Random Ramblings

I cut myself shaving pretty badly this morning causing me to bleed my own blood on and off for nearly an hour. It's times like these when I would love to grow a Brett Keisel beard.

I'm about 75 pages until the end of Stephen King's 11/22/63. I'm not a horror fan, so this is the first Stephen King book that I'm going to finish. Despite being approximately 850 pages, it is an amazing book that I highly recommend. I guess I should probably update the "What I'm Reading" section of this blog.

Pope Francis is apparently a big soccer fan. As the Pope, can he tell Brazil to get him tickets for all of the Argentina games at the 2014 World Cup? My guess is yes and Brazil would also have to say yes, right?

I haven't filled out my NCAA bracket yet, and I really don't know what to do about Pitt. In my heart, I think they can Wichita State and the #1 seed Gonzaga. In my head, they'll probably lose in the first round, and I'll be disappointed.

Meanwhile, I'm really looking forward to seeing Kentucky play at Robert Morris in the NIT. I may need to find a bar showing this game and the Penguins-Capitals game side-by-side. Seriously, when was the last time Kentucky played a game at a venue that seats less than 3,500?

I had one of my worst experiences as a soccer referee over the weekend. During a tournament that included teams from well outside the DC area, I worked with two other officials that were very nice but completely overwhelmed and lacked the experience to work these game. I was and am embarrassed by some of the calls they made, but I really couldn't do anything about it. I agreed with all of the comments and criticism by the coaches, but I would never tell them this. Fortunately, the final score was 7-0 so the bad officiating didn't have an impact on the result. I sent an e-mail to the referee assigner with my thoughts though I haven't heard back and I'm not sure that I will. If that's the case, I'm not working for him again.

Notes From Pitt-Georgetown

On Tuesday night, I attended probably my final Pitt-Georgetown game at the Verizon Center. Although Pitt may face Maryland in College Park next year when the teams overlap in the ACC for one season, unless George Washington, George Mason or American join the ACC, I may not see Pitt basketball in the DC area for many years. Therefore, let’s focus on the positive: Pitt-73 Georgetown-45

You can read all about the game on The Washington Post, ESPN, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Pitt Blather, Cardiac Hill, Casual Hoya and probably dozens of other places. Instead, I’m going to focus on some of the off the court stuff.

- A 9:00 game on a Tuesday night is a terrible time for a college basketball game, especially when the game takes place at an off-campus facility. I think I’ve attended five Pitt-Georgetown games at the Verizon Center, and this game had the smallest attendance by far.

- Speaking of the Verizon Center, what are the logistics for Georgetown students and staff getting from campus to the arena? It seems like there would always be traffic and it takes a significant effort to attend most games. How long does it take to get back to campus if you want to leave early? (For example, the student section cleared out with about 5-6 minutes left in the game.)

- Alexander Ovechkin was in attendance apparently waiting until the game was over so he could skate at the Verizon Center ice again. Unfortunately, Maria Kirilenko was not there. (There are much more provocative photos of Kirilenko on the internet, but this is a family-friendly blog - at least today - so enjoy this picture of the tennis star.)

- Washington Wizards rookie Bradley Beal was also in attendance. He is younger than just about every player on Pitt and Georgetown.

- At halftime, a female student hit a three-pointer to win free Lasik surgery. That may have been the loudest noise from the Georgetown crowd all night. After making the shot, the excited announcer screamed that "there was no doubt about it." I hope he had to pay royalties to Lanny Frattare.

- Living Social had an amazing deal where upper-deck tickets were only $12. Unfortunately, I'm now receiving three e-mails a day from Living Social.

- Being in the arena, I had no idea what happened at the end of the first half. I saw Tray Woodall lying on his back on the court and another Pitt player clearly fouled in what appeared to be just before the buzzer. Both teams went to the locker rooms while the refs looked at the video monitors for several minutes. I didn’t find out what happened until the day after the game.

- With about 5 minutes left in the first half, I noticed that Talib Zanna had no points. He scored 8 points over the next 4+ minutes. I need to notice stuff like this more often.

- Dante Taylor provided a huge spark (at least in my mind and based on this picture used on every website) for Pitt with an impressive dunk and then a bucket and a made foul shot fairly early in the game. I really feel like Taylor is going to play an important role in some Pitt victories at some point this season.

Always nice to celebrate a Pitt win in DC with plenty of Pitt fans! Go Pitt!

The Pulse of a Pittsburgh Sports Fan

ESPN’s Bill Simmons wrote a column several years ago stating that you can’t complain about your sports team for five years after they win a championship. Does that apply to all sports teams in the same city after one wins a title? What if two teams win championships? The Pittsburgh Steelers won Super Bowls in the 2006 and 2008 seasons while the Pittsburgh Penguins won the Stanley Cup in the 2008-2009 season. Nevertheless, when the Steelers lost to the Green Bay Packers last month, it hurt as a fan. The consolation in the defeat was that Green Bay outplayed the Steelers and definitely deserved to win, and I shifted my focus to the Penguins and Pitt basketball.



Nearly 24 hours after* Pitt lost in dramatic fashion to Butler on Saturday night, I’m still amazed at the ending. Actually, I’m amazed at the entire game. This was the year that Pitt was supposed to reach the Final Four. The team started 3 seniors and 2 juniors and had one of the deepest teams in college basketball. Pitt won the regular season Big East Championship in arguably the toughest conference ever. Even the loss in the Big East Tournament was fine since you figured that the team would be well-rested for the NCAA tournament and focus on the mistakes made against UConn and work to correct them. Then, Saturday night happened. (Sorry to interrupt this post, but Butler's Matt Howard just flopped as I was typing this.) As was the case in most of Pitt’s losses this year, they fell behind early and extended a lot of energy and emotion to come back. However, Pitt did come back against Butler. If you follow basketball, you know what happened during the final 10 seconds. I’m not going repeat the game story here, but I don’t remember a game with such a drastic range of emotions over such a short period of time. The end result is one of the most painful defeats in Pittsburgh sports history.

So 2011 has not started well for Pittsburgh sports. Sure, feel free to make the argument that the Cleveland Browns would love to have been in the position to play in a Super Bowl. There are also 300 college basketball teams that would love to reach the NCAA round of 32. That doesn’t make me feel better. I’m already waiting to see what spectacular way the Penguins will lose in the playoffs. Will Sidney Crosby return only to get another head injury in a game 7 against the Flyers or Capitals courtesy of Mike Richards or Alexander Ovechkin and then that same player scores the game-winner moments later? Yes, that’s where I am right now. I guess that way the year has gone so far, but maybe I’m looking at everything wrong. Maybe the unthinkable has yet to occur. Perhaps the Pirates can be a .500 team!

You know, what makes me (and hopefully you too) feel better? Jerome Lane’s dunk (and reading about the dunk)!



Read more about the Pitt-Butler game on the Pitt Script blog & Sports Illustrated

* I’m either writing this on Sunday night or I travelled to Australia and somehow changed time. Your choice.

DeJuan Blair vs Hasheem Thabeet

If you're looking for the Best Pittsburgh Sports Blog Tournament, please scroll down to the post below.

Growing up in Pittsburgh as a sports fan, we had the Pirates, Penguins, Steelers, and Panthers, and for brief periods of time, the USFL’s Maulers, arena football’s Gladiators, indoor soccer’s Spirit and the Pittsburgh Bulls indoor lacrosse team (featuring #66 Butch Marino). As you can tell, none of these are NBA teams. Without a local team in the pre-internet (how did we live without internet casinos?) and pre-SportsCenter era (there probably was SportsCenter but I don’t remember watching it until later), my friends and I never followed the NBA and naturally were not big NBA fans. Sure we watched the Lakers and Celtics championships, but otherwise, I don’t even remember the NBA being on television.

These days, I check the box scores of nearly every NBA game played by the San Antonio Spurs, Memphis Grizzlies and New Orleans Hornets to see how former Pitt players DeJuan Blair, Sam Young and Aaron Gray are doing. All three are currently starting on their respective teams, though DeJuan Blair is the player of this group who really stands out. Although Blair benefits from playing on team with Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili, Bill Simmons included him at #50 in his NBA trade value column since he puts up double-doubles regularly. Anyone who watched him at Pitt knew what a great player he was, though there was a question about how his size (6’7”) would translate in the NBA. Of course, some doubts may have been alleviated from his match-up with 7’3” Hasheem Thabeet of Connecticut. Let’s go back to February 16, 2009, shall we.





While the videos illustrate that Blair dominated Thabeet in this game, the box score shows it even more.

Blair: 22 points; 23 rebounds; 2 assists and 1 block.
Thabeet: 5 points; 4 rebounds; 2 steals and 2 blocks (fouled out).

So here's what I don't understand about the NBA. Although Blair dominated Thabeet, the UConn center was drafted 2nd overall and earned a very nice payday. Meanwhile, Blair wasn't drafted until the 2nd round at 37th overall. I understand that you can't look at the one aforementioned game in a vacuum, but it turned out to be accurate.

Not including last night’s game against the Chicago Bulls, Blair is averaging 8.6 points per game and 7.5 rebounds per game in only 22+ minutes per game. Meanwhile, Thabeet plays only about 8 minutes per game and averages 1.1 points and 1.6 rebounds. If you’re 7’3” how don’t you get at least 2 rebounds a game just by standing under the basket? Thabeet was listed as a DNP (did not play): Coach's Decision in Memphis' last two games. Therefore, Thabeet had the same impact on these games as if he was sitting home playing video poker online.

This post isn't to discredit Thabeet. Enough people in hindsight criticize Thabeet and Memphis for drafting him 2nd overall. It seems to me that NBA teams are scared to pass on what they feel might be a dominant center since this is rare to find. This post is just to point out that I don't understand how so many teams passed on DeJuan Blair, and to show appreciation for how well he is doing in the NBA.

Plus, I like seeing the video of Blair slamming Thabeet again!

Random Thoughts

Let’s start with a quick, quick recap of yesterday’s Pittsburgh Steelers-Tennessee Titans game. The Steelers defense was amazing forcing seven turnovers with four sacks. Plus, Titans running back Chris Johnson, who has had twelve consecutive 100-yard games, was held to only 34 rushing yards. Meanwhile the Steelers offense still has some work to do. The team is not going to win very often with 43 passing yards and going 2 for 15 in third-down conversions.

When I worked at Blockbuster, we had an automatic VHS tape rewinder to rewind all of the VHS tapes that hooligans failed to rewind. While at Yom Kippur services this weekend, it is easy to notice that the Torah is clearly coming to the end. I wonder if some company could make automatic Torah rewinders to take the Torah back to Genesis.

Congratulations to the Ithaca College football team for defeating Widener University 31-7. The Bombers are now 3-0 on the season.

Ithaca’s primary rival is the SUNY-Cortland Red Dragons. Because of this, I always choose to buy red delicious apples instead of Cortland apples.

Was it me or did it seem like a lot of players lost helmets or shoes during the course of Sunday’s Steelers-Titans game?

I listened to part of the Washington Redskins radio broadcast while returning from the grocery store. After Kevin Walter made a catch in overtime, either Washington broadcaster Sonny Jurgensen or Sam Huff stated that they hadn’t called Walter’s name during the game. After a long pause, play-by-play announcer Larry Michael stated that the catch was Walter’s ninth of the game.

Mark your calendars. The University of Pittsburgh men’s basketball team visits Georgetown at the Verizon Center on Wednesday, January 12th.

I had the opportunity to watch the premiere episode of tonight’s How I Met Your Mother before the show airs. This season picks up from where last season ends including another guest appearance by Rachel Bilson. Bilson may now be one of my top five actresses based solely on one of the closing scenes.

Although I didn’t notice him in the episode, JQ doppelganger Aaron Takahashi is listed on my “TV critic” information page as a guest cast member.

If I get to 100 Twitter followers, I’ll create a new TMI Thursday post. I’m currently at 96.


Finally, I can’t get enough of this video of Vince Young getting slammed to the ground by James Harrison, Aaron Smith and Brett Kiesel. I’m glad that Young is okay because I thought he may have been seriously hurt by the trio of Steelers defenders.

Pitt Season Begins Tonight

The college football season officially begins tonight when the University of Pittsburgh travels to Salt Lake City to face the University of Utah. The entire University of Pittsburgh really isn't traveling to Utah (how would you move the Cathedral of Learning?), but the football team, marching band and other students, staff and alumni will go west. Anyway, I've been on record stating that I despise the Division I college football system (get a 16-team playoff!); however, the atmosphere of college football games are unmatched, and I enjoy watching the games especially the Pitt Panthers.

Therefore, in honor of the season-opener, I give you Darrelle Revis' incredible punt return in the 2006 Backyard Brawl between Pitt and West Virginia.

Sunday Notes

Between the Grammy Awards and the Penguins and Pitt games, Sunday was a good television day. Here are my notes from yesterday:

- Can the Penguins and Pitt play every Sunday until April? This will help get over the lack of Sunday football games.

- Actually, after watching Pitt lose to both Seton Hall and South Florida, perhaps we’ll just stick with the Penguins playing on Sunday afternoon.

- There were not one, but two television commercials during the Penguins-Red Wings game featuring racecar driver Danica Patrick. Does she have a big following among hockey fans that I am unaware of?

- "Have you heard about McDonalds new $1 menu at breakfast?" Has this sentence every actually worked as a pick-up line?

- Sidney Crosby’s 2nd period and shoot-out goals were sweet.

- South Florida’s Dominique Jones is the best college basketball player you’ve never heard of. I may also be the best college basketball player you’re heard of.

- The Grammys were kind enough to let us vote for one of three Bon Jovi songs for the band to perform. I think there should have been a write-in vote to have them cover a Barry Manilow tune.

- I think I liked Beyonce covering Alanis’ You Oughta Know.

- Pink is a professional. How else can you explain her singing while twirling round and round while wet.

- Speaking of the Pink performance, are the Grammy Awards now like Sea World where the first three rows are the splash zone?

- When did Lady Antebellum get big? I saw them perform during halftime of a Steelers game a few years ago.

- Ke$ha and Justin Bieber are available to present at Bar Mitzvahs, corporate events, and weddings!



- Is Kanye banned from all award shows? He should have been on stage for actually winning for Run This Town with Jay-Z and Rihanna.

This was about the time that I went to sleep.

Fear the Stache?

There's no need to fear my mustache, is there?



Instead, Notre Dame should fear Dave Wannstedt's Stache Saturday night at Heinz Field.



Please click on this link to contribute to Movember to raise funds for the Prostate Cancer Foundation and the Lance Armstrong Foundation (LIVESTRONG). That's the reason why I am growing this mustache. Perhaps, Notre Dame will also fear my 'stache!

Go Pitt!

Dear Philadelphia Flyers Fans,

Enjoy chanting "Crosby sucks" while mowing the lawn, hitting golf balls or on your way to work on Monday since you’re not going to have the chance to do so at the Wachovia Center again during the 2009 Stanley Cup playoffs. However, you may have a good point. Perhaps Sidney Crosby does suck. I mean he only had two goals on Saturday and a total of 4 goals and 4 assists in the series. Of course, those eight points would be three more than any other Flyer (Mike Richards and Claude Giroux led the team with 5 points) in the six-game series. Actually, I’ll let Crosby, the recipient of all of the taunting, speak for himself:

"We've had huge rivalries over the years. It's a loud building. They were playing well and the crowd was into to it, so to hear a little silence was gratifying."

So what’s the excuse as to why the Pittsburgh Penguins defeated the Flyers this season? Simon Gagne, Kimmo Timonen and Braydon Coburn were injured during last year’s playoff series, but they looked healthy the last few weeks. In addition, the Penguins took 2 of 3 games in your home arena. I remember when the Penguins went years without defeating Philadelphia at the Spectrum. Are you going to blame Biron or will you actually concede that the Penguins are better than the Flyers?

On a positive note, enjoy the LeSean McCoy era with the Eagles. I’m being completely serious with this statement. I really enjoyed watching McCoy at Pitt, and I hope that he does well in Philadelphia.


For the Penguins fans reading this, make sure to visit Empty Netters and The Pensblog for more coverage of the Penguins first round victory.

Pitt Falls To Villanova

I really want to be upset or disappointed about Pitt’s loss to Villanova in the Elite Eight on Saturday night, but I can’t. I guess you could say that if Pitt made one more free throw, allowed one less offensive rebound, or turned the ball over one less time, they would have won. Well sure, but to use an expression that I hate, it is what it is.* Pitt and Villanova are both great teams and played an amazing game. Villanova has as balanced a team there is in the country and deserves its spot in the Final Four. Plus, after seeing how poorly top teams Oklahoma and Louisville played on Sunday, I feel even better about Pitt’s performance. Levance Fields, Sam Young and DeJuan Blair all had terrific seasons, and the team as a whole deserves credit for accomplishments that no other Pitt team has achieved.

I should also add another reason why I’m not too upset about Pitt’s loss. I talked to a woman on Friday whose kids went to high school with Scottie Reynolds. She was rooting for Villanova because she said that he is a nice kid and is a bit of a hometown hero. I really can’t hate a team like Villanova who has three seniors in Cunningham, Anderson and Clark and also features Corey Fisher who has had an amazing childhood as featured by ESPN.com last week. Jay Wright and the team are likable and play a fun style of basketball where they can dominate on both ends of the floor (just ask Duke).

Anyway, congratulations to the University of Pittsburgh Panthers men’s basketball team on an incredible season! Thanks to Fields, Young and Biggs for their four seasons at Pitt.

For more about the game and Pitt's season, go to Pitt Blather and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette website.



* If I ever use this expression here again, feel free to stop reading this blog!

Pitt-Georgetown Recap

Did you know that the Georgetown University had a 28-game winning streak at the Verizon Center? The key word of that sentence is "had" after Pitt’s impressive 70-54 win on Saturday. Here are my thoughts of the game from my view in Section 404.

- When showed on the scoreboard, the national anthem singer looked like a frail, old man, who may not even make it through the song. Well, he quickly proved me wrong by belting out the anthem better than David Cook or David Archuleta ever could.

- Speaking of the national anthem, I hate the Baltimore-Washington people who yell "O" during the line "O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave." That is completely disrespectful and tarnishes the national anthem. Stop it!

- As for the game itself, DeJuan Blair is the man. I didn’t see the complete stats until I got home, but Blair had 20 points, 17 rebounds and added 3 assists.

- I noticed during the game that the Panthers seemed to have few turnovers. I was correct as they only had 8, none by point guard Levance Fields, who also had 8 assists.

- The game was tied 40 all when Pitt went on a dominating 17-4 run and closed the game by outscoring Georgetown 30-14.

- DaJuan Summers had 15 points in the first half, but only 7 in the second half, many of which coming on meaningless free throws in the last few minutes. Nice adjustment by Jamie Dixon and the Pitt defense.

- I was expecting big things from Georgetown’s freshman Greg Monroe. The box score shows that he had 15 points, but I barely noticed him.

- The only negatives about Pitt’s performance are the fact that they didn’t get to the free throw line often (only 6 attempts; 3 makes) and the team shot a poor 15.8% (3 of 19) from 3-point range. Jermaine Dixon had two points and was 0-for-5 from 3. That’s our starting shooting guard.

- Gilbert Brown and Brad Wanamaker continue to impress me coming off the bench. They combined for 14 points and 10 rebounds and only 1 turnover while providing solid minutes, energy and defense.

- The CBSSports.com recap of the game includes this statement:

In the second half, however, it was Blair who was thumping his chest while chants of "Let's Go, Pitt!" came from the thousands of upper-deck fans who made the trip to the nation's capital.

After living in the DC area for 7+ years now, I feel like it’s time to address this. Were there people from Western Pennsylvania who made the trip to DC for a Saturday game? Sure. However, my guess is that the vast majority of Pitt fans in attendance live in the Baltimore-Washington area. The Post-Gazette ran a three-part series a few years ago about Pittsburghers who moved from the area and included the graphic below about where Pittsburghers moved between 1985 and 1990. Five of those counties listed are in and around Washington. Now, how many people moved from Pittsburgh to this area over the past 18 years? My guess is tens of thousands and maybe over 100,000. How many University of Pittsburgh grads now live around DC? Perhaps several thousand. So that’s why there were 20,000-30,000 Steelers fans at the Redskins game this season. That’s why half of the crowds at Penguins-Capitals games consists of Penguins fans. That’s why there are even Pirates fans at Nationals games. After all of these years, why do announcers and columnists continue to write that Pittsburgh fans travel so well? Well, they do, but the bigger reason is that there are so many Pittsburgh fans already in the area. OK, I’ll get off my soapbox now.



By the way, in the Washington Post recap of the game, Liz Clarke wrote that, "the near-capacity crowd of 19,397 fell largely silent as Blair and the Panthers put the game out of reach in the second half, scoring on all but two possessions during a 14-minute stretch." It seemed pretty loud to me with all of the Pitt fans in attendance. Was Liz Clarke sitting in the locker room or was she even at the game?

Go Pitt!

Oh, one final note. I'd like to thanks Clyde's for being the first bar/restaurant in years for carding me. However, they used a Sharpie pen on my hand to show that I'm over 21 that I still can't get out.

Big College Football Day

Unfortunately the Michigan/Ohio State game is going to be cancelled for the first time ever this year. The reason is Michigan can't get past Toledo. In addition, I heard that U of M can't access the internet; they can't get three W's in a row.

I can’t take credit for these jokes. Anyway, the Michigan-Ohio State game starts in minutes on ABC.

In the first round of the NCAA Division III playoffs, Ithaca College meets Curry. There’s no truth to the rumor that Curry is named for former MTV VJ Adam Curry.



The game is being broadcast on WICB and is also available on LiveStats. At the moment, I can’t find any live webcast of the game.

Why is Pittsburgh and Cincinnati playing twice in three days? Are they replaying the game to allow Chad Johnson to play? Oh, it’s the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Cincinnati for possibly the Big East title. I will take credit for these jokes. Anyway, the game starts at 7:00 and will air on ESPN2.

Finally, the Texas Tech-Oklahoma game at 8:00 on ABC should be a lot of fun.

Have a great Saturday!

Sunday Links

At what age does it stop being fun to play in the rain? I worked two games as a soccer referee yesterday in miserable cold and rainy conditions. In the second game, where the weather turned worse than the first one, some of the 15 and 16 year-old kids seemed to be having a great time. I did not, but of course, I was not actually playing. On to the links:

According to WJLA, Presidential candidate John McCain’s brother, Joe, called 911 to complain about traffic on the Wilson Bridge. Not very smart.

I don’t want to write about the Pitt and Ohio State football teams (it’s so frustrating being a Pitt fan; I may write about this in length some day), but at least Ithaca College won defeating Utica 42-7. The win guarantees Ithaca’s 38th consecutive winning season, the second longest such streak in any level of college football. If only the Pittsburgh Pirates would have one winning season!

Jason has a video of the Wazzup guys eight years later.

Puck Daddy interviews Kevin Smith, the director of the upcoming movie Zack and Miri Make a Porno, which was filmed in Pittsburgh.

I was honored to be part of Cotter’s Meeting People is Easy. He does an amazing great job with this weekly feature.

Cotter, of the previously mentioned One for the Other Thumb, and I were featured in a debate about whether the Tennessee Titans will win the AFC. The short answer is no.

Finally, Terry Tate: Office Linebacker is back!





h/t Scribbled Noise for these videos.

2008 Pitt Football Schedule

The University of Pittsburgh’s 2008 football schedule was released on Monday:

August 30 – Bowling Green
September 6 – Buffalo
September 20 – Iowa
September 27 – at Syracuse
October 2 – at South Florida
October 18 – at Navy
October 25 – Rutgers
November 1 – at Notre Dame
November 8 – Louisville
November 22 – at Cincinnati
November 28 – West Virginia for the Backyard Brawl
December 6 – at Connecticut

Overall, I like Pitt’s schedule. I’m glad that Pitt is playing Notre Dame again, and I think the series with Iowa will be good. Personally, I haven’t been to a Pitt football game in several years, so I am excited for the likelihood of going to the Navy game in Annapolis. My only real complaint is the fact that Pitt-West Virginia is not the final game of the season. The Backyard Brawl really should be the last game for both teams.

More on the schedule at the Post-Gazette, Pitt Blather (here and here) and the official athletic website of the University of Pittsburgh.

Weekend Review

I promised a thorough review of the weekend, so here you go. For non-sports fans, I promise some good stuff at the end of this post. I’ll start with the Steelers, who lost their first game of the season, 21-14, against the Arizona Cardinals. First, thanks to everyone for giving their comments and suggestions about how and where I could watch Sunday’s game during the engagement party. I was able to watch much of the first half at the party and most of the second half at a house. The Steelers obviously did not play their best, and I’m worried about the health of Troy Polamalu, Casey Hampton and Bryant McFadden. I was also disappointed by the offensive line as Willie Parker only had 37 yards rushing, the Cardinals had 4 sacks and it seemed like the line had about a half dozen false start or holding penalties. Ben Roethlisberger’s interception in the end zone while the team was on the Arizona 2 certainly did not help.

However, to put this in perspective, it’s not a terrible loss. Arizona has a decent team, and the Steelers were playing on the road. Let’s be honest, this was the Super Bowl for former Steelers coaches Ken Whisenhunt and Russ Grimm. I’m sure they have been preparing for this game since they got hired by the Cardinals. Plus, if the Steelers are going to lose a game, losing to an NFC team is much better than a defeat against a division rival or even against an AFC team. Conference wins and losses are factored into playoff tie-breakers. So now, let’s see how Mike Tomlin and the team respond to their first loss.

Two final notes from the game. Actually, two Arizona players. I had mixed reactions watching Larry Fitzgerald make incredible catches and seeing Steve Breaston return the punt for a touchdown. I really, really like both of those guys. Fitzgerald was amazing to watch when he was at Pitt, and I hope he turns out to be one of the best wide receivers in NFL history. Breaston is from Woodland Hills High School, so I’m glad that he’s representing his alma mater well.

I also had the opportunity to watch my first Pitt game of the year. After seeing Pitt get crushed by the University of Virginia, let’s just say that I am not planning on re-arranging my schedule to see another game this season. At the end of the first quarter, Pitt trailed 27-0 and had seven penalties, a botched on-side kick and a fumbled kick-off return. The offensive couldn’t move the ball and the defense couldn’t stop Virginia. The best part of the first quarter may have been ESPN’s interview with the Virginia Cavalier. With the game out of hand, the announcers also discussed how Thomas Jefferson was an anti-Federalist.

Overall, I had a lot of problems with the coaches in this game. Pitt ran this “Wildcat” formation where the running back lines up at the quarterback position about a dozen times. Maybe you run this formation once or twice a game to throw off the defense. Pitt has a freshman QB; let him try to pass the ball and run the offense. Don’t put the QB out as a wide receiver when the running back is never going to throw the football. Virginia knew this and stopped Pitt every time. On 3rd and 8, let the quarterback play quarterback! I also was not happy with Virginia coach Al Groh. Virginia was leading 37-14 with only a few minutes remaining and ran a fake field goal for a touchdown. That is simply running up the score, and my opinion, was classless. I guess Virginia was still upset losing to Pitt in 2006. Pitt Blather has much, much more on this game.

I’ll write more about fantasy baseball (damn you Dontrelle Willis) and fantasy football (damn you Brian Westbrook; actually damn you gametime decisions!) another time, but I wanted to finish with Vanilla Ice. As expected, I did not see him on Friday night; however, Arjewtino’s friends did. Great story and pictures!

Sean’s Sports Update

While the Pittsburgh Steelers are my primary sports focus this time of year, there are other teams that I also closely follow. Unfortunately, most of them are not doing very well. Yesterday, Ithaca College’s football team lost 37-16 against #6 St. John’s Fisher. This loss coupled with last week’s defeat against Hartwick (the Bombers first loss to Hartwick since 1946!) leaves the team only 2-2 and 0-2 in the Empire 8 conference. Things need to change quickly if the Bombers have any chance at reaching the postseason.

Another team that has virtually no chance to reach a bowl game is the Pitt Panthers after losing 34-14 at home against the University of Connecticut. Pitt still needs to play West Virginia, Rutgers, South Florida, Virginia and Louisville, so a winning record does not seem likely. With Syracuse’s win over Louisville, Pitt may very well be the worst team in the Big East.

Finally, the Woodland Hills High School football team, whose alumni include current NFL players Jason Taylor, Shawntae Spencer, Steve Breaston and Lousaka Polite, is 0-4 for the first time in 21 years.

The one bright spot is Ithaca College’s women’s tennis team. They are 5-0 and look at these scores against their biggest rival, Cortland State:

Singles competition
1. Melanie COHEN (IC) def. Meg Cole (CORT) 6-2, 6-1
2. Rachel GUNDERSON (IC) def. Amanda McElroy (CORT) 6-0, 6-0
3. Alyssa JAFFE (IC) def. Merchon Brower (CORT) 6-0, 6-0
4. Devra REIMAN (IC) def. Ariel Kelner (CORT) 6-0, 6-1
5. Sarah HOLLIS (IC) def. Katie Freeman (CORT) 6-0, 6-1
6. Natalie JENERESKI (IC) def. Lauren Funes (CORT) 6-0, 6-0

Doubles competition
1. Alyssa JAFFE/Devra REIMAN (IC) def. Meg Cole/Amanda McElroy (CORT) 8-2
2. Melanie COHEN/Melissa NUNEZ (IC) def. Merchon Brower/Ariel Kelner (CORT) 8-1
3. Rachel GUNDERSON/Natalie JENERESKI (IC) def. Katie Freeman/Jennifer Carlisi (CORT) 8-1

The scores from the singles matches are similar to what would happen if I ever played Roger Federer, (we’ll just assume that Federer is off the court shooting Gillette commercials with Tiger Woods and Thierry Henry for games that I win).

Three hours until the Steelers-San Francisco game!