I missed on Cornell with this week’s AP vote; Quick word on Knight’s comments

Well, I blew it on Sunday.

Every week when I cast my ballot for the AP basketball poll I use the 25th spot to try to give a tiny bit of recognition to a smaller school, one that isn’t likely to compete for the national championship in April but is playing good basketball without getting much notice for it.

I know—because coaches have told me—that showing up in “also receiving votes,” is a big deal to the schools I vote for and I have the luxury of being able to do it because the poll has absolutely nothing to do with deciding the national champion. It exists to give people something to talk about and to allow players to talk about being a ranked team or, perhaps more important, beating a ranked team.

I’m not exactly sure how many years I’ve been an AP voter but I remember when I started casting the 25th place vote for the little guys: it was during the ’99-2000 season when I was working on “The Last Amateurs.” Lafayette had won something like 14 straight games and had a good basketball team. The Leopards had won in overtime at Princeton—when Princeton was still very good—and had lost in the last minute on the road to a ranked Villanova team. So, one week in February, I ranked them 25th in my poll.

I didn’t think much of it until a few days later when I was in Easton for a game and the sports information people told me that someone had voted for the Leopards in the poll. (This was before AP made each pollster’s vote available on a weekly basis). I’m pretty sure they didn’t even know I had a vote. So, I told them I had been the voter. That pretty much made me a hero to everyone but Coach Fran O’Hanlon. “Now the kids may get big heads about it,” he moaned, half-joking. Pat Brogan, his assistant coach, who had a sign on his desk that said, “recruit every day,” had already blown up the “also receiving votes,” into giant type and was sending it to recruits.

It never occurred to me that something like that mattered even a little bit. Apparently, it did.

So, I began making it a habit to the point where the guys on the AP desk in New York would actually speculate before I told them who was No. 25 on who I might be voting for that week. I made a general rule—sometimes broken—that if the No. 25 team kept winning it kept its vote.

The whole thing actually got some attention in 2006 when I began voting for George Mason in the poll in early January. I’d seen the Patriots play and thought they were really good. In fact, after they beat Wichita State in February I moved them up to—I think—No. 21. By then others had noticed and they actually cracked the poll at No. 25. After that happened, Joseph White, the AP sports editor here in Washington did a little story on me and my quirky No. 25 vote.

I like to think I’ve always had an appreciation for the little guy in college hoops. I grew up going to games in Columbia’s University Gym and was insane enough to actually LISTEN to games on the student radio stations of Columbia (WKCR); Fordham (WFUV) and Seton Hall (WSHU). I had a math tutor when I was in seventh grade named Steve Handel who was a Columbia grad. He frequently took me to Columbia games during the golden era of Jim McMillan, Heyward Dotson, Dave Newmark and Roger Walaszek. The fifth starter, if you’re scoring at home, was Billy Ames. That group actually reached the Sweet Sixteen in 1968 before losing to a Davidson team coached by—you guessed it—Lefty Driesell.

Anyway, back to Sunday.

Two weeks ago I cast my No. 25 ballot for Army. The Cadets are off to a great start and were 7-2, including a win over a Harvard team (who I almost voted for) that has beaten Boston College and lost a close game at Connecticut. This Sunday I was torn: Army had beaten Division III Mt St. Vincent’s in less-than-convincing fashion. Harvard was still 7-2 and Cornell was 8-2.

The Big Red is one of college basketball’s more fun stories right now. Steve Donahue left a fairly cushy job as Fran Dunphy’s No. 1 assistant at Penn nine years ago to take over a woebegone program that had dropped to the bottom of The Ivy League. He methodically rebuilt—I suspect that’s the only way to rebuild in Ithaca, New York—and after five losing seasons during which Cornell was 51-85, he began to get it turned around in 2007—going 16-13 and finishing third in The Ivy League. The breakthrough came the next year: a 14-0 Ivy record, the school’s first NCAA bid since 1988 and a 22-6 record. Last year produced another Ivy title and this year with a core of senior starters, including Ryan Wittman, the son of former Indiana sharpshooter Randy Wittman, the Big Red is the real deal.

It has two losses to date: to Seton Hall and at Syracuse. It has wins at Alabama, at Massachusetts and at St. Joseph’s. So, I sat there on Sunday thinking I should give Cornell the 25th place vote after it survived in overtime against Davidson in the opening round of The Holiday Festival in New York. I’d already voted for the Big Red once earlier in the season before the loss to Seton Hall.

But I chickened out and stuck with Army. Here’s why: I knew Cornell had to play St. John’s in The Garden in the Holiday Festival final on Monday night. St. John’s is better this year. Its only loss had been at Duke in a good game and I really didn’t think the Red Storm was going to lose on a home court to Cornell. I figured the game would be competitive but St. John’s would win and people would be saying I jinxed Cornell.

Don’t think it doesn’t happen. When Ralph Willard was coaching at Holy Cross he pleaded with me to NOT vote his team No. 25 because the Crusaders always seemed to lose when I gave them a vote. What’s more, now that our votes are made public—which I think is a good idea—I’ve had people ridicule my 25th place votes so I really try to be sure there’s SOME logic behind them.

I gave the vote to Army. Cornell beat St. John’s, 71-66, coming from behind in the second half, outscoring the Red Storm 11-6 down the stretch to break a 60-60 tie. Oh Me Of Little Faith.

Listen, Cornell’s good and a great story too. I definitely want to make it to one of their games with Harvard once Ivy League play begins. In the meantime, their win over St. John’s is worthy of note—serious note. The last Ivy League team I remember beating St. John’s in the Holiday Festival was that Columbia team 42 years ago. I believe the final was something like 61-55. I know I was there—that was when the Festival was an eight team tournament and the last night was tripleheader.

I wish I’d been there last night but at least I had excuses—kids, the weather—for not being in New York. There’s NO excuse for my vote on Sunday night. Maybe I’ll vote the Big Red No. 24 this Sunday.

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Several people asked yesterday where I stood on Bob Knight’s comments on John Calipari. I actually wrote my Sporting News column for next week on the topic and don’t like to copy myself too often but here’s my synopsis: Is Knight right that Kentucky would sell its soul to the devil to win and that Calipari’s track record—two vacated Final Fours—makes him tainted? Yes. Are those who respond that Knight never broke any NCAA rules but has broken just about every rule of etiquette, courtesy and how to treat other people right too? Yes.

But all of them miss the larger point: Kentucky isn’t the exception, it is the rule. There isn’t a big time program in this country that doesn’t put winning ahead of all the alleged values the presidents espouse. Heck, forget big time—Penn just fired a coach in December.

The other day I asked Mike Krzyzewski this question: “You were 38-47 after three seasons at Duke and you had a perfect graduation record. If you had kept winning at that rate and graduating players at that rate where would you be today?”

His answer: “Not coaching at Duke.”

Which is, of course, true everywhere. When Kentucky looks at Calipari it doesn’t look at a coach with two vacated Final Fours. It looks at a coach who took one program that was way down (Massachusetts) and another that had slipped (Memphis) and went to The Final Four. The rest is just detail.

So, bottom line: Knight’s right (although his acting as if this is something new in college basketball is kind of silly) but the problem isn’t Calipari or Kentucky, the problem is the value system we’ve built in big-time college athletics. And that isn’t likely to change anytime in the near future—if ever.

So Much to Write About On Monday Mornings

Monday is always the toughest--and easiest--blog day because there are so many different things to write about. If the Redskins had somehow lost to the horrid Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday I'm pretty sure I would have been ripping Danny Snyder for firing Jim Zorn instead of firing himself. It's amazing to read The Washington Post this morning where the reaction to the 16-13 win would make you think the Redskins had come from 10-0 down at halftime to beat the Steelers or the Cowboys.

Speaking of my newspaper--and it will always be my newspaper for better or worse--there were THREE stories on Sunday about Maryland's win over Clemson. THREE. Forget that Maryland's bad and Clemson's mediocre or that half the crowd was from Clemson because few people in the area seriously care about Maryland football, the fact is it was an ACC football game between two mediocre teams. Most ACC football games are between two mediocre teams, the exception being Virginia Tech-Duke on Saturday which was between a good team and a bad team even if Duke kept the final score close.

While The Post was obsessing about Maryland (I won't even get into the Redskins obsession this morning) the paper all but missed a truly wonderful game in Annapolis between Navy and Air Force. (I know my editor Matt Rennie will point out that the Navy game story was played right next to Maryland's but the Maryland SIDEBAR was longer than the one Navy story). You pretty much have to be in the stadium--which was packed unlike Byrd Stadium where they keep pumping up their alleged attendance figures--to feel the intensity of a game like this one. After Saturday's 16-13 overtime win, Navy has now beaten Air Force seven times in a row by a total of 36 points, 11 of those coming in the game two years ago when Navy scored very late to stretch the final margin. That means six games decided by 25 points. Do the math.

Both defenses were brilliant in this game. You could feel the energy on both sidelines from the radio booth and, no doubt, everywhere else in the stadium. It took a god-awful call--a phantom roughing the passer penalty on a play in which Navy made what should have been a game-clinching interception--to put the game into overtime. (If you think this is my Navy bias talking, check the replay or check Air Force coach Troy Calhoun's quote on the play. He called it, "a gift.") Navy kicker Joe Buckley, who lost his job a week ago and then got it back, made three field goals including a 38-yarder in overtime. Air Force kicker Erik Soderberg, who had made a 33-yarder at the buzzer to tie the game (after the brutal call) missed wide left from 31-yards and Navy had won again.

As happy as I was for Navy, I couldn't help but feel for Soderberg, who not surprisingly was completely stand-up about the miss putting the blame on himself (this is what service academy kids do) and for all the Air Force players who gave heart and soul to winning the game and now must wait 12 months to try again--except for their seniors who will never beat Navy. As many times as I have seen it, the playing of the alma maters after a service academy game still gets to me, the teams standing in front of their respective bands and student bodies--first the losers, then the winners--for the songs. You never see any of the losers sneak out or fail to cross the field after their song has been played to show respect for the winners. It's just a very cool thing. I can't count the number of times I've seen it and I still get chills.

One other football score absolutely jumped off the page at me Saturday. It was NOT UTEP over Houston or Michigan State (yawn) over Michigan or even Notre Dame lucking out again. It was this: Columbia-38, Princeton-0 at Princeton. Look, I know Columbia football. I grew up going to games in Baker Field and watching the Lions roll up one losing season after another even with some guys on the team--Marty Domres, George Starke, Marcellus Wiley (later) who went on to play in the NFL. I don't know the exact numbers but I think Columbia has had (maybe) three winning seasons in forty years. The Lions almost never beat Princeton much less KILL the Tigers. That score is as stunning as any you will see in college football this year.

Back now to our regularly scheduled blog.

As soon as the alma maters had been played and Bob Socci threw our broadcast to a break, I had to race to my car. I was giving a speech at George Mason and the overtime cost me 20 minutes. I HAD to get out before the traffic backed up. As I ran the 200 yards or so from the press box elevator to my car I noticed two things: I wasn't breathing very hard at all and I didn't notice the incisions from heart surgery until I got in the car and realized I hadn't noticed them. Progress. Now I need to lose 20 pounds and get in swimming shape.

I beat the traffic and got to Mason in time. It is amazing what that school has done in the time since I've been in Washington. The Final Four appearance in 2006 was the centerpiece of what has become a truly admirable athletic program. The dinner was packed. (Must have been the speaker). I joked that if I HAD been late they could have had Jim Larranaga introduce me because that would have killed at least an hour. Jim is a reporter's dream unless you're on a tight deadline. Ask him about someone make him a jump shot and he will tell you about James Naismith teaching his players the set shot and move on from there before arriving back in 2009. By the way, the Patriots will be very good this year.

With all the football going on Sunday I was really focused--once I got home from my daughter's birthday party--on one event: The Senior Players Championship in Baltimore. If not for Brigid's party I would have driven up there because Tom Watson had a four shot lead. Watson just couldn't get going on Sunday. Jay Haas did, shooting 66 to beat him by one shot with a brilliant birdie on 18, hitting a 6-iron to two feet on a hole almost no one had even hit the green (23 percent of the field) on all day. Haas is one of the truly good guys in all of sports. Several years ago he was awarded the Golf Writer's Association's annual Jim Murray Award for cooperating with the media. His opening line was, "I guess this should be called the, 'Curtis blew us off so let's go talk to Jay,' Award." For years golf writers never knew what they were going to get when approaching Jay's old Wake Forest teammate Curtis Strange. They always knew what they'd get with Jay.

In his entire career on the two tours--33 years and counting--Jay has been fined once. It happened in Milwaukee about 10 years ago when he was struggling with his game. He managed to play well the first two rounds but was awful on Saturday, shooting something like 77 which on that golf course is like shooting 85. Disgusted, he managed to hit his second shot on the par-five 18th just off the back of the green. He caught a really bad lie though and plunked his third all the way to the other side of the green. As he walked to his ball, steam coming out of his ears, some guy yelled out, "you really suck Haas!" Jay just couldn't take it anymore. "F---- you!" He yelled back.

The next morning, Wade Cagle, the rules official who was running the tournament, called Haas into his office. "Jay someone filed a complaint against you yesterday," he said, looking a little bit pale. "Says here that you said, 'f---- you,' to a fan. I'm sure they misheard. I'm sure you said 'THANK-you.'

Haas shook his head. "Nope," he said. "Guy's got it right; How much (fine money) do I owe you?"

I digress. As much as I like Jay, Watson losing was painful. Think how close he has come to an absolutely historic year: he just missed becoming the oldest man by ELEVEN years to win a major at The British Open and if he had won yesterday he would have been the oldest man to win a major on The Champions Tour. What a double THAT would have been. In fact, had he pulled both wins off I would have made the case that, adding in the remarkable work he has done to raise money for ALS Research, he should be Sportsman of the Year. Now, even though Tom should still be considered, it almost certainly will go to Roger Federer--who is deserving but not as inspiring as Watson on any level in my (biased) view.

Life is never perfect. Especially on a weekend when Dan Snyder and Charlie Weis eek out wins. Then again, Navy-Air Force made up for it--in spades. Not because Navy won but because being in that stadium on a perfect October afternoon was so