With a win at DePaul tonight, Notre Dame can finish its three-game road trip with a respectable 2-1 record. You wouldn’t have figured on wins at Syracuse and DePaul and a loss at South Florida, but still, 2-1 is 2-1. And so far, so good: Irish lead 11-0!

UPDATE, 12:04 AM: Just got back from bowling. I bowled a 102 and a 120. Oh, and DePaul won, 67-66. Dammit. Forget being ranked; Notre Dame is officially in bubble trouble.

P.S. Black and Green has a good post about the game. Excerpt:

What do you say? A tackle of Colin Falls gives DePaul the go ahead points and Kurz got mauled down low with a chance to win.

First off, let me get my thoughts out about the end. Tory Jackson goes Rambo on the team with a reckless spinning drive that ended up as close to the basket as South Bend. He kicks the ball out to the furthest man only to see Zeller (not 100% sure, I think it was him) heave up a pathetic attempt (it did hit the backboard) which Rob Kurz rebounded with a clear shot. Unbelievable no-call by the officials on a clear foul. Fran Fraschilla had a pretty good analysis of it afterwards, saying officials don’t want to make the call unless its a hack job late. Still, a no-call determines the game every bit as much as calling the foul. Terrible mistake by the men in stripes who called a pretty good game.

What do you do now? 2-4 in close games this year (2-8 last year?). It’s ridiculous to see this team fall late against poor opponents like this. Notre Dame should have won this game after the early 11-0 run…

Where do we go from here? Mike Brey again showed his ineptitude with close games. I hate to place the blame on him, but certainly some is due after horrid performances late the last two years. This stings even more after the pathetic USF performence.

Fire Mike Brey?

Speaking of censorship…

Week 2 of Law School Bowling is tonight. Unfortunately, some teams will not be bowling under the same names they had in Week 1, after a reported crackdown by Student Services on some of the more risqué team names. This was necessary because we’re in freakin’ middle school, apparently.

After the jump, a list of teams that changed their names, reportedly to appease our ridiculously prudish administration.

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Kristy and V had better be grateful they’re not students at Long Island University. If they were, their Hugh Manatee hostage videos could land them in hot water:

Five college students have been stripped of residence hall jobs and are facing campus hearings for making a video that mimics a hostage taking, university officials said Thursday.

In the video, five figures in ski masks speak in crude Middle Eastern accents as they threaten their captive, a rubber duck that serves as the mascot of a residence hall at the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University. …

The video was accompanied by a statement saying it was a joke, but university administrators saw it as insensitive.

My favorite part is this quote: “This is not an issue of free speech, but rather an issue of respect for others and insensitively to acts of violence.” Heh. Yeah, right. Suppressors of free speech never think it’s “an issue of free speech,” do they?

UPDATE: Here’s more from Newsday, which apparently broke the story:

A video by five students at the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University depicting ski-masked “hostage-takers” speaking in cartoonish Middle Eastern accents has drawn condemnations from local Muslim leaders.

The university dismissed the students from their jobs as residence hall assistants in Brookville Hall, saying they had engaged in activity that violated their employment contract and that reflected “insensitivity.”

In the video, which mocks those aired by real-life terrorists, five figures speak in exaggerated accents as they threaten their captive, a rubber duck dubbed “Pete,” according to an account in the student newspaper that knowledgeable campus sources agreed was accurate. The subtext is understood to many on campus: The duck is the mascot for Brookville Hall.

While friends of those who created the film amphasized it was made in jest, Muslim leaders did not see the humor. They acknowledged students’ right to freedom of speech, but said that right carries responsibility.

I always love it when the phrase “freedom of speech” is followed by the word “but.”

The students’ names are Robert Bennett, Bert Estrada, Dustin Frye, Jordan Marmara and Billy McDermott. They’re all seniors. In addition, RubberDuckGate “apparently also cost Brookville Hall’s residence hall director, Kristin Kielczewski, her job.”

According to Newsday, McDermott “said yesterday that Brewington had advised him and the other fired student resident assistants not to comment beyond saying, ‘We’re getting our ducks in a row.’” Heh. Well, at least somebody has a sense of humor.

Anna Nicole Smith dies after being found unconscious in her hotel room, a law enforcement source says. Visit CNN for the latest.

In the wee hours of this morning, I attempted to upgrade my blog from WordPress 1.5.2 to WordPress 2.1. In fact, I did upgrade it, but I’ve now reverted to my pre-upgrade backups (while maintaining the upgraded version in a hidden location on the server) because of several problems that I had with version 2.1. I’m going to post about those problems in the WordPress support forums, but I thought I’d mention them here too, in case anyone has similar problems and googles around to see if others have experienced the same thing. Details after the jump.

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Chris just got called on in ConLaw II, and asked the most on-the-spot question ever in law school — especially at a conservative Catholic school like Notre Dame. In essence, though not in so many words, it amounted to, “So, Mr. Aemisegger… Roe v. Wade: right or wrong?”

Heh.

An anonymous commenter on an earlier post directed my attention to this line from an e-mail that all NDLS students received Tuesday from Student Services:

Finally, with increased technological advancements, please note that iPods, MP3 players, cell phones and any personal digital assistants will not be allowed in classrooms during exams.

Thank you in advance for complying with these guidelines, and please contact me with any questions.

This may seem quite reasonable to outsiders, but you have to understand, Notre Dame Law School makes such a big deal about its “Honor Code,” which is basically a self-enforced set of ethical obligations, that it’s a bit strange to see a policy like this — especially given how many professors give take-home exams, with rules like “once you start, you have eight hours to finish… you’re under the Honor Code.” So, we’re considered totally trustworthy in “take-home” classes, but in classes with scheduled exams, we’re so untrustworthy that we’re not even allowed to have an iPod or cell phone tucked away in a backpack during the exam? It doesn’t make much sense to me.

Anyway, I just fired off an e-mail expressing my opinion on the matter, the bulk of which I’ve reprinted after the jump. I’m curious what my fellow NDLSers think about this. Am I totally out in left field here, or do my objections make some sense?

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My dad says his comments are disappearing. The problem may just be an issue with my parents’ computer, but in light of recent events with the server, I want to be sure. So if anyone’s having any sort of technical problem with the blog, please let me know.

UPDATE: I figured out what was causing the problem. It was the same thing that caused the same problem back in April: a plugin called lr2Spam, which “prevents blind [comment] posting by adding a dynamic hidden field to the form and validating that field when posted.” I forgot that it had caused problems for older browsers, so last night, in the course of tinkering with the blog, I re-activated it. But I can live without it, whereas I can’t live without my dad’s sometimes incomprehensible but always entertaining comments. :) So I’ve, uh, re-de-activated it.

Well, damn. UCLA 70, USC 65, final. The Trojans made a valiant effort — in particular as they hit a barrage of three-pointers in the final half-minute to extend the game — but in the end, the #2-ranked Bruins were too much.

USC jumped ahead early and led for most of the game, but it was a precarious lead from the final third of the first half on. UCLA took its first lead with 5:49 left in the game, then pulled away in the final minutes as the Trojans suffered two referee-induced setbacks that even the Bruin-loving announcers on UCLAradio.com seemed to think were somewhat questionable: an offensive-foul call on Taj Gibson with 2:42 left (for a freakin’ moving screen!!) that knocked the USC freshman phenom out of the game with his fifth foul, and an intentional-foul call on the Trojans in a situation where, well, of course they were intentionally fouling (as all trailing teams will do in the final minute of a game), but it wasn’t clear what was so different about this particular intentional foul that warranted the harsh call. Then again, I wasn’t watching on TV, so I could be wrong, but that was the impression I got from the radio broadcast.

In any event, the refs aren’t the reason UCLA won this game — UCLA’s free-throw shooting is. With the way USC was shooting threes in the final 30 seconds, a few missed free throws could have spelled disaster for the Bruins. But, much to the Trojans’ chagrin, UCLA defied its 63.7% season free-throw shooting percentage and went 11-for-12 from the charity stripe in the final 45 seconds, securing the victory despite the Trojans’ best efforts.

Anyway, you obviously never want to lose to your archrival, but at the same time, there’s no shame in losing a close game to the second-best team in the country on their home floor. USC should not drop out of the rankings for this loss; in fact, they shouldn’t drop at all (though they probably will), because if anything, their performance was better than you’d expect a #21 team to do against a #2 team. And while the pollsters, being inherently irrational and dumb, probably won’t recognize that, the NCAA committee surely will. This loss didn’t hurt USC’s at-large case or seed. If anything, it established once again that the Trojans are a very legit team. These guys can play with anybody, and will be a tough out in March. Especially if Taj Gibson can avoid fouling out… grumble, grumble.

Fight on!!

P.S. Oh, and UCLA? We’ll get you in the Pac-10 tournament, b*tches. Two close losses… the third time will be the charm. We look likely to be a #4 or #5 seed; you look likely to be the #1 seed. So, second round at Staples Center… bring it ON.

UPDATE: Gabe Pruitt is on the same wavelength as me: “Hopefully, we’ll see them in the postseason (Pac-10) tournament.”