New Mascot In Oxford, Downton Olympics, Football & 5,6,7,8's

University of Mississippi alumni, season ticket holders and students have finally selected a mascot. After what seemed like a painful search, Ole Miss stake holders went with the Rebel Black Bear. Probably the safest selection over Hotty Toddy and the Rebel Land Shark.

The Ole Miss marketing department must be drooling over the available promotional opportunities. Like, with Tim the Bear from Fox's The Cleveland Show,

or PSAs with Smokey the Bear,

or with Conan's Masturbating Bear.

Here's a quick look at Conan's friend in action.




Ole Miss may also have a chance to have the first jersey sponsorships of the SEC.

Just received a note that the Downtown Olympics are this Saturday. Here's the schedule of events.

11am: Registration & Check-in opens at Max’s (formerly Calhoun’s)

12 Noon: Opening Ceremony – Team Introductions

12:45pm: 4-Bar Relay Start

1:30pm: Synchronized Beer Drinking Start

2:45pm: Downtown Survivor Challenge Start

4:00pm: Big Wheel Race Start

5:15pm: Cornhole Tourney Start

7:00pm: DynaFlow Takes the Stage

7:30pm: Trophy & Medal Presentation

8:00pm: Dynaflow Rocks into the Night

The Events are as follows:

4-Bar Relay – short relay race where each team member must kill a beer which they have purchased, run with baton to next bar, pass baton to next team member, who then rinses & repeats until finish line at Max’s (previously Calhoun's)... Bars will be announced soon & runs will be kept to a minimum...

Synchronized Beer Drinking – All team members participate in a music-related skit which involves synchronized beer drinking...

Big Wheel Race – Two (2) team members participate in head-to-head bracket style racing on a Big Wheel or Tricycle (teams responsible for their own BigWheel)... Last year’s course included a figure-8, so expect to be challenged...

Downtown Survivor Challenge – Each team member will have to complete a downtown-related task before next team member can begin the next task & complete entire challenge... Expect beer purchase to be involved here...

Cornhole Tourney – Each team may have 2 distinct Two-person cornhole teams in cornhole tourney... Toss ‘em to win...

Then it’s Dynaflow in the courtyard behind Calhoun’s for some entertainment & winner’s celebrations.

If football is more your speed, then you should go to the Memphis football game on Saturday. Tickets are dirt cheap. For $10 you get your ticket, a soft drink and a hot dog. Not a bad deal.

College football in the state of Tennessee is just plain bad this year. Middle Tennessee State (2-3), Vanderbilt (2-3) and Tennessee-Knoxville (2-4) have an edge over Memphis (1-5) for the most wins of Volunteer State FBS programs. That's right, all of the FBS programs have losing records.  The FCS programs aren't doing much better. Tennessee State (3-3) has the best record over Austin Peay (2-3), Tennessee-Martin (2-4) and Tennessee Tech (2-4).

Here's the picks for this week.

Last Week: 3-3
Season: 26-10 (72%)

10/16
Millsaps over Rhodes
Southern Miss over Memphis
Auburn over Arkansas
Ohio State over Wisconsin
Tampa Bay Buccaneers over New Orleans Saints
Tennessee Titans over Jacksonville Jaguars

Weekly Liberty Bowl Projection:  East Carolina vs Cincinnati

The Liberty Bowl usually matches up the Conference USA champion vs a SEC representative. Its looking like two SEC teams will make it to the BCS bowls, so the SEC may not have enough bowl eligible teams to fill all of its bowl tie-ins. The Liberty Bowl has an alternate agreement with the Big East to provide a team if the SEC doesn't have enough teams.

The 5, 6, 7, 8's are playing at the Hi-Tone on Sunday night. You may remember them from Kill Bill Vol. 1 or from Vonage commercials. Here's a quick look.