Finals Countdown
TAMPA -
The NCAA Tournament is coming at an absolutely awful time for UCLA's academics, as the opening week coincides with finals week for the Bruins.
Sophomore forward Brendan Lane had to take a Political Science final on the team plane while flying to Tampa, proctored by academic coordinator Kenny Donaldson and faxed immediately to Lane's professor when the team arrived at the hotel.
Three players had finals on Wednesday and Tyler Lamb, Tyler Honeycutt, Reeves Nelson and Anthony Stover all have finals on Friday.
But at least they're in Tampa.
David and Travis Wear, who transferred from North Carolina before the season and had to sit out the year because of transfer rules, could not get out of their finals schedule and were left behind in Los Angeles.
This is nothing new, it happens every year thanks to the quarter system. While I'm sure it's no fun to be taking a final on a plane or a hotel room when they could conceivably be watching film of the upcoming team, it's something that the UCLA basketball program is used to dealing with.
Thanks a lot, Jon...
Now I'm going to have this song stuck in my head all day: http://youtu.be/9jK-NcRmVcw.
The upshot is that it's spring break if the team advances.
This sucks. I remember how stressful Finals week was. The all nighters. Putting Finals and studying ahead of everything else. I can only imagine what it is like with having to worry about sandwhiching NCAA games around that. Hopefully that stress is tempered by all the extra academic help they get.