The Rock Chalkboard

Kansas and Oklahoma react to historic free throw, foul numbers in Tuesday night's game
Oklahoma players Grant Sherfield and Sam Godwin hung and shook their heads at the 62 combined free throws in Kansas’ 79-75 win over Oklahoma on Tuesday night. They struggled to adequately translate what had just taken place in the prior two and a half hours.

Everything Bill Self said after KU's win over Oklahoma
"There were some guys making some plays. I mean, Kevin McCullar hadn't done much at all and then he gets to the unbelievable drive and he got the steal late. We didn't have anything going. Gradey, he didn't really do a lot and then he gets some big rebounds, they're late and everything. So, the place is special. Guys have so much confidence here but that was some guys making some individual plays."

Three observations from KU's 79-75 win over Oklahoma
Kansas improved to 15-1 and 4-0 in Big 12 play on Tuesday night in a come-from-behind win over Oklahoma, 79-75. It was a closely contested game at the half, with KU holding slim, 36-34, advantage. But in the second half, KU went 12:52 of game time without making a shot from the field. During that stretch, KU scored 18 straight points at the free throw line. Oklahoma took a 10-point lead as KU struggled before KU closed the game on a 16-4 run. With that, here are three observations from the game...

Bits o Chalk

Kirby Smart: Georgia has to 'reinvent' itself for College Football Playoff National Championship three-peat
"So starting to think about the next one, I do think it's going to be much tougher," Smart said. "And I do think we're going to have to reinvent ourselves next year because you can't just stay the same. Like these two guys up here, they're coming back. And we have a lot of guys, in my opinion, that are going to come back and it's easy to get comfortable. And comfortable does not win."

Georgia QB Stetson Bennett skips final press conference after title
LOS ANGELES — Georgia football quarterback Stetson Bennett did a postgame press conference Monday night following his second national championship game MVP performance and put on a headset to talk to ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt on a mostly cleared out SoFi Stadium field.

Bills' Damar Hamlin undergoing testing in Buffalo after being released from Cincinnati hospital - CBSSports.com
About a week after being admitted, Hamlin was discharged from the University of Cincinnati Medical Center and transferred to a Buffalo-area hospital, his doctors announced Monday. Hamlin elaborated on the great news via social media:

Carlos Correa Agrees to $200 Million Deal with Twins - The New York Times
Twenty days later, however, Correa, 28, a shortstop, walked away from that deal as well. On Tuesday, he reached an agreement with the Minnesota Twins, whom he played for last season, on a six-year, $200 million contract. A personal familiar with the details of the negotiations confirmed Correa’s deal with the Twins on condition of anonymity.

Eraser Dust

Major FAA outage halts all domestic flight departures in the U.S.
More than 3,700 flights within, to and out of the U.S. were delayed as of around 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, according to the online flight tracker FlightAware. Nearly 560 flights were listed as canceled.

‘We want people to be uncomfortable’: The conservative plan to target pharmacies that dispense abortion pills - POLITICO
Anti-abortion advocates are organizing pickets outside CVS and Walgreens in early February in at least eight cities, including Washington, D.C., in response to the companies’ plans to take advantage of the Food and Drug Administration’s decision last week allowing retail pharmacies to stock and dispense abortion pills in states where they’re legal.

Mortgage refinance demand surges, as homeowners take advantage of lower interest rates
The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances ($647,200 or less) decreased last week to 6.42% from 6.58%, with points remaining at 0.73 (including the origination fee) for loans with a 20% down payment. One year ago, that rate was 3.52%.

House Republicans to vote on bill abolishing IRS, eliminating income tax
Republicans in the House of Representatives will vote on a bill that would abolish the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), eliminate the national income tax, and replace it with a national consumption tax.

‘Star Wars’ Fans Have a Simple Answer to an Oversight That’s Bugged ‘The Last Jedi’ Detractors
Still others were eager to offer an explanation to make sure everyone understood. The scene is notably filled with tiny hints that Luke is not physically on Crait during his fight with Ren. Aside from his young appearance and the now-destroyed lightsaber, his apparition leaves no footprints on the iconic red surface of the planet. So really, what was a plot hole was actually a consistent detail, one that even Ren himself didn’t pick up on.

It's official: Department store Kohl’s opening in North Kalispell | Daily Inter Lake
Kohl’s is officially opening a location in North Kalispell.