Because of her Orthodox religion, Naama Shafir doesn't ride in cars or use modern conveniences on the Sabbath. My favorite part in this Dave Hackenberg column is how she had to walk a half hour in Grand Forks, North Dakota to a January 2, 2010 game against the Sioux and had a 16-point, 9-assist game. According to the Old Farmer's Almanac, on 1/2/10 in Grand Forks there was a high of -16º F with a low of -33º. This is, of course, one small anecdote in the heartwarming journey of Shafir from Israel to Toledo.

The former Akron soccer coach made his MLS debut tonight, and it required clawing back from a 3-1 hole thanks to a goal by his former Zips midfielder Darlington Nagbe, plus ... an own goal by New York. That's how we do it in the MAC, and that's how they're gonna do it in Major League Soccer.

This is a tremendous breakdown of who MAC football plays annually in the nonconference compared to the Big Ten and SEC. The B1G's OOC schedule is a little over one-quarter in true road games, compared to the MAC's 58 percent. This is something we all knew but probably never dug into the numbers.

This is a good read about an under publicized story. The amount of money they generated from one form letter is amazing.

As long as this site keeps their foot on the neck of this story, it's not going to go away.

If you're a UT fan this article is worth reading just so you can finally learn the back story of the lady with the flag.

Neat interview here by Paul Lukas of Uni Watch with Frank Cloutier, PR director for the Saginaw Chippewas about their relationship with CMU and how schools can appropriately use Indians as mascots. The Great Lakes region has plenty of Native American history and if, say, Eastern Michigan used this blueprint for a relationship with the Huron tribe, they could very well bring back that beloved mascot, as they briefly did last year.

Just in case you were feeling upbeat about college athletics, check out this Kevin Hadsell interview to bring you back down to earth.

I'm not entirely sure who puts this projection together, but they purport to use computer rankings to project the season. You'll notice Akron as a 12 and OHIO as a 13, which I am guessing means they have Ohio over Akron in the MAC Championship, with the Zips nabbing a 12-seed ... along with Kentucky. What a weird, stupid season. (For the record, most projections have Akron still as a 13-seed.)

The accomplished Miami (OH) is finally getting the Jon Gruden treatment. He'll be one of nine quarterbacks to attend the camp and, I imagine, will have a segment about his game on ESPN at some point. No sign of Alex Carder, though.