Going for history...

31-for-31. Has it ever been done? Doubt it. Has it ever been attempted? Probably. Will it ever be done? Someday. Do I have any chance in doing it? No way in hell.

But today begins my lifelong quest to correctly predict all 31 conference champions before the conference tournaments begin (tonight). I'd write a little bit about each champion, but the fact is I haven't even heard of half these conferences, so I can't really say it's thinking that brought me to the conclusion that that team will win its championship. Most of this is guesswork.

Your guess is as good as mine.

In alphabetical order, your 31 conference champions are:

America East Conference: Binghampton
Atlantic 10 Conference: George Washington
Atlantic Coast Conference: Duke
Atlantic Sun Conference: Belmont
Big 12 Conference: Texas
Big East Conference: UConn
Big Sky Conference: Montana
Big South Conference: Winthrop
Big Ten Conference: Illinois
Big West Conference: Pacific
Colonial Athletic Association: UNC-Wilmington
Conference USA: Memphis
Horizon League: Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Ivy League: Pennsylvania
Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference: Manhattan
Mid Continent Conference: Oral Roberts
Mid American Conference: Kent State
Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference: Delaware State
Missouri Valley Conference: Creighton
Mountain West Conference: Air Force
Northeast Conference: Monmouth
Ohio Valley Conference: Murray State
Pacific-10 Conference: Arizona
Patriot League: Bucknell
Southeastern Conference: LSU
Southern Conference: Georgia Southern
Southland Conference: Northwestern State
Southwestern Athletic Conference: Southern
Sun Belt Conference: Western Kentucky
West Coast Conference: Gonzaga
Western Athletic Conference: Nevada

There you have it, your 31 conference champions! Only 12 days until Selection Sunday.

In the meantime, back to my Beatles book, which is taking me way longer to read than a normal book does because its so damn huge and the font is so damn small. But that's ok, it's a great book, I'm not really wanting it to end.

Coming Soon... Me.

I know I said I'd post, but I have to be honest, I'm not interested. My mom got me "The Beatles" by Bob Spitz for Christmas, and for whatever reason, I decided to read three other books that I got before I picked this one up. Why? I don't know, it wasn't my smartest move. But anyway, I finally got around to it recently, and I'm sucked in. I feel like I'm letting the book down just by posting this, but I had to give you all something to live off of for the next few days.

By Tuesday, I promise I'll have the book finished, and the horrible month of February will be over, and thesharkey.com will be on to bigger and better things.

What you can look forward to in the near future:
Tuesday: The start of the college basketball conference tournaments, when I will attempt to become the first person to ever correctly predict all 33 conference champions. Is it possible? I doubt it. But why not try & find out?

Sometime after Tuesday: I will start an NCAA Tournament Challenge, hosted by our lovely partners at Yahoo, and we'll see who can join Scott (twice) and Logan as a thesharkey.com champion.

Sometime after that: Baseball season begins, and with it comes my breakdown of all 30 teams, as well as my breakdown of myself, a 4-time fantasy champion in the last 5 years, now officially the most dominant force known to the fantasy baseball world.

Yea Bronze

So the first week of the Olympics I was so wrapped up in Curling it was ridiculous.

Than week 2 hits.

I get ready for Sunday's game, someone tells me the result right before it's about to start.

Then Monday's game. They had already clinched the medal round, so I just kinda watched it on fast forward, took about 10 minutes.

OK, go time. Wednesday, the semi-finals, vs Canada. I'm at work. I TiVo it. Too tired to watch it Wednesday night, I wait for Thursday. Only I stupidly open the sports section Thursday morning only to see, in huge letters, that the Canadians "sweeped the floor" with us, winning 11-5. Ugh.

So I missed three games in a row. Tear. I was able to get myself up earlier enough this morning to watch the bronze medal game before I went to work. Great game. Up one. Tied. Up three. Up four. Up one. Up two. Up one. Up two. Victory. Bronze!

If curling was the "it" sport at the 2002 games, it truly took off this year. Everyone and their mother watched this men's team to the unthinkable, going 7-4 and capturing a medal, beating Great Britain twice to make that possible.

Very excited. Can't wait for 2010. Wasn't exactly the result I was looking for, as watching these guys play 8 or 9 or however many matches it was clear to see they could beat any team on any day if they played their best game. Unfortunately, they didn't always play their best game, so they settled for Bronze. Nothing to complain about, but hopefully in four years they are a little better prepared, because nothing less than Gold will be acceptable.

Thanks for putting up with my curling rants for the last two weeks. Now back to your regularly scheduled thesharkey.com reading material (starting tomorrow)...

Out of the doghouse...

So the US' mens team (curling, in case you haven't noticed which sport I'm totally sucked into by this point in time) has a nice win over the Swiss yesterday, giving them back-to-back wins for the first time this tournament, and putting them at 4-2, in a 3-way tie for second place.

Then today they get Germany, a 1-4 team just going thru the motions at this point in time, no real chance at anything. After Germany, the US has Great Britain (5-1, first place) tomorrow & Canada (4-2, t-2nd place) on Monday. That will then conclude their 9-game round robin. AFter that, the top 4 teams will play in a playoff to determine the gold medalist.

So obviously the Germany game is big. Going into Great Britain/Canada at 5-2 would be nice, because a split in those two tough games gets you to 6-3, which will be good enough for Top 4.

Of course, though, you can't overlook Germany.

USA didn't. They came out aggressive, scoring 2 in the first end. Then stealing a point in the 2nd end to make it 3-0. Fast forward to the 5th end, it's 3-1 America. Germany has one stone left, then America gets their last stone. The American's are currently lying 4. A 2, 3, or 4 point end is in their reach. The game could easily become 6-1, and out of reach for the Germans. Unforunately, the German skip hits a beautiful shot, knocking out all 4 American stones. Pete Fenson, America's skip, with the last shot, seemingly flustered, blows it, and the Germans end up coming away with the point. Now, isntead of 6-1, it's 3-2, and the Germans are right back in the game.

You can tell in the 6th end that it got in the Americans heads. Their first two shooters, John Schuster & Joe Polo, don't perform up to standards, and its looking like the Germans may steal a point or two in this end. Then Shawn Rojeski comes up. I've made it perfectly clear that he's the weakpoint of this team, in my opinion. He shoots too hard, has no accuracy, and never hits the big shot. Well, today he redeemed himself. He throws a beautiful shot which allows the Americans to get 2 in the 6th, making it 5-2.

From there, the Americans were in control, and eventually went on to win 8-4.

Their confidence is restored, and my confidence in Rojeski just went up a notch or two. Tomorrow, Great Britain, at 4 o'clock. A win puts them in a tie for first place with one game left in the round robin. A loss may shake their confidence a little, but shouldn't do too much harm in the standings.

The men continue to roll, and a medal definitely isn't out of the question.

Rojeski Out

Anyone who's watched men's curling so far this Olympics knows what an up-and-down ride it's been.

Beat the defending Gold Medalists Norway 11-5.
Lost to Finland 4-3.
Beat New Zealand handily.
Lost to Italy, a team who only qualified because they're the host country, 6-5.
Beat Sweden, easily one of the three best teams (with Norway & Canada) 10-6.

Can't really take the madness anymore. The Finland loss still stings since it was on the very last stone of the game. And the Italy loss hurts even more, because they are a team who is admittedly just happy to be there and getting some recognition for their country. We're a team with a legitimate shot at a medal, and we lose to Italy? How does that happen?

There are a lot of reasons for this crazy first 5 games, but the one that sticks out more than any other is our third, Sean Rojeski. He's barely hitting an 70% accuracy mark. Anytime there is a big shot needed to be made, he misses like he shot with his eyes closed. If we have an alternate, I think we could be much better with him in there over Rojeski.

This isn't to take the blame off Pete Fenson, our skip, who isn't doing much better, but at least when it matters he hits the big shot, and has won us quite a few points.

All in all, it's been interesting so far. 4 games left in the round robin. A 3-1 record should get the USA into the medal round. They can do it, but I'm not sure if they will. This is a team that could very easily be 5-0 right now. They've beaten two of the top three teams in the world by convincing margins, but they've struggled in all 5 games so far. It doesn't help that we still have Canada on our schedule, as the last game of our Round Robin. I hope we don't go into that needing a victory, or things could get ugly.

As for hockey, real quick, a tie with Latvia doesn't bode well for our future. If we don't beat Kaz convincingly today, things are going to turn sour real quick. As for Slovakia, a buddy has predicted (before the tourney started) that they'd shock the world and win the Gold. After yesterday, I now think its a definite possibility.

More Olympics tomorrow.

Olympics

After my hiatus grew & grew & extended & extended Commander-In-Chief style over the last few weeks, my 4 loyal readers wondered if I'd ever return.

I'm back.

It's olympics, and that means one thing. Curling. If this isn't your favorite sport yet, you're wasting your time watching the Olympics. And if you don't have a TiVo, you're also wasting your time, because odds are you're missing all the curling.

Most matches are shown on USA at either 3am, 7am or 5pm. That's right during sleep/sleep/work hours, so it's inconvenient to watch. That's where TiVo comes into play. Combine this tidbit of info with the glorious fast forward thru commercials & slow parts of the match feature, and a 2.5 hour curling match just got condensed to 40 minutes.

Yesterday the American's beat the defending Gold Medalist Norwegian team 11-5 (actually made the Norwegians concede in the 8th end*), only to then lose to the Fins 4-3 in their second game of the day. Beating the Norwegians is a great showing, but you can't follow that up with a loss to the Finnish and their 15-letter-last-named captain. (He's nicknamed U-15, because most people, himself included, can't pronounce his last name, which begins with two U's. I'm not even going to attempt to spell it). 1-1 after 1 day, poor showing.

Today they have New Zealand. The match has already been played, but I haven't watched it yet (God Bless TiVo), and will do so at some point tonight. Here's hoping for a win.

*What is Curling? I don't know.

Here's thesharkey's quick overview to Olympic Curling & everything you need to know.

*There are 10 ends to a game. An end is like an inning, except there are 10, not 9.
*In each end, each team has 8 stones to throw. They slide them across 93 feet of ice, trying to get as close to the center of a 10 foot target as possible.
*4 members make up a curling team, and each member throws 2 stones per end.
*Scoring is done like Bocce Ball. At the end of each end, the team closest to the center gets a point. For every stone you have closest to the center inside the other teams closest stone, you get a point. ie, if the four closest stones are American-American-American-New Zealand, the boys of the red, white & blue get three points.
*At the end of 10 ends, the team with the most points win.
*There are 10 teams in the Olympic Curling Tournament. The teams will play a round-robin tournament, and then the four teams with the best records will face off in a 4-team playoff for the Gold Medal.

God Bless Curling.

Tomorrow, more on Curling, plus a breakdown of the men's ice hockey tournament, which begins tomorrow.

Challenges update

Sorry I haven't posted in nearly two weeks. I'd like to tell you I've been way too busy to write anything, but we all know that's not the case. I'm just lazy. After having a few people yell at me to start updating again (a major boost to my ego to find out that people actually read this site) I'm going to do just that, start updating again.

Nothing special here, just final standings to the Shark Playoff Challenge & Playoff FF Challenge. New article coming tomorrow, I promise.


Playoff Challenge final standings:
(out of 38 possible points)

1. Logan 32
2. Hordell 19
3. Shark 16
3. Pat 16
3. Vols 16
3. Ponce 16
7. Wizzzah 15
7. AJay 15
9. Bennett 14
9. Dphew 14
9. Brooks 14
9. Bader 14
13. Tom 13
13. Badfish 13
15. Ace 12
15. Reverend 12
17. Scoot 11
17. Scott 11
19. Thouse 10
20. Telecasting 9
21. Cityondown 8
21. uwlax 8
23. Irishfury 5
23. Doozer 5
25. Schmike 1
25. Mark 1

Fantasy Football Final Standings:

1. Scott 2536
2. Cityondown 2278
3. Doozer 2193
4. Shark 2081
5. Ed 2064
6. Weeba 2057
7. Hordell 1966
8. Wizzzah 1991
9. Vols 1937
10. Eoin 1851
11. Scoot 1813
12. Mark 1804
13. AJ 1793
14. Tom 1774
15. Timeagle 1727
16. Bauer 1582
17. Thouse 1541
18. Pat 1501
19. Brooks 1432*
20. Ace 1310*
21. Chiefs 1243*
22. Mrmoon 482*
23. Bader 357*
*didn't play all 4 weeks

Here are the week 4 player scores:

QB:
Matt Hasselbeck 358
Ben Roethlisberger 198

RB:
Shaun Alexander 97
Jerome Bettis 43
Willie Parker 144

WR:
Darrell Jackson 50
Hines Ward 191
Antwaan Randle El 137
Bobby Engram 70


Here are everybodies final scores:

Shark:
Week 1: Eli Manning 113, Rudi Johnson 120, Santana Moss 29
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Clinton Portis 52, Steve Smith 344
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Willie Parker 55, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Shaun Alexander 97, Hines Ward 191
Total: 2081

Tom:
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Clinton Portis 98, Chad Johnson 59
Week 2: Peyton Manning 340, Shaun Alexander 9 , Hines Ward 68
Week 3: Ben Roethlisberger 438, Nick Goings 2, Steve Smith 142
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Willie Parker 144, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 1774

Scott:
Week 1: Tom Brady 360, Cadillac Williams 59, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294 , Thomas Jones 120, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Shaun Alexander 232, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Willie Parker 144, Hines Ward 191
Total: 2536

Doozer:
Week 1: Tom Brady 360, Willie Parker 129, Santana Moss 29
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Tatum Bell 19, Steve Smith 344
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Mike Anderson 97, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Shaun Alexander 97, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 2193

Ace:
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Clinton Portis 98, Steve Smith 196
Week2: Tom Brady 390, Edgerrin James 132, Marvin Harrison 52
Week 3: Jake Delhomme 261, Nick Goings 2, Hines Ward 113
Total: 1310

Wav:
Week 1: Jake Delhomme 190, Rudi Johnson 120, Plaxico Burress 0
Week 2: Jake Plummer 255, Clinton Portis 52, Marvin Harrison 52
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Shaun Alexander 232, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: Ben Roethlisberger 198, Jerome Bettis 43, Hines Ward 191
Total: 1804 (703)

Eoin:
Week 1: Ben Roethlisberger 361, Tiki Barber 69, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Jake Plummer 255, Willie Parker 78, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Mike Anderson 97, Rod Smith 61
Week 4. Seneca Wallace, Shaun Alexander 97, Antwan Randel El 137
Total: 1851

Wizzah:
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Clinton Portis 98, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Willie Parker 78, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Mike Anderson 97, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Shaun Alexander 97, Antwan Randel-El 137
Total: 1991

Rudybrooks:
Week 1: Tom Brady 360, Tiki Barber 69, Hines Ward 60
Week 2: Peyton Manning 340, Shaun Alexander 9, Marvin Harrison 52
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Mike Anderson 97, Steve Smith 142
Total: 1432

Bader:
Week 1: Jake Delhomme 190, Clinton Portis 98, Joey Galloway 69
Total: 357

AJ:
Week 1: Chris Simms209 , Tiki Barber 69, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Jake Plummer 255, Shaun Alexander 9, Reggie Wayne 97
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Willie Parker 55, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: Ben Roethlisberger 198, Jerome Bettis 43, Hines Ward 191
Total: 1793

Tim eagle:
Week 1: Mark Brunell 47, Corey Dillon 62, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Tom Brady 390, Shaun Alexander 9, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Nick Goings 2, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Jerome Bettis 43, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 1727

Cityondown (chris loughman):
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Tiki Barber 69, Santana Moss 29
Week 2: Tom Brady 390, Thomas Jones 120, Steve Smith 344
Week 3: Ben Roethlisberger 438, Willie Parker 55, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Shaun Alexander 97, Hines Ward 191
Total: 2278 (850)

Bauer:
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Tiki Barber 69, Hines Ward 60
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Tatum Bell 19, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Jake Delhomme 261, Jerome Bettis 89, Antawn Randel-El 65
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Shaun Alexander 97, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 1582

Vols:
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Clinton Portis 98, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Matt Hasselbeck 336, Edgerrin James 132, Marvin Harrison 52
Week 3: Jake Delhomme 261, Shaun Alexander 232, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Ben Roethlisberger 358, Jerome Bettis 43, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 1937

Pat:
Week 1: Mark Brunell 47, Tiki Barber 69, Joey Galloway 69
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Shaun Alexander 9, Steve Smith 344
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Mike Anderson 97, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Seattle’s QB2, Jerome Bettis 43, Bobby Engram 70
Total: 1501

Ben Hordell:
Week 1: Tom Brady 360, Tiki Barber 69, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Edgerrin James 132, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Nick Goings 2, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: Tommy Maddox, Shaun Alexander 97, Hines Ward 191
Total: 1966

Weeba:
Week 1: Tom Brady 360, Tiki Barber 69, Chad Johnson 59
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Shaun Alexander 9, Steve Smith 344
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Willie Parker 55, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Matt Hasselbeck 358, Jerome Bettis 43, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 2057

Chiefs:
Week 1: Carson Palmer 66, Cadillac Williams 59, Plaxico Burress 0
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Shaun Alexander 9, Steve Smith 344
Week 3: Jake Delhomme 261, Mike Anderson 97, Hines Ward 113
Total: 1243

Thouse:
Week 1: Jake Delhomme 190, Jerome Bettis 102, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Clinton Portis 52, Marvin Harrison 52
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Nick Goings 2, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Neil Odonnell, Willie Parker 144, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 1541

Mrmoon:
Week 1: Tom Brady 360, Corey Dillon 62, Hines Ward 60
Total: 482

Scoots:
Week 1: Jake Delhomme 190, Willie Parker 129, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Tom Brady 390, Shaun Alexander 9, Marvin Harrison 52
Week 3: Matt Hasselback 346, Mike Anderson 97, Hines Ward 113
Week 4: Ben Roethlisberger 198, Jerome Bettis 43, Darrell Jackson 50
Total: 1813

Ed:
Week 1: Jake Delhomme 190, Clinton Portis 98, Steve Smith 196
Week 2: Ben Roethlisberger 294, Shaun Alexander 9, Santana Moss 154
Week 3: Jake Plummer 303, Nick Goings 2, Darrell Jackson 125
Week 4: matt Hasselbeck 358, Willie Parker 144, Hines Ward 191
Total: 2064


The first three Shark Challenge Winners:
College Bowl: Scott
NFL Playoff: Logan
Playoff FF: Scott

Next Challenge: NCAA Tournament Brackets Challenge