Let’s take you, gentle reader, through our Monday evening: with best-selling author Rocket in town, it was decided that a game of basketball was in order. So we headed at 6 p.m. to a game we know of in Northeast and proceeded to remind ourselves that there is a vast difference between being in “elliptical” shape and “basketball” shape. Seriously, five minutes in, after not playing for several months, we were sucking some serious wind. But it was a good time nonetheless. We finished around 8, made ourselves look as respectable as possible and then headed out for some food and the rest of the BCS title game. As everyone now knows, the LSU romp over Ohio State was basically an extension of the writer’s strike. There was no clever new material. Just the Big Ten cannon fodder of a year ago. But at the very least the Buckeyes kept things within vague striking distance in the second half, at least long enough for us to make it through some glorious pizza and wings (but not long enough for our creaky basketball-playing bones to completely calcify). We headed out after OSU turned it over with 5 minutes left, trailing 31-17 and listened to the rest in the car on the way home. And that, dear reader, is where the night took a turn for the worse. Brent Musburger had the call for ESPN radio, which is a hazard to those who enjoy the Brent Musburger Drinking Game, but we digress. Musburger spent the better part of the final 3-4 minutes of the game figuratively urinating all over Ohio State while essentially lamenting the fact that USC, the one team he felt could have gone “toe-to-toe” with LSU, was not playing in this game. He made 8 gazillion excuses for the Trojans, ranging from injuries to blah to blah. It was gross, and it barely if ever touched on this fact: USC, favored by 41 points, lost at home to Stanford this season. Maybe on their best day, they have the talent to compete for a title. But they didn’t deserve to be there. Case closed. We will say this, however: A two-loss champion? This year begged for a real playoff. The BCS has been fortunate in a decent number of its years that two teams separated themselves from the pack. It won’t always be so lucky.

What else?

*A high school wrestling team in Florida had its 459-match dual meet winning streak — which started close to 34 years ago — come to an end (Via Deadspin). They are expected to bounce back quickly, though, as four of their next six are against the Timberwolves (wrong sport, we know, but cheap shots know no boundaries).

*Baseball Hall of Fame voting will be announced this afternoon, but there might not be any inductees from what we can tell. We’d have to say Goose Gossage has the best shot. It’s also not the worst time in the world for Bert Blyleven to get some votes, though he didn’t get 50 percent last year and 75 percent is needed for election. Best guess: Gossage gets in, Jim Rice, Andre Dawson and Jack Morris are reasonably close, Blyleven adds to his total but not enough and Mark McGwire goes up a little from the 23 percent he got last year.

*Wade Phillips’ reaction to Tony Romo going to Mexico with Jessica Simpson during the playoff bye week includes use of the word “gal,” which is priceless.

*We wrote this too early Tuesday morning for Fasolamatt to get his link in, so we’ll have to settle on this one of our own. Just thought someone might enjoy a list that concludes that the Stone Temple Pilots are the 13th-greatest rock band of all time.

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