preview-capsules Page 2 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Brigham Young Cougars
1. My Left Foot. BYU lost to UNLV for the second straight year in the Mountain West championship game, but one has to wonder if things would have been different had the Cougars' 6-foot-11 Vuk Ivanovic still been on the roster. Ivanovic, a native of Serbia and Montenegro, broke his foot during practi...
Miami Hurricanes
1. The Saving Grace of South Florida Sports. South Florida is not exactly considered a college hoops hotbed. The Canes have long been an afterthought even for their own students and the community. But with every team associated with the Miami area deciding to suck all at once, the Canes basketball t...
Temple Owls
1. Philly's Phinest. An afterthought at the beginning of the season and seemingly since the departure of John Chaney, second year head coach/former Penn coach Fran Dunphy has transformed the Owls into a contender more quickly than anyone could have imagined. While everyone was raving about A-10 flam...
Maryland Baltimore County Retrievers
1. Retriever Fever. Every March, we are presented with a mid-major that you can't help but root for. This year, that team is the UMBC Retrievers. You have the fantastic nickname of "Retrievers." Then, you have the hyphenated university name, which unfortunately sounds like a school that you find adv...
Oregon Ducks
1. Should of Just Been a Duck. The Oregon student section, or The Pit Crew, was awesome enough to get mentioned (with an accompanying picture) in Sports Illustrated as one of the nastiest, most verbally abusive, over-the-line student sections in the country. Oh wait, not so awesome. When Portland na...
Massachusetts Minutemen
1. So THAT'S what she meant! While vacationing in Boston one summer, I met a lovely girl. After spending a week with her, she told me she loved the Minutemen. Unfortunately for me, I was the wrong kind of "minuteman." The University of Massachusetts mascot comes from the Revolutionary War era where ...
Florida Gators
1. This Year's Team, Nothing Like Last Year's Team. 32.3 minutes, 11.6 points, 5.1 rebounds and 2.4 assists. Those were the combined averages of the three Gators left over from last year's championship team. In all, the Gators lost 87 percent of last year's scoring, including their entire starting f...
St. Joseph's Hawks
1. How Many Passes before You Shoot? Hawks sophomore guard Garrett Williamson came to Saint Joseph's from Lower Merion High School, where he was the second all-time leading scorer, behind Jelly Bean Bryant's kid. Somehow in the transition to college, he turned "scorer" into "defensive specialist" an...
Arizona Wildcats
1. Depth That Rivals A Wading Pool. If we were comparing depth, a team like Tennessee might be an aging porn actress while the Wildcats are a young virgin, still contemplating how long "true love" actually lasts. The Wildcats have three (3!) players that are averaging over 8.8 points a game and only...
Drake Bulldogs
1. Where Did You Come From? Drake graduated four starters last year - Al Stewart, Aliou Kieta, Nick Grant and Ajay Calvin. It would have been five graduating starters had Klayton Korver not medically redshirt his junior year. Enter Josh Young, Adam Emmenecker, Jonathon Cox and Leonard Houston. Not s...
Kansas Jayhawks
1. Joe Morgan disapproves. According to the VORPies over at Basketball Prospectus, Kansas has the #1 Pythagorean winning percentage in all the land. In addition, they are ranked #1 in both offensive and defensive efficiency. I have no idea what this means (other than Mario Chalmers clogging up the b...
Wisconsin Badgers
1. Team of the 2000's? OK, that may be taking things a bit too far, but let's review what the basketball Badgers have accomplished since the year 2000. One Final Four, 2 Elite Eights, 3 Sweet Sixteens, 3 Big Ten Regular Season titles (2 outright) and 1 Big Ten Tournament title. Although the casual f...
UCLA Bruins
1. "Well, Jack Likes It." Remember when Dukie V and the state of Tennessee blew their collective load when "big time celebrities" Peyton Manning and Priscila Presley showed up at the Memphis-Tennessee game? Yawn. As the greatest basketball program in NCAA history, situated in the heart of LA between...
Texas Arlington Mavericks
1. You Ain't From Around Here, Are Ya, Boy? Ten of the eleven players listed as eligible on the UTA roster are from the state of Texas. The eleventh is 6'1" Guard Brandon Long, who hails from Richton Park, Illinois. The Junior was scoring 12 ppg before an injury vs. Texas Christian put him out for t...
St. Mary's Gaels
1. That Confusing Nickname. Saint Mary's, out of the West Coast Conference (aka Gonzaga's Conference) cannot be found on a map by many (or any?) but is 20 miles from Oakland and San Francisco in the hills of the East Bay. They may suffer from having the most confusing name in college basketball. To ...
Michigan State Spartans
1. Foolish Consistency is the Hobgoblin of Conference Champions. On February 16 , Michigan State went to Indiana to face lame duck coach Kelvin Sampson, and, despite leading by double digits early in the first half, they lost the game by 19. Twelve days later, they scored a whopping 42 points in a l...
Western Kentucky Hilltoppers
1. There's Only One Big Red! While a number of other schools claim to be the Big Red, there is only one mascot that fits the bill ... our Big Red. He's without a doubt the most famous alumnus of our school. He's been featured in ESPN's "This is SportsCenter" commercials, and some of those silly Capi...
UNLV Runnin' Rebels
1. Who are these guys? The Rebels lost four starters from last year's Sweet 16 Cinderella squad, including their leading scorer, rebounder, shot blocker and assist man. While they were expected to be rebuilding towards a contending season next year, UNLV has ridden a great defense led by "veterans" ...
Houston Cougars
1. Fluffin' Ain't Easy. Guess who's scored the most points in a D-I game this year. It's not Michael Beasley, it's not O.J. Mayo, and it sure as hell isn't Tyler "I can't get this look off my face" Hansbrough. No, it's Rob "Fluff" McKiver, who dropped 52 on Southern Miss to break Larry Bird's single...
Arizona State Sun Devils
1. The Herbivores. The Tempe fans have nicknamed themselves the "Herbivores," in loving deference to second-year head coach Herb Sendek, late of NC State. And let's face it: Herb Sendek is a just a terrible name. At least someone is having fun with it. Though I'd like to think the fans got the name ...