You won a medal, too?

Van Chancellor got a taste of humility last week while coaching the U.S. women’s basketball team to an Olympic gold medal.

According to the Houston Chronicle, Chancellor, coach of the WNBA Houston Comets, got a call on his cell phone from a friend asking if he wanted to play golf.

Chancellor informed his friend he was in Athens, prompting the friend to ask: “What are you doing in Athens?”

Yogi is his coach

Pittsburgh Steelers backup quarterback Ike Taylor, after being tabbed to start an exhibition game, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “You only get a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity so many times.”

Definitely not Bush league

“It’s August and we’ve already got a Heisman Trophy favorite,” wrote Jim Armstrong in his aol.com column.

Of Reggie Bush’s performance in USC’s victory over Virginia Tech, Armstrong said Bush “caught touchdown passes (on plays) of 35, 53 and 29 yards. He also returned punts and kickoffs and played the tuba in the USC band.”

Definitely Busch league

Before finishing eighth in last weekend’s NASCAR Nextel Cup race at Bristol, Tenn., Kurt Busch said on TNT that his dad had told him he wouldn’t win.

Said Busch, “My dad is the biggest superstitious guy in the world. He said, ‘You know in how many races you’ve done well, and you know in how many races you haven’t done well.’ And he said, ‘I don’t think it is your time this year.’

“And I said, ‘Thanks, Dad.’ “

Pinstriped leis?

Wednesday is “New York Yankee Day” – in Hawaii, of all places.

The state’s attorney general, Mark Bennett, a Brooklyn native who has lived on the islands for 25 years, took advantage of being acting governor this week and Monday signed a proclamation honoring his favorite baseball team.

Gov. Linda Lingle and Lt. Gov. James “Duke” Aiona are in New York for the Republican National Convention.

Maybe they can declare it “Hawaii Islanders Day” in New York.

Getting an argument

A documentary on the National Collegiate Debate Championship, held in April in the nation’s capital, will be televised a number of times by College Sports Television (CSTV) beginning tonight.

But is debating a sport? One competitor calls it “Top Gun for dorks.”

Don’t gum up works

Atlanta Braves’ announcer Don Sutton said former major league slugger Harmon Killebrew once told him why it’s not a good idea to chew gum when batting.

“It’ll make your eyeballs bounce up and down,” Sutton quoted Killebrew as saying.