Forget the fact that the "big name" teams are no longer left in the NFL playoffs.  This year's playoffs are producing the kind of heart-stopping "will they or won't they?" moments usually reserved for March Madness.  I, for one, can't wait to see what happens on Sunday.  My money is on the Steelers and Seattle.  The Steelers have the "Win one for the Bus" thing going for them, and Polamalu should feast on Plummer's mistakes if the blitz works like it did in Indy.  In the other game, the loss of Foster may be too much for Carolina to overcome, despite the un-human play of Steve Smith ...

Paris Hilton never ceases to amaze.  From her deposition this week:  "I meet so many people. I don't even know some of my friends' names."  She also apparently doesn't know that London is in the U.K. and thinks all of Europe speaks French ...

The NFL is also full of surprises.  By all accounts Joey Porter was headed for the mother of all fines for saying he thought the referees in last week's game were trying to hand the win over to the Colts.  Instead, they chose to do nothing and made no comment.  How very unlike them ...

Is it just me, or does Bode Miller seem like a good time? ...

I'm so glad my tennis career never panned out.  Jelena Dokic, who lost her opening match this week at the Australian Open, was the target of kidnapping threats by her estranged father.  He also threatened to detonate a nuclear bomb in Sydney.  It used to be tennis dads were just overbearing ...

Only eight months until college football season starts.  Notre Dame has signed some of the best talent in the nation on the offensive line; one kid is 360 lbs.  Three hundred and sixty pounds, people!!!  But what I love most is that they've signed a TE named Paddy Mullen.  I'll drink a Guinness to that ...

I said it months ago, and now, thanks to the shot seen around the world, everyone can finally see it, Alex Ovechkin is the next big thing in the NHL.  The scary thing is the kid's only getting better every game ...

If Peyton Manning was "trying to be a good teammate" when calling out his linemen, I would never want to play with him, or live with him for that matter.  Can you imagine?  "Well I'm not trying to name names, but someone didn't replace the toilet paper"...

And in all sincerity, congratulations to Pat Summitt on her 900^th career win.  She's 900-172 over 32 seasons at Tennessee.  Think about that for a minute.  If she were a man, the hype around this would be unbelievable.

My favorite football memory didn't take place in a stadium in front of thousands of screaming fans, and it certainly wasn't televised.  In fact, it went largely unnoticed. 

It occurred on a RecSports field on a far-flung corner of the Notre Dame campus in front of a relatively small group of fans and bystanders.  It involved not Notre Dame's storied football team, but Lyons Hall's women's flag football team, and all of the passion and intensity befitting an NCAA Division I football game.

It was late September, and we were nearly a month into our senior year, facing our first test of the season, a tough Walsh Hall team that had succeeded deep into the playoffs the year before.  We had not been as lucky.  After losing our quarterback and several other key offensive players, we had been forced to move talent around to keep any hope of making the playoffs alive.  The result was that Katy, our best running back/receiver, played quarterback.  This meant we ran the option more than Nebraska, and other defenses quickly figured us out.  We missed the playoffs by one win.  Now, we were looking for redemption. 

As freshmen, we had been part of a team that brought home Lyons Hall's third straight interhall championship.  Anchored by a ferociously stingy defense, we went undefeated that year, allowing only seven points all season, off an interception returned for a touchdown no less.  Most of us had played bit roles in winning that title and wanted to claim one of our own.  We felt that we had a good chance.

With the previous year's offensive problems seemingly under control (we had found ourselves a freshman who could throw the ball and outrun tacklers, thereby freeing Katy to resume her role as tailback), we were poised to make a strong showing in our opening game, proving we were once again a power to be reckoned with.  The only concern lay with the defense.  Although the new girls were performing well technically, they lacked the intensity of the upperclassmen.  Passion and intensity, which came to define our defense well before my time, were crucial if we were to contend for the championship.  The freshmen and new sophomores did not seem to grasp that yet.  Having never played a game, they didn't understand why we practiced so long or spent so much time dissecting and discussing plays. Frankly, we worried that they thought we were crazy and might quit on us.

Afraid of really scaring the new recruits, we had held off on indoctrinating them into the most bizarre part of our defensive tradition.  Our basic defensive package had been christened "Mad Dog" many years before.  Some alcohol-fueled night, someone got the bright idea that the defense should drink from a dog bowl before the game as a show of solidarity.  It quickly took root and became our "thing."  Ray Lewis has his dance; we had 15 girls clapping and growling and drinking from a dog bowl full of water.  Seeing as our own offense thought we were nuts, our captain Chrissy made the executive decision to keep the ritual a secret until right before kick off. 

As the referees signaled for warm ups to come to an end, we gathered the defense on our sideline, pulled out the bowl and held it reverently before the team like it was the Holy Grail.  We explained what would happen and got several uncertain stares in return.  However, due to the high number of seniors and the beauty of peer pressure, everyone took communion.  As the clapping and stamping and growling grew louder I looked up and Chrissy met my eyes; it was done.  They were one of us now and it was time to prove it on the field.  We broke the huddle and took the field with adrenaline coursing through our veins.

I honestly don't remember much of the game that followed.  I recall that it was a shutout, I vaguely remember recording a sack, and I'm fairly sure there was an interception or two from our secondary, but the other details are lost to me. 

However, the look in the eyes of the new girls as time expired was unforgettable; they were hooked.  About two hours after the game ended I was back in my room studying when someone knocked on my door.  Five freshmen came spilling into my room, each talking at the top of her lungs.  A girl named Laura finally out shouted the others, explaining how she had spent the last hour on the phone with her dad telling him about the game, the dog bowl, and the "D" was so different, so intense, so much more fun than the offense.  She loved it.  The others quickly agreed and began asking questions about past exploits and talking about how much they couldn't wait to practice the next day.  Listening to them talk, their eyes wild with excitement, I knew that, regardless of the outcome of the season, something more precious than a championship had already occurred.  Though they'd only played one game, these girls giggling on my floor got it.  They had caught the passion.  They were members of the Lyons Hall defense with our traditions safely instilled in them.  The spirit would live on.

The NFL Network's "Sounds of the Game" puts viewers on the sidelines where they can hear players and coaches react as plays are happening on the field.  It also features audio and video from inside teams' locker rooms both before and after the game.  Last night's edition spanned all four of the weekend's playoff games. 

The segment on the Colts-Steelers game was up first.  It featured player and announcer reactions to the interception that wasn't, Jerome Bettis' fumble on the two-yard line, and Mike Vanderjagt's missed field goal as time expired.  It also followed the Steelers into the locker room after their win and showed Bettis trying to rally the troops for next week's game in Denver against the Broncos.  The Bus' speech was full of typical underdog talk and ended with him trying to lead the team in a chant of "Let's ride."  Joey Porter obviously caught the fever and felt the need to chime in, screaming at the top of his lungs, "They shot me in Denver!"  Amazingly, no one missed a beat and kept on chanting as the segment cut away.

Now if that's not motivation, I don't know what is.

You have to see it to believe it.  Washington Capitals rookie Alex Ovechkin continues to amaze, yesterday scoring on his back in a 6-1 road win over the Phoenix Coyotes.  The goal was his fifth in two games.

Even Coyotes Head Coach Wayne Gretzky, who knows a thing or two about scoring, was impressed.  In an interview with the Associated Press, he called the goal "sweet,"  adding, "It's great to see, because he is that good."

Ovechkin was working one-on-one against Coyotes defenseman Paul Mara with nearly eight minutes left to go in the game when he was knocked to the ice.  Somehow, from his back, he had the presence of mind to swing his stick one-handed over his head, catching the puck and sending it behind a stunned Brian Boucher for the goal.  This is the kind of moment Tivo was made for.  I had to pause and rewind it five times to be sure it went in.

You can see the goal for yourself on the Caps Web site at  http://www.washingtoncaps.com/news/news.asp?story_id=3770

With the college football season over and the NFL into the playoffs, I recently allowed myself to start thinking ahead to college basketball.  I admit I really don't get into it until February; following football just consumes too much of my time.  But my mind started to wander as I flipped channels the other night and saw ND lose a heart-breaker to Syracuse, and it got me thinking about the granddaddy of all student athletic traditions at ND, the Bookstore Basketball Tournament. 

For those of you who are not ND alums or aren't married to one and therefore don't have to listen to us prattle on about all things Irish, Bookstore is commonly cited as the largest five-on-five, outdoor basketball tournament in the world.  Most of the student body, and a significant number of professors, coaches and university staff, participate.  It's a classic, single-elimination, five-on-five tournament that rages on the outdoor asphalt courts that dot the ND campus for several weeks each April. 

Some teams are serious, most are not.  In fact, the vast majority of teams are just out there for the hell of it, complete with ridiculous costumes.  My all-time favorite was a team that dressed themselves completely in duct tape.  They looked like silver space-age mummies.  I can only imagine how long it took them to suit up and the pain that ensued when they de-robed.  Another favorite was my friend's Braveheart-inspired team back in '97.  They all wore kilts and blue war paint a la Mel Gibson.  Funny thing was, they actually had a couple guys who could play and made it deep into the tournament.  The highlight was that the few guys who couldn't play would resort to giving a Highland Salute to opposing players as they charged the basket, and true to form, they wore nothing under their kilts.  All teams must have a name and countless hours are wasted trying to come up with clever epithets that will pass the review board.  Give Catholic kids rules and they will undoubtedly uncover a way around them.

After the first three or four rounds, when the joke teams have been eliminated, the real tournament kicks in.  The remaining teams are good, and although they usually consist of a couple of varsity athletes (rules state you can only have one varsity basketball player per team, he/she must have no remaining NCAA eligibility, and no more than three varsity athletes from any other sport), a team of "regular" guys will usually pull a Gonzaga and make a march for glory.  And when that happens, they quickly become the crowd favorite.

How big is Bookstore?  Let me put it this way; they erect stands around the outdoor courts for the semi-finals and finals.  The student paper covers it like it's the NCAA tournament, famous alumni come back to play in an exhibition game before the final -- I'll never forget watching Tony Rice play one year; the guy has an amazing vertical - and going to a game is a perfectly acceptable excuse to get out of, well, just about anything. 

But it transcends all that.  Bookstore draws the whole school together in a way only football season can match.  For a few short weeks when northern Indiana is just starting to wake up from its winter nap, we come alive again.  We clear out the cobwebs and get excited about sports and being Notre Dame again.  And it provides countless excuses for blowing off studying for finals a bit longer.

My roommates and I entered the tournament our senior year and it continues to be one of my favorite memories from college.  There is a separate women's draw and it tends to be quite competitive, but we knew we had no chance of winning anything so we entered the main draw.  We drew a team of freshman guys in the first round.  Now, our average height was about 5'4," at most.  Four of the five of us had played basketball, an all-star point guard among us, so we weren't horrible, but we weren't exactly good either.  In the end we put up a good fight, had a great time and bought the kids a case of beer after the game because they finally figured out what our team nickname meant. (For the record it was "Triple Stuffed Oreo"; we were three white girls, a Mexican-American and a Vietnamese-American.)  Fortunately we had more serious matters to attend to.  My roommate's boyfriend's team, consisting of him, three varsity football players and a guy who turned down a chance to walk onto the basketball team, was projected to be a contender, and we had anointed ourselves their official cheerleaders/hecklers.  We had work to do.  I'd like to think our clever quips and exhortations to put some hustle in their game helped them into the final eight.  Granted, two of the guys now play in the NFL so they really didn't need any athletic coaching from us.

So now I want to hear from you guys.  I can only speak from my own experience at Notre Dame, but I think Bookstore is hard to top.  I want to know, what's the greatest collegiate athletic tradition out there?