I’ll write this briefly before I start my day of chores out here on the Deer Creek mini-ranch….the team which wins the SEC Tournament title will be winning a tougher tournament than the NCAA Tournament itself.
The SEC team which wins this tournament will have done much, much more from a difficulty of competition standpoint than what two-time defending NCAA champ UConn has done the previous two Aprils.
Not hubris on my part at all. ESPN’s Jay Bilis, an ex-Dukie and ACC guy to the core, stated,”This is the single toughest array of teams in any conference in the history of college basketball.”
That’s not MJ. That’s Jay Bilas.
So my thought for my Sooners is this…try and win this game tonight over Kentucky, then sit back and see if Alabama, Auburn, Florida, and Tennessee destroy themselves physically in the hope of winning the SEC Tournament.
I’m not at all openly advocating tanking, but really focus hard on tonight and don’t fret anything beyond in this SEC Tournament.
A song for last night beyond Boomer Sooner would be nice. This is what we blared outside the basketball gym after big hoop wins at John Marshall in the the mid-70’s.
It’s a classic Sly Stone song which by buddy, Rod the Mule Carter, turned me onto my junior year. Rod was our placekicker and a backup offensive lineman. After his breakout junior year as an All-City place kicker…Rod then informed our offensive line coach, Ed Rodsinger, he would no longer be wasting his time as an offensive lineman. Too much sweating and contact. Rod didn’t want to hurt the leg.
Coach Rodsinger went ballistic and would have kicked Rod off the team if head coach Don McDonald hadn’t kept Rod because of his excellent kicking percentages.
Coach Rodzinger…. then one day when Coach Mac was with the defense on the other end of the field in practice put Rod in front and center of the offensive team and informed Rod he was a worthless, lazy mule not good for anything except kicking the goddamn football.
So..from that day forward–Rod became the Mule at John Marshall. I loved Rod.
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My wife’s five-hundred daffodils have exploded into full bloom out here on the ranch. Better than Augusta National.
Have a beautiful spring day..even though it’s not really spring yet.
Peace and love, MJ