November 28th update

NBA Lockout Ends

• You can't put the NBA under a tree but if all you wanted for Christmas was professional basketball than:
A. You're an extremely dedicated fan and
B. You'll get your wish... the 2011-2012 NBA season will not be completely canceled as so many were predicting and will most likely begin on Christmas Day.
• The schedule will be 66 games long instead of 82 and will have teams averaging about 2 extra games per month as they try to squeeze the season in despite nearly a 2 month late start. Every team will not visit every city, as has been the case in the past.
• As for the lockout, the main point of contention was how BRI or Basketball Related Income would be split between the players and owners. They finally settled on 51.2% going to the players, which is way down from the 57% that had been previously awarded to the players. There is also a much stricter luxury tax which will most likely keep the big market teams from outspending the smaller teams to such a large degree. For all the other details of the CBA, click here.
• Additionally, the stars we mentioned last week who were planning their 4 city "Homecoming Tour" have canceled the event and tour organizers have said that tickets will be refunded fully. It would have been interesting to see but I'm sure everyone is satisfied that the tour will not have to take the place of actual NBA games and a real season.


Tebow Headlines NFL Weekend

• The San Diego Chargers are the latest team to get Tebow’d. The Denver Broncos defeated San Diego in overtime, using a punishing running attack to defeat the underachieving Chargers. Tim Tebow had another below average game as a quarterback, completing 9 of his 18 pass attempts with one touchdown. However, he played well enough as running back, as he also added 67 yards rushing on 22 attempts which were the most rushing attempts by a QB in the modern era. Willis McGahee added 117 yards rushing to assist the Denver to their fifth win in Tebow’s six starts.
• The New England Patriots crushed the Philadelphia Eagles 38-20, dropping the disappointing Eagles to 4-7. The Patriots proved their offensive prowess, while the Eagles proved they need some more time (probably next season at the soonest) to gel. The Patriots went down 10-0 7 minutes into the game, before running off a 38-3 stretch to put the game out of reach. The Eagles, led by backup quarterback Vince Young, started strong but faded quickly and could not keep up with the high octane Patriots
• Houston Texans down to a third quarterback, defeat the Jacksonville Jaguars. Texans star quarterback Matt Schaub was injured for the year last weekend. Backup Matt Leinart, who was the 2004 Heisman Trophy winner as the best college football player, was in line to finish the season but he got injured with less than two minutes left in the first half. His injured collarbone (which knocked him out a few years ago as well when he was in Arizona) is expected to end his season. The Texans then turned to rookie TJ Yates. Yates was victorious on Sunday, but the Texans will have their work cut out for them to continue.


College Basketball Preseason Tournaments completed

• Duke University wins Maui Invitational. The preseason tournament in Hawaii featured 8 of the biggest names in college basketball. Duke, the highest ranked team of the 8, won the championship on Wednesday. They defeated the Kansas Jayhawks in a highly entertaining basketball game that was tightly contested until the final minute.
• Syracuse wins season tip-off NIT title despite child abuse allegations hanging over the team. This preseason tournament, hosted at Madison Square Garden, is a favorite for the Orange, and they won the tournament defeating Virginia Tech and Stanford en route to the championship. Two days later the University officially fired long time associate head coach Bernie Fine after a third person came forward alleging Fine molested them and a tape was recovered that showed Fine's wife admitting that she believed the allegations were true.
• University of Connecticut and North Carolina, both preseason top 5 teams, fell in tournaments in exotic locations. UConn fell to the University of Central Florida in the Bahamas while UNC was defeated by UNLV in Las Vegas. Both teams are still expected to have good seasons, but will have to go on this season without a preseason championship title.