Monday Medley

What we read while exiting through the evacuation slide….

• NPI-favorite Jonathan Franzen (so what if he’s not as favorite as David Foster Wallace…he’s still good) is getting a lot of positive pub with the impending release of his new novel, Freedom. Franzen received Time cover treatment (the article is only excerpted online…cheap, right?) along with solid reviews from Sam Anderson at New York and Benjamin Alsup at Esquire. Alan Cheuse at NPR was less enthusiastic, if, it seems, unjustifiably so. And The Guardian tries to sum up what it means for the author and The Novel (in a general sense).

• An interesting account of working with George Lucas on Star Wars. Apparently, the Ewoks weren’t always in the cards….

• We love language, we love sports (they are both categories at NPI), so why wouldn’t we love Steve Rushin on language in sports?

• Continuing the sports theme, here’s Jack McCallum on the Dream Team reunion as they go into the Hall of Fame and Dana O’Neil (continuing her own strong summer) on the impact of Ali Farokhmenesh’s shot at Northern Iowa. The highs of both of those sporting events were perhaps countered by the low at Sunday’s PGA Championship, where Dustin Johnson was penalized on the 72nd hole due to a technicality. Golf.com’s roundtable discusses an event that has already been compared ad nauseam to Armando Galarraga’s imperfect perfect game.

• Continuing the language theme, we couldn’t see this story and not think of one of our favorite commercials of yore.

• Joe Posnanski assesses who is the worst everyday player in baseball and analyzes defensive statistics as well.

• Speaking of defense, definitely the legal defense of the week.

Tim’s Friday Picks

Three-for-four. Three-for-four. Man, I churn out three-for-four nights like a Little League All-Star. Of course, I knew I was going to get ONE game wrong last night; I didn’t know which. It turned out to be the game I was most confident in with my pick, as Syracuse (my national champion) looked listless early and panicked late. A disappointing showing by the Orange, although it keeps alive the Butler storyline, which I’ve been harping all year.

So again, with a 39-13 record in this Tournament, you know I’ve got three of these right. But which one isn’t?

5. Michigan State vs.  9. Northern Iowa

Original: Kansas over Maryland

What I’ve Learned: I was pretty confident that KU would lose eventually and that when it did, it would likely be because Sherron Collins tried to do too much. Of course, I didn’t think it would happen in the second round, and even then, I had UNLV in the second round. But to say that Northern Iowa’s win over the Jayhawks is one of the biggest upsets in Tournament history ignores the fact that the Panthers are a very good team that has lost only four times all season—and one of those was without Jordan Eglseder. UNI is like Cornell in that it can beat you inside and out on the offensive end; the Panthers, however, are one of the nation’s best defensive teams and capable of forcing any team into playing their tempo.

Michigan State’s win over Maryland—without Kalin Lucas and Chris Allen—only proved Tom Izzo’s coaching wizardry once more. The Spartans had no business winning that game, but they did. There are two reasons to pick State in this one: Izzo and the idea that UNI might be overwhelmed by the media attention in the last week. There are more reasons, however, to pick the Panthers: Their win over Kansas wasn’t as big a fluke as portrayed and their defense will certainly dictate tempo to a team playing without its point guard and leader.

The Pick: Northern Iowa

Tim’s Sunday Picks

I went 6-2 yesterday to extend my Tourney record to 30-10, although to be fair, two of my correct picks on Saturday were teams I had losing in the first round (Saint Mary’s and Washington). But 28-12 ain’t bad either, right?

1. Syracuse vs. 8. Gonzaga

Original: Syracuse over Gonzaga

What I’ve Learned: I thought it would be a close game originally, and I still do. Gonzaga should exploit the high post with Elias Harris, Bobby Sacre, and even Matt Bouldin. That said, I expect the Orange to shoot very well against an iffy Bulldogs’ defense and make the necessary adjustments on defense themselves. It’s been a long time since Gonzaga beat a good team. It will be several more months before it does.

The Pick: Syracuse