Consarned Adamites!

College basketball

The Big Ten promptly doubled their losses, but I would almost count MSU's triple-OT loss to Gonzaga as a win. Come March, when State has a solid rebounder in Matt Trannon coming off the bench, I would not be surprised if the Sparties are clearly the better team were the two clubs to meet again. That said, Adam Morrison is amazing, perhaps the closest match to Larry Bird I've yet seen. He just doesn't pass as well, but then again, why should he? Derek Raivio is also criminally underrated on the national scene.

Iowa's loss to Texas showed all the problems Iowa has. Major guard problems when Horner doesn't have his game on, and he went to the bench at a critical juncture after getting suckered into committing a silly foul. Iowa should be a solid NCAA team, but they are not the real deal otherwise.

Michigan and Purdue get solid wins over Boston U. and South Alabama, repsectively, and both of those opponents should be battling for their conference's auto-bids. Illinois blows out Texas Southern, as they should, and Ohio State looks pretty weak after an overtime squeaker against Butler.

Elsewhere, Dane Fife got his first win with IPFW, beating Southeast Missouri St. Wins should be rare for him this season, but next season looks pretty good for him.

IU men's soccer will not be a three-time champion, as they came out flat and lost to Notre Dame 2-zip. A 7-minute hate of Notre Dame.

And now I wish them well in the tourney. Them and Penn State. But I'm afraid Maryland is now the team to beat.

IU has had a habit this year of not taking their opponents seriously, something I saw first-hand when Northwestern tied them. It's a common occurence in all sports, especially with younger successful teams. The Silver lining is that they might keep super-frosh Lee Nguyen, who if he had won a championship was almost certainly gone to MLS.

They will only lose three seniors: Mike Ambersley, Jordan Chirico, and Brian Plotkin. Ambersley and Chirico were decent, but they were basically your typical four-year Hoosier seniors. But midfielder Plotkin is a four-year starter who's been the hub of the offense for the last two championship. His loss will be hard to replace if Nguyen goes pro early.

Forward Jake Peterson and Sweep Jed Zayner could also go pro, and their losses would hurt as well.

But Mike Frietag has a solid squad returning otherwise, Chris Munroe will be a good keeper, Julian Dieterle, Greg Stevning, and Charley Traylor at the Backs, Brad Ring at Back/Midfield, Josh Tudela and John Michael Hayden on the wings, and forwards Kevin Noshang andKevin Robson are begging for more time.

Sweeper and Central Midfielder are positions of concern, but will probably be addressed through players not going pro, recruiting, or perhaps a redshirt like Darren Yeagle or Ian Clair could help answer those questions.

In the NFL, the Colts told a ton of critics to STFU after beating Cincy solidly. I still think they'll probably finish with two losses on the season, one in the next few weeks and then one in the season finale when they have homefield clinched. The Bears look to get a playoff spot, but I think they'll limp through the remaining 6 games going a mere 3-3, and out in the first round.