Randy Styles leads Pick ’em Contest

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Randy Styles (WOLFMANBC) stayed a perfect 6-0 and took sole possession of the lead in the 6th annual LRT Bowl Pick ’em Contest when San Diego State beat Navy in the Poinsettia Bowl last night. Casey Zak (DARMOKANDJALAD), who picked Navy, fell back into a second-place tie. Top of the leaderboard shown below.

Everyone shown picked Hawaii in tonight’s Hawaii Bowl (worth 2 points) except MUROYALS and RACHELDULITZ, who picked Tulsa –and will tie Styles for first place if the Golden Hurricane wins.

Zak, Styles tied for Bowl Pick ’em lead

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Louisville’s win in the Beef ‘O’ Brady’s Bowl means “WOLFMANBC” (a.k.a. Randy Styles) and “DARMOKANDJALAD” (a.k.a. Casey Zak) are now tied for the lead in the 6th annual LRT Bowl Pick ’em Contest with perfect 4-0 records. (Standings visible to non-contestants here.)

One of the co-leaders is guaranteed to take sole possession of the lead Thursday: Zak if Navy wins the Poinsettia Bowl, Styles if San Diego State does. (Both contestants, along with everyone in the pool except Loyette, picked Boise over Utah tomorrow.)

UConn women set all-time NCAA record for longest winning streak

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Geno Auriemma to ESPN interviewer (and, long ago, his very first basketball superstar) Rebecca Lobo, after the Huskies’ 89th consecutive win:

I don’t want my team to compare themselves to anyone. This stands on its own. I’m not John Wooden and this isn’t UCLA. This is Connecticut, and for us, that’s enough.

And then he grumpily gave out a Wii to someone in the crowd, live on national TV.

[Bumped. -ed.]

Denver wins second straight, heads into Christmas Break on a roll (finally)

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The Denver Pioneers wrapped up their nonconference schedule Tuesday with a 4-9 record — and perhaps more importantly, a 2-game winning streak — as they won 73-55 over Arkansas-Pine Bluff, in a game that was actually far more lopsided than the final score.

“This sends us off to Christmas Break the right way,” said Coach Joe Scott after the game. (Hence my use of the Santa photo above — which, incidentally, is published with permission of SID Mike Kennedy; backstory here.) The Pioneers have an eight-day break before their next game, also at home, on December 30 against Sun Belt foe Louisiana-Lafayette, kicking off the conference season.

“I’m happy for our guys because obviously they needed the success; we all did,” Scott added. “And hopefully we can use this as a springboard as we head into the league.”

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What time is it? It’s Beef O’Brady time!

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The grand tradition and pageantry of college football’s bowl season continues tonight with the Great-Grandnephew Of Them All, the Beef O’Brady’s Bowl between Southern Miss (8-4) and Louisville (6-6, with a win over UConn and otherwise a whole lot of nothin’, having beaten 7-5 Syracuse, 4-8 Rutgers, 4-8 Arkansas State, 1-11 Memphis, and 6-5 FCS team Eastern Kentucky) at 6:00 PM Mountain Time on ESPN. It’s a glorified exhibition game between two mediocre teams, which will nevertheless crush the historic UConn-FSU women’s basketball game (5pm MST on ESPN2) in the ratings. God bless America.

Anyway, the implications for the LRT Bowl Pick ’em Contest are as follows: if Louisville wins, Casey Zak and Randy Styles will be in a two-way for the lead. If Southern Miss wins, Zach Bloxham (@zbloxham), Ryan (@rpm002), Josh Rubin and Kelly Strutz will be in a four-way tie for the lead. So, there you go. BEEF!!

Denver (3-9) vs. Ark.-Pine Bluff (0-10)

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Denver will attempt to build on the momentum of Saturday’s big win over Northern Colorado — which felt like a breakthrough for the struggling Pioneers — when it hosts winless Arkansas-Pine Bluff (0-10, RPI #263, BBState #315) tonight at Magness Arena. I can’t find a point spread online, perhaps because Vegas can’t be bothered to adjudicate between two such bad teams (at least on paper; Denver is RPI #297 and BBState #266), but I’d imagine DU would be a high-single-digit favorite. A win would put the Pioneers on their first winning streak of the season (their three wins thus far have been sandwiched between losing streaks of 4, 2 and 3 games) and give them considerable momentum and confidence heading into Christmas Break and the start of Sun Belt play on December 30.

Unfortunately, I once again won’t be there, thanks to a sore throat, cough, stuffy nose, and general nasty cold that I caught from Loyette. (Ah, the joys of having a kid in preschool!) Thus, a win would run Denver’s home record while Brendan & Bally are absent to 3-0, compared to 1-3 when we’re there. But I’d rather risk continuing that apparent “jinx” than risk the real jinx of getting Coach Scott or any of the players (or fellow denizens of press row) sick right before the holidays. Plus, I need to recuperate! But I’ll be watching from home on Pioneer Vision. I don’t know if I’ll do an organized “liveblog,” but at a minimum, I’m sure I’ll post a few tweets, which will be on the LRT Live page, as well as my Twitter stream. Game time is 7:00 PM Mountain Time.