Keith Bryant, Funny Duke Girl Troll Hard Tuesday

UPDATED: 3:31pm to fix embarrassing mascot mistake.

So in case you aren't aware of these things, 4-star class of 2013 DT Keith Bryant is the biggest troll since Steve Jobs. After committing to the University of Miami football team awhile back and then subsequently de-committing, Bryant then proceeded to lure, hook, reel-in, and then eat for brunch Hurricanes fans with his teasing tweets and contradicting stories to different reporters. It was reported a few days ago that Bryant was down to FSU and some SEC school and that Miami was out of the picture; however, now it has been tweeted by this guy that Bryant will receive an in-home visit by UM coach Al Golden. Also, Bryant's twitter home page describes him as a "cane commit" and he tweeted at ~12:30 "Bruh you know it's a cane thing". Most Canes football fans have learned to stop worrying about Bryant's antics by now, yet no doubt many will read too much into this high school senior's latest social media debauchery. It's time that we all recognize Bryant as the needy, attention-seeking little girl that he is.

Speaking of needy, attention-seeking girls, the internet remembered today that it hates Duke and learned that it has a slight appreciation now for the University of Miami. The Deadspin article regarding this is here and I highly recommend that you read it. Basically, a Duke graduate and Miami grad student goes to Miami-Duke game in all Blue Devil gear, sits in the student section with her other disrespectful "friends", gets deservedly heckled by a group of excellent, university-representing Lambda Chi Fraternity brothers, has a sad, and then whines about it in an article published by Duke's deplorable student newspaper. Among other things, this chick goes on about how a private University violated her 1st Amendment rights. I'm not even going to point out here that she's wrong, so let's take pride in this people! Oh, and Deadspin referred to our student section as "Miami bros." This letter is pretentious, unsupported, assuming, and absolutely hilarious, and I suggest you read it for the good laugh. Basically what's to be learned here is that the LC guys deserve some epic reward and should be commended for their great work as Hurricanes sports fans. Keep on hitting with those noodles, boys.

Oh, and if you missed the Duke game by some horrible chance, here is an excellent summation of it. Seriously, click on this.

Canes Hoops Ranked 14th in Latest Poll, Cameron Wake Gets Sack in Pro Bowl

Let me get this out of the way real quickly before anyone yells at me for even mentioning the Pro Bowl: Cameron Wake got a sack. This is awesome because Wake is awesome. Otherwise, nothing to see here.

Seriously though, I think everybody would enjoy the Pro Bowl more if it was a week after the Super Bowl and merely consisted of all of our favorite players going extremely hard at an intensive game of flag football. This is not a slight on the way Roger Goodell and the NFL are handling contact and injuries, I'd just really like to see this happen.


Ok, now on to more Canes hoops news. Miami jumped lots of spots to #14 in the AP poll and #15 in the USA Today Coaches' poll. While I'm aware that I should be happy because of such a high ranking for our usually inept Hurricane basketball team, I took great offense to being ranked behind teams such as Ohio State, Butler, Gonzaga, and Oregon. And good lord why are we ranked behind Michigan State? We have a better record, better SOS, better RPI, more quality wins, and OH YEAH THAT'S RIGHT WE BEAT THEM HEAD TO HEAD. This is why I have no hope for America. If our colors were gag green and we had Tom Izzo as our coach we'd be ranked freaking #1 right now. The only good news about this is that I'll take anything that keeps our team hungry

Sorry about going into personal mode. I won't refer to the Canes as "we" anymore. Ok, I probably will.

I'm aware that college basketball rankings mean less than the points in Who's Line is it Anyway? BUT RESPECT NARRATIVE! Alright, I'm done ranting. Go Canes.

Canes Thrash Noles, Improve to 6-0 in ACC

Well, the Miami Hurricanes are good at basketball. I guess this is a thing now.

In front of a second-straight sold out crowd of nearly 8,000 fans Sunday night, the Hurricanes improved to 15-3 in impressive fashion, stifling their bitter rivals Florida State University 71-47. In a game largely decided by a large run at the end of the first half, the Canes continued their domination in Coral Gables (9-0 at home) and clearly fed off of another hostile environment (albeit a slightly lesser one than the Duke game Wednesday night).

Trey McKinney-Jones led all scorers with 15 points, saying "please" before nailing every Ray Allen corner 3 and "thank you" after every crushing dunk or spot-up jumper. Shane Larkin, part hobbit, grabbed 9 boards to go along with 6 assists, 8 points, and some suffocating D on arguably FSU's best player, Michael Snaer. The rest of the team followed these two's lead in good fashion, playing great drive-and-dish offense and rotation defense. Except for a 6 minute period without a FG in the middle of the first half, Miami pretty much played a perfect game, winning virtually every aspect of the contest against the Seminoles.

Speaking of Michael Snaer, the Seminole's "superstar" was held to a measly 4 points thanks to great defense by Larkin and Durand Scott and a general fear of shooting the three, a surprising outing for the usually-annoying sniper. Held to 18 minutes after getting in some foul trouble in the 1st, Snaer was left mostly useless on the floor, allowing Ian Miller to be the token Nole that had a decent game.

The game was pretty much over in the first half, and the crowd morphed into a semi-caring force that would only get up and loud for the now-common sight of a Tonye Jekiri, Kenny Kadji, Julian Gamble, or McKinney-Jones alley-oop. The student section then amused themselves by throwing out an assortment of "F@#% The Seminoles," "Safety School," and "Na-na-na-na" chants sparingly as the minutes waned down. Snaer gave out a few Kendrick Perkins looks, that huge Ojo character smiled a bit like Joe Flacco after an interception, and then the game was pretty much over.

Expect the Hurricanes to be ranked anywhere from 8 to 13 come tomorrow. This is exciting stuff, folks.

He's waited 6 years for this folks.

Miami-Florida State Basketball PREVIEW

There is honestly no better way to kick off this new blog with a preview of the latest installment of one of the greatest rivalries in college sports, Miami-Florida State. After a come-from-behind win over Clemson topped by a Michael Snaer game-winning 3, the Seminoles (11-7, 3-2 ACC) head to Coral Gables to face the red-hot #25 Hurricanes (14-3, 5-0 ACC), coming off of a packed-house whopping of #1 Duke Wednesday night. If y'all are having trouble remembering 90-63 Hurricane Andrew-esque destruction of the Blue Devils, I'll just remind you that this happened:

Then this happened:

And then this happened:

But now the Hurricanes must regroup and continue their conquest for ACC domination against their most hated rivals Sunday at 6pm in the Bank United Center, four days after arguably the biggest win in the school's basketball history. Usually teams come out a bit flat after a season-defining win like the Canes had against the Dukies, but thanks to convenient scheduling Miami should come out fired up against their rivals.

On the flip side of the coin, however, Florida State should also come out like somebody shot their dog and the high-emotions will probably keep the game closer than the talent disparity suggests. Led by senior guard Michael Snaer and sophomore Terry Whisnant II, the Seminoles will most likely be looking to beat the Hurricanes the same way Arizona did in the Diamond Head Classic in Hawaii over the Holidays: overcoming the Canes' solid perimeter defense by merely shooting threes over them and penetrating the lane. Mark Lyons shot 7-12 in that game and scored 19, and Snaer will be looking to have a similar output if he wants even the remotest chance of stealing a victory down in South Florida.

However, the Canes have also been out-rebounded 92-120 (according to State of the U) in their three losses this season, and with the return of big man Reggie Johnson and the excellent rebounding efforts of Julian Gamble, Kenny Kadji, and Tonye Jekiri, Miami should easily handle Florida State's big men on the boards. 

So expect Shane Larkin to do that thing where he breaks someone's ankles before spotting up and draining a three, Kenny Kadji to easily out-maneuver lesser athletes down low, and Reggie Johnson to slowly come back to playing shape and dominate the 'Noles down low with Julian Gamble. I don't expect this to be too much of a problem for the Canes once emotions calm down and the game gets settled in, so I predict a nice 72-59 little thrashing of our lovely rivals. Expect a top-15 ranking for the Hurricanes when polls come out Monday. 

Tickets have sold out for the second game in a row and the third time BUC history, so if you're not a student and not going to the game make sure to tune into ESPNU at 6pm.