“ESPN’s second annual College Hoops Tip-Off Marathon — featuring 12 consecutive live college basketball games in 24 hours Tuesday on ESPN — will include extensive coverage across the ESPN platforms to celebrate the beginning of the 2009-10 season. ESPN games will tip off every two hours, starting at midnight ET with Cal State Fullerton at UCLA.”

I somehow missed this one last year, but the idea sounds interesting. I’ll have to pass on those middle of the night games though.

Continuing the trend, my top picks for Wednesday evening are all on Cable:

8-9

1. Hank (ABC) – 01×02 – Yard Sale
2. The Middle (ABC) – 01×02 – The Cheerleader

9-10

1. MythBusters (Discovery Channel) – 07×12 – Knock Your Socks Off
2. Ghost Hunters (Syfy)- 05×16 – Glimmer Men
3. Modern Family (ABC) – 01×03 – Come Fly with Me
4. Nostradamus Effect (History Channel) – 01×05 – The Apocalypse Code
5. The Othersiders (Cartoon) – 01×12 – Glendora House – Some sort of kiddie ghost show, which I haven’t seen myself & won’t be doing so tonight either

10-11

1. Man v. Food (Travel) – 02×10 – Springfield
2. MysteryQuest (History Channel) – 01×04 – Atlantis
3. Destination Truth (Syfy) – 03×05 – Alien Mummies/Van Lake Monster

Also, game 4 of the WNBA finals is on ESPN2 tonight, which I only mention because the hometown Indiana Fever may get their first championship tonight.

Mel Simon died this morning at the age of 82. Mel was best known around Indianapolis as chairman emeritus of the board of Simon Property Group (mainly malls, malls & more malls) and owner of the Indiana Pacers.  To say that he had a major impact on the city, as well as the entire country, would be an understatement.  Most recently Mel and his wife, Bren, donated $25 million to Melvin and Bren Simon Cancer Center at the IU School of Medicine campus in Indianapolis.

Check out the Indy Star for an in depth article about Mel Simon.

Here are the 2008 NCAA Final Four matchups. All games are on CBS and played in the Alamodome (San Antonio, TX).

Saturday, April 5, 2008
6:07 pm EDT (1) UCLA (35-3) vs. (1) Memphis (37-1)
8:47 pm EDT (1) Kansas (35-3) vs. (1) North Carolina (36-2)

Monday, April 7, 2008
9:11 pm EDT (1) North Carolina / (1) Kansas vs. (1) Memphis / (1) UCLA

So we’re still in line for my Memphis over North Carolina prediction in the final.

While this is the first time four number ones made the finals and many are praising the selection committee for that, overall I can’t agree. Yes, you probably have the four best regular season teams, but teams like Davidson and Butler were clearly better than their seedings (just to name a few). Yes, they want the “Cinderella” story line. I get that. And yes, it’s a drawn out task to select 65 teams within the selection guidelines. But when teams should clearly be seeded substantially higher it would seem that something funny is going on or that someone doesn’t know what they’re doing. But what do I know? I don’t even really care about basketball except for tourney time.

For those of you who care, here are the “Sweet Sixteen” matchups (all games are on CBS, and to my knowledge, Katie Couric is NOT commentating)…

Thursday, March 27, 2008
7:10 PM ET No. 7 West Virginia at No. 3 Xavier
7:27 PM ET No. 4 Washington State at No. 1 North Carolina
9:40 PM ET No. 12 Western Kentucky at No. 1 UCLA
9:57 PM ET No. 3 Louisville at No. 2 Tennessee

Friday, March 28, 2008
7:10 PM ET No. 10 Davidson at No. 3 Wisconsin
7:27 PM ET No. 3 Stanford at No. 2 Texas
9:40 PM ET No. 12 Villanova at No. 1 Kansas
9:57 PM ET No. 5 Michigan State at No. 1 Memphis

I’ll say that overall the matchups seem pretty lame. (Chalk one up for the selection committee.) While there’s a really decent chance that 3 or 4 #1 seeds move on to the Final Four, I’ve still got to root for the Big Ten (even though my Boilers are out). However, I’m sticking by my initial predicting for the final game: North Carolina vs. Memphis with Memphis winning. But what do I know, I only watch college hoops a few weeks a year.

“The Indiana Pacers announced today they will not increase season-ticket prices for the 2008-09 regular season.”

Is this really newsworthy?

You have the worst attendance in the league, you’re mediocre at best and you employ people who consistently make poor off court choices.  Personally I think that I’d drop ticket prices AND “clean house” for next season, but maybe that’s just me.

A word of advice to Kelvin Sampson. “DON’T MESS WITH THE STANGER! Or you’re bound to get stung.” (Cheesy I know, but hey, if Emmis can get away with that sort of thoughtless promotion, so can we.)

Apparently Sampson is not a fan of Jeff Stanger, baseball, Bloomington or books. I’m a Purdue grad, but come on, are you serious? Sure, Rick Greenspan might lay down the law and Michael McRobbie will get his first test due to the recruiting violations , but what is their stance on the remarks towards Trolley Dodgers, Jeff Stanger, baseball, the city of Bloomington and the future release of Kansaska? That my friend is the real story.

Going into the All-Star Break, it looks like the Indiana Pacers will be sitting at 21-32 or 20-33, depending if they can beat Portland. (Boston and Detroit are probably safe bets for the loss column given their play of late.)

Some people will look at that and think that’s just horrible and that they need to win the rest of the season to make the playoffs. But I say do everything in your power, short of “throwing” games, to lose the rest of the way out and have a decent shot at high lottery pick. If you make the playoffs you’re only ensuring yourself of an early exit and no decent draft picks.

Miami is clearly doing this, so why not give them and Minnesota a bit of competition? The attendance this year is the worst in the league (rightfully so, and the fans are making a statement by staying away). If they can manage to get a lottery pick in the top three they can probably grab Eric Gordon which would do wonders for the attendance at the very least (they blew it last year in getting one of the three local players in the draft).

But then again, historically the Pacers aren’t too bright when it comes to draft picks and they’d probably pick someone from overseas that has no intention of playing in the NBA anytime soon. So go ahead. Make the run for the last playoff spot.

Could someone please make the bad men stop…

Indiana Pacers center David Harrison has been suspended five games without pay by the NBA for violating the terms of the NBA/NBPA Anti-Drug program, the league announced today. (via the IndyStar)

Seriously guys, please stop listening to the people who told you that any publicity is good publicity.  This sort of thing is getting really old.

I said it almost a year ago and I’ll say it again, the Indiana Pacers must get rid of Jamaal Tinsley (legal troubles and just poor judgement) and they might as well send Jermaine O’Neal (slows the team down when he’s on the court), Marquis Daniels (legal troubles with his buddy Tinsley) and Shawne Williams (legal troubles) with him in some sort of package deal that does not include Mike Dunleavy (as I can see them doing that).  Poor off court decisions, regardless of who is at fault, continue to kill the support for the team and maybe eventually even the players themselves.  Seriously guys, something has got to give.