12 Hours of Sports

11:00 a.m. on New Year's Day: I am headed to MKE for a 12-hour sports bonanza. A full slate of lesser Big Ten bowls awaited prior to the Grandaddy Of Them All along with the company of my best bud and my brother. The soon-to-be-arrived-at viewing venue happened to serve beer and tasty snacks and featured an HD television every 22.5 degrees of my field of vision. The Ticketcity Bowl was kicking off as I headed over the Chicago Skyway - the 2011 Bowl Season was officially underway.

Some of you may have correctly observed that the bowl season began weeks ago beginning with the New Mexico Bowl, the uDrove Humanitarian Bowl, and the R plus L Carriers New Orleans Bowl (oh, how I wish I was making at least two of those up). While this is technically true, I had enough trouble listening to the Northwestern game without veering into oncoming traffic to even think about feigning interest in the likes of the Little Caesars Bowl.

So back to New Year's Day and Milwaukee's Rock Bottom Brewery. Our first and second pints helped hide the fact that the Big Ten was getting spanked in each and every bowl matchup. (Note to bitter Michigan State Fans: It's time to Shut Up now.) Me and my two 'mates were faced with either bad football or the daunting prospect of actual conversation. We of course discussed movie quotations from Fletch and Support Your Local Sheriff.

The Badger game came on at the appointed hour. The opening drive was promising but only netted Bucky a field goal while TCU countered with a touchdown. The Badgers played just well enough to maintain optimism but just bad enough to allow creeping dread. TCU seemed to know which Badger DB was the least experienced, while U-Dub played away from what worked early on. A gutsy fake punt created false hope, the early missed field goal loomed large. A failed onside kick sealed our fate.

It retrospect, TCU played an excellent game and deserved to win - they were the better team that day. The Badgers were capable of winning the game and were in it until the end, but it still left a bitter taste. Subdued from the Rose Bowl and several additional pints, we headed for the Bradley Center and the Bucks-Mavericks game.

The Bucks were urging people to "Wear Red!" for the game in hopes of parlaying Rose Bowl enthusiasm into a raucous game atmosphere (more on that later). Dallas was without Dirk Nowitzki and Shawn Marion, but we felt little sympathy as the Bucks were short nearly a full squad themselves (for those scoring at home: Brandon Jennings, Michael Redd, Carlos Delfino, Drew Gooden). With cautious optimism we took our Row A seats and awarded salvage rights to the Bucks for this day of athletic competition.

A word on our seats: Row A is a good thing, but not always a great thing. The Bradley Center was built for hockey and is a fantastic hockey venue. For basketball, it is still a fantastic hockey venue, with our euphemistically-named "corner section" seats situated fairly deep off the baseline. We were afforded a unprecedented view, however, of Jason Terry warming up on an exercise bike.

The previously mentioned "Wear Red" campaign yielded mixed results, which is a polite way of saying it blew. To be fair, a number of folks were clad in red, but at no time would you have suspected it was the result of any concerted effort. The game atmosphere was subdued, the in-game entertainment was fair-to-lame. Rose Bowl hangover oozed throughout the building.

Dallas lost Caron Butler to a torn patellar tendon early in the game, but countered with an en fuego JJ Barea and Jason Kidd doing a Jason Kidd impersonation. Milwaukee responded with all 65 inches of Earl Boykins and Ersan Illyasova channeling a circa-1983 Moses Malone. The final buzzer sounded with scoreboard reading Milwaukee 99 Dallas 87.

Our three-block walk to the hotel was accompanied by 30 mph winds in 15 degree weather, but our 12 hours of sports ended on a high note. We are on a four-year winning streak with the Bucks, and an o-fer with the Badgers. Bring on 2012!