National Signing Day is over for the UConn Huskies football team as they picked up 21 new recruits who will look to help the Huskies keep their bowl game streak alive and reach the ultimate goal of making a BCS bowl game. Most of the recruiting websites have UConn’s class as the 6th or 7th best in the Big East and somewhere in the 70’s nationally.

John Silver of the Journal Inquirer, Chip Malafronte of the New Haven Register, Desmond Conner of the Hartford Courant, Neill Ostrout of the Connecticut Post all have some notes on the newest Huskies.

Rob Lunn has his 5 reasons why you should be excited for UConn football [Thoughts From a Fat White Guy]

Rob Lunn tells us you’re never too old to look stupid [Thoughts From a Fat White Guy]

Here are some photos from the reception held at Rentschler Field last night [UConnHuskies.com]

Quality tops quanity for UConn’s state recruits [New Haven Register]

UConn has a well-received crop [New London Day]

Seymour’s Mike Osiecki is offically a Husky [New Haven Register]

UConn landed 4 receiving options [Connecticut Post]

There were some good catches for the UConn football team [Hartford Courant]

21 student-athletes sign on to be Huskies [Norwich Bulletin]

UConn hopes Difton is a big catch [Hartford Courant]

There were 4 big catches for the UConn football team [Journal Inquirer]

Mike Anthony of the Hartford Courant has some notes on the UConn men’s basketball team.

David Gillett has his top 10 UConn basketball players in the NBA [UConn Huskies Basketball]

John Altavilla of the Hartford Courant, Joe Perez of the Norwich Bulletin and Rich Elliott of the Connecticut Post have some notes on the UConn women’s basketball team.

Renee Montgomery was named a Lowes Senior CLASS finalist [BigEast.org]

Kalana Greene is showing flashes of brilliance [Norwich Bulletin]

Meghan Gardler stepped up big against Rutgers [Hartford Courant]

Tina Charles and Lorin Dixon had nights to forget on Tuesday night [Journal Inquirer]

Meghan Gardler made the most of her time on Tuesday night [New Haven Register]

The UConn women’s hockey team will take on Boston University this weekend [UConnHuskies.com]

[dailymotion]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x89js4_5-good-minutes_sport[/dailymotion]

Theo Epstein: Boston Red Sox GM Theo Epstein called into the “Dale and Holley Show” this morning to talk some baseball. Theo is already down in Florida today and was enjoying the warm weather while we freeze our butts off up here. He offered some thoughts on the pursuit of Mark Teixeira and John Smoltz among other things. Here’s the audio and the link is to the transcript.

[Extra Bases]

Here is the press release from the UConn Huskies football program announcing the signing of 21 student-athletes to National Letters of Intent.

STORRS – University of Connecticut head football coach Randy Edsall announced on Wednesday that the Huskies have signed 21 student-athletes to a National Letter of Intent to join the UConn program.

Student-athletes in UConn’s 2009 signing class hail from 10 different states (and Canada).

The following is a full signee roster and biography of each:

Name Pos. Hgt. Wt. Hometown/High School/Prep School

• Aiken, Marcus WR 6-1 175 New Britain, Conn./St. Paul (Bristol)
• Brandon, Tevrin DB 5-9 180 Bethlehem, Pa./Bethlehem Catholic
• Box, Michael QB 6-3 195 Suwanee, Ga./Collins Hill
• Bullock, Tyler OL 6-4 250 Mechanicsburg, Pa./ Mechanicsburg
• Chambers, Keensen DE 6-5 230 Greenville, S.C./Southside/WorcesterAcademy (Mass.)
• Christen, Chad K-P 6-1 190 Etters, Pa./Red Land
• Difton, Dwayne WR 5-11 175 Ft. Lauderdale, Fla./St. Thomas Aquinas
• Friend, Kevin OL 6-5 260 Warrenton, Va./Faquier
• Generett, Malik WR 6-5 210 York, Pa./ William Penn
• Greene, Steve OL 6-5 311 Edensburg, Pa./Bishop Carroll
• Hyppolite, Martin RB 6-0 215 Wakefield, Mass./Wakefield
• Joseph, Jesse DE 6-4 235 Lavel, Quebec/Northeast Philadelphia (Pa.)/Vanier Prep
• Kenney, David SS 6-0 205 Highstown, N.J./The Peddie School
• Kinnard, Leon QB 5-9 180 Reistertown, Md./Loyola Blakefield
• Lang, Michael WR 6-0 180 Largo, Fla./Largo
• Lopes, Chris DB 5-10 190 Brockton, Mass./Tilton School (N.H.)
• Osiecki, Michael LB 6-2 225 Seymour, Conn./ Seymour
• Stephen, Shamar DT 6-5 260 Brookville, N.Y./Long Island Lutheran
• Williams, Nick ATH 5-10 180 East Windsor, N.J./The Hun School
• Williams, Trevardo DE 6-3 220 Bridgeport, Conn./Central/Canterbury School (Conn.)
• Willman, Tim DT 6-4 245 Fulton, Md./Reservoir

If you want to watch the press conference head coach Randy Edsall will be holding, you can click here at 3 PM.

A look at their bios after the jump.

Continue reading →

We are now just two days away from Truck Day for the Boston Red Sox. It may not feel like spring up here in New England but Truck Day for us here cancels out what the groundhog said because it means spring training is near. In fact, it’s just 8 days until pitchers and catchers report to Ft. Myers. That is unless you’re Jon Lester, then you are already there.

Speaking of Ft. Myers, I don’t know if anyone has been following the whole new Red Sox spring training site saga. Recently they narrowed down the fields on the site for the complex and also the builder. Now it turns out that one of the people on the commission is dating one of the builders and people don’t want her to vote.

County Commissioner Tammy Hall has the right – and obligation – to vote when the board decides whether to approve a construction manager for the new Boston Red Sox spring training complex, according to the county attorney.

Hall’s boyfriend, Howard Wheeler, is president of Chris-Tel Construction of Fort Myers, one of two subcontractors for manager Kraft Construction on the project. The other is Casey Construction.

“Boyfriends are not included in the (state) statute,” County Attorney David Owen said Friday. “It is not a conflict of interest.”

If there is no conflict, Owen said public officials are bound to vote.

“That is their obligation, that is their duty,”Owen said.

Commissioner Frank Mann is concerned the relationship could derail the entire Red Sox project, he wrote in a Monday memo to Owen.

Wait, it gets better.

The wait for a state ethics agency’s ruling could delay the hiring of a construction manager for the new Boston Red Sox spring training stadium.

Lee County Attorney David Owen recommended Tuesday Commissioner Tammy Hall get an opinion from the state about whether it will be a conflict of interest if she votes on hiring a construction manager for the complex.

And just when you thought it wouldn’t get any better.

This week Bigelow brought the issue to the table again, this time handing the “undue influence” tag to the Boston Red Sox.

“It’s come to light to me that we have placed a Red Sox official on the selection committee, so we have one appointee who’s backed up by the ability to veto.”

Commissioners did vote in December to make an exception and allow a team representative – Florida operations manager Todd Stephenson – a vote on the committee that has already chosen a design firm and construction manager and has yet to select a stadium site.

Now does it really matter who she’s porking. For the past year or so, she’s been voting on contracts involving her boyfriend, what makes this so different. My only guess would it has to do with the expenditure the county will have to put forth in this economy. I’m sure it doesn’t look good to the taxpayers when you’re going to have to shell close to $60 million but yet make cuts in other areas.

I have an idea, “if you build it, they will come” and then you can recoup some of your money when people flock to Lee County to see the new complex.

Hall reluctant to vote on boyfriend [News-Press.com]

Hall urged to get ethics opinion before Red Sox stadium vote [News-Press.com]

Lee commissioner asks why Red Sox rep is on committee [Naples Daily News]

Lee County Red Sox sites get green ranking [News-Press.com]

Let’s stay out of the politics and see what else is making news for the Red Sox after the jump.

Continue reading →