OK, first off, the sincerest of sincere apologies to longtime Province Sports reader Chris “C-Dub” Wilson, who read Tuesday’s 2 O’Clock and was less than delighted to learn, from me of all people, that Body Break legends Hal and Joanne had been punted from The Amazing Race Canada. I ruined it for him, and he was determined not to ruin it for his wife and son, who’d be watching ARC on PVR last night. “That’s the last time I read your 2 O’Clock,” wrote Wilson. It is true. He is right. I am a bad man for spoiling something that had actually been on TV some 17 hours earlier. Chris Wilson, it’s 2013! You are on Twitter! You have a computer! Don’t stop reading the 2 O’Clock because you’re angry!
We good? We good. And now, onto The 10 O’Clock, and there’s some solid stuff to share with you this morning.
There are photo galleries, and then there are photo galleries. And what a gallery from The Daily Mail, which celebrated today’s England-Scotland soccer friendly (Sportsnet World, noon PT) by sharing photos of the rivalry going back more than a century. The first picture, taken at Hampden Park stadium, suggests that there were 122,000 fans there. And it certainly looks like it, a stunning photo. There’s Tommy Walker’s penalty-kick goal for Scotland in 1936. The crowd walking down Wembley Way in 1955. Denis Law and Bobby Charlton, Manchester United teammates but foes on this day, exchanging jerseys in 1965. And Paul Gascoigne scoring in 1996. Nice, big pictures. Excellent cutlines explaining what’s going on. Pretty much consider it a bookmark.
Now, I know it’s not even remotely close to the NBA season, but the New York Post’s Tim Bontemps is in midseason form, writing about New Jersey Brookyn Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov. (Hard to keep track of all the teams’ comings and goings.) When the Russian billionaire bought the Nets back in 2010, he famously declared that if the club didn’t win an NBA championship by 2015, he’d get married. At that point, we were all doubling down on the get-married option, since the Nets had just come off a remarkable 12-70 season, which included the firing of head coach Lawrence Franks, a former Vancouver Grizzlies assistant. But as Bontemps writes, “Sure, Prokhorov wants to win. Anyone willing to spend more in luxury taxes than the entire payroll of any NBA team obviously will do whatever it takes to win. But the bigger, larger point of Prokhorov’s championship-or-bust declaration wasn’t to put that goal up for the organization to strive for in order to save him from marriage, but to change the talk surrounding the franchise itself.” The Nets were 49-33 last season, made the playoffs for the first time since 2007, and are no longer considered one of the biggest jokes in the NBA.
A couple of quick hits, both from the Miami Herald. The first is about Israel Paopao. He’s a freshman quarterback with Florida International University, and if his name seems familiar, it should: He’s the nephew of former B.C. Lions QB Joe Paopao. And he received some key tutelage from former Calgary Stampeders QB Jeff Garcia.
There’s also the story about how the 1972 Miami Dolphins, the only NFL team to go through an entire season unbeaten, plus win the Super Bowl, will be heading to the White House next Tuesday to be honoured by Barack Obama. What? Forty-one years later? Indeed. Seems that it wasn’t until later in the 1970′s that the tradition of a U.S. president celebrating Super Bowl winners began. Considering how constantly visible this squad is — they love nothing more than to celebrate when the last NFL team to lose a game every season does — it’s amazing no one has thought of this sooner. Too bad for the 2007 New England Patriots, which ripped through the regular season 16-0, then won its first two playoff games before losing by a field goal to the New York Giants in the Super Bowl. They’ll never receive this honour.
Finally, from Newsday in New York, a story about Islanders star John Tavares. He continues to star in near-anonymity, considering the usual dysfunction of the Islanders organization. But Arthur Staple writes that Tavares will, almost certainly, be named the Islanders’ 14th captain when training camp rolls around next month.
OK, get back to work. We’ll see you at The 2 O’Clock.
