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What is it About Division II?

That Findlay shot in OT was great today. Just brilliant.

But let's not forget - LET'S NOT FORGET - that two years ago Barton College from Wilson, NC did this:

Know Your Canon Fodder

UNC-Radford: From this Radford-NCAA-party, pick the "hey we're on TV!" bench guys and the "Dang- Carolina?"-starter:

so Radford's domain is runet.edu, huh? Well, if you look up RU.edu, you don't get rutgers or rice or regent or anywhere in russia. You get Rogers State, which is in Oklahoma. Rogers State also has RSU.edu locked up, which really seems greedy.
(radford also owns Radford.edu).

So Radford is in - wait for it! - Radford VA, which is, err, in Virginia, nearer mountains than a beach, to judge from the aeriel pics.


Morgan State-OU:

All you need to know about Morgan State.

The favorite with 5 to go to finish the summer as my favorite Alphabet clip.

Memphis-Cal State Northridge: I'm fairly certain CSUN ("C-sun", or alternately "Cal State-Northridge" or as Bill Simmons says with hilarious cluelessness, "C-S-Northridge") is the most famous bad school in America. CSUN is the state U that serves the San Fernando Valley, miles below the academic mastiffs of nearby LA and the state's UC campuses. It has long been the go-to punchline school for Los Angeles, which means that over the years that status has proliferated nationally thanks to jokes on TV and movies and just-often-enough peripheral appearances from its baseball and bball team.

The town of Northridge is a ridge-less valley city squeezed between the more-famous Reseda (Tom Petty), Granada Hills (better sports) and Chatsworth (you know why), and is distinctive in absolutely no way at all except for being the epicenter, and popular name, of the worst LA earthquake of the TV era.

Perhaps ironically, on the same day CSUN makes its Memphis curtain call (March 19), China Sunergy (CSUN-nasdaq) willl announce is full year 2008 earnings. Not sure what to expect on the call, but consider: CSUN Dec 28, 2007 - 17.07; last Friday: 1.65. So 2008 didn't have the pop for CSUN LLC it did for the CSUN Matadors.

Somebody should offer a parly of spreads of CSUN vs. Memphis against CSUN vs. FY08.

Binghamton-Duke: It either is or was SUNY-Binghamton, after beginning life as a branch of Syracuse after its founding by The Guy behind IBM. But henceforth, in deference to its upstate NY lineage, we'll call it "the Bing". The Bing may not have the basketball pedigree - or any pedigree - of Duke, but that that doesn't mean they won't give Duke all the entitled smugness they can handle. From the top of the Bing's About Page:

The best public university in the northeast. Period.

Oh my.

On the same terribly self-impressed page, the Bing reports this at-first-blush impressive stat -
Students in top 25% of their HS class: 84%

Let's break that down just a bit... what percent of any HS class goes to ANY 4-year school? Less than 50% right? 25-30 go to work, 20-25 go to JC or less? So about 50? So 3 out of every 20 Bing students were NOT in the top half of their college-bound peers?
Period.

However, if the Bing is not quite the Harvard-on-the-Susquehanna it likes to think it is, it's no CSUN. First of all, the campus has a really terrific housing/dorm naming system. Each block of dorms - "college" - has a theme, and the names of the buildings follow the theme. So for the College-in-the-Woods, your building is named after an Iriquios Tribe. In the Hienman College, your dorm is named for former NY Govs (no word on the Spitzer Quad). The buildings in Hillside college are all named after NY state parks, and those in Susquehanna college are all named after - get this - tributaries to the Susquehanna, which flows through campus.

I ain't gonna lie: that's all cool as hell.

Another way in which the Bing differs from CSUN: it's shaped like a brain.

from wiki:

A unique feature of the main campus is that it is shaped like a brain. The primary road on campus creates a closed loop to form the cerebrum and cerebellum, and the main entrance road creates the spinal cord which leads up to a traffic circle (representing the medulla). The main road is thus frequently referred to as The Brain.

and, well, here it is:

Homer and the Heels Index

Or How Losing to FSU was the Perfect Plan!


I have a friend nicknamed Homer who is a looooong-time Duke fan because he went to geek-camp there when he was 12 or something. He emailed after the Heels lost to FSU:

"Buddy of mine has always sensibly insisted that it's best to lose no later than Saturday in the acc tournament, better even than winning the whole thing."

UPDATE: The Homer Theory Rolls On

Wisco 61, FSU 59;
UNC 101, Radford 58

Really? Cuz as of yesterday, that's me! Let's do an Index!

The first NCAA tourney that allowed 'at large' teams (ie, more than one team per conference) was 1974. We'll use that era to look at "Homer Teams", which is the why-not name we'll use for teams that "lost "no later than Saturday in the acc tournament" ie, non ACC-tourney finalist.

Homer Teams Vs ACC Runner-Ups

22: NCAA tourneys since 1974 (35 years) in which an ACC Homer Team advanced farther than the ACC runner-up.
6: NCAA tourney in which an ACC Homer Team tied the Runner-up's performance.
7: Number of times that the ACC Runner-up had a better tourney run than any ACC Homer Team.

Or...

60: Percent of NCAA tourneys in which a Homer Team outperformed the ACC runner-up.
80: Percent including 'ties', i.e. years that an ACC Homer Team advanced at least as far as the ACC runner-up.

And more recently...

81.25: Percent of years since 1992 that Homer team out-performed ACC Runner-up (no ties).

Lesson - 4 out of 5 times in the modern NCAA era, at least one ACC team that lost "no later than Saturday in the ACC tournament" has performed as well or better than the team that lost on Sunday. And since 1992, a Homer team has almost always performed better.

That's abjectly bad news for today's runner-up (please Duke please Duke please Duke!), because only one team is the RU each year. Those numbers are YOURS.

It's a bit trickier for would-be Homer team, since ever tourney (since expansion) produces 10 Homer-candidates that lose "no later than Saturday," and at least two or three of them generally make the tourney.
The trick is to be the right one.

Homer Teams vs. ACC Champions

9: NCAA tourney's since 1974 when an ACC "Homer Team" has been the best performing ACC entry (ie, advanced farther than both the ACC Champ and runner-up)
12: Same stat, including "ties" (Homer team equals performance of ACC Champ and runner-up)
6: Those occurances since 1990 (meaning that 2/3s of the best Homer runs have occured in less than half of the tourneys).
7: Same stat, with ties

Homer Lesson#2 - Since 1990, a Homer team has outperformed the ACC finalists in the NCAAs slightly more than 1/3 of the time... about what you'd expect if the two finalists and the next best team were all taken as 'equals.'

Technically, this fails the Homer Theory, but only the part about it being "better than winning the whole thing".


Runner-up: First loser. Again.

5: NCAA tourney since 1974 when the ACC runner-up was the top performing ACC team in the NCAA tournament, or 1/7 years.
0: Same stat, since 1996.
5: Homer teams that had the best NCAA run since 1996.

Homer Lesson #3 - Don't be the Runner-up

Final Championship Index

9: NCAA Championships won by ACC teams since 1974

5: NCAA Titles won by ACC Champs
2: NCAA Titles won by ACC Runner-ups
2: NCAA TItles won by ACC Homer Teams... including the last two (UMD 02, UNC 05)

So Cheer up, Heels - we got'em right where we want'em!

ACC's NCAA CHAMPS (ACC tourney result)
- 1974 NC State (Champ)
- 1982 UNC (Champ)
- 1983 NC State (Champ)
- 1991 Duke (RU)
- 1992 Duke (Champ)
- 1993 UNC (RU)
- 2001 Duke (Champ)
- 2002 Maryland (Homer Team)
- 2005 UNC (Homer Team)

Chick-fil-a Index

We'll be back to the CFB Alphabet tomorrow (anybody wild guesses at V? Anybody want odds?). All this video is missing is a reference to Polynesian Sauce and a lock against playing it on Sunday.





11: Years the Chick-fil-a Peach Bowl was sponsored by the Atlanta Marathon, ie The Atlanta Marathon bowl.
2: by ratings, Chick-fil-a Peach Bowls in all-time top six ESPN bowl broadcasts, including 2009 Auburn Clemson game, ESPN's top broadcast of the bowl season (Auburn 23, Clemson 20 OT)
4: Consecutive wins by the SEC.
4: Consecutive SEC losses prior to current streak.
36: Average LSU winning margin (37, 35) in two last four games.
410: Calories in a chicken sandwich
400: 12 nuggets
370: Medium waffle fries
660: Vanilla shakes. God bless.

HIGH SCHOOL-ATHLETE-TRIVIA BONUS:

40-4: High school wrestling record (jr and sr years), including Ga state champion, of Dan Cathy, current Sr. VP and son of Truett Cathy, CFA founder.

UPDATE:

Mostly for the music track, highlughts of 2007 CFA Bowl, Auburn-Clemson. Whoever Au.Tiger.96 is, he knows how to use an over-inflated Michael Bay-ish soundtrack.

Alliteration Index

"Come and sit by me side if you love me,
Do not hasten to bid me Adieu /
Just remember the Red River's Val Varley
And that guy who played for TCU"

10: Years in prison for Lonta Hobbs, former TCU RB and one of the stars of the legendary TCU-Boise State Ft. Worth Bowl.

Hobbs was rung up for selling drugs near his old HS stadium by the exquisitely named Red River DA, Val Varley.

U is for Unneccesary, Unsportsmanlike and Ultramarine Turf

(yip: starts with "U," means blue. I pulled it off)

Like orphans and sundresses, Boise State's secondary will hitchee.

Oh, they'll draw a flag. You'll get your first down. But you won't try that shit again, and by that shit we mean, 'advancing the ball.'

No. 1 - Jeron Johnson marking his territory against San Jose State on an overthrown ball to the sideline with a cheap shot to the back.



No. 2 and No. 3

First half of clip: Safety Ellis Powers with a two-steps late cheap-shot on Oregon QB Jeremiah Masoli, knocking him out of the game (they are announcing line-ups as the clip begins)
Second half of clip: Johnson again, getting tossed from the game for "targeting a defenseless player" no less on an overthrown ball. Indeed, the reciever leaps for the ball while Johnson is 2 steps away, and the receiver tracks the ball with his head as it passes out of reach - and then Johnson levels him.




These aren't penalties or even that cheap, but more of Johnson blowing up Right-Angle-State teams:

Utah... (at the first down mark - instinctual!)



Idaho...



and Wyoming.... And this is not actuallyJohnson, but a big Samoan. Terrific big-boy hit, and even better Bad Announcing.