We came up dry in our quest for a game of the week, so let me just remind you folks: Submissions, not just winners, of the epic contests you've played in sports games, get your comment handle starred. Details inside.
It's really simple: In our official sports open thread on the weekend, we want to kick things off with our epic comebacks and colossal beatdowns in sports games. I boldface and repeat that because some folks send me Halo: Reach deathmatches, which are competitive but not a sport. But I digress.
Any sports title on any console or platform is eligible; doesn't have to be a current year game. We do ask that you take a picture of the screen showing the final score - a crappy cell pic of a TV or monitor screen is fine - and write up a couple paragraphs about why your game was so epic.
Email it to me, owenATkotakuDOTcom, with "Box Scores" in the subject header. Submitters who follow all of these rules get starred. Consider this an outreach project on behalf of the sports community.
So be sure to include include your commenter handle, or your commenter page URL if it is different from your handle.
Now the Kotaku Sports open thread commences with the sports TV highlights for today and tomorrow. All times are U.S. Eastern.
- All-Star Games
A whopping three this weekend. The NHL's all-star game proceeds under a new format - teams formed by a "fantasy draft" of the pooled stars. It's also the first one since 2009, as the 2010 Olympics interrupted last year's. Sunday at 4 p.m. on Versus. American football does its all star games in the postseason, and the only thing less relevant than the Pro Bowl (Fox, 7 p.m. Sunday) is the Senior Bowl (NFL Network, today, 4 p.m.) - College Hoops
No. 21 Georgetown at No. 8 Villanova just tipped off on ESPN. No. 16 Minnesota is at No. 12 Purdue on CBS, 1 p.m. (check local listings. You might get No. 24 Florida at Mississippi State. No. 9 Brigham Young is at New Mexico on Versus at 4 p.m. Finally, N.C. State faces the University of Kansas-Chapel Hill at 2 p.m. on ESPN, followed by Kansas State versus the University of North Carolina at Lawrence at 7 p.m., same network. - NBA
Miami at Oklahoma City is Sunday's appointment-basketball contest on ABC at 1 p.m.,; followed by the Lakers and Celtics at 3:30. Utah and Golden State tussle in the 10 p.m. nightcap on ESPN. All games Sunday. - MMA
Strikeforce has quite the freakshow going on in San Jose. Nick Diaz and Evangelista Santos duke it out for the welterweight belt; the undercard involves middleweights Jacare Souza and Robbie Lawler; Heisman Trophy winner Herschel Walker and Scott Carson; and light heavies Roger Gracie and Trevor Prangley. Showtime, 10 p.m. - Boxing
Holy shit, they found a use for the Pontiac Silverdome. Folks, this is a stadium that was built in 1975 at a cost of $55 million - that's in 1975 dollars - went vacant 10 years ago, and sold in 2009 for $583,000, which today buys you a garden variety McMansion and a two hour commute in the East Bay. Promoters of the Devon Alexander-Timothy Bradley fight, to unify the WBC/WBO junior welterweight titles, have taken a stadium that once set the record for largest crowd at an indoor sporting event, and turned it into a 9,000 seat venue. I don't know if this is more of a metaphor for Detroit housing prices or the state of boxing, but it's on HBO at 10 p.m.
- Mountain Dew
The Winter X-Games are today on ESPN2 and tomorrow on ESPN. Check local listings.
Remember, you may send Game of the Week nominations to owenATkotakuDOTcom, and flag it "Box Scores" in the subject header. Please include your commenter handle for proper credit.