with this team. They were picked across the board to finish in the bottom half of the SEC East, but Ogilvy has been much, much better than I think anyone expected him to be. Barring a serious let-down between now and January, this is a team that will almost certainly go into conference play at 15-0. UMass is the only truly challenging opponent left on the pre-conference schedule; the remaining teams are Tennessee-Martin, Tennessee State, Iona and Rice, all at home. There are four or five really tough conference road games, so unless Tennessee really is as beatable as they've looked in the early going, I don't think that Vandy can claim the division title (Tennessee's conference schedule is a bit more favorable than Vandy's is). Splitting the difference between optimism and pessimism leads me to predict that Vandy will finish 15-0 in the non-conference and go 11-5 or thereabouts in conference, claiming the second spot in the East.

December 10, 1967

2007-12-10T20:19:00.000-06:00

Speaking of feeling old...

2007-12-08T00:11:00.000-06:00

It's been a sucky day for age-related misfortune. First there was the thing at lunch where the girl made me feel ancient by having minimal recognition of Duran Duran, then as we were shutting down for the day, I went to put away a large folding table and — wait for it — threw out my back. Excruciating pain ensued.

I'm only thirty years old. What the hell am I doing throwing out my back?

I spent four hours in the ER, first in the waiting room, then in an exam room for an hour and a half while the only doctor on shift stitched up a screaming toddler in the next room. Once I actually saw the doctor, I was out in less than half an hour. Fortunately, it's not particularly serious, just a sprain. There's no radiating pain, numbness, loss of sensation, or anything like that, so they sent me off with scrips for vicodin and flexeril (a muscle relaxant). I also picked up some of those Icy Hot back patches.

It's a good thing I don't have any plans this weekend. I'm not going to feel like doing anything for a few days.

She sure knows how to make a guy feel special

2007-12-07T13:25:00.000-06:00

One of the kids at work made me feel really old today. I was reading this week's Austin Chronicle while monitoring the games at lunch, and she wanted to look at the club listings. As I was paging through them, I pointed out the listing for the show Duran Duran is playing at Austin Music Hall next Tuesday.

She said — and I quote — "Oh, I think I know who they are."

Arg. Just kill me now.

A (very) minor revelation

2007-12-04T23:42:00.000-06:00

I was just mucking about with the HTML code of my previous post, and I learned that it's possible to resize an embedded YouTube video, at least by absolute pixel width. I didn't check if it was possible to do relative sizing by a percentage of the available space, like my blog template uses. I might try and drop some 2005 Rose Bowl highlights into the sidebar, or something.

And here's something bizarre:

I saw this scene on my way home from work this afternoon. This is the flood basin — a rough square about 125 yards to a side — at the corner of my street. In the middle of the basin sat a lone office chair, upright. It was such an odd and strangely lonely sight that I had to take a picture of it before someone went down and hauled off the chair. I probably should have zoomed in a little bit more, though.

Yay!

2007-12-03T21:58:00.001-06:00

Also:

Rankings, season final

2007-12-03T14:17:00.000-06:00

I just had the most bizarre experience. I was eating lunch at the Chipotle around the corner from my house, reading Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss. I had almost finished when I suddenly noticed the music that was playing. It was a reggae version of "Johnny B. Goode."

Yeah.

Reggae.

"Johnny B. Goode."

Bizarre. I felt like my brain had slipped two inches to the left.

Anyway, rankings:

Top 25, 12/03/2007:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)
  1 Ohio State                  7.2456    11-1     73    3.00     3 (+2)
  2 Hawaii                      7.2244    12-0    119    1.91     4 (+2)
  3 Kansas                      7.0026    11-1     97    2.77     5 (+2)
  4 Louisiana State             6.9562    11-2     17    1.97     6 (+2)
  5 Virginia Tech               6.9240    11-2     20    1.90     8 (+3)
  6 Missouri                    6.8874    11-2     25    1.63     2 (-4)
  7 Georgia                     6.7900    10-2     32    1.52     7 (0)
  8 Oklahoma                    6.6978    11-2     55    2.39    10 (+2)
  9 West Virginia               6.6742    10-2     50    2.26     1 (-8)
 10 Arizona State               6.4626    10-2     66    1.60    11 (+1)
 11 Florida                     6.3412     9-3      4    1.78    13 (+2)
 12 Brigham Young               6.3216    10-2     77    1.66    12 (0)
 13 Southern California         6.2654    10-2     87    1.96    14 (+1)
 14 Boston College              6.0568    10-3     33    1.41     9 (-5)
 15 South Florida               6.0188     9-3     31    1.73    16 (+1)
 16 Boise State                 5.9798    10-2    112    2.14    18 (+2)
 17 Illinois                    5.9564     9-3     37    1.47    17 (0)
 18 Clemson                     5.9273     9-3     42    1.86    20 (+2)
 19 Cincinnati                  5.7294     9-3     59    1.98    21 (+2)
 20 Texas                       5.6815     9-3     63    1.46    22 (+2)
 21 Virginia                    5.6433     9-3     67    1.28    24 (+3)
 22 Connecticut                 5.5960     9-3     70    1.50    23 (+1)
 23 Wisconsin                   5.5550     9-3     74    1.31    25 (+2)
 24 Central Florida             5.5140    10-3     86    1.38    27 (+3)
 25 Tennessee                   5.4223     9-4     15    1.19    15 (-10)

Dropped out: #19 Oregon (to #27)

Bottom 10:

Rkg Team                        Rating   Record   SOS   PF/PA   LW (Chng)
111 Nevada - Las Vegas          0.4279     2-10    27    0.64   112 (+1)
112 Alabama - Birmingham        0.2320     2-10    52    0.56   113 (+1)
113 Utah State                  0.1378     2-10    58    0.61   114 (+1)
114 Minnesota                  -0.1843     1-11    10    0.74   115 (+1)
115 Duke                       -0.1844     1-11     8    0.54   116 (+1)
116 North Texas                -0.1874     2-10    91    0.55   109 (-7)
117 Northern Illinois          -0.4480     2-10   113    0.62   117 (0)
118 Florida International      -0.7491     1-11    68    0.39   119 (+1)
119 Southern Methodist         -0.8660     1-11    78    0.71   118 (-1)
120 Idaho                      -0.8661     1-11    76    0.58   120 (0)

Thoughts:

I've chopped off the listing of bowl games, since it's too wide to fit the column here. All that stuff is available in the usual place, though.
Ugh. Holiday Bowl. Arizona State is going to destroy us.
Other Big 12 bowl games: Texas A&M vs. Penn State in the Alamo; Colorado vs. Alabama in the Independence; Oklahoma State vs. Indiana in the Insight; Missouri vs. Arkansas in the Cotton; Texas Tech vs. Virginia in the Gator; Oklahoma vs. West Virginia in the Fiesta; and Kansas vs. Virginia Tech in the Orange.
Ignoring for the moment the inherent and systemic ridiculousness of the bowl system, the biggest travesty of all is that 8-4 Troy failed to secure a bowl bid, while 6-6 Oklahoma State, which was blown out by Troy early in the season, didn't. For this reason, I have become convinced that conference tie-ins, except for those that go to the actual conference champions, should be abolished entirely. It's patently ridiculous that the Sun Belt co-champion was passed over in bowl selection in favor of a major conference team that they beat handily.
Again, this is a perfect year for a playoff. Like I said in my first bullet point after last week's rankings, the teams that are playing the best right now — Georgia and Southern Cal — have absolutely no shot whatsoever at a national championship. And now we can add Oklahoma and Virginia Tech to that list, too. Not that I think that VaTech could win it all what with their almost totally non-existent offense, but they deserve a shot at it, at the very least.
To this end, I've been constructing hypothetical 16-team playoff brackets. My selection rules and the brackets going back to the 1981 season are available at my rankings website.
I've just seen some footage from Sean Taylor's funeral on ESPNews. It's a sad, sad day for football. I'm not going to insult you by waxing rhapsodic over the stupid senselessness of his death, because you know this already. I just wanted to mention it and make my small contribution to the mourning process.
As far as I'm concerned, it's officially basketball season. Texas wound up #5 in both polls after the dramatic upset of #1/2 UCLA yesterday evening. I'm now more excited about this year than I think I've ever been before. They're starting to remind me a bit of the 2003-04 team, which remains my favorite recent Longhorns team. They're not the deepest or the most talented team out there, but there's a calmness, a centeredness, and a get-it-done-at-all-costs mentality surrounding them that is terribly endearing. Even better, we won last night despite playing like crap in the second half. Granted, a lot of that had to do with UCLA's as-advertised defense finally kicking in, but still, the fact that we were even in a position to win it at the end speaks to the toughness and dedication of D.J. Augustin and Damion James, to the suddenly and shockingly clutch play of Connor Atchley (easily our most improved returning player), and to the renewed commitment to defense we've seen this year. And the best thing of all is that barring an early entry into the NBA by Augustin (a distinct possibility), we get this entire team back next year. The only seniors are J.D. Lewis and Ian Mooney, neither of which plays more than five or six minutes per game.
Vandy cracked the top 25 for the first time in a few seasons. The Commodores are led by senior wingman Shan Foster (19.6 points and 4.7 rebounds per game) and Australian freshman center Andrew Ogilvy (18.1 and 6.0), who is shooting almost 70% on the season so far. It's a tough, deep, athletic team that will almost certainly make another Sweet 16 run in March. They're currently 7-0, and they actually have a good chance of winning out in non-conference play. Games against Wake Forest at home this Wednesday, on the road at DePaul a week later, and at home against UMass on 5 January look to be the biggest challenges, but a 15-0 record going into conference play isn't totally out of the question. Neither is a second-place finish behind Tennessee in the SEC East.