PackerHawk

Grapple at The Garden tickets go on presale tomorrow, general public on Friday. I know I'm going and was wondering if anybody else plans on attending the event. I was hoping my first trip to MSG would be for the NIT last year, but I'll settle for this.

So Maturi gave Kill a 7 year contract extension retroactive to his hiring last December. Why?

Heard this on my way to work this morning and was reminded of our discussions of CTE from the past. Thought it might be of interest in these parts. Still very preliminary research with small n-size, so nothing earth shaking yet. However, I wonder IF the APOE link is proven in larger trials if this could lead to some sort of screening test, if such a test would actually deter people from participating in concussion-prone activities, and eventually reduce CTE and premature deaths in future generations of athletes by causing people to stop playing football or hitting things with their heads at a younger age.

I'm sure the braintrust will be adding a superb piece on this in the morning. But for us night owls, throw on some Junior Senior and move your feet. The city has taken the obvious action of regulating the vendors a la the downtown vendors at every special event, and there will be Big ASS Turkey Legs and other stuff on Melrose this fall.

For those wondering if the UI AD would botch this one, dissect at will. I think this was an appropriate response.

Sometimes caring isn't creepy, it's the right thing to do. Yesterday the regents approved the construction of the new UI Children's Hospital to be completed by 2016. Thanks again to Jacobi, Vint, and Ross for getting us all involved with TD4K last fall.

Umm, massive fail at Reuters.

Brandon Wegher will have to sit out the 2011 and have two years of eligibility remaining. Clearly, KF and GB were busy yesterday finalizing this blow to Wegher's hopes and dreams and this explains their absence from the press conference. Hopefully they picked up a new shipment of diamonds while they were out of town.

It's because he's smart with hiring his assistants and he instills the right kind of mentality in his players. Even with all the grumbling in blogistan about his hire, I maintain that he will turn the program around sooner rather than later. First up, hiring a good defensive coordinator, Greg Mattison, father of former Iowa OG Bryan Mattison. See, I made it somewhat relevant.

Tip of the hat to Nathan Stuer for the graphic. Much better than the logo Delany will stick us with for the foreseeable future. It actually references the numbers 10 AND 12!! What a concept.

The interminable wait for the Midlands is almost over. Six days from now we will know how the current group of grapplers fare in a tournament format. So far, so good in duals, but I don't think we care about the National Duals as much as the chance at a 4-peat in March. While the seeds won't be announced until the 28th, our Armani clad pwners at NU have graced us with a "Top Contenders" list. Iowa has 2 guys at #1, McDonough and Gambrall, and at least has somebody in the "other contenders" list at every weight except 149.

I just noticed this when I finally opened my "pay up" letter from UIHC yesterday. In the simplest calculation (and assuming everybody pays what they pledged), BHGP'ers accounted for 20k of the 181k raised for TD4K. I don't know if I'm just really proud of our virtual community, disappointed that the rest of Hawkdom didn't step up more, or both. Either way, kudos to all of BHGP for stepping up big time on this one. Edit: I don't mean to downplay the amount of money raised for UIHC, I just doubt that 1/9th of Hawk fans are BHGP'ers and wonder why we accounted for a disproportionate share of the total.

Heard this story on NPR Saturday morning. It's only relevant because I'm sure there are readers here who would have liked the chance to play the game in college, and it just speaks to how widespread the love of college football is.

As referenced in the comments of the McCann't thread, the University of Iowa has been cleared of "unintentional and accidental" violations. Apparently, redundancy is in at TWWL (sorry for linking them, but I couldn't find another source for the story). PS - Not trying to break any news, just putting it out there for the commentariat. PPS - Could Ashton look like more of a douche in the article pic?

So let's all drink in his honor this weekend. The man is gone but his legacy still remains.