Those interested in musical history might like this. Rick Beato who I've followed for a while on youtube, does a great walk through of the famous Studio 2. They geek out on the old mics and mixing equipment still in use there. It's a cool watch.

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Hey all,

Wanted to provide a quick update and let you know that the next few weeks will hopefully be exciting for the men's and women's basketball programs. For good or bad, the NIL "market" has ramped up considerably, but you all will be excited with the work both staffs are doing in recruiting the portal and good news is hopefully around the corner. That said, increasing our resources with the We Will Collective only helps our cause as these potential student athletes are on campus and are informed of NIL opportunities. We are holding a leadership summit on May 11th from 11am-2pm in Ankeny with presentations from Coach Campbell, Otz and Fennelly and have tables of eight or individual tickets for sale. The coaches are donating their time in order to help us at We Will raise funds and provide an interesting learning opportunity for all. More info and support opportunities can be found here: https://wewillcollective.com/events

Appreciate everyone's support in this interesting time and also appreciate Bill's kindness in allowing me to post these things here on CR. Go Clones!

-Brent Blum

Iowa State Media Relations

MAUI, Hawaii –The 2024 Maui Jim Maui Invitational field was announced today and Iowa State will be one of the teams in the 41st annual tournament. The Cyclones will participate in what is expected to be one of the strongest fields in tournament history. Joining the Cyclones in Maui will be Auburn, Colorado, Dayton, Memphis, Michigan State, North Carolina and 2023 National Champion UConn.

The 2024 appearance marks the third time the Cyclones take the floor in Maui, having appeared in 1990 and 2018. In 2018, ISU dropped the opener to Arizona before defeating Illinois and San Diego State. The 1990 Cyclones went 1-2 under Johnny Orr's guidance, defeating Chaminade and falling to Syracuse and Santa Clara.

The 2024 Maui Jim Maui Invitational will be played Nov. 25-27 at Maui's famed Lahaina Civic Center. All 12 Maui games will be telecast by ESPN networks, with the bracket being announced at a later date. The 2024 teams bolster a total of 218 NCAA Tournament appearances, 45 Final Four berths and 13 NCAA Tournament titles. Half of the teams competing rank within the top-40 of the winningest programs of all-time in men’s college basketball.

UCONN has won the NCAA Championship five times in the last 25 years, and also has won the Maui Title twice in that span. This year’s National Championship game in Houston was a prime example of ‘Maui Magic,’ as San Diego State finished fourth in the 2022 Maui Jim Maui Invitational.

All eight teams have been to the Maui Jim Maui Invitational before at least once, with North Carolina holding the most previous trips at eight. Memphis will be making its sixth trip, first since 2011, while Dayton, Michigan State and UCONN will return for their fifth appearances.

Additionally, half of the teams have previously won the Maui Jim Maui Invitational: North Carolina has won four times, UConn twice and Michigan State and Dayton each hold one coveted title apiece.

“The goal of the Maui Jim Maui Invitational is and always has been to bring together the top programs in college basketball in one of the most stunning places in the country. The 2024 field will accomplish that and more,” said Tom Valdiserri, executive vice president of KemperLesnik, the operator of the Maui Jim Maui Invitational. “The field includes a variety of iconic programs and coaches, as well as respected up-and-comers. We are confident when we say that the Maui Jim Maui Invitational does not disappoint, and we think fans back home and on-island will be in for an epic few days of college basketball with this stacked field.”

All-Tournament travel packages and school Booster travel packages for the 2024 Maui Jim Maui Invitational will be available at a later date. For more information on the Tournament, please visit mauiinvitational.com.

I did something yesterday I promised myself I'd never do -- watch Game of Thrones. I finally figured out how to log into HBO+ (the password and username I was giving it were not the ones it wanted) and binge watched the Last of Us.

After that, I was looking for something else to watch and watched the first episode of GOT.

Now I'm torn as to whether I want to continue watching it. The first episode was interesting enough, but also a bit confusing. They introduced so many characters from so many far-flung places that it left me reeling and a little bit confused as to what was going on. I'm not sure it gets any better from here.

I hate shows where it seems like you jumped into the middle of the story and have to figure out what's going on as you go. That seems to be the case here. To top it off, I've never been a big fan of programs set in that era -- knights and kings and dragons -- so that's why I said I'd never watch it. So I just don't know.

Caitlin Clark or Kim Mulkey.??
My despise for Mulkey has endured longer over time than Clark but my contempt for the team that Clark represents has been forever (well ever since I was an ISU student).

Is there anyway both peeps and their teams can lose today??

Sigh........

Gold and Blue Dude.

The guy entertained with his almost daily live shows. Tough to see someone that is only 40 pass suddenly from Crohn's disease. He suddenly went septic over the weekend and died. Leaving behind a family.

Another one of the many rumors out there, that Uconn is talking with networks and BY about coming into the Big 12 in all sports. Add Gonzaga to that, that is a hell of a basketball league.

Any recommendation as to who serves the best Chili and Cinnamon rolls in Iowa?

House +17%
Farm ground +26%

Long story.......

We came back from vacation yesterday, went through the re-entry process at San Juan. Had a new experience.

We're in the Priority line at American Airlines ticketing. The family in front of us is taking absolutely forever. Some kind of problem. At one point, the mother stayed there and the rest of the family departed, then came back 15 minutes later and there was more hassle. Only one ticket agent on duty. It became clear that the people hadn't done something they were required to do. Eventually they got ticketed -- they were holding up the line more than 30 minutes -- and we stepped up. Went to check the bags and were told they didn't have a USDA sticker.

WTF?

The agent said all bags had to have a sticker showing they had been inspected by the USDA. I've traveled internationally a fair amount, and never ran into this before, at San Juan or any other port of entry. The agent did the paperwork for checking the bags, but said he couldn't accept them without a sticker. We had to go to the USDA check station and get a sticker. Where is that? He pointed to a corner of the ticketing area. We went over there and found a scanner with conveyor belt and a sign that said "APHIS" and were told to put our bags on the conveyor. Not just the ones we were going to check, but also my carryon, our computer case and even Mrs. LC's purse. Everything went through the scanner at relatively high speed. Nobody seemed to be looking at any screen. They put a sticker on every piece. We then took the bags back to the ticket counter and they were accepted.

Amazing. We had been asked, as always, if we were carrying any meat, plants, etc., when we came through Customs. The USDA check was a farce, wouldn't have discovered it if we had been carrying a cage full of covid-infected Chinese bats. The check station was nowhere near immigration or customs.

Fortunately, we had almost 3 hours to make our connection, but it was still a royal pain in the ass for no purpose that I can imagine. And as I said, I've never run into it anywhere else. Also, American Airlines presumably would have assigned more than one agent, because while we were there, everybody had the same problem.

I later went online and discovered that APHIS is an acronym for the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, a part of USDA, but I found no explanation for what seems to be a new (and redundant) policy.

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Parrott visits 'dream school', collects third P5 offer

Police shoot "her" dead. It was planned out. Who are liberals gonna blame on this one?

Good read

I’d totally forgotten that ISU had recruited Alex Karaban pretty hard before he ended up at UConn. With his skillset, he sure would’ve been a big contributor the past two seasons.

“I’m not going to sit here and say that they think they have a Brady-type story with last year’s seventh-round pick, but I do believe the 49ers’ brass thinks Purdy’s capable of giving them the highest level of quarterback play they’ve had since Kyle Shanahan arrived in 2017 . . . The Niners are working with a six-to-eight-month return-to-play timetable on Purdy, with the idea being that the timeline should be more concrete two to three months post-op (Purdy’s surgery was March 10). That means by the summer break, San Francisco should know if it’s getting Purdy back for opening day, at some point midseason or somewhere in between.”

Is formally not connected to the ISU foundation anymore which means they can donate to Football NIL, if they so decide. I like this move. I was considering not renewing, but I think they are adapting to the new realities.

Averaging 29 points, 6 rebounds, and 7 assists over the last four games. He’s kind of come out of nowhere since becoming a starter.

I listened to his interview. First I was disappointed with the questioning. Secondly, he doesn't give any more specificity than Matt, but he does take a lot less time to say nothing. 😜

About the only thing I picked up was Joet Peterson and Ike ? were running at 1-2 at rush end and Tyler Oneidem was number 1 at Boundry End. And he did not mention Singleton. But maybe he relies on position coaches to establish the depth chart.

Linebacker, he mentioned a lot of bodies but no idea who was doing "well." That can be good or bad.

The EIU WBB team is going to the Final Four!😬😖😵🤬🤯😳🫣🤢🤮😱

UCONN's victory just cinched a win for me in our office pool. I generally fill out one bracket in about 10 minutes with little thought. My recollection of how UCONN just whacked us early in the year influenced me to have UCONN winning the whole thing. I thought they had everything needed to win a title. It looks like that may be true. Either way, my win was locked up with this game going final in UCONN's favor. No one can catch me now.

Iowa State Media Relations

AMES, Iowa – 3-peat. Ashley Joens did it again, as Iowa State’s women’s basketball star took home the Cheryl Miller Award, presented to women’s college basketball’s top small forward on Saturday. Joens is now owner of half the Miller Award’s in the six-year history of the trophy.

In addition, Iowa State is the home to four-of-six, with Bridget Carleton being the recipient in 2018-19.

Joens finished her Iowa State career with a huge collection of postseason honors. In addition to the Cheryl Miller Award, Joens was named to the WBCA All-America Team, a second Team All-American by the USBWA, a Third Team All-American by the Associated Press, the Big 12 Player of the Year and a unanimous selection to the All-Big 12 First Team (her fourth-straight season as a unanimous choice).

The Iowa State record books were rewritten by Joens, who will leave ISU as the career record holder for points (3,060), rebounds (1,391), games played and started (158), field goals (988), 3-pointers (344), free throws (740), double-doubles (65) and points per game (19.4). Her career points total ranks ninth in NCAA Division I Women's Basketball history, while games played and started are both Big 12 records.

Her final season in Ames saw Joens lead the Big 12 and rank ninth nationally averaging 21.6 points per game. She scored in double figures in 31 of 32 games for the Cyclones this season, going over 20 on 20 occasions, including each of Iowa State's final 10 games. She also had 16 double-doubles on the season.

Joens helped lead the Cyclones to the Phillips 66 Big 12 Women's Basketball Championship title two weeks ago with an all-time legendary weekend, being the unanimous selection as Tournament Most Outstanding Player after averaging 26.7 points and 11.0 rebounds per contest, helping the Cyclones claim a first Big 12 trophy in 22 years.

Of course it helps when you get to play every game on your home court. Their coach is spouting how Arizona made the Final Four two years after winning the NIT. They expect their three seniors back next year including the 6’6” girl who was MVP of the tournament.

Ironic that ISU’s loss to them near the end of the season may have cost us a home court seed.