Friday, March 14, 2008

Impressions from Indianapolis - Big Ten Tourny Game 1


First of all, Conseco Fieldhouse is an amazing arena. For those who haven't had the opportunity to take in a game there, think the Palace of Auburn Hills, but smaller and much more intimate. Rob and I made the 4+ hour drive down, leaving around 5:45 this morning which put us down in Indianapolis just in time to catch Tubby Smith wrapping up Minnesota's practice.

We spent about 20 minutes scouring the many press rows courtside looking for our assigned seats (whats up with the Michigan yearbook getting a better seat than us?? and how about Michigan "B" Radio...since when do we have a second radio station covering Michigan Basketball?). We finally broke down and asked someone for help and after waiting another 20 minutes for her to find someone to help us, we were eventually shown to our table which was set up in the front of the middle deck. They turned out to be very good seats, we were able to spread out and to our delight, we found a working phone line so we were able to have the call live.

Michigan came out inspired in the first half, storming to a 14-point advantage. The Wolverines would eventually push the lead out to 15 in the second half before deciding that they were going to see what happens if they go 10 minutes without scoring. Well, the result was the lead shrinking to eight before Anthony Wright hit a deep three from beyond NBA range to put the game out of reach. Manny Harris was on fire to begin the game, connecting on five of his first six attempts from the field, including two three-pointers and a thunderous one-handed slam off a C.J. Lee steal.

As Rushi mentioned below, Michigan will take on #1 seed (oops) Wisconsin at noon tomorrow. That game can be seen on ESPN. WCBN will not have access to a phone line tomorrow, so the game will be on the sports stream at a later date.

GO BLUE!

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