Turn back the clock

  I’ve been telling my friends I’m going to pretend it’s 1974 on Sunday. That way, the St. Louis Cardinals will be playing in the Super Bowl.

  When the Houston Comets franchise disbanded in December, I wrote here about knowing the feeling of losing a team. Having grown up a St. Louis Cardinals football fan, I stopped really having an NFL team to root for after 1987. OK, it was a deeper hurt than that. I lost something I’d loved since childhood. Right or wrong, we feel that way about our teams.

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Big 12 power rankings No. 2

  Not to belabor the obvious … oh, well, why not? What else are sports writers good for? The top three South teams – Oklahoma (6), Baylor (5) and Texas A&M (4) – all have more or as many conference wins as the bottom four North teams combined. Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri and Colorado all have one victory apiece.

  That’s how it stands through Wednesday, when President Bush’s luck remained unchanged (he was rooting for Baylor against OU), Texas’ frustrations continued to boil, the Cowgirls topped the Tigers and, in a battle of the Big 12′s western-most outposts, Texas Tech defeated Colorado. 

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Kay would love it if we laugh a bit, too

   As we spend this weekend thinking about N.C. State coach Kay Yow, we should remember this: Along with so many other wonderful qualities, she had a great sense of humor.

The Indiana Fever’s Lin Dunn was a pioneer in the women’s college game like Yow; Dunn began her career in 1970. Saturday, Dunn sent me an an e-mail sharing her memory of the funny side of Yow.

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Big 12 power rankings No. 1

 I don’t like to do these until after a few games have been played, just to have a better feel for the teams. Four games in, here’s the Jumbo Dozen Power Rankings No. 1 for 2009:

1. Baylor, 4-0: Seems to have the best combination of skills and experience. 

2. Oklahoma, 4-0: If Sooners can handle Texas at home Sunday, then it really heats up the Baylor game next.

3. Kansas State, 3-1: May turn out like last year when the Wildcats’ only South losses were to Bears and Sooners. One of those has already happened.

4. Texas A&M, 2-2: A good team that’s still learning how best to utilize its depth.

5. Texas, 2-1: After pounding Buffs, Horns have eight days to prepare for Sooners on Sunday.

6. Iowa State, 2-2: Cyclones are doing OK, just have to avoid their ghosts in Lincoln on Saturday.

7. Texas Tech, 2-2: Raiders have to fix offensive lapses that doomed them against K-State

8. Oklahoma State, 1-2: It’s probably been good for Cowgirls to have week of practice before A&M.

9. Nebraska, 1-3: Next two games are against the top two North teams.

10. Kansas, 1-3: Beat Missouri but has scored 39, 49 and 58 points in three other games.

11. Missouri, 1-3: Showed life in opener against Texas A&M and edged Nebraska at home.

12. Colorado, 0-4: The Buffs likely aren’t worse than the three North teams above them;  they’ve just had to open with four South teams.

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Malia to the hoop and other thoughts

  Oh, goodness, there’s a lot to get to from the past several days, so here goes.

*-Surely everyone’s noticed how tall Malia Obama seems to be at age 10. And we know her dad, the new Prez, can play some hoops. 

  Have others been thinking what I’ve been thinking? That maybe eight years from now, we’ll have the first First Daughter to play collegiate sports? How cool would that be? How historical? I admit I’m already crossing my fingers. 

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About the Geno vs. Syracuse thing

  In regard to UConn’s game Saturday with Syracuse, and the postgame hijinx …

  I understand a coach like UConn’s Geno Auriemma being concerned about rough play and feeling the need to protect his players. But let’s try to look at this from both sides’ perspective.

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And just in case you’re wondering what Pat thinks …

  Here in Knoxville, Tenn., today, they had 16,413 fans to see Tennessee’s 68-56 victory over South Carolina.
  I figured as long as I was already in the general vicinity of Knoxville – it’s just about a 6-hour drive from North Carolina’s Triangle – I’d come over to watch the game and do a little prep work for a certain big-number victory that a coach in these parts is nearing.

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It’s not supposed to be this freaking freezing here

 I mean, come on. I expect it to be frigid if I go to a game at, say, Iowa State. But N.C. State? It usually doesn’t get that cold in Raleigh. But it sure is now. It’s really, really cold.

I’m here in the Triangle to catch some basketball action – Thursday was Florida State vs. N.C. State. I was about to pull the trigger on ranking the Seminoles last week, following their Jan. 5 win over Texas A&M. I confess their 2-point loss to Washington last month in Cancun held me back _ just because Washington was coming off two putrid losses, to Stanford and Cal.

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Sooners vs. “perfect” again

       The first truly tough test of Kansas State’s undefeated season comes Wednesday night at Oklahoma. And it’s interesting that this will be the third of the four still-unbeaten teams that the Sooners will face.

  They lost at home to North Carolina on Nov. 23 in the WNIT title game, then at Connecticut on Nov. 30. The Huskies and Tar Heels, of course, are currently the Nos. 1-2 teams in the country. 

  ”I hope we have better luck against the third unbeaten,” OU coach Sherri Coale said during Tuesday’s Big 12 coaches’ teleconference. “They’re a typical Kanas State team: They play really smart and don’t beat themselves.”

 True. What Coale didn’t say, though, is that the Wildcats typically don’t beat the Sooners, either. At least not in the past decade. Since 1998 – the second season at their respective schools for Coale and K-State’s Deb Patterson _ OU has won five in a row and 11 of the last 13 in this series.

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Welcome back, Vandy

  OK, I’ve given Vanderbilt the opposite of “props” recently, explaining in one post that I was taking the Commodores out of the Top 25 and then wondering in another post why they were staying in the rankings despite suffering their fourth loss this season.

  Considering their rivalry with Tennessee has been so decidedly one-sided, the ‘Dores were carrying a lot of bad history with them into Sunday’s game in Nashville. But they played as if they didn’t know that, taking advantage of their experience vs. Tennessee’s youth in a 74-58 victory.

 In recognition of the importance of every time Vandy pulls this off – the ‘Dores are now 7-52 against the Orange Crush – we will list the six previous wins.

*-Jan. 16, 1985: 84-77 in Nashville.

*-Feb. 4, 1987: 77-76 in Nashville.

*-Dec. 6, 1990: 80-66 in Nashville

*-March 6, 1995: 67-61 at SEC tournament in Chattanooga.

*-March 3, 2001: 77-74 at SEC tournament in Memphis.

*-Feb. 2, 2002: 76-59 in Nashville.

So … the ‘Dores still haven’t broken through in Knoxville. But any win anywhere for Vandy over Tennessee is a big deal.

And with that, Vandy is back in my poll. Rutgers, on a three-game skid, is out. Here’s my ballot this week:

Jan. 11 vote

1.Connecticut, 2. North Carolina, 3. Duke, 4. Baylor, 5. Oklahoma, 6. Stanford, 7. Louisville, 8. Auburn, 9. Texas A&M, 10. Maryland, 11. Tennessee, 12. Notre Dame, 13. Cal, 14. Virginia, 15. Ohio State, 16. Kansas State, 17. Georgia Tech, 18. Texas, 19. Florida, 20. South Dakota State, 21. Vanderbilt, 22. Marist, 23. Iowa State, 24. New Mexico, 25. DePaul

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