One of the things that stood out in Lance Armstrong’s interview with Oprah Winfrey was how he rationalized doping under a “win at all costs” mentality. As a sports fan, it is hard not to slip into that mentality at times. In the end, you want your opponent’s best player to foul out. You want your opponent to miss their free throws. You want things to break your team’s way. You don’t just root for your team to be good, you root for them to be lucky too.

(After all, almost no one wins a national title without a few breaks along the way. This is the reason Arizona’s streak of beating three #1 seeds in the 1997 tournament remains so special. Almost everyone gets lucky and faces a few weaker teams at some point.)

But I also think it is fair to say that the more sports one watches, the more important it is to not just win, but to also win the right way.

For example, there is nothing more frustrating in college basketball then when a player gets hit with an elbow and exaggerates their reaction. It is perfectly smart to do so, because any elbow is an automatic flagrant foul, two free throws and the ball. But if a team wins or pulls away in a game because of this call, especially when the elbow contact was incidental, it certainly feels wrong.

Similarly, if a team wins after a bank-shot, that is less satisfying. (The Arizona – Colorado game from Jan. 3 might have been the first time that neither team could pick up a truly satisfying win. Colorado would have won the game with a banked shot at the end. But instead, Arizona won in OT when the refs waived off the shot, breaking the NCAA rule about indisputable video evidence in the process.)

This is also why so many fans find Kentucky’s recent success so frustrating. They view it as unseemly to recruit so many one-and-done players. Whether anyone proves John Calipari has done something wrong recruiting players to Kentucky is not the point. For many people, the perception will always be that his style is not the right way to win.

And that is why Gonzaga vs Butler on Saturday night was the perfect summary of what people feel is right about college basketball. The game was being playing in Indiana, where the movie Hoosiers defined team sport. And the game featured two programs that define winning the right way. Neither team wins by engaging in ugly recruiting battles. Both teams have done a fabulous job graduating four year players. And despite offers to coach in BCS leagues, both coaches have chosen to stay with their programs. Both coaches have realized that there is more to sports than just trying to maximize money and maximize their ability to recruit NBA draft picks.

And of course with this backdrop, it was the ultimate hustle play that decided the game. Butler’s 6’4” Roosevelt Jones had been defending Gonzaga’s 7’0” Kelly Olynyk all day. Jones had even blocked an Olynyk shot down the stretch (which sort of defies the laws of physics). And on the games ultimate play, Jones fought for space, stole the ball from Olynyk, and drove for the game-winning shot.

Sure, maybe in a few years, we’ll be complaining about how Brad Stevens teams do not win the right way. We’ll say they mug teams and ruin the game of basketball. (And if you watch the steal in slow-motion, Gonzaga fans may have reason to be upset about the contact that preceded that steal.) But for now, the world will continue to view it another way. An under-sized player made the ultimate hustle play leading to his team’s upset win. It was just two points, but it symbolized so much more.

One other game note: I loved the similarity between these two teams. With 1:24 and 24 seconds left in the game, the two teams scored on plays that were mirror images of one another. With 1:24 remaining, Kelly Olynyk backed Roosevelt Jones deeper into the lane and sealed off a crease for Elias Harris to drive for a lay-up. Then with 24 seconds left, Butler ran the exact same play.  Andrew Smith backed Olynyk into the paint allowing Alex Barlow to drive for a lay-up. With two teams this evenly matched, you cannot make this stuff up.

There are plenty of things worth discussing after this weekend. Is this the first time North Carolina looked like a Top 25 team? Did Washington’s home loss to Utah prove that the Huskies fast Pac-12 start was fool’s gold? Has Florida St. finally hit rock bottom after scoring 36 points against Virginia? And there were lots of critical injuries that deserve more examination. What has happened to Missouri without Laurence Bowers? But that analysis (particularly the injury numbers) will be saved for another week.

On a Saturday with 154 games and numerous dramatic endings, I am going to stick to the action. And with so many games coming down to the wire, I am not even going to have time to recount the drama of Texas leading Kansas, or Connecticut nearly coming back against Pittsburgh. Today I am only going to focus on games decided by the slimmest of margins.

Quantity leads to Quality

-Rutgers has never started 4-2 in Big East play, but they had a chance on Saturday. After a driving lay-up by Rutger’s Eli Carter cut the lead to one point, Rutger’s Mike Poole tied up Notre Dame’s Eric Atkins. The possession arrow favored the Scarlet Knights, and that meant that Rutgers had a chance to win the game. Rutgers once again fed Eli Carter, but this time Carter over-penetrated, was called for an offensive foul for running over Notre Dame’s Scott Martin, and Carter saw his shot blocked away by Notre Dame’s Jack Cooley for good measure. And Rutgers once again failed to achieve a 4-2 market in conference play.

-I’m going to continue to curse the limited television distribution of the Pac-12 Network by pointing out this one stat. In the Oregon St. vs USC game, the lead changed hands 8 times in the final 2:52 of the game. Aaron Fuller gave USC the lead for the last time with 5 seconds left.

-In an nearly equally dramatic game, Texas A&M’s Fabyon Harris hit a jump shot to give the Aggies a one point lead with 19 seconds left, but Alabama’s Trevor Lacey hit an even tougher jumper to retake the lead seconds later.

-And what about what happened in Blacksburg, Virginia? Virginia Tech’s Marquis Rankin, Wake Forests’s Travis McKie, and Virginia Tech’s Robert Brown all hit shots to give their team the lead in the final 45 seconds. And then it looked like Wake Forest would take the lead one more time. Wake placed its shooters on the left side of the floor, and using a rub-screen, Wake Forest’s CJ Harris seemed to have a wide-open drive for a lay-up. But several Virginia Tech players drove in defensively at the last minute which caused Harris to miss the lay-up. And when Wake Forest’s Tyler Cavanaugh missed the put-back, Virginia Tech held on for a one point win. (I still cannot believe Wake Forest didn’t make either the first lay-up or the put-back.)

-And failures were common in other games. Trailing Nebraska by two points at home, Penn St.’s Jermaine Marshall missed two free throws with 16 seconds left and Nebraska hung on for the narrow victory.

-Trailing Michigan St. by two with 30 seconds left, Ohio St.’s DeShaun Thomas missed a three, and the Spartans hung on to win. Ohio St. stayed in the game by hitting ten threes, including six by Thomas, but despite 28 from Thomas on the day, he couldn’t hit the go-ahead shot.

-Creighton’s Ethan Wragge had two three point shots to tie in the final seconds against Wichita St., but missed both. A lot of people are going to criticize Creighton for not getting Doug McDermott the ball in those situations, but Wragge has shot over 40% from beyond the arc as a freshmen, sophomore, and junior, and he already has 46 threes this season. Wragge certainly was not a bad choice for the last second shot.

-Meanwhile, Georgetown’s Otto Porter had 21 in the game, but lost control of the ball in the final seconds, and didn’t get off a shot while his team trailed by one at South Florida. Porter’s turnover allowed the Bulls earned their first Big East win on the season.

-And so it would appear that the rule was that hot shooters were not the place to go late in the game. But that wasn’t the case in Cincinnati where Cincinnati’s Sean Kilpatrick drove coast to coast at the end of overtime to break the tie and give his team the narrow win. Kilpatrick had 36 in the game in leading all scorers. Marquette came back after shooting 18% in the first half to score 50 in the second half, but even Davante’s Gardner’s old fashioned three point play at the end of overtime was not enough for Marquette thanks to Kilpatrick’s heroics.

Quality leads to Quality

Without question the endings were magical on Saturday. And I’ve often said that college basketball’s best asset is the sheer number of games, not the elite matchups. But just to make sure there was a cherry on top, Saturday’s featured game lived up to the hype too.

#6 Syracuse travelled to #1 Louisville for one of two meetings between the Big East favorites. Syracuse had won two of the last three Big East regular season titles and had won 26 of their last 27 Big East regular season games. The Orange featured possibly more depth in the front-court than any team in the nation, and by playing their traditional zone defense, they once again had a top five defensive team.

But if anyone was going to challenge Syracuse for the Big East crown, Louisville looked like the perfect candidate. The Cardinals went to the Final Four last season and had the best Points Per Possession (PPP) defense in the nation heading into Saturday’s game. But what was making Louisville into the possible Big East favorite was the emergence of Russ Smith. The former inconsistent sixth man had emerged as the Cardinal’s surprise national-player-of-the-year candidate by increasing his scoring average from 11 PPG to 19 PPG, increasing his shooting percentage, maintaining his incredible steal rate, and by continuing to pass the ball at a special rate for a score-first player. Clearly Saturday’s matchup had Final Four implications.

And the game started strong. For most of the first half on Saturday, it seemed like Louisville’s system might be Syracuse’s kryptonite. While Syracuse’s zone defense is as good as ever, by forcing 11 first half turnovers and pushing the ball in transition, Louisville was attacking the basket before Syracuse even had a chance to set up their zone. And when Louisville was forced into half-court situations, Louisville’s Gorgui Dieng emerged as the perfect zone beater. Dieng’s passing from the top of the key led to several beautiful lay-ups and dunks. Meanwhile Louisville was also using shot-fakes and other aggressive plays to drive the ball and carve up the zone in a way few teams had done this season.

But as well as Louisville was playing, Brandon Triche had every answer. The Syracuse guard put his team on his back making 8 of 8 first half shots including 4 of 4 shots from beyond the arc. I have never been a huge fan of Triche because I feel like people always mischaracterize his game. People raved about his point-guard play early in his career, but running an offense has never been his best trait. But now with freshman Michael Carter-Williams emerging as the team’s clear PG, Triche is free to become the elite scorer he was always meant to be. And on Saturday, by driving to the basket, and knocking down open threes in transition, Triche proved why fans have been praising him for all these years. Triche put his team on his back and refused to let Syracuse fall behind. Despite Louisville playing a seemingly perfect first half, the game was tied at 38 at the intermission.

And then in the second half, Triche’s teammates picked him up. Michael Carter-Williams started taking better care of the ball, Syracuse started forcing turnovers and blocking shots (even when Louisville made beautiful post-feeds), and in the final minute Syracuse had the lead. It wasn’t that Louisville had played poorly. Other than Louisville’s Peyton Siva missing some shots he normally makes (threes from the top of the key), Louisville never played flawed basketball.  But with time running down, Siva’s bad pass that led to a transition basket, and then a tough Dieng turnover under the basket, proved the difference in Louisville’s two point loss.

Syracuse now has the early lead in the Big East title race, but this game confirmed that both teams are legitimate Final Four contenders. Dieng’s passing and Triche’s scoring showed that if these teams continue to develop at a high rate, the top of the Big East may be better than we imagined.

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Duke isn’t a perfect team. Their defensive rebounding remains suspect. On Saturday Night, it felt like Louisville could take as many bad threes as they wanted because the Cardinals always got the rebound. Ryan Kelly usually takes the blame. He wasn’t a great defensive rebounder last year, and that trend continues into this season. But the moment you start to question one of the Blue Devils, he finds a way to surprise you. Just when you thought that Ryan Kelly lacked strength on the interior, there he was at the end of the Louisville game getting a key block that led to a run-out and basket on the other end. And that four point swing was critical in a five point win.

Meanwhile, Kelly and Mason Plumlee were vital in beating VCU’s press, and that allowed Duke to escape the VCU game with a 12.3% turnover rate. That was the best job a team did holding onto the ball against VCU since the 2011 NCAA tournament. Meanwhile Plumlee and Kelly also matched the physicality in the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament. While the refs called plenty of perimeter whistles in the Bahamas, they seemed to swallow their whistles on the inside. And Duke managed to avoid being overwhelmed by the physical strength of players like Minnesota’s Trevor Mbakwe.

Duke may not be #1 in the polls, but in terms of accomplishments, no one has more quality wins than the Blue Devils at this point. They’ve beaten two preseason Top-5 teams and two more probable tournament teams. And as we near the end of November, we are once again reminded that no one has their team ready to play at the start of the season better than Mike Krzyzewski.

Year after year his teams win these preseason tournaments, and they do it by simply making fewer early season mistakes than their counterparts. With Duke nursing a three-point lead in the final minute of the Louisville game, the shot-clock was winding down. Duke was going to have to settle for a tough shot against a Louisville defense that had been shutting them down all day. But then Russ Smith made a foolish gamble. He dove for the ball instead of playing straight up, and Quinn Cook spun into the lane for a beautiful floater that sealed the victory. Duke made the right play, Louisville didn’t, and the Blue Devils won again.

That doesn’t necessarily mean that Duke will be the best team in March. Kentucky is still very young. Gorgui Dieng was out of the lineup for Louisville. And as the analysis below will show, Duke’s early season success doesn’t always translate into March success. But give Mike Krzyzewski credit for dominating the early season once again.

Other Impressive Teams

- Is the key to the early season simply good guard play? Illinois is off to a 7-0 start, and the Fighting Illini made at least ten threes in the first six games of the season. They broke the streak of outside shooting against Gardner Webb (and almost lost the game), but Illinois’ guards have looked fabulous so far this season.

Meanwhile, Cincinnati has rode its guards and looked incredibly impressive in its 6-0 start. In almost every game so far guards Sean Kilpatrick, Cashmere Wright, and JaQuon Parker have scored in double figures. In the preseason I wondered if the inside play of Cincinnati’s forwards would drag the offense down enough to stop the Bearcats from becoming an elite team. And the truth is Justin Jackson has continued to struggle with turnovers. That’s a three year trend that may not be correctable at this point. But Mick Cronin hasn’t felt obligated to give Jackson major minutes. Instead, he has been giving plenty of time to JUCO transfers Titus Rubles and David Nyarsuk, and the early returns are good. Not only have those players been able to finish the lay-ups and dunks that have come their way, their defensive intensity has allowed the Bearcats to reach even higher levels than last season. Cincinnati’s two point defense is near the tops in the nation right now. It helps that Cincinnati has played four of the worst teams in D1 in the early season. But Cincinnati also stifled Iowa St. and Oregon in winning the Global Sports Classic in Las Vegas, so there is some reason to think their defense is for real. I still think the question marks in the post could hurt Illinois and Cincinnati in conference play, but the early returns are fantastic.

Of course, perhaps we should continue to be reminded that the season is still early and we still have a small sample of games. No one looked more impressive than Baylor to start the season. The development of Cory Jefferson into a dominant player and the impressive debut of Top 10 freshmen Isaiah Austin had us all raising our expectations for Scott Drew’s club. But with Brady Heslip out of the lineup after having his appendix removed, Baylor couldn’t produce any points against the College of Charleston and the Bears fell at home on Saturday. Pierre Jackson and Heslip are outstanding guards, but the dropoff to Baylor’s backup guards Gary Franklin and AJ Walton is huge. Franklin and Walton have experience, but they just aren’t good offensive players.

Bullets

- Stanford’s Chasson Randle’s would like to erase the Minnesota game from his memory bank. Randle was 3-for-19 from the floor which was bad enough. But he may have committed the worst play of the season when he fouled Minnesota’s Andre Hollins at the end of the game. Hollins took a desperation half-court heave in a tie game, and Randle inexplicably fouled him. Hollins calmly sunk three free throws to give Minnesota the win. Hollins scored 41 the previous day against Memphis, and Stanford held him in check for most of the game, but Randle’s foolish foul allowed Hollins to win it at the end. Despite the dumb play, I love the postgame comments from Stanford coach Johnny Dawkins who tried to deflect some of the blame from Randle. Dawkins noted that one play doesn’t decide a game, and that Stanford made other mistakes that contributed to the loss.

- My biggest question for Michigan was whether someone could step in and fill the spot-up shooter role (played by Stu Douglass and others in past seasons.) So far Nik Stauskas has been more than up for the challenge. I don’t think his current efficiency numbers are sustainable, but the 78th ranked player out of high school has been much better than advertised. Certainly playing alongside Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway helps, but as teammate Matt Vogrich has shown, simply playing with other good guards doesn’t guarantee you will become a dominant scorer. I don’t know how much longer John Beilein can start Vogrich ahead of Stauskas.

- Northwestern held off Illinois St. in OT (thanks to a late technical by Illinois St.’s Jackie Carmichael), and that gave the Big Ten its fifth title in the nineteen Feast Week tournaments, most of any conference. That has given the Big Ten the early lead in most ranking systems from conference RPI to Sagarin.

- Oregon got 44 points from freshmen in the team’s 83-79 win at UNLV. With those new players and Arsalan Kazemi surprisingly declared eligible, Dana Altman has some great new pieces to work with.

Early Season vs Late Season Coaches

Team X is “going to be so much better by the time conference play rolls around.” I heard this phrase a lot during Feast Week. But I hate to break it to the announcers. Even if everyone improves, some teams are going to fall behind the curve and look even worse in conference play.

Two weeks ago, I talked about how freshmen-led teams have the most potential to improve, (unless the losses pile up and they stop playing defense.) But another question I have been pondering is whether certain coaches are particularly good at developing their teams over the course of the season. The results are presented below. At some level, they make sense to me. Duke hasn’t lost an early season tournament game since 2006. And Krzyzweski has more wins in the ACC/Big Ten challenge than any other coach. Clearly, Duke is at its best in November. And I think Tom Izzo clearly has a reputation as a coach whose teams improve over the course of the season.

But I am hesitant to say that these numbers have much predictive power. By random chance, some coaches are going to have teams that get better over time, and some will have teams that get worse over time. This doesn’t guarantee that Michigan St. will be better in March or that Duke will be worse in March again this season. But whether they have predictive power or not, the past trends are worth examining.

A few notes on the tables. I calculated the average Pythagorean winning percentage for each coach for the time periods listed duplicating the formula used on kenpom.com. Then I averaged those splits over a coach’s career. At most this includes 10 years of data for each coach. This doesn’t include the current season, or the near death-penalty 2006 season at Baylor since I cannot construct splits for those seasons. In many cases, such as Bill Self’s splits, the differences are so small as to be meaningless. Bill Self is dominant in all seasons. The Pythagorean winning percentages are listed in the following tables:

Coaches that Are Great Early

Unfortunately, I think there is a negative stigma associated with the coaches on this first list. Rich Barnes teams have often looked dominant early in the year only to disappoint as the season progresses. But instead of praising Barnes for getting his team up to #1 at some point in the season, we all view him as a “choker” for not getting his team to the Final Four more often.

There also seems to be a negative stigma associated with blasting small schools early in the season. Wisconsin absolutely punishes the small schools it faces, and that raises their power numbers, even though a 40-point win against Presbyterian may not have as much predictive power as the top ranking systems give it.

But that is a very negative way to look at this table. There is real skill to having a team prepared to play in November and December. Mark Few’s teams have typically been fabulous in the Feast Week tournaments, and we respect him for that. So don’t bash Mike Krzyzewski for having his team ready to play in November.

One other trend in the table is worth noting. The best mid-majors tend to show a pattern of less impressive play in January and February. (See Dave Rose and Mark Few.) I think the issue here is that it is hard to blow out conference opponents by 20 points every night, even if they are inferior teams.

The mid-major effect partly explains Mick Cronin’s poor numbers as this includes his time at Murray St. Also remember the 2007 season where Cronin’s Cincinnati team was 9-4 at the end of December with wins against three Top 100 teams, only to go 2-15 the rest of the way. Cronin inherited a team in chaos at that point in time, and I wouldn’t necessarily say it reflects on his future expectations, but it does cause his splits to look pretty poor. I wouldn’t expect a collapse this season based on past performance.

Coaches that Dominate Mid-Season

It is no surprise Bill Self would be on this list given how his teams win the Big 12 ever year, but the truth is Kansas is usually pretty dominant in all seasons. Ben Howland on the other hand, typically needs a couple of months before his teams get on a roll. Buzz Williams numbers look a little lower than expected because this includes one season at New Orleans.

Coaches at their Best Late

I love the contrast of Roy Williams and John Calipari here. Both coaches have had their teams playing at a peak level in March, but John Calipari’s teams have relied much more heavily on in-season growth. John Calipari’s numbers are even more impressive here when you consider that this includes his time at Memphis.

Many of the coaches like Rick Pitino, Tom Izzo, and John Beilein have truly been at their best in the NCAA tournament and everyone is aware of that. But I didn’t want one tournament loss to skew how a team was playing late in the year, so I used the whole month of March instead of only the NCAA tournament. Thus Leonard Hamilton and Frank Haith also get credit as late-season coaches based on their ACC and Big 12 tournament title wins.

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Before the NCAA Tournament began, I thought two teams -- Kentucky and UNC -- had separated themselves from the rest of the field. Now, after a wild opening weekend where two No. 1 seeds (UNC and Syracuse) suffered devastating personnel losses, two No. 2 seeds (Duke and Missouri) were knocked out in the first round and two No. 3 seeds (Florida State and Georgetown) lost in the second, the field is as wide open as ever.

While there is more talent in college basketball than in the past few years, the majority of it is in the South Region, which featured two underachieving teams -- UConn and Baylor -- which should have had the talent to keep pace with Kentucky all season. The defending national champion Huskies were undone by a perfect storm of NCAA suspensions, chemistry problems and Jim Calhoun’s medical absence, while Scott Drew’s improperly balanced offense and preposterous 1-3-1 gimmick defense have kept the Bears playing below their talent level most of the season.

Baylor certainly can’t overlook Xavier, a complete team that features a versatile frontcourt and experienced play on the perimeter. Indiana, meanwhile, is one of the few teams in the country with the talent to match up with Kentucky, as they have a 6’10+ center (Cody Zeller) who can muscle Anthony Davis in the paint and get him into foul trouble like he did in the Hoosiers dramatic 73-72 victory over the Wildcats earlier in the season.

And with Kendall Marshall likely out for the Tournament with a wrist injury, there are no other giants looming in the other three regionals. UNC has now lost three scholarship perimeter players to injury this year, with little-used freshmen Stillman White the only scholarship PG still on the roster. Their more realistic option is sliding the 6’5 PJ Hairston into the starting line-up and attempting to swarm teams defensively with their length and athleticism; either way, it’s never good when a team has to dramatically change their identity in the middle of the Tournament. 

Neither of the other two No. 1 seeds, Syracuse and Michigan State, have the overwhelming talent advantage that would make them a clear favorite to reach the Final Four. Without Fab Melo, the interior of Jim Boeheim’s 2-3 zone is far less threatening, while their best shot-creator, Dion Waiters, is still coming off the bench. Tom Izzo might be the best coach in college basketball when it comes to tactical adjustments, but Draymond Green is the Spartans’ only reliable shot-creator.

With the exception of Ohio, this year’s Cinderella, none of the other eight teams in the Midwest, East and West Regionals would be overmatched in a match-up with their respective No. 1 seeds. As a result, prognosticating the Sweet 16 is almost hopeless. Even if you look past No. 2 seeds Kansas and Ohio State and No. 3 seed Marquette, all of whom survived tough second round challenges, you can come up with legitimate cases for teams up and down the seed line to eventually advance to New Orleans.

Could Wisconsin’s methodical half-court offense and excellent perimeter shooting slow the tempo down enough to neutralize Syracuse’s defense? Could Cincinnati turn their next two games into the type of ugly Royal Rumble-esque brawl that was their victory over Florida State?

Could Lorenzo Brown and CJ Leslie, two legitimate future first-round picks, outplay their more heralded counterparts in the Midwest Regional? Could Florida, one of the most talented teams in the country, have finally put it together at the right time?

At least 12 teams can make a legitimate case for why they will be headed to Atlanta by the end of the weekend. Even Kentucky, despite their overwhelming dominance all season, can’t rest on their laurels. In a one-game scenario, any team with a very thin bench is one or two close whistles from finding themselves in a dire situation.

The first weekend of the NCAA Tournament was one of the most unpredictable in recent memory. Now, with the second weekend set to tip-off, the Madness may have only just begun.