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On Saturday, The University of Southern California (USC) will hold its 27th Annual Swim With Mike swim-a-thon. A fundraiser for USC������s Physically Challenged Athletes Scholarship Fund, 22 disabled athletes will be awarded scholarships, including 10 enrolled at USC.

After All-American USC swimmer Mike Nyeholt was paralyzed in a motorcycle accident in 1981, the school held a fundraiser to purchase a specially equipped van for him. What was meant as a one-time event has blossomed into an annual fundraiser that has raised over $6 million dollars in scholarship money for physically challenged athletes. In 2003, the fund -- which is the only one of its kind -- began awarding scholarships to students attending universities other than USC.

Highlighting this weekend will be a relay competition featuring football coach Pete Carroll and comedian and USC alum Will Ferrell. An inner-tube relay between the USC football team and the USC song girls will follow.

Active.com was unable to confirm whether or not Ferrell will attempt to upstage the cannonball he did as Ron Burgundy in Anchorman with a Triple Lindy, made famous by Rodney Dangerfield in Back to School. One can only hope������

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Little League Baseball and Softball will be teaming up with several college softball programs throughout the U. S. this season to provide local Little League softball teams a special experience ��� Little League Softball Days.

On Little League Softball Day, Little Leaguers, their parents and local league volunteers may attend the hosting institution���s regular-season game free of charge, or in some cases at a discounted rate. The players will come dressed in their Little League uniform jerseys, and following the games will be permitted onto the field to meet the collegiate players and coaches.

This is such a great initiative. I would have loved a chance to meet college softball players after one of their games when I was young as I looked up to the older softball players a great deal. Now, more than 364,000 Little League Softball players are welcome to take part in this unique experience that will benefit all of those involved. For as excited as the youngsters will be to meet the college ballplayers, hopefully the student-athletes will be reminded of why they fell in love with and play the game of softball. 

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I can't remember enjoying March Madness, and college hoops in general, as much as I've enjoyed it this year. For some reason, the games seem to be particularly good this year.

I lost a fair amount of interest in college hoops once high schoolers started jumping to the NBA. I���m going to go on a ���back in the day��� rant here and say that college teams used to stay together for three or four years in the past (like Georgetown and St. John's in the mid-'80s, or Duke and UNLV in the early '90s). Once that continuity was removed, the quality declined.

This year everything seems to be back to good. The quality of play has been remarkable, culminating in Sunday's Georgetown-UNC classic, an awesome game. If you love basketball, you were legitimately thrilled like me. Which raises the question ... what's happening here?

Everything started with the NBA's decision to ban high schoolers from its draft. If that didn't happen, Kevin Durant and Greg Oden would have skipped college and so many casual fans wouldn't have been sucked in. Oden's impact on the game this year is immeasurable -- from the block at the end of the Tennessee game to the excitement of his battle against Georgetown's Roy Hibbert this weekend.

Saturday's games (Florida-UCLA and OSU-Georgetown) are must-sees for anyone who enjoys the game of basketball. I can���t wait.

What do you think about the rule and March Madness this year?

(Photo provided by Getty Images/Travis Lindquist)

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If you know only one thing about Candace Parker, it���s this: she dunks. Over the past year, the University of Tennessee���s 6-foot-4 Parker has single-handedly eclipsed the total number of dunks in the history of women���s NCAA basketball ��� six jams to three. Impressively, Parker pulled off her first dunk at age 15. At 17, she defeated five male contestants, including the future Denver Nuggets starter J. R. Smith, in the slam dunk contest at the McDonald���s All-American High School Game. And last year, Parker became the first woman to throw down in an NCAA tournament game. She���s got some serious game.

Parker says she first picked up a basketball when she was still in diapers and grew up playing against boys, including her very good older brothers, one of whom now plays for the Toronto Raptors. She went on to a high school career, in Naperville, Ill., that is already legendary. (A two-time USA Today national player of the year, she signed her college letter of intent live on ESPN.) Now a redshirt sophomore for one of the best teams in America, Parker has her sights set high in the NCAA tournament.

Candace Parker���s skill and talent is seemingly guaranteed to carry her beyond the NCAA and into the professional ranks. ���Ever since I started playing basketball, there���s been the option to play after college,��� Parker told the New York Times. That opportunity to get paid to play has kept her and other young women like her working on their skills. Many would say that the best female players ���play like guys.��� I think now it should be said that the best female players play like Candace Parker.

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Today is International Women���s Day! Annually on March 8th, thousands of events are held throughout the world to inspire women and celebrate their achievements as makers of history; it is rooted in the centuries-old struggle of women to participate in society on an equal footing with men.

International Women's Day is also commemorated at the United Nations and is designated in many countries as a national holiday. When women on all continents, often divided by national boundaries and by ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic and political differences, come together to celebrate their Day, they can look back to a tradition that represents at least nine decades of struggle for equality, justice, peace and development.

Despite these struggles for equality, the world of sports has the power

to unite and transcend boundaries that once divided this community. Women's effort to redefine sport and achieve equality is something I am passionate about and has drastically impacted my life. The changes that have occurred so far are promising; women have experienced joy, camaraderie, pride, strength, increased educational opportunities and leadership as a result of their involvement and progression in sports.

In light of recognizing this important day, I���d like to pay homage to some of the greatest moments in women���s sports:

1973 | Battle of the Sexes. In the most watched tennis match in history, Billie Jean King routed Bobby Riggs in the Battle of the Sexes. For many, this was the event that defined the women's movement of the 1970s and changed the social landscape for females forever. Thirty-three years later, the USTA renamed the National Tennis Center the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, the first time in U.S. history that a major sports arena bore the name of a woman.

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Los Angeles Clippers* point guard, Shaun Livingston, suffered a very serious and potentially career ending injury to his knee earlier in the week tearing three of the four ligaments in his left knee while driving to the basket. I saw a video replay of it and hope I never see it happen to anyone ever again. It was gross.

A new rule implemented by the NBA says players must be at least one year removed from high school before entering the NBA. Perhaps Livingston can serve as a reminder to the voices who defend this rule and are telling these young athletes about the benefits of staying one more year in college.

[http://active.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/57579794.jpg] I just read a story about the recruiting trail for Washington State University's basketball program -- they are already focusing on 2010. Patrick Simon, a freshman in high school, committed to play basketball at Washington State University despite the fact that he's only in the middle of his first season of prep basketball. The Cougars on Monday made a scholarship offer to the 6-foot-7 Simon, who is only 14 and won't play there until the next decade.

Simon leads his team in scoring and rebounding and orally accepted the offer. No one from the Washington State basketball program can comment on Simon's commitment until he signs a letter of intent, which would happen in fall 2009 at the earliest.

"I've thought about it quite a bit and it all came to how good they've been doing this season, they're No. 9 now, and how coach Tony Bennett really made the team a top team," Simon told The Spokesman-Review.

I know an oral commitment doesn���t mean a whole lot until he signs a letter of intent more than two years from now, but it still seems a little rushed. Isn���t this a little too young to make such a huge life decision? He���s only 14!

(Photo provided by Getty Images, taken by Jeff Gross)