NCAA Tournament Thoughts: Sunday

That's what scares me about North Carolina. They can score, no lead against them is ever safe. They have what Clark Kellogg calls "spurtability."

I love the ending of this game, especially compared to Pittsburgh-Butler. The teams were aggressive and attacking. I love LoRo letting Venoy Overton drive to the basket with 7 seconds left. He didn't make the shot and he didn't get fouled, but Jamie Dixon would have called time out and made his team wait til 2 seconds were left. It didn't work out for Washington but they gave themselves several good chances to win it.

I think Jim Nantz called Scott Suggs Scott Sucks. He garbled it just enough so you couldn't tell. Like when John Sterling garbles his Ps and Bs so it sounds like "hre really smacked that bitch" or "that was a good looking bitch."

Even Duke is not immune from the late game jitters. They almost blew that game and it seemed like no one on the team even knew they had to shoot the ball.

I like Michigan's coaching at the end, don't call timeout (did they have any left?) let the guys run, they got the best shot they were going to get, they just happened to miss it.

Did they pair Michigan and Duke just to get more mileage out of this "Uncle Tom" comment? I still haven't watched "The Fab Five" though.

Didn't Damino go to Cornell?

I paused the Syracuse game to watch Arizona-Texas and I am so glad I did. Amazing turnaround in that game. Texas has the ball, a 2 point lead and only 27 seconds left. They get called for 5 seconds, right before the timeout and Arizona not only scores, but gets fouled and takes the lead on the free throw. Texas's last chance was denied when Jim Burr swallowed his whistle. Not on the shot, but there was deinitely a foul underneath on the putback. At least similar to what Robinson did to Howard in the Pittsburgh-Butler game last night.

What did I tell you? A 2 seed always loses in the second round. When the other 3 2s survived, barely, I knew Notre Dame was gonna lose. I should have bet the money line.

VCU goes from derided team, to play-in game, to Sweet 16/Cinderella darling. Just to clarify, their performance in these three games does not mean the Committee was right or that Jay Bilas or anyone else who criticized their selection was wrong. It simply means they started playing in the tournament at a lot higher level than they played in the regular season. This team lost 11 games during the season, 3 of them to teams with RPIs higher than 150.

I never believe in that whole "no one believes in us but us" mentality actually being a benefit (because USC probably felt that way too) but they do seem genuinely pissed off and now they have at least a decent chance of beating Florida State and making it to the Elite 8.

Kansas has no excuse not to make the Final Four now. Illinois is the highest seeded team they can face until the Final Four. If they don't beat Richmond and the VCU/Florida State winner it would be one of the biggest choke jobs in NCAA history, worse than UConn losing to George Mason.

Speaking of choke jobs, there will be separate posts coming on Syracuse and the Big East.