And that pretty much sums up the game against LSU.

But, as I found out today, at least VU has the number one football schedule poster. Suck on that.

This week also revealed  the “competitive yet collaborative” environment that so aptly describes the Owen culture. You’ll find people still at school way past 12:00am working hard on some homework assignment, yet they are still approachable and helpful if you are stuck on a problem. It’s great because I have no idea how I’d ever get any of my accounting done without help from my classmates.

As you can tell by my terser than usual words, my brain is pretty exhausted so enjoy some pics I took during the week. I’m finding out that the BB camera isn’t so bad after all.

[Show as slideshow]

Jim Rome interviewed Caldwell yesterday. The interview can be heard here for free @ VUcommodores. No thanks to Rome for charging to listen to the interview.

I think the coach is a nice guy and I love his southern drawl. One has to wonder though whether a guy who has spent 30 years as an assistant coach is ready to lead a football team in the SEC as the man. At the very least, I think people will be pulling for him, in a Rudy-esque kind of way, as the team is getting its butt kicked (the schedule is nightmare this year). Best of luck to him and the team.

That being said, I’m looking forward to the trouncing the football team will receive this year. Better to have a team that stinks than not because it affords the opportunity to do tailgates, or in other words, drink. Go Dores.

Texas has an undeniable passion for football. Even down at the high school level, the amount of passion is ridiculous. Some town in Texas is spending $60 million for a new HIGH SCHOOL football stadium that will seat 50,000 people. Article here.

I bet that my high school’s football stadium has never in its 40+ year history seen that many people. Total. Although the article disputes this, but it looks like Texas has its priority straight; football first, education second.

Personalized:
4 shirts (compression short sleeve, sleeveless, long sleeve, and loose)
Fleece top
Travel suit jacket
Core short (number only)

Non- personalized:
Fleece and travel bottoms
2 loose shorts
Compression shorts
Socks
Leggings

Gift  Bag:
Duffel bag
Pair of Mercenary trainers
Pair of cleats depending on position
Pair of slides
Pair of combine shoes (for 40, vertical, broad jump)
Beanie
Hoody
T-shirt (“We must protect this house! I will!”)
Recharge socks
Grippy socks
Digi skull cap
Digi gloves
Digi bandana

CNBC Scouting Combine Gift Bag

Man that’s a lot of cool stuff. Noticeably missing though is a UA jockstrap. Regardless, it’s probably close to $1000 worth of UA paraphernalia.

From watching the NFL combine videos, UA’s been sponsoring the event for the past two years and as the CNBC article says, they pretty much has the event on lock. The combines such a great place to tell the UA “story”. People watching the combine see the products in use and will immediately associate the brand with performance. The guy just lifted 225 45 times? He ran the 40 in 4.1? And he was wearing a UA compression shirt? UA also has an early bead on a bunch of potential NFL superstars who probably haven’t signed any sponsorship deals yet because they’re still in college.

If you couldn’t think of one, don’t blame yourself. If you said Dat Nguyen, shame on you because he is Vietnamese.

Well, if you’re waiting for a Chinese NFL superstar you might not have to wait much longer. Ed Wang, a 6’4” 300 lb OT from Virginia Tech, is trying to become the first Chinese American to make it into the NFL. I didn’t think that Chinese people could be built that big. OK, there’s Yao Ming and that wacky  Mongolian guy, but they were cooked up in a lab. Ed Wang, however, grew up in Virginia! Close your eyes and listen to him talk and you’d think that he was a black guy. But then it all makes sense after watching his bio. His parents were former Chinese Olympians who probably received the premium grains enhanced with special performance enhancing vitamins given by the CCP.

I guess it’s not that surprising that the offspring of two world class athletes would turn into a world class athlete. Maybe if I hooked up with the world’s biggest, baddest female athlete, Serena Williams, I could have myself a little Reggie Bush. Yikes.

Anyways, good luck to Ed. Make us proud.

Forbes recently released their 2010 Business School rankings in which they ranked the schools by ROI after 5 years. It’s an interesting methodology, especially if you consider the bottomline for some students who pursue an MBA: how much more money will I be making after school. I think this ranking is great if you’re looking for the school that will give you the best bang for your buck. For me though, Forbe’s ranking only provides a nice place to view a compilation of stats. I’m not sure you can convince many people, especially in southeren California, that BYU (16), is a better school than UCLA (19).

Just for fun, I compared the rankings of the schools I’m interested in from the Forbes with USA Today’s College Football Coaches poll. Here’s how things shook out.

From Forbes:

Texas – 11
UCLA – 19
USC – 32
ND – 38
UCI – 58

From USA Today:

Texas – 2
USC – 4
ND – 23
UCI – No respect (ranked higher than the Bruins – Anteaters are undefeated)
UCLA – Even less respect

Ha! It’s close in order if you disregard the actual rank. I might as well replace the Forbes poll with the USA Today poll. The bottomline, take these business school rankings with a grain of salt. They’re not the best way to figure out which school is the best for you.

Moving onto bball.

The amazing thing was we were TIED at the half. We could have been up, but the refs erroneously called one of our TDs back and I dropped two shoulda-been-caught balls that probably would have been TDs… The two catches that I did make were bobbled. Come to think of it, I bobbled one last week too….. I’m blaming my chappy hands and the football; it’s time to get gloves. I’m going to dream about those two dropped passes tonight, augh.

This loss, coupled with Ramrods probable win tonight, puts us in third place and a slight grip on a playoff spot. As a team, we played much better this week than we did last week. I think we overcame my gripes from the last game and in some ways, the team over fixed the problems. I’m sure the caps will adjust though. Seriously, the dude sends out powerpoint presentations on plays/formations every week. There was a spectator tonight that said, “Wow, I didn’t think this was going to be that serious”. That’s right lady, we’ve JNs for FF.