how i did my part to spawn an overnight 'net sensation.

(reposted from SummitLeague.blogspot.com

I don't know if I talked about it at length here, but I think I figured out how my video of Eli and Jawz squaring off in a Battle Royale with Cheese was the YouTube video that would launch a thousand blog entries, TV news stories, ESPN conversations, etc.

I think it all started here and here.

Let's go back to the beginning...

Tuesday
6:30 p.m. CDT: (or so): The mascots got ejected for fighting during a timeout.
6:41 p.m. CDT: I post a one sentence entry about the fight to this blog.

Wednesday
12:35 a.m. CDT: I uploaded my video of the fight to YouTube.
2:41 a.m. CDT: I upload a link to the video on this blog.
6 - 11 a.m. CDT: As I'm waiting for my flight home from Tulsa, I sit in the airport and bump around the Internet on my iPhone. Amidst the bumping, I notice I'm getting lots of traffic to this blog. All the hits seem to be coming from Tulsa.Rivals.com. By the end of Wednesday, this blog received 120 hits...a ONE THOUSAND PERCENT INCREASE!
7 p.m. EDT: After a long day of traveling, I go straight to bed once I get home. I don't re-surface until 7 a.m. the following morning.

And to what did I awaken?
* My YouTube video received more than 40,000 hits in about a day and a half
* I got word the Tulsa World ran a story about the brawl, directly citing (and linking to) my YouTube video: "The incident sparked interest Wednesday after a portion of the scuffle appeared on youtube.com, a popular Internet site for viewing, sharing and uploading video content."
* ESPN contacted me to use the video.
* Several local affiliates across the nation broadcast it or portions of other video captured by IUPUI and a Tulsa affiliate.
* It appeared on MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann Thursday night.
* By week's end, the Jawz vs. Eli scuffle has become an all-out Internet sensation...my YouTube video has garnered nearly a quarter-million hits.

Of course, no one knows nor cares about Patient Zero in this entire thing...unless you're Patient Zero. In this case, I am Patient Zero! And I will remind you of that as often as necessary.

Why? Since I stand to gain nary a penny from this whole thing, I feel it's to my best interest to remind the world who broke this thing wide open. This is my Watergate. My Zapruder film. My stained, blue dress. It is my one and only claim to Internet fame and I plan to exploit it so this site may receive more traffic.

Just remember, boys and girls, it was SummitLeague.blogspot.com who broke this story.

EVERYTHING AND EVERYBODY followed me on this one.

Let's not let that minor detail escape, eh?

just how fabulous are these t-birds?

I wonder if somewhere in the Utah desert is a feeling that tonight's game between the Jags and T-birds is something of a vengeance game in the name of Bill Evans.

Evans, the former coach at Southern Utah, was fired shortly after getting knocked out of last season's conference tournament by IUPUI in the quarterfinals.

Truth is, I wonder if Evans would still be coaching there had they not lost that one game. IUPUI was plagued by injuries last season...well, injurY is more like it. Without George Hill, the Jags were a different team; still highly competitive, but you just don't replace a guy like George Hill.

Nevertheless, tonight's game won't be about Bill Evans. For IUPUI, it's getting closer to locking up at least a #2-seed. As it stands, they're two games up on the nearest team (Oakland). With nine games left, IUPUI needs to win seven (right now).

We shall see.

Looking forward to tonight and Saturday. This is all a precursor to the Feb. 16 showdown against Oral Roberts.

If history is any sort of guide, it promises to be a classic. But first, SUU.

yet another blog.

Though it's barely there, I'm starting another blog:

Summit League Hoops

No, it's not going to be Woodward & Bernstein caliber of journalism. I doubt I'll be getting scoops on the teams and such, but maybe I can draw some interest from fans around the conference to get involved a bit and mix it up for fun.

We'll see.