March Mad(der)ness; Sunshine City; On the Road Again

March Mad(der)ness
Three of the first four games ended on buzzer beaters this afternoon, starting off what is shaping up to be a crazy March of college basketball.

West Virginia was tied with Clemson at the half, 40-40, but pulled away in the second half to take the Big East to a 1-0 record with an 84-76 victory.  Huggins' crew shot nearly 50% from the floor and held Clemson to 5-21 beyond the arc.

Louisville went out and got the Big East right back to .500 with a last second loss at the hands of Morehead State, 62-61.  Demonte Harper drilled a three with 4.2 ticks left to stir the pot in this March Madness.

Temple took down a red-hot Penn St. team on a jumper by Juan Fernandez with under a second left, 62-60.  North Philly got the win in this intrastate battle - speaking of Battle, Penn St. stud Talor Battle's 23 points weren't enough to help the Nittany Lions.

In an 8/9 matchup, Butler pulled out a win against Old Dominion with a tip-in at the buzzer by Matt Howard, 60-58.  Butler got outscored at the stripe 21-9 but made up for it with their defense, which held ODU to 36% from the floor.

Kentucky survived a scare from the smart kids over at Princeton, 59-57.  Despite being outrebounded by the Tigers, the fact that they held Princeton to three three-pointers helped them pull it out and avoid a monumental upset.  (side note:  UK only hit 5 threes).  UK advances to take on West Virginia.  Huggy Bear and Coach Cal - contrast of styles.

In other action, San Diego State is pulling away from Northern Colorado (I know, who?) and Pitt put UNC-Asheville out of their misery courtesy of an 18-point advantage in the second half.  With just over two minutes left, Richmond holds a slim two point lead over Vanderbilt.  A 12/5 upset in the making?

Sunshine City
After a chilly start to the day, the sun decided to come out and turn it out.  I think I got some owl-eyes going on from wearing the Oakleys all day every day for the past few weeks.  The trip to Tennessee and the past two games (in Newark and South Orange, NJ) were beautiful as well, so that might have contributed.

A beautiful day to practice turned into a beautiful night for a women's college basketball game.  I'm here for the first round game of the WBI (Women's Basketball Invitational) against Sacred Heart.

We're the 5-seed hosting the 4-seed - still trying to wrap my head around that one, but that's for another day.

On the Road Again
This weekend we head down to (It's Always Sunny in) Philadelphia.  LaSalle, St. Joseph's, and Villanova are on tap this weekend.  It's shaping up to be a nice weekend.

Hopefully we can keep our pitching going and carry it through the weekend.  It'd be nice to have a good week of games.  We beat NJIT 8-1 on Tuesday and took down Seton Hall 6-3 yesterday.  All three teams this weekend are playing some good baseball it seems.  It'd be nice to go on a little roll, but we'll see how it goes.

Tune in over the weekend and I'll keep you posted - on our team and my March Madness analysis.