Poor Siena, their Cinderella run ended and they were never really in the game. Siena shot only 36% against Vanderbilt compared to 57% against Vanderbilt. At least I found out Siena has a guy, Ryan Rossiter, from Staten Island. But he went to Farrell so he's probably gay.
And his brother, Stephen Rossiter, plays for Davidson. The parents went to Tampa with Ryan because they saw Davidson's conference tournament.
[Correction: Apparently the Rossiters drove to Raleigh after the first game and were there to see Davidson knock off Georgetown.]
The brothers combined for zero points on Sunday, but at least Stephen is playing on.
I listened to this game on the radio and the announcer called Edwin Ubilies, Kevin at least twice (because it's pronounced similarly to Youkilis).
Tennessee committed way too many fouls down the stretch. Mike Green and AJ Graves were dribbling right into them but for 6 minutes and 20 seconds until the last tip-in, they got 8 points, all from the line. Normally if you hold your opponent without a field goal for 6 minutes down the stretch you're going to win. Instead Butler tied the game and forced overtime.
If you don't believe anything I say about the NCAA Tournament, believe this, the team that wins the close games is the team that has the guy they can go when they need a basket, and he will deliver. You saw it with Brook Lopez for Stanford, you saw it with Love and Collison for UCLA and you saw it with Ramar and Chism for Tennessee.
And you saw it with Stephen Curry for Davidson. This guy is incredible. He has 100 points in 3 NCAA Tournament games. I made fun of him in the first half saying he was averaging 21 points per game in the tournament (he had 2 at the time), but he went off in the second half. He scored 25 of the last 41 points for Davidson.
This game and the Tennessee game were ending at the same time so we couldn't see both and CBS kept bouncing us back and forth. I've always wondered why they don't stagger the starts more so that all the games could end at different times. Are they worried if a game is a blowout people will turn away so they want three games to end at once to increase the likelihood of one good finish?
And while those two games were going San Diego was making a run at Western Kentucky. It was the 7th time (Villanova-Siena was the 6th) that a 12 and 13 seed played in the second round. The 12 seed was won 6 of those matchups. But 12 seeds are 0-13 against 1 seeds.
Poor San Diego, their athletic department chose to send their band with the women's team because they were playing in California. They hired Western Kentucky's band to play for them when they played against UConn. But they needed to find some new friends when they ended up facing Western Kentucky, so Siena's band stuck around to do the honors. The dance team told them to play what they knew and they'd improvise.
This is the first year that 3 double digit seeds are in the Sweet 16 since 2002.
UNC is absolutely killing people. They are so fast and so good and so scary right now that I'm regretting picking UCLA. But I think playing UCLA may frustrate them even more because UCLA will bump, hound and slow them out of their game.
And I can't say I'm discouraged by UCLA's bad game against Texas A&M. Any win is a good win, and a win in which your best players show their stones by hitting several key late baskets has to be viewed as a positive.
There has been a major problem with the logos on the courts being too slippery. I've seen a lot of players slip and fall on them. They need to fix that for next week. After Tyler Hansbrough fell Roy Williams freaked out and exhorted Jim Nantz to mention it on the telecast.
Billy Packer spouted the trite line about not wanting to see someone get hurt, but I think a greater concern is that someone could slip at a key part of the game. Say a guy is dribbling up court down by 1, and he slips and loses the ball and his team loses the game. That would call into question the entire tournament.
I am willing to recant one thing I said so far. It is quite possible that Memphis's free throw shooting will cost them a game. Even I didn't expect them to shoot 46%. And that was actually bolstered by a couple 1 for 2s by CDR and Rose.
Another thing I was wrong about, Ian Eagle called him Chris Douglas-Roberts the whole weekend.
It's starting to look a lot like UNC, UCLA, Kansas and Memphis or Texas in the Final 4.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
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3 comments:
Do you still think Wisconsin sucks?
I'm getting kind of tired of people ripping on them that last saw them 8 years ago under Dick Bennett.
No one says a word when UCLA scores in the 50's but the Badgers score 71 and 72 in their first 2 games, crushing in both games, and they still are "ugly". Kills me. They run their offense and it's effecient and they have great defense so they must be boring. You want to see boring, watch Benett's son at WSU.
Maybe everyone will catch on when Michael Flowers man handles Stephen Curry as UW storms the elite 8.
You can say a lot of things about me, that I get everything wrong for one, but you cannot say that I don't watch the games. I have seen Wisconsin play several times this year, not as many as I've seen Washington State, but yes I've seen them play.
First of all I did say they deserved a 2 seed because of their season's accomplishments.
Second, their style of play lends itself to a tournament upset. Over fewer possessions the team with less talent has a better chance of winning, usually.
Didn't Wisconsin lose in the second round last year, under Bo Ryan? Didn't Dick Bennett take them to a Final Four as an 8 seed?
Also, I don't like the Big Ten in general. I think the conference is the weakest of the six major conferences and I don't think they have the quality of athletes of the other conferences. So a team like Wisconsin can beat up Big Ten foes, but when they get to the tournament they'll get run over, around and through. Hasn't happened so far. Let's see what happens when Big Ten teams Wisconsin and Michigan State play teams with superior athleticism like Memphis and Kansas.
That said, as a Wisconsin fan you should be very pleased with the team's performance so far, but consider yourself a little bit fortunate that you won't have to face a single digit seed until Kansas.
I knew the whole "haven't faced a single digit seed" thing would come up too. Not our fault the higher seeds are losing before we get a chance at them. I would have loved for it to be Georgetown instead of Davidson Friday just for that reason and I hate to think what people would say if Villinova somehow pulls off the upset over Kansas.
Wisconsin will have backed their way into the final 4 without having played a single digit seed.
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