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Morning Briefing

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Times Staff Writer

Returning to scene of crime

San Antonio police arrested a ticket scalper Monday night after bitter customers tracked him down upon learning that the tickets they bought for the national championship game were fake, according to an Internet report by San Antonio television station KENS.

The fans paid more than $400 each to see their team, but were turned back at the Alamodome entrance when the ticket taker spotted the counterfeits.

“They were obviously upset and went back to the River Walk and, by happenstance, found the individual that had sold them the tickets,” said Steven Baum of the San Antonio Park Police.

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Police arrived and after a dramatic foot chase down the River Walk, 39-year-old Calvin Harris of New York was caught. He allegedly had other counterfeit tickets and thousands of dollars.

Trivia time

With its 75-68 overtime victory Monday over Memphis and a 54-53 triple overtime loss to North Carolina in 1957, Kansas became the second school to have an overtime victory and loss in an NCAA championship game. Name the other.

Cups runneth over

Kansas canceled classes Tuesday in recognition of the Jayhawks’ national championship, a school-issued news release said. Thousands of hung-over students might not have shown up anyway.

The Daily Kansan reported that dozens of bars along Massachusetts Street filled up hours before tipoff and some sold out of beer.

About 40,000 fans packed Lawrence streets after the game, according to the Lawrence Journal World. Police reported only three arrests, but acknowledged that they had turned a blind eye to public consumption of alcohol.

“In terms of what’s in a plastic cup, when you’ve got that many people down there, I’m not sure that that’s a priority,” Lawrence Police Sgt. Paul Fellers said.

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Party poopers

Not everybody in Kansas was excited about the Jayhawks’ victory Monday night.

“I absolutely hate KU,” Kansas State sophomore Levi Holmes told the Kansas City Star. “I’m glad that [the Big 12 has] a championship now, but I can’t stand that KU is responsible for it. This is just something else for them to rub in our faces.”

The feeling was shared at a bar in Columbia, Mo., home of Big 12 rival Missouri.

“When KU went ahead 69-63 an MU athletic-department official -- unidentified here for protection of his identity -- actually rose,” the paper reported. “And after uttering: ‘I’m not going to stay here and watch them celebrate,’ he walked out.”

With or without sprouts?

The Memphis Commercial Appeal reports Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen would send an order of Rendezvous ribs, a Memphis specialty, to Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius as payment of a friendly wager they made on the game.

No such wager was made with California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger over the women’s title game between Tennessee and Stanford. A reader commenting on the Commercial Appeal’s website theorized that it was because Schwarzenegger might wager a California tofu burger.

Trivia answer

Cincinnati, which defeated Ohio State in 1961 and lost to Loyola (Ill.) in 1963.

And finally

Geoff Calkins of the Memphis Commercial Appeal figures that only a true master of the blues would be able to sum up the heartbreaking way that Memphis lost the championship game.

“W.C. Handy would know what to do with this moment,” Calkins wrote. “B.B. King could play it on Lucille.”

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peter.yoon@latimes.com

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