VCU could cost Vegas

We tweeted about it last night, asking what were the opening odds on VCU to win the tournament? A little bit of research has revealed that VCU was part of what the casinos label "The Field" bet, a group of nineteen teams where any one of them winning paid 200 to 1.

Jay Kornegay, executive director of the race and sports book at the Las Vegas Hilton said, "I've been doing this for 22 years, I can't remember a field team making it to the Final Four." But apparently there was not much action at that point, supposedly the bets that are really poised to hurt Vegas if VCU wins the tournament were made just before the Sweet Sixteen. At that point, VCU had beaten Georgetown and Purdue. Vegas offered new odds on each Sweet Sixteen participant to win their tournament and set VCU winning the title at 80 to 1. Word is they took some big money action. Now they are worried.

Kentucky is the 8 to 5 favorite of books looking at the four teams left. VCU, if one were to hop at their bandwagon at this late date, only pays 13 to 2. My, my what a long way they have come.

D'Antoni fails to use the bench

Fun times

New York Knicks Coach Mike D'Antoni is one of the worst coaches in the league when it comes to under-utilizing his bench. This is not news to Phoenix Suns fans. He did it there, too. Last year with the Knicks, he had the productive shooter and defensive stopper Toney Douglas pinned to the bench simply because he was a rookie.

This year is more of the same. The Melo trade, by getting rid of the Knicks depth, just gave D'Antoni a built-in excuse. The Wall Street Journal breaks down just how bad D'Antoni's substitution patterns are here.

We would be very surprised if both D'Antoni and General Manager Donnie Walsh are back with the team next year.

Evidence mounts

At Madison Square Garden evidence continues to mount that having two no defense playing, All-Star caliber power forwards gets a team a lot more razzle-dazzle than it does wins. The Knicks lost again last night. Melo managed five points in the second half and no field goals in the fourth quarter, while the Celtics rallied from a fifteen point deficit to beat the Knicks.

The Knicks are now under .500, 7 up and 9 down since the Anthony trade. The Nuggets meanwhile are surging. The Knicks lack depth, play no defense, and already there are signs of chemistry issues between the two big guys, Amare and Melo. Amare chastised anonymous teammates early this week for not buying into Coach Mike D'Antoni's system, while Melo bellyached and whined a day or two later that time to mesh may mean that successes are postponed until next season. (when the Knicks could have had 'Melo for nothing but Benjamins and could have kept Ray Felton to spell the geriatric Chauncey Billups).

As things stand, the Knicks will be unlikely to win a game from either the Bulls or the Celtics in a first round playoff series. The Miami Heat, who are even softer inside than the Knicks, are somewhat more vulnerable. If the Knicks could lure the Heat into high scoring battles, playing games in the 110's or 120's they might win one or two from the Heat, then as sphincters tightened in South Beach, they would have a puncher's chance against LeBron and D-Wade.

At Auburn, no way?

Very legitimate...

Well, well, well we can hardly believe what we are reading on ESPN.com this morning. Four players from Auburn's football team were arrested for five counts of first-degree robbery, one count of first-degree burglary -- both of which are felonies -- and one count of third-degree theft. Reportedly, three men entered a house off-campus, displayed a gun and robbed the residents.

Their vehicle was stopped by police, a pistol and stolen property were recovered, and the four players were taken into custody. They are being held on $511,000 bail. Three of them were part of Auburn's 2010 recruiting class. The fourth was their leading tackler in the national championship game last year. All four have been kicked off the team.

Read more here.

Knicks find a pothole

Former Syracuse star, Andy Rautins, breaks it down for Knick teammate, Landry Fields. That's right, Stanford, it snows here, in New York. Snow, ice and salt breakdown roads. Yes, Long Beach, this leads to gaping potholes. Apparently Fields, with Rautins in the front seat, hit a huge pothole getting on the Major Deegan Expressway. Ouch.

Harvard Hoops

Harvard Coach Tommy Ammaker learned from the best...

The Clarion Content was on this story many moons ago. Duke alum, Tommy Ammaker, and his Harvard Crimson, have a shot at the school's first Ivy League Men's Basketball title in 100 years of competition. They are the only one of Harvard thirty-four varsity sports not to have won a single league title. They are the antithesis of Jack Nicklaus, having finished second only twice in school history. Once was under Coach Ammaker, with a star, who has since matriculated to the NBA, Jeremy Lin.

This year Coach Ammaker's squad is the youngest in the Ivy League. With wins in their remaining games against league pillars Penn and Princeton, this team can do something never accomplished in the history of Harvard basketball. The New York Times quotes the coach, "I’m not sure you can walk anywhere on this campus and find something that hasn’t been done before," Amaker told the Times this week. "But we are on the verge of doing it."

Read the whole story here.

Not sold on the new Knicks

This was Knicks alpha dog. Now?

An expanded look to follow on the main page soon, but let it be heard that the Sports Editor is not sold on the new look New York Knicks. Sure Melo and Amare were both All-Star starters, but they play the same position and neither plays defense.

Anthony's first two games with the Knicks, twenty-five shots and twenty-two shots to score twenty-seven points each time, as the Knicks split games with the Milwaukee Bucks and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Not exactly impressive.

There are those that will say Coach Mike D'Antoni style is the problem. The Clarion Content certainly agrees it is a problem, nobody has ever won playing Loyola Marymount ball in the NBA. Having Melo and Amare together couldn't solve that conundrum even if Dog Moe were running the offense.

The Knicks are no closer to a title today than they were a week ago and apparently they could have had Deron Williams for half the price.

Look out

The Duke Blue Devils backed into the #1 ranking in the land this weekend when the four teams ahead of them lost. However, last night Duke took a much more definite step forward when the Most Outstanding Player at last year's Final Four finally exploded. Much like the beginning of last season, Duke's Kyle Singler has battled to find his place in the offense. Singler has rotated over the course of his career between center, power forward and wing player, depending on the needs of the team.

This year, like last year, as the team has grown around him, Singler has been willing to sublimate his own game to let others develop theirs. About this time last year Brian Zubek's emergence as a defensive and rebounding presence helped clearly define Singler's role and led to Duke's run.

Last night, against a banged up Temple squad, Singler exploded for twenty-eight points without the benefit of a single three-point shot. Temple Coach Fran Dunphy said, "He was just not to be denied."

Singler humbly noted, "The bigs were actually passing the ball to me, so I got good post entries and ... just kept getting the ball and putting it back up."

Has the Duke offense turned a corner?

The Wood Brothers ride again

The last time the Wood Brothers team won the Daytona 500 was in this legendary, 1976, David Pearson driven Lincoln-Mercury.

NFL Labor strife

Why are the NFL owners aggressively going on the warpath against the players?

In the post King George the II economy, there are a bunch of franchises struggling with cash flow (in some cases needed to service their debt). Struggling to sell out the stadium, no new luxury boxes, no new PSLs and no new naming rights money on the horizon in: Buffalo, Charlotte, Cincinnati, Jacksonville, Nashville, San Diego...

No doubt these greedy old white men (billionaires) are wealthy beyond belief already, but the reason they want a cash grab back from the players (millionaires) is that they don't have as many new revenue streams as they did in the 1990s. (Much like the rest of the America...)

The increase in value of their franchise is only realized when they sell. And 97% of these guys are going to own their team for the rest of their lives.

This year is the perfect time for the owners to attack because they have secured a deal with their television contracts where they get paid-in-full even if there is a labor stoppage.