I'll be working on the weekend

Opening thoughts: Tomorrow, macro test, followed by basketball against the Econ professors. Hopefully, it is a good Friday. Then, after micro class, it's back here to grade exams the rest of the night. I know, so much fun.

Let's talk hoops:

• Michigan St. 77, Wisconsin 64. Suzy Kolber couldn't have said it better on Sportscenter, Alan Anderson had a Christian Laettner kind of night, going 10/10 from the floor, 7/7 from the line for a career-high 28. The Spartans as a team shot 56% from the floor, which is awfully good against the Badgers, even at East Lansing. MSU will be interesting to watch in the NCAAs. Can they go out of the Big 10 and beat anyone good? It's still hard to believe they're ranked 9th in the country.
• Arizona 57, Washington St. 56, OT. Pullman is a tough place to play, but the Wildcats get out with a big road win. Arizona will be another team to watch in the NCAAs. Can they go out of the Pac 10 and beat anyone good? Channing Frye had 26 points and 8 boards tonight to make up for the Arizona backcourt, which combined to only go 6/23 tonight (Salim Stoudamire: 1/7).
• St. Mary's 81, San Francisco 77, 3OT. The Gaels will get in for sure if they at least make the WCC finals. They were impressive early in the year without their best player, and at 23-7 currently, it would be hard to deny them a bid.
  
• Oregon St. 84, Stanford 83. The Beavers clinched their first winning season in 15 years since the days of Gary Payton I believe. Stanford got another great effort from Chris Hernandez, who had 29, but this was a bad loss. The Cardinal must win at Oregon this weekend, or they're back on the bubble. It's going to be tough without Dan Grunfeld, their leading scorer.
• Washington 90, Arizona St. 82. In maybe the worst officiated game of the year, the Huskies took care of business at home to setup the showdown for Pac 10 supremacy with Arizona on Saturday. Lil' Nate Robinson was in foul trouble most of the 2nd half, but came up with some big shots down the stretch, including the clincher that put the Huskies up 5 with 40 sec. left. Ike Diogu for ASU was as advertised, scoring 29 and getting a double-double, but his supporting cast just isn't consistent enough. Washington is ANOTHER team to watch in the NCAAs. Can they win a game outside of the Pac10 against anyone good? Can the teams from the weaker SEC, Big 10 and Pac 10 win big games in March after playing in mediocre conferences? That'll be interesting to see.

In Survivor, Ashlee, the student was voted off as Oolong? lost the immunity challenge for the 2nd straight time, although they did win reward. Her biggest thing was she didn't eat after her tribe caught fish and looked weak, despite Kim not contributing much physically during the challenge.

The collegians showed some creativity in The Apprentice, delivering the better graffiti ad to Sony Playstation, winning only their 2nd challenge. Alex, project manager, actually thought outside of the box, asking Harlem residents (where the graffiti wall was being painted) what they would like to see from the ad, which would get them to buy the game. Tara, PM for the high schoolers, tried to do too much. Instead of an advertisement, she did her best to become President of the Harlem Chamber of Commerce by coming up with art that was more for the community. During the whole task, she, by herself, took credit for coming up with the idea, which was her downfall as she didn't take advice from her team.

I'm getting ancy for the Madness to start, 4 days until March, 8 days until Championship Week starts.