If there's one thing Sunday's victory over USC did, it was add more ammunition to FSN's arsenal of Craig Robinson/ Barack Obama notes for easy reference during future Oregon State basketball telecats. The Beavers are on FSN about 12 more times this year, if you're just now jumping on the bandwagon. Don't worry, there is still pleanty of time for you to watch the Beavers, and learn the genealogy of Craig Robinson at the same time. Hopefully those Robinson/Obama comments get as redundant as the plethora of Pac-10 wins the Beavers are about to accumulate. Okay, maybe not.

Today, Craig Robinson shared some anecdotes of what he went through after Sunday's game in Corvallis, and they were captured very nicely by Paul Buker. Unsurprisingly, Craig got a call from the presidential-elect after the game.

"I was running some errands, and the phone rings. I know when he calls, because it comes up funny (on his cell phone) ... and he said, 'congratulations, I heard you won a big game. I didn't see it, but some of the guys saw it. Tell me about it, what happened?' "

Robinson had stuff to do, but he couldn't get Obama off the phone.

I mean, would you cut the next President short? "I talked to him for like 20 minutes,'' said Robinson, who admitted he was thinking, in the back of his mind, why do you care? Do you really care about this? ... he was very excited for us.''

Craig was the talk of the town as well, receiving comments from people everywhere he went.  Buker tells us that Craig said everybody in McMinnamins had something to say... Riley called... UCLA coach Ben Howland called...  there were 80+ messages on his answering machine... and an Applebees bartender bought the coach and his wife beer.  

You've arrived, coach. 

The compliments likely have Coach Robinson more confident about his own abilities, but you should hear what it's doing to his players. From Terry Horstman of The Barometer:

"We're no longer the same team we were last year in the Pac-10," Calvin Haynes said after the win against USC. "We can play with anybody, and we know that. Today was just the day that we showed everybody in the world that we can execute down the stretch of a big game and get it done, and it's going to be like that for the rest of the season."

"I hope teams don't sleep on us," Haynes said. "Because if they do, this is what's going to happen every single time."

Although we know the Beavers' confidence has been rising throughout these winter months, I doubt Calvin would have said that a statement like that with such confidence before the USC game.

And on a related topic, here's your suggested reading for the day. 

The Beavers head down to the desert for two very tricky games this week. It's nationally ranked Arizona State on Thursday, then Arizona on Saturday.

Buckle up, Beaver Nation.

--Jake (jake.buildingthedam@gmail.com)