nit Page 259 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Well, That Was Miserable
Yeah! Soccer! Reading through the comments from the United States-Ghana live blog — the United States lost, by the way, if you didn't hear — pretty much prepared us for the postgame comments of ESPN analyst Eric Wynalda (whom we've actually enjoyed thus far): "Bruce Arena screwed up this World Cup f...

Live Blog: United States Vs. Ghana
Well, here we go: It's the game that will let us know whether we're gonna have a rollicking drunk Tuesday 11 a.m. party next week, or whether ... well, whether the United States will be playing during said drunkenness. As you know, the United States needs an Italian win and a win here, both of whi...

Not That Many Hours Left 'Til Gametime
Since it's a one of those 10 a.m. starts tomorrow, we figure this is as close to a preview of tomorrow's United States vs. Ghana matchup as we're going to get, considering the sleep schedules of your average Deadspin reader....

A Closer Look At Jorge Larrionda
I don't often blames losses on officiating. And I'm not doing that here, either, particularly since there was no loss to speak of, and sure, both the Italian and United States sides have complaints. But there is plenty of controversy concerning red-card happy official Jorge Larrionda of Uruguay. ...

A Love Letter To Ghana
With their courageous defense and scorching balls, Ghana has provided hope and inspiration to a United States soccer team that can use all it can get. With their unlikely 2-0 drubbing of the Czech Republic, a US win over Italy today leaves Group F wide open....

Taking 'Group Of Death' A Little Too Literally
It may be of interest to our men and women soldiers serving overseas that war is just like the World Cup. So says U.S. forward Eddie Johnson, anyway. The U.S. team was at Ramstein Air Base outside Kaiserslautern, Germany, where they will play Italy on Saturday. Johnson stopped by on Wednesday to say...

Hirshey: We Waited Four Years For THIS?
David Hirshey's World Cup Closer begins today. Enjoy....

Picking Through The U.S. Carnage
One of the funnier bits "The Daily Show" has done of late was to run training video of late terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi set to the "American Idol" song "Bad Day," which was always played when a contestant was voted off the show. It somehow summed up so many conflicted and complicated wor...

Live Blog: United States-Czech Republic
All right! GO AMERICA! The one World Cup moment the majority of Americans will actually be paying attention is upon us: The red, white and blue is going soccering!...

If The World Cup Devolves Into A Battle Rap, We're In Fine Shape
I'm not sure how to react to this. When an athlete makes a rap video, and it's not that embarrassing, it throws into question my entire set of beliefs and values. That just so rarely happens. And the fact that it's a soccer player, and that he's white... I'm just confused. Here's Clint "Deuce" Demps...

Some Not-So-Tiny World Cup Tidbits
The World Cup is ominously close! So that you aren't caught offside (they have that in soccer, right?), we're previewing all the participants, bringing you Four Things You Don't Know About Them. Today: Japan, the United States and Italy! Tomorrow we'll also be featuring leftover tidbits from all t...

Four Tiny Tidbits On: The United States
The World Cup is ominously close! So that you aren't caught offside (they have that in soccer, right?), we're previewing all the participants, bringing you Four Things You Don't Know About Them. Today: the United States! And for World Cup previews that are even better than ours, check out That's O...

Wither The Bearcats? (And The Wolverines ... And The Seminoles ... And The ...)
We're not quite sure how this whole RPI thing works — foolishly, we did not major in bracketology in college — but we know a pissed-off coach when we see one. Cincinnati's Andy Kennedy is none to pleased with his Bearcats being left out of the NCAA Tournament, and unless we miss our guess, right a...

Florida State Seminoles
1. Jennifer Sterger And Her Friends Are Not The Hottest Girls On Campus. And it's really not even close. The FSU Cowgirls are certainly the most famous pretty faces on the Internet from FSU, but a stroll through campus reveals that girls as attractive as Jen and her pals — or moreso — are pretty com...

Michigan Wolverines
1. Head Coach Tommy Amaker Is Squeaky Clean. That's what you would expected for a four-year starter under Mike Krzyzewski. But as good as Amaker played at Duke, he and the other five former Duke assistant coaches under Mike Krzyzewski have 13 NCAA appearances in the equivalent of 53 seasons to their...

Missouri State Bears
1. This Is The Best Missouri State Team In History. This is sort of like saying that my pet snake is my best friend even though he's my only friend, but still. The school changed its name from Southwest Missouri State following last year s centennial celebration. So technically this is the best team...

Creighton Bluejays
1. Trust The Frosh With The Rock. Creighton was 17-5 for the season before losing true freshman point guard Josh Dotzler to a knee injury, and went 2-4 without Dotzler, who will be back for the NCAA tournament. Dotzler isn't the first true freshman to start at the point for Creighton: Dotzler succee...

Cincinnati Bearcats
1. Bob Huggins Won Lots Of Games And Has Lots Of Baggage. In 16 seasons at Cincinnati, Huggins won 399 games and took the Bearcats to 14 consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances. Of course he is just as well known for not graduating his players - 20 percent during his tenure, losing regularly in the ...

Hofstra Pride
1. What's in A Name? The team nickname was The Flying Dutchmen forever, and then it was changed to Pride in 2001. There was actually a bit of an uproar over this change, with many "well-educated" Hofstra alumni worried that the athletic teams would now be "gay" ... because, you know, Flying Dutchmen...

St. Joseph's Hawks
1. They Were Nearly "The Bomb." The famed Hawk mascot turned 50 this year, but the team nickname has been around since 1929, when a student yearbook editor started a contest for naming the athletic teams. "Hawks" just barely beat out "Grenadiers," the name of World War I soldiers who specialized in ...