A Rose by Any Other Name

Posted on April 22, 2012 by itgoestoxi

It’s fair to question whether ESPN reports on sports or runs them (especially college football). To its credit, the Worldwide Leader is conscious of the issue and has partnered with the Poynter Institute to police itself to some degree. (The first order of business, though, will always be to turn a profit for Disney and its shareholders.)

Despite all that, ESPN’s commercials are still funny, especially this new entry in the “It’s Not Crazy, It’s Sports” series:

Clever, certainly, but the ad is a clear case of life imitating art.

Did you know that Michael Jordan played for the Penn Quakers, made the All-Ivy League first team three times, and was Ivy League Player of the Year for the 1999-2000 season?

The "other" Michael Jordan in action for the Quakers of Penn. Photo courtesy of penngazettesports.com.

Wait a minute. His Airness was not on an NBA roster for the 1999-2000 season, but did he somehow convince the NCAA to make him eligible again? After six NBA rings, did Jordan covet the Ivy League award, one of the few basketball honors he didn’t achieve?

No, of course not. (Aren’t you the least bit curious, though, what a 37-year-old Jordan would have averaged against Ivy League competition?)

Michael Jeffrey Jordan, the man behind the shoe from which this blog takes its name, was born on February 17, 1963, and played his college ball under Dean Smith at UNC.

Michael Hakim Jordan, fourteen years younger than Michael Jeffrey, graduated from Abington Friends School in Philadelphia and played four seasons at Penn under coach Fran Dunphy (currently the head man at Temple).

Michael Hakim finished his college career with 1,604 points, currently good for fifth on Penn’s all-time list. Michael Hakim and Michael Jeffrey both wore number 23, but the Quaker Michael was humble about any comparison between the two, telling the Chicago Tribune, “People just assume you’re going to going to go out and play like him, which nobody can do.”

Even so, Michael Hakim played several seasons of professional basketball in Europe and hopes to transition to a coaching career.

For his part, Dunphy said that, “[H]ere at Penn we’re real proud of our Michael Jordan.” Although that comment came in 2000, Dunphy can continue to be proud of Penn’s Michael Jordan, who remains a devoted supporter of his alma mater and blessedly has nothing to do with the Bobcats.

The gold standard.

He Hate Me: Swag for Sale

Posted on April 13, 2012 by Cjones

Urban Dictionary tells us that while the primary definition of the term “swag” refers to the way a person carries himself, it is also permissible to use the term to refer to promotional merchandise, especially t-shirts. (The 1960′s gave us “Never trust anyone over 30.” Maybe this decade will prove that you should never trust anyone who relies on Urban Dictionary to keep his slang current.)

After mentioning the Stanford NIT Championship t-shirts in a recent post, I have been of a mind to highlight some of the sharper swag available for the discerning basketball fan. Bless you, interwebs!

Honorable Mention:

Unfortunately this one is no longer available in adult sizes on nike.com, but the enterprising can always try their luck on eBay.

7. Wash away the taste of 2011′s split title and playoff loss to Princeton by celebrating Harvard’s 2012 Ivy League crown with this shirt:

Fans of t-shirt irony may prefer this one, however. Also available in Brown!

6. You too can wear the shirt that Baylor men’s players wore during their Elite Eight run in this year’s NCAA tournament:

Guaranteed to take the sting out of NCAA probation!

5. If you’re not up for the signature shoes, you can still show your support for Chris Paul with this shirt from the NBA store:

This is also available in Lin, Carmelo, LeBron, Wade, Durant, and Blake Griffin variations. I like these shirts because for some reason, they remind me of Rod Smart and the XFL.

If a clever and disgruntled Lakers fan printed the CP3 version in Lakers colors with #BasketballReasons on the front, though, I would buy at least fifty of them.

4. Are you out of gift ideas for that special someone who likes Twitter-inspired t-shirts and also hates Duke? Your problem is now officially solved:

3. Norfolk State blew up my bracket by knocking Missouri out in the first round, but I still enjoyed the heck out of that game. Everyone around you can Behold the Green and Gold if you purchase one of these:

That’s a lot of chutzpah for a team that lost at home to Division II Elizabeth City State earlier in the year, but I guess you can’t fault the Spartans for memorializing the signature win in program history.

The more demure Norfolk State fan can opt for this instead:

2. Show some love for Denver Nuggets rookie forward Kenneth Faried, who owns the best nickname currently in circulation: Manimal.

(Tip of the cap to AllKyHoops.com.)

1. In the first round of the tournament, Baylor notched a 68-60 victory over the South Dakota State Jackrabbits, who were champions of the Summit League. You can remember the 2012 Summit League title forever with this shirt:

Or go for broke and show your pride in all things Jackrabbit with this one:

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

Search Terms and Shout Outs

Posted on February 16, 2012 by Cjones

One of the neat things about WordPress is that you can view the search terms that lead people to your site from their internet searches. Common sense says to give readers what they want, so this post will highlight the top three search terms for It Goes to XI thus far.

Worldwide sensation Jeremy Lin (17) in action against two other bright young stars, Kevin Love (42) and Ricky Rubio. Photo by Reuters, courtesy of ibtimes.com.

Jeremy Lin seems to be the biggest thing since Beatlemania, and it’s no different here. He is far and away the most popular search term for the site, even though he’s been featured just once (three days ago). After sinking a game-winning three-pointer in the waning seconds against Toronto on Tuesday night, Lin came back to earth a tiny bit in last night’s defeat of the Sacramento Kings. He failed to score 20 points for the first time during his scorching seven-game stretch, but he notched a career high 13 assists, with several coming on SportsCenter-worthy lobs finished by teammates’ dunks. The Knicks host the Hornets on Friday night and the defending champion Mavericks visit the Garden on Sunday afternoon. Check out Lin and the Knicks if you get a chance.

By the way, my favorite thing to come out of the Lin story might be the following: #everydayimhustLIN. (Tip of the cap to Malik Shareef).

Towson's Robert Nwankwo shoots the hook against Michigan earlier this season. Photo courtesy of towsontigers.com.

Towson senior Robert Nwankwo of Towson is second to Lin in the search term category. Unfortunately, the Tigers are 0-5 since their streak-snapping win against UNC Wilmington last month. Nwankwo has been very productive during that stretch, however, averaging 14.8 points and 11.6 rebounds over Towson’s last five games. In the Tigers’ most recent outing, a road loss to Northeastern, Nwankwo was a one-man gang, going for 19 points and 13 boards in 33 minutes. Although this season has surely been a trying one, Nwankwo has a chance to end his career as Towson’s all-time leader in career games played. He is currently fifth on Towson’s career rebounding list (747) and third in career blocked shots (217). Not bad for a guy who began his college career as a walk-on and didn’t earn a scholarship until his junior year.

Nutella World Peace?

Coming in third, and I am not making this up, is Nutella. I don’t really know what to say, but if the NBA ever goes the European soccer route and puts corporate sponsors on team jerseys, the franchise with Nutella across its players’ chests will have my undying allegiance.

Kyle O'Quinn (10) muscles his way to the bucket against Delaware State. Photo by Steve Earley, courtesy of pilotonline.com.

Shout out to Norfolk State Spartan Kyle O’Quinn. In the Spartans’ Wednesday home loss to Delaware State, O’Quinn grabbed 12 rebounds, pushing him over 1,000 for his college career. O’Quinn is only the seventh Spartan to score 1,000 points and collect 1,000 rebounds, and is the first to achieve that feat during the Spartans’ time as a Division I program. (Tip of the cap to Rich Radford).

Shout out to the Philadelphia 76ers, who recently made a very cool memorabilia acquisition. If only they could get hold of Wilt’s little black book.