Starting Five

1. The Miami Heat win their 16th straight, although this time it was a nail-biter versus Orlando. The Chicago Blackhawks rally from a goal down in the third period versus the Avalanche to win 3-2 and maintain their remarkable streak of recording at least one point in every game this season, through 24 games. Chicago is 21-0-3. Keep on keepin’ on, both of you.

2. So, it turns out that Mila Kunis is every bit as cool as her character from “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.” The editors of Horse & Hound would be beaming with pride. (“So far you’re doing a great job.” “Really?” “No, but we’ll see what happens.”) (“I should get back to the questions.” “Why? This is WAY more fun for me.”)

She will spend time with the lads at a pub and then watch your football club’s game with you. What’s not to love?

The reward of listening to that video all the way through is that you get to hear Scott ask Mila, “Have you ever dropped trou at a wedding?”

3. Kentucky congressman Rand Paul undertakes a 13-hour filibuster in Congress to protest the administration’s policy on potential use of drone strikes in the United States versus non-combatants. Paul’s address reminds us that once upon a time there was an English band named Talk Talk who released an album entitled “Talk Talk” that had the hit single “Talk Talk.” Hey, it was the height of the New Wave era. Anything with a synthesizer was cool.

Look Who’s Talking

4. So, Sports Illustrated puts out a theme issue, “The 50 Most Powerful People in Sports”, a list that Sports Business Journal has been compiling for years with far less fanfare. A few things:

— Any time you can get Steve Rushin to write your essay, then it was worth the inspiration.

— No. 10 on their list? “Hedge Fund Dude.” I will now spend the next three days in a fit of depression.

— The entire “Game of Thrones” conceit that accompanies the piece was the brainchild of my good friend, terminally hopeless hipster and bonafide good egg Adam Duerson. He is a man of many passions — soccer, RAGBRAI, and the George R.R. Martin series, to name a few– and certainly one of the finest people I have ever met.

You want an Adam Duerson story? Okay. In March of 2004 Adam, writer Jaime Lowe and myself were thrown into an RV and told to travel to as many NCAA (and/or NIT) tournament games as possible for SI On Campus (a great idea with an idiot as its publisher). The pilgrimage took us from Storrs to Spokane to finally, Phoenix (where we had two hours of R&R at my parents’ house, time that was spent with my mom and dad shoveling lasagna down our throats and doing the laundry of two of the three of us [I was the stinky odd man out]).

Adam Duerson: Of course he owns a bear suit. Why wouldn’t he?

Anyway, on St. Patrick’s Day we found ourselves in South Bend, Ind., for an NIT game. Being that it was that day and that McDonald’s serves Shamrock shakes — and that we thought it would be cool to have a non-alcoholic drinking contest — Duerson and I engaged in a Shamrock Shakedown. Now, he’s a lot younger than I am and attended a large state school, so I knew I’d have no chance in this seven-minute, all-you-can-drink battle royale…unless I went tortoise.

Which I did. Adam sprinted out to an early lead, but about five minutes in began grabbing the front of his cranium and moaning, over and over, “Brain freeze. Brain freeze. Brain freeze.” It remains to this day one of my greatest triumphs.

Okay, maybe that was a John Walters story. But I love Duerson.

The people at McDonald’s, by the way, kicked us out.

5. When should you not be allowed to bring a pocket knife to a cabin? When that cabin is part of an aircraft. The TSA has passed a resolution in which small, sharp objects will once more be allowed on commercial flights. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

Reserves

The insomniacs’ cut (it’s kind of like the devil’s cut and the angel’s cut, but not really) last night was staying up late enough to listen to the indefatigable, existential Bill Walton do color for Cal-Stanford. First of all, it was a game in which a bench-clearing brawl elicited the ejections of two players and three assistant coaches. Better was listening to Walton berate the lack of traveling calls and wondering exactly why players with the ball in a half-court set are allowed to bull-rush to the hoop without being whistled for an offensive foul. He sounded so old. He sounded…just like me.

As soon as you shoot 22 for 23 in an NCAA championship game, feel free to criticize Big Red. Until then…zip it.

My favorite Walton moment was, when discussing the rule that mandates assistant coaches be automatically ejected for leaving the bench area (even if it is, as it was in this case, to break up a melee), Big Red said, “That’s something that must be discussed at the next measure of evolution.”

Remote Patrol

Today I am devoting this space to the game that should be televised but won’t be. While ESPN –and the WWL does wonderful things with college hoops, I get it– has time to air Penn State at Northwestern (the pair are a combined 5-27 in Big Ten play), it will not air Louisiana Tech (26-3) at New Mexico State (19-10). The Bulldogs boast an 18-game win streak, which I believe is the nation’s longest, while the Aggies are 13-1 in Las Cruces this season, their lone loss coming to ranked in-state rival New Mexico.

Tech’s leading scorer, Raheem Appleby. Who wouldn’t want to watch a dude named Raheem Appleby ball?

Come on, Kerri Potts, throw your weight around. Get this game on the air.

By the way, my MSN Picks page previews tonight’s Thunder at Knicks contest as “a potential NBA Finals preview.” Chico, please.