There is no timetable for Charlotte to rename its team to the Hornets and Adam Silver has said such a change would take at least 18 months to implement. Read More.
The Thunder made a business decision when trading James Harden nine months ago. Now, they need to be just as cold-blooded with Scott Brooks. Brooks has consistently left points on the board in each of the last three seasons and has shown no ability to learn from his mistakes. Read More. Written by Jonathan Tjarks on May 17, 2013
There is no timetable for Charlotte to rename its team to the Hornets and Adam Silver has said such a change would take at least 18 months to implement. Read More.
Tyus Jones, the No. 2 overall recruit for 2014 and an excellent point guard, was selected by Paul Biancardi, Adam Finkelstein and John Stovall. Read More.
The event gives front offices the opportunity to evaluate D-League players with the possibility of offering Summer League or training camp invites. Read More.
Tyus Jones, the No. 2 overall recruit for 2014 and an excellent point guard, was selected by Paul Biancardi, Adam Finkelstein and John Stovall. Read More.
The older I get, the more I see that one of the things I love most about sports is the variety of it, the diversity of it and the CHARACTERS. Men’s tennis is at its best in many years because, for the first time in a long time, the top three or four players all have wildly different styles. The Tim Tebow story was fun on so many levels, but one of those levels was that he was just SO DIFFERENT in how he played — I’d say we are entering a great time for quarterbacks, because Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers and Eli Manning and Drew Brees and Michael Vick and Cam Newton and Tebow and others are not really alike at all.
As a basketball fan, I’ve never understood the division that exists between fans of the NBA and the NCAA. While the NBA has the best basketball players in the world, March Madness is compelling in its own right and as entertaining as anything that happens on the professional level.
In the NBA, the owners of the 30 franchises consider turning a profit and getting an equal shot at the top players a right, regardless of how well (or how poorly) they run their organization and the respective size of their fan-bases. Since every losing team is a few ping pong balls from the rights to a LeBron James, Kevin Durant or Dwight Howard, personnel determines scheme in the NBA.
In contrast, the vast majority of the 344 Division I programs in college basketball have little chance of ever receiving a commitment from a McDonald’s All-American. But instead of petulantly trying to sabotage the sport in a misguided effort to legislate fairness, schools try many creative ways of leveraging the talents of the players they can recruit. As a result, scheme determines personnel in the NCAA.
At Syracuse, Jim Boeheim has made a Hall of Fame career out of running a contrarian scheme, in his case an aggressive 2-3 zone. The Orange traditionally have rosters full of “1.5’s”, 6’3+ combo guards lacking the quickness to defend elite PG’s and the size to defend SG’s, and “3.5’s”, 6’8+ combo forwards lacking the quickness to defend elite SF’s and the size to defend PF’s. However, because Syracuse never plays man defense, the athletic deficiencies of their players are minimized.
So while nearly every NBA team runs a fairly similar system of isolations, pick-and-rolls and man defense, an incredibly diverse array of styles can be found in the college game. On one end of the spectrum, teams like Missouri play four guards and pressure the ball 94 feet for 48 minutes, on the other, teams like Wisconsin run a deliberate motion offense, trying to minimize the number of possessions and shoot at the very end of the shot-clock.
In the NBA, the players are too good for the “40 Minutes of Hell” system (which Mike Anderson has brought to Missouri and Arkansas in the last few years) to be successful. Like Mike Leach’s bizarre pass-happy offense in college football, Anderson’s system, which he learned as a member of Nolan Richardson’s staff in Arkansas in the 1990’s, has philosophical holes that professional athletes can exploit. Nevertheless, that doesn’t make them any less entertaining on the collegiate level.
And with 68 teams set to compete in the NCAA Tournament, there are a lot more surprises in the college game. Even programs ranked in the top-15 like Murray State have barely been on national TV this season.
We have a pretty good idea of how teams like the Pacers and the 76ers match up with the top of the Eastern Conference but not whether an undersized Murray State squad can handle the size of an elite team from a Power Six conference. It’s an open question how Isaiah Canaan’s speed and athleticism translates outside of the Ohio Valley Conference. Non-conference play in college basketball generally ends in late December, so it’s almost impossible to gauge how younger teams like Texas, Washington and Tennessee who have found their groove in the last two months will fare in March.
In the NBA, it’s hard to envision a scenario where Chicago, Miami and Oklahoma City aren’t three of the final four teams left in the playoffs. In the NCAA, as many as two dozen teams have a legitimate shot at making a run at the Final Four.
Of course, in terms of entertainment, none of this makes the NCAA necessarily better or worse than the NBA, just different. But, as Posnanski writes, there’s something to be said for the concept of “different” in the modern sports world. Basketball fans of all stripes should enjoy March Madness; the NBA will still be here in a few weeks.
Big Ten: Ohio St. beat Michigan St. to force a three-way tie for the Big Ten regular season title. (Michigan also shared the crown.) You get so used to watching games decided by three-pointers and driving guards, but in the final ten minutes this game was decided in the low-post. That should favor the Spartans. Besides Draymond Green, Michigan St. has three players in Derrick Nix, Branden Dawson and Adreian Payne with phenomenal offensive rebounding numbers, and the Spartans tend to overwhelm teams on the interior. And Derrick Nix was up to the challenge in this game with some brilliant post moves.
But the Buckeyes somehow matched the Spartans toughness in the paint. With Jared Sullinger in foul trouble, Evan Ravenel forced his way to the basket and refused to be intimidated. And at the end of the game, when no one else could keep Draymond Green out of the lane, Ravenel came back off the bench and forced Green into a fade-away jumper that essentially decided the game. William Buford is going to get a lot of credit for his hot-shooting and his game-winning jumper with 1 second left, but Ravenel’s defensive stop on Green was the play-of-the-game.
ACC: North Carolina beat Duke to win the outright ACC title, and in the process the Tar Heels became only the second team this season to hold Duke under one point per possession. (Ohio St. was the other.) With Duke’s defensive problems this year, they aren’t going to beat anyone if they shoot like they did in the first half on Saturday.
SEC: Did anyone expect Tennessee to beat Vanderbilt to force a three-way tie for second place in the SEC? Did anyone expect Tennessee to sneak back into the bubble discussion? I sure did not, and that is why I left them out of Thursday’s injury split column. But since Jarnell Stokes became eligible for the second semester, Tennessee has been playing like the 34th best team in the nation. Part of what fascinates me about Stokes' splits is that in his debut he was a great offensive weapon but seemed confused defensively. But since that time he has struggled with free throw and turnovers, and basically earned his keep as a defensive stopper. Stokes block rate and steal rate are now tops on Tennessee among regular rotation players, and as the overall data shows, Tennessee has grown into a dominant defensive team with Stokes in the lineup:
Team
Adj Off
Adj Def
W
L
Pyth.
Tennessee (without Stokes)
107.0
98.1
8
8
0.7096
Tennessee (with Stokes)
103.3
87.6
9
5
0.8438
(Does not include game against Chaminade.)
Big East: Marquette beat Georgetown to claim the 2-seed in the Big East tournament. The Golden Eagles had a free throw rate of 90.0 in the win, meaning they earned 9 FTA for every 10 FGA in the game. That may seem exceptionally high (and it was a season high for Marquette), but it wasn’t the best in the nation this year. Gonzaga had a free throw rate of 107.3 vs BYU on February 23rd.
Big 12: Iowa St. beat Baylor to force a tie for third place and win the 3-seed in the Big 12 tournament. Despite using a lineup that spreads the floor (four perimeter players around Royce White), and despite Baylor’s highly ranked post prospects, Iowa St. won the offensive rebounding battle. It often seems like Pierre Jackson is the only player on Baylor with any toughness and he did not go down without a fight, scoring 35 points for the Bears. But Jackson couldn’t win the game by himself, and Baylor’s late season swoon continues.
Punching Tickets
Matt Norlander of CBS Sports was kind enough to have me on his podcast on Friday. One thing we discussed was how Championship Week gives many players their one moment in the sun. Win or lose, Illinois St.’s Tyler Brown made a driving lay-up to help send the MVC championship into OT and a three pointer just before half-time on national TV. And no one can ever take that game-tape away from him.
But let’s face it, these non-BCS conference finals are so much better when there is a potential bid-thief involved. NC-Asheville beating VMI was nice for those schools. And Belmont coming back to beat Florida-Gulf Coast made the NCAA field a little tougher. But when an Illinois St. win shrinks the bubble by one slot, and Creighton needs 33 points from Doug McDermott to beat Illinois St. in OT, that is a special game. And Murray St.’s comeback from seven points down to avenge their only loss of the season was equally intriguing. Those two games are just a taste of what is to come:
Week Ahead
Monday
- Drexel plays VCU in the CAA tournament final. Drexel was my preseason pick to win the CAA and they ultimately won the regular season title. Everyone knows VCU from their incredible Final Four run last year. You will hear people say ad naseum how the loser of this game deserves an NCAA bid, but with the weakness of the CAA, only a win ensures anything.
- Gonzaga plays St. Mary’s in the WCC tournament final in a game that is much less fascinating. Both teams are in the NCAA field no matter what, so this game is just about NCAA seeding.
- Also, Davidson faces Western Carolina in the Southern Conference title game, and Fairfield plays Loyola (Md) in the MAAC title game. This weekend Fairfield knocked off MAAC regular season champion Iona which means we will have to look for the incredible passing of Scott Machado in the NIT. I saw Fairfield down in Orlando and Ryan Olander is a legit big-man who can guard BCS-level teams in the NCAA tournament. His shot-blocking is one of the reasons Fairfield has one of the top defensive teams in the country. (If the name sounds familiar, Ryan’s brother Tyler plays for UConn.) Fairfield also has Boston College transfer Rakim Sanders, so for a four-seed in a mid-major league, this is a very intriguing team. And by beating Iona in the MAAC tournament, they earned my respect.
The Big East tournament begins with two clear bubble teams in action. Connecticut and Seton Hall both finished with losing records in the Big East, and with Seton Hall ending the season with losses to Rutgers and DePaul, the Pirates desperately need to get things back on track at Madison Square Garden. Amazingly the tournament kicks off with Connecticut vs DePaul for the second year in a row. Last year UConn was in the exact same spot and a win over DePaul kick-started an 11 game winning streak for the Huskies.
Temple, St. Louis and Xavier are getting all the attention, but I get the feeling we are going to see a surprise team emerge in the A10. And it might even happen as an at-large. Right now 8 of the 14 schools in the league count as Top 100 wins and that means there are plenty of teams with decent resumes, and more quality wins to be had in the tournament. As an example, Dayton has 3 Top 50 wins and 5 more wins against 51-100, and while their 9-7 conference record doesn’t feel like an NCAA tournament team, with a run to the A-10 final, an at-large bid would suddenly become very plausible. UMass, St. Joe’s, La Salle, and Dayton all get started Tuesday night, and all are intriguing dark horse candidates.
- Penn plays at Princeton. If the Quakers win they will force a one-game playoff with Harvard. If the Quakers lose, Harvard wins the Ivy League’s auto-bid.
- Detroit plays Valparaiso for the Horizon league title. Surprisingly, Butler is not playing in this game and the two-time national runner-up will not be in the NCAA tournament this season. Detroit was my preseason pick to win the Horizon league but Valparaiso won the regular season title.
- The Summit league and Sun Belt will also crown tournament champions.
Wednesday
- The Big East tournament continues. West Virginia should be in the NCAA tournament (especially when you look at their non-conference resume), but if it comes down to a comparison with UConn, the last thing the Mountaineers want is a head-to-head loss to end the year. South Florida will also be in action in the evening session. South Florida’s Big East record is inflated because they played Pitt, Villanova, and Providence twice and none of the teams with winning records twice, but 12-6 in a major conference is still impressive. I’ve argued that you have to discount USF’s non-conference record due to the absence of multiple starters, and I think USF and Washington (out of the Pac-12) have very similar resumes when you put them side-by-side.
- The Big 12, Pac-12, and CUSA tournament also get started. Even though there are no real bubble implications on the opening day for these leagues, that just means that every team is fighting for its NCAA tournament life. Seeing UCLA play a one-and-done, win-or-go-home game for the NCAA tournament is always intriguing.
- The Big Sky, NEC, and Patriot Leagues all crown tournament champs.
Thursday
If you take time off work on Thursday and Friday during the NCAA tournament to watch basketball, I highly recommend you take off work this day. All the major conferences have 4 games going on, and it is impossible not to see some jaw-dropping results and buzzer beaters on this day. These conferences finally get started:
Colorado St.’s RPI is inflated because they have only played four teams with an RPI over 200. They definitely have work to do starting Thursday afternoon.
On Sunday, Virginia’s Darion Atkins blew a dunk with four seconds left in a tie-game, but Virginia held on to beat Maryland in OT. That was huge because it gave Virginia a bye in the ACC tournament and no team has ever won four games in four days in the ACC tourney. NC State and Miami (FL) open up on Thursday desperately needing wins if they want to make the NCAA field.
Northwestern is the lone Big Ten bubble team, but the tournament broke in a favorable fashion for the Cats because they potentially face Michigan in the second round instead of Michigan St. or Ohio St. After losing in OT to the Wolverines in Evanston, Northwestern may need to get revenge to earn an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament. But first they have to beat Minnesota on Thursday.
In the old divisional set-up 9-7 Alabama and 8-8 Mississippi St. would have earned byes and Florida and Vanderbilt would be playing on Day 1. But under the new standards, Mississippi St. plays a dangerous Georgia team and Alabama must open up against a South Carolina team that has nothing to play for and can play fast-and-loose.
- Texas vs Iowa St. in the Big 12 quarterfinal could be one of the best games of the weekend. The Longhorns desperately need another win over a quality team and Iowa St. has been playing incredible basketball lately. Baylor vs Kansas St. is equally good, if only to see if Baylor can get any momentum or if the early season undefeated streak is wasted.
- Washington, Cal and Arizona all lost this last weekend, so the Pac-12 quarterfinals are quite intriguing. None of these teams can afford to lose their opening game.
Friday
This might be the best night of basketball of the whole year. You won’t get nearly as many quality match-ups on any NCAA tournament day as you do on this day.
Saturday
This is usually what I call panic day. The ACC, Big Ten, SEC and A10 will almost certainly have an unexpected team in the semifinals, and if that team wins it all, the bubble shrinks by one slot.
- The Big 12, Big East, Pac-12, MWC, CUSA, MAC, WAC, SWAC, MEAC, Southland, American East and Big West all crown tournament champions.
Regarding the Big West, Long Beach St. has an impressive non-conference strength-of-schedule, but not a lot of quality wins in those games. They were rolling through the BW regular season, but suffered their first conference loss this last weekend. That may not seem like a big deal, but one of the best things Long Beach St. had going for them was the long winning streak, and now they better hope they do well in the Big West tournament.
Sunday
The ACC, SEC, A10, and Big Ten all crown tournament champions and the greatest hour in television, the NCAA selection show, arrives.
Championship week has a little bit of everything. It has win-or-go-home games, the fight to stay on the bubble, and the battle for No. 1 seeds in the NCAA tournament. But most importantly, it has anticipation. There is the anticipation for next week’s NCAA tournament. And there is the anticipation for Sunday night when the bracket will finally be revealed.
Do not wait until next week to take time off work. The action starts this Tuesday afternoon from Madison Square Garden. Here are the printable tournament brackets for the top 10 Pomeroy conferences, as well as some key Nitty Gritty numbers. As always, I recommend you look at the numbers and draw your own conclusions about which teams are NCAA tournament bound.
CW = Conference Wins CL = Conference Losses RNW = Road Neutral Wins RNL = Road Neutral Losses T50W = Wins against RPI 1-50 T50L = Losses against RPI 1-50 N50W = Wins against RPI 51-100 N50L = Losses against RPI 51-100 BL = Bad Losses to RPI 101+
RPI ranking is primarily used as an organizational tool. It organizes the quality of wins and losses. Thus I do not include each team’s own RPI rank in the tables that follow. Keep in mind that the committee has deemphasized the importance of the last 10 or 12 games. But individual committee members are human and may still choose to emphasize recent play.
Marquette probably deserves to be in the NCAA field, but I would not be feeling that confident if I was a Golden Eagles fan. Marquette fans will point out that their best wins (Notre Dame, Syracuse, West Virginia, and Connecticut) are much more impressive than other bubble teams. But Marquette has also struggled away from home and that may hurt them. More than any other Big East team, Marquette could prove a lot by winning some games on a neutral floor.
Michigan, Illinois, Michigan St., and Penn St. are eerily similar at this point, but if you look a little closer you see some key differences.
First, the top 50 wins are a little misleading because Michigan and Penn St. fall just outside the top 50. This gives Penn St. credit for a top 50 win vs Illinois, but Illinois does not get credit for a top 50 win against Penn St. The committee will not miss this. Also, Illinois did well in the non-conference, beating North Carolina and Gonzaga. So when it comes to quality wins, Illinois is slightly ahead. On the other hand, Illinois has the most baffling bad losses of any team on this list.
Michigan also has some obvious points in their favor. First, even if the committee has deemphasized the last 10 or 12 games, you cannot look at the Wolverines and not be aware that they have played significantly better in the second half of the Big Ten schedule. Second, Michigan is the only one of the Big Ten bubble teams with a decent road/neutral record. Third, Michigan swept Michigan St. and Penn St. On the other hand, outside those wins, Michigan’s best win is Harvard. I am starting to believe both Illinois and Michigan might make it, but the loser of Friday’s quarterfinal will certainly be nervous on Sunday night.
Michigan St. obviously has a strong NCSOS. But in the unbalanced Big Ten schedule, Penn St. had the toughest conference schedule. Penn St. played Iowa and Indiana only once each. I honestly have no idea how this will play out. Losing the openers would be devastating, but if any of these teams can upset Ohio St., Purdue, or Wisconsin, it might completely change the pecking order.
Baylor’s NCAA odds look slim to none at this point. With only two top 50 wins, they look similar to all the ACC bubble teams. And at 3-9 on the road, Baylor is not really in the discussion. Nebraska and Colorado were also terrible on the road, with far too many bad losses.
But Colorado beat Texas, swept Kansas St., beat Missouri, and beat MWC bubble team Colorado St. And that will certainly keep Colorado in the discussion. And if Colorado can beat Kansas St. for a third time on Thursday, it might be hard to argue to keep them out.
The three teams sitting at 9-7 in the ACC provide a real puzzle. Virginia Tech sounds the best because they beat Duke recently, and had an earlier win against Florida St. But Virginia Tech went 0-2 vs BC and is 0-1 against Clemson too. It is starting to look like Virginia Tech probably has to beat Florida St. in the ACC quarterfinals to have a legitimate shot at an at-large bid.
But the other two 9-7 teams are not great at-large candidates either. BC has just one top 50 win. And Clemson lost to fellow bubble teams Michigan and Old Dominion, which could block them from getting one of the last at-large bids. The loser of a Clemson vs Boston College quarterfinal is almost certainly eliminated from the discussion, but I’m not even sure if the winner will have done enough.
Finally, Maryland’s Pomeroy ranking is still solid, but their odds of getting an at-large bid are basically zero at this point.
I think Alabama will be a nice test case for the idea the committee is conference color blind. 12-4 in the SEC sounds great, and this team has clearly rebounded from a terrible start to the season. But four quality wins (Kentucky, Georgia, Tennessee, Ole Miss) against ten losses is usually a recipe for the NIT. (Consider that a team like Nebraska has seven quality wins on the year has just eleven losses.)
I am starting to think an SEC quarterfinal game between Georgia and Alabama might be an elimination game. Georgia’s overall profile (5 top 100 wins) is not quite the profile of an NCAA tournament lock either.
Arizona’s profile may not look that impressive (two top 50 wins), but that is being deflated by the fact that teams like USC, Cal, and Washington St. are not in the top 50. But Arizona is definitely a step above the rest, as are UCLA and Washington. The Pac-10 is a true round robin, and the top teams get full credit for that. But what do we make of USC? The team beat Arizona, UCLA, Washington, Tennessee, and Texas this year. And that makes them a much more interesting case than you might think. What about all those head-scratching losses to Bradley, TCU, and the Oregon schools? Well, Tennessee had those head-scratching losses too, and USC beat Tennessee. I’m not even sure USC will beat California in the Pac-10 quarters, but if they can win that game, I won’t be surprised to see them on a lot of “last four out” lists.
UNLV beat Wisconsin, Virginia Tech, and Colorado St., so I think they are in the field. But Colorado St.’s only elite win is UNLV and that probably is not enough.
I have seen Richmond in a lot of projected fields. But this seems to be putting a lot of weight on the win over Purdue if you ask me. Doesn’t Nebraska have a great win over Texas? Doesn’t USC have a great win over Texas? Doesn’t Virginia Tech have a great win over Duke? One win is not everything.
Yes, winning 13 games in the A10 is impressive. But the A10 did not have a dominant non-conference performance year this year. If VCU upends Old Dominion on Monday, I actually think the CAA has a slightly better chance to get three bids, based on ODU’s dominance over the A10, and ODU’s victory over Richmond earlier this year.
No conference confuses me more than CUSA. UAB has a solid at-large profile, but with so many top 100 teams, this league screams “multi-bid” league. But who gets the other bid? Memphis has the highest volume of top 100 wins. But Memphis also has a worse conference record than UTEP and Tulsa. But the conference schedule was not balanced, so maybe that was not a fair metric. This is definitely a case where getting to the conference tournament final could mean a lot.
There is only one reason to watch the WAC tournament, to see if Utah St. will lose. And I am not even convinced that if Utah St. loses that they are guaranteed an NCAA spot. (Somehow the two RPI top 100 wins do not sway me.) But the three total losses mean something. And thanks to a head-to-head win at St. Mary’s, at least one bubble team will be nervous.
Utah St. has been slotted into the WAC semifinals, so there is no need to pay attention until Friday.
Utah St. joins the short list of teams I mentioned last week from smaller conferences that have a shot to make the NCAA field as an at-large. As I discussed last week, I think George Mason, Old Dominion, Butler, Gonzaga, and St. Mary’s have a plausible shot at an at-large bid. But as some at-large candidates in the major conferences improved their standing this weekend, I am starting to doubt that the WCC loser will make it.
VCU faces Old Dominion in the CAA final on Monday, Gonzaga faces St. Mary’s in the WCC final on Monday, and Butler faces Milwaukee in the Horizon league final on Tuesday.
Again, who says Joe Lunardi is right? Look at the above list of teams and choose 50 to make the field. (13 as automatic bids and 37 at-large qualifiers.) Make your own bracket picks.
Dance Card
Four teams punched their NCAA tickets this weekend and every outcome was at least somewhat predictable:
Belmont – In the A-Sun title game, the Margin-of-Victory darlings won by 41 points.
Morehead St. – In the OVC title game, the team with the NCAA career rebounding leader, Kenneth Faried, watched Faried score 24 points and grab 15 boards.
UNC Asheville – In the Big South title game, the team that upset 28-5 Coastal Carolina earlier this year on a steal and shot at the buzzer, upset Coastal Carolina again.
Indiana St. – And in the MVC, where the top teams struggled to win key non-conference games this year, both Wichita St. and Missouri St. failed to win the key games again. Both fell to Indiana St. sending Larry Bird’s alma mater back to the field of 68 for the first time in a decade.
That leaves 27 automatic bids to dole out in the next week, 26 in conference tournaments.
The one exception is the Ivy league which does not hold a conference tournament. The Ivy league automatic bid will be determined by the regular season title. If Princeton loses to Penn on Tuesday, Harvard will win the regular season title and automatic bid. But if Princeton beats Penn on Tuesday, it will force a one game playoff between Harvard and Princeton on Friday or Saturday at a neutral site.
Ending with a win
One team that will not have a chance to make the NCAA tournament field is Fordham in the A10. Because the A10 tournament only invites 12 teams, 14th place Fordham’s season is over. But in odd fashion, Fordham won its first A10 game of the year in the season finale. This gives Fordham an odd distinction. While almost every team in the country will end its season with a tournament loss in the next few weeks, Fordham gets to end their season with a victory.
A Note on Tiebreakers
I am not going to mention every tiebreaker that led to the printable conference tournament brackets listed above, but I do want to spend a moment on how convoluted some of these procedures can be. I spent about 15 minutes on Friday trying to figure out what would happen if 10-7 West Virginia, 10-7 Georgetown, 9-8 Villanova, 9-8 Marquette, and 9-8 Connecticut ended up in a 5-way tie at 10-8 in the Big East standings. Where would the teams be seeded in the Big East tournament? Who would get the first day bye? I consulted the Big East tiebreakers and determined that in the hypothetical situation, the five teams would make up a “mini-conference.”
In the mini-conference, Connecticut was 3-2, Marquette 2-3, and everyone else 2-2. That meant I needed to create another mini-conference with West Virginia, Georgetown, and Villanova. But these teams were all 1-1 against each other. Thus it came down to how these three teams did against Pittsburgh. In the hypothetical, the teams would be 1-1 and 0-1 and 0-2 against Pittsburgh. But under the complex rules, this could not be the tiebreaker. That was because 1-1 was considered to be dominant over 0-2, but 1-1 was not dominant over 0-1. And 0-1 was not dominant over 0-2, so 0-2 was not eliminated. So we would have to move to the team’s records against Notre Dame. At that point, I decided the Big East tiebreakers were way too complicated.
Part of the joy of Saturday was trying to see if this tiebreaker or other crazy tiebreakers would come to fruition. Starting Saturday at noon, a West Virginia loss would potentially put West Virginia in that multi-way tie. And late in the game against Louisville, West Virginia trailed. But West Virginia’s Casey Mitchell hit a pair of three pointers to tie the game at 70. Then with Louisville holding the ball in a no-lose situation (take the final shot or go to OT), Preston Knowles missed the shot and then proceeded to foul West Virginia’s Truck Bryant. Bryant calmly sank a pair of free throws in the miracle come from behind win.
Shortly thereafter, Connecticut knew that a win could put them in a multi-way tie and likely earn a first round Big East tournament bye. But in the second half, UConn trailed Notre Dame by eight with 8 minutes left. That’s when Notre Dame’s Ben Hansbrough threw his shoulder into a Connecticut defender and fouled out of the game. Connecticut proceeded to go on a 13-0 run and take the lead. But after a few empty possessions, Notre Dame took the lead back. And then Connecticut missed several chances to win or tie the game. First Kemba Walker missed a jumper. Then Charles Okwandu missed the put back. Then, after a pair of missed Notre Dame free throws, Kemba Walker missed another three pointer. Then with time running down, Kemba Walker passed the ball to Donnell Beverly who was wide open in the corner. Beverly dropped the ball and missed a chance at a game-tying three pointer.
And with Villanova and Marquette also losing, the truly crazy scenarios were averted. West Virginia avoided an 8th loss, Georgetown was the only team with an 8th loss, and Connecticut won a mini-conference with Villanova and Marquette by virtue of a better head-to-head record, 2-1 to 1-1 to 1-2.
Senior Day
Every team has senior day stories.
- I appreciate that a team like North Carolina can play their biggest rivals on the biggest stage and still be willing to start three senior walk-ons.
- I appreciate the Big Ten network giving us extended coverage of senior day, including the entire post-game ceremony for Illinois. (This is why conference only TV networks are great.)
- I appreciate Chris Meriwether, the Vanderbilt senior whose Mom passed away not too long ago, entering the loss to Florida in the final minute and scoring his first basket of the season.
- And I love watching a player like Pittsbugh senior Nick Rivers hope for his 20 seconds in the sun. While Jamie Dixon worriedly tried to ensure that Pittsburgh won the Big East regular season title, who could not feel for the former team assistant turned walk-on, told to sit back down by a nervous Dixon? And who could not cheer when the senior finally took the court?
Every one of these moments is special. But the highlight for me was Seton Hall’s senior day. Leading by a comfortable margin with 20 seconds left, Seton Hall coach Kevin Willard realized he could not call time out. But he needed to get Jeremy Hazell out of the game to a standing ovation. So he yelled at one of his players to intentionally throw the ball out of bounds. And so the Seton Hall player did just that. But he threw the ball out of bounds and hit a 10-year-old kid in the head! You just cannot make this stuff up.
The moment he let the ball go, the Seton Hall player knew it was going to hit the kid, and he immediately ran over and apologized. And after the kid shrugged and smiled and waived it off, the fans gave Jeremy Hazell his standing ovation.
The True Meaning of Rivalry
Star players can create rivalries. (See Peyton Manning and Tom Brady.) And border states can create rivalries. (See the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears.) But a rivalry really only gets pushed to that next level when something gets taken away.
Illinois and Indiana was a solid basketball rivalry with plenty of tradition. But when Eric Gordon changed his commitment from Illinois to Indiana, the rivalry stepped up to another level. Indiana took something from Illinois, and the intensity was magnified.
Saturday night’s Duke versus North Carolina game was not an epic down-to-the-wire masterpiece. Mason Plumlee was a non-factor and fouled out. Kyle Singler repeated this year’s formula of being quiet for long stretches. Kendall Marshall reminded us why he should have been starting in November. And North Carolina won easily. The analysis can go on and on. Duke was so concerned with Tyler Zeller inside that they gave up open perimeter looks. Then Duke tried to take away the perimeter shots and gave up far too many uncontested drives to the basket. But this game was not about who executed and who failed. This game was about enhancing the rivalry.
All season long, Duke fans assumed the ACC regular season title was theirs for the taking. Duke was the defending national champ. Duke was the consensus preseason favorite to win the ACC. North Carolina struggled in the non-conference schedule. North Carolina lost to Georgia Tech. For the last three to four months, it has been increasingly evident that this year’s regular season title belonged to Duke.
But something happened in the last month. Duke fell to Virginia Tech. Harrison Barnes hit a late three pointer to beat Florida St. And suddenly, without much warning or anticipation, North Carolina ripped the ACC regular season title away from their bitter rivals.
And in the process, North Carolina may have ripped a No. 1 seed away from Duke too. The ACC is down this year, but for months Duke fans have been counting on the fact that an ACC regular season and ACC tournament title would still ensure a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament. But now Duke does not hold the regular season title. And even with BYU’s injury to forward Brandon Davies, and the recent collapse by Texas, there is no guarantee that Duke will get a No. 1 seed.
Duke had something in the palm of their hand, and North Carolina just took it away. The game may not have been great, but the intensity of the rivalry is always renewed.
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