Detroit Free Press

In the lower bunk slept a 3-year-old boy. He wore pajamas. He kept his miniature cars nearby. This was his room, and he had a toy chest and a closet for his baby clothes. In the upper bed slept his roommate. A grown man.A guy named Tom Izzo.

ST. LOUIS -- So Sergei Fedorov gets the puck on a breakaway, and he makes one of those moves, and yada, yada, yada, Wings win.Oh. Sorry. Got my shows crossed.On a night when a third of the nation was watching "Seinfeld" end, those of us who prefer pucks to yucks were watching a remarkable pattern continue. It was the Red Wings showing familiar focus when threatened. It was the Red Wings showing familiar disregard for other people's ice, winning their fourth straight road game in these playoffs.

ATLANTA -- It's true, I admit, I've done my share of knocking badminton at the Summer Games. Like millions of others, I couldn't understand how something you play after roasting marshmallows could qualify as an Olympic sport. Birdies? Shuttlecocks? The jokes were almost too easy, and I took every one.

The puck was coming at him. "Uh-oh," he thought. "I gotta stop it. . . . Am I gonna stop it? . . . How do I stop it?" He had enough time to think all this, because the puck was shot from the other end of the ice and was moving pretty slowly. Even so, it went between his legs before he flopped backwards, landed on it, then reached behind him.And then, a smile."I did it," he told himself, looking at the puck. "I made my first save."He was 8 years old.He had just become a goalie.

If someone created all the bad news in the world, then he would be responsible for it.But if the bad news were already there, and that someone just told you about it, would he be the problem -- or a depressing reminder?That's the stand-off we have this morning, the day Reggie Lewis's number will be raised to the rafters of Boston Garden. A cloud of doubt will ride up that rope, alongside the green and white banner. And in a country never satisfied until we blame somebody, the fingers are pointing -- but in the wrong direction.

INDIANAPOLIS -- The game had the awkwardness of a teenager learning to dance, the stickiness of wet paint, the color of an unripe banana. Whacks, pokes, dumb passes, ill-advised shots. It simply was not polished basketball -- the inevitable problem with inexperienced feet being asked to walk the highest rope.And yet . . .

WIMBLEDON, England -- There's nothing wrong with men's tennis that a hamburger, some running shoes and a Coke wouldn't fix.Allow me to explain.Every year I come to Wimbledon, it's the same tongue-clucking story."The men's game is fizzling," critics moan. "There is no interest. No one is watching. Kids back home think a racket is what you make at a Hanson concert."To which I say these five words: Hey, dummy, remember the NBA?