Lee Lowenfish

On the Saturday after Thanksgiving Wisconsin's football season ended with a thud on a snow-covered field in Minneapolis. There was a brief hope in the third quarter that the Badgers might actually take the lead or at least tie this fierce rivalry game against Minnesota for possession of Paul Bunyan's axe, the oldest college rivalry game in the country. But in field goal range, reserve quarterback Hunter Simmons threw an interception that snatched away the last chance for victory as the Gophers won 17-7 in a game that wasn't really that close. Wisconsin has an improving defense but a woeful offense even on a dry field. The Badgers finished 4-8 and missed a bowl game, however minor, for 2nd straight year.

 

To be brutally honest, every one of the quarterbacks on the Wisconsin roster were "reserve QBs" and virtually all of them got injured this season.   I wouldn't dismiss the possible growth of the healthy true freshman Carter Smith from Fort Myers Florida who I doubt ever played in the snow before.  (I love the term "true freshman" as opposed to false freshman or lying, cheating freshman). Smith is a promising runner, but is a work in progress as a passer.  Yet how many times can Badger fans put up with bringing in via the transfer portal a supposed savior who is secretly injured? 

 

On a long-term very expensive contract, coach Luke Fickell will have at least another year or two to figure this out.   Ohio State people swear by the talent and character of the former Buckeye player and coach. Although I'm not a Buckeye fan, I have to tip my cap to Ryan Day's undefeated team that finally exorcised the 4 recent osses to Michigan with a convincing 27-9 win in Ann Arbor.  Coach Day said all the right things after the game, stressing humility and the importance of his team's love for brotherhood more than its hatred of an enemy.  

 

Wisconsin men's basketball is not looking too good right now either. They have only lost two games but they were bad losses in which they reminded me a little too much of the football team.  Just not ready for prime time.  Except unlike football, basketball defense is suspect and the team has not really been competitive in its two losses to Brigham Young, who ousted them from the Big Dance last year, and TCU.  The Horned Frogs under coach Jamie Dixon - who went to Texas Christian U - beat Florida, last year's national champion, in a Thanksgiving tourney, and then throttled Wisconsin handily. It's obvious that the Badgers cannot rely only on guards Nick Boyd, the San Diego St. transfer, and John Blackwell to be the chief scorers. I'm not throwing in the towel after 7 games but my level of concern is rising.  

 

I am happy to report that loyal Wisconsin fans have both men's and women's hockey teams to cheer on to good seasons this year.  And also that the top-notch women's volleyball team is getting hot at the right time as the national playoffs near. The Wisconsin women's basketball team is showing some promise too under a new coach.  The boo hounds undoubtedly will pick up their chorus for the ouster of men's coach Greg Gard. I say that after blowing up the football program by hiring the former Buckeye Luke Fickell, I would be careful about doing the same thing to basketball.  Especially if the deservedly embattled athletic director Chris McIntosh is making the decisions.  

 

Locally, there is better news about my other alma mater Columbia whose women's basketball team just completed its tough early schedule with a 4-4 record.   Coach Megan Griffith in her 10th year at her alma mater has a player of the year candidate in junior Riley Weiss who found her shooting touch in a Thanksgiving tournament at the Cancun resort in Mexico.  She tied a school record with a 19 point.4th quarter in a win over S. Dakota State.  She added 31 in a loss to nationally ranked UNC-Chapel Hill, a game that was close until the veteran Tarheels broke it open in final period.  What I love about Griffith's teams is their aggressive running style and commitment to defense. There is no better spokesperson for defense than co-captain Perri Page. Check out some of the interviews at gocolumbialions.com 

 

The women's team has 4 games in December in this area, two at home at the Levien Gym, just east of Broadway at 120th Street:  '

Sat Dec 6 at 2P against Wagner from Staten Island

Sat Dec 20 University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) 1p. 

And on the road at Manhattan Riverdale NY, Wed Dec 3 7P 

Seton Hall, South Orange NJ - Tu Dec 9 6P 

Ivy League season begins on Sat Jan 3 2P against Cornell

 

Having lost only one game, the Columbia men's team is having a very exciting season under new head coach Kevin Hovde.  They have 4 remaining home games in December:

W Dec 3 Hofstra 7P

Sa Dec 6 U Albany 530P (part of a double admission doubleheader after women's game against Wagner)2P

Tu Dec 9 at Stony Brook 7P

W Dec 31 Penn State at Abington 

Ivy League home season begins Sa Jan 10 against Harvard 2P 

 

I''ll have more to say next post about MLB trades and free agent signings when there are facts and not rumors and hallucinations. I don't consider the Blue Jays' extravagant 7-year contract to former Padres RH starting pitcher Dylan Cease big news except to note that rich owners like Toronto's James Rogers love to spend money to bring home the proverbial moose on the wall for their living room and also satisfy hungry fans that think money alone brings championships.  Perhaps the Orioles are improved by trading for Taylor Ward, 31, and giving up on RHP Grayson Rodriguez who was always injured.  Perhaps Ryan Helsley will be a free agent signing that will help Bird bullpen.  I'm still waiting for the core of young players that all regressed last season to take steps forward.  I will try to be patient.

 

And now here's the cornicopia of TCM listings:

I don't know how much of a baseball fan Richard Pryor really was, but he does appear in a Cubs uniform early in this film. You can see for yourself:

M Dec 1 10P as Pryor stars in TCM's showing of "Brewster's Millions" (1985). He plays a onetime minor league pitcher who will inherit a rich relative's bequest of $300 million if he spends $30 million in 30 days.  John Candy plays a catcher and the cast includes Lonette McKee (who I saw as Rachel Robinson in the ill-fated Broadway musical a few years earlier in "The First" with David Alan Grier as Jackie Robinson and David Huddleston as Branch Rickey (younger readers will remember the actor for playing the richer Lebowski iopposite the "Dude" Jeff Bridges in the Coen Brothers' "The Big Lebowski").  Others in "Brewster" cast include Tovah Feldshuh and Pat Hingle.   

TCM's Pryor festival begins at 8P with "Silver Streak" (1976) co-starring Gene Wilder and continues at 1145P with Pryor "Live from Sunset Strip" (1982) and goes on until dawn.

 

Tu Dec 2 230P "Requiem for a Heavyweight" (1962) Not as good as the TV version 3 years earlier but this one about a boxer down on its luck turning to wrestling has an interesting cast:  Mickey Rooney, Jackie Gleason, Anthony Quinn. With cameos by boxers Jack Dempsey, Willie Pep, and wrestler Haystacks Calhoun.  Reportedly Rod Serling was a script writer.

  

Th Dec 4 6A "The Bob Mathias Story" (1954) the Olympic decathalon champion in both 1948 and 1952 playing himself

730A "Crazylegs" (1953) Elroy "Crazylegs" Hirsch" great Wisconsin player (and later Badger athletic director) creditably plays himself

 - directed by Harmon Jones who the year before directed Dan Dailey as Dizzy Dean in "The Pride of St Louis" (1952)

9A "The Babe Ruth Story" (1948) William Bendix miscast as Babe Ruth, veteran Charles Bickford who doesn't age as Brother Matthias in first and last scenes and Claire Trevor

not exactly memorable but always watchable as Ruth's missus.  It's not every film that you get to see onetime prominent newscaster H.V. Kaltenborn

11A "Jackie Robinson Story" (1950) in which JR plays himself, Ruby Dee as Rachel, and character actor Minor Watson (who played Katherine Hepburn's father in "Woman of the Year") as Branch Rickey

1230P "Knute Rockne, All American" (1940) Pat O'Brien in title role and a member of Warner Brothers acting stable named Ronald Reagan as George Gipp

215P "Jim Thorpe, All American" (1951) Burt Lancaster in title role/Reagan returns as George Gipp, Michael "Casablanca" Curtiz director

415P "Somebody Up There Likes Me" (1956) life story of boxer Rocky Graziano played by Paul Newman.  Rowland Barber adapts his biography for screen. A few years later Barber was co-author of HARPO SPEAKS the indispensable biography of the sweetest and most engaging Marx Brother.  Harpo was a huge New York Giant baseball fan watching his team for free from Coogan's Bluff high above the Polo Grounds' left field.  Harpo said his favorirte Giant was left fielder Sam Tertes the only Giant who he could see from his perch.

615P "When We Were Kings" (1997) Leon Gast's documentary of Muhammad Ali's "rumble in the jungle" against George Foreman in Zaire with plenty of good rock and soul music

745P "How To Watch Football" (1938) Robert Benchley ends this marathon with one of his priceless comedy shorts

NB at 945P "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" (1941) Robert Montgomery plays a boxer who comes back to life with the help of a divine emissary Claude Rains/also with Evelyn Keyes

 

F Dec 5 doesn't have sports-themed movies but quite an impressive lineup: 

1245P "Johnny Belinda" (1948) Jane Wyman's Oscar as deaf young woman raised by Charles Bickford. Lew Ayres as her caring doctor and Stephen McNally playing a horrendous town bully, a character in today's America who would probably become a Trumpian Hollywood ambassador. 

4P "Citizen Kane" (1941)

8P "Cover Girl" (1944) a musical with Gene Kelly and Rita Hayworth and songs by Jerome Kern/Ira Gershwin including "Long Ago and Far Away" 

10P "New York, New York" (1977) Scorsese's uncut version of a jazz band on road with DeNiro/Liza Minnelli/Lionel Stander

 

Su Dec 7 Noir Alley 12M, repeated at 10A. "Cry of the City" (1948) another intense and watchable Robert Siodmak film with Richard Conte, Victor Mature, Fred Clark. I became aware of things in the early 1950s when Fred Clark was one of the neighbors of George Burns and Gracie Allen.  Only recentily did I realize the range of his acting that included trying to save Montgomery Clift's life in "A Place in the Sun" and being a business associate of Fred Astaire in "Daddy Longlegs".)   

 

That's all for now.  My mantra remains: Stay positive, test negative, and Take it easy but take it! 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

I usually end my blogs with TCM tips. But time is of the essence now. You're in for a treat tomorrow night Mar 22.

 TCM airs the original - accept no substitutes! - "Angels in the Outfield" from MGM in 1951.  It is directed by Clarence Brown, the man who learned his craft in early days of

silent movies from Maurice Tourneur [father of the Noir director Jacques Tourneur ["Out of the Past", "Easy Living" the 1949 version and many more], Clarence Brown became the man whose craft made Greta Garbo a star and later shepherded Elizabeth Taylor in her first films.

 

"Angels" stars Paul Douglas, a onetime pro football player and NBC announcer/sportscaster who made his acting name in the Broadway version of "Born Yesterday". He plays Guffy McGovern, the crusty manager of the tailend Pittsburgh Pirates who becomes a winner thanks to the human touch of 24-year-old Janet Leigh playing a Household Hints reporter for a Pittsburgh newspaper. (Pgh natives will love the on-location photography of Forbes Field and its environs - Ralph Kiner hits a home run in one scene and Sam Narron, one of the 8 Narrons in pro ball, has a line as s first base coach.) Douglas's biggest help comes from the orphan girl Bridget played by 8-year-old Donna Corcoran who didn't become the next Shirley Temple but she lives in posterity for this believable part. 

 

Bridget sees angels in the outfield helping the Pirates win games.  Her supervising nuns are played by Spring Byington and Ellen Corby. Keenan Wynn plays a nasty broadcaster as only this talented actor can. He leads a crusade to ban Guffy from baseball for being loony enough to see angels. (Bat Guano in "Dr. Strangelove" was a few years ahead in Wynn's future.)

 

James Whitmore is the uncredited voice of angel Gabriel, coach of the Heavenly Choir.   I can't fail to mention Bruce Bennett who plays aging pitcher Saul Hellman/ Bennett is probably the best athlete ever to play in the movies (he won the silver medal in the shot put in the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics and earlier played for Washington Huskies n 1926 Rose Bowl.)  Bennett was notable opposite Ida Lupino in "The Man I Love" (1946) and vital to the success of "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (1946). 

If you disagree on my enthusiasm for this film, feel free to make comments. 

 

If this film is not enough for the first Sat night of spring, before "Angels" there is a 15-minute short, "Donkey Baseball" (1935), one of promoter Ray Doan's many hustles during the Great Depression.  After "Angels", Babe Ruth stars in a 1936 short, "Home Run on the Keys" with Rez Confrey who made a hit with "Kitten on the Keys".  Babe is trying to sell a song about baseball to the radio.  Have not seen this one and it could be a hoot.   

 

AND NOW SOME EXCITING NYC HOOPS NEWS! 

At 4p today Fri Mar 21 NYU men's basketball team plays for Division III title against Trinity from Hartford CT. Also at 4P the women go for their second straight title and their 62nd win in a row in a rematch against Smith of Northampton MA.  Use your search engines to find where you can see these games.

 

My Columbia women's team won their First Four game in thrilling fashion last night (Th Mar 20).  Trailing by 13 at the half, aggressive defense and timely offense pulled

off a 63-60 victory.  Next up tomorrow Sa Mar 22 at 2P on ESPNEWS is West Virginia University.  Followed by Harvard, conquerors of Columbia in the Ivy League tourney.

 

Wisconsin Badger men live on with a Saturday match against tough Brigham Young tomorrow (Sa Mar 22) 745P CBS - all times are EDT.

It has been a dream college season for yours truly.  Columbia women were expected to do well and they have exceeded expectations.

Wisconsin men were picked for 12th in the now-18-team Big Ten.  The Badgers are proof that players with the help of coaching preparation win games, not pundits or fans.

But how we love to root them on.

 

More next time on today's MLB which opened the season in Tokyo earlier this week with two predictable wins of the Dodgers over the Cubs.  Baseball should

open the season in Cincinnati where it used to for many many years.  And if they claim that Jackie Robinson's debut game on April 15 1947 was the greatest

moment in the sport's history, why not start the season then?  Of course, the powers don't believe that about JR's debut. They even purged that story from their website as "DEI infected" until they were shamed to return it. 

 

But I will not end this post on a down snarky note.  "It's not my style," Ricky Nelson says to John Wayne in "Rio Bravo".  Instead I will give the last word to

Columbia women's coach Megan Griffith in the post-game presser after the 63-60 win over Washington:

"I like to teach young people how to do hard things together - maybe it's something missing in today's society."

 

Amen sister!  Until next time, stay positive test negative and take it easy but take it.