nalytically speaking, Purdue is obviously good. But above all else, the NCAA tour

A man and his dog were at Newlands on Wednesday afternoon but not to make up the proverbial crowd that usually attends domestic first-class matches here. The man was Faf du Plessis, who was making his first appearance as the new permanent Test captain. The dog was Giorgio, his nine-year old dachshund, who had a back operation earlier this year after becoming temporarily paralysed and now has his hind legs in a harness.Together they walked the outfield that is now du Plessis domain; the outfield on which South Africas captaincy conundrum has come full circle.It was on this ground that Hashim Amla announced he would not continue to captain, opening the door for AB de Villiers to do the job he always wanted. It was also on this ground that du Plessis, standing in for an injured de Villiers, led South Africa in completing a 5-nil ODI series whitewash over Australia to begin the conversation over whether the leadership role needed to be looked at again. And it was on this ground last Thursday that du Plessis played for the national cricket side against the national rugby side and afterwards found out that de Villiers had made the decision to give up the captaincy before anyone else could make it for him.I got the call just after the Proteas game against the Boks that AB is going to stand down for the Test matches, du Plessis said. I spoke to him that evening and I phoned him the next day just to make sure. My policy will always be one of being really honest, so it was just speaking as friends would do about going forward.De Villiers decision came on the back of his own injury problems. He has not yet recovered from an elbow problem and hasnt played for South Africa in almost six months, since their triangular series in the Caribbean. In that time the team have found the drive they lacked last summer and they have started winning again. It is obvious that they have got a good thing going and de Villiers did not want to stand in the way of that developing.AB has been amazing, du Plessis said. He has always been a guy that puts the team first, as youve seen by his making this decision. To be part of something like that says a lot about our culture but also shows a lot about AB as a person and how he values the team above himself. Du Plessis stressed that having his old schoolmates backing is the crucial to his captaincy. Thats something he said to me, that he will always be there no matter what and he will always back me. It was great to hear that from him. I got a call from Hashim as well, to say well done. Hashim passed it on to AB and then AB passed it on to me.While Amla has completely relinquished armbands of any description - except when leading du Plessis defense against ball-tampering - de Villiers remains in charge in some capacity. He is the ODI captain and should return to that role mid-January, when South Africa play Sri Lanka as they start their planning for Junes ICC event. Du Plessis has promised to offer him reciprocal commitment. AB is still captain in ODIs and I am really excited about that because he wants to win that Champions Trophy and I will be completely behind him, du Plessis said.Little else could be expected from two men who knew each other before the world knew either of them, more than two decades ago. To outsiders its a bromance between school-friends turned international team-mates but to South Africa, it means adjusting between captains. Split leadership was in vogue a few years ago but more recent thinking - including Graeme Smiths appreciation for streamlining the captaincy - has suggested it could be a curveball. Du Plessis played that down, saying the only difference between de Villiers and him is that his friend is the brightest star in South Africas sporting sky while du Plessis is just one of the troops - albeit one who has the teams buy-in. AB leads from performance - he is a guy that every time he steps onto the field, you want to be better as a player because he is that good. He is a freak when it comes to cricket. He always puts himself out there and he gives 150%, so its easy for a team to follow that, du Plessis said. My style is a little bit different to that. I am not as good as AB is, so I have to rely on other qualities. I try and challenge a team as much as I can. For me its harder work, I suppose.But its also work that du Plessis loves. He has long said captaincy brings out the best in him and he has proved it with two hundreds in five Tests as stand-in captain. The longest format is his first love and leading in it gives him his greatest joy.Being a Test captain is almost the first time when people really take you seriously. T20 is like fun, the X-factor of cricket. Test cricket is, for me the most enjoyable time to be a captain because you have to work on plans for a long period of time, you have to strategise how you are going to get guys out and continuously challenge guys over a long period of time, du Plessis said. Its a huge honour and I will be taking it very seriously.Just at that moment, things became completely un-serious. Giorgio grew restless, shifted between the cameras and the reporters, wandered towards the pitch and eventually sat at du Plessis feet, looking up with puppy eyes and whimpering. His wish was du Plessis command. Mid-interview, Giorgio was lifted off the floor and cuddled. Between this man and his dog, theres no doubt who the real boss is. Nike Presto Uk .com) - The red-hot Los Angeles Kings will try to extend their winning streak to a season-high seven games when they visit the Edmonton Oilers for Sundays clash at Rexall Place. Nike Presto Sale Uk .H. -- Matt Kenseth made it 2 for 2 in the Chase, holding off teammate Kyle Busch to win Sunday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. http://www.prestotrainersuk.com/uk-cheap-nike-air-more-uptempo-50/ . -- Ty Montgomery had 290 all-purpose yards and two touchdowns, and fifth-ranked Stanford held on to beat No. Nike Air Vapormax Flyknit Moc Womens Running Shoe . Its 1987 and a Brazilian playmaker, known as Mirandinha, is being paraded around St James Park to the passionate Newcastle fans. Nike Presto White . It was just business as usual for the Thunder at home. Durant scored 32 points and the Thunder beat the Bulls 107-95 on Thursday night for their eighth straight win. Quick question: Just how good is Kentucky, anyway?The safe bet is very good. Very, very good. Like, national-title-contention good. And why not? John Calipari entered the 2016-17 season having wrangled together the nations No. 1 recruiting class, per ESPN RecruitingNation, in a year when No. 1 Harry Giles and No. 3 Jayson Tatum both chose to play at Duke.That was not easy to do, but done it was, and those dudes of the No. 1 class have hardly disappointed. Freshmen?DeAaron Fox, Malik Monk, Bam Adebayo?and Wenyen Gabriel are all on the floor more frequently than any Wildcats player except sophomore?Isaiah Briscoe. All but Gabriel -- who gets 20.4 minutes per game and is still the teams second-leading rebounder -- average double-figure points per game. Fox has been described (by his own coach, among others) as a left-handed?John Wall; Monk has more or less lived up to CoachCal.coms preseason appraisals; Adebayo has grabbed offensive rebounds, drawn fouls and dutifully protected the rim.The Wildcats enter the weekend ranked among the top 10 in offensive and defensive adjusted efficiency, per KenPom.com, something just two other teams can say. One of those teams is Kansas. The other is Kentuckys next opponent.And thats just a small portion of what makes No. 6 Kentucky vs. No. 7 North Carolina (5:45 p.m. ET, CBS) so fascinating. For months, this neutral-court matchup at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas -- not UCLAs cross-country visit, pfft -- was the one Wildcats fans had circled on their calendar (albeit in slightly less-bold ink than next weeks blood feud with Louisville). Now here we are, and those same fans are?wondering?-- unfairly --?whether Saturday is the moment Kentucky turns really good into a win over a really good team.Whats doubly exciting is that the Tar Heels are big, athletic and versatile, and they love to push the pace. Which is to say theyre coached by Roy Williams, and which, in a twist, matches up perfectly with this version of the Wildcats.Recent Kentucky teams, for all their success, have never willingly played at a Williams-level pace. Over seven seasons, Caliparis UK teams have averaged 67.1 (adjusted, per KenPom.com) possessions per game. This season, they average 75.9; their mean possession ends in 13.5 seconds, fourth-fastest in the country. Theyre flying with Fox-led fast breaks and rebound runouts and Briscoe open-court creativity. The results have been impressive -- even against UCLA, when UK scored 92 points in 83 possessions, only to find itself outdone by an even better, even faster offensive team.That is the question posed by Saturdays matchup in Las Vegas: Can Caliparis team, as athletic and talented and fast as it is, sustain this style? Are the Wildcats so good that it can work against a team such as UNC, which is designed from the ground up to do the exact same thing (and which is vastly more experienced than Kentucky)? Can the Wildcats do so while keeping the nations best offensive rebounding team off the boards? Are they good enough to do so? How good are they, anyway?Probably really good! But lets see how Saturday -- and, not for nothing, Wednesdays trip to the Yum! Center -- goes before we decide. Fair?Crossroads ClassicNoo.dddddddddddd 21 Notre Dame vs. No. 15 Purdue, Saturday, 2 p.m., ESPN2No. 18 Butler vs. No. 9 Indiana, Saturday, 5 p.m., BTNCollege basketballs recent vintage has yielded a bumper crop of nonconference events. Sometimes these events produce good basketball. Sometimes they have weird names. Sometimes they -- gasp -- even make money.Rarely, however, are these events so organically obvious that its a wonder they havent existed all along. The Crossroads Classic, which pairs Indianas four marquee college hoops programs, is the most notable exception.As easy as it is to overly romanticize the states love affair with basketball and to reduce a cultural touchstone to pat Jimmy Chitwood references, there are good reasons why you might. Frankly, there is no event in college basketball that manages to capture the culture of the state in which it is held quite like the Crossroads Classic. For one Saturday in December, fans of four different teams, from various corners of a basketball-obsessed geographic area, congregate in one arena -- in the same way they would for, say, the Indiana state high school basketball tournament, which fills the same number of seats in Bankers Life Fieldhouse every season as does the Crossroads Classic. Which is to say, all of them.Its an event so good that it feels as if its always been around. In fact, its only 6 years old. But however successful the idea of pairing Indiana, Butler, Notre Dame and Purdue in one doubleheader has been, its safe to say the basketball itself has probably never been better than it will be Saturday.All four teams are ranked in the top 25. Combined, they are 34-5 on the season. Indiana has toppled Kansas and North Carolina; Butler owns wins over Arizona and Cincinnati; Notre Dame and surprise star Bonzie Colson had Villanova on the ropes for 35 minutes last week; Purdue has the highest efficiency margin of all four.Indeed, no team has more on the line Saturday than the Boilermakers. A neutral-court matchup with Notre Dame -- or a neutral-court matchup at least until the Indiana fans show up -- is the first of Purdues remaining three nonconference games before Big Ten play and the only one with any redeeming résumé value. To date, Matt Painters team has looked generally excellent but failed to hold on against Villanova at home and lost a tight game to Louisville on the road. Analytically speaking, Purdue is obviously good. But above all else, the NCAA tournament selection committee cares about wins and losses, and this is the Boilermakers last chance to impress before conference play begins. (Oh, and by the way, Purdue has yet to win in the first five years of the Crossroads Classic. The Boilers would very much like for that to change.)Saturdays Indiana-focused basketball will be as good as it ever has been. Thats not really the point. In an era flush with nonconference doubleheaders, most of which contain almost zero thematic or cultural resonance, the on-court product at the Crossroads Classic could be garbage and still be pretty rad. Fortunately, the basketball will be good, too. Cheap NFL Jerseys Wholesale Jerseys Wholesale NFL Jerseys Jerseys From China Wholesale NFL Jerseys Cheap NFL Jerseys Cheap Jerseys ' ' '