National Championship Running Diary

Bill Simmons has a rule: whenever Paul Arras's former favorite sport to watch is holding a pseudo-national championship the day before a New Hampshire primary, and Paul actually thinks it might be a really good game, then Paul has to keep a running diary.

8:13 After catching 15 minutes of a surprisingly entertaining pre-game show with Eddie George, Urban Meier, Jimmy Johnson and what looked like Lance Bass, Thom Brennaman and Charles Davis (Tony Gwynn?) take over the commentary.

8:16 Brennaman mentions some of the key players, who I only vaguely recognize. Let me come right out and say that I am not at all qualified to say anything insightful about college football anymore. Back in middle school, I used to watch every single bowl game. Now I'm only watching one bowl game more out of obligation as a sports fan than anything else. And yes, I do think this will be a good game. I just don't buy the theories that say the SEC is THAT much better than everyone and that Ohio State doesn't have the athletes to compete.

8:19 If anything, the biggest factor is that LSU is playing in their own state. How is that fair? I guess OSU travels well.

8:26 A minute and a half into the game, Chris Wells gives LSU and the SEC a taste of Big 10 speed...65 yards for the touchdown! I should also mention, Ohio State has been my Big 10 team to cheer for since the John Cooper-era, when they were second fiddle to Michigan in the Big Ten. Also, when Chris and I lived in the same room in our fraternity senior year, we lived next door to Steve Register, who might have been the biggest Ohio State fan to not go to OSU. He was a pretty soft-spoken guy, but everybody knew it when he was watching a Buckeye game in his room. Somewhere, Register is shouting.

12:03 (Let's switch to game time.) LSU goes three and out, moving backwards after the center snaps the ball over the QB's head on third down. That's followed by one of those "Dude!" beer commercials, with a cameo from Joe Buck. Has there ever been a less likable big time announcer? He just rubs me the wrong way.

11:53 Another huge play from Ohio State, this time a pass, gives the Buckeyes first down on LSU's fifteen! Moments later, Brennaman reminds us that LSU's defensive coordinator, Bo Pelini, is moving to Nebraska and is, by the way, an OSU alum.

9:15 Nice job by Pelini's squad, holding OSU to a field goal and keeping this game reasonable.

9:05 First beer. Work tomorrow at 6:00am, but this was my only day off all week. Plus, I'm possibly the greatest Borders employee ever. The secret to waking up at 4:50am is having all your clothes picked out the night before. Who wants to choose a golf shirt and khakis or chinos that early in the morning? It's just straight into the shower for me. I'll also probably get my lunch together so I can just toss it in a bag and go. The beer, by the way, is a JW Dundee Honey Brown. Not the best honey brown I've ever had, but it hits the spot right now.


6:35 LSU RB Jacob Hester majors in Interdisciplinary Studies. That reminds me...

Hibbert: (Chuckles) Your playing days are over, my friend. But you can always fall back on your degree in... communications!? Oh, dear Lord!
Lubchenko: I know! Is phony major! Lubchenko learn nothing. Nothing! (cries)


2:31 (1st) I just wanted to point out I spent four minutes of game time looking up that quote online to get it right. LSU, having converted three straight third downs, is now in the red zone. They kick a field goal to make it 10-3.

13:00 (2nd) LSU ties it up with an impressive drive, capped off with a trick-formation TD. But Chris Wells comes right back with another nice run featuring a devastating stiff arm. I just looked it up...Wells is only a Sophomore. Wow.

12:12 "When it comes to blood...blood is going to win ahead of school, when blood is in the contest." -Charles Davis. Valid.

10:53 LSU blocks a Buckeye field goal. The Tigers just drove up, threw Momentum in a white van, and flew off down the road with it. This is starting to feel like a coaching chess match. Tressel came out firing, now Miles has countered. It's up to Tressel to respond before LSU takes the lead.

7:25 (2nd) Too late. LSU TD on yet another impressive drive. Les Miles is an excellent coach. 17-10 Tigers.

4:16 Another TD makes it 24 unanswered. 24-10. OSU has to score before the half or I'm looking at an early bedtime after all.

Half Didn't happen. I don't know about Jim Tressel, but my second half game plan consists of milk and cookies, fiddling with the TV cables to try to get the weak Syracuse Fox HD signal over the antenna, and playing it by ear whether I stick with this game to the bitter end.

7:47 (3rd) OK, I've spent all of halftime until now trying to get the elusive Fox HD signal. I've had to dig up this old HD antenna and plug that in. I've got the signal, but it flickers every minute or so, which is really annoying. With an analog signal, if the signal wavers, the picture might get a little scratchy or something. When a digital signal wavers, it drops out completely for a split second. This is very important, because the Super Bowl is on FOX this year. If it takes climbing up onto the roof and actually manipulating our antenna, old school style, with someone shouting up at me, so be it. We will get HD Fox by the Super Bowl.

Meanwhile, this game is over. 31-10 LSU. I was wrong. The SEC is much better than the Big 10 right now. Oh well. Time for those cookies.

The Greatest Basketball Coach in the World

Old readers of Random Thoughts might remember my recurring column last year, NCAA survivor. In it, I proposed that the national champion could be selected before the tournament from a pool of teams narrowed down over the course of a season. As it turned out, I blew it by missing Florida on my list.

This year, however, if I had picked that column back up, I think we can all agree that I would have had Florida, UCLA, Ohio State, and Georgetown in the pool. It was a perfect season for the NCAA survivor idea. Oh well...

Marge: I cannot believe this! I'm trying to give our daughter a head start in life, and you aren't helping a bit!
Homer: Marge, name one successful person in life who ever lived without air conditioning.
Marge: Balzac!
Homer: No need for potty mouth just because you can't think of one.
Marge: But Balzac-
Homer [interrupting]: "If 'ifs' and 'buts' were candy and nuts..." Wait, how does the rest of that go?

The other thing you might recall from last season was my intense insistence on the case for Thad Matta as the greatest coach in college basketball. If you also read The Sports Guy you'll know that Bill Simmons has been critical of Thad Matta this season. I'm not exactly clear on what his specific grievances are, but I believe he feels Thad is under-utilizing Greg Oden, or something, and that he's a poor clock manager. Allow me to counter-argue:

1. Thad Matta is a great recruiter. The Freshmen class he has on the Ohio State team might be the greatest foursome ever landed. You've heard of Greg Oden. You now know that Mike Conley Jr. might be even better than Oden. You've caught glimpses of David Lighty's abilities. And Daequan Cook is also a Freshman. What's most amazing is that he recruited these guys last year, while Ohio State was still uncertain whether the NCAA would grant it post-season elligibility after they had been busted for violations under Jim O'Brien.
2. Thad Matta is an unbelievably fantastic motivator, Part 1. In his final season at Xavier, before he got the Ohio State job, Matta took his unranked team into a game against the undefeated, #1 team in the country and won (St. Joseph's). The next season, Matta took his unranked team into a game against the undefeated, #1 team in the country and won (Illinois).
3. Thad Matta is an unbelievably fantastic motivator, Part 2. It's one thing to get players pumped up for big games. It's another to keep them playing hard all season long. At three different schools over the last seven years, Matta has won at least 24 games every season except one, with Ohio State in his first season, when the Buckeyes were on probation and inelligible for the post-season.
4. Thad Matta is an unbelievably fantastic motivator, Part 3. Some anecdotes: Greg Oden wasn't really showing a heck of a lot in this tournament...until with ten minutes remaining in the Memphis game Matta peered down the bench at Oden (sitting with three fouls) and made eye-contact. Oden nodded, and Matta sent him into the game with the instructions: "Play real hard and don't foul anybody." Another good story: Matta gave all his players Final Four pamphlets at the beginning of this season.
   
5. Thad Matta gets the most out of his players. Clearly, Ohio State has some outstanding talent on its team this year, but its not uncommon for a loaded team to have difficulties with chemistry. Matta successfully integrated five new players onto a team that went 26-6 and earned a 2-seed in the tournament last year. He handled the tension between the highly-touted freshmen and the important veterans, like senior Ron Lewis who hit the big three to send the Xavier game into overtime. Plus, he integrated Greg Oden into the mix after the season had already started. And they've only lost three games.
6. Thad Matta is a Good Game Coach. Admittedly, I don't really have a lot to argue here, other than, again, his W-L records have been pretty amazing, and he's playing in the national championship tomorrow. He's 12-5 in the tournament, with a number of upset victories counting in that win total. He was upset last year, yes. That loss was against 7-seed Georgetown, an excellent team in retrospect. Matta avenged that loss yesterday.
   

Who knows? Maybe Simmons is right. Maybe Matta will choke somehow tomorrow night. It still won't change those first five points above, and I'll still believe we're watching the emergence of the next great college basketball coach.