Wednesday, December 23, 2015

The Twelve Days of Gheorghemas: Day Eight

On the eighth day of Gheorghemas, Big Gheorghe gave to me:

Eight Tribey Moments
Seven books for reading
6.9 Non Sequiturs
Six All-Star Nods
Five podcasts for listening
Four posts zman meant to write but never did
Three French Hens
Two in-state rivalries
And a dork with a split personality


We make no apologies for our love of all things William & Mary, (And Florida. We love the Gators.) so it's only fitting that we celebrate the Tribe as part of this year-end GTB tradition. Given that we love Tribe basketball more than most things William & Mary, you won't be surprised to learn that Tony Shaver's team gets fully half the airtime, and that W&M sports nabs all but one of the spots in this list.

Pleasantries concluded, here are eight great moments from the year in William & Mary:

The Yule Log Continues

I daresay that none of the assembled Gheorghies ever took part in W&M's annual Yule Log ceremony. We weren't big on ceremony, frankly, and we weren't big on mixing with the 'normal' members of the W&M student body. But it is a noteworthy W&M tradition, even if it paints our school even dorkier than it actually is. That right there is saying something.



Deandre Houston-Carson Rising

Senior free safety Deandre Houston Carson was a consensus FCS All-American after leading the Tribe to its first NCAA Tournament since 2012, intercepting four passes and blocking two punts. Houston-Carson shared co-CAA Defensive Player of the Year honors with Stony Brook's Victor Ochi. Widely expected to be selected in next year's NFL Draft, Houston-Carson has been tabbed to play in the Senior Bowl, the first W&M player to do so since B.W. Webb in 2013.

Suck it, Danimal
Running Men (and Women)

W&M's men's cross country team won their 16th consecutive CAA championship, the fifth-longest such streak in NCAA history. Meanwhile senior Emily Stites shared CAA athlete of the year honors with sophomore Regan Rome. Stites won the conference cross country title and finished third in the nation in the 10000m, earning a school-record 7th All-American nod, while Rome finished 25th in nation in cross country.



Booter Ellis!

Just today, we learned that W&M has a sophomore field hockey player named Booter Ellis. I hope she's friends with Hunter Seacat(!).


Tribe Hoops Opens Strong

W&M traveled to Raleigh to take on North Carolina State in the 2015-15 season opener. The Tribe got out to a 23-5 lead, and were never threatened as they coasted to an 85-67 win over the Wolfpack. Hopes, already sprung eternal, were raised.



Daniel Dixon, Part Deux

Junior guard Daniel Dixon burnished his reputation as a purveyor of daggers, draining a long three with four seconds left in overtime to lead the Tribe to a 78-75 win over High Point. Dixon's averaging 15 points a game on 45.2% three-point shooting, while Omar Prewitt leads W&M with 17.4 points per game, and Terry Tarpey continues to stuff stat sheets for the 7-3 Tribe.



Daniel Dixon, the First

Dixon's corner triple at the double overtime buzzer sent W&M to its second consecutive CAA Tournament final. 


Marcus Thornton Drafted by the Celtics

And the greatest moment of the year, W&M edition, was the announcement that the Boston Celtics selected Marcus Thornton, guard, College of William & Mary with the 45th pick of the 2015 NBA Draft. I yelled aloud from a hotel room in Minneapolis, then watched my Twitter timeline blow up.

Thornton closed his collegiate career as W&M's all-time leading scorer, and is undoubtedly the best player to ever wear the green and gold. After a couple of decent outings in NBA Summer League action, he's averaging 15.3 points per game for the Sydney Kings while he learns his craft. He needs to work on distributing the ball, and he's not shooting a high enough percentage, but nobody can take back that draft selection.

And if he hears the phrase, 'Ewing Theory', tossed about in this space, we'll be glad to let him know that he'll always be our favorite.

18 comments:

T.J. said...

excellent post, robert

TR said...

Darren Sharper not make the list?

zman said...

Too soon.

Whitney said...

Nice post. Nice caption.

Shlara said...

Marcus being drafted = highlight of this year's draft, for sure

zman said...

Martin Shkreli's lawyer, who allegedly helped Shkreli perpetrate fraud, is out on bail and received permission from the judge presiding over his case to go to Cancun this week for a family vacation.

Clarence said...

It bothers me

the way the one-armed man pronounces Cancun in The Fugitive. He really went there and thinks it's can-CUN as opposed to can-COON? Or is he an actor who has never been there and the director didn't correct him? Hmmm?

His colleagues were going, no way they all pronounced it wrong. He booked the ticket -- in 1993, so no online, you had to call. On the phone, the ticket agent would have said it back to him. He checked in at the airport, someone had to have said it the right way. They announced the boarding of the flight, the pilot probably mentioned the city name in his little greeting, and someone at the airport or hotel had to have said Welcome to Cancun. All that, and still he pronounces it can-CUN? Come on. It's harder to believe than Jurassic Park.

Although... although... maybe he's a wicked misogynist (he did murder a woman) and he pronounces it that way because when cops and level headed decent people aren't around, he adds a T on the end. That fucker. What a dick. I'm glad he went to prison and was forced to do gross things with his one good arm.

T.J. said...

^^nominee for comment of the year^^

Dave said...

it's like shatner with "sabotage."

great post rob. we gave your super-fan daughter a shout out on the test today . . . should be up in a week or two.

Clarence said...

69° here at the moment. It's not global warming, it's global coooooling.

rob said...

the forecast low for christmas day in dc is 62. 62! the low! fuck you, jim inhofe.

Mark said...

That recent Dixon game winner was ballsy. And deeeep. Not balls deep though.

Booter Ellis reminds me of a former Vanderbilt soccer player who was honored during halftime of the Vandy-Florida football game I attended last season. Her name? Misty Butts. Many jokes were made in our section of Vanderbilt's shitty little stadium.

Today was the beginning of nearly two weeks of holiday vacation for me. Pretty psyched about how little I've worked during the month of December.

Mark said...

Temperatures have consistently been in the 80s all month here. The only time I've worn a sweatshirt in the past 10 months was when I was in South America.

rob said...

just rewatched the recent dixon clip. if you look at the top center of the screen at the beginning of the video, there's a guy wearing a neon green top. that's dixon's dad. pretty cool for him.

TR said...

on that Can-Cun vibe, the most egregious example I can recall is when Rick from Just One of the Guys tells Teri "Yeah right, and I'm Cindy LOWWWW-per," in response to her comment to him that she's a chick.

My friends and I may have had an unsober conversation on that dialogue years ago. We posited that at the last minute, the director thought they needed to make the dialogue more hip and add a pop culture reference and somebody came up with an edgy, up and coming pop star.

Of course, that terrible line is followed up by the classic "Where do you get off having tits?" line, which pretty much redeems him.

zman said...

Or "no talent ass-clown" as opposed to "no-talent-ass clown". Or "my wife's in the driveway with an ass in her cock."

Mark said...

In the Boogie Nights Oral History on Grantland (RIP) there's a great section about the whole "ass in her cock" line and how it took a million takes and once they hit the editing room they realized the screw up of the line was ultimately the way to go.

And, no less than two hours after Clarence's comment I tuned in to The Fugitive on Sundance.

Dave said...

hey gheorghies! early pub night this week