Having not finished my Snow Patrol review...

I offer the following questions... You're allowed to attend one non-festival type concert tour. Who and why? Second, in programming you're own radio station, what 5 artists that wouldn't see the playlist of corporate radio would you feature?

Rant and discuss.

Regionals are over and the owls are still alive

Baylor fought valiantly but they were unable to hold a 3-0 lead in the third inning and fell 7-4 as Rice swept its home regional. Meanwhile the Oklahoma Sooners battled back again Wichita State to clinch the Norman regional 7-6. Yes, this would set up an interesting situation for me, if it were any sport but baseball. Normally, due to my growing up in Norman and most of my family attending OU, I would root for them wholeheartedly. However, since it is baseball, the only sport Rice is good at, and to be honest very few sooner fans follow the baseball team, I shall root for Rice from the comfort of my desk.

More baseball chat later in the week.

Tomorrow: Music reviews return... allegedly

NCAA baseball recaps: Champs dethroned

While the events of the Houston regional were pretty much true to form, other regional sites provided a fair amount of chaos. Two of the eight national seeds are gone and one is on the ropes. I must send out a thank you to the NC State Wolfpack. Having Texas defend their baseball title from last year would've be unfortunate but thankfully the Wolfpack used a three-run eighth to dethrone the champs 6-3.

Rice jumped out early then cruised behind Eddie Degerman's 8 innings pitched and 14 strikeouts to a 7-2 win over Baylor. The Bears then turned the tables on the ASU Sun Devils by a similar score of 7-2. Rice will play Baylor tomorrow with Baylor needing two wins to advance.

Congratulations to Oral Roberts, the #3 seed in the Fayetteville regional, who took out Oklahoma State 9-2 to advance to the Super Regionals against national #1 Clemson.

Oh and by the way Nebraska, losing on your home field to Manhattan and San Francisco (the Dons, not the Giants) truly validates your #6 overall seed.

As a tribute to those teams already fallen along the Road to Omaha, I give you today's song lyric..

Song Lyric of the day #1
"It's okay to be safe
I'm on top of my game
I'm losing control
Falling by the wayside"
People In Planes -- "Falling by the Wayside"

And for those continuing...
Song Lyric of the day #2
"When I look out on the horizon
I see far beyond this place called home
But every time I try to explain it
I end up feeling so alone
You don't want to walk in my shoes
Beneath all this envy green
I'm varsity blue"
Caroline's Spine -- "Varsity Blue"

NCAA baseball day 2

It was a long and somewhat frightening afternoon here in Houston. Prarie View and their speed merchants and a little timely power from Arthur Christal jumped to a 5-1 lead over Rice in the 3rd. Brian Friday's 2-run homer in the bottom of the 3rd kept Rice in the game at 5-3. However, a number of scoring chances were lost in the middle innings by the Owls inability to get a timely hit. Things came apart for Prarie View in the 8th. With the bases loaded and no one out in the top of the 8th with a chance to bury the Owls, Wilford White grounded into an odd 6-2-3 double play with the second out resulting from runner's interference because White was inside the baseline. Bryce Cox came in a shut the door on the Panthers to keep it 5-3. Aaron Luna homered in bottom of the 8th with Joe Savery aboard to tie the game at 5-5. The bottom of the ninth rally was began with a walk and hit batsman followed by an error on 3rd baseman on an attempted sacrifice. Josh Rodriguez singled to left to drive home Tyler Henley for the 6-5 win.

Elsewhere, the Houston Cougars lost a pitcher's duel to Wichita State 2-1 in Norman and the TCU Horned Frogs upset the hosting Oklahoma Sooners. The Vanderbilt Commodores got good pitching and 3 home runs to beat Michigan 5-2. At the time of this writing, it appears Vandy will take on hosting Georgia Tech as they are up on Stetson 7-0 in the 6th. In Fayetteville Oklahoma State methodically dispatched Princeton 4-1 while Oral Roberts rallied to beat Arkansas 4-3 in extra innings setting up an Oklahoma showdown in the winner's bracket game.

No Rice game today due to rescheduling around rain so more attention will be paid to Vandy and the ORU-OSU game.

On second thought...

I could attempt to sound smart and preview these regionals but since I don't know much about the teams outside of C-USA and the Big 12, I see no point. Recaps will follow after tomorrow's games but no previews.

On a completely unrelated note, if you have not heard Stone Sour's new song "Through Glass" you really should.

Let the sound of aluminum bats be heard as the road to Omaha begins tomorrow

It's now that time of year where I as a college sports fan can acknowledge attending Rice without my fellow sports fans chuckling or instantly feeling pity. Tomorrow begins the NCAA baseball tournament where 64 teams will battle for 8 sports at Rosenblatt Stadium in Omaha, Nebraska for the college world series. Due to the nature of the tournament with 16 regional sites and utter chaos ongoing. I am only going to cover four of them. Of course I will follow the results here at Reckling Park in Houston and the results in Norman, OK since the winners of these regionals will face each other in the Super Regional round. I will also provide coverage of the Fayetteville, AR regional, featuring Oklahoma State, Oral Roberts, and Arkansas as teams of interest, and the Atlanta, GA regional to follow Vanderbilt's progress since the only consistent readers and providers of entertaining comments of this futile attempt at a blog both have ties to Vandy.

Full regional previews will be added tonight when I have my statistics to work from.

Song Lyric of the Day
"Got a beat-up glove, a homemade bat, and brand new pair of shoes
You know I think it's time to give this game a ride.
Just to hit the ball and touch 'em all, a moment in the sun
It's gone and you can tell that one goodbye!"
John Fogerty -- "Centerfield"