In The Huddle

Here are some of my thoughts from tonight’s Super Bowl XLII…

-You know, I had these crazy thoughts heading into tonight’s game. I pictured it ending like the final moments of some cheesy sports movie. You could see the Patriots, a team of perfect villains (Sorry Pats fans) having a season’s worth of karmic checks being cashed in one delicious come-uppance with a stoic Bill Belichick seeing the error of his ways while a formerly dictatorial Tom Coughlin reaping the rewards of lightening up.

You could see a neglected little brother Eli Manning finally getting the respect of his father and big brother while the icy Gisele tosses her appletini and storms out of the luxury box hoping to go somewhere, anywhere to get the stink of a loser off of her.

I thought that was just Hollywood.

Apparently not.

By the way, just when I thought I had outgrown sports, this happens. Now I’m hooked for another few years. No good I tell you. No good. My fiancé is shaking her head disapprovingly, a sight I’m sure all see for years to come.

-Justin Hite called it. Our intern was the only one with the cajones to pick the Giants and, damn if he wasn’t spot on. Good for him.

-How can you not like Michael Strahan? Seriously, that guy is the straightest shooter in pro sports since Charles Barkley retired. And endearing as hell. I’m not a Giants fan, but I was ready to plop down the cash for Strahan jersey after watching his postgame.

On a related note, our former intern Brian Guiffra used to roll into our office for agate shifts rocking a game-worn David Tyree jersey. Apparently his dad was tight with the Giants receiver or something. But yeah, Brian should wear that every day for about the next month or so. Tyree was a stud.

- I wish the ‘72 Dolphins would go away. Sadly, the Giants made sure we’ll still have to hear from them each time a team takes a perfect record into October. Thanks New York.

-So recently retired Giants running back Tiki Barber goes from voice of reason on a dysfunctional team five months ago to locker room cancer. Yikes.

-I hope when Pennsylvania senator Arlen Spector finds out that the Giants won, he’ll drop this interest in Spygate. I mean, aren’t we at war? Aren’t we in a recession? How about the fact that I can’t flush my toilet because we don’t have enough water? How about the fact that my 401K looks as if it’s headed into that aforementioned toilet? Look into that.

- Quote of the year thus far: “We’re only going to score 17 points? (Laughter) Is (Plaxico Burress) going to play defense?” - Tom Brady.

Hubris, thy name is New England. While you’re reaching for your dictionary, look up schadenfreude as well. It’s relevant.

(For those of you that didn’t see the game, the Giants won 17-14 and Burress caught the game-winning touchdown. You should really watch more TV. I’m not judging, I’m just saying.)

-By the way, the Pats are going to win Super Bowl XLIII. That’s pretty much common knowledge, right? This time next year, the NFL will be scorched earth with Brady, Belichick and the rest of the Pats in full flex. This will happen.

There’s a predictable a tiresome refrain that comes from our neophyte Old North State residents each time a sporting event, usually a high school football game, gets called off because of bad weather. It usually comes from folks from New York, New Jersey, New England, etc. and it usually follows the logic that high school football is superior back there because they play it in all kinds of bad weather, meaning the kids are tougher (as opposed to those pansies that grow up playing football in places like Texas and Florida).

While I disagree with much of that sentiment, there is a grain of truth. Yes, us Southerners aren’t usually fans of winter weather (come talk to us when it’s 90 degrees and 100 percent relative humidity, though).

But anyway, don’t lump N.C. State fans into that crowd.

With snow, or sleet, or freezing rain, or whatever you want to call that mess that was coming down Saturday night, in full throat as fans made their way to the RBC Center for the Wolfpack’s must-win ACC game with No. 21 Miami, more than 12,000 energetic Wolfpack fans kept the RBC Center loud for two halves and overtime.

They left happy as Gavin Grant’s steal and layup gave N.C. State the 79-77 win.

Grant said he was surprised by the turnout. Then the Bronx native proceeded to join in the chorus of those from north of here ridiculing our reaction to the white stuff.

“There were a lot of people here (Saturday night),” Grant said. “I’m from New York where it snows all the time. The first time it snowed while I was down here, it was like an inch and they shut everything down. … I was shocked.”

It’s nothing we haven’t heard before Gavin.

I’ve always thought that writing blog entries (or columns) around a theme like “My new year’s resolutions” and filling them with lines like “I resolve to always pay cash for my performance-enhancing drugs” is a played-out, unoriginal idea. Since my New Year’s resolution was to shy away from played-out, unoriginal ideas, I’m just going to hit with a couple of thoughts from my travels through the area sports world during the past few weeks.

HOOPS HOTBED: Graham and Cummings met in the final of the Times-News Holiday Classic and for fans of high school basketball around here, it was worth the wait. These two teams have been aching to get at each other after last season’s playoff drama and some offseason transfers. Round one of what is sure to be a multi-volume rivalry went to Graham, 80-79. It had all the feel of an epic prep game, dramatic comebacks, clutch shots, no empty seats and heat and humidity approaching that of the Amazon. Basketball season has indeed begun.

Lost In the breathless accounts of the Cavs-Devils rivalry is the success of the Williams boys. The Bulldogs wrapped up the Capital Bank Classic by beating undefeated Western Alamance. That, combined with a win at Cummings, has helped the Bulldogs stake their claim as one of the area’s heavyweights. Don’t get excited about a Graham/Williams showdown, because it won’t happen. You can thank the Mid-State 2-A Conference and the 97 league games the Red Devils have to play for that. But anyway, the Bulldogs are no doubt going to be one of the top teams in the Mid-State 3-A and should be a team to watch come playoff time.

Speaking of teams that look like a million bucks, how about the Graham girls? They won the Don Amos / Mid-Carolina Bank Holiday Classic and have shown no let up from their Class 2-A runner-up campaign last season. Provided there are no Next-Ivory-Latta-McDonalds-All-Americans out there, this team should be the favorite in Class 2-A.

I’M JUST SAYIN’: So Saturday I was at the Meineke Car Care Bowl. In between cranking out what is sure to be award-winning prose, I couldn’t help but notice something disturbing playing out in the club level seats right in front of the press box. It started when I noticed a pair of nice, blond, female Wake Forest fans returning to their seats with what appeared to be red wine. Then I began noticing a couple of other Deacon fans doing the same. Red, white, it was all over the place.

This led to an epiphany regarding college football and beverages. If you feel the need to drink wine at a football game, you do not deserve a good football team.

Ok, I know that sounds harsh. I’m not saying that just because you can appreciate both the spread option and a nice Oregon Pinot that you shouldn’t have a winning program. If you’ve got both, then hey, you’re living right (Personally, it’s my idea of heaven). I’m just saying that, when your team falls on hard times, don’t expect sympathy.

Football is a game of controlled savagery. It is played by athletes would risk significant physical damage to play positions where many times anonymity comes with the territory. In football there is no subtlety. Subtlety is what wine is all about.

Aside from that, it’s the principle of the thing.

A 3-8 season should be washed down with natty light or Kentucky Gentleman (or Pepsi), not Stags Leap. The fans that risk arrest to smuggle in airplane bottles NEED a good team. The ones that pack a corkscrew, don’t.

This is not a knock on Wake fans. There are plenty of college football stadiums around the country, like maybe one a few miles down Highway 54, that would have lines out the door if fans could plop down a few bucks for a glass of a crisp Chenin Blanc.

NO MORE DRAMA: Was it just me or was 2007 one of the most forgettable sports years you can remember? Of course if you had ties to Boston or the University of Florida, it was more fun than Mardi Gras, Spring Break and a Walker Texas Ranger marathon rolled into one. But for the rest of us, it was kind of boring.

The biggest stories for me were steroids, obscenely-rich college coaching deals and an undefeated Patriots team with all the charm of rabies.

I mean, even the championship races in the major sports were pretty much devoid of drama. Did you actually think anyone was going to beat the Spurs, Red Sox or Hendrick boys? Was it a surprise to anyone that Florida slapped Ohio State around twice?

Here’s hoping that 2008 will be more fun. Maybe Dale Jr. will get one track with a new ride. Maybe the Panthers and Hurricanes will return to their championship form. Maybe the new American Gladiators will be better than the original. Then again, maybe not.

Michael Vick, former Atlanta Falcons quarterback and current poster child for all that is wrong with the world, was sentenced to 23 months in federal prison Monday for running a dog fighting ring and executing several dogs on his rural Virginia property.

Accompanying Vick’s sentence, which was five months longer than the maximum length prosecutors recommended, was the usual media uproar.

It ran the spectrum from those who wanted Vick to spend the better part of the next two years locked in a 3×3-foot cage with a really pissed Doberman to those who just wanted it to be a mildly annoyed Doberman.

Now do I agree with the sentence? Sure. The guy has repeatedly said he regrets his bad judgment. Me taking the Panthers and the points on Sunday, that was bad judgment. Electrocuting dogs that don’t perform well, man, that’s just sick.

He deserves everything he gets.

But while the football-crazy public is getting themselves overheated, calling upon the NFL to continue Vick’s punishment with a lengthy suspension after he gets out and words like ‘lifetime ban’ are being thrown around, my mind can’t help but think about Susan Gutweiler.

Who is Susan Gutweiler?

On the night of Oct. 19, 1998 St. Louis Rams defensive lineman Leonard Little celebrated his 24th birthday.

Little got drunk.

He decided to drive.

He ran a red light.

He slammed his car into Gutweiler’s.

The 47-year old mother died the next day.

Little, who had a blood-alcohol level more than twice Missouri’s legal limit, was convicted of manslaughter and spent 90 days in jail. The NFL weighed in, suspending him for eight games.

He returned midway through the 1999 season, amid protests by anti-drunken driving advocacy groups. The protests eventually died down and Little became a productive member of the Rams’ defense, helping the franchise to its lone Super Bowl title.

Three years after Gutweiler’s death, he signed a contract with the Rams worth $17.6 million.

In 2004 Little’s Mercedes was stopped in a neighboring county going 78 mph in a 55 mph zone. He failed three field sobriety tests.

He dodged that DUI charge when his attorneys attacked the procedures of the arresting officers. He was convicted of speeding and got two years of probation.

Little’s contract with the Rams was extended in 2006. He’s battled injuries this season but has recorded 19 tackles and a sack.

That’s it. Ninety days in jail. Eight games. Meanwhile Susan Gutweiler’s husband Bill, is a widow and judging from his second arrest, Little didn’t learn a thing.

I watched a Rams’ game earlier this year in which Little played. He did some good things. The Rams’ fans cheered. The announcers praised the 10-year league vet.

No mention of Susan Gutweiler.

Meanwhile, her son Mike, who was 15 when Gutweiler died, will celebrate another holiday season this month without a hug, a conversation or a home-cooked meal from his mother.

What does this have to do with Michael Vick? Nothing.

Vick won’t get out of prison until the summer of 2009 at the earliest. He has lost untold millions in endorsement money. The Falcons are trying to recoup the millions they paid him.

Twenty-three months after Gutweiler’s death, Little was starting for the reigning Super Bowl champs.

The NFL, with is shield logo, Clint Eastwood-commissioner Roger Goddell and rabid fans, needs to keep that in mind when it thinks about any post-prison discipline for Vick.

If it doesn’t, it runs the risk of the crime of hypocrisy.

Wait, hypocrisy in pro sports?

Yeah, I know.

Do you ever have those moments when you realize that something has fundamentally changed in the world you live in and you’ve been too distracted to notice? You know, when you experience something and you’re left stunned, chewing on this new reality.

I get that each time I see a new 10-gallons-to-the-mile SUV or teenage girls running around the mall in outfits so revealing they’d make strippers blush.

I had one of those moments today when I heard Redskins safety Sean Taylor died from a gunshot wound suffered in a home invaision early Monday.

Taylor, who was 24, was shot by an intruder while his fiancé and baby daughter lay in bed in the family’s Florida home.

Don’t try to make to make too much sense out of this loss because there just isn’t any sense to be found. Someone gunned the man down to either get a piece of his wealth, settle some score or for just no reason at all.

He is the second NFL player do be killed by gun violence in the last year as Broncos cornerback Darrent Williams was murdered last December.

He is one of several high-profile athletes to be the victim of a home invasion recently as NBA players Antione Walker and Eddy Curry were robbed at gunpoint in their homes earlier this year.

These men excelled in athletics, something that is universally valued in our culture. Yet things got so desperate in their communities that they became marked men.

This reminds me of what goes on overseas. Several of the top international soccer stars hail from impoverished countries in South America and Africa. The star athletes have all the money and fame of their American counterparts, but have a greater number of worries.

Kidnappings of relatives in exchange for ransoms are common. Returns home, if they ever do return, involve complex security issues.

Their countrymen, crippled by poverty, have turned their sports heroes into targets.

I guess that’s us now.