Cahoona Forum: What new Irons should the Grappler get?

I've finally made the inevitable decision to give technology a try and dump my trusted Lynx irons. The body has been telling me I'll never be both limber and strong enough (that fabulous combination of youth) again to play forged irons. The happy experience last year of dumping the first-generation Warbird for the new R7 has me ready to (gasp!) spend a few bucks on equipment and relegate the Staff, Parallax and Apex years of my youth to history.

So here goes: what should I get? Casey's Ping vote has already been registered, at length. What about the new Callaway x20? Anybody got Titleists' or Hogans? How about TaylorMade, Mizuno or Cobra? Cheer the ones you like, trash the ones you hate or whine about the set the airline lost.

The second forum topic (no, not that Forum Kirbo, you'll have to stick to Captain Stabbin for your Web thrills) is hybrids. Who's got what? Are they replacing high irons or fairway woods? Who's got the "4 wedge, 5 iron, 3 hybrids and a driver" -style set-up in their bag? How many wedges will Kirby break this year? How many prairie dogs will Dougie beat to death at Chamberlain National this year (and have mounted for the new clubhouse walls)? How the hell can a putter cost $250?

Hole of the Week #31 - The Pines Marsh Hole 3

"A great 4-par that begs for accuracy off the tee. Play to the middle of the fairway and choose your yardage well when playing downhill to this huge green." Do they all say this?

How about: "Hit a perfect drive right down the middle. Then choose the correct club and hit it three feet from the pin. Tap it in and then go drink your birdie beer while your fellow Cahoonas hack up the hole!"

Gophers Poised for a Return to Glory - Or Not

Maybe we'll get to see a decent game or two from Williams now. Lately, FSN has been showing more high school hockey than Gopher B-ball. . .

MINNESOTA HIRES TUFFY SMITH AS NEW HEAD COACH

Joel Maturi's goal when he began looking for a new men's basketball coach was to give the program "a shot in the arm." The University of Minnesota athletic director certainly accomplished that Thursday.

Instead of landing a hot, young coach, Maturi hired Tubby Smith, the current -- but embattled -- coach at traditional college basketball powerhouse Kentucky. Smith replaces Jim Molinari, the interim coach since Dan Monson was fired Nov. 30.

Smith, who arrived in the Twin Cities on Thursday afternoon, will be formally introduced today at noon at Williams Arena. He has agreed to a seven-year contract worth $1.7 million per season, plus incentives for both basketball and academic performance.

Smith won the 1998 national title and went to 10 straight NCAA tournaments at Kentucky, but was under pressure after failing to get to the Sweet 16 the past two seasons.

"Come in" / "Go away" Doormat

It reads "Come In" and from the other "Go Away". Take a look here. Which one is showing when the Jehovah's come knocking?

Place Your Bets

Here's your chance to show your basketball prognostication abilities. There are two pools. If you like the simple "pick as many right as I can" type of pool, the Standard Pool is the one for you. The Seed Scoring Pool encourages players to pick upsets because it rewards those players who correctly pick an upset. It also rewards those who correctly pick upsets in later rounds.

Each entry costs $5. Enter as many times as you wish. Please send your entry fee to me at Box 376, Chamberlain, SD 57325. The payout at the end of the tournament will be as follows:1st place gets 40% of total pot; 2nd place gets you 30%; 3rd place gets 20%; and 4th place gets 10%.

Feel free to invite friends, family and co-workers to enter.

Submit your entries before the tournament begins. The tournament begins at 11:00 CST on Thursday, March 15.

You may enter 3 times per User ID. To enter more than three, please create another ID. It is really helpful if you enter online as my assistant (either my daughter or my wife) really doesn't like entering these for me!

You need to create your own used ID and password for the Sportsline site. You'll be asked to enter the password before you can join the pool. The group password for the Standard Pool is "knustandard" and the password for the Seed Scoring Pool is "knustseed".

To get started, just clink on the respective link above. Everyone has a team to follow: I have the Bluejays, Grap has the Mildcats, Goet has the Irish (at least for one game) and Kirby has the.......well almost everyone has a team in the tourney. Kirby, the Bluejays are always looking for fans though I'm not sure the Jesuits would approve of the "Sparky" thing.

Hole of the Week #30 - Deacon's Lodge #3

After tip-toeing through the best-ball litter (crushed beer cans) on the teebox, you get the first par three of the round. The green is deceptive and I have found myself down low on the back left too many times to even think about.

This is a great hole and I have visions of the Cahoonas whooping it up on this hole with a group on this box, the next box and a group playing this hole. Cuyooooooooona!!!!!!!

Hole of the Week #29 - The Preserve #16

I really like the final five holes at the Preserve beginning with the short, downhill par 3. This hole follows the 280-yard par four. It is very difficult to not think you can birdie each of these holes. They scream for a "grip it and rip it" mentality.

This hole is actually quite easy and I remember few times when at least one drunken Cahoona didn't earn himself another beer. The key to this hole is to get off the tee box. You don't need to smash one, just hit one 240 off the box.

I wish I was there today!

Big Week for Hoops! State A Preview

The South Dakota State A basketball tournament opens this week at the Rushmore Center in Rapid City. There is a distinct Cahoona interest in this year's tourney as three Cahoonas claim Region 6 champion, Chamberlain, as their alma mater (with one's son on the Cub team) while another has children that attend Region 8 champ Rapid City St. Thomas More. Of course "Shot Clock" Kirby would claim any school as his alma mater if it meant a chance to soak some cold suds or sip some fine whiskey!


St. Thomas More (22-1) is seeded #1 (by virtue of their beating up a hapless AA Rapid City Douglas), and will tangle with Lennox in the first game of the tournament. The Cavs are fortunate that those extra power points take them out of the Cubs bracket! They should have no problem disposing of the Orioles.

Fourth seeded Madison (21-2) will play Aberdeen Roncalli (20-3) in the second game of the afternoon on Thursday. I expect Madison, whose only two losses are to #1 seed St. Thomas More and #2 seed Parkston, to take care of Roncalli. In the first game of the evening session, Parkston (22-0) should handle Sioux Valley (18-5).



The final first round game feature the Cubs (18-5), who ride a 10-game winning streak into the tournament, and Little Wound (22-1), whose only loss this season came to Heart of the Earth, MN. The Cubs were the last team South Dakota team to beat Little Wound as they defeated them in the consolation round of last year's state tourney. There was some bad blood at the end of that game. While my heart says Cubs, my brain says that the 3-point shooting and up tempo offense of the Mustangs will be too much. Little Wound will advance.

Friday's semifinals feature two great match ups. St. Thomas More and Madison square off in a rematch of the mid-season Hansen Classic nightcap in the Corn Palace. The Cavaliers got the better of things in the Palace but are short some personnel since that game. The familiarity of the Rushmore Center and being able to sleep in their own beds offsets that though and the Cavaliers will advance to the finals.

Parkston and Little Wound match up in the nightcap. This game should be a shootout and I think the Trojans have the quickness to defend the Mustangs on the perimeter. I look for a great game with Parkston eeking out a narrow win.

Roncalli and Chamberlain will win their games on Friday setting up a match up between the two for the consolation championship on Saturday.

On Saturday, Lennox will win the seventh place game over Sioux Valley and Roncalli will take a close one over Chamberlain for fifth. Madison will beat Little Wound as the Mustangs mail it in.

The championship game will feature the defending state champion St. Thomas More Cavaliers and the Parkston Trojans. This final could have been foreseen a year ago when the Cavs won the title and Parkston easily walked through the consolation bracket.

I believe that playing in the Rushmore Center and sleeping in the own beds will give STM just the slight edge they need to beat the Trojans. I look for a close game that will be decided by depth. The Cavaliers will surge in the fourth quarter to repeat as state champions.

My longshot pick is that the Cubs and Cavs square off in the finals with a bottle of good whiskey on the line. My most solid prediction is that there will be some trash-talking and beer and whiskey swilling among those stogie-smoking Cahoonas in attendance. So let it begin here: It is tough for the rest of the Class A public schools to keep up with the Cavaliers' or Mustangs' recruiting (McCauley is at his third school in three years). The word is that Lebron James just about went to St. Thomas More rather than entering the draft because the money was better at STM!!

If you cannot attend and want to follow the action, here is the Class A tournament page and you can watch live webcasts here.

Let's go Cubs!!!

Hole of the Week #28 - Pines Woods #8

I've never played this hole from the fairway. When it goes well, I'm in the rough on the right with a shot. When it doesn't I'm either in the trees on the right or the shit on the left. I remember more than once hitting a good shot, headed for the left side of the fairway (as the player's bokk suggests), only to hit the lone tree on the left side and go into the shit.

A Dukie That Might Actually Make the Cahoona Cut

DUKE GRAD INVENTS BEER TOSSING FRIDGE

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- When John Cornwell graduated from Duke University last year, he landed a job as software engineer in Atlanta but soon found himself longing for his college lifestyle. So the engineering graduate built himself a reminder of life on campus: a refrigerator that can toss a can of beer to his couch with the click of a remote control.

It took the 22-year-old Cornwell about 150 hours and $400 in parts to modify a mini-fridge common to many college dorm rooms into the beer-tossing contraption, which can launch 10 cans of beer from its magazine before needing a reload.

With a click of the remote, fashioned from a car's keyless entry device, a small elevator inside the refrigerator lifts a beer can through a hole and loads it into the fridge's catapult arm. A second click fires the device, tossing the beer up to 20 feet - "far enough to get to the couch," he said.

In developing his beer catapult, Cornwell said he dented a few walls and came close to accidentally throwing a can through his television. He's since fine-tuned the machine to land a beer where he usually sits at home, on what he called "a right-angle couch system."

A video featuring the device is a hit on the Internet, where more than 600,000 people have watched it at metacafe.com, earning Cornwell more than $3,000 from the Web site.

Prominent Rapid City Lawyer Avoids Charges

Damn, those sobriety checks are getting nasty.

Creighton Bluejays - 2007 Missouri Valley Conference Champs!!

Put on your dancin' shoes baby! Billy and the Bluejays (22-10) are going to "The Big Dance"!!

Hole of the Week #27 - Deacon's Lodge #8

By this hole, the birdie or social beers have set in and you have lost all sense of course management. The question you ask yourself as you walk to the tee box is "How hard can I swing without hurting myself?".

As you address the ball, your fellow golf buddies encourage you to swing out of your shoes. You do and more than likely you are still in play through no fault of your own.

This is an easy hole if you can play within yourself. The problem is, that is difficult to do. By now, you need a birdie, have have a beer or two and you'll get encouragement from the other Cahoonas that is not necessarily in your best interest.

Swing away Cahoona!!!!