Zach Dotsey

First off, happy birthday to my brother, Adam Dotsey, who turned 27 today!  Today also marks Milly’s nine month birthday and we noticed that her left front top tooth is poking through the gums now.

Duke beat Georgia Tech in another grinder, 65-61, to secure their ninth ACC Tournament championship in twelve seasons.  They also secured the third one seed in the NCAA Tournament.  Some are saying they’ve got an easy road to the Final Four, but some Duke fans are worried about a possible matchup with an inconsistent Louisville team.  I’m also hearing complaints about Kansas and Kentucky, the top two one seeds, having too tough of a road.

Kentucky won their conference title today, too.  I saw that it was near the end of a close game in which UK had been trailing to Mississippi State, so I switched the channel just in time to see the final sequence of regulation, where Kentucky hit a foul shot then got off a tip-in at the buzzer to tie the game.  They ended up winning in OT.

Anyway, it was another exciting day of basketball, and I talked to my dad and Uncle Roy a bit about it.  I don’t really know what to expect in the Tournament.

One thing that irritates me is that the Heels are a four seed in the NIT.  I don’t know that they deserved that, but a lot of people said the NIT would do it because they’re a draw, and they’d want to make some money.  I hope they lose in an embarrassment in the first round, which is against William & Mary.

Amanda and I helped with Grow Zone today.  We still haven’t decided what to do, what with them going to needing to volunteer every Sunday before long.  I had a lot of fun in there, playing with the kids today.  We also moved Milly back into the cruisers room, where she did fine for the first service she was in there for, but got fussy in the second one.  Fortunately, the second service is when Amanda and I volunteer, and Amanda was able to get Milly after helping sign kids in.

Adam came over for dinner tonight.  Amanda fixed the ham, potatoes, asparagus and cream cheese sauce thing and we devoured it.  Adam got to spend some good time with Milly and even helped feed her and put her down for a nap.

Zach Dotsey

The weather was pretty nice today, but I stayed in and watched basketball for most of it.  Duke beat Miami in a 1 versus 12 seed where the 12 seed just wouldn’t go away.  Duke won the game 77-74.  It wasn’t a great game, but survive and advance, right?

Georgia Tech beat our NC State in another close game.  The Wolfpack might have won but they were bringing the ball up while down three when Javi Gonzalez dribbled the ball off his foot and someone (Derrick Favors I think?) grabbed the ball and went for a fast break.  Gonzalez grabbed his jersey to stop him, but then he held on so that Favors (or whoever) spun around on the floor.  It was a very obvious intentional foul and warranted the technical foul assessed to State and they ended up losing by three.  Who knows?  I’d rather Duke face State to get revenge for the loss earlier in the season, plus I tend to root for North Carolina teams (except North Carolina) when they’re not playing Duke.

In other conference tournament news, Purdue, the sixth ranked team in the country, scored only 11 points in the first half of their game against Minnesota and Ohio State needed double overtime to beat Illinois.

Amanda went out to Olive Garden again with the small group girls.  Milly and I stayed behind and hung out, playing a bit and watching basketball.  I didn’t bother putting her down for her late nap because she was mostly in a good mood, but I did give her a bath and feed her early.  Bath time with Milly is so much fun because she enjoys herself so much.  She’ll just sit in there and splash around while making noises, and she’d probably be happy to do it all night.

On the matter of feeding Milly and putting her to bed early, I thought it would be a good idea because tomorrow we set the clocks back for daylight savings time.  She’s usually in fed and in bed by 8:00 or so, but tonight I had her down a little after 7:30.  Hopefully that will help her adjust.

Zach Dotsey

Conference tournament upsets continue.  As of today, Duke is the only top ACC team still in the tournament, and Virginia gave them all they wanted for the first half of the game.  Maryland, the second seed in the tournament, lost to Georgia Tech.  The Yellow Jackets can be decent, but it was a bit of a surprise.  Then Miami and NC State beat Virginia Tech and Florida State, respectively, which was a pretty huge shock.  Both of those teams have been sitting pretty snugly at the bottom of the ACC for some time, but here they are playing in the quarterfinal games tomorrow.  Duke should have a pretty good go of the rest of the tournament.  They’ll face Miami tomorrow then the winner of Georgia Tech and NC State.  The smart money’s on Georgia Tech, but I’d like Duke to get a revenge match for the beating the Wolfpack gave them earlier this season.  Either way, like I said, Duke should win the ACC and lock up a #1 seed for the NCAA Tournament.

So, it’s gotten to the point where we pretty much have to put the dogs’ and cat’s water bowl up on the table any time Milly is out and about.  She heads straight over for it and really enjoys putting her hands in it.  I think I mentioned that yesterday, but it literally happens whenever she’s awake now.  Sucks for the animals- they’ve complained about it some.

We went over to Nick and Amy’s tonight for dinner and games.  Amanda and Nick were a little burned out on Puerto Rico so we introduced them to Wits & Wagers (Amy and I each won a game) then played Yahtzee, which I won over Amanda by six points.  I think it was Amanda who mentioned what time it was when we were going to start the second game as an argument for not playing Puerto Rico, but Yahtzee probably took twice as long.  We had a good time with them, as is the norm.

Zach Dotsey

Today was a special day, officially marking the start of March Madness for 2010.  Well, some conferences had already started their tournaments, but in particular the ACC Tournament started today at noon.  I was excited to watch what I could, but I had a pretty full slate including a meeting today.

I will say that there have been a lot of upsets so far.  I think the lower seed advanced in all the ACC games except one, that being Carolina.  I’ll give them this though- they actually played pretty well in the first half and had up to a twelve or so point lead over Georgia Tech, who had already swept the Heels in the regular season.  Georgia Tech came out pretty strong in the second half though, and I figured once it got close that they’d pull through and win, which they did.

Syracuse, Villanova and Pittsburgh, all Big East teams, were all upset today too.  I just hope all the upsets stop by noon tomorrow, when Duke plays Virginia (who upset Boston College).

On the subject of Duke, they got a verbal commitment from Michael Gbinije (ben-ee-jee?) today.  He’s part of the 2011 class and is currently rated as one of the top 15 player in the country.  Congrats to both him and Duke University!

Billy Supplee and Cyra Sherburn came over for dinner and The Office tonight.  I was in the middle of changing Milly when they got here, but she had gotten up and wandered off before I  put a diaper back on her, so we let her greet them at the door like that.  This may sound funny, but it’s so cute when she’s crawling around on the floor with her tiny bare butt.

Speaking of Milly crawling around, I’m looking forward to a time when we can get her a kiddie pool.  Every time she goes to the kitchen she heads for the water bowl.  She likes to put her hand in it and splash it around a little.  That girl loves the water, so I think it’s good that she’ll be growing up going to the beach a lot.  That’s the plan anyway.

A few weeks ago, Seth and Dana Holloman turned me and Amanda on to an iPhone/iPod app called Words with Friends.  It’s basically online Scrabble.  Amanda and I had a really close game going, but she won in the end.  That was my first loss.  So far I’ve beaten a random player and Dana and lost to Amanda.  I think I’ll beat Seth and Ben Lambeth, who also has the game.  Amanda and I started a new game tonight and we’re also both playing Billy.  No idea how those game will go yet.

Zach Dotsey

What a great night, and there are so many things that were great about this game.

I’ve been amped about the Carolina at Duke game since yesterday.  Going into it, I knew that Duke should win the game handily, and that it could be a blowout, but I figured we wouldn’t be that lucky.  I thought Carolina would hang around for a bit.  In reality, Carolina scored the first single point then Duke killed them from there.

• Michael Mercer, my brother-in-law and UNC fan, told me he was giving me two Duke wins over Carolina for my birthday.  It was a nice touch for him to make the margin of victory on this one the same as the age I just turned: 32.
• The worst loss Roy Williams has ever had was 33.  So close!
• I said beforehand that if Duke beat the largest margin of victory in the series (37, by Carolina many, many years ago) that I’d shave my face.  I thought it was going to happen, but it did not.
• Duke scored more in the first half (53) than Carolina scored the entire game.  That means Duke could have not scored at all in the second half and still get the win.  Think about how crazy that is.
• In the first half, Brian Zoubek had more rebounds by himself than the entire Tar Heel team.
• This was Carolina’s worst loss since 2002 (to Maryland) and the fewest points scored in a game since 2003 (to Duke).
• This was the worst loss by a defending NCAA champion since 1990.
• Duke set a school record for home wins in a season with 17.  All but one of those was by double digits, and the one that wasn’t was an out of conference game.
• Duke tied Maryland for the ACC regular season title but is the #1 seed in the ACC Tournament next week.
• Carolina has secured a #10 seed for the ACC Tournament, their lowest ever.
• Duke is being discussed as being the probable fourth #1 seed for the NCAA Tournament.  It helps that Kansas State lost today.
• It was Senior Night for Jon Scheyer, Brian Zoubek and Lance Thomas.  Coach K was emotional during the Senior Day celebrations, which they showed before the game.
• The Presbyterian fan who was kicked out of a Carolina game by Roy Williams for mild heckling was in attendance.

So it was a good night, as you can see.

We started the day going to Cracker Barrel for breakfast.  Actually, the day started earlier than that.  Bruce kept getting up and going downstairs to bother Karen and Milly woke up and cried a bunch around 1:00.  Maybe she’s teething again, because she was very fussy today.  She didn’t like being put down for naps, and when she did nap it wasn’t for long.  She wasn’t a fan of going to sleep tonight either, although she seemed to go out (or at least quiet down) pretty soon after I shut her door.

Anyway, Cracker Barrel.  We went to Wal-Mart after that to pick up a few things and Karen took off when we got home.  Amanda actually napped on the couch, which is very much a rarity.  I went out to pick up some chicken for our enchilada dinner tonight (we forgot to get it at Wally World) and to drop off the recycling.  I took a huge amount of paper recycling that had built up over a few years.  There were some slips of paper at the bottom of it that had been used for Balderdash, and I can’t remember the last time we played that.

Around 5:00 Amanda started getting things ready for tonight.  Blake and Stephanie Konny came over around 6:30 for dinner.  Since there was time, we went ahead and introduced them to Puerto Rico.  It didn’t go well for me and Amanda.  Blake won, followed by Stephanie then Amanda then me.  That’s okay though, because the game came on before we finished and I’ll admit I was a little distracted.  (Not that that’s why I lost.)  I did DVR the game, and I plan on watching it again.  It really was fun.

Zach Dotsey

When I went to get Milly up this morning, I found her standing in her crib with her Duke pacifier in her mouth.  We leave a few pacis in the crib so she can easily find one if she needs it in between the time we put her down and the time we get her up, plus she tends to knock some out of the crib during the night.  Anyway, with Duke’s big game to clinch the outright #1 spot in the ACC this season looming large tonight, I thought maybe it was a good sign.

I was wrong.  Maryland came out pretty strong in the first half and Duke trailed by 14 early, but they got it within two points at the half then the two teams traded small leads and ties for most of the rest of the game with Maryland ending up on top.  Can’t hate too much- Maryland’s a good team with loud (if classless) fans.  On top of that, it was senior night for them and the were pretty amped up.  If both teams win their next game (which they should, facing Carolina and Virginia) they’ll tie for regular season conference champs.  Oh well.

Seth Holloman came over to watch the game with us.  We might go over to his place on Saturday night to watch Duke and Carolina.  Amanda had forgotten about the game and invited Blake and Stephanie Konny over for dinner.  I’ll be watching it one way or another, it’s just a matter of where.

I can’t remember if I mentioned it the other day or not, but Milly will sometimes share her puffs now.  If she picks one up and you open your mouth near her, sometimes she’ll put her tiny fist in your mouth to try to drop it off.  She did that again with me today, and yesterday she was putting her paci in my mouth.  It’s so cute.

What’s not so cute is the three poops she had today.  Just thought I’d throw that in there.

Zach Dotsey

We decided on going to The Oceanic for breakfast this morning.  Three of us ordered the French toast but Amanda decided to be different and ordered eggs Benedict.  Milly and Graelyn were both very good, though Milly has gotten to the stage where she thinks it’s fun to drop something on the floor and watch you pick it up for her… repeatedly.

When we got home I dozed a bit, and I think Ben did too.  Other than that he and Jessica got things ready to go and took off around 1 or 1:30 I think.  It was so great to be able to spend the weekend with them.  I we talked about getting them down here again in July.

Amanda and I watched a bit of TV and I played some Empire Total War, which runs so much better on the new laptop than it did the last laptop or the desktop.  Around 6:30 I ran out to the store to return District 9 and pick up a couple things from the grocery store, but the Redbox machine was out, so I went to Wal-Mart to do that and pick up a couple things I hadn’t already gotten (since I bought the other stuff before remembering that I needed to return the movie).

Wally World was fine until I got to the checkout line.  I know it tends to get busy on Sunday nights, but I have never seen such long lines at Wal-Mart.  I literally waited 20 minutes to buy dish detergent, baby oatmeal and some puffs.  What got me really irritated is that I, of course, picked a slow-moving express lane, which I dealt with okay, but then they opened up a lane next to mine when I was the next person in line.  That would have been fine too, but the people in front of me had a bunch of items (the express lane being for people with 20 items or less) and took forever.  And by the time I noticed the next lane over was open, literally everybody behind me had already shifted over to it.  It just really irritated me, particularly since I was expecting to be gone for ten minutes tops and I ended up being gone for over an hour, a good chunk of it wasted waiting in line.  I would have just returned the movie and left, but I didn’t notice the line until I’d gotten my stuff already.

The rest of the night was better though.  Milly was happy to see me when I got home and the Duke game at Virginia was about to come on.  Amanda warmed me up some steak and green beans while I fed Milly then we watched the first half together.  Amanda was beat, so she went to bed at the half.  Duke had a good lead at that point already, having started on a 20-4 run.  There were mostly bench players on the court for the Blue Devils with about eight minutes left in the game and by the end it was all bench and reserves.

Duke won it 67-49, though the game wasn’t even that close since, like I said, the starters were out for a good portion of the second half.  I’ll give Virginia some credit though- they were without their star player, Sylven Landesberg.  Still, it was a good win for Duke, especially on a weekend where so many top teams got beat.  Purdue, which is ranked third, also lost.  They’re down their key player, Robbie Hummel, also, but he’s expected to be out for the season.  This should move Duke to the top four and, if they win out against Maryland and UNC, they should be getting a one seed in the NCAA Tournament.  Really though, they’ve got the same record as the Boilermakers along with a better RPI and strength of schedule, so they should probably have already been in that spot, but whatevs.

Zach Dotsey