Coach Penders has had a lot to smile about in his 5-2 start.
Today was a historic day for the Huskies athletic department. What’s that?… Oh, no, no, no, not for that boring girls basketball win-streak thingee either. With 71 games in a row? Or as I like to say, 71 straight dunk-free basketball games… no thank you.
Nope, today was much more important than that for Connecticut athletics. It was the baseball teams’ chance to get a four-game sweep at Cal State Northridge.
I also got the chance to talk to UConn head coach Jim Penders after his Huskies came up just short in getting that sweep. But it should be noted that they showed signs of life for a much, much, much better season in 2010.
We're giving these gold statuettes away to the best teams of the day. And the Oscar goes to...
Weekend three of the 2010 season comes to a close with a lot of fanfare and projections of who the worthy winners are and what they did to earn the spotlight on this college baseball Sunday.
So in honor of that timeless tradition of the Oscars ceremony, let’s put this weekend of stitched-ball action in the books and announce our winners of the day and the weekend.
The first limo of the evening has just pulled up, so cue the music and let the flashbulbs start lighting up the sky. And again, gentlemen, put on your best suit and tie and high-shine shoes. Ladies, get that dress that shows off as much skin as possible. The immense cleavage wars begin here.
Recruiting guru Turtle Thomas is weaving his magic at FIU.
And here’s what I found out…
FIU is a work in progress… heavy emphasis on the “progress” part.
Whoever wrote the song lyric that said, “It never rains in California” is a stoned liar. This is the third weekend in a row where rain has altered the schedule of games in the L.A. Basin. So with showers aimed to pelt the Los Angeles area on Saturday, it was time to load up my ‘64 Dodge Dart with the wire-hanger for an antenna and make a road trip over to the Coca-Cola Classic out in the Valley of the Sun.
Once I got there, I found an interesting story with Florida International emerging as a national player in just the third year of the Turtle Thomas era. Today, I was able to catch the Golden Panthers close-shave win over Cal Poly, 10-8, to improve to 8-1 on the season.
The weekend started early with a couple of marquee matchups coming on Thursday night, instead of the usual Friday lidlifters. And I figured the game I went to tonight would be THE pitching matchup of the weekend.
Addison Reed was a blur to the Kentucky batters tonight.
Unfortunately, it turned out to be much ado about nothing.
Pepperdine coach Steve Rodriguez has a big opportunity this weekend.
WHAT WE LEARNED FROM FEBRUARY.
Funny how things change. Okay, not funny “ha-ha” just funny-peculiar, ya’ know?
Things sure are different from the old days of college baseball. And by that I mean, for example, in 2001 Stanford and Cal Poly started the season with a January 21st game at Baggett Stadium for its grand opening. But now, we’re in the common start date era of our sport. So instead of a full month and a half of Division I action, there were only two weekends in the month of February. Still, a lot of early conclusions could be drawn already from the first 10 days (and change) of the 2010 season.
Here are eight quick-hit things we learned from February…
A hateful, repugnant waste of nine and a half minutes.
Welcome to the third baldcast of From The Cave for this season. Hope you enjoy it. And if not, thanks for watching anyway.
And if you don’t like watching me blabber on about the sport we love, then check out the *other* 10 reasons it was a good day in college baseball - posted below. (Yes, that means you have to keep reading, slacker.)
For those of you out there looking for big upsets in the college baseball landscape, this was certainly a good weekend for you. And it wasn’t just a win here, a win there, like a chicken pecking corn in the feed lot. We’re talking mid-major and even low-major teams out there winning weekend series against the fat cats of the college sports world.
Brendan Dougherty and the Coastal Carolina coaching staff have leadoff man Rico Noel and the rest of the Chanticleers pointed in the right direction.
I mean, when was the last time you saw teams like LeMoyne, Southeastern Louisiana and Western Kentucky listed in the Team of the Week feature? Never, right? Well here we are now people. All three are included in this week’s honorees.
14,588 fans filed into Dodger Stadium to see UCLA and USC
You hear it all the time out in the L.A. basin. Beaches. Mountains. Hollywood. Sunset Strip. Attractions. Theme parks. Good weather for doing anything outdoors. There are a lot of reasons people give for why attendance at college sports in this town is so weak. Especially for college baseball.
But today, maybe what we found out is that all it really takes is a big league venue. A crowd of 14,588 showed up for the second game of today’s DodgerTown Classic between UCLA and USC.
… and there are some teams across the country that WISH they could’ve had a rain out today.
The only contest that was able to be played around here was the Vanderbilt-USC game in South Central L.A. But even that game had its start time pushed far enough into prime time that I wasn’t able to catch it. I had this buddy whose band was given a nice slot opening for Seattle’s Prima Donna at the world famous Key Club on the Sunset Strip. Sorry, priorities people.
Vandy stood strong in the face of the elements and the Men of Troy tonight.
But no worries. ‘Coz Vanderbilt easily dismantled USC by a 10-1 count, so unless there was a female streaker at the game or something, I didn’t miss much.
