…to all of you from Thirty-Five Seconds. Tonight and only tonight, have as much sex as you like in the Champagne Room.

Happy New Year to all.

The noble and hearty Big Ten team valiantly defended their home turf, but it was all for naught. Rallying back from a laughable 14 points in the second half, the [redacted] had a chance to seal it late. Unfortunately, that chance was senior center Shaun Pruitt at the free throw line. The big man tossed an 0 fer Patrick Ewing style, allowing TSU to extend their lead with some charity stripe action of their own. The Tigers single handedly earn a trip to this week’s “Who Are These Guys?” despite their 4-7 record, meanwhile, the [fighting redacted]’s season continues its schadenfreude-tastic ways. Adding this game to the bad loss column with Miami(OH), they limp into conference play on Thursday to host Ohio State.

Tennessee State 60 – Illinois 58

The Duke/UNC rivalry got a little bit less pale last night when the Tar Heels lost guard Bobby Frasor for the season. The scrappy, intelligent, gutsy, Welker-esque guard went down when his ACL blew out like Bob Huggins on a New Years bender. UNC will now be forced to play the rest of the season without their best chucker, until they find some random walk-on with a comparable skill set.

In related news, the wine and cheese aficionados of Chapel Hill were delighted to receive free fish sticks biscuits after their boys went for triple figures against Nevada.

In unrelated news, Gary Parrish is the whiny bitch of the day for complaining about shit that couldn’t possibly matter any less. He is worthy of your finest scorn and derision.

The college basketball landscape is a vast, vast countryside with rolling meadows, open plains, treacherous cliffs, and other various biomes ripe for hyperbole. 35seconds would like to help everyone explore this random land of wonderment by bringing to light some lesser known programs. Whether they have bracket-busting aspirations, interesting back stories, or just give good mascot, there’s always room for some mid-major lovin’.

Morehead State Eagles (4-7, 2-2)-RPI: 292, currently unranked

Notable Wins: Western Illinois, Eastern Illinois, Alice Lloyd College

Notable Losses: at Bowling Green, at Oklahoma, at Louisville

Nestled twixt the foothills of the Daniel Boone National Park in Rowan County, the town of Morehead Kentucky is home to the Eagles of the Ohio Valley Conference. Known for little more than its unfortunate moniker, the co-educational university was named to US News And World Report’s “Top 25 Schools in the South” and is also home to one of only four colleges to offer degrees in “space science.” Notable alumni include game show hosting legend Chuck Woolery (outfits furnished by Botany 500), former football Giants quarterback Phil Simms, and Hannah Montana’s dad. Coached by Donnie Tyndall, Eagles class of ‘93, the squad lost almost all of their experience from last season. Only four players on the current roster have played D-I minutes. Led by senior guard Nikola Stojakovic (7 assists/game) , Morehead State looks to get the ball to its young offensive talents, sophomore Maze Stallworth (13 points/3 rebounds per game) and freshman Kenneth Faried (10/7). Junior transfer Lee Simmons should also bring his experience into the mix at forward. To get to the dance, Morehead will have to get past SE Missouri St. and Austin Peay in the OVC and improve on last year’s RPI of 133.

Wichita State Shockers (7-4, 0-0)-RPI: 117, currently unranked

Notable wins: Illinois-Chicago, LSU, UAB

Notable Losses: Baylor, at Monmouth

It was only a matter of time before our duty to sophomoric humor brought us to the Shockers. Located in Wichita, Kansas and named after a farming term for wheat harvesting, WSU has fast won over the hearts and minds of hipster basketball fans everywhere with their mid-major pluckiness and pop-culture hand signal. While the university openly discourages the use of the “traditional shocker” as seen in more lurid contexts by its cheerleaders and fans, the association still proudly exists in the free-spirited underbelly of the campus pep culture. Notable Shocker alumni include former Toronto Blue Jay Joe Carter and the WWE’s Big Show, Paul Wight. Led by senior forwards PJ Cousinard and Phillip Thomasson (each avg 11pts/game), WSU remains focused on senior leadership and experience. Fellow senior Matt Braeuer also contributes 10 points a night with 4 assists. The Shockers bring their blogtastic hand signals to Missouri Valley Conference play this Saturday, hosting their first game against Drake University. WSU will have to harvest their way past the Bulldogs as well as Creighton, Illinois State, UNI, Bradley, and SIU if they want to get out of the formidable MVC.

Scorers tables: holding up drunk invalid coaches for fifty years.

Coach Eddie Sutton is returning to the bench just two wins shy of the magic arbitrary number of 800. But the legendary drunk/pillhead isn’t returning to the familiar environs of Stillwater where his son now reigns. Instead Sutton will be taking over the job for the San Francisco Dons. After being introduced by some girly AD Sutton addressed the small media gathering.

“I’d like to thank Mrs. Debra MannBearPig for this opportunity to return to the college game that I love so much. I really think this is the beginning of something special for the San Francisco Dons. I’m incredibly excited to be coaching such fantastic young student-athletes as KC Jones, Bill Russel, lil’ Fred Scolari. Frankly I was a bit surprised that such a great job opportunity would present itself at this point in the season, but I’m not here to ask questions. I’m here to drink gin and coach basketball, and I’m all outta gin!”

Coach Sutton falls off the podium.

Well this should certainly be fun. We’re setting the over/under on number of games it takes to win two games at 12.

John Calipari worked out slumping junior guard Chris Douglas-Roberts personally during the week leading up to Memphis’ nonconference game with Georgetown. And in doing so, John Calipari not only toughened up Douglas Roberts and helped him turn in a stellar 24 point performance against the Hoyas, he TURNED HIM INTO A HERMAPHRODITE.

“For the first 30 minutes, he whined like he was exhausted,” Calipari said. “There were sounds coming out of him that I didn’t know if he were a female or a male.”

If John Calipari has difficulty distinguishing between the two, he’s either been coaching a WNBA team on the sly, or his love life is far more interesting than previously thought.

“He’s long, strong, and his ball skills and ability to penetrate are unbelievable.

In a game that neither team seemed to want to win, Illinois defeated Missouri for the eight straight “Bragging Rights” game at St. Louis’ Scottrade Center, ironically sponsored by the equally lackluster Busch Light. Forty minutes of scrappy Midwestern ball ended when Lawrence foibled his chance to drive in the buzzer beater. With 7.4 seconds left, the sophomore dribbled the ball off of his foot as he attempted to build the final attack.  After this week’s loss to Miami(OH), Illinois will likely use this win to return to thinking that they are awesome. Chants of “BCS! BCS!” rang through the arena shortly after the final whistle. Stay classy, [Fighting Redacted].

Illinois 59-Missouri 58

One does not walk lightly into the Izzone, but when you’re a top 5 team like Texas, at least look like you care about your tournament seeding. Michigan State strangled control of this midway through the first and never looked back. In typical Longhorn style, they rally back to make it interesting, but fall short of the actual comeback and must settle on a moral victory. AJ Abrams outdid DJ Augustin with 24 points off the bench to his teammate’s 22, but it wasn’t enough initials or hype to get past the Spartans. In a game that had all of the excitement of a blowout, and none of the fun of an actual reversal, Michigan State improves their resume and sends the Longhorns back to Austin for a consolation ranking somewhere between 9 and 11.

Michigan State 78- Texas 72

Welcome one and all to a truly epic day in the 2007 season which I’ve dubbed Ballgasm Saturday. ESPN’s incestuous family of networks is airing four quality games that are conveniently stacked up one after another. If it were up to me I’d be locked in my apartment for the next 8 hours, but society demands that I buy crap for relatives because some assholes decided that their god was born around the time of the winter solstice to dupe a bunch of pagan assholes. Hooray!

Getting back to the original point, it’s a dream day to be a basketball fan who already has his shopping done. Here’s a handy breakdown of all the action.

No. 4 Georgetown at No. 2 Memphis

Simply put, this is the kind of game that makes me happy to be alive. This one’s already over (I tried to write the post during the game but I only managed a couple of nonsensical sentences) and Memphis was superb in victory. Georgetown couldn’t find their offensive rhythm in the second half and they had no answer for Chris Douglas-Roberts. Regardless of the outcome I maintain that these are the two best teams in the nation on a neutral court (shut the fuck up UNC and KU fans, I can already hear your bitching). Hopefully the Hoyas get another shot in the Final Four.

No. 12 Tennessee at No. 24 Xavier

Drew Lavender is easily the most talented midget in college basketball but he’s seriously lacking in the wacky antics department. Regardless of his skill I don’t see Xavier sticking around against a Tennessee team composed entirely of full sized humans. The best battle of the day will be between Bruce Pearl’s dominating puddle and the scrappy mop boys of Xavier.

No. 25 Stanford at Texas Tech

The Lopez sisters are going to make Bobby Knight wish his team wasn’t so damn shitty. Seriously Knight, just go away now.

No. 5 Texas at No. 10 Michigan State

D.J. Augustin is about as good as it gets but that’s nothing new for Rick Barnes and it’s never seemed to help his teams win big games in the past. Michigan State counters with Drew Nietzel, who is a great guard with ten years of college basketball experience, and the masterful Tom Izzo. The floorboards will run burnt orange with the blood of the Longhorns.

Oh ESPN, you spoil us so.

I’ll be back to recap the action later tonight if I’m not being held in custody for bludgeoning a salesperson to death.

Gonzaga will get a badly needed player back on the floor in the form of Josh Heytvelt, who is coming back from injury himself: a stress fracture in his foot that he opted to have a pin inserted in rather than have surgery and miss more playing time.

Heytvelt is also taking the long road back from being caught with a mammoth bag of Cali mushrooms in February, an arrest made much worse when the Spokane Review published pictures of the trip-pillow he was carrying around with him. We cut basketball players a good bit more slack than many athletes when it comes to substance abuse. Our childhood greats went around on the court zonked out of their mind on the finest of chiba and God knows what else, especially Robert Parrish, who looked like the Queen Mary chugging into port when he went town the court: a long black shape trailing a dark cloud of smoke.

The odds are stacked enough against even a noted giant-killer like Gonzaga. If Heytvelt wants to attempt to even the score by chomping on a few mushroom muffins and play the whole game swatting at those damn pterodactyls who want the ball, let him.
Just take the wings off the ball, man. Makes this shit so much harder to play than it already is.

Pic courtesy of Dan.