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DAILY REPORT:
THURSDAY, JAN. 1,
2009
It's
Time for Business
By
Brian Bailey
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WNCT-TV 9 Sports
Director Brian Bailey is on the
scene in Memphis this week bringing
daily coverage of East Carolina's
preparations for the 2009 AutoZone
Liberty Bowl to Bonesville's readers
and Channel 9's viewers. |
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MEMPHIS — The
preliminaries are finally over. After a week of Elvis,
ribs, blues and fun, the East Carolina Pirates and
Kentucky Wildcats will finally hook up on the gridiron
this afternoon.
The Pirates are still
favored. ECU coach Skip Holtz says it's certainly a
reversal from last year.
"99 percent of the
people on the ESPN poll last year had us losing," said
Holtz. "That stuff really doesn't mean anything."
This year, over 80
percent of the pollsters say East Carolina will win this
time out.
The Pirates had a
relatively quiet Thursday. The team had a photo session
late in the afternoon and held a closed walk-through.
"I think they are ready
to go," said Holtz. "We've got some other things to go
over during the next 24 hours, just to get in the game
mentally. The guys have worked hard. They went through
two-a-days in Greenville and have come out here and
really worked hard again. I'm very pleased."
This is certainly a
loose bunch. Many of the youngsters were joking it up
for the cameras. Some of the older players laughed and
called for some maturity from the younger guys. It was
all in fun.
It's been much colder
over the last couple of days. Hopefully, it won't be too
bad this evening. It was cold and a little windy at
Thursday's walk-through.
This has the potential
makings of another big Pirate win over a BCS team. But
folks shouldn't take Kentucky lightly, because this is a
very good SEC defense. I look for a defensive struggle.
East Carolina and
Kentucky kick it off at 5 p.m. today (ESPN).
Content:
Brian Bailey. ©2009 Bonesville.net and WNCT-TV 9. All
rights reserved. |
