LEXINGTON, Ky. – John Calipari said it, repeated it, then said it again. He did everything but hire an airplane to circle Rupp Arena towing a banner with the following message:

The annual rivalry game with Louisville was going to be a push-shove-slapfest. It was going to be physical to the extreme.

This is nothing new from Calipari, who for years has delighted in spreading that gospel before he faces his dear friend Rick Pitino. The reasoning is twofold: You never know when the officials might be listening, and you always know that Pitino will be listening. Insinuating that his Cardinals get away with voluminous fouling will tick off Pitino. And ticking off Pitino is something Calipari keeps on his daily to-do list.

But the message also was a call to action for Calipari's best player, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. That's right, his best player. Center Anthony Davis is a wonderful talent and Kentucky's best pro prospect, but the 6-foot-7 freshman swingman from New Jersey is absolutely the

ST. LOUIS – Rick Majerus suggests the bison sausage. Oh, and the Nueske's bacon – it's from Wisconsin, same as him. And try the fresh-squeezed orange juice, too.

The enthusiastic recommendations pour forth from Majerus, the Saint Louis University basketball coach, over breakfast at Café Osage, an earthy spot not far from campus. If you need a dinner tip, he'll send you to The Fountain on Locust, where they have his mother's chili – cleverly called Rick's Mom's Chili – in the soup rotation. (He supplied them the recipe and they just about got it right, but can't quite perfectly reproduce it. "Nobody can," Majerus says, half proud and half sad.)

He wants you to see where the Billikens play. Chaifetz Arena, the four-year-old, $81 million, 10,600-seat on-campus gym is a gem, Majerus says. Attendance is good. You've got to come to a game.

The only thing missing was a Chamber of Commerce button on his XXL sweatshirt.

Spend some time with Rick Majerus and you get the feeling he is at home

After the historic inter-conference agreement announced Wednesday between the Big Ten and Pac-12, one of the immediate questions was what impact it would have on Notre Dame.

The Fighting Irish have a huge part of their schedule invested in those leagues. The fiercely independent Irish have five ongoing annual series with teams from those leagues: Michigan, Michigan State and Purdue of the Big Ten, and USC and Stanford of the Pac-12. If the leagues are going to add an annual game between members, would that potentially squeeze Notre Dame out of the mix?

Not likely, said Irish athletic director Jack Swarbrick, who has a close relationship with Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany.

"I don't anticipate it having much of an impact," Swarbrick told Yahoo! Sports. "I was aware it was coming; they sort of kept us informed. I think it's a great thing for the two conferences."

A more likely scenario than dropping Notre Dame is a reduction in conference games from nine to eight. Thus, the Big Ten vs.

When the bowl matchups were announced earlier this month, the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl looked like a prime candidate for the worst matchup of them all.

The New Year's Eve game features 6-6 Illinois, riding a six-game losing streak, against 6-7 UCLA, given an NCAA waiver to compete despite a losing record. Both schools fired their coaches. Both are playing under interim leaders.

Since then, the bowl has defied the odds and somehow gotten worse. UCLA has four players ineligible for the game, including backup quarterback Richard Brehaut. Illinois has two players ineligible for the game, including leading rusher Jason Ford.

Now comes news of a rather contentious contract dispute between several Illinois assistants and the school administration.

In January 2010, several new assistants were hired by then-coach Ron Zook and given two-year contracts that would roll over each year, documents obtained by Yahoo! Sports show. Two-year deals for assistants are considered a luxury of stability, and

ST. LOUIS – With more than 22,000 people puckering and praying around him, in an arena drenched with tension, Phil Pressey lowered his head and went to the basket.

And went ham.

Pressey's Missouri Tigers had given away every bit of a 14-point lead to Illinois and trailed by one with less than three minutes to play. Brandon Paul had just dead-bounced a fluke 3-pointer off the back rim, then the front rim, then in. The orange-and-blue half of the Scottrade Center was roaring with hope that the Illini were going to steal this game from the undefeated-but-unraveling Tigers.

That's when the 5-foot-10 (ha!) Pressey slashed to the basket, darting around his defender like he was a totem pole. What he did next, amid tight quarters in a tight game, defied belief but defines Pressey's fearless game.

Illinois center Meyers Leonard stepped toward Pressey to stop his penetration, so he blithely whipped a behind-the-back pass to Ricardo Ratliffe, who laid it in for a 68-67 lead.

"When you've got a

A mismatch in a pre-Christmas bowl normally wouldn't be appointment viewing, but Thursday night's Las Vegas Bowl is a different matter.

If you appreciate a program that has maximized its potential, you will tune in to see Boise State. If you're tired of underachievers and respect overachievers, you'll watch Broncos quarterback Kellen Moore play his final college game. And if you suspect that a special era may be passing before our eyes, you'll lock those eyes on Chris Petersen's program as it takes on Arizona State.

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I firmly believe Boise will remain an implausibly successful program for as long as Petersen is its coach, and I hope he stays there forever. The fit is perfect, and it's simply been fun to have such a complete outlier – no long-standing tradition, no natural recruiting base – rise up to prominence in a sport that flagrantly discriminates against the have-nots. But the future is not guaranteed.

That's why this game is

Until Wednesday, there was a video on the Pittsburgh athletics website that basically was a marketing vehicle for Todd Graham's coaching style and personality. The best part of the video was when Graham said, with spectacular insincerity, "My favorite thing about coaching is the relationships with the players."

Via Twitter, here's an update on how your relationships are going with the Pitt Panthers, Todd:

Adam Lazenga called you a "liar and a fraud."

Devin Street called you "The liar."

Edited into English from Twitterese, Mark Giubilato Jr. says, "Trust nobody but yourself and your family, because nobody else cares about the implications their lies have on you as a person and your future."

Max Gruder: "A lot of empty promises."

Graham shattered about 105 of the relationships he allegedly cares about the most when he fled Pitt like a bandit Wednesday for Arizona State. Leaving after less than a year at Pitt was bad enough, but the goodbye was even worse – an email to your director of

After just one season at Pittsburgh, Todd Graham is leaving the school to become the next coach at Arizona State, multiple sources have confirmed to Yahoo! Sports.

The move is a stunning plot twist for both schools. Pitt will now be searching for its fourth coach in little more than a year: It fired Dave Wannstedt in December 2010, replaced him with Mike Haywood for two weeks until a confrontation with a female led to Haywood's dismissal, then hired Graham away from Tulsa. Now he's gone after 12 games for the Pac-12.

At Arizona State, Graham arrives after the school had conversations with SMU's June Jones and Houston's Kevin Sumlin. In Jones' case, a deal reportedly was agreed upon before the Sun Devils pulled the offer at the 11th hour. After 17 days of searching, ASU got its man in the form of Graham.

Pitt was a disappointing 6-6 under Graham, and it appeared at times the team – especially quarterback Tino Sunseri – struggled to transition to his offensive system after six years