Recap of the fourth block of games
CBS and Billy Packer got their wish! Kansas and Kentucky will square off on Sunday in the 2nd round. Kentucky took down Villanova, with Sumpter and Nardi saying goodbye and Nova nation now officially starting the countdown to next year's "four-guard offense - the next generation"
Southern Illinois beat Holy Cross and Ralph Willard
Florida toyed with Jackson State and then reached the prestigious 100+ scoring mark
Arkansas started strong, Stan Heath gets excited, but slowly USC took over and the commentators started talking about OJ Mayo
Kentucky Watch: Fueling the fire was Billy Packer by saying fire the assistant who messed up the starting line-up paperwork and ended up having Bobby Perry's cousin Dwight Perry starting the game at an NCAA game! (not an exhibition game). Tubby had to resort to a quick foul so he could insert Bobby Perry in the line-up... Our Senior Coaching Carousel Editor Dr Lei Off is projecting major changes at Kentucky in the summer...
Recap of the third block of games
* The Arizona Moody Blues performed as expected, Purdue played better and toughed and they earned the right to be blown away by Florida on Sunday
* Reggie Theus made a national stage debut with his all-transfer team by giving Texas and Kevin Durant all they could handle. This bodes very well for the future of New Mexico State (if they can keep Theus there for more than a year)
* Kansas took all its first round frustrations on Niagara. They scored 100+ and a margin of 40+. Bill Self and the Jayhawk nation can now forget about the 1st round jinx and concentrate on a Final Four run
* Illinois "got lucky" (thank you B10 member of the selection cmte) and got an NCAA bid despite a disasterous season. Tonight's game was a microcosm of the season as they tasted the victory all game long but they faltered under the full court press of the unpredictable Greenies of Virginia Tech
Recap of the second block of games
* Two of the #3 seeds had to sweat it out but they managed to "survive and advance"...
* Oregon started 0-9, then went 20-0, and ended up winning by two. Nowhere near as hot as they ended the season (blew out of USC in the Pac-10 conference tourney final). They will face...
* ...Winthrop who survived a comeback by Notre Dame, but ultimately Winthrop was the team that closed the game and made the fewer mistakes and finally got their NCAA win. Last year they lost to a last second shot by Chris Lofton and two years ago they barely lost to the Designer Zags.
* Meanwhile Tennessee and Long Beach State reminded everyone of how games should be played, with 200+ points scored and the Vols getting a 12x-8x win. Once upon a time this was the rule, not the exception in college hoops.
* In the only overtime and in a closely contested game Nevada beat the Funk of Creighton despite two nickle-dimers causing Fazekas to foul out.
* Come on NCAA already, let's go to six fouls! Let the best players play!
* Texas A&M Corpus Cristi thought they were having their Cinderella night. Wisconsin scored just 4 points (yes, four) in the first 9 minutes of the game (yes, nine). That was on pace to finish the game with just over 40 points. Unfortunately for A&M-CC the Badgers kept chipping away at the lead and managed to take control of the game.
CBS TV note: The morning games that get played on the west coast start later, therefore the 2nd game of the morning block is not shown nationally. It is only shown in the local/regional markets. This was the case yesterday with George Washington vs Vandy (but it was shown nationally on CSTV), and today with Miami of Ohio vs Oregon (not shown on CSTV).
Recap of the first block of games
* Memphis had to earn their win against the feisty North Texas team
* Virginia "scrimmaged" against Albany. And that was a game my March Madness editors (*cough* me *cough*) picked as an upset special.
* UNLV managed to beat Georgia Tech in a hard-fought game where scoring was at a premium
2005-54 rescinded!: That's what Billy Packer said. And that's a good thing because it essentially turned them into free agents. Now if this was followed in the spirit of the law there would be no issues, but you know how coaches are, if a player is eligible, they will recruit him (directly or indirectly) regardless... 2005-54 was a new NCAA rule of last year that turned student-athletes into free agents providing their got their undergraduate degree, had remaining eligibility and were accepted in a graduate program at another university. Typically this affected five year seniors who had a year left (eg redshirt, medical or otherwise). Some may call it the Lon/Kevin Kruger Rule. And it worked out for them as they are moving into the 2nd round of the NCAA. Others that moved because of this rule: Jermaine Maybank (StJohns to Kansas State), Jason Walberg (St Mary's to Pepperdine; another one going to play for daddy), and Alm. Thierro (Memphis to Duquesne). The last one probably the only one that happened with the 100% blessing of both teams.
Speaking of Georgia Tech, this was one of the teams I was most looking forward to watching before the season started. However, their on-court performance seemed disjointed, out of sync and without flow most of the time. Not sure what the root cause is, perhaps the absence of enough ballhandlers/true guards? On paper this team promised to be of the mold of the 2004/2005 Georgia Tech teams with Jack, Ish Muhammad (who can forget the announcer saying after a monster dunk "take the women and children out of the lane"), BJ Elder, etc...
We are ready to call it!: Our Senior March Madness Editors Volf Blidzor, power-forward Jamez Cafforty and Andersen Koopor 180x2 are projecting that Texas A&M Corpus Cristi will upset Wisconsin. Book it! :-)
Unlucky CSTV: Both of the two live NCAA games shown on CSTV have been blowouts from the start...
Conference Realignment Madness!: Samford will leave the Ohio Valley Conference after the 2007-2008 season and join the Southern (not Southland) conference for the 2008-2009 season.
The madness continues both on CBS with a full slate of games and one live game on CSTV airing right now (915amPT/1215pmET) Albany trying to upset Virginia. Detailed national CBS TV listings here. For local TV schedules check with your local CBS TV stations...
Meanwhile on ESPN, another 5 1/2 hour College Gameday Scoreboard marathon from 9amPT/noonET through 3pmPT/6pmET. It will feature analysis, highlights, pre and post-game press conferences, interviews and all sorts of other goodies.
Gerald Henderson's dirty foul may have caused Duke a first round loss!... Why? Duke has a very high RPI/SOS, which would have given the selection committee all the excuses/justification they needed to give Duke a #4 or a #5 seed. All they needed to do was beat NC State and maybe their next opponent in the ACC tourney. Gerald Dirty-Foul Henderson was one of their hottest players offensive at the time of the incident. With him they had a good chance of beating NC State. With a #4 or #5 seed Duke would have been matched up against an easier opponent and would most likely have won... So Dirty Foul ---> 1st Round Exit... Some may call it karma, some may call it divine justice, some may call it "they deserved it". Thank you NC State and VCU!...
As far as the question of Duke's talent and depth let me point out a few things:
His starters are Top 100 talent and McDonalds All Americans (granted some of them were chosen to the Burger game because they committed to Duke, not because they deserved it, but they are still Top 50/100 talent).
His bench players were Top 100 talent coming into college. Most "BCS" teams don't have that many Top 100 players in their starting lineup.
It's no one's fault that Coach Dirty-K-Rat does not trust his bench players so he has to play only 6-7 of them
It's no one's fault that Coach Dirty-K-Rat did not develop his players
If you don't play them any minutes at all, guess what, they will transfer! (Eric Boateng, Jamal Boykin, and one more this year to be revealed later on).
If I was Kyle Singler I would really really really consider ejecting and staying near home. The last time I checked Oregon was doing real well :-)
If I was Nolan Smith I would really really really consider ejecting and playing where his dad played. The last time I checked Louisville was doing real well :-)
Sports or Entertainment? You decide... The 2007 edition of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue
6 comments:
In retrospect, I wouldn't have picked against so many Big Ten teams (Michigan State, Wisconsin, Purdue and Indiana all picked to lose in the first round?!?!?!). Everyone forgets it's a different style of basketball in the Big Ten and it favors tourney play.
Keep up the great blog!
Oooops! They all won :-) I forgot to mention my predictions usually turn out to be of the contrarian indicator variety ;-)
I wasn't picking by conference, or going for the most reasonable/likely outcome, I was just trying to capture the randomness.
Thanks for the comment!
It's your blog, but I'd humbly suggest a moratorium on the Duke slamming. They're gone. It's insulting to the rest of college basketball that Duke is still being discussed. I went there, and I'm tired of hearing about 'em, positive or negative.
Now, if Coach K appears on CBS as an analyst, or if the State Farm ad's airtime gets outta hand, be my guest.
I may be overdoing it, but it's a fun topic (at least for me). It is still relevant since it only happened two days ago :-)
After all a blog, (unlike a newspaper or the mass media websites), is pretty much anything goes. I'm sure some people get a large order of french fries from McDonalds and blog about each fry indvidually (which is pretty close to what I am doing) :-)
Besides ,the State Farm ads are still running, and Coach K had another whinefest, this time on "Costas Now" on HBO. I haven't watched that one yet (the NCAA games get in the way), but from what I heard he is whining that some 100 Duke professors made negative comments on Duke athletics after the lacrosse incident. So there's definately no moratorium from me :-)
How does 2005-54 create free agents? It is my understanding that coaches cannot approach student-athletes that currently play at another school. Doesn't that mean that a coach could not approach a graduate who still has a year of eligibility left? Instead, I think that the student athlete, once s/he has graduated and been accepted into a graduate program at another university, would then have to approach the coach at that university. We need to remember that most student-athletes will going on in something other that sports, and the ncaa should allow them to go attend a graduate school best suited to their career aspirations.
Well for one thing the 2005-54 is not going to create any more "free agents" since it was rescinded...
That was the spirit of the law as you described, but unfortunately college coaches (as always) approached it as a free-for-all for anyone available. It would have gotten a lot worse had it not been rescinded. Basically they started to treat graduated five year redshirt seniors as free agents. And what about a player who graduates in 3 years? Then they would go after him as well...
As with other things (like recruiting HS/Juco players) direct contact may not be allowed, but coaches find ways to express their interest (eg through HS/AAU coaches or other intermediaries). The coaches parse the NCAA rules, find holes and exploit them to the max until they are rescinded. Some glaring examples were the exhibition games where AAU coaches of potential recruits hastily assembled "all-star" exhibition teams and got paid the guarantee, or text messaging which is treated differently from a telephone conversation.
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