So I forgot to post my Associated Press vote this week. Maybe last week, too. (Ahem). I got all caught up in the Oscars this past Sunday. Not sure what happened the previous Sunday. Is it still February?
I’ll put my full vote from Sunday at the bottom of this post, but will mention here that I ranked Tennessee No. 20. This was before the Vols’ 63-61 loss at LSU on Thursday, which ended with the officials needing to go over to the monitor to look at the time left on a so-called jump ball that never even came close to happening.
It was the kind of amateurish finish that seemed almost fitting for a game that kept reminding us, throughout, who wasn’t on the floor anymore for these teams. Like, everybody.
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OK, Texas A&M never killed off its women’s basketball program for eight days like Oklahoma once did. But, let me tell you … the Aggies’ program, not long ago, seemed more or less dead.
In a recent blog post, I wrote about Billie Jean King … how nervous I was to talk to her in 1999, even though by that point, I’d been interviewing people for 15 years. It was because of the high regard I had for her, of course, and the gratitude for what she’d done for women and athletics in general.
Not that this is a news flash … but it’s looking even more likely these days that the two titans of women’s hoops, Tennessee and Connecticut, won’t meet for the second year in a row.
There’s somewhat of a ruckus here in Big 12 country because Iowa State’s “super fan” – Wild Bill Yungclas – announced he is “retiring” after this season because of the economy.
OK, it’s Sunday … or it was when I started writing this post. I was in Ames, Iowa, for the Texas-Iowa State game, a contest that seemed like it was in the Cyclones’ hands … until the end, when it wasn’t. It was a big win for the Longhorns, and the kind of loss that I would think will sit like undigested food for the Cyclones until they attempt to take out their frustrations on Nebraska on Wednesday.
Sorry to have taken a little break from the blog … but now I want to tell you one of those heart-warming, feel-good, why-sports-matters, you-go-girl, I-am-woman-hear-me-roar, do-I-have-an-amen-from-the-sisterhood, and-brother-you’re-invited-too, long-and-rambling kind of stories.
Bedlam in Stillwater, Okla., wasn’t very “crazy” Sunday – it was predictably all about Oklahoma. Last season, Oklahoma State made a breakthrough by beating the Sooners at Gallagher-Iba Arena behind Andrea Riley’s 45 points. 
The big tumbler for me this week was Louisville, which dropped from No. 4 to No. 11. That was a combination of weighing the Cardinals’ loss to West Virginia and strong performances from the teams ranked 5-10 last week (with the exception of Texas A&M.)
Wednesday during a teleconference with Tennessee coach Pat Summitt, someone who had called in apparently was in a room where people walked in and started joking around.
