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IN OTHER NEWS...

The Gators-versus-Buckeye-related e-mail has been flying this week, as you would expect.

Dave, at work, sent this missive:

Sent: Thursday, April 05, 2007 3:22 PM
Subject: Florida and Ohio

News out of Florida this week: Gators win NCAA championship

News out of Ohio this week: This.

Then Russ at work forwarded this faux news ditty from a Florida Gator blog. ("This should be in the Onion," Russ writes.):

Florida President unsure of what to do with Ohio State

By VERN JACKSON
Gainesville Sun Staff Writer

April 4, 2007

GAINESVILLE – In the wake of Florida’s unprecedented dual championship victories over Ohio State, the University finds itself with a unique and somewhat perplexing problem.

What to do with Ohio State now that Florida owns it.

According to little known and never before used “Clause 121” of the NCAA charter, when a University defeats another member University for two consecutive national championship games by “convincing margins,” the defeated University becomes the sole property of the victor.

University of Florida President J. Bernard “Bernie” Machen readily admits that he was unaware of “Clause 121”, and is unsure of what to do with Ohio State. “They have, what is it, over 54,000 students? Plus, it’s in Columbus, Ohio. It is very inconvenient.”

The University of Florida Board of Trustees is holding an emergency meeting this Friday to deal with the unprecedented situation. According to sources on the Board, initial ideas include –

Sell It – The easiest move the Board might make is simply to sell Ohio State. However, due to the University’s size, and its location in the relatively depressed real estate market of central Ohio, it may be difficult to find a willing buyer. “We are looking into this option,” Machen says. “We have contacted the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio to see if they need more land.”

Keep It – This option has several difficulties, but may be the only one if Florida is unable to get a buyer for fair market value. Primary among the difficulties is the large student body population of Ohio State. However, sources on the Board did say since OSU’s student population is near Florida’s 50,000, there may be a situation where Ohio State students could be lent to Florida students on a semester by semester basis as personal valets.

Florida junior Kevin Young thinks the valet idea is just swell. “Everyone should have their own pet Buckeye,” said Young. “It would be like having your own personal fraternity pledge. I think the idea rocks!”

Were Florida to keep Ohio State, issues of whether to allow OSU to keep their current team name and mascot, as well as whether to allow them to continue to play in the Big Ten, would have to be resolved. Says Machen, “I think we could reach some sort agreement that would allow them to keep Brutus Buckeye and play in the Big 10. After all, what would we do – move them to the SEC? They would only get hurt. Since they are our wards now, we could never allow that.”

The prospect also exists that Florida would have dissolve Ohio State athletics. In that case, the issue of what to do with the student athletes is uncertain. Florida football coach Urban Meyer, when approached with the prospect of having to absorb Ohio State’s football team, paused for a moment and said, “I suppose they could be a scout team for our scout team. They really aren’t fast enough for anything else.”

Finally, there is one other idea University officials have floated, and that is simply to donate Ohio State to charity. “As I understand it, thousands of Hurricane Katrina refuges are still displaced. We could give OSU to the Katrina Relief Fund, and allow people to relocate there,” Machen said. “That could be the win-win situation everyone is looking for.”

Speaking of The Onion, they had their own take:

ATLANTA—The NCAA tournament field narrowed a little further—and became much more intense—on Monday night as the University of Florida tallied a convincing 84-75 victory over Ohio State University to advance further into college basketball's championship, making 2007 the second time in as many years that Florida has reached the NCAA Tournament's Round Of One.

However, Florida head coach Billy Donovan says that this time around, his team hopes to win it all.

Then Carrie, a friend from my UF days, passed along this story from the Gainesville Sun:

Spurrier Can't Hide Glee

Gator fans were still buzzing about the basketball team's back-to-back-to-back national titles in basketball and football Tuesday morning.

That includes the one in Columbia, S.C., who was getting ready to tee it up when he called both Florida athletic director Jeremy Foley and basketball coach Billy Donovan to offer his congratulations.

"That's an amazing basketball team," said South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier in a cell phone call to The Sun. "Billy has done an unbelievable job with them."

The former UF ball coach slipped in a "we" when twisting the knife into Ohio State, which lost both the football and basketball championships to Florida.

"We've kind of turned Ohio State into Runner-up U., haven't we?" said Spurrier, a Gator alumnus.

Update: I hadn't seen this ESPN spot:

Posted by Jeff at April 6, 2007 05:18 AM | TrackBack