By Brendan Loy

Dayton’s win over Ole Miss mathematically eliminated Joe Hiegel of Greenfield, Wisconsin from the 6th annual Living Room Times NIT Pool, and now it’s Steve Ivey vs. Rick Boeckler for the pool championship.

If Rhode Island beats North Carolina in tonight’s second semifinal, Ivey, of Greensboro, NC, will win the pool. If the Tar Heels win, Boeckler, of Silver Spring, MD, will stay alive, and the pool will go down to the wire. In that case, Boeckler would win the pool if UNC wins Thursday’s title game, and Ivey would win if Dayton wins.

UPDATE: Overtime!

UPDATE 2: North Carolina wins (in controversial fashion), preventing an all-Atlantic-14 final, and the pool goes down to the wire!

Boeckler is Rebecca Loy’s uncle, and the champion of the 2003 and 2006 Living Room Times women’s NCAA pools. Ivey, a 2005 Kentucky grad, “stumbled on the blog a few years back looking for an online NIT pool to enter.” Every year since 2007, he has entered the Times NIT Pool — and only the NIT Pool — finishing seventeenth out of 93, ninth out of 62, and tenth out of 74, respectively.

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

UConn 90, Florida State 50. Dayton 68, Ole Miss 63. An all-Atlantic-14 NIT final if URI wins. And it’s Ivey vs. Boeckler in the pool.

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

Now underway: UConn-Florida State (NCAAW) – http://bit.ly/aCwAbv – and Ole Miss-Dayton (NIT) – http://bit.ly/c1b25g.

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

F*** Tim Floyd. RT @sevenandsevens: So another school & its unoffending players get penalized as the guilty coach moves on. (via @aglock)

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

Was there a briefcase of cash involved? RT @KNX1070 Former USC basketball coach Tim Floyd has been named new coach at UTEP (via @uscpsycho)

By Brendan Loy

You may notice that my blog has a new masthead, an image of the Denver skyline set against the Rockies. I took the photo Sunday at the Museum of Nature and Science, whose atrium has one of the most breathtaking views of the city you’ll find.

More pics here, including the full panorama shown (in part) in the masthead.

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

“Nobody wants to be the worst team in history, so it is exciting to get 10 wins. But then again, it is 10 wins.” http://bit.ly/96kzKO

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

Coming soon: Venus and Mercury in the post-sunset sky: http://bit.ly/961MKE http://bit.ly/d2L7AS http://bit.ly/cTBTEE http://bit.ly/aCK9SJ

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

RT @midmajority: On 46th St in Indianapolis. Beautiful. http://twitpic.com/1byafi

By Brendan Loy (Twitter/FriendFeed)

CNN Breaking News — Scientists in Geneva mark “new territory” in physics, smashing two proton beams at record high energy rate.

By Brendan Loy

Longtime blog reader and 2004 Notre Dame alum Lauren Taylor of Smyrna, Georgia (a.k.a. NDLauren) is the champion of the 13th annual Living Room Times NCAA women’s basketball pool.

Taylor clinched the pool Monday night — on the first night of the Elite Eight, one of the earliest clinches in LRT history — when Stanford beat Xavier on a Tyus Edney-like buzzer beater by Jeanette Pohlen. Earlier, Taylor had taken a commanding lead when #4-seed Baylor advanced to the Final Four — just as she, alone among the 65 pool contestants, predicted.

There are three main reasons Taylor was able to clinch so early: her bold Baylor pick, the near-unanimity of the field in picking UConn as the national champ (and, to a slightly lesser extent, Stanford as the runner-up), and the numerous upsets that have kept every top-2 seed except UConn and Stanford out of the Final Four, thus eliminating most competitors’ opportunity to gain further points.

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