SI View The Week in TV Sports

Highlights

SATURDAY 1/6

Wake Forest at North Carolina
ESPN 9 PM Answers to life's most perplexing questions, such as
Who Moved My Cheese? or Dude, Where's My Car?, we can't provide.
But if you ask, "Are the Number 4 Demon Deacons for real?" we
say, "Yes." Led in scoring by sixth man Craig Dawson (15.3-point
average), Wake Forest (12-0 through Tuesday) visits Chapel Hill
having won 17 straight games and held all but one opponent to
less than 40% shooting from the field. The No. 13 Tar Heels were
9-2 under first-year alum-coach Matt Doherty but lost to their
only ranked rival, No. 1 Michigan State.

WEDNESDAY 1/10

Trail Blazers at Sixers

TNT 8 PM How long until Philly coach Larry Brown pulls a Cast
Away and speaks only to a basketball that he addresses as
"Spalding"? Through Tuesday the Sixers, after a 10-0 start, had
gone an erratic 11-8, lost floor leader Eric Snow to a broken
right ankle and weathered the 48-hour absence of Brown, who
called a personal timeout to calm his nerves. The upside: The
rapping of leading scorer Allen Iverson (26.2 points per game)
will allow VH-1 someday to do a Behind the Music on the Sixers'
season.

Blues at Mighty Ducks

ESPN2 10:30 PM If you're playing the Blues, you're singing the
blues. Through Tuesday, thanks to the NHL's stingiest defense
(2.0 goals allowed per game), St. Louis had suffered a mere six
losses in 36 games. Moreover, defensemen Chris Pronger and Al
MacInnis, and left wing Pavol Demitra were the league's top three
players in the plus-minus category. Anaheim, in last place in the
Pacific Division, needs right wing Teemu Selanne, who was
suffering through a 14-game scoring drought, to return to form.

Don't Miss

SATURDAY 1/6 AND SUNDAY 1/7

NFL Divisional Playoffs

SATURDAY FOX 12:30 PM, CBS 4 PM; SUNDAY CBS 12:30 PM, FOX 4 PM
Cinematically speaking, history's first forward pass occurred
during the "dawn of man" scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey, when an
ape-man hurled a bone. In a scene cut from the film, referee Phil
Luckett called roughing the passer against the monolith, but
that's another tale for another day. In the weekend's best
matchup, Sunday's early game between the Ravens and the Titans,
passing won't be the story as linebacker Ray Lewis (page 60)
leads Baltimore and its record-setting defense against Tennessee
and formidable running back Eddie George (above). The Ravens are
the only team to have beaten the Titans at Adelphia Coliseum (a
24-23 defeat on Nov. 12), the site of today's game.

ALL TIMES EASTERN. SCHEDULES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE.

COLOR PHOTO: AFP PHOTO/NEIL BRAKE

THE ZAPPER

Showtime's 90-minute TV movie The Sports Pages (Sunday, 8 p.m.)
is the most all-over-the-road programming we've seen since
Saturday Night Live retired its "Toonces, the Driving Cat" bit.
The fictionalized and contrived account of the 1968 Jets-Raiders
"Heidi game" is interspersed with commentary from the principals,
including Daryle Lamonica, Oakland's quarterback at the time....
Arnold Palmer joins host Peter Kessler, who criticized Arnie's
stance on nonconforming clubs last October, on The Golf Channel's
Golf Talk Live (Monday, 8 p.m.).