— Florida 79, Auburn 73
Auburn led 46-38 at halftime.
Florida has now won 11 games in a row.
Walter Clayton scored 34 points, the first 30+ point game in a Final Four since Carmelo Anthony, 22 years ago.
Gators are in the national title game for the first time since 2011.
Average age of Auburn’s starting 5 is a year younger than the starting 5 for the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder.
— Houston 70, Duke 67
Houston ended the game on an 11-1 run.
Cougars shot 10-22 on arc, out-rebounded Duke, 42-31.
LJ Cryer scored 26 points for Houston.
Florida-Houston play for the national title Monday night.
— I think there is opportunity in betting baseball totals, over/under for runs in a game, so I chart umpires. In couple weeks, when we gather some more numbers, I’ll be posting stuff about umpires several times a week.
Friday night in Anaheim, Clint Vondrak had the plate for Guardians-Angels; if this was 2026 and the challenge system existed, there would have been a lot of challenges. Just about every marginal pitch went the hitters’ way.
Last year, over was 19-11 when Vondrak worked the plate; so far this season; his two games behind the dish ended 10-6/8-6. This will be interesting to follow.
— I won’t embarrass myself by telling you how many times I’ve watched Moneyball, but I had it on the other night, and decided to look up Art Howe’s record as a manager.
He managed the A’s for seven years, went 296-189 the last three years, but lost 3-2 in playoff series all three years. Winning 91-102-103 games three years in a row is really good.
He obviously had the falling out with Billy Beane and bolted the A’s for the Mets, where he went 66-95/71-91 in two years, before they told him to take a hike.
In Moneyball, they made Howe look overweight, his character looked like Whitey Herzog, not Art Howe; he was a big league infielder for 11 years, hit .260. Pretty good athlete.
— Arizona Diamondbacks put 2B Ketel Marte on the IL (strained hamstring); sounded like the injury was fairly significant.
— Famous birthdays, April 6th:
John Ratzenberger, 78
Bert Blyleven, 74
Marilu Henner, 73
Sterling Sharpe, 60
Bret Boone, 56
Paul Rudd, 56
Tim Hasselbeck, 47
Spencer Dinwiddie, 32
— Mets 3, Blue Jays 2
Toronto led 2-0 in the 8th inning.
Jesse Winker tied the game with a 2-run triple.
Francisco Lindor’s sac fly was the 7th walk-off RBI of his career.
— Marlins 4, Braves 0
Cal Quantrill threw five shutout innings.
Matt Mervis homered twice for the Marlins.
Atlanta is off to a 1-8 start.
— Reds 11, Brewers 7
Cincinnati scored 14 runs Monday, 11 runs in this game.
In the four games in between, they scored a total of 2 runs, in four games.
TJ Friedl went 4-5, scored twice, had two RBI
— A’s 7, Rockies 4
Colorado led 3-1 after the fifth inning.
Jacob Wilson hit a 2-run double; earlier in the day, he hit into a triple play.
A’s are 4-2 on the road, 0-3 at home.
— In his 11 NBA seasons, Sacramento Kings’ G Zach LaVine has played in only four playoff games, the fewest of any player in the last 25 years amongst players who’ve averaged 20+ points/game.
— Word of the Day: kakistocracy- Government by the least suitable or competent citizens of a state.
— Stock market went down a combined 3,910 points Thursday/Friday; maybe we shouldn’t have elected a convicted felon president of the country, since he doesn’t seem to care much if the country succeeds or fails, he just wants to play golf.
One question before I go; how come Russia doesn’t have any tariffs?
(If you’re annoyed that I mentioned this, too bleepin’ bad. It would be nice if this country remained a democracy, I’d like to think you at least agree with that)
