“You can’t do justice in sound bites. The way to arrive at a determination of the facts is to hear in a fair and open proceeding all of the evidence … then to determine what the facts are, and we’ve done that this week. That did not happen and was not going to happen, apparently, in the Duke lacrosse case.” – NC State Bar Chairman Lane Williamson 6/16/07

The now former Durham County district attorney Mike Nifong was disbarred yesterday by the NC State Bar. The ironies of course are glaring and voluminous in the Duke Lacrosse case. To note any earns one an instant nomination as “Master of the Obvious”. Today, I get my nomination. Nifong took the case as a instrument to champion his cause to win election in November 2006. It was meant to give him credibility, respect and fame. In the end, the case shredded his credibility and destroyed all respect the public has of him. To be fair he has kept he fame; albeit the more pejorative ‘notoriety’ kind. The three wrongly accused players never found themselves on trial due to Nifong’s case; but Nifong would find himself on trial for his actions. I relent. This is just too easy. Pointing out the ironies is as easy as shooting fish in a barrel. Read the rest of this entry »

East Chapel Hill midfielder Tony Mendes has become the first Under Armour All-American from the state of North Carolina. While North Carolina isn’t going to best New York or Maryland as the hot bed of future lacrosse talent any time soon, this a positive sign that the sport, and more importantly the talent, is growing in the state. Only 44 high school seniors are selected for the Under Armour All-American teams which are broken down into a “North” and “South” team. (those designations don’t mean anything in terms of where a player comes from). To be selected to play is an obvious honor. Tony will be playing at Maryland as he was looking for the chance to get out of the area.

Below is a youtube clip of highlights from his career at East Chapel Hill. The moves at the 1:49 remaining mark are just sick. [More on Tony from Inside Lacrosse]

Congrats to Drew who was drafted in the first round by the NY Yankees in this year’s MLB draft. Check out gopack.com for more information.

I sent him an text message (really instant message on AIM) to congratulate him. I stopped short of calling him a “Damn Yankee”. He is up in Cincinnasty Cincinnati now with his parents.

This is long delayed posting. While college is in session, I am crazy busy with sports to cover and often get behind. With that, many photos of Duke lacrosse took a back seat during the year and were never posted. I do now however have more images up from the home-opener v. Dartmouth game and have finally posted the Delaware photos. Up next is the ACC championship of Duke v. UVA.

• Duke lacrosse v. Dartmouth photo gallery (215 images)
• Duke lacrosse v. Delaware photo gallery (133 images)

Tuesday of last week, I emailed Art Chase, sports information director for Duke men’s Lacrosse, to explore the feasibility of going with the Duke men’s lacrosse team last weekend for the Final Four in Baltimore, MD. Originally the plan for me was to go for Inside Lacrosse. But, after reviewing their budget, it was apparent they would not be able to afford flying and housing me up there. Looking at my budget, I couldn’t afford the trip either. Between hotels, gas and food, it was going to be at least $1,000. The email to Art was a shot in the dark to see if he had a photographer going up with him to Baltimore with the team. Ever since James Schaffer from Inside Lacrosse did a photo story on the team for their “Two Days In Durham” article, I wanted to something with the team also. But I thought the chances of Art saying, “Sure come on up with us”, were about as high as me emailing head coach John Danowski, asking if I could play and him saying “Yes”.

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