The WIAA Board of Control had a busy day on Thursday. They passed major changes in the structure of both football and basketball. Let's start with football where the Wisconsin Valley Conference and Fox Valley Association will offcially merge to form one football only 16 team conference with two divisions starting in 2011. The WVC coaches love this idea...the FVA coaches not so much. The WVA has only been a shell of it's former self after Merrill, Antigo and Rhinelander left. Ironically Merrill will return for one season this year before going back to the Great Northern Conference. Rhinelander begins play in the GNC this season. The GNC will also add Ashland for football in 2011 as Tomahawk and Eagle River leave.

The basketball changes are interesting mainly for how they will affect the D-1 State Tournament. Starting this season both boys & girls basketball will feature 5 divisions instead of 4. Each division will send 4 teams to the state tournament. In lieu of the divison 1 quarterfinals, the large schools will play a "super sectional" on the Tuesday the week of the State Tournament. Those games will be at various sites around the state instead of the Kohl Center. The divisions will be based on enrollment.

The Bucks wanted to get bigger in Thursday's draft and they accomplished that. Larry Sanders of Virginia Commonweath is a 6'11" power forward who also is very fast and athletic. They also picked up a 6'7 guard Darlington Hobson, a 7' center Jerome Jordan and a 6'9" forward Keith gallon. Coach Scott Skiles thinks Sanders can contribute right away.

The Brewers get the sweep of the Twins. Yovanni Gallardo shook off a bad last outing and was dominant once again. A complete game shut-out with 12 K's. The Brewers take on the struggling Mariners in interleague play this weekend.

The Woodchucks are playing good baseball right now. They are in first place and are scoring a bunch but also playing excellent defense. They are in La Crosse this weekend and return to Athletic Park on Tuesday.

Both the French and Italians failed to advance to the round of 16 at the World Cup. Expect much wailing and gnashing of teeth in Europe.

Congrat to John Isner who finally prevailed in that marathon tennis match at Wimbledon. Actually it was much longer than a marathon.

The Wausau Legion Bulldogs have been off for a week after a rain out Wednesday. We are scheudled to return to action Saturday at Stoughton and Sunday at Chippewa Falls but again the weather looks like it may not cooperate. Even the farmers are saying enough with the rain for awhile..

Songs of the Day - (From My -I-pod)

The Garden of Allah-Don Henley (mid-90's) it has nothing to do with Islam. The Garden of Allah was a hotel complex in Los Angeles that had it's hey-dey from the 30's through the late 50's where the hoi-polloi met to intellectualize and fornicate. He ties that into the OJ Simpson circus and the devil visiting LA. As usual Henley's caustic lyrics cut to the bone.

Gangster of Love-Steve Miller Band (1967) a Steve Miller classic from his early days. He began as a blues guy at UW-Madison along with Boz Scaggs and Ben Sidran before morphing into the pop star of the 70's. Wausau's own James "Curley" Cooke played on the early Steve Miller Band records