Sports – Page 4 – Tom Robinson

March 27, 2015March 27, 2015

Unflinching

I saw a tremendous finish to a college basketball game the other night, one of the best I’ve seen live. Maybe the best. I was sitting just to the left of the basket, at a media table, when Trey Freeman banked in his running 3-pointer that beat Murray State and sent Old Dominion to the NIT semifinals next week at Madison Square Garden.

(Jason Hirschfeld photo)

The ball arced from about 30-feet away. It banked into the basket cleanly. And the white-noise eruption of multiple jet engines, or something like it rising from the seats and bouncing off the ceiling, ensued. And it sustained for many minutes of pure delirium at the Constant Center.

Yet I barely moved a muscle the entire time, except for my fingers pounding a keyboard and my eyes scanning a stat sheet. I was working as a freelancer for the Associated Press. And it was my job to file a short story on the game immediately, if not sooner, after the horn sounded.

So I stayed calm, composed my words and hit the “send” button mere seconds into that swirl of chaos.

But I wondered as I left The Ted a bit later, after refiling a story with quotes from players and coaches, how I’d have reacted had I not been on the clock, but rather just a patron in the stands.

I didn’t have to ponder long, though, because I’d been in similar situations, and so I already knew the answer. I would have looked on with a large measure of minimal reaction. I’d have recognized the magnitude and serendipity of the moment, certainly, and probably uttered a “Wow” or an “Oh my God” or “Well, how about that?” to my seat-mates. Would have offered appropriate applause for the athletic drama.

But go crazy? Lose a lung bellowing? Rush the court? Feel lifted on wings, somehow, the next day or two? Not quite. That shipped sailed long, long years ago, if it ever really floated in the first place.

No cheering in the press box is right, and proper. It is a workplace, not a wing joint. And so working in sports journalism — and I started part-time in college — stripped from me all but the most deep-seated fragments of “fan” that percolate to the surface, for this child of Philly sports, only occasionally via an Eagles or Phillies game.

So it was during some of the greatest, most famous sports moments I was blessed to cover as a writer: Kirk Gibson’s World Series home run in 1988. Keri Strug’s gold-clinching vault in the ’96 Olympics. Payne Stewart’s putt to win the ’99 U.S. Open. They happened. I soaked it in. And with the crowd noise bursting my ear drums, my brain immediately began forming words and sentences. No time for emotion. No instinct toward emotion, really. Labor needed to be performed.

But react impassively often enough and “impassive” becomes a default state. That’s the danger. It drills so deeply into the nervous system, this requisite detachment, it infiltrates personal spaces and behaviors far from the arena. It did for me, I admit. So let me re-state that thesis as a singular assessment.

Still, as I ruminated on my ride home from a Ted gone bonkers, I truly was pleased I had witnessed what I had witnessed, and also that I’d been able to provide the news-service story read by much of the country — well, anyone who cared about the game anyway.

Had you looked at me before, during and after that ball banked through, however, you’d have had no clue to my satisfaction for having added a cool, great moment to my mental menu. I know that is unfortunate collateral damage of the task-focused, neutrality-required, deadline-driven vocation in which I trafficked for so long.

There’s no crying in baseball, and there’s no emotion — if it can be helped — in writing about the pulsing emotion of sports. That’s irony not lost on a sports “fan” lost long ago.

March 11, 2015

Hearts out there

I wish I had stayed up with this college basketball game to its conclusion Tuesday night. North Dakota State was battling South Dakota State – isn’t that great? – for the Summit League tournament championship and an automatic berth in the NCAA tournament.

North Dakota State wound up winning 57-56. The Bison rumble on, the hard-luck Jackrabbits scoot along to the National Invitation Tournament.

March is full of euphoria and heartbreak like this, it’s why the term March Madness was coined lo these many years ago, and why so many lives rise and fall with it. But now and again there is something to be gleaned beyond the winner and loser. South Dakota’s coach Scott Nagy delivered that in his post-game comments, according to reports on the game.

I’ve been in enough post-game press conferences to hear in my head the reporter ask Nagy the obligatory, “Coach, what did you tell your team in the locker room?”

This is what Nagy said:

“Most people don’t try, they live in the middle. They don’t put their hearts out there and they try and protect themselves. When you do this and you put your heart out there in front of all these people, sometimes it’s exhilarating and sometimes it’s incredibly painful. But that’s what living feels like . . .

“I hope they live the rest of their lives that way and they don’t protect themselves. It’s hurtful sometimes. Very hurtful.”

I would venture this is always a timely message and reminder, for a lot of us. Timely, yes. But poignant, too. Inspirational, for sure. I’ll read that quote a few more times this week. And the next.

It’s also a reminder that we all need coaches in our lives, of some sort, even if they pass through in just the flash of a basketball press conference.

Thanks, coach.

February 7, 2015February 7, 2015

Virginia wins again, and the run to March begins

CHARLOTTESVILLE – There has been earlier evidence, but Saturday convinced me that scoring the basketball, as the Dickie V.’s of the hoops world like to chirp, on Virginia presently is one of the hardest things to do in American sports.

More accurately, I should say Louisville’s ugly offense, matched against the smothering blanket of the Cavaliers’ harassing D, convinced me.

The Cardinals, ranked 9^th (for whatever the Associated Press rankings are worth), scored four baskets and 13 points in the first half. None of those four baskets, nor any free throws, went through the hoop in the half’s final 10 ½ minutes of what became No. 3 U.Va.’s 52-47 victory, one that stretched its stunning record to 21-1. That’s a serious scoring drought in any league, but one that was raw meat to a ravenous, orange-clad crowd turned out to revel in the cult of their Cavaliers.

For sure, it was a pumped-up night at John Paul Jones Arena, as you would expect. A full house. All the blaring music and rousing cheers that come with it. A home team facing one of the “royalty” programs of college hoops for the first time in ACC play, and its third Hall of Fame coach in three games (Rick Pitino), looking to launch into the last four weeks of the season the right way.

And if U.Va. never quite dominated, thanks to a lackluster offensive game and the hand injury of star guard Justin Anderson, the Cavaliers controlled the play and won with only mild drama. (The Cards closed to within four with 35 seconds left and then three with 18 ticks to go.)

Controlling the play, both with and without the ball, is of course how U.Va. has made its bones under coach Tony Bennett. And so the Cavs made the Cardinals dance: Louisville never led past the opening five minutes and scored its second-fewest points this season.

Especially in the first half, the Cavs flummoxed the Cards with the trap-the-ball-out-front, collapse-on-the-ball-down-low defense on which Bennett has built a stellar career, first at Washington State and now, in his sixth season, at U.Va. Louisville figured some things out in the second half, but that 24-13 halftime deficit was too large to overcome.

So the Cavs are down to eight games left – they will be favored to win them all — before the ACC tournament, and then the NCAAs that follow. That’s the part of the schedule their fans long for — if they could only skip right to it — especially after U.Va.’s long-shot chance at going undefeated was ruined by Duke last Saturday.

It took a while, what with Kentucky’s roster full of NBA prospects dominating the buzz, but the national voices of college basketball eventually got around to acclaiming U.Va. a “legitimate” contender for the throne of March Madness. That’s impressive praise to breathe in, but it’s deserved – for the simple reason that defense should never really have an off-night.

The Cavaliers’ deliberate, but uneven, offense will ultimately come to haunt them. I think. If there is a hedge against that, it’s because the defense and rebounding aspect of the game always comes down to “want-to,” to that hand-in-glove tandem of effort and concentration.

The consistency with which Bennett coaxes that performance from his players, and how regularly they respond – to the hungry cheers of fans conditioned to treat the dwindling of a shot clock like a dog treats a dinner bell – is the new story of U.Va. basketball. One that is, at the top of this stretch run, is about to get even more interesting.

February 5, 2015February 5, 2015

Signing Daze

I feel fortunate that “signing day” as a craze arrived long after I was responsible for covering a college sports beat. My water bill would have been astronomical each February for all the showers I’d have needed to take.

Bad enough I had to proffer opinion most years about the obscene indulgence of an event – trumpeting the signing of national letters of intent, or that is, scholarship acceptance by already entitled teenagers — that fluffs sports programs and inflates impressionable egos.

Somehow it was always the same opinion on rewind, that, well, it’s an obscene indulgence. As it was again Wednesday.

It is a perpetuating embarrassment to the adults of college sports – administrators, coaches and fans — who have created a four- and five-star frenzy over college recruiting, and in the reactionary sports media that blankets it all ’round the clock.

As a matter of fact, I don’t drive a Buick, and I do fancy the Internet. Still, is it that old school to be offended by the rush to instant judgment that has bled into “amateur” sports and applied unnecessary and unwelcome marketplace pressures?

Or that many top youth players who want to play beyond high school are forced to “commit” to college programs as sophomores, under vague threat of being recruited over and losing their spot on the factory line?

When it comes to young bodies and minds — in general, not just among athletes — sensible observers understand what is now is not what will be, good or bad. Future performance is never guaranteed.

Yet mature sensibilities take a holiday when we create a growing market for subscription-based websites selling “expert” scouting reports on high-school athletes and their potential.

That in turn demands the college coach to proactively respond — with predictable gushing praise — to snap reviews of his recruiting success based on obscure ratings and blind trust. The ravenous who buy seat licenses and season tickets must be fed.

Here is a quaint quote: “Proof of the pudding is in the eating.” That’s the actual proverb, did you know that? The trouble is, reflexive — refluxive? — response has ruined a sports nation’s appetite for patient tasting.

It’s regretful that gorging on the whims of high school kids, the definition of signing day hype, is the default behavior we bring to the table.

January 28, 2015January 28, 2015

Bob and Tom explain it all again

Remember when the Blues Brothers were on a “mission from God” to get the band back together? This isn’t quite a religious experience, but it IS cool to pair up with longtime bud and sports-writing hero Bob Molinaro for a new edition of the Bob/Tom Super Bowl Series™ now in its 22nd year. Well, that isn’t true, either. Still, we’ve been doing these things a while – and well, thanks to Bob’s generosity, here we go again.

Sweeping winds off of Brambleton Ave. recently scattered us . . . but we boys do not so lightly dissipate. Bob this month rejoined the traditional media product on an ala carte basis. His fan-fave “Weekly Briefing” — insightful and bemused takes on the sports world – drops on Fridays. And I noodle around here with words and stuff, exercising writing muscles while deciding between barista and mall-cop opportunities.

So with Super Bowl 49 nigh – no Roman numerals here, yo — the time has come to banter and stream-of-consciously spar regarding this sporting tilt between the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots in Glendale, Ariz.

(Only officially inflated footballs whose pressure will be checked between plays to avoid chicanery, not mentioning any names, need apply.)

That’s where we hope to provide some useful football-speak i.e. things to perhaps watch for on the field, as well as reminding you for the umpteenth time that Seattle stars Kam Chancellor and Russell Wilson are . . . wait for it . . . from Norfolk and Richmond, respectively!

And so I say:

Your envy does not become you, Robert. You well know that in our most recent collaboration before the season, I guessed, savant-like, the Patriots would meet the Seahawks in the Super Bowl. I can tell it’s eating you up.

I had Patriots vs. 49ers. Failed to anticipate Jim Harbaugh would be more of a Michigan man than a match for Pete Carroll. Now we’ve got a Stupor Bowl with the NFL’s two least likeable teams. Or so they say. You?

Trash Talkers with an annoying gum-chompin’ coach vs. Envelope Pushers led by an evil genius. Speaking of which, Bill Belichick’s brought six teams this far now, so the Pats are like the Yankees. Everybody but Yankees fans hates the Yankees. But Seattle struts and preens and goes on and on about its fittingly loud-mouth “12th Man” fans.

It’s a rooting-interest dilemma — but alas, a really compelling match: Seattle trying to become the first repeat champ since, yep, the ’03-’04 Patriots. The Tom Bradys, after losses in ‘07 and ‘11, trying to win No. 4.

I root for a good game and decent chili. Wasn’t so lucky last year when the Seahawks obliterated Denver 43-8. An aberration, that was, just the second SB in the last seven decided by more than a touchdown. You could look it up . . . but, I mean, I just did so.

We’ve come to expect compelling SBs, but in the ‘80s and ‘90s when The Pilot was printing money in the basement, I covered a series of busts, most decided before “Up With People” hit the field. Wait, am I old enough to have seen Pete Rozelle’s favorite halftime group perform live? On second thought, I’m not THAT old, but you get the point.

And you’re right, Tom, last year’s rout was an outlier, the most lopsided result since ‘93.

I like this game in part for the powerful personalities involved. Gut reaction, Bob: Richard Sherman.

The kid who said the emperor has no clothes.

Ok, Marshawn Lynch. Are you good with his belligerence with the media?

He just doesn’t want to be fined. If a man has nothing to say the best thing to do is say nothing. Typically, the media have taken the bait.

Belichick. My take: you’ve got to give it up to him. The Pats have won more since he was caught, you know, cheating with the clandestine signal-taping eight years ago than before. Plus he’s brilliant and ruthless — brilliantly ruthless — managing a roster. Complicated fella. Is there an unauthorized biography out on him? It would be fascinating. OK, Brady. Go.

Nixon and Belichick have embarrassing tapes in common. Both claimed they were not crooks. Beyond that, well, Brady throws a better pass than Haldeman could. He just might be the best QB ever . . . after Johnny Unitas, of course. Sorry, couldn’t resist. Do we agree, though, that top to bottom, Seattle’s roster is stronger?

Yeah, more Seattle star power for sure, even without the mercurial — mercurial! — Percy Harvin, who just didn’t fit and was moved in a ballsy October trade that clicked. With the Pats, once you get past Brady, Gronk and Revis, it’s pretty much yeoman-city. I mean, their top runner, LeGarrette Blount, was cut by Pittsburgh in late November. Belichick re-signs him — Blount was with him last year — and he torches the Colts for 148 yards and 3 TDs in the AFC title game. Crazy.

Play Howie Long for me, Bob. What’s a game matchup that could have the most impact?

Got one. Seattle safety Earl Thomas is coming off a separated left shoulder. That gives the Patriots even more incentive to attack him downfield with Brady’s favorite target, tight end Rob Gronkowski. Brady to Gronk could have Cris Collinsworth’s Telestrators working overtime. On the other side, if Pats can’t contain Lynch, The Hoodie may not have enough answers.

That’s my Captain Obvious matchup: Lynch averages about five yards and Wilson seven a carry for the league’s best rushing team. Can it be slowed? Stopped?

The other (obvious) thing, turnovers. Not sexy, just damn important. New England coughed it up a league-low 13 times in the regular season, Seattle 14, although Wilson was picked four times in the NFC title game and still beat the chokin’ Packers. Green Bay was just powerless against the beastly Lynch, whose interview if/when he wins MVP ought to be awesome.

Having typed that, the rules say if you picked something in August then you have to stick with it in February or else . . . well, I really don’t know what else. Anyway, this is why I will bet you a short one that New England wins 24-21, the margin in honor of an odd stat: Four of the Pats’ five SBs were decided by three points. The other? Four points.

Roger Goodell wants — he needs! — a dramatic, thrill-filled finale to divert attention from his horrible, rotten, most terrible — and sometimes deflating — year. Even if it means Pats’ owner Robert Kraft, his friend and some say “assistant commissioner,” takes the fall.

Given the year it’s had, the NFL deserves a game bad and ugly enough to make viewers want to gouge out their eyes with toothpicks. But if “deserved” had anything to do with it, Goodell would be paying to get into the game.

This season really proves the unsightly mega-power of the NFL (duh). Domestic abuse upon scandal upon investigation! The league is shameless, and now somebody monkeyed with a bunch of balls to gain an edge — the search continues for Zapruder-like film of the dastardly crime. But this league rules. Ironic choice of words there. Ha . . .

The NFL prevails because it’s America’s biggest, most popular TV show. And this year, the Emmy — uh, Lombardi Trophy — goes to the Seahawks. Here to accept is Pete Carroll. Damn, I hate that grin.

Thanks, Tom, for sharing the blog.

God bless America, Bob. And God bless Katy Perry.

January 26, 2015January 26, 2015

Coach K and the next thousand

The day after claiming his 1,000th coaching victory, Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski, battling sniffles, was back at the business of claiming No. 1,001. Or at least talking about it for a few minutes with media jackals.

His 17-2 Blue Devils (ranked fourth) play at Notre Dame (No. 8) on Wednesday night, the first top-10 clash on the Irish’s court in 12 years. That little tidbit surprises me some, but that was the word on Monday’s ACC coaches conference call.

With 1,000 down, Krzyzewski was asked how he’ll get those Blue Devils to reboot and start the climb up the next mountain. “We’re trying to figure that out,” he said. “I think our team the last month has gone through some things other teams haven’t gone through, because of all this (hype). It’s a different journey. We’ve won the 1,000th game; what does that mean?”

Well, right away he hopes it means a mentally sharp bunch will win Wednesday before heading to Charlottesville for Saturday’s big tilt with No. 2 and 19-0 Virginia at John Paul Jones Arena.

Coach K was benevolent as could be when asked about U.Va.’s Tony Bennett, fluffing him as “one of the truly outstanding coaches in the country.” Hard to argue, considering the Cavaliers are an incredible 49-7 the last two seasons.

“He’s lived the game since he was born and it shows,” Krzyzewski said, noting the broad-leafed family coaching tree from which Bennett emerged. “He’s just got a consistent, outstanding effort in preparation for each game. He has a great system, and he recruits to that system. And it appears he has great support from his university.”

More platitudes ensued, but you get the drift. My friend David Teel of the Daily Press did draw some insight from Coach K, however, when he quizzed him on whether he thought U.Va.’s suffocating post defense might trouble Duke’s stud freshman big man Jahlil Okafor.

Krzyzewski said Okafor, who averages 19 points and nine rebounds, meets collapsing double-teams with unfrosh-like poise, and gave an interesting hint as to why that fans can watch for.

“Part of it is he’s got really huge hands, so he can pass out of it one-handed, which gives you a little more room,” Krzyzewski said. “You’re longer than you would be with two hands and wider in making your passes out. He can pass, and he wants to pass. He’s made overall great decisions in handling that.”

Then again, those passes are just pretty pictures if Duke misses an unhealthy share of the open perimeter shots that ensue. The Blue Devils shot 37 percent and 44 percent when they lost back-to-back games this month to North Carolina State and Miami, the latter by a ridiculous, for college hoops, 90-74 score. 90!

“So,” said the Coach, “we have to help (Okafor) out by completing the play.”

Truer words were never . . . well, you know.

7 p.m. Saturday. Enjoy the game.

January 18, 2015January 18, 2015

Prediction: No more NFL predictions

It’s healthy to engage in a little personal review every year – except when your personal activity involves predicting before the NFL season the records with which each team would finish, which would make the playoffs, reach the Super Bowl and ultimately emerge as champion.

It’s a fool’s errand. Ah, but such prognostications were still part of my full-time sports journalistic duties last September, when I went on printed record for the 28^th consecutive season – eh, more like six – and in the process somehow predicted the Dallas Cowboys would stink out the NFL joint and win only five games. Um, they were a powerhouse at 12-4.

Ha! And let me flagellate myself further. (What? That’s a word! Keep it clean, people!) Not only was I dubious on Dallas, but I ‘ciphered and figgered and ruminated and churnchurnchurn whirlwhirl . . . I endorsed the New Orleans Saints for 13 – count ‘em, 13! – victories. Yes, in print that people paid for! With my name attached. I assumed their loaded offense would erupt all over a soft schedule and a weak division. Ha! The NFC South turned out weak indeed – the Carolina Panthers won the stupid four-team division with a 7-9 record. The Saints, the outfit I expected to win the most games in the NFL? Yeah, they won six silly contests.

I note this at this point because those who care know that the NFC and AFC championship games will be played today (Sunday). And seeing the teams involved – Seattle and Green Bay in the NFC, then Indianapolis and New England – it jogged my memory that I THOUGHT I’d picked the playoffs pretty well, at least. And I did. That is to say, I thought Seattle would be playing at New Orleans today and that the Seahawks, with that mighty Kam Chancellor-led defense, would win. And I thought that Denver would lose in New England; alas, Brady and the other Gray Hoodies will still host, but they will instead take out Indianapolis, which beat Denver last week.

Alas, these results will set up the Super Bowl I DID predict five months ago and subsequently put my mortgage down on in Las Vegas (which isn’t true at all) – New England vs. Seattle, with the Patriots winning that championship game with the pretentious Roman Numerals ridiculously attached to it.

Overall, then, I judge this slight salvaging as positive to my self-esteem as a sports writer with an NFL emphasis, in that I predicted six teams right on the number and 11 more within one victory of their total — so that 53 percent came in perfect or plus-or-minus 1.

That is about the very definition of middling. The good news is I will be doubtful to ever quit my day job – if I ever get another day job – to launch a venture as a sports-book railbird.

And that’s really all I have to say about that.

Enjoy the games.

January 12, 2015January 12, 2015

NFL rules; and why U.Va. could rule

(USA Today photo)

A little sports talk . . .

THE DALLAS COWBOYS WEREN’T HOSED by the refs Sunday in their playoff loss to the Green Bay Packers. They were hosed by a convoluted NFL rule applied only after a deft replay review demanded by the Packers head coach.

“NFL” and “convoluted rules” are intertwined, if you haven’t noticed. It’s a circumstance, spun far out of control, that needs to change in order to bring common sense back into the game and to eliminate a creeping and suffocating referee nannyism.

This particular rule, having to do with a receiver controlling the football after tumbling to the ground following a catch, is a few years old. With the advent of the zoom lens peering everywhere, and from multiple angles, the NFL’s intent was to be sure no receiver got away with anything, i.e. half-catching the ball, as it were.

That’s why it wasn’t good enough for Dallas’ brilliant Dez Bryant to out-duel his defender with a leap, catch the ball, and run with it, secure in his hands, for two steps before being tackled just shy of a touchdown late in Sunday’s 26-21 loss. It wasn’t good enough because the ball popped from Bryant’s grasp – and back into his arms — when it hit the ground upon his reaching it toward the goal line.

In every sense of football, athleticism and fair play, Bryant made a spectacular catch that might have set up his team to score the game-clinching touchdown. He caught the ball. He ran with it. He had full control of it in those crucial seconds.

That should be plenty. If a running back fumbles the ball upon landing on it after being tackled, it is not a fumble. Why, boys and girls? Because, as the laymen’s explanation goes, “the ground cannot cause a fumble.”

Easy enough to understand. After seeing the reception rule interpreted in correct, but unfortunate, fashion Sunday, the same disclaimer should be applied. The NFL should not allow the ground to nullify a receiver’s catch if he has obvious control of the ball when he hits the ground FOLLOWING CONTACT.

Catch. Run. Control. Two feet in bounds. That’s a catch. That’s what we all know, and what we’ve always known. The eye-test, whatever you want to call it. Or as a guy on Twitter reminded me was once urged by John Madden, if three guys watching in a bar know it’s a catch, it’s a catch, come on already.

Then again, expecting the ultra-corporate, multi-billion-dollar generating NFL to relax and let the game happen is like asking for world peace.

The unintended consequence of finicky rules and fine-tooth replays in the NFL is continued iron-fist suppression of the game’s spirit. There are enough controversies already swirling around football to rob its supreme athletes of what should be supreme moments.

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DON’T LOOK NOW — OH, THAT’S FINE, LOOK — but the University of Virginia’s basketball team remains undefeated (15-0) and will be ranked second in the nation behind Kentucky when this week’s Associated Press poll is released today. (The poll is out; No. 2 it is.) Duke will drop from the second spot after losing to North Carolina State on Sunday.

Pundit declarations of the Cavaliers as being among the favorites to reach the national semifinals and contend for the NCAA title at this point should be met with a resounding “duh.”

Of course coach Tony Bennett’s team is a strong challenger to the crown should it keep all the pieces intact, i.e. prevent injuries from disrupting its flow.

The Cavs still play lockdown, relentless half-court defense better than anybody – they lead the country in fewest points allowed per game 51.1. Teams HATE playing against lock-down half-court defense about as much as purist fans of basketball’s free-flowing motion hate the resultant rock fights, but such is life.

Their attention to defensive detail and commitment to making the life of the other offense hell remains striking. What stands out as different about this team, even from last year when the Cavs were 30-7, won the ACC and reached the regional semifinals, is they score much easier. Dangerous pairing, that one.

They average 71 points a game, five more than last season. Junior Justin Anderson averages 15 points but has made 56 percent of his 3-point shots – 36 of 64, which is just ridiculous accuracy. Super-steady point guard London Perrantes is back with a 3-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio. And big men Mike Tobey and Darion Atkins – fyi, the team’s only senior – are an efficient duo combining for 13 rebounds and 57-percent shooting around the bucket.

U.Va.’s calm, confidence and savvy, personified best by classy junior guard Malcolm Brogdon, stand out in a quiet way against the drum-beating for other programs with higher-profile recruits and more NBA prospects.

Try as media star-making apparatus might, the college game remains first about chemistry and teamwork, which is also why Kentucky and its roster of heralded talents deserve credit for blending well, so far, amid all those egos. Duke as well, bad Sunday and all. These are teams that get what the sense and value of “team” are about. All are worth watching as the long season strides toward March’s tournaments.

It’s just that the team in Charlottesville has already proven it stands as great a shot as ever, and of any around, to stand alone at the end.

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TONIGHT, IT SAYS HERE OREGON WINS the national college championship in a high-scoring, entertaining match with Ohio State, which, repeat after me, has lost only to Virginia Tech (which finished 7-6) in the second week of the season. That was early September, a long time ago, way too long for a college sports season to endure, which remains part of the cloying hypocrisy of the NCAA, which rivals the NFL for over-bearing.

Ah, but I admit, or I suppose, I’ll watch with interest — but yes, with a few pangs.

I am amused — bemused? — that Buckeye’s quarterback Cardale Jones, who started the season the third-stringer, is a 22-year-old SOPHOMORE, although I do appreciate that he tweeted a couple years ago, in a moment of honest frustration, the pointlessness of being required to go to class when he was recruited to play ball. “We ain’t come to play SCHOOL,” Master Jones artfully tweeted to, it turns out, his regret as his constant back-tracking and smoothing over during this game’s ceaseless build-up has droned on.

The solution, of course: Pay that man for his time, Ohio State, and for some slices of pizza after practice. He ain’t come to Columbus to play school, and you know it.