After being off for a few weeks due to the dangerous roads and not being able to physically get into the school building, we’re back with your weekend recap. The Superbowl was a snooze-fest and Bad Bunny’s halftime show may have been the most entertaining part  of it. It was great to see the Patriots lose and see our good friend Owen MacMaster team lose the biggest game of the season. Hopefully, now that the best sport is over, we get treated with a great March Madness and good NBA and NHL playoffs, coming up soon. 

Superbowl- The lights were just too bright for New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye. The Superbowl can be described in one sentence. A test for Patriots Quarterback Drake Maye. Drake Maye has shown immense growth throughout the off season last year as well in season this year. After playing 13 games last season Drake Maye could not finish the season with a winning record, finishing with the record of  (4-13). This year the entire record was just about flipped with the new England patriots finishing the season off with the record of (14-3).  Drake Maye is not the only one to blame for their loss, but also just about every player on the offensive line who failed to give Drake Maye more than 2 seconds to throw the ball, resulting in a sack or an incomplete pass every play. After an early game sack by Derick Hall the Patriots were forced to change their offense. But the run game was not very strong for New England either, Bad Bunny supposedly had more rushing yards than the Patriots entire offense, considering he was holding a football for about 90% of the halftime show. The Seahawks took this game over after halftime by a large margin by continuing to apply pressure on Drake Maye until one of the sacks turned into a fumble with Seahawks linebacker Uchenna Nwosu scooping up the ball and running into the endzone with it. Later in the 3rd quarter Derrick Hall hit Drake Maye so hard that Byron Murphy II, (Seahawks nose tackle) jumped on the ball and Seahawks regained possession. The Patriots did show some hope for fans at home when Mac Hollins caught a touchdown in the endzone early in the 4th quarter making the score (19-7).  Although there was still some time for the Patriots to catch up after forcing the Seahawks to punt, Drake Maye threw a catastrophic, game-sealing interception to Seahawks safety Julian Love. Drake Maye learned this game that every little detail counts when you’re trying to win something as grand as the Superbowl. Although Drake and the patriots lost big this year, there is lots of hope for them next year.  

Pitt Basketball- The Panthers hosted the SMU Mustangs Saturday afternoon in the Peterson Event Center looking for just their 3rd acc win this season. They came into the game 2-8 in ACC play while SMU came in at 4-5 and on the right side of the NCAA Tournament bubble. The Mustangs couldn’t afford an upset loss to Pitt. The game started close with Pitt taking an early 5 point lead. Pitt was outrebounding them and getting good shots. SMU wouldn’t go away, going on a late first half run to take a 34-32 lead at halftime. Coming out of the break, SMU went on a dominating 10-0 run to start the second half going up 44-32 with it looking as if they had taken the heart of the Panthers right out of them. It’s like groundhogs day every game; same old second half blown lead by your fellow Panthers. SMU would continue this dominance and even with a few sparks by Pitt late it was never enough to pull off the comeback. Watching Pitt play, I swear takes 5 years off of my life. It’s frustrating and it’s going to continue. Pitt will play #4 Duke Tuesday night in the Pete. This game is going to be a massacre and they might lose by 40 points. This could solidify the end of Capel’s tenure here at Pitt and it sure would be nice to have a new coach.  

Shaler Boys Basketball- Last Friday Shaler Area took on the Talbots. This game meant a lot for both teams. If the Titans won they would have a good chance at a home playoff game and have a higher seed. If the Talbots won they would make the 5A playoffs. One team just wanted it more though from the jump though. The energy was off the meter for the Talbots and Shaler just came out flat forcing bad shots. The Titans offense looked rushed to score on the first opportunity they got instead of swinging the ball more to get a better look. The Titans defense was lazy in the first half with no communication and no physicality. In the second half the Titans again started off rough but a few lineup switches and the Titans offense was moving again. In the second half the Titans scored more than double their points in the first half. But Hampton still kept fighting to maintain their lead. The Talbots ended up beating the Titans 65-56.

College Basketball-

UNC vs Duke- The #11 Carolina Tarheels hosted the #4 Duke Blue Devils in a classic Duke vs UNC rivalry game. Duke came out hot led by rookie sensation Cameron Boozer who ended up posting a double-double with 24 points and 11 rebounds for the blue devils. While UNC fell flat Henri Veesaar was almost non-existent going 0-2 in the first on shooting and

just running cardio out there. So why was UNC still in the game after the 1st half? Caleb Wilson is the answer he was unstoppable all night  with his ability to get the rim and ability to knock down the contested 2 and 3, no one could stop him. After Wilson got going his whole team came alive in the second half slowly cutting into Duke’s 20 point lead. Henri veesaar had a huge much needed half for the Tarheels after his catastrophic first half performance he ended the game with a double-double of 13 points and 11 rebounds. But with a tie game 68-68 the time winding down freshman Derek Dixon drove into the paint bringing in 3 Blue Devils defenders and threw the skip pass to a wide open Seth Tremble in the corner and made the 3 to shock the college basketball world and beat #4 Duke 71-68. The MVP of this game Caleb Wilson ended with 23 points going 8-12 from the field and 1-2 from the 3 putting his dominance on full display. 

Illinois vs Michigan State-  Illinois played a very hard fought game in their overtime loss to the Spartans. Michigan State had the tempo for most of the game but some late shots by the Illini helped get the game to overtime. Andrej Stojakovic’ made some nice buckets to cut into the spartan lead. Jeremy Fears Jr. hit a huge three in the final seconds to go up 2 but after the final shot by Illinois, Jake Davis rebounded the ball, put it up and got fouled. Davis hit both free throws to send the game to overtime. In overtime it was all Michigan State as they went up 6 but in the end the Spartans pulled it out, winning the game 85-82 and picked up a top 5 victory to continue their push to a BIG10 regular season title.