Preview: A Cold, Empty Nothingness In Your Heart Comment Count

Brian

HOCKEYBEAR IS—AW, HAMBURGERS THAT'S NEXT WEEK

wasteland_v2_by_radecke The Essentials 

WHAT You vs A Weekend Without Michigan Sporting Events
WHERE The Depths Of Your Existential Dread, Pancreas, TX
WHEN An irritatingly persistent feeling that serves as a preview for the Long Dark after the Frozen Four
THE LINE Existential Dread -7
TELEVISION Versus (Versus will televise anything)

Flipping Through The Channels, Finding Nothing But Clippers Games

(And the Final Four, I guess)

Record. 10-10, 5-5 in conference. Everything this weekend is a nondescript defensive battle between teams too bad to be exciting and too good to be interesting. Both teams wear grey, and Ricky Davis is nowhere in sight.

Previous meetings. Last summer this was a merciful end. The prospect of being required to watch nothing except half-full NBA arenas that double as Ambien for their attendees was sweet relief after football and basketball imploded and hockey only narrowly avoided doing so.

Dangermen. You're really going to want to watch out for old baseball/football/hockey cards (17-27-44), especially that Tim Cheveldae rookie card you thought was going to be worth thousands by now. They will remind you of a time when even bits of cardboard with pictures of people on them were endlessly fascinating. Remembering this could lead into other reveries, like the first time you saw a boob on pay cable, that can only go downhill from there.

Goalie and defense and whatnot. Alcohol, probably. Hang on to the "previous meetings" factoid. It will help to remember that the alternative to feeling lost and alone after relevant sporting events cease is feeling like that all the time. Wait, that doesn't help at all.

Special teams. Their power play is better than Michigan's, I tell you what!

You Versus The Dread Sports Distracts You From

Good luck with that, buddy. You may even find yourself bowling. You hate bowling.

Scandals are pretty much sports too. Jim Tressel, man.

When in doubt.

HOCKEYBEAR IS GO ANYWAY

The Big Picture

Next Thursday and, God willing, Saturday are the Frozen Four. The methadone of spring practice and the spring game-type-substance will provide a gentle glide path into May, but at that point you're just waiting for September. Prepare.

Comments

Other Chris

April 1st, 2011 at 1:08 PM ^

For the women's gymnastics regionals tomorrow night, eh?

Or at the Fish for the series against Indiana?

Or at Oosterbaan tonight for lax?

There are Michigan sports everywhere, if you keep an open mind!

UMGooch

April 1st, 2011 at 1:09 PM ^

Yesterday, I was so pumped to watch the Frozen Four actually televised in Florida with my beloved Wolverines. I had told a bunch of fellow Michigan alumni at work to "watch the game tonight!" We had the storm from the depths of Hades all day yesterday, so I wouldn't feel guilty perched in front of my television watching HD college hockey and pretending I still lived in the Great White North. As I clocked out from work, I double checked the start time only to find out that it was next week they are playing. I April Fools'd'ed myself.

tl;dr: fail.

zlionsfan

April 1st, 2011 at 6:04 PM ^

on whether you prefer online or offline play and how often you're willing to buy a new game.

Because if you prefer online play, then even those seasons end, usually in a sizeable group and without much warning, the assumption being that you don't care because of course you keep buying the same game every year ...

Cosmic Blue

April 1st, 2011 at 2:45 PM ^

hopefully they will carry through till june

i have no idea what to expect from this team tho. with the current slew of injuries its hard to predict anything. i'd really like to see pav and howard back for a few games before the playoffs start. that game against the blues was soul-dong punch worthy

zlionsfan

April 1st, 2011 at 6:09 PM ^

but multiple injuries at goalie are a bad thing. Most teams would struggle throwing their #2 out night after night ... when you're down to a #3, no matter who it is, that's a problem, especially with the division title still up for grabs.

If it's "just" another run to the conference semis, it'll be a little disappointing, but things have been much worse, and there's been more than enough recent success to get me through the bad times, should they actually come back.

pasadenablue

April 1st, 2011 at 1:44 PM ^

How about some love for cricket????

 

World Cup championship is Friday, 5 AM Eastern.  Directv is showing it on some channel, and its also streaming online (see myp2p.eu for links).

 

 

GOOOOOOOOOO INDIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

stubob

April 1st, 2011 at 1:51 PM ^

Speak for yourself, but End of Basketball == Start of Cycling season on Versus.

This weekend we get the TdF(NTTDF) - Tour de Flanders, prelude to Paris-Roubaix. Then the big tours start: California, Suisse, France. Looking forward to Tour "de" California not being a rainy mess like it has been every other February.

smwilliams

April 1st, 2011 at 1:55 PM ^

Just to sum up what exactly occurs during that HOCKEYBEAR video...

- Giant bear is unfrozen from his prison beneath the sea.

- Giant bear manufactures giant hockey stick out of pure electricity

- Uses said hockey stick to cut a cruise ship in half, murdering hundreds of innocent people

- Fighter pilots in giant bear's army blow up the campuses of Miami (NTM), Ohio State, and Michigan State, killing thousands.

- Lead bear fighter pilot drops several nuclear bombs into active volcanoes, thereby blowing up the planet Earth (killing billions this time), the force of which causes him to travel to a parallel universe and land in Carlson Arena in Fairbanks, Alaska where he fires a slapshot before the game even begins that explodes the goal.

I think the NCAA needs to come down hard on Fairbanks using a genocidal bear as one of their top-6 forwards.

Tha Quiet Storm

April 1st, 2011 at 2:36 PM ^

"Dangermen. You're really going to want to watch out for old baseball/football/hockey cards (17-27-44), especially that Tim Cheveldae rookie card you thought was going to be worth thousands by now. They will remind you of a time when even bits of cardboard with pictures of people on them were endlessly fascinating. Remembering this could lead into other reveries, like the first time you saw a boob on pay cable, that can only go downhill from there."

Damn you Brian get out of my head!!!

BlueDragon

April 1st, 2011 at 2:52 PM ^

The last paragraph about withdrawal is key.  Especially in the summer, when everyone's out exercising and enjoying the weather instead of typing verbose comments on MGoBlog.  If it wasn't for ExpansionFest 2010, I don't know what I would have done for sports news.  (I'm not  much of a baseball person.)

Leaders_and_Best

April 1st, 2011 at 3:28 PM ^

I consider The Wolverine Season Preview issue my major dose of methadone during the summer, even though this here blog does alot of good reporting anyway, I still feel the preview issue helps us all cope.  My dad saved the '97 preview issue and I read the article about Charles every once in awhile to make me feel good.

also, nobody a motorsport fan? Formula 1 and MotoGP are too cool to ignore see:

Drill

April 1st, 2011 at 5:54 PM ^

I don't hate bowling.  I just hate how bad and inconsistent I am at bowling.  I love going bowling though.  I just hate watching myself bowl.  Or throwing the ball down the lane.  Or any of those things.

Hmm... maybe I do hate bowling.

Skiptoomylou22

April 2nd, 2011 at 7:02 PM ^

"...Nothing except half-full NBA arenas that double as Ambien..."

My feelings exactly on the NBA, love the occasional good simile. Only thing is, I think Ambien plays more d.