Give Me Some of That Real Music

If you've been a full-time reader, you know this already, but if not, nothing beats a good gut-wrenching R&B/Soul song for me. There's some good stuff on the radio right now, I like Mary J. Blige's new song, and I'm enjoying the old and new stuff featuring the Notorious BIG, along with the resurrection of Mariah Carey (even though she's still a little crazy). But the new song out by Keyshia Cole, "Love". Now that's the song. She's begging for her man to stay and you can feel her gut wrenching with every word. If you haven't heard it, I suggest you download it. Keyshia Cole, Alicia Keys, Leela James, keep singing ladies I love it.

Less than 48 hours until Selection Sunday, can you feel the excitement!!!:

• In the ACC, tomorrow's first semifinal will be top-seed Duke vs. last-place Wake Forest after the Deacons knocked off 4 seed NC State. Wake had 5 in double figures and outrebounded the Wolfpack by 19, yikes. Duke saw JJ Redick return to mideseason form after a slow start. JJ finished with 25 on 9/17 shooting, 5/11 from 3. The second semifinal will be North Carolina vs. Boston College. The Heels survived a pesky Virginia team, keeping their streak of good play going. BC is having an easy time with Maryland, who I think are headed for the NIT. What will Gary Williams complain about after this one?
• In the Big Ten, semifinal #1 will be Iowa vs. a resurgent Michigan St., who upset Illinois in tonight's quarterfinal nightcap. Sparty won a tough, gritty game, a type of game they've lost this year. Give credit to Michigan St.'s backup frontcourt players. When Paul Davis got in foul trouble, the backups stepped up, keeping the Spartans in front. Illinois is great defensively and their big people present matchup problems. But they don't make a lot of outside shots and their foul shooting is atrocious, which will be their downfall. Semifinal #2 will be Ohio St. vs. Indiana, who I think are in the NCAAs after their win today. IU's been a 2nd half team all year, and today was no excpetion. They were down 19-15 at the half, but got hot from the outside, which got Marco Killingsworth going inside, and they were able to beat Wisconsin. Now, what will happen if Indiana plays Iowa in the finals??? IU playing their #1 candidate for their coaching job in Indianapolis. Drama, people, drama. With UConn and Villanova losing this week and Duke struggling, a Big 1o tourney win will most likely give Ohio St. a 1 seed I think.
• Tomorrow's Conference USA championship will be Memphis vs. UAB, 1 vs. 2. I think UAB is in the tournament, they have continued to roll after beating Memphis just several days ago. This game might be the most entertaining of them all tomorrow. The game is in Memphis by the way.
• In the Patriot Championship, Bucknell took care of business against Holy Cross. Bucknell made 10/18 3s in this game. When they shoot like that, and you add the big fella Chris McNaughton inside, they can beat a lot of teams. They will be a 7 or 8 seed I think.
• The SEC final 4 will be Kentucky vs. South Carolina, and LSU vs. Florida. South Carolina beat Tennessee to make it to the semis. Talk about a team struggling, Tennessee can't guard anybody right now. South Carolina is one of the poorer offensive teams in the SEC, yet they shot 54% and had 21 assists on their 28 field goals, talk about efficiency!!!!
• The Atlantic 10 final will be St. Joseph's vs. Xavier. Xavier is playing basically a home game down at US Bank Arena on the Riverfront. What a gift this NCAA bid would be with none of the top 4 seeds winning their quarterfinal game in this tournament. I guess the 1st round bye is overrated.
• Another tournament where apparently the 1st round bye was overrated is the Big East. 3 of the 4 semifinalists played 1st round games (Villanova the exception). Gerry McNamara was at it again for the Cuse. After a slow 1st half, he scored 15 of his 17 in the 2nd half, including a 3 with 46 sec. left to bring his team to within 1 of Georgetown. Then, he threw a great bounce pass to Eric Devendorf for the game-winning layup with 10 sec. left. Syracuse is a whole different team from the one I saw get embarassed at DePaul. They're doing a better job of getting the ball to G-Mac more and they're playing harder defensively. Darryl Watkins isn't playing great, but he's playing well, well enough to be a factor at both ends. In the 2nd semifinal, Pittsburgh did everything right vs. Villanova, and the Wildcats may have lost Big East player of the year Allen Ray. Ray suffered an eye injury at the start of the 2nd half which didn't look good. He was taken to the hospital. What a tough break for Nova. If Ray is unavailable, the selection committee may drop Nova to a 2 seed, as they did with Cincinnati when Kenyon Martin broke his leg.
• In the MAC, it will be Kent State vs. Toledo. Yes, Toledo upset Akron, who had everything going for them in this tournament. They had the much easier half of the draw, made even easier when Toledo beat MAC West champ Northern Illinois in the quarterfinals. But Akron hasn't played well in Cleveland, and it bit them tonight.
• And in the Big 12, it will be Texas vs. Texas A&M, who are definitely in after whipping Colorado, and Kansas vs. Nebraska, who upset Oklahoma in the quarterfinal nightcap. The majority of upsets occur in the 1st and 4th games of 4 game sessions. The noon starting time is too early for some, it's tough to get the energy going, and with the late starting time, you're sitting around all day waiting to play, which allows the nerves to creep in. At least that's my theory.

After tomorrow, we'll know most of the NCAA field. I'll be filling in my 65 team field and will be able to tell you tomorrow night who the Last 5 in and the Last 5 out are.

If you get a chance, get a copy of this week's Sports Illustrated and read the story about Barry Bonds. You're innocent until proven guilty, but wow, this is pretty darn close. The pieces seem to fall into place. Again, seem is the key word.

Here's a little bit of Keyshia's song to finish things tonight:

"Oh, Love, never knew what I was missing, but I knew once we started kissin' I found......Love, never knew what I was missin but I knew once we start kissin' I found....."