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If you followed my AP voting at all this season, you know that I've been very skeptical of Hawaii. By the end of the season I had finally bumped the Warriors to No. 12 based essentially on this flawed logic.

"I'm still not sure if Hawaii is any good, but they're undefeated. And in a season in which everyone else has two losses, that's got to count for something ... right?"

Wrong. If I were a gutsier voter I would have stuck to my convictions that Hawaii was a product of its soft schedule. Certainly that was proven emphatically last night in the Sugar Bowl, when Georgia outclassed the Warriors in every which way in a 41-10 romp.

It was a painful game to watch because of its lopsidedness (is that a word? It is in blogdom at least). Pretty much like the Rose Bowl, in which Southern Cal once again buried an overmatched Big Ten team. This time it was the Fighting Zookers of Illinois who were steamrolled, 49-17.

So if you're scoring at home, that's two boring blowouts in two BCS Bowls.

Why do I bring this up? Just to complain? (nope). To pat myself on the back for having the right instincts about Hawaii (perhaps). Or it could it be too ...

wait for it ...

wait for it ...

Talk about a playoff!!!!!!

Didn't see that one coming did you? You did? Ah well, I'll press on nonetheless.

Those two games disproved the growing sentiment that more teams need access to the BCS. Actually, less do. There was no way either Illinois or Hawaii deserved a BCS berth, yet both got one becuase, hey, there 12 spots to fill and someone's gotta fill them.

All of which confirms my belief that an eight-team playoff would give us just the right amount of teams to play for the national championship. If you don't make that cutoff, then your argument for being a national title contender is probably a weak one - like Hawaii's clearly was.

An eight-team playoff could work this way - seed the top four teams and let them play home games (yep, this would cause the most controversy, I get that.) Then play the next four games at BCS sites - the Rose Bowl, the Sugar, the Orange and the Fiesta. Then play the title game at one of these sites - just like the BCS game that's being held at the Sugar Bowl. Or add the Cotton Bowl to the mix and save one of the bowls for purely the title game.

As for all the other non-playoff teams? Let them keep playing in the same bowls as always. No need to topple that gravy train.

You could put the first round of the playoffs sometime in mid-December, or schedule it right around Christmas if you'd like. Then play the semis on Jan. 1 and the title game on Jan. 8. Heck, the season right now is already stretched to Jan. 7.

Worried about adding too many games? Then take that 12th game that was recently added back off the schedule. The max a team would play is 15 games if it was in a conference that has a title game.

The one glitch? Would fans travel one week to a semifinal game and then travel again the next week to a title game on short notice? How would you handle travel arrangements, etc? I'll grant that these problems aren't easily solved, but I have a feeling that college football fans are just loony enough to pull off the back-to-back week thing. If you've ever seen the army of RVs that show up at every major college football game the day before the freakin' game, you know what I mean.

So there. Now that this issue has been tidily solved, I'll move on the Middle East.

David Price's first comment to me after his Dudley team fell to Greensboro Day in the Little Four final Friday: "OK, you can put them back at No. 1 now."

He caught himself, remembering that I never actually released a Mighty Nine poll Christmas week, meaning the Bengals remained at No. 1 even after losses to Ravenscroft and the Christ School. Not that early-season rankings mean much but I do feel kind of bad for not giving the Panthers at least a short stay at No. 1. Dudley was in prime position to move up, but with a not-so-bad loss to nationally ranked Oak Hill and a tough defeat to GDS, it's hard to see a climb from No. 2 now. I'm off to see Trinity tonight to see how Tim Kelly's Bulldogs (13-1 with only a loss to Raleigh Wakefield) look against another Mighty Nine mainstay, Andrews. We'll try to post a New Year's Mighty Nine (boys AND girls) by Friday.

Andrews is coming off a thrilling 65-63 win over EJ Abrams-Ward (35 points) and Thomasville in the Wachovia Classic's American bracket finals. Or was that the National bracket? Stan Kowalewski said today that the tournament will be leaving High Point for Northern Guilford -- where he is now boys varsity coach -- in 2008. You can read more on that in my Friday high school notebook. The Nighthawks (6-3) made a strong showing in this year's event, giving Thomasville a good game in the semifinals, and they promise to be really tough next year when point guard Jonathan Frye is a junior and 6-7 Jacob Lawson is bigger and stronger as a sophomore.

Also, how about Southeast Guilford sweeping boys and girls titles Monday in the NewBridge Christmas Classic at Ledford? The Falcons girls (9-4) are looking particularly formidable.

If you like obscure stats, check this one out.
The perpetually hacked and frequently successful Tyler Hansbrough is on pace to make around 270 free throws this season. Context: UNC's opponents made 263 in the Tar Heels' championship season of 1981-82.
At 542 for his career, Hansbrough is on pace to surpass Christian Laettner's total of 713 -- perhaps by the end of this season. The former Duke Blue Devil made more free throws than anybody who played his entire career in the ACC, which is not to say it's an official league record.
The confusions stems from the fact that one of the most prolific scorers in NCAA history, Wake Forest's Dickie Hemric, played in the league's first season after having logged two years in the Southern Conference. When calculating statistics, the league grandfathered in Hemric's career totals in points and rebounds but did not take other stats into account.
It will now do the same for free throws made and attempted, spokesman Brian Morrison said this morning.
Hemric, who also holds the NCAA record, stands at 905. Hansbrough is 20th with 542 but could move all the way past Laettner if he retains his current pace, he stays healthy and the Tar Heels play five postseason games. (That looks like a pretty solid bet.)

ACC SINGLE-SEASON FT MADE LEADERS
Total Player School Season
285 Lenny Rosenbluth UNC 1956-57
282 Buzzy Wilkinson Virginia 1954-55
278 Len Chappell Wake 1961-62
242 Tyler Hansbrough UNC 2006-07
234 Grady Wallace SCar 1956-57
230 Dickie Hemric Wake 1953-54
225 Christian Laettner Duke 1989-90
222 Bob Lewis UNC 1965-66
220 Jim Spanarkel Duke 1977-78
217 Art Heyman Duke 1962-63

The league's career FT leaders can be found here.

That's right, call me bold or call me audacious, but I have indeed moved Trinity to the top of the Mighty Nine boys poll after the Bulldogs went to 13-0 with a convincing victory over Andrews on Wednesday night. My story on Trinity's impressive start elicited a hilarious email response from Asheboro coach Brian Nance, whose team plays Trinity again Jan. 17.

From the story:

"Hey, these boys ain't Asheboro!" Kelly bellowed to his players. "They're not going to quit."

So Nance's subject line was this: I surrender.

Calling himself General Cornwallis, Nance went on to thank me for providing him with pregame speech material when his team gets its shot at redemption for last week's 86-49 loss to Trinity.

Good stuff.

Of course, we made Tim Kelly's career record even more remarkable than it already is. Forgetting the typo, Friday's story should have him at 363-128 in 18+ seasons.

Here's the new boys poll, which will be updated again on Tuesday:

1. Trinity 13-0 3 (last week) / 2. Greensboro Day 16-2 1 / 3. Dudley 9-2 2 / 4. Ragsdale 10-2 5 / 5. Graham 8-0 NR / 6. Andrews 9-2 7 / 7. Grimsley 9-3 8 / 8. Williams 8-1 NR / 9. Page 8-3 4. Dropped out: Reidsville (was 6th), Glenn (was 9th).

Quick explanation on the change at the top of the poll: Trinity is one of two area teams that remain unbeaten -- the other, 8-0 Graham, went from unranked to No. 5 after beating Cummings 80-79 last week -- so it slid up from No. 3. It would be easy to leave Greensboro Day at No. 1 after it beat No. 2 Dudley (now 3) in the Little Four finals, but I dropped the Bengals a spot because of losses to Arden Christ School and Raleigh Ravenscroft before the holidays and after our last poll update. Christ School, with its three tall-tower Plumlee brothers, is probably the best private-school team in the state, so that 59-55 loss alone couldn't knock GDS down from No. 1. But paired with a loss to Ravenscroft, I felt justified.

Dudley held its own with Oak Hill in Arizona on Dec. 22. It would be great if we get to see the Panthers take on Trinity again this March -- the Bulldogs beat Dudley for the '04 3-A state title.

There are a few key games in the next few days that could shake up the rankings: No. 8 Williams is playing Greensboro Day and High Point Central faces No. 6 Andrews in two hours. Trinity is at No. 5 Ragsdale on Monday. Two other big games tonight: Reidsville, with its state-champion football players now in basketball shape, at Grimsley; and Northern Guilford at Northeast, which is just on the outside of the poll despite two wins over No. 9 Page. Looking at the whole picture, the Pirates seem to be the better team right now despite their two close head-to-head losses to the Rams.

Complaints and other comments welcome.

In 2008, Wake Forest kicker Sam Swank has a chance to become the all-time leading scorer in ACC football history. And if he does, he'll almost certainly bring another $4,000 or so to the university's general scholarship fund through the auspices of the ACC's advertising relationship with Allstate. In all, Wake has taken in $16,000 from the program.
I bring this up because it's one of the few examples of financial impact that can be definitively tied to an athlete or a group of athletes. And because I presume you'll be wondering what those Allstate nets are doing behind the goalposts at the BCS title game tonight.

If you're wondering why I didn't pound it out last night after the game, well then you obviously don't have two very small children whose wakeup time is not affected at all by the BCS.

I'll have it up in about an hour. Stay strong.

This is my final AP Poll blog entry and ... I promised myself ... I wouldn't cry ... (sob) ... but I just .... get so ... emotional ... (sob).

There, now that I've regained my composure, let's move forward with my explanations. One more time, it's my current ranking/my previous ranking and then (the overall AP Poll ranking).

1/2 LSU (1) - I wasn't required to vote LSU No. 1 just because it won the BCS title game over Ohio State. But considering the Tigers were the champions of the toughest conference in the land, that their two losses came in triple overtime and that they looked pretty awesome (against Virginia Tech and against Ohio State) when fully healthy, I put the Bengal Tigers on top anyway.

2/6 Southern Cal (3) - You could make a pretty strong argument for the Trojans as the No. 1 team in the land, considering their two losses came when their starting quarterback, John David Booty, was injured. But it's not quite as strong as LSU's primarily because you still can't lose to Stanford, with or without a healthy starting QB.

3/5 Georgia (2) - Three voters but the Dawgs at No. 1. I understand that, and maybe Georgia beats LSU on a neutral field if they played next week. But the entire season counts, and that three touchdown loss to Tennesee, the team LSU beat in the SEC title game, won't just disappear.

4/10 West Virginia (6) - The other voters had the Mountaineers a little lower, probably because of that bizarre loss to Pitt. But man, that win over Oklahoma was pretty darned thorough. And doing it without their head coach makes it even more impressive.

5/7 Missouri (4) - Teams that get screwed out of a BCS bowl berth usually lay on egg. Not the Tigers, who pretty much mauled Arkansas.

6/8 Kansas (7) - I thought the Jayhawks were exposed when they lost to Mizzou in its final regular season game. Instead, KU's Orange Bowl win over the Hokies probably exposed the ACC as a not-so-great conference. Or it proved that the Big 12 is pretty darned good. Take your pick.

7/1 Ohio State (5) - I had the Buckeyes at No. 5 originally, but I felt like thoroughness of their loss to LSU, combined with their dearth of big regular season wins justified dropping them below Missouri and Kansas.

8/3 Oklahoma (8) - Wow, imagine if the Sooners hadn't been so eager to avenge their previous Fiesta Bowl loss to Boise State! Then their game against West Virginia could have really been ugly. It seems strange to say about a coach who gets his team to BCS games with regularity, but I'm losing a little faith in Bob Stoops.

9/4 Virginia Tech (9) - I'm still not sure how the Hokies lost to Kansas or why they didn't give the ball to Branden Ore more. But I am sure that the Orange Bowl didn't do much for the ACC's less-than-sterling reputation ...

10/14 Boston College (T10) - .... which is why I felt so funny about putting a second ACC team in the top 10. Call it a quirk of the polls I guess.

11/16 Tennessee (12) - The Volunteers finished just outside the top 10. It's high time they fired Phil Fulmer, don't you think?

12/17 Texas (T10) - Another season of impressive wins in the games the Longhorns were supposed to win and losses in the tough games. It feels good to have the old Mack Brown back after that brief Vince Young interlude.

13/21 Auburn (15) - The fact that the Tigers could revamp their offense after the regular season and still win the Peach Bowl over Clemson is a proof that a) they've got a heck of a coaching staff and b) the layoff after the regular season is waaaaay too long.

14/9 Florida (13) - Okay Gators. You've had a couple of phenomenal recruiting classes in a row. Surely you have someone else besides Tim Tebow and Percy Harvin that can touch the ball on offense ... right?

15/11 Arizona State (16) - Nice season for the Sun Devils. Maybe Dennis Erickson will even stick around for another one.

16/13 Illinois (20) - Yeah, I probably should have had the Illini lower. Maybe I have a soft spot for Ron Zook. Can you blame me?

17/23 BYU (14) - Normally you wouldn't be rewarded for hanging on to beat UCLA in a bowl game, but there was a lot of movement at the bottom half of the poll. Plus, I like guys named Bronco. So, apparently do my fellow pollsters.

18/15 Clemson (21) - The Tigers should really be loaded up for a run at the ACC title next season. Stop me if you've heard that one before.

19/NR Oregon (23) - Why jump the Ducks up so high? Because this was a very, very good team when Dennis Dixon was healthy and it was very, very good once it finally had the time to groom a replacement for Dixon.

20/24 Cincinnati (17) - Enjoy Brian Kelly while you can, Bearcats. He's too good a coach to stay at Cincy for much longer.

21/18 Wisconsin (24) - Wasn't this supposed to a big season for the Badgers? Apparently not.

22/NR Michigan (18) - You can see why some folks really wanted me to put App State back in the poll, couldn't you? Still, I think the Wolverines deserved this spot after their impressive win over Florida. Plus, I have a soft spot for Lloyd ... okay, that's not true.

23/25 Oregon State (25) - I would have moved the Beavers up higher, but winning a bowl game over Maryland just doesn't prove much.

24/19 Virginia (NR) - On the whole, a pretty darned impressive season for Al Groh and his Cavaliers. Give that man a lucrative contract extension!

25/12 Hawaii (12) - And so, my strange relationship with the Warriors comes to an end. All season long I felt they were pretenders. But it took 13 games before I was finally proven right. For simply not losing games they were supposed to win, I'll grant them the final spot in my final AP Poll.

Kyle Hines' pursuit of 2,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in a career continues. Click
here to track his progress.

Sadly, the AP is not in the basketball poll business as they are for high school football. For understandable reasons; no offense intended, Aaron Beard.

But I am still participating as a voter in statewide polls being administered by Deana King at NCPreps.com.

Here are this week's polls (note that Trinity and Dudley are 2-3 in the 3-A boys poll and Grimsley is almost in a dead heat with Wakefield for No. 1 in the 4-A girls poll):

1-A BOYS

1. Mount Airy 14-0 (8) – 133
2. Cherryville 12-1 (1) – 114
3. Thomasville 8-1 (3) – 109
4. North Edgecombe 8-0 (2) – 106
5. Winston-Salem Prep 14-5 – 84
6. Hendersonville 10-1 – 75
7. Trask 10-1 – 59
8. Albemarle 9-2 – 26
9. Princeton 10-3 – 19
10. Pender 10-2 – 15

HONORABLE MENTION: Polk County (10-4) – 10; Louisburg (8-3) – 10; Hayesville (10-3) – 4; Camden County (8-2) – 3; South Robeson (8-2) – 1; Jordan-Matthews (9-5) – 1;

I believe it was Wilt Chamberlain or maybe Andre the Giant, who said "Nobody loves Goliath."

That was never more true than last night at the Dean Dome, when tiny little Tyler Hansbrough dunked over 7-7 colossus Kenny Georgia and the roof practically blew off the place from the noise. It was an impressive feat, to say the least.

But, upon further review, Hansbrough did need an extra edge to pull it off. Specifically about an extra step and a half.

Check out the video here. Actually just fast forward it to the replay at :50. You'll see the step, step, then plant both feet go up technique Hansbrough uses.

I'm not knocking the effort by Psycho T. But poor George was publicly abused in front of thousands. He deserves some justice, darn it.

I can make the joke because it's not a big deal, but Roy Williams was forced to postpone his usual 2 p.m. press conference today because he tripped in his office and smacked his head against a wall, opening up a cut.

The real jewel in this story is that Williams apparently tripped over the cord of his remote control. You read that correctly. Roy Williams does not have a wireless remote control for the television in his office. Apparently all his money goes toward the recruiting budget and Cokes for his office fridge.

Seriously, don't worry. He'll be fine.

UNCG's Kyle Hines is on track to become the 96th player in the 71-year history of NCAA statistics to amass 2,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in a career. At his current rates, he'll get the points mark at Furman on Feb. 10 and the rebounds figure at Western Carolina on Feb. 21.
Click here to check on his progress.

Sometime early tomorrow morning - which will be late evening in Melbourne, Australia - John Isner will take the court in his second-ever grand slam, against Frenchman Fabrice Santoro.

If you're following this tournament at all, you know that Roger Federer would be the likely second-round opponent for Isner if he beats Santoro.

But if you follow this tournament, closely, you know that facing Federer is far, far from Isner's mind. Santoro is a very tough matchup. In fact, noted tennis scribe Jon Wertheim of Sports Illustrated is clearly expecting the Frenchman to advance. Here's what he wrote about Federer in a pre-tournament piece.

"Looking forward to second rounder against Fabrice Santoro."

Ouch! Bonnie Ford of ESPN.com isn't exactly giving an endoresment to Thin Izzy either.

"Roger Federer may be rooting for John Isner, who sneaked into the main draw courtesy of a few injury withdrawals, in the first round so he doesn't have to face the enduringly pesky Fabrice Santoro. Isner took a set off Federer in New York, but the slower courts here will take a little edge off that booming serve."

Double ouch! Don't worry. Folks aren't jumping off the Isner bandwagon. Rather, they're just recognizing two key factors. 1) The new blue surface at the Australian Open is slower than the previous one. That's never a good thing for a dominating server like Isner. 2) Fabrice Santoro, and we mean this in the nicest way possible, can be a real pain in the rear to play.

The guy just turned 35 in December. 35! Given that professinal tennis tends to age you in dog years on the court that's remarkable. Santoro's been able to keep going - and going quite well when you consider that he's ranked No. 36 in the world and just reached the semifinals in Sydney, one of the big prep tournaments for the Aussie Open - because he's in phenomenal shape, he's a very smart player and he's got one of the widest arrays of shots on the ATP Tour. There's a reason they call this guy "The Magician." He also uses both hands from both sides, a style of play you just don't see every day on the tour.

That said, while Santoro can play some of the best defensive tennis on the tour, he'll never blow you off the court. Isner is the one with the big stick here. If he wields it well and wins most of his service games easily, he'll get a chance here and there on Santoro's serve. But if Isner gives Santoro an opening, the Frenchman is wiley enough to sneak in a break or two.

Prediction? This match features at least two tiebreakers (surprise!) If Isner gets in a bunch of first serves in those games, he wins in four. If not, he goes down in four.

Isner is currently 109th in the world, with 407 rankings points. A win against Santoro would give him 35 more points and probably vault him into the mid 90s in the rankings.

Well, unless you're the unbeaten Grimsley girls.

On the boys side, Trinity suffered its first loss last Monday at then No. 4 RAgsdale, 58-55, and slipped from the top spot to 4th, behind Ragsdale. Yes, the Tigers have losses to now-unranked Page and No. 9 Andrews, but when in doubt, I look at head-to-head results. For now, that puts RAgsdale at No. 3 behind Greensboro Day and Dudley, which have returned to the top two spots. Hard to see those two losing again in the regular season, though Dudley (10-2) still must face Northeast Guilford (9-5) at least twice, including Tuesday night at home. Ragsdale still has to visit Trinity (Feb. 1), which should be warmly greeted this Thursday at Asheboro after Blue Comet fans apparently took offense at coach Tim Kelly's crack about their team's late-game effort in a holiday tournament.

Here's the boys Mighty Nine for this week:

BOYS School / Record / LW* 1. Greensboro Day / 19-2 / 2 LW: Def. Durham Academy 63-43 2. Dudley / 10-2 / 3 LW: Def. Morehead 58-44, def. Northern Guilford 64-50 3. Ragsdale / 14-2 / 4 LW: Def. Trinity 58-55, def. Randleman 77-33 4. Trinity / 14-1 / 1 LW: Lost to Ragsdale 58-55 5. Graham / 12-0 / 5 LW: Def. Science & Math 107-33, def. E. Alamance 97-66, def. Northwood 73-52 6. Grimsley / 12-3 / 7 LW: Def. HP Central 62-52, def. East Forsyth 55-47 7. Thomasville / 8-1 / 9 LW: Def. West Montgomery 71-47, def. Jordan-Matthews 83-75 8. Cummings / 9-2 / NR LW: Def. Science & Math 93-51, def. Williams 72-60 9. Andrews / 9-3 / 6 LW: Lost to Glenn 62-54

Dropped out: Williams (9).

Notice Graham and Cummings are both feasting on a suspect Mid-State 1-A/2-A Conference. Graham has a close win over the Cavaliers, who just bumped Williams out of the poll with a 72-60 verdict Saturday. To be fair, Northwood has done OK this season, but the Chargers did just have it handed to them by Graham, 73-53, on Friday. They play Cummings on Tuesday night.

With Page struggling since Christmas, Grimsley seems to have become the clear front-runner in the Metro 4-A.

Which leads us to the girls poll. Page and Grimsley tangle Friday. Both have played very well since the Little Four, as has Northwest Guilford, which remains No. 2 in the Mighty Nine behind the Whirlies. Here's the latest poll:

GIRLS School / Record / LW* 1. Grimsley / 16-0 / 1 LW: Def. HP Central 62-33, def. Dudley 54-35, def. East Forsyth 60-34 2. Northwest Guilford / 15-1 / 2 LW: Def. Smith 55-34, def. HP Central 61-43 3. Bishop McGuinness / 12-3 / 3 LW: Def. North Stokes 58-15, def. East Wilkes 60-47 4. Ragsdale / 13-2 / 4 LW: Def. Trinity 65-31, def. Randleman 64-40 5. Page / 12-2 / 5 LW: Def. East Forsyth 56-27, def. Smith 44-38. 6. Graham / 12-0 / 6 LW: Def. Eastern Alamance 75-56, def. Northwood 78-24 7. Rockingham County / 14-1 / 7 LW: Def. Northern Guilford 71-38, def. Western Guilford 63-32 8. Southeast Guilford / 13-4 / 8 LW: Def. Asheboro 65-24, def. SW Randolph 63-41 9. East Davidson / 13-2 / 9 LW: Def. North Rowan 72-32, def. Central Davidson 57-15

Dropped out: None.

*-- Last week’s ranking

Two dangerous teams are lurking just outside the poll: Glenn (11-2) and Dudley (8-4), whick knocked off Rockingham County on the road but came back to earth a bit with the loss Thursday to Grimsley. Honestly, an unbeaten season would not be a stretch for Trumae Lucas and the Whirlies. Deep, athletic and senior-loaded, they're not prone to significant letdowns.

As always, any comments or complaints about my very unscientific rankings are welcome.

Thanks to the wonders of time zones, John Isner took the court in Australia this morning well before most of us were awake here in the U.S. Combine that with the fact that the King, Roger Federer, made his triumphant return after being sidelined with a stomach bug, and you've got a dearth of information on Isner's straight-set first-round loss to Fabrice Santoro.

That's where I come in. Thanks to my abilities to move a mouse and type, I've done what the kids like to call "some web surfing" and come up with some descriptions of the match.

Bonnie Ford of ESPN was thankfully checking out this match, in large part to do this piece about Santoro, who set a record with his 62nd appearance in a Grand Slam. Obviously, most of the piece is about the guy known as "The Magician," but it gives you a good idea why Isner struggled so badly against him. And then there's this quote from Thin Izzy about the match.

"He broke me six times," Isner said wonderingly. "I can't remember the last time that happened.
"The court's a bit slow and he was able to scrap a lot of returns back. Then sometimes he'd lunge and hit the ball 40 feet in the air and it would land inside the baseline. He's got that junky little slice. It's not the best matchup for me. … Guess I'll be the answer to a trivia question."

That's pretty similar to what was posted on the tennis blog, Tennis-X.com.

“He broke me six times so I guess he figured me out. That junky slice was tough for me to get down to."

And then there's this description of the Isner-Santoro match by Kamakshi Tandon, who is blogging the tournament for Tennis.com.

David forced Goliath to come up with his own pace from the baseline and found all kinds of awkward positions to place his passing shots when Isner managed to get to net. And while all pros miss easy shots from time to time, Isner tends to miss them wildly – and today, far too frequently. The fact that he was having a bad day on serve just about finished things off.

David, as you might have guessed, was Santoro, while Goliath was Isner. But that metaphor really only works in terms of their height difference (Santoro is 5-10, while Isner is 6-9 or 6-10 depending on what day it is). In terms of playing experience it was Isner that played the Lilliputian to Santoro's Gulliver. Add in the slow playing surface, which allowed Santoro to track down more balls and get them back with his wacky spins, and you really had to consider Isner an underdog in this match.

That said, I'm sure John would be the first to tell you he wasn't thrilled with how he played. For now, though, chalk it up to a tough lesson learned on what not to when playing a guy with a very unorthodox style.

It's not over in Oz for Iz. This evening Australia (which willl again be early morning here) John teams up with 6-10 Ivo Karlovic to play their first-round match in doubles. Normally doubles doesn't get any exposure until the later rounds, but I wouldn't be surprised if ESPN's cameras found their way to Court Seven to record a bit of this unusual duo.

The road-weary basketball teams of Northern Guilford High were getting pretty excited about playing their first games in a home gym that they've only been allowed to get a 15-minute look at so far. But the fire marshal won't let them open Friday against Morehead as had been tentatively scheduled. Coach Stan Kowalewski said the Nighthawks will play those varsity games at the Northern middle school next door at 6 and 7:30. The new grand opening will come next Tuesday vs. Western Alamance.

The Northern boys will be coming off a MLK holiday matchup Monday against Mt. Zion Academy's postgraduate team (6 p.m. at the coliseum; Greensboro Day meets Page at 3 in that Scholastic Classic lineup).

By the time they get a true home game, Kowalewski's team will have played 15 games off campus and one in Northern's middle-school gym. The good news: Their last 7 conference games are at home and they're currently residing in 2nd in the league.

While we're talking about schedule changes, Dudley coach David Price says that Montrose Christian, the Maryland private-school power that was scheduled to play the Panthers in North Carolina on Saturday, canceled on the game last week. Montrose was unable to travel two states away as part of its acceptance into Maryland's public-school association, Price was told.

Looking to see Dudley in a marquee matchup. Well, if tonight's game against Northeast Guilford doesn't do it for you, then stop by the Panthers' gym next Saturday (Jan. 26) when 2-
A state-champion Cummings visits. The girls start at 6, boys at 7:30.

Courtesy of an AP blurb in an Indian on-line paper (in case you somehow thought tennis wasn't an international sport) we have a bit of an update on what happened to John Isner and Ivo Karlovic, the world's tallest doubles team.

Isner and Karlovic fell to the Argentinian team of Agustin Calleri and Juan Pablo Brzezicki (an Italian surname and a Polish surname. You gotta love the Arengtinian melting pot). 7-6, 6-3.

The result proves that the teaming of the 6-9 Isner and the 6-10 Karlovic, while really cool in theory, wasn't going to automatically produce great results. Doubles is truly a team game, with both players needing to know what the other is going to do and where they're going to go on the court, at all times. Considering this was the first time Isner and Karlovic had played together, you can guess that they weren't quite in sync.

Plus, that slow surface in Australia made each big man's serve returnable. And those returns invariably wound up at the feet of Isner and Karlovic, the hardest spot for any tall tennis player to get to.

Afterward Isner said he'd probably join forces with Dr. Ivo again at Wimbledon, where the force of their gigantic serves should be awfully effective.

As for Isner, I'm still trying to catch up with him. He's now planning to spend next week at a Challenger tournament in Hawaii, before rejoining the ATP tour at a tournament in Delray Beach.

When Paul Hewitt brings his Georgia Tech team to Raleigh on Wednesday night, it will be the first time back at the RBC Center since he had a bit of a tete-a-tete with a State student. It came in the waning moments of a Wolfpack win back in January of 2006 (Tech didn't play at State last year. Thanks, expansion).

John Elias, a State student had been heckling Yellow Jackets big man Theodis Tarver, who had been declared academically ineligible earlier in the season.

In this article in the State student newspaper, The Technician, Elias admitted saying this line that finally got under Hewitt's skin.

"During the last timeout, I yelled 'Hey Paul, do you think Tarver even understood those drawings?' "

The game was already decided, so maybe Hewitt wasn't as focused on the court as he normally would be. Or maybe it was because he knew that Tarver had lost his mother the previous summer and that Tarver's grief played a role in his academic struggles. Whatever the case, here was Hewitt's response, according to Elias.

"That's when coach Hewitt turned around, pointed at me and said, "Hey F*** you. That's just classless."

Zing.

To his credit Hewitt apologized several times after the game and admitted he should have ignored the heckling, even if was pretty tasteless stuff. And maybe, in some way, his willingness to stand up for a player helped Hewitt in the locker room.

But you never want to me known as a coach with rabbit ears, to admit that you actually listen to whatever verbal abuse the crowd spews forth. Once you do, you're giving the crowd even more incentive to keep heckling. Just ask Gary Williams how his chats with Duke fans over the years have gone.

Tarver's long since departed Tech, but the Yellow Jackets do have Lewis Clinch, who was suspended last season for an honor code violation. And if State fans elect to go easy on the players, they could always just pick on Hewitt. Certainly the Atlanta media already is, as evidenced by this column in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Hard to believe Hewitt had the Yellow Jackets in the NCAA title game just four seasons ago.

... we should grant equal time to N.C. State's neighbor, North Carolina.

After UNC's loss to Maryland, on the ABC broadcast you can clearly hear an unidentified female yelling "Go back to the Ghetto!" at the Maryland players - most likely Greivis Vasquez, who had been jawing with the UNC students.

You can click on the audio of it through this link.

(As the Sporting News blog notes, please don't assume that the person in the video is the one who made the comment)

As I said, it does appear that the Maryland players, and Vasquez in particular, were woofing with the UNC students after the game, but c'mon, the "ghetto" reference is over-the-line.

And don't think Duke is exempt from this either. A few years ago when the Blue Devils were playing Temple, a student behind me yelled "This ain't the hood!" at an Owls player with a bit of flash to his game.

You'd think after years of sitting and listening to home fans heap abuse on visiting teams I would be numb to this sort of thing, but I'm still stunned by how vile the heckling can get. I've pretty much come to the conclusion that fans behave very differently in that mob-type setting than they would in the rest of their lives.

At least, I hope that's the case.

The next time a coach says he's excited about going to the Meineke Car Care Bowl, don't laugh. There's something to be said for an unopposed time slot.
The Wake Forest-UConn game, played on a Saturday afternoon without direct football competition, drew 3,607,429 viewers, according to estimates from Nielsen Media. In the process, it attracted 40 percent more eyeballs than JoePa's Nittany Lions got for their Alamo Bowl game with Texas A&M.
The Deacs and Huskies doubled the audience of Alabama and Colorado in the Independence Bowl (1.8 million) and surpassed two New Year's Day games, the Outback between Tennessee and Wisconsin (3.26 million) and the Gator featuring Virginia and Texas Tech (2.96 million).
If you were looking for a big number on Jan. 1, you didn't want to play early in the afternoon. The Outback started at 11 a.m., the Cotton went off at 11:30 -- or a bright and early 10:30 local time in Dallas -- and the Gator and Capital One started at 1. Given a choice, a whopping 10 million viewers selected Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow and his Florida Gators against outgoing Michigan coach Lloyd Carr and his band of Michigan Wolverines in the Capital One.

Check out the chart here.

So, as I was watching Duke beat Maryland last night, it occurred to me just how many coaches from the K coaching tree all came together to scout the MLK Scholastic Classic a week ago in Greensboro. You had Mike Brey from Notre Dame, Duke assistant Chris Collins and former Duke player and assistant coach Tommy Amaker (now at Harvard) with courtside seats to see the likes of 6-10 Christ School junior Mason Plumlee -- brother of 6-11 Stanford commit Miles Plumlee -- and Forsyth Country Day 8th-grader Tyler Lewis. Hey, it's never too early to ID good raw talent.

Scout.com recruiting guru Dave Telep is convinced Northern Guilford freshman Jacob Lawson is the real deal, and might even be back playing at the coliseum some day with an ACC team.

"Oh, yeah," Telep said. "He's 6-6 now and has a live body."

Lots of upside, in other words.

Lawson and the Nighthawks finally play a home game in their new gym Tuesday night vs Northeast -- well, we're about 99% sure the gym will be open for business after several delays.

A couple other notables on hand last week at the coliseum: Georgia Tech's Paul Hewitt and a former Tar Heel, Scott Cherry, who is now a top assistant at Western Kentucky. When UNC fans last saw Cherry, he was doing a little celebration dance in front of the George Mason bench alongside Jim Larranaga after their 2nd-round upset of the Heels in Dayton in '06

I know that most of you reading this blog have no idea about the movie, The Warriors. And I know that a good chunk of you are too young to be familiar with a movie that came out in 1979. And I'm aware the a few more of you don't know who Matt Causey is.

This, then, is for the five of you who do know about The Warriors and do know that Matt Causey is a hot-headed reserve point guard for Georgia Tech with a frizzy mop of hair.

You'll appreciate the connection my boss, Joe Sirera, made between Causey and Luther, the bad-guy leader of the Rogues in the movie.

Still unsure? Check out this link. You'll see that in addition to having a nice jumper, Causey may also be a homicidal maniac. Maybe.

Yellow Jackets, come out to play!!!!

So it's about time we find out the last time an area school had both its varsity boys and girls basketball teams get through a season undefeated. If you hadn't noticed, Graham is threatening to run the table on the boys and girls side. The 16-0 Graham boys, who are laying waste to the overmatched Mid-State 1-A/2-A conference, are holding at No. 5 in this week's Mighty Nine -- Greensboro Day, Dudley, Ragsdale and Trinity simply aren't showing signs of faltering -- while the 16-0 Red Devil girls have slid up to No. 3 ahead of Bishop McGuinness, no slight intended toward the Villains, who played two national-level programs in three days in Ohio. Graham is just looking so dominant right now.

Another interesting shift in the boys poll? Stan Kowalewski's baby Nighthawks have jumped into the rankings at No. 9, coming off a competitive loss to Mount Zion at the coliseum and lopsided conference wins over BY and Western Alamance. It was a gutty win at Northeast Guilford 3 weeks ago that had me seriously considering Northern as a legit top area team. Now the Hawks will put their new-found ranking on the line Tuesday night against the Rams in the school's true home opener. Expect emotions, and the competive juices, to be running high in that one.

Here are the new Mighty Nine polls, which you can read in more detail in tomorrow's News & Record:

MIGHTY NINE BOYS
School / Record / LW* ... 1. Greensboro Day / 22-2 / 1 ... 2. Dudley / 14-2 / 2 ... 3. Ragsdale / 16-2 / 3 ... 4. Trinity / 18-1 / 4 ... 5. Graham / 16-0 / 5 ... 6. Thomasville / 11-1 / 7 ... 7. Grimsley / 14-3 / 6 ... 8. Andrews / 12-4 / 9 ... 9. Northern Guilford / 11-6 / NR.
Dropped out: Asheboro (8). *_last week’s ranking

MIGHTY NINE GIRLS
School / Record / LW* ... 1. Grimsley / 18-0 / 1 ... 2. Northwest Guilford / 16-2 / 2 ... 3. Graham / 16-0 / 5 ... 4. Bishop McGuinness / 14-5 / 3 ... 5. Southeast Guilford / 16-4 / 7 ... 6. Ragsdale / 14-3 / 4 ... 7. Page / 14-3 / 6 ... 8. East Davidson / 16-2 / 8 ... 9. Dudley / 11-4 / 9.
Dropped out: None. *-- Last week’s ranking

A couple more quick thoughts on the girls rankings ...
* It's dangerous to be in the 7-9 range given the quality teams that are lurking just outside the poll. Such as: Glenn (13-3), Eastern Guilford (14-3, winners of 7 straight), Thomasville (11-3), Wesleyan (16-5 if my math is right), not to mention solid Triad 3-A rivals Northeast Guilford and Rockingham County.
* After dismantling a very good Northwest Guilford team Friday night, it's hard to envision Grimsley losing a game this year before seeing either Wakefield or Hillside in the 4-A finals unless a) the Whirlies turn in a very flat effort somewhere along the way or b) run into a very hot team that handles defensive ball pressure very well.

At this point of the season, many fans begin wondering what their team must do in order to secure an NCAA tournament bid. Some Wake Forest partisans are probably lamenting losses at Vanderbilt and Clemson and dreaming that 13-6 could really be 15-4.
Understandable, but unreasonable. As the great comedian Steven Wright said, "You can't have everything. Where would you put it?"
While the Deacs (3-3 in the ACC) have dropped two that they could have won, they've also won two that could have easily fallen into the loss column.
If Virginia Tech's A.D. Vassallo doesn't jack up a 3-pointer with his team up eight points in the final 90 seconds and the shot clock at 29, the Deacs don't come back to beat the Hokies on Dec. 23.
Then there's last night's win over Miami. Wake, among the nation's bottom 10 teams in 3-point accuracy coming into the contest, went 10-for-19 from downtown against the Hurricanes. And the Deacs won by two. You can't just assume that game's an easy, automatic win. On a normal night with 19 attempts from long range, Wake connects five or six times. In a sense, the Deacons got 12 to 15 "additional" points last night.
So this club is precisely where it should be. And that's ahead of schedule.
No matter how mediocre the ACC is, avoiding disaster -- as the Deacs seem to be doing -- is a credible achievement for this team.