Tournament Talk: Second Round Saturday

Duke needs to stop recruiting so many white pussies. They all completely turtled up when the game was on the line. I'm including DeMarcus Nelson as an honorary white pussy for his putrid performance in these two games.

Gerald Henderson is the only guy on Duke with a little toughness.

It's not a coincidence that Duke started hitting 3s once the game was no longer in doubt.

Duke came out in the first half with the right strategy, they were running and pressing and not settling for 3-pointers. But in the second half when West Virginia started to make a run, Duke just kept chucking up 3s. They missed 15 in a row at one point.

This was another game were every little bit of contact was called. A lot of it did go Duke's way, but not enough to say the refs were doing it on purpose.

I really like Joe Alexander but he was the least effective player on the floor for West Virginia. Their whole team was running and jumping and passing and driving and Alexander was a black hole. Every time he got the ball he wanted to shoot it. He loosened up at the end but he was definitely trying too hard and hurting his team through the first 25 or 30 minutes of the game.

Xavier plays some tough defense. They got down early in both their games but it seemed like they just flipped a switch and started playing the stifling defense.

That was the Kansas State team I had seen all year and thought we would see against USC. Sure Wisconsin was on fire but I think Walker and Beasley do a little too much individual play. They probably will both be gone next season.

The refs really had short tempers in the Stanford-Marquette game. Yes, Trent Johnson was all the way on the court but I didn't think he deserved an ejection.

Doug Oliver who replaced Johnson made a huge mistake by resting both Lopez brothers before the under 8 minute timeout. He wanted them both fresh for the stretch run but Stanford had just taken the lead and he let Marquette get it right back.

I told you Robin Lopez was improving offensively. Brook will probably come out and Robin could score 20 points per game next season.

Brook was absolutely awesome down the stretch, every time they needed a basket he gave them one.

And what about Jerel McNeal for Marquette? He refused to miss also.

Pittsburgh - Michigan State set offensive basketball back about 20 years. A lot of driving and running into people. Levance Fields was good as he usually is but he didn't get much help. Michigan State pulled away at the end thanks to a couple clutch baskets from Drew Neitzell.

Bob Knight loses his champion.

And UCLA, barely survived. But they showed what I like about them. They play ferocious defense and they can score when they need to. About 4 possessions in a row when they absolutely had to have a basket they got 2 fallaways from Love and 2 driving layups from Collison.