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Mama Mia! From AP-
Papa John’s founder John Schnatter is promising a free pizza to every fan who saw him sink a shot from midcourt at a Louisville basketball game.
He banked one in after a few tries at halftime of the Oral Roberts-Louisville game last week.
Video posted by the company on YouTube shows Schnatter celebrating wildly after hitting the long shot in Freedom Hall.
The company estimates that if all 18,868 fans claim the free large one-topping pizza, it will add up to a $174,000 giveaway.
People who watched the game have up to December 27th to make a claim. Anyone for pepperoni pizza on Christmas day?
The Rams were 1-4 so far this year. From AP-
The signs were pointing to another losing basketball season at Fordham so coach Dereck Whittenburg was fired just five games into his seventh season.
The player known for taking one of the most famous shots in NCAA tournament history wasn’t able to match that type of success at Fordham. Whittenburg compiled a 69-112 record, including 1-4 this season.
“There was a lot of people who thought we should make a change last spring and they rode me pretty hard,” athletic director Frank McLaughlin said Thursday. “I felt that with the strong recruiting class we had coming in, and with the right support, things could turn around. We had a favorable schedule. … We should be better than 1-4 and we felt a change had to be made.”
McLaughlin said Jared Grasso, an assistant on Whittenburg’s staff the last four seasons, will take over for the remainder of the season.
Fordham went 3-25 last year. McLaughlin said “From a purely basketball standpoint it was not a difficult decision. The record speaks for itself.” I agree, a change was justified.
For the second consecutive day, some NCAA Basketball coaching history was made. From AP-
Roy Williams’ milestone victories are starting to blend together for North Carolina
The Tar Heels gave their Hall of Fame coach his 600th career win Sunday night, an 80-73 triumph over pesky Nevada behind a career-high 23 points from Deon Thompson.
Ed Davis added 16 points, a personal-best 15 rebounds and a pair of momentum-changing blocked shots late for the Tar Heels (6-1).
Williams became the 33rd coach to reach this milestone, and the 3rd quickest. As I noted yesterday, the ever lengthening College Basketball season is the root cause of this.
He broke the record previously set by his predecessor, Jud Heathcote. From AP-
Izzo was doused with water by the jubilant Spartans after setting the school record for victories with 341 in the No. 2 Spartans’ 106-68 win over Massachusetts on Saturday night in the Legends Classic.
“I had a little bath,” a smiling Izzo said.
He didn’t have time to duck when the Spartans snuck behind him in the locker room with buckets of water. The Spartans also gave their coach a plaque that read “341 leaves a footprint in the sand.”
*****
Izzo set the record the same week mentor and predecessor Jud Heathcote was inducted into the National Collegiate Hall of Fame. For years, it was Izzo who sat by Heathcote’s side as an assistant and associate head coach. When Heathcote retired, Izzo was his hand-picked successor.
Izzo had already matched him with one national championship apiece. He now stands alone atop the Spartans’ win list with a 341-138 record in his 15th season.
It took Heathcote 19 seasons to get to 340 wins. The NCAA basketball season, is approximately a month longer today, than when Heathcote led the Spartans to a national championship in 1979. How can’t these lengthy schedules help affect the academic studies of athletes who do want to learn? Players have to travel and practice, not just play the actual games their school has scheduled.
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OTB Sports linked with Sweet 600- North Carolina beats Nevada 80-73...
It was the college coaching debut for FIU’s Isiah Thomas. From AP-
Isiah Thomas lost his coaching debut at Florida International on Wednesday night when Northwood, an NAIA school coached by Rollie Massimino, beat the Panthers 71-61 in an exhibition game.
Thomas, the Basketball Hall of Famer and most recently coach of the New York Knicks, faced Massimino, who coached Villanova to the 1985 NCAA title and is entering his fourth season at the West Palm Beach, Fla., school.
Lester Hunte scored 18 points for Northwood, while Patrick Horstmann had 13. Jay Duncan scored seven of his 10 points in the final minutes as Northwood pulled away.
Losing to a little known(I didn’t even know Northwood fielded a basketball team and the school is less than 15 minutes from my home) technical is not an auspicious start for FIU. The real season begins for the Panthers with a game against North Carolina on November 9th. Thomas will be lucky to lead FIU to 10 wins this year.
Very sad and slightly reminiscent of Maggie Dixon who coached Army and died at the same age. RIP.
Jackie Moore, a 28-year-old assistant women’s basketball coach at Eastern Illinois, has died.
The university says Moore died Wednesday night at a hospital after collapsing as she started a workout.
School spokesman Rich Moser says doctors said Moore’s heart “just stopped.” Moser says an autopsy is planned.
Moore was in her third season at the school. She graduated from Christian Brothers University in Memphis, Tenn., in 2005 and was from Windsor, Ontario.
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OTB Sports linked with Eastern Illinois Asst. Coach Jeff Hoover dead at 41...
Very sad and RIP.
Alan Ogg, a 7-foot-2 shotblocker who played for UAB Blazers and spent parts of three seasons in the NBA, died Sunday from complications from a staph infection, a university spokesman said. He was 42.
UAB spokesman Norm Reilly said Ogg died at UAB Hospital.
Ogg played 80 NBA games over three seasons beginning in 1990 with the Miami Heat, who had a moment of silence Sunday night before playing Chicago. He also played for Milwaukee and Washington, and averaged 2.2 points and 1.7 rebounds during his career.
Ogg is UAB’s career leader with 266 blocked shots over four seasons, averaging more than two a game.
He was playing basketball in Portugal when he suddenly collapsed during a game. RIP.
Kevin Widemond, a 23-year-old American guard, died of a heart attack during a Portuguese basketball tournament.
The Portuguese basketball federation said Widemond collapsed in the locker room Sunday during halftime of a game between his team Ovarense and Academica in Leiria, in northern Portugal.
Widemond, a native of Newark, N.J., had played 10 minutes in the third-place playoff game of the cup competition, which was canceled following his death.
“He was sitting on a bench, listening with the others to what the coach was saying, when he just keeled over,” Ovarense sports director Jose Eduardo said.
A doctor immediately began trying to resuscitate Widemond and those efforts continued in an ambulance and then at the hospital, Eduardo told public broadcaster RTP.
Eduardo said Widemond underwent extensive medical tests when he joined Ovarense a month ago. An autopsy would be performed, he said.
He replaces the recently fired Jim Crews. From the Times Herald-Record-
(Athletic Director) Anderson confirmed that Spiker agreed to a six-year deal. The Academy will introduce its new hire at a news conference at 3 p.m. Tuesday at West Point.
Spiker, who was on campus for an interview this week, expected to leave Cornell on Saturday morning and arrive at his new home on the Hudson Saturday afternoon
Army hasn’t had a winning season in 25 years. In light of the recruiting restrictions placed on service academies, Spiker will have a hard time reversing that trend.
Why did Army fire Crews only days before his basketball team was to begin practicing for the 2009-10 season?
He replaces Jim Crews, who last month was fired after being accused of physically and verbally abusing players.
If Crews abused his players, his firing is justifiable. I think abuse of college athletes is more common than the few and far between reports of it that emerge sometimes.
Who in Columbia need concern themselves with athletes twittering too much when the University is selling its own secrets. From AP-
The University of Missouri athletics department is changing its procedures after selling a box of old cell phones that included old text messages and contact numbers.
Mike Bellman paid $190 for 25 phones. They included text messages to and from basketball coach Mike Anderson, football coach Gary Pinkel and Athletics Director Mike Alden. E-mails and contact numbers were also on the phones.
The university offered to buy them back, but Bellman said he hoped to sell them to a sports collector.
Are there some sports fanatics who would cough up money for these phones or is it wishful thinking? I guess some people’s junk is sports memorabilia to other people.
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