If you notice that the highways are unusually empty this evening and the crowds have emptied out of the stores having their after-Christmas sales, don’t be alarmed.  I know the reason.

In about two hours, everyone will be glued to their TVs to watch a monumental clash of the titans that could only happen in the renowned Emerald Bowl (Who needs the Rose Bowl?  This game is sponsored by people who sell nuts!  Beat that, USC!  And, much healthier than steaks, Tennessee!).

My Maryland Terrapins will be taking on the Oregon State Beavers for the bragging rights that come when the game clock winds down and only one team is given the honor of raising that bronzed statue of a giant almond.  I am getting emotional just thinking about it.

Come on, Terps!  Let’s finish a season of disappointing mediocrity with a marginally acceptable performance and return to the East Coast with a victory!

Before Catherine was born, Nathan and I agreed upon a fair division of sports allegiances that we would try to impart upon our daughter. Nathan gets the Tennessee Titans and the Atlanta Braves. I get the Maryland Terrapins for both basketball and football (sorry, Catherine … it’s not looking so good these days). We share the Nashville Predators and Sounds.

I have tried to play along, even purchasing a generic Titans jersey for my daughter (as seen in this photo taken several months ago).

I want the Titans to make the playoffs, as this will make my husband happy. However, in the unlikely event that both the Steelers and Titans proceed far enough into the playoffs to face each other, I may have to sneak a Steelers t-shirt under Catherine’s jersey. That way, when the Steelers roll over the Titans with a convincing victory, Catherine can reveal the black and gold with pride. The girl needs something since my pathetic Terps are 6-6 so far this season, including two losses at home against non-ACC opponents. Maybe our baseball team is good this year …

My Terps travel to Jersey today to play Rutgers and I imagine many turtle fans will make the road trip up the turnpike to enjoy the game. (When I lived in Boston, my longest drive home to Maryland ever involved a three-hour standstill on the Jersey Turnpike due to burning tires covering the road. Gotta love it.) After all, it is likely that the turtle parents live nearby.  I had several friends who lived off Exit 7A.  It’s a fine exit.

When I attended University of Maryland, I sometimes wondered if College Park really served as a satellite campus for New Jersey’s state school. Walk through Lot 1 student parking and you would see the yellow and white license plates, or perhaps even some of the light blue plate model. Jersery certainly did represent.

So, who will win the battle of the Jersey schools today? My boys are big dogs in this game, but I really would love to quiet those nasty Rutgers fans. We shall see during nationwide TV coverage this afternoon. GO TERPS!

What an absolutely wonderful day!  Non-stop basketball for my viewing enjoyment.  This really is one of the best days of the year.  I fail to understand how people can find college football more exciting than the magic of college hoops!

Today started well, with Maryland pulling out a first-round victory over Davidson.  I’ll be rooting for Vandy later today to keep our home happy!

GO TERPS!  FEAR THE TURTLE!

Sweet victory! I thoroughly enjoyed our 85-77 win over Duke at Cameron last night, even though I find it difficult to watch the game in my normal manner when Catherine is asleep. I get very loud, so I had to slap my own hand over my mouth several times.
Even with identical overall and conference records, Duke was ranked significantly ahead of us going into last night’s game. Duke gets the same favoritism in basketball that Notre Dame gets in football. Now that Maryland has six straight conference wins and we’re clearly the hottest team in the ACC, we better jump over Duke and get a respectable number next to our name when the new rankings come out on Monday night.

Much love to D.J. Strawberry (who has his father’s athletic talent and hopefully not his personal addiction demons) and his fantastic, “in-your-face, Cameron Crazies” dunks. Shout out to Mike Jones, who is our hero from beyond the arc. Greivis Vasquez, who was one rebound away from a triple-double, is shaping up to be a great point guard. And, Bambale “Frosby” Osby came off the bench for same fierce rebounding. He seemed to perk up a bit when the clock was set to 4:20. Coincidence?

The Terps are so much fun to watch now and I’m very excited for our postseason play!  My enjoyment of college football has grown since I moved to Tennessee, but Saturday afternoons in autumn still can’t come close to the excitement that I have for March Madness!

Maryland takes on #14 Duke in one hour at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Maryland is playing great ball right now (finally) and I believe we have earned a place in the Big Dance with some key wins. Admittedly, Duke is uncharacteristically not a greatly feared team this year. However, there is nothing sweeter than beating Duke in their house. We already beat them at Comcast, so let’s go for the season sweep!

GO TERPS!

A few hundred Maryland students carried on the ridiculous tradition of setting fires and acting obnoxious following a big victory. Why is destroying property seen as an appropriate way of celebrating to these idiots?

One man, who had a T-shirt wrapped around his face and identified himself only as “John,” said he wanted to “Keep the tradition,” by joining in the melee. But it was his girlfriend, who identified herself as “Suzie,” who encouraged him to “Start a few fires” and “Knock some s— over.”

“They can’t f—ing go on our campus,” one student screamed. As police retreated toward the much larger crowd at Knox Road, students belted out the lyrics to the song “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Good-bye,” and chanted “We can’t hear you.”

These students also screamed profanities directed at J. J. Redick, the star of the Duke men’s team. Ummm … he wasn’t playing, people. His team lost in the Sweet 16 and he is now preparing to make millions of dollars in the NBA. Let it go.

Incidents such as this one are embarrassing and give a bad name to the university. I know our campus is not unique in these types of “celebrations”, but I continue to naively hope that our students would be above such nonsense.

I am reminded of a men’s basketball game I attended during my senior year. We were playing Florida State and some of the guys in my section were being obnoxious to the FSU family members who were seated on the court. They even taunted the little kids who came to see their big brothers play and threw ice at anyone within shot. I finally told the jerks to stop and instead focus their energy on cheering for our team (or at least limit their taunts to the opposing players) and I was met with a tirade of profane words and gestures. I leaned over the railing after the game to apologize to the FSU bench and tell them that those guys didn’t represent true Terp spirit. I hope I was right! When all is said and done, it’s just a game!

I do not usually follow women’s basketball … I just never enjoyed the way the game was played. However, I will be watching the NCAA national championship game tonight because my beloved Terps are competing for the title! They beat defending champion Baylor and the number one ranked Tar Heels to earn a spot. Even better, they are playing Duke tonight! Beating the Blue Devils will make the victory even sweeter!

Since the men’s team had a pathetic season and lost in the first round of the NIT (despite being the top seed in that second tier tournament), I am pinning all of my hoop hopes on the ladies this year. GO TERPS!

UPDATE: That was a great game! I was surprised by how much I enjoyed watching … a joy that was enhanced by the Lady Terps earning their first championship in school history. Those women played a physical game and made a fan out of me. And, it is always so sweet to beat Duke.

I was happy for Nathan last night as he watched the Vanderbilt vs. Kentucky game with glee. Beating the Kentucky basketball team at Rupp and the Tennessee football team at whatever their stadium is named (Neiland, Neyland?) in the same school year is quite the coup after such a long drought. Vandy caught both teams during down years.

Tonight the country will witness a real battle! Maryland plays Duke at Cameron at 8:00pm central and I am counting down the hours. These two teams HATE each other (largely due to Maryland’s obscene behavior whenever Duke comes to College Park … words and actions that got us voted onto the list of Top Ten Worst Fans by ESPN recently). Star player J. J. Redick mentioned Maryland as being particularly brutal in their taunts — “they can make a grown man cry”. I don’t approve of the behavior displayed by some of my fellow Terps at games, but perhaps Redick should not read his poetry while sitting at half court for an ESPN special. This silliness just invites mocking.

We handed Duke their first loss last season, and I hope we can repeat that feat this evening! GO TERPS!

I’m certainly a football fan, and my enjoyment of the college game has increased greatly since moving to Tennessee (I have watched the NFL since I was five, but that never translated to following the college game for some reason … maybe because Maryland was so very bad for so very long) . I still have absolutely no interest in high school football, but we all have our limits.

Despite my appreciation for the gridiron and finally learning that Steve Spurrier is more than just the guy who briefly coached the Washington Redskins, the college sport to which I hold true and devoted allegiance is getting underway! College hoops is starting the 2005-06 season with some amazing games! My Terps (ranked 21) take on #7 Gonzaga at the Maui Invitational today at 4:00pm (how will I get out of work early?), followed by two other games in which all four teams are ranked (including Kentucky, which I know holds more local interest). This is good stuff!

The exciting buildup starts now and will continue to grow until the big bracket show on CBS. I have March 12 circled on my calendar! Basketball has arrived … it’s the ACC’s party now … Fear the Turtle!

I’m a couple of weeks late in mentioning this, but I felt some serious Terp pride when one of my alma mater’s professors was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics. That makes two Nobel winners currently on our beautiful campus (you’ve got none, UVA … take that!).

Professor Thomas Schelling won this honor for this work in game-theory analysis. The other current UMD professor with a Nobel to his name is Williams Phillips from the Physics Department.

The University of Maryland has come a long way in the past twenty years. The school now has a top honors program and is ranked 18th among all public institutions in the country (55th among all colleges and universities). I’m proud to be a graduate of that school and I will be thrilled if our firstborn decides to be a Terp. I’ve been singing the Maryland fight song while patting my belly … we’ll see if there’s any effect.

Wow. The Terps are 1-2 and Vandy is 3-0. We’re definitely experiencing bizarro world in our home. I readily admit that the Terps are not a perennial favorite for the national championship, but I always expect them to do better than the Commodores! But, I am happy for Nathan and his beloved alma mater. Vandy is actually fun to watch this year!

Can’t decide how to go with tonight’s Tennessee vs. Florida game. Nathan is rooting for Tennessee. His longtime friend and Georgia grad is staying with us this weekend, and he hopes for a giant flood that fills Neyland Stadium during the game. Nathan’s sister, also a Georgia grad, envisioned a more violent and explosive possibility. I think they are kidding, although it’s difficult to tell in this SEC world to which I am becoming accustomed.

I know this is not of great interest to most people who will be reading my posts, but I would like to state my disappointment in the Terps today. How could we let a ten-point lead in the fourth quarter disappear? I told Nathan that I can now relate to being a Vandy fan. A home win against Clemson would have been so very nice. Oh, well. Bring on WVU!

Ralph Friedgen took a nonexistent Maryland football team and turned it into a respected and competitive program. From ESPN on game planning

“My interpretation is that the defense has been game-planning for us. I try to get an understanding of what they like to do, because they will adjust to [our] formations. What’s the coverage?

“Then I break us down. What do our tendencies look like? If you have a tendency, that’s not bad. That means that’s what you do well. I want to know what they know. If I’m them, this is what I do to stop what I do.”

Come again?

Yeah, like that. The whole article is impressive. If you care a lick about college football, check it out.