I only hope we get a repeat of this game on Monday night, April 7th! That would be fitting and somewhat awesome!
I will say here that I will never, EVER get tired of this and may watch
until I’m old and gray (Okay – older and grayer!):
"Pulling a Craft..."
MADNESS
The brackets are out and as usual I’m going to be a little pre-occupied
for the next three and a half days as I contemplate, decided, re-decide, erase,
second guess, and finally throw my hands up and probably go with the initial
bracket that I completed (in less than 5 minutes this year – a new record!) and
maybe one other “crazy” or “insanity” bracket that does something silly like
putting 3 B1G teams in the Final 4…or has Michigan vs. Sparty on Monday night…For
Real! It can happen!
Michigan got the seed I was hoping for, but to say that Michigan pulled
the toughest bracket is an understatement.
The committee went OUT OF IT’S WAY to insure that there would be no F4 repeats from
last year as 3 of the F4 teams from last year are in the same region! (Witchy State, Louisville, and
Michigan). While I get that part of it
(apparently, last year’s F4 was as low a draw for TV as it’s ever been – not sure
why that is, but when you lose Tobacco Road, well…You lose Tobacco Road.
Still, Witchy State was and still is the Feel Good team of the season,
but their road to a repeat appearance is filled with land mines, to say the
least. Greg Marshall’s task last year
was quite easy once he had defeated Gonzaga….So, what was a gift last year is a
curse this year as the Shockers may suffer the same fate as they dealt to the
Zags from the 9 seed in the 2nd round…
Bracket toughness (by RPI rankings) in
order with comments on each:
Midwest – Witchy State, Michigan, dook, Louisville: All I can say is, really? We couldn’t have had UCLA or SDSU in this
bracket? I’d even take the ‘Cuse over
dook here because…well, the Boeheim Curse and all….I like a suddenly hot Kentucky
in a 8 over 1 Seed upset of the Shockers, but remember that EVERYONE will be
picking that upset…so the upset “pick” might actually be the chalk. But if the Wildcats can get it together, they
could own this bracket. I like Michigan
to the Sweet 16 but a re-match with dook looks scary…not to mention that the
2013 Championship re-match with the Cards - hottest team in the NCAA right now
- would be next…Yeah, an easy bracket, for sure.
St. Louis is not playing well right now and if you are looking for a
12-5, I like NCState (after handling Xavier) to beat the Bilikens in that
one. Point spread also suggests the same
thing. Iowa or Tennessee over UMass is
also worth a look as a potential 11- 6 upset in the making….
West – ‘Zona, Wiscy, Creighton, SDSU:
I was going to call this the all upset bracket, but now I’m not so
sure. I see a lot of balance in the top
4 seeds and Creighton could be the sleeper that comes out of this one…But I
like the chalk here for some reason all of a sudden and I like Wiscy as a
potential F4 team – IF THEY CAN GET PAST HOT
SHOOTING OREGON. Yes, Smart and Okie State will be a test for
Zona, but don’t believe the hype. Arizona
can play….I would have taken the Huskers against ANY OTHER 6 SEED except the
one they got (well maybe not UNC) – Baylor.
Baylor can score and shoot the 3 pointer and the MMPG is awed by bright
and shiny things…Defense, not so much. I’m
not sure what to do here…Another 12-5 is ND state (Awesome Off Eff) over
Oklahoma who kind of slid sideways into the tournament. Again, the bright and shiny thing stuff…
South – Florida, Kansas, Cuse, UCLA:
If this had been Virigina on the top line, it would have been the
easiest bracket. KU is fading fast and
the Orange are the Orange…UCLA winning the Pac 12 will be true test for Florida
and that could be a tough game to pick. In the only 11-6 upset I like the
Flyers to beat ohio…Gotta go with Offense and Dayton’s got a lot of that plus an
in-state chip on their shoulder. In
fact, I might give Dayton a serious look as an 11 seed all the way to the Elite
8 in this one!
East – Virginia, Villanova, Iowa State, Sparty: If anything, you could REVERSE this 1-4 seed
line-up and I think you’d have a more representative indication of relative
strength of this region. Let’s face
it: Virginia won the ACC with a
favorable schedule. Villanova is fading
fast and Iowa State is a lot like Michigan – Huge on offense and has sort of
heard about this thing called “defense”, but has never really tried it on for
size. Sparty doesn’t even get a test
until the Elite 8. UConn maybe upsets
Villanova in the 2nd round….And look for Amaker to repeat as a 12-5
upset over an unpredictable up and down Cincinnati team….Is Providence capable
of pulling the upset? I don’t think so….
So, yes, the committee once again did the Izzo-Troll a HUGE favor and
placed the 4th seeded Sparty in the easiest bracket with a relatively
simple road to the F4. But, whoever
survives the Midwest Region will have literally seen a schedule and line-up
that is akin to going to Hell and surviving the fires of Hades and will be
ready for whatever the F4 can offer.
I will have my bracket put together and will post either tomorrow or
Wednesday after I’ve had a full day or two of deliberation and mental digestion
of what’s going on…
From the Book of Little Known Facts: Did you know
that the State of Indiana did not field a single team in this year’s NCAA
Tourney? They have 11 schools in D-1 and
not one even got close…For Tom Crean and everyone else in Indiana, if you would
have just kept your home-grown talent in state, you could have quite a line-up. Hell, even if you kept the State of Michigan
out of your state and kept that talent, you’d have a scary good team!
Mitch McGary, GRIII, Zak Irvin, Spike Albrecht, Sean Lonergran, Andrew
Dakich from Michigan are all Indiana kids…
Gary Harris and Branden Dawson from Sparty.
Could you imagine that? I’m glad
Michigan and Sparty recruit well!
Little Known Fact II: The Hoosiers
couldn’t even make the NIT! This is a
big deal in a Basketball oriented University like IU…I can imagine that they
are as frustrated as they have ever been in Hoosier land right now. To add a little insult to injury, IU told theCBI that they wouldn’t be playing in that tournament, either, and declined theinvite stating that, “We’re Indiana. Wedon’t play in the CBI.” Well, yeah…um…you
haven’t really played all year anywhere so I guess that’s appropriate thinking there.
State of the Game
Because basketball is one of the best sports out there and is AWESOME at
every level, I would be re-miss if I didn’t give a call out of recogntion to my
niece down in Cleveland, well, Olmsted Falls, OH, to be precise, and her 3rd - 4th
Grade Team’s accomplishment this year.
Here’s the link to the Olmsted Falls newspaper and for those of you toolazy to click it, I’ve re-produced all the important stuff right here:
Perfect record – The Olmsted Falls
fourth-grade girls basketball team had a 24-0 record this year.
It won the Lake Erie Basketball League’s regular
season and end-of-the-season tournament. The girls’ achievements began early.
They also took first place in the Tiger Rage pre-season tournament, the Bulldog
Holiday Classic and the Independence Youth Tournament.
Team members are Kylee Urban, Sydney Moses, Mia
Kalich and Paige Kohler, all third graders and Maddy Sagerman, Sara Glover, Sammie Gaba, Aubrey Thiel,
Katie Voisinet and Lauren Noernberg, fourth graders. Dawn Moses and Kim Urban
are the coaches.
Congratulations, girls, for this perfect season.
Way To Go Sara!
Uncle Russ couldn’t be prouder and I’m only sad that we didn’t get down
there to see you play this season! But I
will definitely keep it on my radar for next year!
No comments:
Post a Comment