8 a.m. -- Tonight's game

As Scott Rabalais writes today in The Advocate, LSU's 12-game winning streak and UNO's 13-game winning streak will collide tonight at Zephyr Field. One streak will end.

The game has momentum, RPI and impress-the-NCAA-selection-committee implications as the final week of the regular season unfolds. LSU will end the week in Auburn, Ala, where the Tigers and Auburn Tigers will play Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

If LSU wins tonight and wins two games at Auburn, the NCAA would have a hard time justifying sending LSU on the road for a regional rather than awarding a regional to LSU and Alex Box Stadium. The champion of the SEC West, especially one on such a late-season surge, has earned a regional. That's not even mentioning the rich history of NCAA events at The Box, and by rich I am not just using poetic license. The NCAA makes good money off regionals at Alex Box Stadium.

The NCAA announces the 16 regional sites May 25, the day of the SEC tournament championship game, but I suspect we'll have a good idea about LSU's chances Saturday, when the regular-season dust settles.

Blog note

I'm taking a day off today. Three weeks ago, it looked all but certain LSU's season would be over Saturday after the Auburn series. I can count on one hand the number of real days off I've had since Feb. 22, the day the season started, and a lot of personal business tends to pile up under those circumstances. I thought it all could wait until the end of the season, but the finish line is farther away now.

Now that it' appears LSU will play baseball at least through May 31, the second day of the regionals, there are some things I need to take care off before the postseason begins. I took a couple of days "off" to work on the Alex Box project you probably saw Sunday in The Advocate and on the blog the same day, but personal matters will take me entirely away from baseball and the computer today.

That means no blogging today unless something extraordinary occurs, and it means no blogging during the game tonight. Scott will cover the game for The Advocate, but he doesn't have a set of keys for the blog, so there won't be updates tonight.

I've got interviews Wednesday before heading on the road to Auburn, and I'm going to stop in Mobile and visit with Sam Box, the 90-year-old brother of Alex Box, and give him a copy of Sunday's paper and thank him for his contribution to the stories. Blogging will be minimal during my travel time too.

Once that's behind me, it's back to the regular pace of blogging you've come to expect.

Just wanted you to know. I appreciate your understanding, and I appreciate every time you stop by.

Take care, and I'll see you soon.