Championship Weekend Sports Chowdah Update- Chief's Belcher Kills Girlfriend, Self; Patriots Clinch AFC East Title; Rick Majerus Passes Away at Age 64; NCAA Volleyball Finals Under Way; Boxer 'Macho' Camacho Dies From Gunshot Wound

John Rieger, US Presswire

NFL- Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher shot himself at the team's facilities in Arrowhead Stadium moments after murdering his 22 year old girlfriend- Kasandra M Perkins- on Saturday morning.

Belcher had reportedly shot Perkins nine times at their home before speeding the relatively short distance to the Arrowhead stadium. Kansas City general manager Scott Pioli and former Patriots defensive coordinator and current Chiefs head coach Romeo Crennel were summoned to the parking lot where they came face-to-face with Belcher, who thanked the two men for giving him a chance in the NFL before putting the gun to his head and pulling the trigger.

Needless to say, the football world in general was stunned by this grim turn of events and Kansas City's disappointing 1-10 season suddenly paled in comparison to Saturday's murder-suicide.

Originally from Long Island, Belcher played Division I-AA football [now called FCS- NANESB!] for the University of Maine Black Bears of the Colonial Athletic Association between 2005 and 2008. Black Bears head coach Jack Cosgrove described Belcher as "a tremendous student-athelete" where he garnered preseason CAA honors and had 293 tackles and 18 sacks in 44 games before graduating with a bachelor's degree in child development and family relations.

The murder-suicide leaves Belcher and Perkins' 3 month old daughter, Zoey, without a mother or father. One of his former Maine teammates reportedly texted Belcher the night before the murder-suicide, congratulating him on the new arrival and joking about getting a gun to ward off future boyfriends. Belcher reportedly replied that he had at least eight firearms to choose from.

The Chiefs' decision to play the Carolina Panthers as scheduled [Kansas City would win by a 21-27 final- NANESB!] the following day came under criticism from some corners of the media. However, some of the media coverage itself drew withering criticism for painting Belcher in a sympathetic light and seemingly ignoring the fact that he killed his girlfriend.

ESPN's Tom Jackson had what many considered to be the most direct comment out of all the Sunday kickoff shows: ""Remember that Jovan Belcher, as we hear about what a great teammate he was and how close some of the guys where to him, that he is in fact a murderer. ... So as we look at the outpouring of sympathy that will go toward Belcher today, I would ask people to remember Kasandra Perkins."

3-month old Zoey is reportedly with Belcher's mother on Long Island while Chiefs players have announced plans to create a benefit fund for Perkins' daughter.

Photo/Rhona Wise

NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS- During Sunday's road game in Miami, the New England Patriots were held to fewer than 35 points for the first time since October 21st. However, despite this fairly noteworthy accomplishment, it was not enough to help the Miami Doplhins in their first matchup against New England this season.

Miami's Brandon Fields would fumble the ball on the Dolphin's first possession of the game, giving New England the ball inside the Dolphins red zone and a rushing TD from Stevan Ridley and putting New England on top 7-0.

With about 3:10 to go in the first and New England driving, Miami safety Reshad Jones managed to pick off Brady and appeared to run it back for a TD- however, the officials threw a flag on the return and the touchdown was negated. Miami would still get a 44 yard FG off the boot of Dan Carpenter to get on the board and make it a 7-3 game.

In the 2nd quarter, the Patriots would make it a 17-3 game thanks to a short brady TD pass to Wes Welker and a 43 yard Gostkowski FG. But instead of running away with it at the half, with just under seven minutes to go, Miami would start off what would be their last drive of the first half from their own 5 yard line thanks to a pair of penalties. However, when RB Reggie Bush wasn't running for 7 or 8 yards, Dolphins QB Ryan Tannehill would throw 12-15 yard passes to put Miami on New England's goal line inside the two minute warning. To cap off the drive, Tannehill would punch it in himself to make it a 17-10 game at the half and make it a one-score game.

There would be no scoring in the 3rd quarter and despite moving the ball inside the Dolphin's 2 yard line to start off the 4th, Brady was sacked twice and New England had to settle for the FG to make it 20-10.

Miami's next drive would bring them inside the New England 10, but LB Jarod Mayo managed to sack Tannehill at the 15, forcing the Dolphins to settle for a FG and 4th and 15.

From there on out, Carpenter and Gostkowski would exchange FG's to make it a 7 point game and while Miami would attempt to get one last posession with 31 seconds to go in regulation, the Patriots would recover the onside kick to close out the game by a 23-16 final.

New England hangs on to win this one and clinch their 9th AFC East title in 10 seasons, joining the Atlanta Falcons and Denver Broncos in clinching their respective divisions on Sunday.

The Patriots next opponent- the 11-1 Houston Texans- have clinched a playoff spot, but the AFC South title isn't official yet. This will be a prime-time matchup [one of the relatively few New England is scheduled to appear in- NANESB!] with the two teams going at it from Foxbourough, MA on Monday night football. Kickoff is scheduled for 8:30 PM ET and the game will be televised nationally on ESPN.


NCAA FOOTBALL- The UConn Huskies, the only New England FBS school with a shot at a bowl game, instead ended the regular season with a 34-17 loss to Cincinnati on Saturday. Between Boston College, UMass and Connecticut, the three schools had 8 wins between them in the 2012 Football season. The Minutemen and Eagles wrapped up their respective regular seasons last week.

While this wasn't entirely unexpected for UMASS's FBS debut season, this is the second straight year the Eagles finished under .500 and were Bowl ineligible.

ELSEWHERE IN NCAA FOOTBALL- Pretty busy Championship Saturday, so I'll try to wrap it up as best I can. In what was no doubt the most anticipated game over the weekend, Alabama held off the Georgia Bulldogs to punch their ticket to the BCS Championship game against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish on January 7th.

There was a pair of conference championship games on Friday night as #8 Stanford held off #16 UCLA by a 27-24 final to win the Pac-12 title. Meanwhile, over in Detroit the #21 Northern Illinois Huskies needed double OT to get past the #17 Kent State Golden Flashes with that one ending in a 44-37 win for NIU.

The OT Championship games resumed on Saturday when the Tulsa Golden Hurricanes got past Central Florida by a 33-27 final for the Conference USA title. The Sun Belt title game wasn't anywhere near as close as Arkansas State routed Middle Tennessee State by a 45-0. #12 Florida State held off a game Georgia Tech [don't let that 6-6 record fool you, I guess- NANESB!] to win by a 21-15 final in prime time while the Wisconsin Badgers simply demolished Nebraska by a 70-31 final in the Big Ten title game.

It was just another Saturday in the Big 12- albeit the final Saturday of the regular season which saw a couple of contests pitting ranked teams against one another. The most marquee matchup was the primetime game between #7 Kansas State and #23 Texas on Saturday- which was sort of a de-facto Big 12 title match. Although they looked a little lost and confused in the first half, the K State Wildcats had a great second half and pulled away from the Longhorns to win by a final of 24-42. #11 Oklahoma managed to beat Texas Christian by a 24-17 final and Baylor played spoiler to #24 Oklahoma State, taking care of business in Waco by a 41-34 final.

The only remaining regular season college football game this upcoming weekend is the annual Army-Navy game from Philadelphia. The game will be televised on CBS and kicks off a 3:00 ET.

OTHER NCAA NEWS- Wisconsin Badgers head coach Bret Bielema has been announced as the new Arkansas Razorbacks head coach on Tuesday. The announcement came barely 48 hours after Wisconsin handily beat Nebraska in the Big Ten title game and earned a spot in the Rose Bowl and third straight Big Ten title.

Bielema was with Wisconsin for 7 seasons and has an overall record of 68-24. He replaces interim Razorbacks head football coach John L Smith, who in turn replaced former head coach Bobby Petrino after the University dismissed him amid revelations he was having an affair with a University of Arkansas Athletic Department employee.

Jamie Sabau/Getty Images

NCAA HOOPS- St Louis Billikens head coach Rick Majerus passed away at the age of 64 this weekend. The jovial basketball coach was perhaps best known for helming the Utah Utes to the 1998 NCAA Men's final and had just one losing season in his 25 year coaching career.

Majerus ended the Billiken's 12 year NCAA tournament drought last season and St Louis took a contest with top regional seed Michigan State down to the wire. Throughout his coaching career, the Wisconsin born Majerus also was head coach of Marquette, Ball State and Utah- as well as a brief stint as an assistant with the NBA's Milwaukee Bucks in the 1980s. Overall, Majerus had a record of 516-217 as a head coach.

Having been the Billiken's head coach since 2007, Majerus announced in August that he would not be returning due to ongoing health issues- he had been suffering from heart problems for the last 20 years. Assistant coach Jim Crews has been the Billiken's interim coach since then.

Yale Athletics photo

NCAA VOLLEYBALL- Well, the regular season for NCAA Women's volleyball has wrapped up and the only New England schools who earned an invite to the Division 1 tournament are Yale and Fairfield.

Yale finished the season with an impressive 14-0 record and clinched the Ivy League title, only to lose to Bowling Green 3 sets to 2 in the first round.

Fairfield Stags celebrate their MAAC volleyball title

Like last season, Yale and another small school from Connecticut [not UConn- NANESB!] were the lone schools representing New England in the NCAA women's volleyball tournament. Last year, Sacred Heart university of Fairfield, CT was felled by Stanford in the first round. This year, it was a different school from the same Connecticut town.

Siena's Lesli Akeo (#9) and Taylor Akana (#12) in action against MAAC opponent Fairfield- Photo: JS Carras- Troy Record

Fairfield, which plays Division volleyball in the Metro Atlantic Conference, had a 15-3 regular season record and came from behind to best the Siena Saints in the MAAC tournament. Siena hasn't appeared in the NCAA tournament since the 2008 season.

However, Fairfield was swept out of the tournament by the USC Trojans last week- the same volleyball program that had eliminated Yale in the first round of last year's tournament.

Louisville's Katie George and Haley Pouliezos seen celebrating win. Scott Utterback- Courier Journal photo

BIG EAST VOLLEYBALL- Despite a pretty good regular season in which they went 19-12, the UConn Huskies made an early exit from the Big East tournament after losing to the Cincinnati Bearcats by a final of 3 sets to 2 on November 16.

UConn finished the regular season in 4th place in the Big East. However, the Big East tournament loss was particularly frustrating as no less than three Big East teams had been selected to the 2012 NCAA tournament. Louisville won the Big East title after sweeping the Marquette Golden Eagles 3 games to none, but both Marquette and Notre Dame managed to secure at-large bids. However, Marquette was swept by Creighton and Notre Dame was swept by Ohio State in the first round.

Louisville came into the tournament ranked #10 and managed to get by Belmont in the first round but lost in the following round to Michigan.

ACC VOLLEYBALL- The BC Eagles women's volleyball wrapped up their 2012 with a 13 game slide, with the soon-to-be-departing the ACC Maryland Terrapins getting a measure of revenge over Boston College for an earlier loss in September. Boston College finishes the regular season with a record of 10-22, behind every school but Virginia in the ACC.

For the ACC tournament, Florida State defeated Miami 3 sets to 1 to clinch the 2012 ACC Volleyball title. Besides FSU, North Carolina, Miami and North Carolina State earned at large bids. However, North Carolina State and Miami made early exits with the Hurricanes losing 3 sets to 2 to the College of Charleston and the Wolfpack losing 3 sets to 1 to Texas A&M in the first round.

The Tarheels and Seminoles managed to advance to the second round with Florida State sweeping Hofstra and North Carolina getting past Cal. However, in the seond round, the Tarheels were dispatched in Ames, IA by the Iowa State Cyclones while the Purdue Boilermakers eliminaetd the Seminoles.

COLONIAL ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION VOLLEYBALL- Depsite a promising regular season in which they finished with a 20-7 record, the Northeastern Huskies lost in the first round of the CAA volleyball final to James Madison.

Towson finished the regular season ahead of Northeastern and beat the Huskies in head-to-head competition last month, but they ended up losing in the CAA champioship game to Hofstra before Hofstra was eliminated from the NCAA tournament in the first round.

BOXING- Professional boxer Hector 'Macho' Camacho died at a hospital just days after being shot multiple times in him hometown of Bayamon, Puerto Rico. The southpaw had won major championships in featherweight, lightweight and welterweight categories.

Camacho's family moved to New York when he was three and repeatedly got into street fights as a teen. A teacher persuaded Camacho to take up boxing as a more constrictive outlet and within a few years, he began winning amateur titles around New York.

Some of Camacho's noteworthy opponents include Sugar Ray Leonard, Julio Caesar Chavez and Oscar De La Hoya. Throughout his boxing career Camacho won a total of 45 matches by knockout- including a bout where he reportedly ended Sugar Ray Leonard's career.

Camacho's body was laying in state for two days in San Juan Puerto Rico before being transported to New York for burial at the request of his mother and sisters. However, the open casket viewing was disrupted when an altercation between Camacho's sisters and a woman claiming to be his girlfriend broke out.....because funeral catfights are apparently the best kind of catfights.

Sports Chowdah Update- Rask 'em! Tukka Gets 1st Win Of Season; Giant Letdown in Foxborough; Boxing Great Fraser Passes Away; OSU/KSU Shakes Things Up

Elsa- Getty Images

NHL: Don't look now, but the defending Stanley Cup Champion Boston Bruins have been on a tear lately, breaking up the Ottawa Senator's 6-game win streak last week and shutting out the Maple Leafs 7-0 thanks to Tyler Seguin's first career hat trick over the weekend before returning to Boston to host the New York Islanders on Monday night.

The Bruins opened up the scoring with a tally from Benoit Pouliot barely 90 seconds into the 1st period, although the Isles Matt Moulson would knot up the score about 4 minutes later with an even strength goal. The B's were then able to convert a power play opportunity on a Nathan Horton tally at the 13:38 mark, followed by a Tyler Segiun even strength goal about 30 seconds later to make it 3-1 Bruins.

By that point, the Islanders decided t pull goalie Evgeni Nabakov- who had allowed 3 goals on 9 shots- for Al Montoya. Then, with just over 90 seconds remaining in the 1st, the Isles Michael Grabner made it a 1-goal game with a shot that beat Tukka Rask at the 18:36 mark.

After a scoreless 2nd period, the Bruins broke it open in the 3rd with goals from Milan Lucic, Nathan Horton and Davic Krejci (the latter coming on an empty netter) to seal the 6-2 win for Boston's 3rd straight win.

Not even one week into November, the Bruins have won as many games as they have for the month of October. Tukka Rask turned aside 24 of the 26 shots he faced for his first win of the season and the B's converted on their only power play opportunity of the evening.

The B's will next take on the Edmonton Oilers at the Garden on Thursday night with a 7 PM Start time.


BOXING: Olympic gold medalist and former undisputed world heavweight boxing champion Joe Frazier passed away due to complications from liver cancer on Monday.

Born and raised on South Carolina, Frazier became interested in boxing when his parents purchased a black and white TV and relatives compared his build to Joe Louis. At age 15, he moved in with relatives in New York City and after winning some amateur titles, he tried out for the US Olympic team, being the only American to win the gold medal in the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.

Frazier is perhaps best known for the 1971 'Fight of the Century' at Madison Square Garden where he took on Mohammed Ali. In a contest between two undefeateds, Frazier managed to best Ali in 15 rounds.

Frazier was diagnosed with liver cancer at the end of September this year and entered hospice care a week ago.

NFL: This had Deja-vu written all over it.

The rematch of Superbowl XLII got off to a pretty slow start. For the first time in nearly 5 years, the Patriots were held scoreless at the half (thanks in part to a missed Gostkowski FG attempt from the Giants 27 before the end of the 2nd quarter). However, the visiting Giants were also held scoreless in the first half, leading to very few highlights with an 0-0 score for the halftime report.

In the 3rd quarter, the Giants would get out to a 10-0 lead before the Pats would get on the board thanks to a Gostkowski FG from 32 yards to make it 10-3.

Most of the game's action would take place in the 4th quarter, where just 32 seconds in, Brady would connect with Aaron Hernandez for the Patriots forst TD of the day to tie things up at 10-10. The drive started when Giants QB Eli Manning threw an interception to New England CB Kyle Arrington in the end zone.

The Patriots would take their first lead of the day on the next possession, with Gostkowski connecting on a 45 yard FG attempt to make it a 13-10 game. However, the Giants put together a 4-minute drive to go up 17-13 late in the 4th. The Patriots and Tom Brady would respond with a drive taking all of a minute and 22 seconds off the clock, capping it off with Brady connecting to Gronkowski on 4th and 9 to make it a 20-17 game.

With 1:36 left in regulation and starting from their own 20 (and aided by some awfully goddamned stupid penalties from the Patriots D) the Giants responded by moving the ball down the field, taking up huge chunks of yardage and finding themselves on the New England 1 with all of 30 seconds remaining in regulation thanks to a pass interference penalty. With 15 seconds remaining, Manning would connect to TE Jake Ballard to put the Giants up 24-20.

And that would be the final, as New England couldn't do anything with the remaining time in regulation. The Patriots fall to 5-3, setting up an important contest next Sunday night between the Jets and Pats.

Although both the Jets and the Bills have an identical 5-3 record, New England is still in first place heading into the Sunday Night game against the Jets. Sunday's home loss was their first regular season loss at Gillette stadium in nearly 3 years.



NCAA FOOTBALL: You'd think for a "Game of the Century", somebody would've managed to have found the end zone!

Keep in mind we're only 11 years into this century, but this was the first time since the 1966 Notre Dame/Michigan State game that a #1 and #2 ranked team played each other in the regular season.

So with all eyes on Tuscaloosa, AL, the game of the 21st century kicked off Saturday night in what turned out to be a rather low-scoring affair, with both teams headed to the locker room with the game tied at 3-3. Unbelievably, regulation would end with each team tied at 6-6, forcing OT.

Alabama's 1st possession of the OT featured them losing 5 yards on offense, QB AJ McCarron getting sacked for another 5 yard loss and a missed FG attempt before turning it over on downs and giving the LSU tigers a chip-shot FG for the win (this was after a TD call was overturned by officials, saying that the reciever was out of bounds).

According to CBS, this was the highest viewed NCAA football game they began tracking viewership in the 1980s. I don't find that difficult to believe, since during the first half I was having dinner in a venue not know for it's affinity for sports, but alot of regulars were clustered around the one TV in the place watching the game....probably hoping SOMEBODY would score a TD (altho' to be fair, the 1966 'Game of the century' was even more anticlimatic).

Brett Deering/ Getty Images

ELSEWHERE IN NCAA FOOTBALL: I was actually getting bored with the LUS/Alabama game, so once in the car, I was randomly scrolling through games on XM and came across the Kansas State/Oklahoma State game. This one turned out to be a polar opposite of the LSU/'Bama game, with 32 points being scored in the 4th quarter. Down 45-52 with 2:16 to go in regulation and starting from their own 29, Kansas state managed to drive all the way down to the Cowboys 5 yard line, but was unable to manage to find the end zone on three consecutive plays and with less than 5 seconds on the clock.

#2 Oklahoma State hangs on to win by the 45-52 margin and will face the Texas Tech Red Raiders this upcoming Saturday.

PENN STATE: Penn State Athletic Director Mark Curley and Senior Vice President for Finance and Business Gary Schultz have been charged with perjury and failure to report after former Nittany Lions defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky was arraigned on charges of sexual assault. Sandusky set up a charity in 1977 called Second Mile to encourage troubled or neglected youth to achieve in sports and academic. Sandusky is accused of coercing or sexually assaulting a number of children from the Second Mile program over the years.

BOSTON COLLEGE: Well, that 38-7 spanking administered by the Florida State Seminoles at Chestnut Hill was broadcast on ESPN for all to see last Thursday.

Boston College hopes to put on a better performance against the 5-4 NC State Wolfpack on Saturday afternoon at 12:30 at Chestnut Hill.

UCONN: The UConn huskies headed into their Bye week with a 28-21 win over the Syracuse Orangemen on Saturday. After taking this weekend off, tehy'll host the Louisville Cardinals at E. Hartford on November 19th.