patrickdaley.com

Sitting in the Kohl Center right now as the full UW band raises the roof with their annual spring concert while keeping tabs on the Crew in my other ear. It’s a very good thing.

See you on Sunday, Xavier. Pretty it may not have been, but the Badgers pulled out a victory. This helps us get back a little of our pride after being hammered by Florida State in our bowl matchup at the end of last year.

Men’s hockey is up here this weekend for the Final Five and unfortunately the Badgers lost to Denver 3-0 today so they’ll be playing for third tomorrow. Not a shabby weekend getting to watch hockey and basketball playoffs.

The alumni chapter had 350 tickets for the Wisconsin at Minnesota basketball game this past Wednesday.  Neither team disappointed by bringing their best Big Ten style of play, with a whopping 23-16 Minnesota lead by the half.  No matter what you might think about the Big Ten conference, our basketball teams definitely know how to put up massive points.  (Sarcasm).  Seriously, 23-16 at half?  A final of 51-46?  Both teams plugged right into the stereotype on Wednesday night.  It was a tough, not often pretty, grindfest between two bubble teams.  Both teams will probably slip into the tournament, but so what?  The Big Ten will send maybe six or seven teams and five of them willl probably be out after the first round.  For the Badgers, they’re just not happy playing anyone who wants to try to put up more than 50 points.  (Think Texas Corpus Christi in the first round of the tournament).

I turned 27 yesterday and feel like I’ve turned the corner coming out of college.  The reason being is that the kids who will be graduating in a few months (on the four year plan) are the first class that I’ve had no overlap with.  I graduated in May of 2005 and they started school in fall of 2005.  Scary.  I’ve also realized that if we want to start having kids that’s probably something we can put off for another five years and that’s about it.  Scary.  I’m four years out of undergrad and still haven’t taken the LSAT or GRE.  Scary times three.  Maybe I’ll coin the phrase “1/3 life crisis” because I feel like that’s where I’m at right now.

The Badgers are in serious trouble. At 0-4 in the Big Ten this is their worst start since 1996. As someone pointed out to be in the JSOnline Live Game Chat, the difference is that in 1996 they were losing a lot of really close games. We just look plain awful right now. Whether or not the Badgers can win any of their remaining conference games is seriously under question. This team will not make a bowl game if they continue with their current level of play. The question is where they go from here. Bielmea will be back next season, but if they struggle again his job will be in jeopardy. Might we see Barry back on the sidelines once again?

I’m back to something of a normal life now that the football season is over. As much as I love Madison and Badger football I’m just not sure if I want to have season tickets for next year. This season was particularly rough because there were so many ups and downs and so many close games. I was really hoping for a BCS game, but finishing 9-3 with a shot at Tennessee in the Outback Bowl isn’t a bad season by any means. We’re going to skip on the bowl game this year because we’ve already been to Florida twice this year, with one of the times being for the Capital One Bowl. I just can’t justify spending the money on a third plane ticket to the same place in such a short amount of time. I think I might try to attend a few select games next year and use the extra time to get to Lambeau. Speaking of which, the Packers just destroyed Oakland to improve to 11-2 on the year. By Favre standards it was a pretty average day, but the defense and special teams really stepped up and made some huge plays. Ryan Grant keeps looking better and better and our receivers are so hard to stop and are leading the NFL in yards after the catch. I could write pages about the team, but suffice it to say it has been one hell of a year so far and I can’t wait for the playoffs. With the holidays coming up I’m hoping to find a day to devote to encoding all of my videos to DVD quality and posting all of my pictures from the fall. In other news I went skiing for the first time this season at Afton Alps. I’m really glad I went out because with the foot of snow we’ve had and the freezing cold weather they had most of the place open, which is pretty good for the beginning of December. I’ve also been playing Starcraft quite a bit lately and would just like to thank Blizzard for making such a great game, which is still enjoyable after 10 years.

On March 30th I was lucky enough to meet Brooks Bollinger. Apparently he was interested in checking out the capitol and is an acquaintance of former Senator Bob Lessard. I was able to get a picture and an autograph, which was really cool and it will soon be up on the wall somewhere in the Badger Room. It is also posted in the Pictures section. As a student I watched him play in Madison for three seasons so getting the chance to meet him was awesome; he was a really nice guy. When he got to the capitol my coworkers that were going to show him around brought him down to my office because they know I am such a huge Wisconsin fan. It was a pretty good way to end the week. While he and Erasmus James are both Vikings now, I knew them as Badgers first so I wish them both the best of luck this season.

Speaking of quarterbacks, who is going to win the starting job for Wisconsin this season? I think it is going to be a real battle. Allan Everidge definitely proved himself as a freshman at Kansas State, but Tyler Donovan is a fifth year senior and showed some real promise last year when he was thrown into games. It will also be interesting to see how much playing time John Clay will be able to compete for. There are only five months until the season starts and I cannot wait. The Brewer home opener is on Monday and I am pretty excited about that, too, because if the Brewers can stay healthy this year they will have a good shot at winning the NL Central.

In other news I will be in Madison three weeks from today after a five-month hiatus. I am going through some pretty rough withdrawal right now. Tonight I am going to see Blades of Glory; hopefully it is a good one.

PS: Ohio State is just about to advance to the 2007 NCAA Championship game. I hate them.

I have wanted to visit Duluth since I moved up here and this past weekend I finally got my chance. Our alumni chapter took a coach bus up there for the hockey game. When you throw some Badgers on a bus with beer you know it is going to be a good time. The hockey game was pretty boring, though. After one overtime the game ended in a 0 – 0 tie. Exciting. On Sunday I finally got some skiing in at Afton Alps; it was the first time I had been out this season and the conditions were great after all the snow we received. How about that finish on Saturday for the basketball team? It looks like we will be playing Michigan State again this Friday unless Northwestern can pull of a win on Thursday. The Badger game is not on TV so I need to find a place to watch it. Oh, and happy birthday to me today, I turn 25.

You can consider this posting therapy for the loss tonight against Michigan State. Michigan State pulled down way too many offensive rebounds in the first half and as a result the Badgers were only up by one at the half. Tucker and Landry had good games, but then again so did Drew Neitzel with 28. The loss of course comes a day after the Badgers were ranked number one in the AP poll. Sunday’s game in Columbus just became even more critical. We need to bounce back and play our best game on the road. In 2004 the football team was crushed at Michigan State and it ruined our shot at the Rose Bowl. I have no love for Michigan State right now.

I am a little late on my posting of Wednesday night’s game. First of all, I am convinced that Williams Arena has one men’s restroom and within that restroom the only place to urinate is in a trough. Can you detect a hint of frustration? I found myself outside, as in out in the freezing cold, more than once while opening doors in my attempt to find a restroom. I guess it is called “the barn” for a reason. Now that I have gotten that tidbit off of my chest I can continue with my recap of the night’s festivities. We started the night at Sally’s, which is kind of like the Gopher version of Brats. It definitely felt like I was in Madison as most of the crowd was donning the cardinal and white. I love our fans. The game was a little too close for comfort. The Gophers did a great job of nailing shots from beyond the arc, while our guys struggled a bit. It was not until ten minutes into the second half that the Badgers started to pull away and never looked back. We had a good amount of fans in attendance, but I will give the Gophers credit because there were a few times where it was pretty loud in there. What a great way to spend Valentine’s Day.

A very good win for the cardinal and white today against a 5-2 Purdue team. The Badgers pulled off a 24-3 win, although the game was closer than the score would indicate. We have Illinois at home this weekend and although they are an improved team the Badgers should have no problem. Let us just hope that the football team does not go out partying on Friday night for Halloween. The win today should definitely move us up a bit in the polls since we actually played a team with a winning record. It seems like after Ohio State and Michigan, Wisconsin can lay claim to the number three spot. Not where I would like to be by any means, but I guess it could be worse. Iowas was unable to pick off Michigan today so my hopes of a BCS bowl are all but gone now. Sigh. On the bright side we are 7-1 with a first year head coach and we should end up with a pretty decent bowl game, which will give me an excuse to go somewhere warm in a few months.

I posted a video of the Wisconsin homecoming parade from last weekend. It is around a half an hour long. Download and watch it to your heart’s content.