Let's start by calling this what it was: a disappointing, but inspiring loss. In so many ways, this game was largely a regression for a team that had made great strides in the second half of the season. As someone mentioned in the open thread last night, it was almost a microcosm of the season; poor start, amazing middle, and disappointing ending.

But at the same time, there was something there that was promising. After falling behind 21 points (a near-insurmountable amount for this team by all accounts), these young men (and I mean that in every sense of the word) showed a resilience that should be commended. They scrapped, they clawed, they pulled out everything they had and left it all on the field.

That they came up short is as much a sign of their youth as it is a sign of the pieces that are still missing. Still, you have to think that good times are ahead.

- Where else to start besides Teddy? The kid showed amazing heart out there. I lost count of how many times I held my breath as he lay on the ground, wondering if he was going to get back up or how he would look when he did. That he kept getting back up, dusting himself off, and jogging back onto the field after one play was amazing. As they say, you can't coach heart, and this kid has it in spades.

At the same time, this was probably the first game in months that he looked like a true freshman out there. There were poor decisions aplenty, not limited to the first interception or the sacks with time running out that you just can't take. Furthermore, he made several errant throws that we haven't seen from him before. It's hard to blame him considering he was running for his life on nearly every play (more on that later), but this game was a painful reminder that he is, in fact, still just a true freshman.

Still, there were again flashes of brilliance, and I have little doubt that this kid will be anything but a star. The play where he tiptoed the sideline and made a beautiful touch pass to the back corner of the end zone (while being held, no less) was spectacular.

- Speaking of quarterbacks, Will Stein can still throw, right? He went into the game three times, and executed the same HB stretch off left tackle from the pistol every single time. The first time, I can understand. The second and third times, though, time was short, points were needed, and lack of yardage gained meant Teddy came back in needing to execute on third and long just to keep the drive going. Let the kid throw a swing or a screen or something, at least.

- In the end, the Will Stein situation was just a small part of an overall larger problem that continues to plague this team: poor play calling on offense. In my mind, it started in the first half in the red zone with the Wild Card call on 3rd and 3 inside the 10. It almost felt like we were settling for a field goal on purpose. Teddy can throw, let him do it.

Nothing was worse, however, than the fourth down calls. Or, rather, the fourth down call. Seriously, we have more than one play on 4th and 1, right? Because judging by the evidence at hand, it would appear that Tight-I Power is all we have. I know Charlie wants to be a physical team, so I can understand the call the first time, maybe even the second. But after it failed both of those times, why would you continue to go to it a third and fourth time? Particularly in critical situations where we have to get the conversion. Everybody in the world could see it coming, there was no surprise or misdirection, and the blocking was poor every single time.

To be completely honest, even during the winning streak, the play calling has been lackluster and conservative. It was a problem last year that was largely overshadowed by good offensive line execution, tremendous running back ability, and, to be fair, low expectations. I had hoped it would be remedied after Watson moved up, but it simply hasn't worked out. My concern is that this is less a problem with the coordinator and more a problem with Charlie Strong wanting a certain style of team. I hope I'm wrong, but the actions that are taken this offseason will say a lot about where this team is headed offensively. Let's hope it's to a place that is far more creative and uses the talents of the team better (the quarterback and receivers).

- There were several coaching snafus in this game in my opinion, even outside the play calling. The onside kick with four minutes left. Not taking timeouts with time running down. A timeout with the clock already stopped. Not challenging the play where they called Teddy out of bounds (when it was clearly an incomplete pass) AND kept the clock rolling. It's sometimes easy to forget that this is still a relatively inexperienced coaching staff as well, and there will be mistakes along the way. It will be interesting to see how the entire team grows over the next few years.

- And now for the elephant in the room: the offensive line. Offensive is a good word for them. This is a regression if I've ever seen it. They were missing blocks, they were slow, and they just weren't very good. There were signs of some good blocking early on, but when NC State brought the pressure (which was often), they really struggled in making the right reads. There was far too much reacting after the snap, which should never happen with a good offensive line. And as evidenced by the repeated failures on fourth down, they were getting blown off the ball by a defensive line that they outweighed by nearly 20 pounds.

As Charlie said after the game, a lot is going to be said and written about this team over the next 8 months or so until the next season begins. But one thing that's certain is that the line has to get a lot better if we want to have a chance to go to a BCS bowl anytime soon. There's no doubt that they played better in the final 6 games of the season, but there were still signs of cracks in the foundation. The Pitt game exemplified this best, where they struggled to open up holes and slow down the pass rush, and it cropped up again last night. We just can't match up with a big, physical team right now, and that's going to limit our progress unless we get a serious infusion of talent and cohesiveness. The good news is that we have a lot of guys coming in and a lot of guys returning.

- If the offensive line is the elephant in the room, the defensive line is the hippo. This was probably the most disappointing aspect of the game in my opinion. They did a fine job stopping the run, but it's hard to know if that was their doing or just NC State being a poor running team (not to mention the fact that they barely even tried to run for much of the game). The pass rush, on the other hand, was almost nonexistent. As I said in the open thread last night, it almost felt like they weren't even trying to get to the quarterback; they were just occupying linemen hoping that somebody else would eventually get there. There wasn't a lot of activity, there wasn't a lot of stunting or twisting, and there was a decided lack of speed. It was a big letdown for the group that was really supposed to be the strength of the defense.

- The defense overall really struggled in the first half, which allowed NC State to get out to a big lead. We've struggled all season with the short pass, and it came back to bite us again last night. I think the problem is two-fold: we're not fast enough in the back 7 to play press coverage (for fear of getting beat deep), and our zone coverage is still not that great. Combined with all the blitzing that we do, it means short routes are going to be open. We've got to get better at swarming to the ball and not letting a 2 yard drag turn into a 10 yard play. Also give credit to NC State, who basically used the umpire as a pick on every other play to great effect. But still, we've got to tackle better. There were way too many broken tackles, particularly in the secondary.

On the other hand, they played very well in the second half, limiting NC State to just 3 points. One thing that is overlooked is the move of Hakeem Smith to nickel corner and bringing in Terrence Simien at safety, who made some huge plays. It's something I didn't see coming, and to be honest, was a pretty astounding shakeup. These guys can coach defense.

- Penalties. My God, the penalties. It's disappointing to me that we continue to struggle here. I know we have a young team, but these have got to stop. You can't keep beating yourself. The drive in the second half where we committed penalties three times to keep the drive alive, and ended up giving up 3 points when it should've been nothing, was a game changer. Not only did it allow them to take a two-touchdown lead, but it also took almost 7 minutes off the clock, time that would have been very valuable down the stretch. This is something we really need to clean up if we want to have a shot at the BCS.

- Eli Rogers is going to be a fantastic receiver, but he's got a lot to learn quickly. He's already been taken off punt return duties for not securing the ball, and he continues to struggle with the same problem in the passing game. He dropped several crucial passes (including one which was ruled a catch and not reviewed), the most damaging being on 3rd down after the onside kick. The worst play, however, was not going for the ball on Amerson's first interception. As Charlie said after the game, if he at least makes a play on the ball, that's either going to be a catch, an incompletion, or a pass interference. Not even making an attempt was just awful, and it ended in a pick-6, which, in retrospect, was probably the dagger. It was still an amazing play by Amerson, who is a very good player.

- I think it's important to give Vic some credit. He played probably his best game of the year, which is what you want to see from a senior. He was making good cuts, looked more determined than ever, was doing a great job at running north-south, and was fighting for every yard. I was hoping to see more of that all season, but it was nice to see him bookend his career in a positive way.

- It was also nice to see Josh Bellamy come to play. In the absence of Michaelee Harris, it was important for him to have a good game, and he stepped up with some big catches. He didn't have quite the senior season that we were all hoping for, and no doubt that has something to do with the quarterback change (Teddy is much more about spreading the ball around whereas Froman and Burke really only concentrated on two or three receivers most of the game), but he was a big reason we had the opportunities we had last night.

- A senior that really didn't step up was Josh Chichester. He made one really good catch, but was nearly invisible for the rest of the game. When he was visible, he was back to dropping a lot of catches. After having a good season last year, I was expecting good things from him this year, but he was incredibly inconsistent. At the end of the day, I just don't think the move to tight end was a good one for him. He's just not a very good blocker, and he's too slow to be coming out of a three-point stance. It'll be interesting to see how the offense changes next year with true tight ends in Nate Nord and Chris White, both of whom made some excellent catches this season and are good blockers.

- I don't know what was going on, but there were a lot of Louisville players slipping out there last night. Maybe it had something to do with playing on natural grass, which is something we didn't do very much this season. Maybe it was because of all the rain earlier in the day. I read something earlier that said the team switched to new cleats and they couldn't change the spikes. No matter the reason, it directly led to at least one touchdown, and several other big plays. Just wasn't our night.

- The officials were terrible. I'm not sure they were really biased, as they made bad calls both ways, I think they were just incompetent. The unsportsmanlike flag on Preston Brown was nothing short of egregious, and is easily one of the top 5 worst calls of all time. How they were able to hold it up, even after conferring, when everyone else could see how bad of a call it was, is absolutely appalling.

Then there was the out of bounds call late in the game where they said Teddy was pushed out when he clearly threw the ball. It was a loss of 7 yards, but worst of all, they kept the clock running, saying he was pushed out of bounds, meaning we lost nearly another minute of time. And at no point did they ever review the play. Besides those plays, there was Eli's catch that wasn't really a catch, there were numerous NC State holds that weren't called, questionable pass interference calls and non-calls, several arguably late hits on Teddy, and countless unnecessary (and unnecessarily long) reviews. Just a poor performance by the zebras.

Overall, a disappointing loss, but this team showed a lot of grit and determination, and that's promising. There's also a ton of youth that will do a lot of growing up. Mike said before the game that he was concerned the young guys on this team would not be focused, that they would look at it more as a reward rather than a business trip, and I think that was true. There definitely seemed to be a lack of focus to start the game, and that resulted in NC State getting out to a big lead that proved too much to overcome.

Still, the future is bright. I don't know that we're quite ready for a BCS bowl yet, but we're certainly headed in that direction, and that's a good thing to be able to say.

Hello! My name is John Marinumbskull, I’m the current president of Beta Epsilon fraternity, and I’d like to start by welcoming you to Because we Can so Shut up University. I’m glad you’ve all made the decision to acquiesce to the University (even though you have no other choice). Tonight, I’d like to talk to you about the benefits of joining an elite BCSU fraternity, then I’d like to discuss some of the other fraternities, and then I’d like to close by showing you why you should rush Beta Epsilon.

Before I begin, I’d like to say it’s good to see you all here. You probably know some of our current members, were probably friends with them before they joined Beta Epsilon. Houston, ECU, you guys are probably familiar with our guys Louisville, South Florida and Cincinnati. Boise, San Diego State, Air Force, I’d like to thank you for making the long trip out here. Hope you don’t have jet lag! Hopefully you can make many more. Navy, your reputation precedes you. I know you haven’t had the greatest luck lately, but you’ve got a rich history, a big family, and a lot of friends, so that’s always good. SMU, UCF, somebody said we should invite you, so here you are.

So let’s dive right into why you should join a fraternity at BCSU. First of all, it gains you a potential invite to the end of year BCSU party. You’ve all heard about it, some of you have crashed it. You know about the party gifts, the music, the media attention. Secondly, it gets you great publicity. The school paper always covers our stories first. The University TV televises a lot of our intramural games (though a lot of ours here at Beta Epsilon seem to end up on the website most of the time these days). And thirdly, money. You’re probably saying to yourself "But I thought I came to BCSU to get an education?" Let’s be honest, you and I both know that’s not true.

You have six fraternity options here at BCSU. We’ll start with Beta 1 Gamma. Stupid name, I know. Don’t even know where the 1 came from, but whatever. Anyway, these guys probably have one of the richest traditions of any of the fraternities. Their dads and granddads won Homecoming King a lot back in the day. Haven’t had many lately, though (but don’t tell the party committee that). Still seem to get nominated a lot on history only. Their parents and grandparents are all lawyers and doctors and stuff, though, so they basically own the party committee and the University media. They were big fans of getting the party started to begin with.

Next you’ve got Sigma Epsilon Chi. These guys have basically dominated Homecoming King in the past decade, but the guys on the east side of the frat house struggle these days. They’ve got that one guy Kentucky that throws a lot of good basketball parties. Between us, I’ve heard he buys a lot of professional dancers for his parties, but the fraternity governing body (the Non Compliance Apathy Association, FYI) seems to turn a blind eye. Bottom line, these guys are good, and we wouldn’t blame you for wanting to join, but all we can say is "Good Luck."

That brings us to Pi Alpha Chi. They’re on the other side of campus. Can’t figure out why people want to join. That fast guy that wears crazy clothes all the time is pretty cool, I guess.

Then you’ve got Alpha Chi Chi. Easily the most overrated fraternity on campus. Haven’t had a Homecoming King in years. Nobody even nominated. Perform terribly in finals. Come from nice neighborhoods, though, so they get plenty of airtime on University TV, warranted or not.

Then there’s the Big 12. That’s not even Greek. I don’t know why people want to join. I mean, sure they do okay in finals, and there always seems to be somebody that’s in the talks of being nominated for Homecoming King, but they haven’t won in a while. Throw solid basketball parties too. I guess it’s because they’re really looking to expand these days since some members got pissed off that that guy Texas basically runs the fraternity singlehandedly and left. Shut up, Louisville, you’re not going anywhere. Not for at least two more years.

So that leaves us with Beta Epsilon. We’ve lost some members in recent months, that’s true. There is absolutely no truth, however, that some members are looking to leave. Shut up, Louisville and Connecticut. Sure, we haven’t had a Homecoming King nominee in quite some time. And sure, our BCSU end of year party invitee has failed to perform the last few years, but the rest of the fraternity does well in their finals, on average. Either way, we haven’t been any worse than Alpha Chi Chi. Plus, our basketball parties are badass, and while they may not be as big, at least they’re performance based.

Now I know you’ve seen the smear campaign that University TV has run against us. They say we don’t deserve an invite any more. They say our location sucks. They say our revenues are too small and our members don’t have enough talent. Don’t buy into it. We have a lot to offer you guys, and our current charter runs through 2013, so you’ll get membership for at least the next couple years. Plus, we can totally work out a new contract with another media outlet if you guys come on board. University TV has too much power anyway. Might as well call them the Everybody Suck our Pole Network. And while we may not offer as many perks as some of the other fraternities, we can promise that you’ll have at least a few more than if you didn’t join any fraternity at all. So, there’s that.

In summation, I hope you choose to rush Beta Epsilon. Don’t worry about not being accepted, because we’re kind of desperate. But that doesn’t mean we’re not proud. Not completely, anyway. Thank you all for coming out, and enjoy our clam buffet and complementary Rosaries.

via i76.photobucket.com

I guess we all gnome the truth now.

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Reading Remote Cardinal’s story brought back a lot of memories for me, because my path to Cardinal fandom is eerily similar to his.  There are some distinct differences, however, so I figured I’d share my experiences with “The Rivalry” as well.  Plus, everybody seems to be doing it.

Like RC, I grew up in a UK household as a UK fan.  In my family, unlike his, it was my mother who was the UK fanatic, while my dad was merely along for the ride.  He grew up all over the world, as his father was in the military, and only moved to Louisville in high school.  My mother, on the other hand, grew up in south-central Kentucky, otherwise known as “true blue” country.  Her parents were Cats fans.  Her brother and sister went to UK.  She ended up going to a vocational school in Louisville, but never bled anything but blue.  I was exposed from day 1, wearing various UK paraphernalia even as an infant. 

As I grew up, Kentucky basketball was king in my household.  We had the commemorative Maker’s Mark bottles and the UK-emblazoned Coca-Cola cans.  I had UK jerseys and sweaters.  I had a framed print of the 92 Wildcats hanging in my room through high school.  I had Jamal Mashburn’s rookie card with the Mavericks (which I actually still have).  I even had an autographed Jeff Brassow card from his 93-94 senior campaign.  But, for me, sports were always kind of an afterthought, even though I played most of them as a kid.  We never had the money to go to games, and I usually found myself playing with Legos while a game was on TV in the background. 

One thing I knew for sure, though, was that we hated Louisville.

My household was not quite as tolerant as Remote Cardinal’s.  Growing up in rural Kentucky, I heard a lot of racism.  More than my fair share.  And a lot of it, sadly, came from within my family.  I grew up hearing all sorts of remarks about the kind of players that Louisville recruited, the kinds of guys that they played, and the kind of people that lived in the city (even though my parents both lived there when I was born).  I think that’s when I really started to separate from their ideals.  I never really bought into that kind of thing.  But, it ended up having an interesting side effect. 

I was in fifth grade in 1997 when Pitino left for the NBA and Tubby Smith took over at Kentucky.  Many members of my family had an immediate reaction to Smith’s hiring, very similar to that of many fans, that is well known, but rarely discussed: how can UK have a n***** for a coach?  Of course, nothing would stop them from praising Big Blue, but I saw first hand how a large part of that fanbase never truly accepted Tubby Smith, even after he won a championship.  Still, it was UK all the way, they just needed a new coach.  Preferably, they wanted Pitino to come back once he inevitably failed in Boston (the writing was on the wall within a year). 

Of course, then Pitino came back to the state of Kentucky.  I was just starting high school when that happened.  Almost immediately I started hearing things that I never thought I’d hear: “Maybe we should start rooting for Louisville.”  Of course, that never actually happened, but it’s safe to say that a large part of the fanbase that had become disgruntled with Tubby Smith (or never really gave him a chance in the first place) became a lot more receptive of Louisville basketball.  It may not be discussed often these days, but from my experience, for all those UK fans that were ready to crucify Pitino when he accepted the Louisville job, there was probably another one (maybe a half) that was actually excited to see him in the state again coaching college basketball.  They may have been secretly hoping that it would force Kentucky to hire someone better, but there’s no doubt that it changed things forever. 

I had a very successful high school career.  I graduated 3rd in my class, did extremely well on my ACT, and was a 2004 Governor’s Scholar.  I could basically go to any in-state school I wanted free of charge.  Western Kentucky, in particular, recruited me hard, inviting myself and 9 other students from around the country to come to campus and be offered their premier scholarship at halftime of a basketball game in Diddle arena.  I decided, however, that I wanted to major in engineering, which WKU does not offer.  I got scholarships to some prestigious out of state schools, including Kettering and Missouri-Rolla (no MIT for me), but they were partial.  Louisville offered me a full scholarship with plenty of money to live.  UK just gave me a scholarship with no stipend, to my disappointment.  I therefore decided, a bit begrudgingly, to attend Louisville, rather than my lifelong dream of being a UK grad.  Again, my parents made very little money, and anything I could do to make things easier for them was what I had to do. 

Shortly after taking my visit to Louisville and signing up for classes, I received the rest of my scholarship offer from Kentucky.  I would be receiving even more money than from Louisville.  But they had waited far too long.  I was insulted.  Did they just expect me to wait around on them forever?  That was a bit arrogant, I thought.  So I decided to stick with Louisville. 

I entered college in 2005.  If you’ll remember, that was a very good year for Louisville athletics.  Shortly after I made my college decision, Louisville was in the Final Four.  But I was still only a casual sports fan at that time.  It wasn’t until I started college and became friends with a member of the Louisville band that I really came to enjoy Louisville sports, particularly football.  And that’s when my first very personal experience with The Rivalry happened.

We played football in Lexington in 2005, and my best friend of course made the trip to Commonwealth stadium with the band.  He was also a freshman, and it was his first experience in Commonwealth.  When he got back from the game, he was extremely upset.  That’s when he told me about everything that had happened in Lexington.  How they had been booed entering the stadium.  How the UK fans threw food at them.  How they poured their drinks on the band as they entered the field and cursed at them.  These weren’t even players.  How could somebody act like that to members of the band?  What’s worse, there were several UK fans attending UofL, and they were insufferable all week long.  Not to mention incredibly sore losers afterwards.  Even members of my family (not my parents) started making derogatory comments about the Cardinals, the team which helped fund my college.  It was at that point my stance in this rivalry changed forever, and I haven’t looked back.

I’ve seen both sides of this rivalry on a very personal level.  What’s more, I’ve seen and experienced firsthand the philosophical differences between the majority of each fanbase.  I drew my own line in the sand just over five years ago, and really haven’t looked back.  One thing I find encouraging, however, is how things have started to change.  My hometown, once a hotbed for all things Blue and a no-fly zone for all things Red, is becoming more red-riddled all the time.  My dad easily converted, and now proudly displays his Cardinal license plate and bumper sticker.  You can buy Louisville merchandise in stores all across the town.  Where there used to be only Wildcat flags, there are now Cardinal flags.  More importantly, however, I’ve seen firsthand the evolution of people in this state to becoming more accepting and more tolerant.  Unfortunately, we still have a way to go, and the side effect seems to be that the old-school stalwarts of each camp have become even more heated as the two sides have mingled and wrestled national success over the years.  Who knows how things go from here, but there’s certainly a change brewing.  One thing of which I’m certain: I’m proud to finally be a Cardinal. 

Mike, I don't know if you can do anything about this, but are you aware of the annoying Samsung Next Level Flash ad that sits on this page right on top of the navigation bar?  It's incredibly annoying.  Is there anything you can do about this?

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So the embargo on NCAA has been lifted as of today.  Reviews are coming in that have been pretty good.  Most are saying that it's the best next-gen football game available (which considering the only other football games released on next-gen consoles were pure Arcade games and/or didn't have the NFL or NCAA licenses still isn't saying much).  Running is apparently much improved, mostly due to blocking improvements.  AI is slightly better, and graphics are much better.

But I know that you guys really want to know about Louisville.  Let's start with the good.  First of all, the stadium expansion IS IN, despite previous reports.  They've added the east upper deck, at least.  The scoreboard looks the same, and I didn't see the new south terrace.  Not saying they're not in, I just didn't see them.  Also, on the Unitas endzone side, the shrubs are not in, but they did add the black "The Ville" inflatables (although, I'm now wondering if we've even used those since 06?).  Now for the bad... the roster is completely jacked up.  I doubt Dorsey or Campbell are in there.  And guess who is rated as our best player?  Vic Anderson?  Nope.  Beaumont?  Nada.  Froman?  You wish.  No, instead it's the stellar and proven... Chris Philpott.  Yes, that's right, the man who has barely played the last two seasons at our worst position and who has been wildly inconsistent in those games in which he has played is the ONLY player rated in the 90s on the team.  Plus there are still issues such as Ashley still being at HB and Chichester still being at WR.  Also, we apparently have another kicker with number 17 who is the 5th best player on the team.  Umm... ok.  Suffice to say, you will want to use updated (and more accurate) community rosters as soon as they become available, so make sure to wait a bit before you start your Dynasties and do some simulations.

Speaking of simulations, I've only seen one so far.  But there was good news.  In that simulation, it had Louisville going 7-5 (3-4) and beating 8-4 (4-3) Hawaii in the New Mexico bowl by a score of 41-24.  Obviously I wouldn't put much into that though since apparently EA thinks our best (nay, only ELITE player) is a junior kicker who has 6 FGs and 10 XPs in his career.  

From what I've seen and heard over on OperationSports, the renovations and updates to PJCS will NOT be in NCAA 11.  They don't even have IU's updates in, and those were done before last season.  The game will be out before the updates here are done, so we'll have to wait until next year.

Also interesting to note: Rutgers' stadium was updated in appearance, but not attendance.  So despite the stadium now being much larger in the game, it will still only report holding around 40,000.  Let's hope we don't have the same issue next year.

Two of the most hyped and highest profile big men in Pitino's tenure at Louisville had very different outcomes at the college level; Samuels kinda-sorta worked out, while Caracter certainly did not.  But it was Caracter who ended up getting a nod from NBA champions LA Lakers late in the 2nd round while Samuels sat on the outside looking in.  If you had told me two years ago that this would be the outcome, I would have said you were crazy.  If you had told me two months ago, I would have given you a "Well... duh" look.  If you had told me two days ago, I would have been absolutely confused.

Like most Louisville fans, I was incredibly disappointed with Samuels' performance in a Cardinal uniform.  There's no doubt that he had a solid contribution to the team and was a large part of the reason the team even made it to the tournament this year; but his talent level and, worse, his effort level, was hyped to be far more than it ended up being (which was slightly higher than that of a Jamaican bobsled team).  At times brilliant, at times lethargic, there were only two things you could always count on from Samardo: 1) he would somehow get a wide-open dunk at some point, and 2) he would give up more rebounds in a half than Pervis Ellison would in an entire game.  With a broken arm.  Blindfolded.

Despite that, it seemed in recent months that Samardo had found some sort of niche within the NBA community.  Word was constantly flowing from NBA draft analysts and "insiders" that scouts were becoming more and more impressed with his game, and as of early this week, he had inexplicably skyrocketed from a fringe late second round pick (or undrafted) to a potential mid first rounder.  Despite his lackluster performance here in the River City, I was hoping I would see him represent the Cardinals as a first round pick for the second straight year and hopefully earn the money that his family seems to need.  Unfortunately, one pick after another came and went, and after 60 other players had heard their names called, Samuels was nowhere to be seen.

Honestly, I'm a little surprised.  Besides all the chatter of his sudden rise in draft stock, it's hard to look at the draft list and think that he couldn't find a spot on a roster ahead of some of these other guys.  Tibor Pleiss?  Paulo Prestes?  Pape Sy?  I understand Pau Gasol and Dirk Nowitzki have worked out well, but there are guys on here being picked up in the first round that have never played a game against anybody with NBA-level talent.  I mean, Chicago took a French guy named Kevin Seraphin with the 17th pick (much to the chagrin of Chicago fans, who immediately booed and began chanting "USA! USA!").  You're telling me that you would rather have these guys on your roster than Samardo Samuels, who spent two years averaging 15+ ppg in the Big East against guys like Greg Monroe, Dejuan Blair, Luke Harangody, and Hamady N'diaye, all of whom were drafted?  Seems like somebody dropped the ball on reporting that NBA scouts were "warming up" to Samardo's style.

Oh well, best of luck to Samardo wherever he ends up.  Shame it had to end this way, though.  

New England was a “couple big plays” away from winning.  Arizona was “a couple big plays” away from winning.  Florida was “a couple big plays” away from beating Ole Miss last year.

Whatever that debacle was that took place at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium last night was not “a couple big plays” away from a victory, and the fact that Steve Kragthorpe has infected the players with that notion is perhaps even more disheartening than the on-field shellacking that they took.

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So I've got a lot to say, cause I've got a lot on my mind after that game.  Whatever hopes or ambitions I had about this team a week ago are quickly fading, and it will take a mesmerizing performance at Commonwealth Stadium in 2 weeks to convince me we've got any shot at postseason play, and even then, if anybody says we've still got a chance, I'll look at them silly in public.  Anyway, ridiculously, unnecessarily, over-the-top wordy analysis after the break.

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I didn't see one posted, so I was just wondering if there was going to be one posted.  If not, I guess anyone who's interested can discuss it here.

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So there were plenty of upsets today, especially in our bracket.  Wake Forest, West Virginia, and Ohio State all went down.

Ohio State I expected.  I had Siena victorious in my bracket, and to be honest, I really think this is a great thing for us.  Not having to play Ohio State in Dayton is a plus in my mind, though I am a little worried about Siena's shooting and they don't seem to get worn down by pressure as much as Ohio State.  But at least they won't have home court advantage.

West Virginia was surprising, and I had them in the Sweet Sixteen in my bracket.  To be honest, though, I thought they would either go three rounds or go out the first round.  They were probably the hardest team outside of Providence from the Big East to gauge.  Either way, I think it's a definite plus to not have to face them for the third time this year.  I think they matched up well with us, too.

Wake Forest was the biggest shocker to me.  And to be honest, I don't know what to expect from Cleveland State.  Did anybody watch this game?  Any thoughts on what to expect from them?  I can't say I'm upset about not having to face Wake Forest, as they were one team I was worried about.  But considered the ass-beating Cleveland State gave them, I don't know which of the two would have been better.  I hope we're not going up against a Cinderella in the third round.  Of course, we took care of the Syracuse cinderella, so I still have faith in this team.

On paper, this is shaping up to be an easy road for us.  The highest seed we'll see before the fourth round will be a 9 seed, and that's next.  We'll be facing either a 12 or 13 in the Sweet Sixteen, where Pitino is undefeated.  On the other hand, you have to be worried about an underrated cinderella.  This is shaping up to be an exciting tournament run.  What do you guys think?

I give us a 70% chance of us still being ranked #6 next week.

That's assuming UConn, UNC, and OK do their deeds this week (as well as us).  I think if everybody in their spot right now wins their games the rest of the week, we'll still be at #6 next week, despite the losses above us.  I see it as:

1.  UConn

2.  UNC

3.  Memphis

4.  Pitt

5.  Oklahoma

6.  Louisville