Super Bowl
Most years I watch the Super Bowl fairly closely, tracking the game, commercials, and halftime show with an idea of being able to take an active role in whatever the post-game discourse is. Last night I sat on the couch for four-plus nearly uninterrupted hours, but was often letting my attention drift to other things.
So no deep takes today. A game that was super boring turned super exciting in the fourth quarter and overtime. No 49ers fan will ever agree if you tell them points after are not important. The Chiefs ascend to the game’s pantheon, and Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes do so for the coaching/quarterback elite of the elite levels as well. The Niners, once one of the most blessed franchises in the game, have a legit argument for least blessed (Super Bowl division, of course). And now ESPN can start forcing the draft down our throats for three months…
I had no idea about the clock rule in overtime, how the teams were basically playing the first quarter and there was no reason for either team to be using time outs late in the extra frame. That seems super dumb to me. It’s overtime; there should be some sense of urgency to score. Glad that didn’t end up being a factor because then we would have heard about it endlessly for the next six months.
Usher’s halftime show? Solid. The grumpy old man in me continues to be bummed that these shows have become more about spectacle than performance, and often a spectacle that is much better viewed inside the stadium than on TV. Usher did the right thing trying the thread the needle between dancing his ass off without relying exclusively on recorded tracks. To me, though, that’s almost more distracting as he would sing a handful of lines then drop out so he could dance again. I know that’s a hell of an expectation and there’s no best way to do it.
Once again the big takeaway is that no one did it better than Prince, and I’m not sure anyone ever will.
Jayhawk Talk
Not the best week for my Jayhawks. Blew a double-digit lead on the road for the second time this season, losing in overtime to a Kansas State team that often seemed only mildly interested in winning Monday night. Seriously, there were a few stretches where both teams played more like middle schoolers, kicking the ball back-and-forth in the dumbest ways possible.
Johnny Furphy, who was apparently sick, didn’t hit a 3 for the first time since he entered the starting lineup. Hunter Dickinson and KJ Adams missed a handful of relatively easy shots that could have kept KSU at arm’s length. Dajuan Harris again had several inexplicable turnovers. And Kevin McCullar was truly bad, forcing bad shots and missing four free throws along the way.
Guess those free throws should have been a clue something was up. McCullar shocked KU fans Saturday morning on ESPN Gameday when he said he might not play that evening against Baylor. Might Not turned into Definitely Won’t as game time got closer, and our sphincters got extra tight.
Fortunately KU’s defense was very good, Baylor’s offense was very bad, and the Jayhawks survived a truly terrible final minute to hold the Bears off. I was glad I missed the second half so those final 60 seconds didn’t ruin my entire night.
Put that all together and I’ve decided KU isn’t winning another road game this year. That’s not a super bold statement, as they have road games at Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Baylor, and Houston, with only OU being a game KU might be favored in. I’m assuming McCullar doesn’t play tonight in Lubbock. Who knows if Harris, who rolled his ankle badly Saturday, will. Furphy still seemed sick Saturday and Jamari McDowell didn’t play because of illness.
The Big 12 title is probably out of reach, as much because of strength of remaining schedule as KU not being able to win a road game. KU has five games left against ranked teams while Houston and Iowa State have just three. Unbalanced schedules suck.
With KU’s road woes, I’ve reached the point where I just hope the Jayhawks can win out at home and then be completely healthy in mid-March. Finishing in the top four of the Big 12 likely means nothing lower than a three seed in the NCAA Tournament. When healthy, KU can beat anyone and go on a run. If they are still banged up in mid-March, they could easily lose to whatever 14-seed they are matched up with.
Other College Hoops Thoughts
Baylor is starting to seem like a lite version of Kentucky. They sign a top ten kid every year, and have multiple freshmen who are expected to leave after one season in Waco. Most nights they have way more raw talent than the teams they are playing. Some nights those young guys are all locked in and look amazing. More often one or two of them are floating through the game, or are overwhelmed by playing against older, more experienced players, and the Bears look disjointed and lost. Not that I’m complaining. Scott Drew is a phony putz and I enjoy seeing him flail around, trying to get those young pieces to work together.
I have no love for Baylor, but it was a true bummer seeing how much Jonathan Tchamwa Tchatchoua struggles after his knee injury a couple years back. He was a breath-taking athlete and seemed poised for stardom when he wrecked his knee. He seems like a shell of his former self, but at least he’s out there still making an effort.
Saturday night was also the second Indiana-Purdue game of the year. The Boilermakers beat the Hoosiers by a combined 41 points in their two games this season. Woof.
I’ve always been strictly neutral in the rivalry since I moved to Indiana. I generally root for whatever is the funniest outcome. Right now Purdue spanking IU is the funniest result, because IU fans are not happy. They are sick of Mike Woodson. They are sick that they would miss the tournament if the brackets came out today. They are sick of the national media fawning over Zach Edey and Matt Painter. They are sick that while they still have five more national championships than Purdue, the last one was nearly 40 years ago and doesn’t mean a thing to most recruits. I think they are also preemptively sick that this might be the Purdue team that finally doesn’t fuck up in March and at least gets to the program’s first Final Four since 1980.
Of course, I watch all this with a healthy dose of worry. IU has never fully recovered from firing Bobby Knight, even if they weren’t the same power in his final 5–6 years as they had been the previous 20. Bill Self is going to retire one day. Maybe someone seamlessly slides in and keeps the airplane aloft, the way he did when he replaced Roy Williams. But IU is a big, fat warning sign that sustained success should never be taken for granted in college sports.
Finally on the college hoops tip, I watched all of the Iowa-Nebraska women’s game Sunday. That was highly entertaining, with Caitlin Clark doing Caitlin Clark things for three quarters until the Huskers shut her down and erased a 14-point deficit to win in the closing seconds. We are going to the Iowa-Indiana game next week and L is looking forward to it.
Props to the Wall Street Journal for pointing out that not only does Lynette Woodard have the true women’s college basketball scoring record, but how the NCAA screwed her and a generation of female athletes when they reluctantly took over women’s sports in the early 1980s.
Clark is going to blow by Woodard’s record a week or two after she breaks the “official” NCAA mark. Hopefully Woodard gets a little more love from the national media in that interim.
Woodard was the first famous athlete I saw up close. When I was visiting an uncle who went to KU and lived in the same dorm as her, Woodard sat a few feet away from us in the cafeteria. I was astounded that she had like four trays of food. I couldn’t wait to get to college so I could get four trays of food at lunch! I also sat by her on a flight about a decade ago. But since I don’t talk to famous people, I didn’t say a word to her. Idiot.
Date Night?
Finally, we went out to dinner with friends Saturday. While eating I noticed something odd at a table near ours.
A couple sat there eating. It was a four-top table, and they were seated so they were next to each other rather than facing each other. They were young, attractive, and looked to be in love; good for them.
However I eventually noticed that the guy had an AirPod in his left ear. And he wasn’t saying much. Odd.
I shifted in my chair so I could see his partner and she had an AirPod in her right ear. She wasn’t talking, either. Very odd.
As much as was acceptable I kept glancing their way. They seemed to be looking at their table. This was during the IU-Purdue game so I wondered if they were watching it on a phone/tablet. Maybe it was hidden, but I couldn’t see a device on their table, and they never seemed to be reacting positively or negatively as you would when watching a game.
Even odder, at one point the guy leaned over, wrapped his arm inside his partner’s and they kind of snuggled into each other as they focused on whatever they were focused on.
Mega odd.
It was crazy strange to me that they chose to probably drop $150 on a dinner for two when they didn’t talk the entire time and spent their time watching/listening to something via AirPods.