NCAA Football Michigan Basketball

Wisconsin is having a fairly easy time of it in today's Big Ten Tournament game against Michigan, but there was one little glitch during the first half, when Badgers coach Bo Ryan got a technical foul for yelling at his own player, Brian Butch:

After Butch was out-played in the paint, Ryan got up off his chair and yelled at Butch. But referee Steve Skiles though Ryan was yelling at him, and gave him a technical foul. Here's how ESPN sideline reporter Erin Andrews explained it:

"Bo Ryan was screaming to Brian Butch, 'Be strong. Stay strong inside.' Skiles thought he was talking to him, and when he came over and explained it to Bo Ryan, he said, 'It wasn't what you said, it was the fact that you stomped your foot.'"

ESPN announcer Steve Lavin said, "That must be a new amendment to the rulebook, no stomping of the feet. We're never going to get through a game if that becomes a rule."

If Ryan actually stepped foot onto the floor while play was in progress, I could understand giving him a technical for that. But if the technical was just for stomping his foot while yelling something to one of his players, well, that's pretty dumb.

I'm a proud graduate of the University of Michigan and part of that pride is the sports tradition. During my time in Ann Arbor Charles Woodson led the Wolverines to a National Championship, the hockey team won a pair of titles and the basketball team, well, I got to see the last year of Ray Jackson and Jimmy King and wonder what might have been if the whole Fab Five stuck around. There's very little that could get me to root against Michigan in any setting.

That includes my beautiful wife, a graduate of a certain school in East Lansing. I love her deeply but that doesn't mean I don't want her Spartans to suffer beatings on a regular basis. My lack of respect for her alma mater reared its head at our very first meeting. I found out she went to Michigan State and, being the smooth lothario that I am, responded, "I went to Michigan, that must mean I'm smarter than you." Somehow I avoided getting a drink thrown in my face and two years later actually convinced her to spend the rest of her life with me and have my children, a trick that even David Blaine would have a hard time pulling off.

Why am I telling you this? Because Dan Shanoff shared the roots of his fanaticism for the Florida Gators on his website today. He roots for them because his Gator-fan wife turned him on to the magic of rooting for a national power after his own collegiate days at Northwestern. It's a great piece and made me think of the one time that my wife got me to root for Michigan State.