Starting Five

1. The Gift of the Magi(c) The Heat’s first stop on its four-game road trip is a puddle Lake Okeechobee-jumper upstate to Orlando, who own the league’s second-worst record. Miami went on a 20-2 run late in the third and coasted to its 27th straight win, 108-94 . Of course, this was the second-most important game between two Florida-based teams this week (FGCU vs. UF in NCAAs later on). Meanwhile in New Orleans, Denver’s 15-game win streak was truncated by Brian Roberts (WHO???) and the New Orleans Not-Yet-Pelicans. Roberts, a rookie from Dayton making his second start, had 18 assists as the NONYP Gulf-coasted, 110-86.

Life of Ti

2. He’s baaaaaaaaaaack. Tiger Woods wins the Arnold Palmer Invitational (our invitation never arrived, either) and more importantly, returns to his rightful No. 1 ranking for the first time since October, 2010 (you know what happened the following month). Tiger went some 2 1/2 years without a victory. He has now won six times in his past 20 starts and three times in 2013. It’s actually going to be a surprise if he does not win at Augusta next month.

3. Hey, JW, is there any connection between Florida Gulf Coast basketball and Notre Dame? Why, as a matter of fact there is. The NCAAs may be the Big Dance, but the world’s largest annual outdoor basketball tournament, Bookstore Basketball, is just commencing in South Bend. More than 600 teams participate. Last year’s champion, Hoops We Did It Again, was led by Beau Bauer, a Notre Dame athletic department employee who also happens to be a former captain of the FGCU basketball squad. Bauer hit the game-winning/tourney-winning shot in a driving rain storm (big thanks to @SIDandtheScribe for this info).

Beau Bauer

Bookstore Basketball buckets (of rain)

4. In sportswriter transaction news, Will Leitch announces that he is leaving New York magazine to join Sports on Earth, the USA Today site. So SoE loses Joe Posnanski, picks up Leitch (and a copy editor to be named later). In related news, and I am not making this up, Will’s old pal Buzz Bissinger announces that he is a…shopaholic. Term I want to use more often: shopaholism. (I think all three of these men suffer from an advanced case of megalomania, but that’s another item for another day).

You can’t go any further from anti-establishment (Deadspin) to establishment than to join “the Nation’s newspaper.”

5. Don’t look now, but it appears as if Geno Auriemma may have gotten the message through to his Huskies after they lost the Big East Championship game to Notre Dame earlier this month. UConn, playing the first two games of the Women’s NCAA Tournament on campus, won by margins of 68 (Idaho) and 33 (Vanderbilt) points. Now Geno’s Traveling Show must trek a full 78 miles southwest to Bridgeport for rounds 3 and 4. A potential Elite Eight matchup would pit UConn against Delaware and former Husky recruit Elena Delle Donne, a six-foot-five senior who is second in the nation in scoring (25.5 points per game). For those of us who are actually interested in women’s hoops, this is the matchup we’re dying to see. Delle Donne has never played UConn.

You can be sure that Geno is Delle-aware

Reserves

In music and physical science news, My Chemical Romance is breaking up dissolving. The solvent? It would seem that lead singer Gerard Way, as this letter attests, had an epiphany while performing in Asbury Park, N.J., last May. So, despite what their most popular tune promises, MCR will not in fact “carry on.”

In replay news, Costa Rica demands a do-over with USA in soccer and Italian prosecutors want to retry Amanda Knox for murder. Double jeopardy is not a principle of the Italian criminal justice system. Extraditing Knox from Seattle to Italy may prove difficult.

Remand Amanda? (You law students, feel free to overturn this caption on grounds of insufficient evidence)

That moment, later this week, when NBA fans realize that the epic Miami Heat at San Antonio Spurs game can only be seen on NBA TV.

This is no way to fight for an 8th seed. The Loss Angeles Lakers (36-35) drop their third straight (although, on the bright side, at least this time it was to a playoff-bound squad) at Golden State. The Warriors (41-31) led by 23 at halftime. Warrior coach Mark Jackson was blunt: “We are the better basketball team. They are in the rear view mirror and I have not checked it and I will not.” Stephen Curry (25 points) and Klay Thompson (22) are fast becoming the most dynamic backcourt in the NBA. And Jarrett Jack (19 points) is a super third guard to have around.

East Baywatch: Curry and Thompson, both of whom are sons of former NBA players.

This seems, well, unnatural, but somehow the U.S. men’s cross-country squad finished ahead of Kenya in the World Cross Country Championships in Poland this weekend. Ethiopia took gold, the U.S. silver, Kenya bronze.

Kenya believe it? Yanks finish ahead of African juggernaut in Poland.

Chicago native Tom Zbikowski, who was released after one season with the Indianapolis Colts, signs a one-year contract with the Chicago Bears. He always belonged there. Best Chicago native/ND alum to become a Bear since Chris Zorich.

Zibby, back in his “I Could Be the Lead Singer for A-Ha” days in South Bend

Time magazine puts out its annual Twitter 140.   Jim Rome made this list over Bill Simmons, Cecil Hurt and Steve Rushin, meaning that Time did not follow its own standard of finding “the very best wit and wisdom that Twitter has to offer.”

Cyprus banks remain closed until Thursday, or until George Bailey can convince the Russians not to pull all of their money out.

As Flock of Seagulls once sang, “Aurora Borealis comes in view, Aurora comes in vi-eeeeewww.” The Northern Lights, as seen from Iceland last week (doesn’t this deserve an Enya soundtrack?)

When you were 15 and alone in your bedroom, chances are that you were not using your time as productively as Nick D’Aloisio. He taught himself to write computer software and devised a free newsreading app that he sold to Yahoo! yesterday for $30 million. D’Aloisio, who is now 17, will work for Yahoo! out of its London office. No word yet on whether Marissa Mayer will allow him to work from home, even though he seems to do all of his best work there.

Remote Patrol

Walking Dead marathon

AMC 8 p.m. to 2 a.m.

Taking you from the Season One finale far into Season 2, as Rick and the refugees flee Atlanta. Zombies? No, Freaknic. (I kid, I kid.)

“No. He said, ‘Walking.’ If I were…dead that would not be…something…you would enjoy seeing…on televsion.”

We note that both “Splash” and “Smash” (What rhymes with “trash”?) are on TV tonight. Apparently, the latter is a decent show.

Big weekend. Big. Let’s begin, shall we?

Starting Five

1. Sweet 16: The Iranian, the Maxim Cover Model, and Some Dude Named Cleanthony

You want colorful? Oregon, a 12-seed that everyone, before the tourney began, decried was the most egregious mistake the selection committee made, advances while being led by a native of Iran, Arsalan Kazemi. A transfer from Rice, Kazemi grabbed 33 rebounds this past weekend. What does Oregon know about advancing in the NCAA tourney? Well, the Ducks won the inaugural tournament back in 1939, but other than that…

Kazemi: The Middle East’s answer to Eduardo Najera

Then there’s Florida Gulf Coast University, located in Dunk City, Fla. Not only are the Eagles the first No. 15 seed to advance to the Sweet 16, but they are just one of seven schools this weekend that won both games by at least 10 points. This was no accident. The particulars you need to know:

1. The school only began holding classes in 1997.

2. It first fielded a Division I hoops team in 2007.

3. Coach Andy Enfield shot 92.5% from the free throw line as a player at Johns Hopkins (he holds the NCAA record for FT accuracy), earned his MBA, made a fortune with a computer software company, and then took a Maxim cover model, Amanda Marcum, out on a first date that included an NIT game and a trip to Taco Bell. In Queens (or so I’ve read). And she married him.

Practice your free throws, kids.

Finally, there’s Wichita State, which knocked off No. 1 seed Gonzaga. They are the Shockers, but let’s not call their victory a shocker. Please. Cleanthony Early, coming off the bench in both games, scored 37 points for Wichita State (Kansas has two teams in the Sweet 16; Florida has three) over the weekend. We desperately hope that Cleanthony has an evil twin named Dirtyrone.

2. Now THAT is a white-out! (a.k.a. “Denver Pile…of Snow”)

If you channel-surfed away from the March Madness blowouts on Friday night and happened upon ESPN, you came upon the surreal scene of a World Cup qualifier (Costa Rica vs. USA from Denver) being played in an epic blizzard. While the Costa Rican soccer federation is protesting the game — Team USA won 1-0, after having lost last month in Costa Rica — this story by The Daily Mail illustrates that soccer has been played in similarly snowy conditions over the decades.

Maybe soccer belongs in the Winter Olympics

3. Minnesota Women

Minnesota has produced the likes of Jane Russell, Cheryl Tiegs, Jessicas Biel and Lange, and Loni Anderson. Add the University of Minnesota women’s hockey team to that august list, as the Golden Gophers defeated Boston University 6-3 in the NCAA championship game to consummate their sport’s first perfect season. The GGs went 41-0 to win their second consecutive NCAA championship while extending their winning streak to 49 games.

Amanda Kessel, the top player in women’s collegiate hockey (whose brother, Phil, plays for the Maple Leafs), scored 2 goals in the final.

4. This family from Overland Park, Kansas, really does not want to hear you whine about your harrowing airport experience.

5. This is Kyle Dake. On Friday evening the Cornell senior became the first wrestler in NCAA history to win four national championships in four different weight classes: 141 pounds as a freshman, 149 as a sophomore, 157 as a junior and 165 as a senior. He had to defeat defending NCAA champ David Taylor of Penn State in the final, a match so anticipated that event organizers rearranged the schedule so that it would be the final bout of the night. Dake finishes his collegiate career with a 132-4 record. Now it’s on to Brazil in 2016.

Reserves

Fron the “Wooden You Know It?” Files: Saturday evening: Sources report that UCLA coach Ben Howland has been fired. Later that evening, UCLA issues a press release saying that Howland has not been fired. Sunday: the Bruins fire Howland.

Were this anyone else in the world of sport, you might be surprised. But it was Sergio Garcia, so you were not. Birdies don’t exist in these kinds of trees.

This may be why Garcia always struggles in desert stops on the PGA Tour

Anderson D. Cooper (“Danger is my middle name”) goes diving with Nile crocodiles on “60 Minutes.” Of course he does.

Cooper: “To be honest, the line outside the men’s room at Splash in Chelsea is more harrowing.”

As many of you know, I’ve been on the Nate Reuss bandwagon since seeing his former band, The Format, open for All-American Rejects back in 2006 (don’t hate me; I took my two nieces to the show).  When I first visited the steakateria to discuss working there, he happened to be sitting next to me at the bar and we struck up a conversation (just two Arizona natives hanging out in the Big Apple). Anyway, this is my favorite song from his breakthrough album with fun.. (Do I write “fun..” at the end of the sentence or is it just “fun.”? Help me, Joseph Erwin).

Jay Leno keeps poking the bear. After all that he’s done (ask Messrs. Letterman and O’Brien), the funniest part of all this is that he’s auditioning for the role of sympathetic figure.

The Heat have won 26 in a row. The Nuggets have won 15 in a row. Both play tonight, in the southeast. They don’t play one another the rest of the season.

Someone in New Jersey purchased the sole winning ticket for the $338 million Powerball lottery. And if history is any guide, their life is about to be pure misery.

Remote Patrol

After four days/nights of gorging yourself on NCAA hoops? Go to the gym tonight.

Starting Five

1. “LaSalle Shocks K-State” reads the ESPN.com headline. “Harvard Pulls NCAA Tournament Schocker vs. New Mexico” proclaims the USA Today. Gentlemen: There are no unbeatable teams in this tournament. There were five different No. 1-ranked (and as many No 1-rankled) schools this season: Indiana (twice), Duke (twice), Louisville, Michigan and Gonzaga. Miami is arguably better than all of them.

A Notre Dame-Kansas final would provide a “Hail Mary, full of grace/The Lord is Withey” headline

Why was the La Salle win a “shock?” Because the Explorers were a lower seed? Didn’t La Salle defeat one more top ten opponent (Butler) this winter than the Wildcats did? And while I’ll grant you that Harvard over New Mexico was a mild upset, both schools had three losses since New Year’s Eve. If a No. 16 were to defeat a No. 1 — all eyes on you later tonight, Western Kentuckuy — for the first time in NCAA tournament history, I’d grant you the s-verb. Until then, let’s not overhype first-round upsets.

There are no shockers in this tourney. There are Shockers (Wichita State moved on to the Round of 32) and there’s Shaka (Smart, coach of VCU), but no shockers.

2. Print is dead. Dominus vobiscum.

Even the pope is canceling his newspaper subscription. The newly elected Pope Francis phoned a Buenos Aires kiosk earlier this week to inform them that he would no longer be needing his daily newspapers (“But what if we offered you the next ten weeks free? And added a Religion section?“)

3. ESPN analyst Jeff Van Gundy says that winning 33 consecutive NBA games is a “bigger accomplishment” than winning the NBA Finals and apparently this is controversial? I understand –and JVG understands — that the goal is to win the Larry O’Brien trophy (now THAT is LOB City), but someone does that by default ever year. No one has won 33 consecutive NBA games in more than 40 years. There’s a reason for that: it’s very difficult to do.

Sure, we could post a Jeff Van Gundy pic here, but this is Julianna Hough. Her boyfriend –Ryan Seacrest — just dumped her.

The Miami Heat are a better squad than both the Boston Celtics and certainly the Cleveland Cadaverliers, and yet trailed the former by 14 and the latter by 27 before winning both games earlier this week. The Denver Nuggets, owners of a 13-game win streak, needed five points in the final 10 seconds to outlast a moribund Philadelphia 76er team playing on the second night of a back-to-back — at altitude — after having lost by 29 one night earlier.

My point? The Heat –and the Nuggets — are going to get their opponents’ A-plus games for as long as their streaks shall survive. That’s why it’s such a tremendous accomplishment (and that is also the hidden cost of creating a college football playoff and eradicating the current system, imperfect as it may be).

4. Yesterday we noted that hippos kill more humans in Africa than any other wild animal. However, we at MH like to consider ourselves a hippo-neutral enterprise. We recognize that while hippos may be deadly, it’s usually only to protect their turf (and since they cannot own guns, what other choice do they have, Mr. LaPierre?). Anyway, we came across this video yesterday and thought we’d present it in the interest of delivering “fair and balanced” hippo content.

To all the hippo-critics out there: shut your yaps.

5. Terrific investigative feature on UCLA prodigy Shabazz Muhammad by Ken Bensinger in the Los Angeles Times. It turns out that Shabazz is actually one year older — 20, not 19 — than listed in the UCLA media guide, but who cares? As for his overbearing dad, Ron Holmes, who are we to judge? And how is Ron Holmes all that different from Earl Woods (father of Tiger) or Richard Williams (dad of Serena and Venus). All three raised children in southern California, all three encouraged –and often pushed — them to succeed in their chosen sports, and two of the three fathers have ridiculously wealthy offspring. Soon, three of them will.

We predict Muhammad will score 19 –no, make that 20 — points versus Minnesota tonight

The stories you rarely if ever read about are of the dads who go full-metal Marinovich on their offspring, who either rebel or fall far short of any type of success. But, hey, who doesn’t have an issue with his or her parents at some point in their lives?

REMOTE PATROL

March Madness

CBS/TNT/TruTV

Still on the docket for tonight: Notre Dame versus Iowa State, Western Kentucky attempts to become the first-ever No. 16 seed to knock off a No. 1 seed (Kansas… expect to hear the name Ali Faroukhmanesh if it does), and Minnesota takes on UCLA in a battle between schools whose campuses are located in cities that have been home to the Lakers.

Steakateria double followed by an early morning steakateria shift. Sorry to be brusque/but today’s IAH at dusk. Enjoy the tourney.

If you guys were the No. 3 seed that knocked out Harvard, you would have knocked out Harvard.

-JW

If you are a sports fan –and you probably are if you are reading this — then today is the equivalent of Christmas morning. TOO. MANY. PRESENTS.

Starting Five

1. Let’s Dance!

Thirty-two games, beginning with No. 14 Valparaiso vs. No. 3 Michigan State at 12:15 p.m. from Auburn Hills. The earliest local start belongs to No. 13 New Mexico State and No. 4 St. Louis, who will tip off at 11:10 a.m. local time from San Jose…. Easiest “upset” picks of today: No. 11 Bucknell and Mike Muscala over No. 6 Butler or No. 12 Oregon, led by 6-7 Iranian native and Rice transfer Arsalan Kazemi, over No. 5 Oklahoma State and freshman stud Marcus Smart. Or is Kazemi’s presence on the Ducks’ roster just a gigantic ruse disguising his real covert mission in the USA, a mission that will only become clear to all of us 30 years from now when Ben Affleck buys the rights to his story? Hmmmm….

You go your way, and Argo mine? No?

2. Over at Deadspin Drew Magary — who else? — has compiled the Ultimate Curse Word Bracket (don’t hit the link, mom) that is inspired in terms of its seeding. Of the four No. 1 seeds, we’d only supplant one, switching it out with the No. 5 seed in that same regional (you’re smart; you can figure it out). Left out and presumably headed for the NIT of Curse Word Brackets: Rat Bastard. A fun game, if it were possible, would be to cross off every one of these 64 terms once a coach uses one during an NCAA tournament game.

3. Heat Night! (and no matter how far and wide we searched, there was no YouTube video of this tune by The Waitressses. It’s a shame) Down 27 with just over 18 minutes to go in Cleveland — the Cavs kinda blow and were without their three leading scorers, yet somehow had managed to gain a 27-point advantage — the LeBronsters came all the way back. In fact, Miami led by nine with three minutes remaining, meaning a 36-point reversal in about 15 minutes of play. James, who played all 24 minutes of the second half and nearly accumulated a post-halftime triple-double (his overall stats were 25, 12 and 10), exerted his will.  The streak extends to 24. And Cleveland, poor Cleveland, experiences yet another excruciating kick to the (see Nos. 8 and/or 16 in the “Body Regional” bracket from the item above) as far as sports fandom.

4. Gone, Baby, Gone

Remember Gavin Smith, the handsome Fox movie executive (okay, he was a distributor) who disappeared last May 1st? Smith, a former UCLA basketball player under John Wooden (his son Evan played at USC last year), simply vanished without a trace. Now, finally, LAPD detectives appear to have some solid evidence to lead them to conclude that he was murdered.

5. This list is, well, to use the author’s own name, Gall-ing. I’m not even a Stuart Scott fan, but how do you leave him off the list of the 20 Greatest SportsCenter anchors but include Kevin Frazier? Also, Rich Eisen would be in my Top 10. Way ahead of Dave Revsine. And I agree with Neil “Howzit” Everett: “(He’s) in the top ten, Roger.”

My Top Five: Patrick & Olbermann (it’s a matched set), Kenny Mayne (back when he actually worked for a living), Chris Berman (once upon a time; he was their first huge star, you cannot deny that), Scott Van Pelt, Neil Everett. Eisen as sixth man. Then Linda Cohn.

Reserves

If you’re keeping score, Kate Upton has a dinner date with Arnold Palmer, 83, (pssst, Kate, order an Arnold Palmer) and has been asked to the prom by a reach-exceeding-grasp high school student. And yet Arash Markazi has her on speed dial. We are not even going to add a photo of Kate Upton in here, which may make us the first sports blog ever to mention Kate Upton without including a photo. Instead, here’s a photo of a hippopotamus. Not that we are making a comparison, because we are not.

“Hippopotamus” means “river horse” in ancient Greek. Hippos kill more humans than any other wild creature in Africa. As Les Miles would say, “So you know…”

He was sentenced to write “I Will Not Carry A Prohibited Firearm” 100 times on a chalkboard. Or at least I hope that was the punishment.

Tina Fey checks the “Meet and Be Interviewed by James Lipton” box off her career to-do list. And revives Sarah Palin while doing so.

Speaking of Alaska, it looks as if the Iditarod is setting up for an historic finish! Mush Madness, y’all! And, yes, there are Musher Babes: twin sisters Anna and Kristy Berington.

The Berington twins: To Nome is to love ’em.

REMOTE PATROL

NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament

CBS, TruTV, TNT, TBS

12 p.m. to pass out

What are the odds that CBS invites Ed O’Bannon on to discuss his views of the tournament and the NCAA at large? I could tell you about the day’s most intriguing matchups and players, but CBS “senior blogger” Matt Norlander has done a better job than I could do right here.