Thomas and Rona Reeves have two children who are star athletes with 4.0 or better grade point averages. Both kids also are playing basketball today for a chance to reach the Georgia High School Association’s Class AAAAA Final Four. Life is great in the Reeves household, right?

Well, yes and no.

Tevin Reeves is a 6-foot-1 senior guard for theWheeler Wildcats whose team is playing at theUniversity of West Georgia at 5:30 p.m. today. Amber Reeves is a 5-foot-10 sophomore guard for the North Cobb Warriors. Her team also is playing today at 4 p.m., but 157 miles away at Fort Valley State University.

The start time for the two games is separated by only 90 minutes, making it impossible for both parents to see both games. But this is nothing new for this busy family who has juggled basketball schedules all season.

During the regular season, when both Tevin and Amber played on the same day–a normal occurrence–both Thomas and Rona would start at Amber’s North Cobb game.

“Normally I will jet out of Amber's game and rush to Wheeler's game,” Thomas said. “Normally I get there and the Wheeler guys are warming up. Sometimes it's close; sometimes it's not as close.”

Thomas will record Tevin’s game and share it with family and friends, but not until all four members of the Reeves family sit down and watch the game together.

When both teams play at the same time, as they will today, the family relies on text messaging to stay up to date. Each parent will send the other a score update at the end of each quarter.

It’s a system the family has just about perfected, but it has taken time and a lot of work. It starts with both basketball schedules on the refrigerator. Then the family maps out the locations of games and the quickest routes. The plan has been drawn up and worked over with great care. The Reeveses know just about every detail of the surrounding area when it comes to the two team’s schedules.

“We know where each team is playing, and it kind of makes it easy because Wheeler has a smaller region,” Rona said. “They don't have as many games as North Cobb. And Tevin plays with Wheeler, who many times may go out of town. It kind of made it easy this year for us because Tevin was out of state playing and Amber was still playing locally.”

A great example occurred over the holiday break. Wheeler traveled to national tournaments in Hawaii and Myrtle Beach while North Cobb played locally in Atlanta.

The Reeves family caught another break when the snowstorm hit the area in January. Because of makeup games, North Cobb played a Wednesday game–typically high school games are on Tuesday, Friday and Saturday–and Wheeler played a Monday game. That gave Tevin and Amber a chance to see each other play live.

Tevin “was so excited that he could actually attend her game,” Rona said. “And she was excited because his game was on a Monday. They are excited when they get to go to each other's game. They are the biggest critics of each other too. They love to get that criticism from one another, and they feed on that.”

The criticism is mostly constructive, Thomas said. “They are each other's biggest fans. And when they get to go to each other's games, trust me, they are probably the loudest fan in the gym.”

Tevin works out frequently with Amber on conditioning and helps with other aspects of her game. But Amber paid the biggest homage of sibling support this season when she changed her number from 30 to 22.

“Out of respect for her brother, she changed her number to 22 when it became available this year,” Rona said. “She changed her number to 22 to match Tevin.”

As much as they like and care for each other, the two basketball stars still aren’t afraid to hand out harsh criticism. According to their father, you can frequently hear either one telling the other to "pick it up" or offering advice about a certain area of the game.

But how will the family handle two basketball games so far apart today? Who will go where?

Thomas will head back to his alma mater to watch Amber play with her North Cobb teammates. “I'm actually going to go to the game at Fort Valley State. I'm a Fort Valley State graduate, so it will be like going home for me. I played ball there also.”

Thomas is hoping that one of the other Wheeler parents will take over for him and record the Wildcats’ game. But what both parents really hope for is two wins.

“To see both of them make it to the Final Four would really be a great achievement for them,” said Thomas, who coached both Tevin and Amber since they were 5 years old. “Tevin was on the 2009 state championship team. And Amber, when she was 11, was on the 11-U AAU national championship team. Tevin's goal is to win a second state championship, and Amber's goal is to get a state championship to go with her AAU championship.”

You might say Thomas and Rona’s only goal is to get both kids in the same gym at the same time.

“I'm just really hoping that they do both win on Saturday so that we'll have them at one venue at the Gwinnett Center and we'll see both of them play back to back,” Rona said. “That's my hope.”

Terry Crews and Rebecca Crews Pictures: Terry Crews and Rebecca Crews arrive on the red carpet at the 42nd NAACP Image Awards held at the Shrine Auditorium on March 4, 2011 in Los Angeles, California.

The NAACP Image Awards is the nation's premier multi-cultural awards show celebrating the outstanding achievements and performances of people of color in the arts (television, recording, literature, motion picture and writing and directing), as well as those individuals or groups who promote social justice through their creative endeavors.

CARACAS, Venezuela — Lina Ron, a vocal supporter of President Hugo Chavez who led radical street groups, died of a heart attack Saturday, a Venezuelan government official said. She was 51.

Information Minister Andres Izarra confirmed her death, saying she had no vital signs when she arrived at a hospital in the capital,Caracas. "Honor and glory to Lina Ron," Izarra said on Twitter.

Ron led groups of Chavez supporters that were involved in attacks on opposition protests, and she repeatedly said she would take up arms if necessary to defend Chavez and his socialist movement.

With platinum-blond hair and a tough-talking nature, Ron soon became a household name in Venezuela within the first few years after Chavez took office in 1999. She founded the small political partyVenezuelan Popular Union and was for years a prominent voice in the radical wing of Chavez's movement.

Chavez once said Ron was "a good woman, but she tends toward anarchy."

The president publicly opposed some of her tactics. She faced various charges related to her involvement in disturbances.

In 2009, a court upheld criminal charges against Ron including assault and illegal use of a firearm for her role in an attack in which her group hurled tear gas canisters at the studios of the television station Globovision. She also led a group that stormed and temporarily occupied the offices of the Vatican's representative in Caracas in 2008.

In an earlier protest that drew widespread criticism, she burned a U.S. flag shortly after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

In a 2002 interview with The Associated Press, Ron described herself as a "social fighter."

"I'm the ugly part of the process, the one who gets the disagreeable part — confronting" Chavez's enemies, Ron said.

Some government opponents have said Ron was useful for Chavez in that she would regularly intimidate members of the opposition while government officials publicly distanced themselves from her.

The Detroit Tigers, Stevo Poulin, and Dwight Howard are absolutely dominating the sports headlines on this early Saturday afternoon. Good stuff, to be sure, and making things even better is the fact that we have a full slate of college hoops to discuss too.

Before we get into that, however, let's briefly discuss the headliners.

Thanks to Miguel Cabrera, spring training for the Detroit Tigers started out as a much-publicized affair. Things have calmed down a little recently though, which means that both the team and fans can get back to focusing on baseball. The AL Central is pretty deep this year, and the Tigers are going to have to match wits with a Minnesota Twins squad that looks very strong and a Chicago White Sox team that is as thunderous as ever. Naturally, we have some thoughts about their chances, and we just might share them.

Have you head of Stevo Poulin yet? If you haven't, all you really need to know is that he might be the most intimidating wrestler in the world right now. He dominates the competition, and he does it with a certain kind of ferocity that you just don't come across that often. He also has a badass mohawk.

Oh, he's also just eight years old.

And then there's Superman. Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic had their four-game winning streak snapped by the Chicago Bulls Friday night. Howard got a loose with his elbows at one point, and was awarded his 16th technical foul. That's the line as far as the NBA is concerned, and Howard will be out of action against the Portland Trail Blazers on Monday night as a result.

All this and more is ahead!

Here’s an interesting idea – what if websites had personalities of their own? The Search Operators is a thought-provoking site that turns Google into a lazy staff member that can’t quite be bothered to get anything right.

Enter search queries and it will yawn. Hit ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’ and you’ll be out of luck. Even the search results you do get will be not quite what you wanted.

Built using HTML5 Canvas, Processing.js, Javascript, jQuery, the Google Search API and a dash of imagination, the site’s developers describe the site as “The sloppy twin of Google search. By reversing the passive roles of UI elements, we want to expand the traditional notion of user interfaces. We hope this sloppy twin helps you switch mind set from everyday web routines and open up new perspectives.”

The Michigan high school basketball star who died shortly after his game-winning shotThursday had an enlarged heart and suffered cardiac arrest because of the condition, the Ottawa County medical examiner said after Friday's autopsy.

Wes Leonard, a 16-year-old junior who scored more than 1,000 points in his career at Fennville (Mich.) High, collapsed on the floor during the postgame celebration moments after his layup with 30 seconds left in overtime preserved his team's undefeated season.

He was taken by ambulance to Holland Hospital, where he was eventually pronounced dead.

Today is one of those days that may have you wondering what happened to all my friends?  I don’t mean your real life friends.   The ones who you can call on a daily basis just to chat, call up to grab a glass of wine after work, or call upon as a last minute baby-sitter .  I mean all those facebook friends you have compiled over the past few years.  The guy you dated once in college.   The kid who sat behind you in homeroom.  The stranger you added just to help you with some funky Farmville mission.   Those are the folks who may be busy defriending you today on the social networking site. 

It’s not just you whose supply of Facebook friends may be diminishing today.  There’s a whole crop of celebrities who rely on their social network to call attention to themselves and their every action (Hello Justin Bieber!)  While most of the celebs rely on everyone to ‘like’ them on the website in order to share their current marketing message, some others will actually friend you themselves (usually the newbies).    Most folks are going to totally disregard the whole National Facebook Defriend Day movement, but I expect to see some celebs see their likability shrink a bit as folks use this as an opportunity to clean up their wall just a bit.   The last time the world was called upon to unfriend folks was November 17, 2010 when Jimmy Kimmel dared the world to defriend those false friends that stalk our walls.

When Kent's Stefano Langone sang "I Need You Now" to the three judges on "American Idol" Thursday night, he really meant it.

Without their support, he would have been eliminated from the show.

As it turned out, Langone's heartfelt rendition of Smokie Norful's ballad earned him a spot as one of 13 contestants to survive the round. Eleven others were sent home.

Ten finalists advanced on the Fox reality show through online and phone votes from viewers, but Langone didn't make that cut.

In a new twist, judges Randy Jackson, Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler picked six of the remaining 14 for a wild-card competition. That's when Langone, 21, pulled "I Need You Now" out of his pocket.

He scored a wild-card berth, as did Ashthon Jones, 24, of Nashville and Naima Adedapo, 26, of Milwaukee.

"This is the toughest night ever," Jackson said.

Five men and five women were chosen by viewers. They are Casey Abrams, 20, of Idyllwild, Calif.; James Durbin, 22, of Santa Cruz, Calif.; Jacob Lusk, 23, of Compton, Calif.; Scotty McCreery, 17, of Garner, N.C.; Paul McDonald, 26, of Nashville; Thia Megia, 16, of Mountain House, Calif.; Haley Reinhart, 20, of Wheeling, Ill.; Karen Rodriguez, 21, of New York; Pia Toscano, 22, of Howard Beach, N.Y.; and Lauren Alaina, 16, of Rossville, Ga

WAUWATOSA - In the end, J.P. Tokoto couldn't pass up the opportunity to play for one of the marquee programs in men's college basketball.

Tokoto, a highly recruited junior forward from Menomonee Falls, announced Thursday night during a press conference at Dave and Buster's that he's heading to North Carolina after his prep career is over. Tokoto can make his decision official by signing a letter of intent in the fall.

One of the most hotly recruited players in the history of Wisconsin prep basketball, Tokoto chose coach Roy Williams and the Tar Heels over a host of successful programs that included two schools in his backyard, the University of Wisconsin and Marquette.

"It felt like it was home to me," Tokoto said of his visit to North Carolina two years ago after his freshman season. "Wisconsin's definitely home, but when I got down to North Carolina it felt like something different."

The 6-foot-6, 190-pound Tokoto recently narrowed a large list of teams chasing him down to a final eight: Connecticut, Kansas, Kentucky, Marquette, Maryland, North Carolina, UCLA and UW.

Tokoto said his decision came down to North Carolina and UW, which offered him a scholarship two years ago.

"I'm coming to the University of North Carolina to play for you," Tokoto told Williams in a phone conversation after he announced his decision. Tokoto ended the conversation by telling Williams he loved him.

The Badgers had made Tokoto their top priority in their 2012 recruiting class, with coach Bo Ryan taking the lead in trying to get the athletic Tokoto to stay in state and play at UW. There, he would have joined another state product, Sheboygan Lutheran forward Sam Dekker, who orally committed to UW last summer. To date, Dekker is the lone commitment in the Badgers' 2012 class.

Tokoto said he left a message for Ryan prior to UW's game at Indiana on Thursday night.

Like Ryan, Williams made Tokoto a high priority for his program and made several visits to Wisconsin to watch Tokoto play.

Tokoto said style of play - the Tar Heels are high-tempo, while the Badgers are much more deliberate - didn't play a major role in his decision.

"I like to get up and down the floor, but at the same time I felt like if I went to Wisconsin I'd fit right in with the offense," Tokoto said. "It's not like they're a walk-it-up-the-floor type of offense."

Tokoto is averaging 20.5 points as a junior at Menomonee Falls, which is 11-11 and will play at Waukesha South in a WIAA Division 1 regional final on Saturday.

Several national recruiting services have Tokoto ranked among the top players in the 2012 class.

Longtime evaluator Bob Gibbons, who runs the All Star Report, rates Tokoto as the 10th-best junior in the nation.

Rivals.com has Tokoto ranked No. 40 overall in the 2012 class and 10th among small forwards.

ESPN ranks Tokoto No. 32 overall and No. 4 among small forwards in the class.

Tokoto said he felt relieved that the recruiting process was over.

"Before this, I was kind of nervous," Tokoto said. "I feel great now that I got it out. I feel like we can go focus on other things." 

The series regular passed away after a short illness, his agent told the BBC. He had been suffering from cancer.

The actor appeared on screen opposite many different Doctors and worked with some more on Doctor Who audio stories.

Former Doctor Tom Baker remembered him as "a wonderful companion" with "a marvellous resonant voice".

"Of all the characters in Doctor Who there is no doubt that he was the most loved by the fans," he wrote on his official website.

'Nick' Courtney had already appeared in such series as Escape and The Saint before making his first Doctor Who appearance in 1965, playing a character named Bret Vyon.

He returned to the show in 1968 to make his first appearance as the Brigadier opposite the second Doctor, Patrick Troughton.

The stalwart of the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce (UNIT) would periodically return over the next two decades before his final appearance in 1989.

In 2008 he reprised his Brigadier role in Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Courtney appeared on other shows during his Doctor Who years, including The Avengers, Callan, The Champions and Minder.

Afterwards he had parts in such popular dramas as The Bill, Casualty and Doctors and was recently heard on BBC Radio 7 series The Scarifyers.

In 1997 he became honorary president of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society in recognition of the 107 episodes in which he appeared.

League of Gentlemen star and Doctor Who writer Mark Gatiss remembered the actor as "a childhood hero and the sweetest of gentlemen".

Impressionist Jon Culsaw said Courtney was "a brilliant actor and warm, charming man", while Shaun of the Dead director Edgar Wright paid tribute to "a true gent".

Blake Griffin certainly had the most entertaining, choir-singing, scene-stealing, crowd-screaming, show-stopping, car-hopping dunk of the night. But overall, he was probably the third-best dunker in Staples Center on Saturday. The best two dunkers were JaVale McGee and Toronto Raptors swingman DeMar DeRozan, and both have a legitimate argument that they were robbed from an opportunity to be slam dunk champion.

Not hating on Griffin, just calling it how I see it.

The odds were severely stacked against any participant not named Griffin, since he had the hype, the fan support and most famous name in the competition. He's an all-star who has been a force since he was allowed to play for the Los Angeles Clippers after taking a year off to recover from a knee injury. But when word began to circulate a few hours before the contest that Griffin had planned to dunk over a car, the other competitors really had to start preparing for second place.

I mean, Griffin had the NBA's official vehicle, the Kia Optima, with a Sprite Slam Dunk sticker on the side. That meant he had to make to the second round, because a prop that elaborate, and possibly expensive, was not going to waste.

I happened to be seated near the tunnel, where Baron Davis was resting on the hood, so I knew what was about to go down before Kenny Smith grabbed the microphone, begged people to get out of their seats and said, "We're going to bring the pageantry to the dunk contest."

To top it off, Griffin had the Crenshaw Elite choir come out to sing, "I Believe I Can Fly." No way McGee was going to follow up the dunk with anything better. McGee joked afterward, "Nothing's going to beat the car unless I bring a plane out or something."

McGee certainly tried his best to overcome a second-or-nothing situation, as he brought out two dunks that had never been attempted before in the slam dunk contest. His first dunk -- or rather dunks -- was so ridiculous that I thought he was a tad too ambitious. He had originally thought about raising a prop goal to 12 feet, so that he could dunk flatfooted off the vertical. But after McGee practiced it on Thursday, he didn't like how it looked, so an observer suggested he dunk with two basketball off both rims.

He tried the first time and got it to go down. So he decided to add it to his arsenal. He needed almost the entire two minutes to pull it off, but when he did, it was rather incredible. He got a 50.

"He created that two rim dunk and only a seven-footer with his wingspan could pull that off," said McGee's mom, Pam. "I was shocked."

Pam McGee was enlisted for his second dunk, but only after JaVale McGee flinched and was forced to change his plans. A few weeks ago, McGee came up with the dunk in which he snatched a piece of paper out the net with his teeth before jamming. He had added a tweak for the competition but was unable to attempt in when Oklahoma City forward Serge Ibaka -- who early had a severely slept-on foul line dunk -- pulled a doll off the rim with his teeth directly before him.

"Serge had did a dunk that was similar to the one, so I switched it around so that I could get a high score," JaVale McGee said.

JaVale McGee had pulled off his three-ball dunk earlier this week in Orlando. Hilton Armstrong was the passer and he put the ball in the right spot for McGee to get it on the first try. He brought out John Wall, who needed a few attempts before McGee could throw them down. He got a 49, only because Brent Barry gave him a nine. I predicted a 50 when I saw it on Wednesday, but Barry should know, as a former champion, that dunking three times while in mid-air is not the easiest thing to do.

McGee had his mother involved, as she walked down an aisle, carrying a red, white and blue in a box and wearing her old Los Angeles Sparks warmup from her days in the WNBA. Afterward, McGee let it be known that it would've been better used in the final round.

"Definitely was trying to get the crowd into it, we knew they was going to be text voting, too," he said. "Most of the people in the world are women, so we felt it was good to get those texts."

McGee earned his trip to the final round, but DeRozan really has a reason to be upset. DeRozan had the disadvantage of going first, but he started out the competition really well, as his Raptors teammate Amir Johnson threw the ball off the basket support and DeRozan jumped underneath the basket, brought the ball between the legs and dunked. He got a 44. It was at least a 47. Canadian exchange rate or something.

The judges made up for it some, when they gave him a 50 for a really nice jam in which he caught the ball of the bounce, brought it down below his waist and nearly banged his head on the rim as he did a reverse dunk.

Now, Griffin's first dunk was a two-handed 360-jam, but I was surprised that he got a 49 right after McGee got a 50 for dunking on two rims. I didn't think McGee's dunk, given the degree of difficulty and creativity, could only be one point better than Griffin's. But it was no biggie, since I wanted to see McGee battle Griffin in the final. I just didn't know that Griffin would get ushered in with some questionable scoring.

Griffin wanted to catch a pass from Davis off the side of the backboard and do another 360-dunk, which would've been insane. But he had to settled for catching the ball of the backboard and throwing down a windmill. It was nice dunk, but certainly not better than DeRozan's between-the-legs 44. Griffin got a 46, giving him the extra point he needed to advance.

Granted, Griffin plays for the Clippers, but DeRozan is born and raised in Los Angeles -- and went to USC. He got no love.

Griffin brought back Vince Carter's arm in the rim dunk in the final round, but McGee added a twist to Michael Jordan's famous rock-the-cradle. McGee's third dunk may have been his best of the night, given the dexterity required to pull it off. He drove baseline, dipped under backboard, rocked the ball and dunked it on the other end.

The irony of the competition? Coach Flip Saunders always criticizes McGee for being a style over substance player, yet McGee was upended because he had more substance than style. Once the decision was left up to fans with cellphones, then McGee had no shot at winning a popularity contest. Most people hadn't heard of the guy until he showed up on Saturday. Griffin trumped McGee with 68 percent of the vote.

On his decisive jam, Griffin had the assistance of two great showmen in Davis and Smith, a former slam dunk champ. "It was actually my idea to use the car," Griffin said. "When they first came to me with the dunk contest idea, they said there was no rules. I was like, 'So I can jump over a car?' Kind of playing around.
"I got the dimensions and all that. Figured I could probably clear it and Baron came up with the choir and Kenny and they all put everything together," he said. "I was actually going to jump over the choir separate from the car, and then Baron was like, 'Why don't you do it together?' So we had the choir position around the car, and then people came in and said you can't cover up the car."

When Griffin hurdled the Kia, Boston Celtics forward Kevin Garnett waved his hands across his neck and yelled, "It's over." And it was. McGee was so shook after that dunk, he could've dunked from halfcourt and not turned a head. It was a tough act to follow. But Pam McGee still has her own opinion about the real champion.

"In my opinion, my son won the dunk contest," she said. "The dunk contest is entertainment. I think JaVale accomplished what he wanted to do. If you don't know, you better ask somebody, you know who JaVale McGee is now. I think hey, he did a wonderful job."

McGee was happy with his performance and said he would likely compete again. Maybe he can jump over a truck. "Hey," he said. "I might."

LOS ANGELES — Thunder guard James Harden, who was a late replacement for injured guard Tyreke Evans, scored a team-high 30 points in 27 minutes for the Sophomore team in Friday night’s Rookie Challenge. Serge Ibaka added 14 points, including two 3-pointers and two blocked shots in 19 minutes.

World News reporter Vinita Nair, co-anchor of ABC World News Now will appear an upcoming episode of the soap opera One Life to Live as a doctor in Natalie’s pregnancy storyline.

“I got to be a soap star for a day,” Nair said during a broadcast.

The episode featuring Nair and Natalie’s labor will air on January 11th.