1-19-19
After watching a successful Aggie Women’s Basketball game this afternoon, I listened to the Aggie Men playing Utah Valley on the
road in the evening. Jack Nixon reported that everyone was
over the flu. They’d certainly need
everyone tonight, as they were playing a team with the second-longest home
winning streak in the country.
First Half
On the Aggies’ first possession, Johnny McCants went for a three.
The shot missed, but he got the rebound and laid it in. On the second possession, Terrell Brown missed the shot, but
again grabbed the rebound and got the bucket.
However, the Wolverines went on a 14-point run for a 10-22 lead. Timeout Aggies. I’m not sure I understand what happened
next. Somehow a production equipment
wire got caught in one of the goals? Mohamed Thiam dislodged it. Jack credited him with an assist.
This clearly sparked the Aggies as they went on an
8-point run. Trevelin Queen (I love the alliteration on that name) hit a three
to get it to 23-26. With five minutes
left, the Aggies got it within one, but then they gave up a three and a
layup. It was 33-39 Utah Valley at the
half.
Second Half
The Aggies again got it within one on a couple of
three’s. They’d take the lead on an AJ Harris’ three. With 10 minutes left in the game, the lead
started going back-and-forth on alternating possessions. Eli
Chuha already had a double double with 7 minutes left. The Aggies got into the double bonus with 5
minutes left. There were lots of fouls
in this game. The Wolverines had several
players with four fouls, though none fouled out.
The Aggies got out to a 3-point lead and took a timeout
with 3 minutes left. AJ came out and hit
a three to make it a 6-point lead. Jojo Zamora then hit a three to make it
77-70 Aggies with one minute left. All those
fouls would come back and haunt the Wolverines at the end. AJ and Terrell hit 6-straight free throws at
the end to ice the game. 83-78 Aggies win!
Well, the Wolverines had broken the Aggies’ home winning
streak last year, so this was just returning the favor. Coach
Jans was happy in the postgame to give you an idea of what he thought of
the team’s performance. Eli Chuha had 20 points with 14
rebounds. AJ Harris and Terrell Brown
each had 19. Jojo Zamora had 13. Here’s
your stat of the game: the Aggies were 83% on free throws and +11 over the
Wolverines in making them.
At this point, I should have started writing up the
Women’s game, but I couldn’t quite turn off the TV that I’d left on during the
Men’s game. Groan. Alright let’s get to
it. Later that night, Manny Pacquaio fought Adrien Broner in a boxing match. Actually, if
they’d played Bridge or something that would have been a tremendous surprise
and perhaps more interesting. I had
hoped I’d missed this last week, but apparently the commercial that I’d seen
was advertising it for this week. I
couldn’t be less enthusiastic, but since I already had the TV on, I thought I’d
watch. Two undercard matches that went
the distance later, I was ready to bail, but the main event finally came on at
11:30pm two hours later.
No, I’m not even doing round-by-round scoring. I wasn’t even going to take any notes unless
something interesting happened. In the
third round, I swear Broner tried to escape the ring by ducking through the
ropes. This was probably the point where
he finally fully realized that he was badly overmatched. In the seventh, I was momentarily thrilled
that the fight might end early on a TKO.
Manny had Broner on the ropes twice.
Broner could only clutch to stop the onslaught. The ref would not stop the fight though, and
Broner was saved by the bell.
Broner got his second wind and continued the fight. He was momentarily knocked off his feet in
the ninth, which got the crowd on theirs.
By the eleventh, Broner was running for his life around the ring. The crowd did not appreciate his sprinting
skill and let him hear it. At the end of
the match, Broner jumped up into a corner of the ring and held up his arms in
moral victory!
The judges disregarded his display and unanimously
awarded the match to Pacquaio. Credit to
the ref for not stopping the fight prematurely, even though Broner was being
used as a punching bag there in the seventh.
I think I had more fun writing this than watching it. Oh crap, now its 12:30. Forget writing up the Women’s game
tonight. I’m done.
1-20-19
I guess there’s a couple of big NFL games on today, so what a great time to talk about hockey.
(Rush Limbaugh has kissed and
made up with the NFL. He’ll regret
it.) Getting back from seeing my
parents, I didn’t make it back in time for the beginning of the Washington Capitals versus the Chicago Blackhawks game. I just missed the first Blackhawk goal by seconds. They were still showing replays of it when I
turned the TV on. That’s okay, I saw
their next goal a few seconds later while changing into more comfortable
clothes. 2-0 Blackhawks early in the
first period.
I decided to exercise rather than sitting down to watch
and take real notes. I might have been
figuring that the game wouldn’t get much more exciting. Well, the Caps scored a goal. The Blackhawks got another goal off of an own
goal by the Caps, as a player deflected it off his hand trying to knock it away
in the air. (I thought you couldn’t get
a goal on a hand pass?) They nearly
scored again, but it was waved off as the puck was actually pushed under the
net. 3-1 Blackhawks.
There was a player on one of the teams named “Kookoo,”
(I’m sure I’m not spelling that right). Mike Emrick tried to explain the
spelling and entomology, but it was eliciting giggles from me whenever I heard
it. There was a little segment on the
horn at the United Center. It was brought over from the old
stadium. It’s operated like an ICBM; you
have to turn a key before hitting the big red button. And, the operator’s name is Michael Horn.
Early in the second, the Blackhawks scored again to make
it 4-1. I was calling for a goalie
change and the Cap’s coach heard me.
Next up was a mass fist fight.
Then there was another fight between Alex Ovechkin and Patrick
Kane. This resulted in a 4 on 4, but
then there was another penalty and another fight. At one point, I saw four Blackhawks in the
penalty box. The refs had some confusion
and everyone else shared in it. The TV
graphics displayed that it was a 4 on 3, then a 4 on 4, and then finally full
strength before play actually restarted. (I think, it was very confusing.)
The Blackhawk goalie (whose name I didn’t quite get)
made three saves in one five-second sequence.
At one point, he was sideways and airborne making a stop. The crowd was on its feet after the
play. About a minute later, a fluky goal
got right past him to make it 4-2.
That’s the way it goes sometimes.
I had to turn away for a minute to see something at
noon. College Wrestling was on the schedule on Stadium. There it was. Navy
was taking on Lehigh and they’d be
taking on Duke afterward. I couldn’t believe this was on over-the-air
TV. A decent crowd was there for the
event. I didn’t quite get all the rules,
but I got the gist. What I saw was
interesting, but not as interesting as the hockey.
At the start of the third period, the Caps scored to get
within 4-3. Kane answered 30 seconds
later on a power play to make it 5-3.
The Blackhawks made it 6-3 with Jonathan
Toews scoring on a two on one breakaway.
Emrick told a story about an organist controversy at an All-Star Game in the 70’s, as the ASG
is coming next week. The United Center
organist was shown on camera and happily waved to the TV audience.
The Capitals scored two more goals and then it was
6-5. By this point, I was actually glad
I wasn’t keeping detailed notes on the scoring.
Toews got a hat trick with his third goal to make it 7-5. Finally, there was an empty-netter to finish
the game 8-5 Blackhawks. The crowd and myself were standing and the
applauding the effort by both teams today.
After the game, I flipped back over to the wrestling. To my surprise, they were showing a couple of
little kids out on the mat. I was
confused until the announcer explained that it was halftime. Yes, they have quarters and halftime in
wrestling. Flipping around, I found on a
Mexican station showing bullfighting. I’ve run into this a couple of times on the
weekends. I think it’s a weekly recap
show: This Week in Bullfighting or something like that. The video was dramatic with the bullfight
going on in a downpour. Okay, I’m not
breaking down bullfighting or wrestling today.
That’s enough of that.
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