4 DAILY SPORTS BREAKS DOWN THE WEEKEND THAT WAS 28 - Monday, April 2, 2007 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com 4 SAID AND HEARD "I've been coaching 18 years and there's no championship that's ever made my heart feel as good as this one." - Michigan women's gymnastics coach BEV PLOCKI after her team captured the Big Ten Championship Satur- day in State College. ATHLETE OF THE WEEK ROYA ST. CLAIR SOFTBALL The freshman catcher exploded with seven RBI in Michigan's 11-4 win over Northwestern on Friday. St. Clair went 3-for-4 batting fifth in the order behind regular catcher Tiffany Worthy. 4 Tonight is Oden's chance to clap back 4 Florida deserves some credit for reaching the title game for the second-consec- utive season. In retrospect, no one should've picked the Gators to lose earlier than the FinalFour. They _ were returning H. JOSE all five of their BOSCH starters! CBS should've done us all a favor and penciled the Gators into the Final Four. Then some of us (what? Me? Maybe ... ) wouldn't have picked them to lose in the second round. Alas, the Gators are still alive and tonight they take on Ohio State. For Michigan fans, watching another National Championship game with these two schools is about as fun as a root canal during a stats exam while being forced to sing "Across the Field" (the Buckeyes' fight song). In other words, it sucks. A lot. But if we're forced to watch another match-up between two schools with more narcissism than the Oscars, the referees should give us a chance to see one of the nation's best players - Greg Oden. The officiating of big men in this tournament has been absurd. When Oden breathes on an opponent, it's a foul and one of the NCAA's bright- est stars has to sit on the bench for most of the first half. Maybe I'm crazy, but watching a star player sitting isn't exciting bas- ketball. The NCAA should take a page out of the NHL playoff book. There's a reason why players get away with everything outside of taking off their skates and slicing another player's throat. The fans want to see the best players decide the outcome of the game, not the officials. The referees have determined they won't let a star player change the way they'll call the game.. But because they're so afraid of giving Oden the star treatment, they're tougher on him than anyone else on the court. Sorry guys, but that's letting a star player change the way you call a game. Please, let the players play tonight. I want to see the over-caf- feinated Joakim Noah bouncing off of the sedated Oden. I'd love to see Oden, in a rare display of emotion, block Noah and begin mocking him, saying stuff like, "Yeah! How about I start clap- ping all the time, too! Get that trash out of here!" The last scenario would be espe- cially sweet considering I can't stand Noah. It's kind of the same hatred "American Idol" fans have toward Sanjaya Malakar. Not only has he butchered classics such as "You Really Got Me" and "Ain't no Mountain High Enough," but his different hairstyles are proof of how far idiocy can go. Even though he probably can sing better than most of us (myself included) we just hate him for his eternal optimism and ridiculous self-confidence. Well, add some talent and height and keep the ridiculous hair and you have my sports equivalent of Sanjaya - Noah. He just won't go away, and every time I watch him play, I wince the same way most of America does when Sanjaya opens his mouth. It's not because I think Noah is bad. The kid will be a lottery pick for sure, and I admire the fact that he and four of his other teammates stayed an extra year, when some of them could've easily been drafted' in the NBA. But that incessant clapping and chest-pumping has got to stop. People say he plays with passion. Passion is screaming after a game-tying dunk with less than a minute to go. Passion is pump- ing your chest when your team has come back from a double-digit deficit. Passion is diving for loose balls, jumping over press tables and essentially doing anything you can to make sure your opponent has no chance to score. So yes, Noah does play with some passion. But when you're doing all that stuff after every single play, when it's not even necessary, you're just being an ass. This Tuesday, we will have to sit through another gut-churning per- formance by Sanjaya on "American Idol," and tonight, I'll have to sit and watch Joakim Noah in the National Championship game against the school I hate the most. Thank god baseball season has arrived. 4 4 Men's track and field team splits The Michigan men's track qualifying time in the 400-meter Former Michigan runner Nate team hit qualifying time on both hurdles. Brannen finished first in the coasts this weekend. Redshirt On the West Coast, sophomore 5,000-meter running for the Ree- sophomore Dan Harmsen led the Lex Williams's NCAA regional bok team. Wolverines to a second-place fin- qualifying time in the 5,000- The entire squad will com- ish at the North Carolina Invita- meter topped Michigan's showing pete in the Texas Relays starting tional with his NCAA regional at the Stanford Invitational. Thursday. U EaTPHILOSOPHICAL THINKER A E A A CREEPY BEARDED GUY Find a job before you outstay your welcome. Post-grad careers, part-time jobs and internships. Go online or text CBcampus to 68247.* STEVEN TAI/Daily Sophomore TiffanyOfili set a Michigan 100-meter hurdle record this weekend. Soph sets another record at Duke Michigan sophomore Tiffany Ofili has no respect for records. She just keeps breaking them. For the second straight week, Ofili set the Michigan record in the 100-meter hurdles (13.01). The time was nearly half a second better than the record she set the week before. In total, the Wolverines captured 12 NCAA Regional qualifying times including three in the 1,500-meter and two in the 800-meter. . Michigan will be back on the road this weekend at the Duke Invi- tational. G4Id11 1104 S. University 734.665.2244 Free soft drink with any entr6e Free soft drink with any sandwich after 2pm Shwarma, falafel, grape leaves, baba ghanouj, hommos, tabbouli and fattoush. Smoka Hookah 1113 S. University 734.761.9900 Grand Opening Specials Quality Cigars 20% OFF Hookahs as low as $12 Cigars - Cigarettes - Hookahs Gifts & Accessories Walk-in Humidor 4 4 - w u . , 4