Sports Fact & Book Rec of the Day 4/5/2012

Trivia: Who was the only football player on a losing college team to win the coveted Heisman Trophy?

4/5/2010:
Butler's Cinderella run in the NCAA men's basketball tournament comes to end with a 61-59 loss to Duke in the championship game. The contest is played at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, about six miles from the Butler campus, before a crowd of 70,930. Duke leads 60-55 with two minutes left, but two-point baskets by Matt Howard cuts the margin to 60-59 with 54 seconds remaining. It is still 60-59 when Gordon Hayward misses a two-point attempt with five seconds left, and Duke's Brian Zoubek is fouled after a rebound. Zoubek makes the first foul shot but misses the second. Hayward pulls down the rebound, dribbles to half-court, and just misses a desperation three-point shot. A private school with an enrollment of 4,200, Butler enters the tournament as a fifth-seed and comes into the championship game with a 25-game winning streak. It is Duke's fourth championship, following those in 1991, 1992, and 2001.

Birthdays:
Doggie Julian b. 1901
Doug Favell b. 1945
Rennie Stennett b. 1951
Brad Van Pelt b. 1951
Ike Hilliard b. 1976

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

When Horace Greeley famously advised, “Go west, young man!” he might have added, “and say hello to Fred Harvey.” Harvey pioneered chain restaurants with clean, inexpensive dining at every railway stop. Staffed by demure young women called “Harvey Girls,” his was an American institution that paved the way for eating out today. Praised by The New York Times as “an expansive chronicle of dining out in America,” this narrative is a must for Americana buffs.

APPETITE FOR AMERICA: HOW VISIONARY BUSINESSMAN FRED HARVEY BUILT A RAILROAD HOSPITALITY EMPIRE THAT CIVILIZED THE AMERICAN WEST, by Stephen Fried (Bantam, 2010)