Surprise Surprise Surprise

Pitt and Richmond Basketball Roundup:

Pitt

Pitt's basketball team is shocking the nation this year with key wins at UConn and Syracuse, the more impressive being the Syracuse win. If you were to tell me that in the first 5 games of Big East play Pitt would play against Cincinatti, UConn, and Syracuse all at their places I would've said well at least we won 2 games and maybe just maybe we could pull an upset over one of those teams. Now its January 23, we're six games into Big East play with wins against the 3 mentioned teams before and a solid Lousville team, we also beat Depaul but if any team loses to Depaul I would really start worrying about the state of the program because they are awful. Of course we lost to Georgetown this past Wednesday but just to be in the position to be the favorite in that game I'd say is impressive. I was looking at the beginning of this year to just have a shot of making the tournament and if you thought any more than that you were on something(Side note: if so then where can I get some because if there is a drug that makes you hallucinate that your college team does well that seems pretty marketable). Now that the season is almost halfway over I'm looking forward to March Madness and I expect Pitt to be yet again a Sweet Sixteen contender.

Richmond 16-6(5-2)

Despite a bad loss Wednesday night against Charleston, Richmond bounced back today against George Washington in a much needed win that will hopefully get things rolling. Richmond saw its NCAA tourney chances take a hit over the past two weeks with what most people would consider "bad" losses against Charlotte and St. Louis. To make the NCAA's as an at large at this point would probably require winning out the rest of the way in the A-10 which would be an impressive effort considering the strength of the A-10 this year. Back to today's game though against George Washington though. Kevin Anderson scored a game high 21 points for Richmond, David Gonzalvez and Justin Harper added 11 and 14 points respectively as Richmond went on to win 62-57 at George Washington. The key play of the game was when Ryan Butler (Complete relation) hit a 3 with the game tied with 26 seconds left in the game to put the Spiders up by 3 and essentially clinching it.

What's Next?

Pitt plays at Seton Hall on Sunday followed by St. Johns on Tuesday at home, both of which should be tough "trap" games. Especially St. Johns considering Pitt always has a bit of trouble against St. Johns.

Richmond has a week off before their next game at St. Louis next saturday. Every game at this point matters for UR.

For Your Listening Pleasure

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68CuGZHxyY8

Final Thoughts

Today I gained the level of Lieutenant Colonel III on Call of Duty today, and to those of you that have to say "Jake you're in college you have loads of time on your hands shouldn't you use some of that time to study?" I have to say back to you listen the skills obtained while playing COD are necessary for the rest of your life skills such as:

• Teamwork(Even though Baller3287 sucks and only has 1 kill and 38 deaths you encourage him to get better by telling him that he sucks so bad every 5 seconds, this ultimately helps your team to improve dramatically)
• Dying with honor (Not being a little girl about things and using a heartbeat sensor)
• Communication skills(Talking trash counts right?)
• Strengthening of the Thumb-Pointy finger squeeze (Required for tasks such as nail clipping, picture taking, and channel changing)
• Proper military tactics that can be used on an everyday basis (This skill comes in handy most while approaching people or what we of the COD world call "flanking" the advantages of flanking someone from the left side when approaching them will do wonders for you)
• Most importantly picking up the chicks because nothing swoons the ladies more than a level 70 General

Keep your expectations low and your game high

-Jake Butler