PREGAME: Welcome to Fifth Third Arena everybody! We are gathered here today to witness a contest between the UC Bearcats and the DePaul Blue Demons. Let us take a moment to rejoice ... Lance Stephenson's epic slam against DePaul two years ago.

In fact, let's take a moment to watch Lance JAM IT IN THE HOOP!

(Gonna have to scroll down the page some, but it's worth it...)

Read More

Two weeks ago it was UC that was on top of their game; not so anymore. The Bearcats have lost three straight and struggled mightily in Piscataway last Saturday. The Bearcats had a less than impressive shooting night at a 35 percent clip. The only exceptions were Dion Dixon and Yancy Gates, who went a combined 13-21.

Read More

It was a disappointing week for both UC and Xavier as the past seven days have seen the teams go a combined 0-4. While both teams faced tough opposition I would have expected both to at least earn one win out of the two games they played.

Read More

The Penn State student-run newspaper, Onward State, over the weekend wrongly reported that former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno had died, leading CBS News and the Huffington Post to publish his obituary. Paterno, who died early Sunday morning, was still alive when Onward State “broke” the story. The managing editor of the student paper has since resigned while CBS and HuffPost have not yet taken laid the blame of the wrongly reported story.

This is not the first time such a big media outlet has made an error — remember NPR falsely reporting the death of Congresswoman Gabriel Giffords? Those who have put their faith in new media as a means of obtaining the news should be crying out for precautionary steps to be taken to avoid such a faux pas. Like fact-checking, for one.

Or they can simply rely on The Onion to report things the way they are: "Joe Paterno Dies In Hospital; Doctors Promise To Tell Their Superiors First Thing Tomorrow."

Things have gone in two drastically different directions for the UC and XU men’s basketball programs after the embarrassment that was the "Crosstown Brawl."

The Bearcats have won eight out of their last nine, while the Muskies have lost five of eight. Both teams had key players suspended and UC found motivation in the fallout while Xavier has struggled to find the identity that had them as a preseason top 15.

Read More

Both Xavier and the University of Cincinnati basketball teams are in the preseason Top 25 coaches poll released today, with Xavier checking in at No. 15 and the Bearcats at No. 22. North Carolina received 31 of the possible 32 first-place votes to take the top spot, with Kentucky, Ohio State, UConn and Syracuse rounding out the top five.

Read More

Sorry to do this, guy who got hit in the face by Michael Boley's celebratory throw. But dang was it funny.

Read More

Did anyone else think they heard Monday Night Football broadcaster Ron Jaworski say "shit" during the Patriots-Dolphins game? I vaguely recall thinking something weird happened, but probably was too distracted by my fantasy football team getting totally destroyed.

Jaws apologized later in the broadcast, and ESPN said that was good enough for everyone to move on.

ESPN spokesman Bill Hofheimer says the network won't put out a statement since Jaworski himself apologized at the end of the game.

Gotta think Jaws was pretty much justified in cursing this throw. Brandon Marshall probably did, too.

Read More

The semifinals — ATP during the afternoon, WTA at night under the lights — has an electric feel. On the men’s side, we’ve been following American Mardy Fish, and his match-up against Brit Andy Murray stirs the crowds. Murray won here in 2008, and Fish was a finalist last year (losing to Roger Federer), so each knows the glory (and the likely battle against the dominant Djokovic) awaiting.

Read More

Only one opportunity to catch a match live, and thanks to a hook-up from the scheduling gods, it was Mardy Fish vs. Rafael Nadal. Yet another look at Fish, the men’s player with the most upside entering the U.S. Open, while Nadal seems to be caught in a slight free fall, so maybe this would serve as a course correction for him.

Read More