Linking Laconically is estimating its chickens before they hatch

• 2010 NCAA Men's Basketball Rankings (March 1)
  Up to #11/12.  Neck and neck with the Butler Bulldogs.  Still lower, but also up from last week, in the KenPom and Sagarin rankings, both of which have us at #20.
• The 2010 Bracket Matrix: The NCAA Basketball Field of 65
  Bracketologists still can't make their mind up us about us.  Mean is a 4-seed; mode is a 3-seed; several 5-seed projections in there, too (and an 8-seed?!).  Consensus is that Minnesota is the sixth team out of the field at this point.
• Ankle sprain won't keep Spartans G Durrell Summers from playing | detnews.com | The Detroit News
  Good news.
• The State News : Sleepover builds chemistry, leads to win
  Father and son campout on the Breslin Center floor Block S last Friday night.  Also: Delvon Roe will need to have his knee scoped after the season is over.
  
• Kalin Lucas continues to show that he has next-level potential | MLive.com
  Defending #1 after an off game.
• Crashing The Dance: Quick Steps: On the Road Again
  Evan Turner is very, how you say, valuable.
• Reaction in two parts | mgoblog
  I'm way late on this, but I can't allow Brian to get away with using the lack of comment on the U-M NCAA infraction story here at TOC as part of his defense.  So here you go: YELLOW-BELLIED CHEATERS!  CHEATING IS THE ONLY WAY YOU EVEN GOT INTO OVERTIME AGAINST US!  (But seriously, the reason we haven't commented on the story is that . . . it's basketball season.)
  
• Road to Recovery: Wolverines wary of another 'rebuilding' crash - Dr. Saturday - NCAAF Blog - Yahoo! Sports
  Let's focus on the future: .500 or bust!
• Spartans' Oren Wilson, Chris L. Rucker, Myles White plead guilty in connection to Nov. 22 fight | - MLive.com
  I'm now ethically compelled to do a couple links on our own football-related issues.  That's the final batch of guilty pleas.
• Chris L. Rucker's attorney belives Rucker is 'reinstated' to Michigan State football team | freep.com | Detroit Free Press
  I really fail to see what the upside is of the university not clarifying the players' status.
• Ohio will be key again for MSU | freep.com | Detroit Free Press
  #1 player in Ohio's 2011 class, DB Doran Grant, has Spartan connection.
• Purdue loss brings chaos to Big Ten lead - College Basketball Nation Blog - ESPN
  If three front runners win out, MSU will be the #3 seed in the BTT.

Bonus, Potentially-Jinx-Inducing Big Ten Championship Odds

Just for fun, here are the odds of the three Big Ten leaders winning their remaining regular season games, per KenPom's projections:

Michigan State

• Penn State: 89%
  
• Michigan: 86%
  
• Odds of winning both games: 76.5%

Purdue

• Indiana: 98%
  
• At Penn State: 79%
• Odds of winning both games: 77.4%

Ohio State

• Illinois: 85% (only remaining game)

Using those odds, you get the following percentage odds of various Big Ten title outcomes:

• Three-way tie with 4 losses: 50.4%
• Two-way tie with 4 losses: 39.0%
• Ohio State wins outright: 4.5%
• Purdue wins outright: 2.7%
• MSU wins outright: 2.6%
• Champion has 5 losses (almost certainly a multi-team tie, potentially including Wisconsin): 0.8%

The number with Breslin banner implications is 76.5%.  That's number actually looks kind of scary--but a lot less scary than the number from Sunday at 3:00 would have looked.