The Super Bowl is only a week away. Yes, one week.

One week until buffalo wing/pizza/guacamole heaven. One week until the biggest sporting event of the year. One week until the big halftime show. Are you ready for some football?

If you’re like many of the ladies out there, you don’t know many of the facts about the upcoming “big game” and you may not even care, but what better way to impress those sports lovin’ hotties at the Super Bowl party? And isn’t everything more fun when you know what’s going on and have someone to root for?

So without further ado, here is a basic Super Bowl XLIII 101.

The Teams

The game pits the top team in the NFC (National Football Conference), the Arizona Cardinals, against the top team in the AFC (American Football Conference), the Pittsburgh Steelers

The Arizona Cardinals:

-This is the first time in team history that the Cardinals are going to the Super Bowl. With 61 years under their belt, they have held the second longest championship drought in American sports.

-The Cardinals made it into the wild card round of the playoffs with a 9-7 record and shocked footballs fans everywhere when they won all 3 of their playoff games, despite being underdogs in each game. They are only the second 9-7 team in history to make it to the Super Bowl. Read More »

Something Old: The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh (1979)

Something New: Semi-Pro (2008)

The Connection: Both are disco-licious basketball comedies – my favorite genre

I am a cynic by nature. I don’t go to church. I don’t play the lottery. I don’t read books that the general population agrees are good. I don’t watch Extreme Home Makeover. I don’t think Barack Obama can revolutionize America. I don’t believe in procreation. I don’t coo over puppies.

But one of the few things that can consistently penetrate my hard-ass realist exterior is an underdog sports movie. Seriously. I can’t explain it, but ever since Rudy, this cheesiest of movie genres has had the ability to burrow in to my stone-cold heart and leave me feeling all warm and fuzzy inside, and sometimes even a little teary-eyed. It’s embarrassing but true, and I take a special kind of guilty pleasure in indulging this ever-so-sissy aspect of myself.

And while The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh is certainly no Rudy, it does the double-duty of being a satisfying underdog sports film and a campy tribute to the disco age (YESSSS!). Set in, duh, Pittsburgh, the film centers around a pro basketball team called the Pittsburgh Pythons that’s on the brink of extinction due to their horrendous track record. In an attempt to save the team, the young waterboy contacts an astrologer (Stockard Channing) to ask for advice, and she determines that the key to success is to create a team of players born under the sign Pisces – hence, the film’s title. Read More »