Let me start out this morning by saying that someone in the Big East office should be smacked around for scheduling the UConn Huskies men’s basketball and women’s basketball teams at the same time on Saturday night. I guess we could blame ESPN since they have the broadcast rights to the men’s game and that means that they control what time the game starts at.

Mike Anthony of the Hartford Courant and David Borges of the New Haven Register both have notes on the UConn men’s basketball team.

Jim Calhoun has a lot of respect for the Irish.

Luke Harangody hasn’t forgetten what Hasheem Thabeet said back in November and said the comments will motivate the Irish.

A.J. Price’s game is coming back into focus for the Huskies.

Hasheem Thabeet has to walk the walk.

Notre Dame’s 45-game home winning streak will be staring the Huskies in the face on Saturday night. And here’s a look at the numbers for the Irish during the streak.

There are lots of subplots that will spice up the game between the Huskies and the Irish on Saturday night.

ESPN GameDay will be in the house tomorrow night in South Bend.

Former Husky Ben Gordon was very unhappy with a fine levied by Chicago Bulls head coach Vinny Del Negro.

Jim Fuller of the New Haven Register, John Altavilla of the Hartford Courant, Rich Elliot of the Connecticut Post, and Joe Perez of the Norwich Bulletin all have some notes on the UConn women’s basketball team.

As noted yesterday, Caroline Doty’s knee surgery was a success.

The UConn women’s hockey team will host Northeastern on Friday and Saturday.

The UConn men’s hockey team returns to action with a two-game road trip to take on Mercyhurst tonight and tomorrow.

With just under 3 weeks until pitchers and catchers report, the Boston Red Sox still have one glaring need. They need a starting catcher. As of yesterday, the only news about the Jason Varitek situation was that there was no news. So what does that mean for the Boston Red Sox.

As Michael Silverman of the Boston Herald points out, if the Red Sox don’t sign the Captain, they could either go with two of the following three catchers in Josh Bard, George Kottaras and Dusty Brown. Or they could make a trade for a younger catcher. As we know the names the Red Sox have been linked to in the past are Taylor Teagarden and Jarrod  Saltalamacchia of the Texas Rangers and Miguel Montero of the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Of course to make one of those trades, the Red Sox are going to have to give up a top quality pitching prospect. The question to me  is it worth it to trade somebody like Clay Buchholz, Michael Bowden or Daniel Bard. Or should the Red Sox try and get a deal done with Varitek.

Here’s what Silverman has to say about the three catchers who be available via trade:

In Montero, it would undoubtedly be his catching and pitch-calling skills. Randy Johnson in particular is said to have been high on Montero as a catcher, and other Arizona veterans enjoyed throwing to him.

Offense is not a problem for Saltalamacchia, who has the potential to become a force with his bat. He is still developing catching-wise but, as the youngest of the three, time is on his side. Few would project him to become the type of defensively accomplished catcher that Montero is, but his offense – high on-base, slugging, average capability – could be of a special caliber.

Teagarden offers the most complete package, blending better catching skills than Saltalamacchia and better offense than Montero. That is likely why he would command a more expensive return in prospects, the same reason why his name is heard less frequently than Saltalamacchia or Montero.

While I’m no baseball expert, I really think the Red  Sox would be better served with Tek behind the plate. Something in my gut tells me that the Red Sox pitching staff just wouldn’t be the same without him. Yes I know eventually at some point things are going to have to change but as I said last night, I really think this team can go really far this year with Varitek behind the plate.

If I had to choose between one of those 3, I probably take Saltalamacchia. I like the fact that he’s a switch-hitter and the youngest of the bunch at 24 (Teagarden is 25 and Montero is 26).

However, I do like the numbers that Teagarden put in a brief amount of time in the big leagues last year. In just 16 games, he hit .319 with 6 home runs, 17 RBIs, .396 OBP and .809 SLG.

You have to figure that in the next week or so, we should know what the Red Sox catching situation will be.

In other Red Sox news, Daniel Barbarisi of the Providence Journal takes a look at the revamped 2009 Red Sox bullpen.

Former Red Sox infielder Bill Werber died at the age of 100.

Gordon Edes of Yahoo! Sports takes a look at the 2009 Red Sox.

The Red Sox introduced a luxury limo package to the games for just $2,500.

Tony Massarotti of the Boston Globe sees the Red Sox opening day payroll at $135 million.

Gary Marbry of WEEI.com has nugget-style reviews of Clay Buchholz and Jed Lowrie.

The Red Sox and Lee County have trimmed down the list of potential sites for the new spring training complex to nine.

Please take a moment to vote in the poll in the sidebar above the calendar about the Red Sox catching situation.

During his new gig on WEEI, former Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling said the Red Sox need Jason Varitek back as their catcher.

“There’s a lot of reasons,” Schilling said. “I think [the Red Sox] went into this winter very intent on trying to find that catcher of the future. I think the plan was to offer ‘Tek arbitration and have a trade made for a kid … somebody to bring in for the next year or two, because I think that the initial plan was to offer [Varitek] arbitration. [They thought,] ‘Of course he’s going to accept it,’ and then next year, they might be in this spot

“I think they were going to start to wane the staff off of a Jason Varitek and onto the catcher of the future.”

“I think you’re looking at about $45 million invested in this pitching staff next year, and if your catcher doesn’t work with your pitching staff, it’s not one player that has a down year, an off season, it’s potentially the entire staff,” Schilling continued. “That might be overstating how many guys would have good or bad seasons based on Jason being back there, but I’m very comfortable with saying that there is very little chance that every guy on that staff won’t be better if he’s back this year. He’s the kind of guy that makes you as good as you can be each start.

“Jason knows us as good, if not better, than some of us know ourselves.”

“They’re going to know in Spring Training if it’s not syncing up [with a young catcher],” Schilling said. “But it’s too late at that point to do anything, because you’ve already signed this kid to be your catcher of the future. Now what happens if this catcher of the future comes on, takes on the No. 1 job, and he can’t cut it the first month?

“My point is it’s an irreversible mistake if you take that path.”

Once WEEI posts the audio up in the archives, I’ll link to it.

I’ve said all along that I feel losing Varitek could hurt the pitching staff and Schilling backed that up during the interview.  Eventually at some point, the Red Sox will need to move on. I just hope it’s not this year because the team assembled right now has all the makings of a World Series Champion again.

Schilling also touched on the Manny Ramirez incidents, that he wants to pitch in the second half and that he thinks he isn’t a Hall of Famer.

The latter part won’t need to become discussion until he officially retires from baseball. Then we’ll have five years to discuss whether or not he belongs.

Update: Here’s the full audio of Schilling’s first appearance on WEEI.

Red Sox, Varitek Talking: Tony Massarotti is reporting that although the Boston Red Red Sox and Jason Varitek are talking, the talks are going very slowly. I still think they get some type of deal done of the 1-2 year variety.

According to one source familiar with the negotiations, Varitek has not given up hope of securing a two-year deal, though that outcome seems unlikely. The challenge for the team and player now comes in finding a deal that will satisfy all parties in the wake of the decision by Varitek and Boras to forgo salary arbitration, a process that likely would have earned the player a one-year deal worth $10 million-$12 million. At the moment, with arbitration no longer an option, Varitek has little leverage and could be looking at a deal for a fraction of that amount.

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