It's Not Plagiarism If You Link To It Is Great

Great. Did you miss Tim Brewster? You should have. It's been days since we've heard from "Brew," and every day without him is a day that's just so much less rich.

Brewster recently sat down for an interview with Adam Rittenberg over at ESPN. See if you can figure out what the special word was on Brewster's daily vocabulary calendar that caught his eye before this interview.

What are you looking forward to seeing when you get back on the field Tuesday?

Tim Brewster: This is really going to be a good group for us. It's a young group, a lot of talent in the group, they've really done a great job in the winter conditioning program. Guys came back off spring break in great shape. We had a great 6 a.m. run this morning. We've just got to do a great job as a staff this spring of developing these young guys.

Okay, we sorta cheated and tossed in some bold tags to help out. "Wait, wait, wait," you say. "Tim Brewster doesn't have a word-a-day calendar that would have the word 'great' in it." Yes, he does. He's Tim Brewster. He's got a room temperature IQ and he loves to meet new people. He's every mediocre coach you've ever seen, plus a charming case of Motivational Tourrette's. May Minnesota never let him go.

Well, until they hire Quin Snyder, anyway: Would you believe that the personnel fallout from the Lickliter firing will be "nobody"? It's a foreign concept, this "getting guys to stick around," but it just might happen. Might. Well, maybe depending on who you ask.

On that note, Cully Payne spoke to Pat Harty. While the bulk of the interview was typical "I have nothing juicy for you" boilerplate stuff that makes am AD's weary heart smile, Payne did have one piece of speculation that stood out:

Payne expressed optimism that all the players would stay at Iowa once things get sorted out.

"Everyone is always asking ‘are you guys leaving?’" Payne said. "These are my boys. So no one is planning on going anywhere.

"I think hearing from everybody we’re all just kind of waiting. No one’s taking off or anything like that. We’re just going to wait and see what happens."

Of course, Payne also said this:

Payne denied rumors that the players were divided over Lickliter’s firing.

"People say that or people see that," Payne said. "But I think all together we liked coach. And we all get along real well, the older guys and us freshmen."

So depending on your level of cynicism, Payne's either right or a cheerleader. We're sorta split on that one; while we don't buy Payne's last statement about everyone liking coach [sic], we do think he can get away with saying it up until someone on the team actually admits that they threatened to transfer if Lickliter returned, and that ain't gonna happen. 

And who knows; perhaps Payne's right. Perhaps the recruits all come and play, and perhaps everyone comes back, even Anthony Tucker if the new coach'll have him. That'd be a stunning departure from the norm, a systemic malady of player flight. And, for the record, that had been going on for a lot longer than when Lickliter first set foot in town. If it stops now for these players, it's such a refreshing departure from the norm that we don't know how to react to it. Do we gloat? Do we predict a Sweet 16 run? Do we, like, insult the players for some reason? Seriously, this is weird and new. We can't handle it yet.

LINKZ WITH COMMENTARY OF A SHORTER NATURE THAN THE MAIN POINTZ LISTED EARLIER IN TODAY'Z EDITION OF IT'Z NOT PLAGIARISM IF YOU LINK TO IT:

Pro Day comes but once a year on the Iowa campus; it's kinda like Christmas Flag Day in that respect. That is, unless 22-year-olds running sprints is as awesome as presents. See, nope. Results are here, anyway. Amari Spievey's 40 time "dipped" from 4.51 to 4.57, which we'll just remind everybody is a completely imperceptible six hundredths of a second. If Spievey's stock drops over this, someone should be slapped. Ah, but Tony Moeaki, Pat Angerer, and A.J. Edds all ran quicker; each guy improved his time anywhere from four to nine hundredths of a second. You know what this means? FIRST ROUNDERS, BABY!

/huffs enough paint to make Mel Kiper and Todd McShay sound like sane human beings
/sees Santa Batman
/criticizes Santa Batman' arm length

Bucky's Fifth Quarter answers a question only a spoiled fanbase could possibly ask: Is it time to ask more of Bo Ryan's Badgers? Their answer: yes. No, really. Which, wow. Quick recap on that underachieving loserbag of a coach: he's got the best conference record in BXI history since he arrived on campus. The Badgers are one of only six teams to have made the NCAA tournament in each of the last 10 years, and Bo Ryan's one of only four coaches to accomplish that feat with the same team over that entire span. The others? Mike Krzyzewski, Tom Izzo, and Bill Carmody Rick Barnes. You want to get to "the next level?" There isn't one. You push away a good, clean, successful coach because you want perennial Final Fours, and you get Steve Fucking Alford. Sorry for the profanity. I mean [COACH FUCKING REDACTED].

You don't really want to see Brent Metcalf in MMA, silly humans. Brent Metcalf doesn't do "punching." He does "rip arms out of sockets," and he'd prefer to wear a gold medal for doing that than some stupid t-shirt with skulls and tribal arm tattoo shit on it.

And finally, HFMR goes to the salon (note: may not actually be HFMR):