The Super Bowl has never been as meaningful to me as the World Series was back in the 1950s, when I was a kid and baseball truly was the national pastime. Those were the days when all the games were played in the daytime and everybody found ways to skip work – and, in some […]

[Read more →]

Far be it from me to stir anything up, but I feel compelled to point out that both Tubby Smith and Billy Clyde Gillispie are serious candidates for national Coach-of-the Year honors. These awards generally go to coaches whose teams overachieve, and neither Smith’s Minnesota Gophers nor Gillispie’s Kentucky Wildcats was picked in anybody’s preseason […]

[Read more →]

Good morning, America, how are you?
Don’t you know me, I’m you’re native son.
I’m the train they call The City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done.
The train is leaving the station, gathering steam and momentum, taking us into our uncertain future. You can hear its whistle, siren call to hope […]

[Read more →]

The Louisville Cardinals live on Survivor Island. Every game they flirt with disaster. Their wins against Kentucky, Villanova, Notre Dame, and Pittsburgh could just have easily been losses. But somehow, just when all seems lost, the air goes out of the other team’s balloon. The reason? As Gen. George S. Patton put it, “Fatigue makes […]

[Read more →]

I’ve been watching the University of Kentucky play basketball for more than 50 years, and I have to say that Jodie Meeks’ 54-point outburst against Tennessee was the best display of pure shooting I’ve ever seen from a Wildcat.
He broke the school single-game scoring record that Dan Issel set in 1970 with a 53-point performance […]

[Read more →]

He wore these aviator sunglasses, even before dawn, and he usually covered his suit and tie – Joe Hirsch always wore a suit and tie – with a trench coat, sometimes when it wasn’t even cold or raining. He kept an apartment in New York City, but that was just an address. Throughout his career, […]

[Read more →]

I don’t care who wins tonight’s so-called “national championship game” between Florida and Oklahoma (I’m pulling for the Gators, if you must know). My national champion is Southern California. It’s a travesty that after losing to a good Oregon State team on Sept. 25, the Trojans never were able to climb back into the title […]

[Read more →]

One thing we know for sure about the Kentucky and Louisville basketball teams is that the Wildcats have shown more heart and character leading into this afternoon’s game in Freedom Hall. Other than the shocking loss to VMI — a tough team to play against anytime but especially in an opener – the Cats have […]

[Read more →]