MARCH MADNESS – After Ali Farokhmanesh nailed the 3-point shot that was heard around the world with 35 seconds left in regulation to seal a victory over the No. 1 overall seed, Kansas Jayhawks, the Northern Iowa Panthers are officially on the map and heading to the Sweet 16 round for the first time in the school’s history.

The Jayhawks entered March Madness as a heavy favorite to win the tournament but that is why the tourney’s last name is “Madness.”

“We never doubted we could play with them at all,” said Panthers’ Adam Koch. The team backed up that comment and came out with a vengeance, leading the favored Jayhawks a majority of the first half.

This 69-67 game creates a lot of what-ifs for the Jayhawks and their fans, like any other two-point game in NCAA ball would, but this one is going to hurt for quite some time. The Jayhawks (33-3) had a hard time finding the net from outside the arch shooting a dismal 6-of23 from long range.

Farokhmanesh finished with a team-high 16 points while center Jordan Eglseder scored 14 and Jake Koch added 10 of the bench for the Panthers. Marcus Morris led the Jayhawks with 16 while Cole Aldrich scored 13 and had 10 boards.

“Obviously, everybody is disappointed on our team,” Aldrich said. “To work so hard and to go through so much adversity … it’s disappointing that we couldn’t have let Sherron go out in a better way.”

As the 9th seed in their bracket, Northern Iowa (30-4) was the first team to defeat a No. 1 seed in the second round since UAB and Alabama won against heavily-favored teams Kentucky and Stanford in 2004.

Note: Here is a free website where you can watch all the NCAA March Madness games live for free on your computer.

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

ATLANTA, GA. – It didn’t take long for the Atlanta Thrashers to get going Saturday night at Philips Arena in their important match-up against their Eastern Conference rival Philadelphia Flyers.

After the Thrashers’ Jim Slater squared off with Flyers’ enforcer Dan Carcillo and sent Carillo to the ice with a solid punch just 39 seconds after the puck was dropped, the Thrashers fed off that adrenaline and rookie Niclas Bergfors scored the game’s first goal about one minute later to take a 1-0 lead.

That tally was Bergfors’ 20th of the season and 7th since coming over from New Jersey in the Ilya Kovalchuk trade.
A short time later Ian Laperriere attempted to avenge Carillo’s thrashing and took on Thrashers’ enforcer Eric Boulton.

Like watching a replay, Laperriere ended up on the ice after exchanging a few punches with Boulton and again the Thrashers responded by putting the puck in the net a short time later to take a 2-0 lead.

The Thrashers never let up and played with more desperation than the visitors, carrying the play much of the game and with the help of 2 Colby Armstrong goals, his 14th and 15th of the season, went on to earn a 5-2 victory. Like Bergfors, Armstrong has come to life as of late and has 4 goals and 1 assist in the past two games.

This game was important to both teams. The Flyers came into the contest sitting in the # 5 spot in the Eastern Conference just one point ahead of the # 7 Montreal Canadians while the Thrashers were just three points behind the Boston Bruins for the final playoff spot.

With the ice tilted in the Thrashers’ favor, Carillo returned to the ice after serving his fighting major penalty and regained some momentum for his team, tipping in a Chris Pronger shot for his 10th of the year at the 8:16 mark to narrow the gap to 2-1.

That is as close as the Flyers would get all night as the Thrashers never trailed in the game and each time the Flyers would score, the Thrashers would respond with another goal.

The win moved the Thrashers one point away from that final playoff spot that is owned by the Boston Bruins.

The Flyers and Thrashers meet again Sunday night to complete their back-to-back series then the Thrashers return home to face the Bruins Tuesday night for another important game at Philips Arena at 7pm.

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

GERMANY – In a heavyweight championship fight on Saturday night, American Eddie “Fast Eddie” Chambers almost survived to make it to the final bell but WBO and IBF heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko had other plans.

Klitschko outmatched the smaller Chambers much of the fight and knocked Chambers out with a left hook with just 5 ticks left on the clock in the 12th and final round to retain both of those belts.

The KO improved the 33-year-old Klitschko’s record to 53-3-48KO while Chambers’ record dropped to 35-2.

It appeared the fight might end early when Klitschko dazed the challenger in the 2nd round. Chambers desperately hung onto the champion for the rest of the round then took the opportunity to regroup during the break between the 2nd and 3rd rounds.

“I have to give him credit, he was fast,” said Klitschko. “He doesn’t have much punching power and his game plan was gone by round six.”

One of Chambers’ best shots was a right hook that landed to the side of Klitschko’s head in the 5th Round but standing 5 inches taller and outweighing his opponent by 35 pounds, the champion shook it off and continued to dominate the fight.

Vitali Klitschko, the WBC heavyweight champion was in his brother’s corner and encouraged him to knock out Chambers but Klitschko seemed content with gaining points with his dominating jabs.

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

Tiger Woods called Arnold Palmer to apologize for not competing in his upcoming tournament at Bay Hill. Woods instead will make his post-sex scandal comeback at Augusta national Golf Club where he will play in the Masters April 8-11.

The world’s No. 1 ranked golfer player and Associated Press Athlete Of The Decade made the announcement in a prepared statement yesterday.

“The Masters is where I won my first major and I view this tournament with great respect. After a long and necessary time away from the game, I feel like I’m ready to start my season at Augusta,” said Woods.

“The major championships have always been a special focus in my career and, as a professional, I think Augusta is where I need to be, even though it’s been a while since I last played.”

Woods will have to work out the rust while trying his best to ignore all the certain distractions surrounding his personal life and infidelities while trying to win in a tournament he has not won since 2005.

Woods has not competed since Nov. 15 when he won the Australian Masters in Melbourne.

A few weeks after that win, he was involved in a one-vehicle accident in front of his home, where his wife Elin Nordegren admitted smashing out the window of his Cadillac SUV with a golf club.

The couple would soon become the main attraction for both mainstream media and tabloid journalists after several women came forward admitting to affairs with the golfer.

After avoiding the media and going into hibernation for several weeks, Woods finally confessed to the affairs after voice mail messages involving he and one of his alleged lovers were made public.

After avoiding the media for several more weeks, he put together a monitored conference that felt more like a funeral than an apology where several friends and family members attended to listen to him read a rehearsed statement. After the reading,  the golfer refused to accept any questions from the couple of hand-picked members of the media.

The Arnold Palmer Invitational that Woods is skipping is a tournament he has won the last two years and six times overall. This will be the first time Woods has not played in PGA Bay Hill event that is a short drive from his home in Isleworth.

“I called both Joe Lewis and Arnold Palmer and expressed my regrets for not attending the Tavistock Cup and the Arnold Palmer Invitational. I again want to thank them both for their support and their understanding,” said Woods. “Those are fantastic tournaments and I look forward to competing in them again.”

In a recent interview, the Golf Channel asked Palmer about that conversation. “He had some zip in his voice,” Palmer told the network.

“He sounded just fine. He knows what he wants to do with his life and the way he’s going to handle it, and I guess we’re going to give him that respect. I would think for Tiger it’s going to be tough. It’s going to be something that’s going to take him a little time to get used to. He expressed his regret for not being able to play. He said that he was sorry, that he really didn’t feel his game was up to speed to start playing this early.”

More Tiger:

Woods Apology Felt More Like a Funeral  – Sports Climax

Woods Voted AP Athlete of the Decade – Sports Climax

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

ARLINGTON, Texas – In front of the largest boxing crowd in almost two decades, Manny ‘Pacman’ Pacquiao dominated his opponent Joshua Clottey from the opening bell Saturday night earning a unanimous decision to retain the World Boxing Organization welterweight title.

Considered the world’s greatest pound-for-pound fighter, Pacquiao outhit Clottey by a landslide throughout the 12-round bout.

CompuBox was tallying the hits and according to their stats, the champion landed 246 of 1,231 punches while Clottey landed 108 of 399.

Many of the standing room only crowd of 50,994 at Cowboys Stadium had to watch the fight on the giant television screen and it was no surprise when the unanimous decision came down. One judge gave Pacquiao every round and the other two judges gave him all but one round.

Most of the fight Clottey played defense, keeping his gloves high and occasionally hoping to land a big punch. Clottey did manage to stay on his feet but his strategy led to some of the most lopsided stats seen in quite a while for a title fight.

“He’s a very tough opponent,” Pacquiao said. “He was looking for a big shot.”

While the world continues to wait for a Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr, fight, Mayweather Jr. will fight Shane Mosley in May 2010.

Pacquiao was originally scheduled to fight Mayweather Jr. but that fight was cancelled over a major dispute concerning blood testing.

“I want that fight, the world wants that fight, but it’s up to him,” Pacquiao said. “I’m ready to fight any time.”

With this fight now history, Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is finding a way to utilize the new $1.2 billion Cowboys Stadium during the NFL off season and this week mixed the NFL with boxing. In the promotional photo seen above, Jones and the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders surround the fighters who are donning Cowboys jerseys.

Earlier in the year, the NBA All Star game was played at Cowboys Stadium in front of a record-setting crowd of 108,000 fans.   

Copyright ©2010 Sports Climax™

The NHL needs all the P.R. it can get and it took a blunder by a U.S. Senate candidate to get it for them this week.

After the 2010 Winter Olympics hockey ratings were sky-high thanks to an adrenaline filled 3-2 victory by Canada over the U.S. the league missed out on retaining a lot of that interest. With a potential rematch between U.S. Olympic goaltender and MVP of the tournament, Ryan Miller and Canada’s Sidney Crosby just days after the gold medal game, Miller was benched for rest and sat out the game.

The following week, Crosby, for reasons no one in marketing can figure, turned down an offer to do the Top Ten on the David Letterman Show.

Jump to this week when Marc Delphine who is running for a U.S. Senate seat in Oregon accepted a ‘free’ logo from a volunteer and placed it on his website.

Turns out the logo is a trademarked piece belonging to the NHL Columbus Blue Jackets. The silver star wrapped in a star-spangled banner, his designer said, evoked the letter ‘D’ for branding purposes.

Delphine thought the design was original but several people contacted him and advised him of the rip-off.

“They were all like, ‘What are you doing with their logo?’ and I was like, ‘I didn’t make the logo!’ and we pulled it immediately,” said Delphine, a Libertarian candidate. “I’m not interested in any kind of infringement. We don’t even need a logo.”

The current Blue Jackets logo is in the photo above and looks almost identical to the hockey one. It is just been flipped from left to right and the red circle synonymous with the Ohio state flag was removed.

“I don’t know if you know anything about Libertarian candidates, but they typically don’t have a lot of money coming in. I was thinking this was so nice, but it was too good to be true,” said Delphine.

Since discovering the rip-off, Delphine removed it from his site and said, “If anything, I hope this raises awareness for the Columbus Blue Jackets.”

Hopefully it does, Mr. Delphine because when it comes to P.R. and marketing, Gary Bettman and the NHL need all the help they can get.

©2010 Sports Climax™

ATLANTA, Ga. – After losing three games in a row and dropping down to 10th place in the Eastern Conference, the Atlanta Thrashers have recalled defenseman Chris Chelios from the Chicago Wolves of the American Hockey League in an attempt to spark the team and bring veteran leadership to a young core of players at a critical time of the season.

Executive VP and GM Don Waddell hopes Chelios can bring stability to and inspire his young team.

“Chris has been an outstanding leader and mentor for our young players in Chicago and his level of play has made him deserving of this opportunity,” said Waddell. “He’s a tremendous competitor who strengthens our group of defensemen and instantly adds a veteran presence to our locker room.”

Originally drafted by the Montreal Canadiens in the second round, 40th overall, of the 1981 NHL Entry Draft, Chelios, 48, has appeared in 46 games with the Chicago Wolves of the American Hockey League this season, recording 22 points (five goals, 17 assists) while ranking fourth in the league with a plus-34 rating.

The Chicago, Ill., native has registered 948 points (185 goals, 763 assists) and 2,891 penalty minutes in 1,644 career NHL games with the Detroit Red Wings, Chicago Blackhawks and Montreal Canadiens.

In a NHL-record 266 career Stanley Cup Playoff games, Chelios has collected 144 points (31 goals, 113 assists) while capturing the Stanley Cup three times, once with Montreal (1986) and twice with Detroit (2002 and 2008).

In his 25-year NHL career, Chelios ranks fourth in games played, eighth in all-time assists by a defenseman, and ranks 10th among defensemen in points. Among American-born players, he ranks first in games played, second in plus/minus (plus-352) , and third in points by a defenseman.

The 6-0, 190-pound defenseman has earned the Norris Trophy as the NHL’s top defenseman three times (1989, 1993, 1996), has been named to the NHL’s First All-Star Team five times (1989, 1993, 1995, 1996, 2002), and has participated in 11 NHL All-Star Games.

Chelios has represented the United States in international competition 12 times, and served as team captain at the 1998, 2002 and 2006 Winter Olympics. He led the U.S. to a Silver Medal at the 2002 Games in Salt Lake City and also won a Gold Medal at the 1996 World Cup of Hockey.

He has also appeared in the 1984 Winter Olympics, the 1984, 1987, 1991 Canada Cup, the 1982 IIHF World Junior Championship and captured the 1983 NCAA Men’s Hockey Championship with the University of Wisconsin.

© 2010 Sports Climax^TM

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – Constantly dominating the ratings, the NFL doesn’t need any outside help promoting their league but last night’s Academy Awards show in Los Angeles provided an adrenaline shot into the league’s arm anyways when Sandra Bullock took home the Best Actress Oscar for her role in The Blind Side, the film that featured Baltimore Ravens offensive tackle Michael Oher.

The movie showed Oher’s impoverished upbringing and adoption by a couple in Memphis, Tennessee and his challenging journey that eventually led to being a first-round selection in the 2009 NFL Draft.

Being the first female-lead film to ever hit the $200 million mark, the heart-warming story provided an abundance of PR for Oher, the Ravens and the NFL and Bullock’s Oscar win last night reached an audience that may not have the NFL set on their DVR’s so it gives the league yet another boast.

In addition to the Best Actress category, The Blind Side was also nominated for  Best Picture and is scheduled to be released on March 12, 2010 in Great Britain, a country that has been the location for NFL regular season games over the past few years.

Note: Bullock also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress and a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role for her performance.

© 2010 Sports Climax^TM

While NFC North rivals the Minnesota Vikings and Green Bay Packers were forced to sit idle during the free agency bidding wars, the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions were the most aggressive teams on day one.

Lovie Smith and Da’ Bears snatched the biggest prize of the day when they signed defensive end Julius Peppers to a six-year contract worth a maximum $91.5 million. The five-time Pro Bowl player will receive a record $42 million guaranteed.

In addition to Peppers, Da’ Bears also snatched running back Chester Taylor from the Vikings signing the rusher to a four-year deal worth $12.5 million with $7 million guaranteed.

Knowing the importance of granting quarterback Jay Cutler more time to throw, they also added blocking tight end Brandon Manumaleuna from the San Diego Chargers.

Not to be outdone, the Detroit Lions made a few quick moves of their own, signing three sure starters when they inked deals with two defensive linemen and a No. 2 wide receiver.

Wanting to shore up a defense that was last in the NFL in points allowed and total yards, Lions head coach Jim Schwartz personally visited Tennessee Titans defensive end Kyle Vanden Bosch at 12:01 AM on day one of free agency and convinced the Pro Bowler to sign with the team.

While Vanden Bosch and his agent were working out the details of a four-year, $26 million deal, the Lions also inked a $25 million contract with Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Nate Burleson.

Burleson played in 13 games for the Seahawks last year, catching 63 for 812 yards and three touchdowns and is expected to free up Calvin Johnson from the double and triple coverage he sees on a weekly basis.

Joining Vanden Bosch on the Lions’ defensive line will be Cleveland Browns Corey Williams, another proven starter who was obtained by a trade.

With the Lions adding these proven veteran linemen to their defense and with the team expected to use their No. 2 overall selection in the upcoming 2010 NFL Draft to select defensive lineman Ndamukong Suh or Gerald McCoy, you can throw last year’s dismal defensive stats out the window.

These aggressive moves by the Bears and Lions are certain to make the NFC North more competitive.

Minnesota lost a huge piece of their offense when Taylor left and while Brett Favre sits on the fence in Minnesota still contemplating a return, The Green Bay Packers lost Pro Bowl defensive lineman Aaron Kampman to free agency as well.

© 2010 – Sports Climax^TM

Steve Williams has had the dream job of a lifetime, dragging around golf clubs for Tiger Woods, the most famous golfer of all time.

After an interview on 60 Minutes last night where he said he “would have blown the whistle” on Woods if he knew of the affairs, it’s hard not to wonder if the caddie will remain at Woods’ side if and when he ever returns to the game.

A friend admitting he would have “blown the whistle” certainly doesn’t sound like a man you want by your side at a time the Paparazzi is in overdrive to stalk down your every move.

Williams also said he is still a close friend of Woods and will stand by him.

Here is some of the dialogue Williams had with the television production crew for the show.

“In some people’s perception, I’m involved in it and I’ve committed a crime or I’ve done wrong,” Williams said. “I’ve said it before. I knew nothing, and that’s my answer.”

“If the shoe was on somebody else’s [foot], I would say the same thing: that it would be very difficult for the caddie not to know but I’m a hundred per cent telling you I knew nothing and that’s that. “I’m a straight-up sort of person. If I’d have known something was going on, the whistle would have been blown. He knows that, that’s just the way I operate.”

“Of course I’m mad at him. Why would you not be? I’m more disappointed that he’s let his family down and let himself down.” Williams, who says he is close to Tiger Woods’ wife Erin Nordegren, went on to say he still has not talked to Woods about the infidelities.

“It’s not up to me to beat him with a stick right now. He’s getting enough grilling from everybody else; the media have had a feeding frenzy. I’m a friend right now. There’s a time and place for everything. Obviously at some point in time, I’ll have a conversation with him. I’d like to see him back playing on the PGA tour. That’s my role right now.”

“I stand by Tiger as a friend. When I talk to him, I don’t talk to him about what’s happened, I talk to him about the future and what we’re going to try and accomplish and how we’re going to get over it.”

Williams’ wife, Kirsty, said it has been difficult seeing her husband dealing with the public’s speculation and accusations that he knew about the affairs over the years.

“He [Williams] is just seen as a bad guy. People are calling for him to be fired. It’s not fair.”

Tiger Woods Apology Felt More Like a Funeral – Video

© 2010 Sports Climax^TM