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Every year more than half a million babies in the United States are born prematurely and many of those babies die. It’s a statistic shared with us by the March of Dimes.
On Saturday News Channel 7 participated in the March of Dimes walk for babies events throughout the Upstate. As a sponsor we know how important it is to support education and research for premature births and help raise money for families facing the challenges, sometimes lifelong, of an early arrival. For many of the families there the march was a personal tribute to babies both living and dead.
"He was born on October 25,2005 and he passed away October 28, 2005," said March for Babies participant Ashley Pearce.
Just three days after Pearce welcomed her baby, Xander, into the world he passed away. Born 17 weeks early Xander only weighed 1 pound 10 ounces.
"He was 13 inches long his eyes weren’t even opened," said Pearce. "You could see through his skin."
That’s why Ashley is walking in the March of Dimes "March for Babies". Her team…and girlfriends…raised more than $1400 to help premature babies, their families, and researchers. It’s money that helps babies like Evan Smith.
"Evan was born three months early in November and he wasn’t due until February," said Kim Smith.
Evan was only two and a half pounds when he was born. Now at 13 pounds and hooked up to a machine that monitors his heart and breathing, his parents Kim and Nate Smith know how lucky they are he’s alive.
"It’s a roller coaster ride and it still is even though he’s home but we’re just thankful that he’s doing good and he’s ok," said Kim.
The proud parents will hit the pavement as Grandma stays back with little Evan–who’s cries might just show he’s not quite ready for all this attention. But his mom Kim says he’s just "hungry".

wspa.com

A victorious run over the past two weeks has helped the Indiana Pacers climb the Eastern Conference standings. Getting Jermaine O’Neal back can only help their cause.
The surging Pacers will have O’Neal on the court for the first time in over two months on Monday when they conclude their season series with the league-worst Miami Heat.
Indiana (30-43) is seeking to return to the playoffs for the 10th time in 11 seasons after missing out in 2006-07, but saw their chances dim after going 6-11 from Feb. 6-March 15 — a stretch with O’Neal on the sidelines.
O’Neal averaged 15.3 points, 7.3 rebounds and 2.2 blocks in 33 games before leaving in the first quarter Jan. 16 against Golden State with a bone bruise on his left knee.
He returns to a Pacers team that has won five of its last seven, including a 123-115 home victory over New Jersey on Friday.
Danny Granger scored 26 points while Troy Murphy added 21 and 17 rebounds for Indiana, which moved within three games of Atlanta for the eighth playoff spot in the East.
The Pacers have nine games remaining, including six against teams that are currently below .500.
“We must continue to play at this level and not let up,” said Murphy, who is averaging 18.2 points and 11.8 boards in his last six games. “On the next two or three days, we need to relax, keep our game faces on and get ready for the rest of the season. We will take them game by game.”
Although the Pacers have allowed 113.4 points per game over the past five contests, they held New Jersey to 8-for-24 shooting in the fourth quarter.
“We defended at a really high level in the second half,” Pacers coach Jim O’Brien said. “I thought our defense won this game for us.”

sports.espn.go.com

The wait is over. You can officially start enjoying spring now. The days will get longer, the sun will shine brighter, and the birds will sing more sweetly now that the line-up for this year’s Sundown in the City has been announced. Feel free to grumble about the picks and complain about the crowds.
Check back on Thursday for the full line-up. Sorry, information embargo is in place until then.
Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria in the Old City was closed for lunch on Monday so staff members could attend a funeral mass for Carrie Daugherty in Chattanooga. Daugherty, 24, was killed March 19. She had been an employee of Barley’s for two years.
“I couldn’t think of anything more horrifying than what we’ve had to go through the last week,” says Barley’s booking manager Robby Dubov. “She was that person for us, you know? She came in a room and everyone smiled. We’re tight. There’s not a lot of turnover. Some people have been here for three to six years.”
Barley’s will hold a benefit concert with the local honky-tonk band J.C. and the Dirty Smokers on April 19 in Daugherty’s memory. Proceeds from the show will be donated to Emily’s Power for the Cure, a foundation formed in honor of Daugherty’s niece, Emily Ransom, that raises money for research to cure neuroblastoma, a form of childhood cancer.
Daugherty had also been training for the Country Music Marathon in Nashville on April 26 to raise money for the foundation. Several Barley’s staff members, including Dubov, are now planning to take part in the marathon.
Micah Johnson, a 21-year-old acquaintance of Daugherty, has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder in her death.
Word has it that Josiah Leming, the Morristown teenager whose dismissal from American Idol earlier this year was among the most controversial cuts ever made on the show, has signed a deal with Warner Bros. The first report, with additional news that Leming had already spent part of his advance on a pick-up truck for his father, came on the KnoxBlab message board on Thursday, March 20. That was followed the next day by a post on News Sentinel entertainment writer Terry Morrow’s blog, which was then linked to by Rolling Stone’s website and realitytvmagazine.com. As of Monday, Leming’s MySpace page still reads that his label deal is “up for negotiation.”

metropulse.com

Sports fans young and old enjoy betting on college basketball during March Madness. Everyone has a bracket and their predictions for each of the 63 games. March Madness got as huge as it is because of sports wagering. The NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship owes its popularity to the basketball pool. Every sports news publication and website is flooded with NCAA information and a copy of the 65 team bracket. In the month of March, millions of sports fans will talk about who to put in the Sweet 16 and what the outcomes will be. Employees across the country will be gathering around the watering hole, talking about their picks and brackets.
However, the tournament hasn’t always been this intense. In fact, March Madness did not originate around the press or the publicity of the multimillion dollar sports industry. In 1939, the NCAA started a postseason tournament for teams with conference affiliation. Schools such as Notre Dame, Marquette and Temple were unable to secure bids into the NCAA because of their independent status. Instead, these schools played in the National Invitational Tournament which was the NCAA’s postseason rival that started the year before.
The NIT was created by New York City’s five colleges to showcase East Coast basketball. It was played at Madison Square Gardens. The NCAA changed its rules in the ’50s and allowing more conferences to participate in the tournament, creating at large bids for schools not affiliated with a conference. The bracket grew from 8 teams to 16 teams in 1951 and eventually 24 teams by the following year. In the ’70s, forty teams were invited each March, and in the ’80s the NCAA had 64 teams, a full 4 region bracket with sixteen teams each.
More popularity came with the increase in teams. UCLA was in the spotlight under the tutelage of John Wooden when the Final Four began to be played in larger stadiums. The games got even more coverage when NBC broadcasted the Final Four to a national television audience in the ’60s. Larry Bird, faced off against Magic Johnson in the national championship game in 1979. Magic Johnson’s team, Michigan State Spartans, won the title that year in a game that ended up being the most viewed college basketball game in television history. This game brought millions of new college basketball fans to the sport.

bignews.biz

The selection committee has seen all the tape and made its choices. North Carolina (32-2), Memphis (33-1), Kansas (31-3) and UCLA (31-3) captured the NCAA March Madness No. 1 seeds on Sunday.
Those teams will share the bill with 60 others, and all of them will fight for the NCAA championship, which will be decided when the tournament finishes on April 7 in San Antonio.
Games start this Thursday. You can see the full bracket by clicking on the graphic below:

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LAS VEGAS — BYU’s Chris Miles played just nine minutes in Friday’s 63-54 Mountain West Conference semifinal win over San Diego State but made his presence felt.
The 6-foot-11 sophomore was 3-for-3 from the field during a crucial stretch with starter Trent Plaisted on the bench. BYU led 32-30 near the 15-minute mark of the second half when Miles hit a short jumper, then followed that up with a layup off a feed from Sam Burgess. Later, he scored again inside on a pass from Jonathan Tavernari.
“The main thing that I wanted to do was change our momentum a little bit,” Miles said. “There was a couple of times when it was tough to push the ball, so I wanted to help get some stops but also help at the other end.”
BYU head coach Dave Rose said Miles’ effort is typical of his bench throughout the season.
“I think if you look back at all of our games, you’ll find this team gets a lot of help from someone off the bench,” Rose said. “I thought that Chris Collinsworth gave us a real good lift in the first half. I thought the second half Chris Miles, his energy and physical presence, gave us a lift. Our players really got him the ball in a couple positions where he could really take advantage of that.”

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DUBLIN, March 13 (Reuters) - These are some of the leading stories in Ireland’s newspapers on Thursday. Reuters has not verified these stories and cannot vouch for their accuracy.
- The UNHCR is seeking substantial amendment of the Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill currently before the Oireachtas.
- The Garda Ombudsman Commission has asked the government to give it the power to opt out of fully investigating some of the public’s complaints against gardai, The Irish Times has learned.
- Permanent tsb has suspended its 100 percent mortgages and cut the maximum loan it will offer on investment properties to 80 percent of the property’s value from 90 percent due to the slowdown in the housing market.
- Gardai have recommended that criminal charges be brought against several people in connection with the death of the model Katy French. Continued…

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