Jingle my bells, baby

I am so excited. For the first time, I actually was able to buy CB a "real" (e.g., something I know he'd want) present. I saved the dregs of my grad school stipend from the final term, which gave me enough to spring for a pair of tickets to a big-deal UW game that's happening over the break. Since it's our last long period of time together for awhile, I wanted to do some things that he'd remember -- and seeing our current b-ball roster play a top-10 team is about as good as it gets for him.

Alas, since he's my wheels this vacation, I had to tell him early...but I'm pretty sure he doesn't mind. ;) I just found out that the tickets arrived at home, safe and sound. Now, all I have to do is hope we don't have any more freak snowstorms on game day. 'Cause I would be leading a frontal assault over the Cascades to get us there by hiking trails, and I'm not too keen on getting my game gear all frosty.

in the dawghouse

i'm at cb's place and his shift keys on the computer don't work, so i will be writing the entire post in lowercase. somehow, that seems appropriate.

we were up from 3am to 6am listening to the game, and i think it took as much a toll on us as it could have on anyone. the bottom line is that the calls didn't go our way and that even the very impartial announcers agreed we could and should have won this game. the technical on roy and the no-goaltending call that should have gone against conn probably cost us the win, and both of those were unjustified by all accounts. too, the luck didn't run our way. we were up by 4 with a few seconds to go and managed to make one of the dumbest fouls we've ever made. i feel terribly for the guy who made it because he's one of our senior players and the blood in his veins runs purple and gold. he takes missed opportunities harder than anyone else on the team, and it is just brutal that this will be the final play of his uw career.

the good, if there is any, is that we hung with conn through regulation time and overtime, stayed with them when our best player had to sit on the bench for 7 minutes, and gave them a battle until the very end when five of our best players had fouled out. we should have gone farther; the game proved we could play any team in the tournament and win, and i think a win here would have given us a run to the final four or even beyond that.

still, we'll be back. all indications are that this bodes well for the future of husky basketball; we have a hot recruiting team coming in next season, but it just stings to think that the guys who built this team won't have the chance to play for a title. i didn't sleep very well last night, thinking about what could have been and how we'll remain unappreciated -- in the eyes of east coast commentators, all this does is prove conn is the best team, rather than revealing that really, honestly, the other huskies could have taken them out despite a ridiculous amount of adversity, bad calls and height disadvantages.

we'll live to fight another day. still, that's small consolation this morning.

Time for a Dawgfight

It's Dawgs v. Dogs tomorrow night when UW faces 1-seed Connecticut in the Sweet 16. I don't care if you don't have a basketball bone in your body -- this is going to be a tough fight for us, since Conn is arguably the best team in the nation, and we need your support! At the very least, humor me and think of the purple and gold tomorrow night (yes, you too, chica, it's not my fault that the Oregon basketball team sucks). Hell, we're staying up to hear the game start at 3am England time, so throwing a good thought our way is the least you can do. :)

Seriously, though, this is a huge game for us. It's a chance to claim the national recognition we deserve and for the man who should be NCAA Player of the Year to receive some much-deserved attention. I don't think I've ever been this worked up about a game in my life...no one thinks it's going to be easy, but if we play our best and shut down their big men, we'll have a chance.

Go Dawgs!

Take your apathy and shove it

Following in the tradition of great Huskies, two UW students have convinced our school to do something about the genocide in Darfur. (You see that, Mr. President? I can use the word genocide without equivocating about it! You should try it sometime!)

The UW is invested in several companies who operate in or do business with Sudan; now, regents have authorized its shareholders to pressure the corporations into pulling out of the region. Harvard and Stanford have employed similar tactics, although they elected to forego shareholder action, instead cutting ties with companies altogether.

It's about time for big-league universities to use their muscle for social justice. Let's hope other schools follow suit. C'mon, Ducks and Cougars: how about a rivalry over a good cause? :)

Now I remember why I haven't been a sports fan. It's because you get your heart broken.

'Nuff said.

Whose house? Dawgs' house!

Woo-hoo! We slammed Pacific today and won by 18...it's onto the Sweet Sixteen, where we'll face either G Tech or Louisville...it was great to see the Dawgs electrify the crowd.

Man alive, I can't believe how ridiculous the wording is for wedding invitations! Apparently, weddings are the opportunities to make up for all of your past social gaffes and inappropriate informalities...we're off to investigate doing it yourself tomorrow, so we'll see.

Not much to report tonight. Go Dawgs!

Double standard

One other thing. Already, the net is heating up with articles about how our game against Montana opens our seeding up to even more questions about whether it was merited. Yet, Kentucky barely survives a game against its 15th-seeded in-state rival, and no one says a damn thing about how they must be completely overrated, too. Oh, the privilege of being a regular in the tournament.

I hope Saturday and next week shut the naysayers up for awhile.

Current bracket count: 2 misses with Alabama (unlike the product, they don't get the job done) and Iowa.

Heatin' up the dance floor

Let’s get the disclaimer over with first: I didn’t see the game.

I am stuck at work, having already missed half the day for a doctor’s appointment, so I listened to most of it through my static-saturated headphones. The reception inside this glass Duplo block is terrible, so I really only heard about half the game. Still, I feel I can offer at least a little analysis.

We do need to play better if we’re going to squash the whining about how we didn’t deserve a #1 seed. While it’s true that the first 10 minutes looked like we were playing a pack of third graders, we shouldn’t have let the Grizzlies back in the game at all. Because I couldn’t physically see the game, I might be wrong; maybe Romar decided to let the guys back off and play easy so they could rest for Pacific on Saturday.

However, we do have a notable tendency to play down unless the game’s on the line. This is a maddening trend which has caused many a Husky fan to turn gray before their time, and it needs to stop. If we start slow against a Pacific, a Georgia Tech, or (dare I say?) a Wake, we’ll never be able to catch up. The Huskies have to stop being complacent when they have a lead: we need to keep our shooting clean, stay out of foul trouble, and learn to run the ball inside and outside. Since our inside ball handlers don’t actually handle the ball with superiority, this isn’t going to be easy. I mean no offense to our guys – they are an incredibly talented team with the ability to annihilate a fellow top seed like ‘Zona – but this is a one round elimination, and we can’t afford to cut anyone any slack. Every team is dangerous. Every team has the ability to send us packing, and the same goes for the other 1 seeds.

If there’s one thing we lack, it’s the seasoned perspective that comes from being a perennial tournament team like Duke or Kentucky. We are a bit behind on the learning curve, but we need to start absorbing new skills at an exponential rate. UW has the ability to make a deep run in the tournament; they demonstrated that potential against some high quality teams this year…but we have to play like we mean it from the second the clock starts ticking, or else we’ll be hearing those “overrated” chants long after the last nets come down.

Mad dawgs

Holy freaking mother of god! The Huskies are a #1 seed in the NCAA tourney! This is an unheard-of event - I was at Hec Ed when ESPN made the announcement, and the entire arena exploded in a frenzy of barking, purple bodies richocheting around the stands. Unbelievable.

We have more than enough to live up to now, and it's not going to be easy - when the Huskies are hot, they're hot. When they aren't, well, we lose to Oregon State. We weren't hot the last few games, however, and we still managed to pull off the wins...the first game is Thursday against Montana (hooray), and the second will be against Pittsburgh or Pacific. We're going to try to attend that one...we'll see!!

Bow down to Washington....

Oh baby!

Well, after two brutal games, we scrapped our way to the first Pac-10 title for UW! I think I'm making up for a week's worth of missed workouts; at one point, I checked my pulse and found it at 120 bpm. This rapidity is probably attributable to my ever-unpredictable thyroid (or nonthyroid, I suppose), but I don't think it's a coincidence that it occured at the exact moment that Stoudamire tripped on the court. Now, it's on to the NCAA...I'm telling you, college basketball should be classified as an illegal substance.

I'm compiling a list of things to do before I leave Seattle in the fall:

• Spend a weekend at the Hoh Rainforest in Olympia
• Climb Mt. Si again
• Complete the RSVP (Ride from Seattle to Vancouver and Party) in August
• Settle down on the pond shore in Snohomish to watch the trumpeter swans fly in at dusk
• Go to Jazz Alley and take in a show, even if it costs more than my wedding invitations

I'm open to suggestions, particularly when it comes to important aspects of Seattle's nightlife, since my after dark activities generally have been limited to studying in the back corners of UW libraries. Be still my beating heart.

Woof woof woof woof!

Two down, one to go - we eked out a win over Stanford, 63-66. Now comes Arizona in the final tomorrow - a difficult prospect, since we have played two tough games in two days, while Zona blew out OSU today and spent the last half of the game cooling their heels. I still can't believe I've become so addicted to college basketball, but I think it's because it includes everything that other sports lack: it is fast-paced, the halves are short, the games are always lively, and the players (at least the Dawgs) are actually likeable. No after-hours scandals! It's also refreshing to watch a bunch of little guys beat up on the big players from other teams, although I still find it difficult to believe that 6'5" is "little."

I took a walk from Fremont to the U-District today in the hopes that fresh air would clear out my lingering flu bug. Slowly, I am realizing how much I will miss this city, how its pulse has become a part of my own. By going to England, I hope to be home that much sooner so I can return to the streets I know so well. This is the first time in my somewhat nomadic existence that I have been able to develop a sense of place; whenever I cycle down the Burke Gilman and see the houseboats bobbing lazily along the water, I feel like an essential component of the city, a small tooth in its ever rotating gears. More on that later...

Dawg power!!

Hah! Huskies won! Granted, we should have been able to pull away with our 18-point lead, instead of almost blowing it and going into OT, but we still stuffed ASU in the end. Now, just two more rounds left in the Pac-10 tourney...looks like we'll be playing Stanford, unless WSU manages to pull out a miracle in the next 10 minutes...maybe we'll finally avenge the loss that tore the Pac-10 title from our paws...go Dawgs!