The ACC once again has a completely random musical sponsor for this year's tournament. Last year it was Lil Mama, who graced the Raycom airwaves, and this year they've stepped up their game. American Idol winner, David Cooke, is your official ACC Tournament sponsor, and he would like to tell you about the song "Heroes" that you'll be hearing Ad nauseam, if you live in ACC Country....

It's been awhile since we've highlighted one of PTI's random commercial cut-ins, but this one was too funny to ignore. As they come back from one commercial, and heading into the next, you can tell that Kornheiser is trying to come up with something for the "Give the People Something to Watch" bit at the end of the show. Tony only cares to know if one show is on, and that show is American Idol!

I'm still not sure exactly how NBC is tabulating these ratings, but either way, they were huge for Phelps' run at eight on Saturday night. Not only did it crush any other Sport the network has aired, it was the highest Saturday rating since Empty Nest debuted back in 1990. Via Yahoo....

The telecast averaged 31.1 million U.S. viewers, NBC's biggest audience for a Saturday night program since an episode of "The Golden Girls" spinoff "Empty Nest" drew 31.4 million viewers in February 1990, according to Nielsen Media Research data cited by the network.

It was the culmination of an especially dramatic day of Olympic competition, which also saw Phelps' U.S. teammate Dara Torres, 41, lose the women's 50-meter freestyle by a 1/100th of a second to 24-year-old Britta Steffen of Germany. Torres, the oldest U.S. swimmer, ended up with three silver medals.

Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt grabbed gold in the 100-meter dash after the reigning world champion Tyson Gay of the United States, who suffered a hamstring injury six weeks ago, was eliminated in the semi-finals.

But the dramatic story arc of Phelps, who came away with gold medals in all eight events he competed in, has been the biggest draw for NBC's Olympic coverage.

The network has averaged 30 million viewers in prime time -- on par with the numbers tuning in for "American Idol" -- since the games opened on August 15, and Saturday night's audience peaked at 40 million viewers in the half hour during which the men's 400-meter medley was held.

Through nine days, 191 million viewers have tuned in to at least one six-minute bloc of the Beijing Games on NBC and its various sister cable networks -- 14 million more than for the Athens Games and 5 million more than the Atlanta Games over the same period, NBC said.

I thought we were only getting Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, but apparently the ever-crazy Paula Abdul might actually be an addition to the show.

A tipster in close proximity to Abdul's inner circle tells me that the American Idol judge, who hasn't released an album of new material since 1995's Head Over Heels, is in talks to perform — no, not on Idol's next '90s theme night — during the network's Super Bowl XLII telecast!