NCAA Men's Regional Semifinals in St. Louis

Two years ago, we hit the NCAA Men's Basketball Sweet Sixteen (Regional Semifinals) and Elite Eight (Regional Finals) in Detroit at Ford Field, but this year, fresh off our trip to Providence for Round 1 & 2, we are heading to St. Louis to follow the next round joining Tennessee fans who were at our game in Providence!  More luck came our way when Tennessee won the games in Providence as my Dad is now able to see his alma mater in St. Louis.

We arrived late Thursday night spending Friday morning with the family before heading downtown St. Louis with Tara, Brian, and my Dad for the pre-game hoopla at Lacledes Landing.  We ducked in Morgan Street Brewery for an early dinner meeting up with Ken and Namiko.  I think half the table ended up ordering their Brew Burger (Fresh 8 oz. ground beef stuffed with goat cheese and topped with carmelized onions) and a beer sampler or "brewski", of course!  We enjoyed their creativity be offering beers as "appetizers"! See our reviews below

	Beer Sampled	Scottie	Lindsay
	Munich Helles (German Lager)
	Red Lager (Vienna style)
	Honey Wheat
	Octoberfest
	H2Brew (Oatmeal Stout)

After dinner, we headed over to the Edward Jones Dome to sell our extra ticket and get to our seats early for the team introductions!

We were actually pleasantly surprised with the layout inside the Edward Jones Dome as they utilized just half the field setting up the court in one of the end zones.  They added make-shift risers to fill in the seating around the court, so that I'm pretty sure most seats in the house were decent.  We were in the upper decks, but still had respectable views of the court.

First up was (6) Tennessee Vols vs. (2) Ohio St.  It was anybody's game... at the half 39-42 in favor of Ohio St.  But in the second half, it became a showdown between J.P. Prince / Wayne Chism of Tennessee against Evan Turner and William Buford of Ohio St.  With 2 minutes on the clock and the score all even as Tennessee fought their way back in the game, Chism had an easy lay-up to take the lead.  Turner answers with a 3-pointer.  Prince and Brian Williams combined to answer with a 2-point play taking the lead 74-73 with 16 seconds on the clock.  Ohio St. missed their shot attempt and Bobby Maze from Tennessee grabbed the rebound and was fouled.  He hit his free throws, so the lead was at 76-73.  Turner makes a wonderful 3-point attempt at the buzzer but Prince was brilliant blocking it for the win.

Second game was (9) UNI versus (5) Michigan St.  It wasn't difficult to find a team to cheer for in this match-up since the entire crowd except the random green section was pulling for UNI after coming off the crazy win against Kansas with Ali Farokhmanesh shot practically heard around the world...well, the United States!

During the Tennessee, we spotted Magic Johnson giving some love to his boys at Michigan St.
UNI caught Michigan St. off-guard in the first half as they jumped out to a 7-0 lead before Korie Lucious, starting in place of the injured Kalin Lucas, hit a 3-pointer!  UNI went on a bit of a run to close the half as they led 29-22.

It only took the first four minutes of the second half for Michigan St to make some adjustments closing the gap. They never looked back after taking the lead.

Post-game, we ran out the door to the closest bar we could find, 6th and Lucas, to catch what remained of the Duke game.  But we drank one beer and left due to some interesting bartenders doing some interesting things on the bar. We finished the night over at Joey B's on the Landing.  See more pictures from the games in my photo album.