Can You Feel It?

SOMEWHERE IN THE AIR BETWEEN DETROIT AND LAS VEGAS (USA) –- Can you feel it? Phil Collins can:

“I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh lord
I’ve been waiting for this moment, all my life, oh lord
Can you feel it coming in the air tonight, oh lord, oh lord”

Well, I am currently ‘in the air’ and I can certainly feel ‘it’ up here, about 35,000 feet over the Midwest. What exactly is ‘it?’ That would be the buzz…the momentum…the undeniable sense that great things are about to be unleashed by the Dayton basketball program. To put it into a frame of reference that we can all understand, it is how Flyer fans all felt after the nationally televised Pitt game last year, minus the injury to Chris Wright.

Oddly enuf, this ‘feeling’ started out on a rather dubious note. I don’t know what else you can call shooting 0-24 from the land of plenty:

http://www.sportsbybrooks.com/dayton...hen-wins-21138

The good news is that UD still managed to win the freakin’ game and no one referred to us as ‘Dayton University.’

After the Auburn debacle came a matchup with #14 Marquette, which begat tons of positive ink like this:

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketb...290339&prov=ap

CW’s incredible dunk over young Mr. Acker was voted #8 on Sports Center:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYL0v...eature=related

Following that performance, CW was named “Co-Player of the Week” in the A-10:

http://atlantic10.cstv.com/sports/m-...113008aaa.html

UD’s Chi-town showing led to the Flyers’ inclusion in the CNNSI Power Rankings:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...ngs/index.html

Seth Davis at CNNSI also tabbed Chris as one of their “10 Breakout Sophs”:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...res/index.html

Kyle Whelliston of ESPN.com provided Insiders with some intel on UD. If you hit the linky goodness, you won’t be able to read the whole thing, but you’ll get the picture

http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog...e%3dncbexperts

It wouldn’t be a party unless Dickie V was invited:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/dickv...ory?id=3736855

While not actually predicting all of the above, some idiot blogger did challenge the Flyers to do exactly what they accomplished in the Windy City:

http://www.udpride.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6828

MJ’s Block vs. Akron was voted #2 on “Sports Center’s Top 10”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0WYMRw5cE4

(A special shout out to UD Pride MB poster “ClearTheRunwayForWLJ” for finally tracking down this elusive video on YouTube.)

LeBron had the #4 highlight and yet SC did not connect the dots on the fact that LBJ and MJ were HS teammates at Akron SVSM. After showing the MJ block vs. Akron, the SC talking heads made the comment that “somewhere our producer Tony is ecstatic.” Could there be an embedded Flyer in the ESPN production crew? Let’s hope so! That’s almost as good as having Dan Patrick sitting at the anchor desk, ain’t it?

ESPN the Magazine most assuredly can ‘feel it’ as the latest issue proclaims that the Flyers are “about to blow up”:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3753638

Finally, this week Dayton is on the very cusp of being rated in both the AP and ESPN Coaches Polls:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/rankings

Whereas CBS Sportsline already has us there, checking in at #22:

http://www.sportsline.com/collegebasketball/polls/top25

And has a nice video feature on BG and The Boys to boot:

http://www.sportsline.com/video/play...6L10YbbXwRGO_4

Yes, I can most assuredly feel ‘it’ but what I really wanna do is to be able to see, or at the very least hear, ‘it.’ I am faced with a conundrum (one wonders how MB poster “Daytonrocks” would manage to spell that word!): When I land I’m headed to the MGM Grand for my company’s national sales meeting. Our confab on Wednesday goes until 5:00PM and then dinner is at 7:00PM. Vegas is on Pacific Time, so they are two hours behind Homerha, which means that I will have a teeny, tiny window of opportunity in which to watch a webcast if WHIO.com comes thru as promised or, failing that, to listen to Larry and Bucky’s call of the game.

Kinda looks like somebody might be tracking the end of the game on his cell phone while he chows down with his work compadres, eh?

That’s it “From the Swamp.”
You can email me at: swampy@udpride.com