Apparently, There’s No Need for March Madness This Year

Diane Pucin of the Philadelphia Inquirer poses this question: “How good is the Kentucky basketball team, which goes 10 deep with players who would start for virtually any other team in the country?”

Replied Arkansas Coach Nolan Richardson: “The best team ever assembled.”

The current Kentucky team has yet to win an NCAA championship. So, Nolan, can’t we wait a while before comparing the Wildcats to the truly great teams, such as the University of San Francisco, led by Bill Russell, which won NCAA titles in 1955 and ‘56, or any of John Wooden’s 10 championship teams at UCLA?

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Trivia time: Who is the last American high school athlete to run a sub four-minute mile?

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Old-timers’ game: Peter Vecsey in the New York Post: “With the addition of Magic Johnson, the Lakers feel they can beat anyone in a best-of-seven legends’ series.”

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Special model: Bernie Lincicome of the Chicago Tribune on Dennis Rodman’s not being selected for the NBA All-Star game: “Having Rodman on an NBA All-Star team would be like a Cadillac having a live iguana as a hood ornament.”

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One of a kind: How good was running back Red Grange, the famed “Galloping Ghost” of Illinois in the 1920s? In “The Sports 100,” a book on the most important people in American sports by Brad Herzog, Damon Runyon once wrote:

“He is Jack Dempsey, Babe Ruth, Al Jolson, Paavo Nurmi and Man o’ War. Put them all together, they spell Grange.”

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Family matter: How did Mike Shula celebrate when he became the youngest offensive coordinator in the NFL, at 30, when he joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers?

He dined at Don Shula’s steakhouse in Tampa, Fla. “The owner said he comped me for the meal,” Mike said.

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Nine-to-five guy: St. Louis goaltender Grant Fuhr is trying to play all of his team’s games. But teammate Brett Hull doesn’t believe it’s such a big deal.

“He just stands there,” Hull said, perhaps jokingly. “I’m not saying it’s easy, but you guys [writers] make it seem like he’s some sort of superhuman man.

“I don’t get that, and he’ll say the same thing. What’s the big deal? He goes home, goes to bed, gets up, comes to the rink again.”

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Mystery writer: Michael Murphy, author of the book “Golf in the Kingdom,” after receiving an award from the California Golf Writers Assn.:

“I didn’t know what I was doing when I wrote it. Maybe even I don’t understand the second half of the book.”

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Trivia answer: Marty Liquori in 1967 with a time of 3:59.8. Note: The American interscholastic record is 3:55.3 set by Jim Ryun in San Diego in 1965.

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Quotebook: Right fielder Larry Walker on the Colorado Rockies’ plan to move him to center field: “The ball gets hit to you, you catch it and throw it back. I’m not taking this like I’m trying to put together an atomic bomb.”