Ron Artest isn't Lorenzo Charles. The Lakers were the favorites at home. Ron Artest is more like Terrell Owens.

In the 1998 playoffs, Terrell Owens was having a terrible offensive game, dropping several key passes that led to the Packers taking a lead late in the 4th quarter. On the last play, Steve Young gave him one more shot at redemption and Owens miraculously hauled it in for the win. Owens has gone on to become one of the more polarizing figures in the NFL

Artest is took the same road, just went in reverse.

No matter what he does, he'll always remembered for the brawl. Even changing cities and changing his role couldn't keep him out of the negative spotlight. Last season with the Houston Rockets, Artest got in Kobe's face after a foul and then arrived in his underwear for Game 7.

This year, he's come close to shooting the Lakers out of the playoffs. There's no reason for the guy to take any shot in the final minutes of a close game, not with so many clutch shooters on the floor with big-game experience. In fact, close to the final minute, Artest missed a shot, the Lakers got the offensive rebound, then Artest took a three-pointer just five seconds later despite a free shot clock.

You could literally hear the collective "NOOOOOOO!" from the crowd. I wasn't sure if I really heard it watching the first time, but caught the TNT replay and sure enough, there it was.

Unable to drain the clock, Phoenix got two more possessions and tied the game on an incredible sequence. The camera panned to Phil Jackson and Artest, the latter unable to face the former. But it was all washed away with one miraculous play.

With a little more than three seconds left, Doug Collins said it best, "You'd be stupid to let Kobe Bryant touch this ball." This after TNT showed what seemed like an endless highlight reel of Kobe's game-winners just from this season.

And boy did Phoenix do a great job. Kobe got his hands on it, but smothered him so well and timed his jump so well that he had to double clutch. As a result, he threw up an airball.

Give Artest credit, though. As most players held their positions, he ran in and beat Jason Richardson to the rebound to put the ball off the glass and into the hoop as the buzzer sounded. Ironically, it was Richardson that tied the game, amplifying Artest's mistake of taking a hasty three-pointer.

But all of that is erased. Artest is the hero, yet another in a long list of Laker playoff heroes. Sadly, yet another in a long list that have broken the hearts of Suns fans.

I would know. I've rooted for that list before. Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili have been a part of a lot of heartbreak in the playoffs for the Steve Nash-era Suns. Nash's Suns have beaten the Lakers before in the playoffs. Exorcising the demons was supposed to happen when they swept the San Antonio Spurs out of the playoffs. Winning two in Phoenix was supposed to make this a three-game series and make believers out of all the detractors who were penciling in the Lakers for yet another NBA Finals appearance.

What's sad is that a two-point loss is infinitely worse than a ten- or twenty-point loss. The Lakers did a good job of keeping the surging Suns at bay most of the 4th quarter. It was looking like this was going back to Phoenix. The Suns played well, just not good enough to win. It was simple. They'd turn around and use home-court advantage to push them over the top and extend the series, just like they did for games 3 and 4.

Now, I'm not sure that they have it in him. The look on Nash's face after that play wasn't erased by the time he got to the postgame press conference. He had a look on his face that I know well because, while I'm a very blessed sports fan, my teams and us fans had to deal with this kind of baggage. The Spurs had Olajuwon, Horry and the Rockets. The Texas Longhorns football had Notre Dame in the 80's and Colorado in 2001. The Red Sox had... well... yeah...

But it's like what Bill Simmons has said. Something weird and miraculous needs to happen to overcome the past and make believers out of a team and it's fans. In '99, San Antonio had the Memorial Day Miracle. In 2005, Texas got several ridiculous comebacks led by Vince Young. In 2004, the Red Sox got a Dave Roberts steal in Game 4 that led to a comeback from down 3-0. Phoenix hasn't had that moment yet in this playoffs, but that's basically what they need to beat the Lakers...

a miracle.

Watchng the fall of the Texas Longhorns basketball team has been a gut-wrenching experience to the point where I was actively avoiding paying attention to that team. After the football team played it's heart out after losing Colt McCoy in the first series of the national championship game (http://tinyurl.com/ylblpk3), the Texas basketball team folded into a joke less than a week after getting ranked the #1 team in the country.

So what did I do?

I looked in my own backyard.

The UTEP Miners are on an incredible run this season, winning 16 of their last 17 games. The only loss came in the conference championship game. That loss, somehow, nearly cost them a spot in the NCAA tournament. The Miners are 26-6 and, until Texas A&M closed the regular season on a nice run, played like the best team in the state of Texas in February and March.

They're good and dominant in a conference like Conference USA because they're built like a big program in a power conference. They're two bigs are NBA-caliber, the three other starters can handle the ball and create their own shots, despite their point guard's size, he's a pass-first guy, and their bench players can knock down threes... and create their own shots.

And their head coach, Tony Barbee, learned his trade under John Calipari. He preaches defense, encourages quick shots by guys who had a hot hand, and can have his team outrun and outshoot opponents on the scoreboard or grind out a victory where neither team scores more than 60.

The team underachieved last year and struggled to gel as a group when this season started, but they really hit their stride when conference play started, esepcially Randy Culpepper.

Pay attention on Thursday afternoon to the short guy on UTEP's team. This little guy can light up an arena. I've seen him do it countless times this season. He can bring a home crowd to it's feet on a breakaway before he even leaves his feet for a dunk. And he's capable of catching fire from beyond the arc, as he had the two highest conference point totals this season: 39 and 45. I was at the 45-point game. It could have and SHOULD have been over 50, but I think the moment got to him.

And now they're in the NCAA tournament. They're a 12-seed and a popular 12-5 upset going into play starting on Thursday. I'm here in San Jose, California with the team. They look loose and ready, not carrying around the pressure of continuing a win streak or maintaining a national ranking. Now, a win just means that they get to play one more game... that's it.

Now just indulge me for a second...

I haven't had a day off in more than a week. That includes a 13-hour Saturday following a morning UTEP conference championship game and a night New Mexico State conference championship game. Both won. There are two teams in my media market in the tournament.

After working a full day on Tuesday that ended around 11:00 pm, I flew out of El Paso at 6:15 this morning after getting 90 minutes of sleep, arrived in San Francisco, drove straight to the HP Pavilion in San Jose, covered the press day, shot introductions and sign-offs that ran Wednesday on NBC AND CBS back in El Paso, edited the footage, sat and waited at the computer for the files to load to the station website to make sure nothing went wrong, I haven't eaten anything since about 7:00 am and haven't gotten a wink of sleep except for the uncomfortable eyes-wide-shut naps I got on the planes, which never counts....

And I'm in heaven. I CAN'T WAIT TO WATCH THIS TOURNAMENT START TOMORROW MORNING!

Last season I got one final four team right and they got to the championship game... I sadly should have seen their demise coming, but underestimated my sense of history and how it repeats itself.

Here's my Final Four this year: Kansas, Duke, Xavier, West Virginia.

Big upsets I'm calling: (15) North Texas over (2) Kansas State in the first round, UTEP reaches the Sweet 16, Xavier, and Notre Dame reaches the Elite Eight with wins over Baylor and Richmond.

For some reason, I like Duke more this year than others. I don't agree that the ACC had a down year. I just think that Duke and Maryland made it look that way. There are a lot of Duke haters out there, almost like they came out of hibernation because they heard the Blue Devils were a #1 seed again. All the anti-Duke talk convinces me that this is their year.

Duke over Kansas in the national championship game.