The "Marquette Got Screwed" Rule

It doesn't change the fact that Marquette got screwed near the end of the game during their 2nd round loss to Missouri this past NCAA tournament, but hey...at least the bureaucrats actually changed something to make sense.

We'll call this change the "Marquette Got Screwed" Rule.

No longer can a coach call on any player — as MU's Mike Anderson did in summoning Kim English from the bench for the injured J.T. Tiller with 5.5 seconds left and the score tied 79-79 in that second-round tournament game. English hit both in MU's 83-79 win.

Now, the opposing coach will choose from the four remaining players on the floor.

I like it! Not sure if they went a little too far by allowing the opposing coach to make the selection...but at least one of the guys on the floor will be taking the shot in these situations. It only makes sense. You can't have a guy come off the bench to shoot a technical.

The bottom line is this: that call lost Marquette the NCAA Championship this year (not even up for debate).

H/T: Two Name for the tip.

Last Night

Love Mizzu, love 'em. 40 minutes of Hell, part II. They press the titties off the ball, play helter-skelter, rotate 11 guys in, jack up 3s....lets see what happens. Other than Pitino, I'm surprised more teams don't play this style. I could see athletic kids in high school wanting to play this way. And it works. Check out coach Mike Anderson's resume.

Boy it's nice seeing Duke get pounded. It was only a 3 point game at halftime, yet you could tell Duke would get creamed in the 2nd half. It was weird. Villanova just gets after it. Sorry for the cliche, but they looked "hungry." It's like somebody told them "if you don't win tonight, your Momma and Daddy can't eat for two weeks." Duke could barely run their offense. How about a combine 9-45 from Henderson-Scheyer-Singler.

How does that fat little PG from Pitt do it? He's like a taller Khalid El-Amin. Just makes big shot after big shot. Sorry, Nubs. Your Muskets fought the good fight, but couldn't come through. Nice team, though.

UConn beat Purdue in a game that never felt like the Boils would win. Even when they whittled the spread down to a couple, it seemed like a mere formality. Thabeet is just too big - just a beast. He should be illegal, sort of like Bo Jackson in Tecmo Bowl. UConn - Mizzu should be interesting. I could see Thabeet getting winded after about 2 minutes. Mizzu will win, by the way. Only 1 day to prepare for that style, and UConn doesn't have enough ball handlers against it.

Speaking of a beast, the Big East is 14-2 with Louisville and Syracuse going tonight. Other conferences:

Big-12: 10-3
Pac-10: 6-5
Big-11: 6-6
ACC: 5-6

It's Back!

March Madness has officially started! Sort of. Believe it or not, conference tournaments started last night. The Horizon, Big South, and Ohio Valley tipped off their conference tournaments. UWM beat some team by a couple. How's that for analysis? I see UWGB went 22-9 this year. I had no idea...haven't paid attention to them since Jeff Nordgaard was sporting a Phoenix jersey.

Point is - the madness, buzzer-beaters, broken dreams, and overtime thrillers have officially begun. To cap it all off...finally a NCAA tournament WITHOUT Billy Packer!!

Good Lord!

There's traveling, Patrick Ewing-traveling, and then this: a holyshityouhavetobefuckingkiddingme-travel. From TheBigLead.com:

"He's a good athlete for a 6-5 white kid..."

I love scout-talk. Especially when it's unnamed scouts, they're brutally honest. A few highlights from this CNNSI article about the NBA prospects of 40 college players. No mention of anybody from MU or UW.

Austin Daye, 6-11 sophomore forward, Gonzaga: "This kid will get you fired. Soft? He invented soft. Jeff Adrien cold cocked him when they played UConn, and he spent the rest of the game behind the three-point line. I'm not denying he has a high skill level, but you better surround him with a lot of bullies."

Michael Bramos, 6-5 senior swingman, Miami (Ohio): "He's going to make money playing basketball, but I'll be shocked if someone drafts him. He can't create at all on his own. He's a good athlete for a 6-5 white kid, but he's not a special athlete and he's not a special shooter."

Jarvis Varnardo, 6-9 junior center, Mississippi State: "I'm not a huge fan. He still gets killed inside. He's great on the weak side, but he can't guard on the ball because he gets pushed around too much. Somebody will probably take him in the second round, but he reminds me of Solomon Jones, the kid from South Florida who's not with the Atlanta Hawks. Solomon hasn't done anything to prove he's an NBA player, and his contract is getting ready to end."

Hasheem Thabeet, 7-3 junior center, UConn: "Of course I love his size, the way he runs, how hard he plays, the way he blocks shots, but I just can't get excited about a guy who's never going to be able to put the ball in the basket. In the NBA, they exploit your weaknesses. He won't be able to score against a 6-10, 6-11 NBA center. He can catch and score when he's open, but I don't really see much improvement in his post skills. He'll be a Mutombo type player who will probably be drafted in the top five, but he's not a star in our league."

Storming The Court Has Jumped The Shark

A ways back, Matt ripped on Purdue Fan for storming the court after a win against Wisconsin. Considering Bucky NEVER wins at the craphole known as West Lafayette, it was uncalled for. Well, I just watched a pretty good game with Arizona State winning at home vs Arizona. Arizona State is ranked 14th in the nation, while the Wildcats are unranked. What happened? ASU almost pisses it away, only to make their free throws at the end... Sun Devils win, bedlum ensues, fans storm the court. Again, ASU is ranked 14th, Arizona is unranked. It should be illegal to storm the court against an unranked team. LAME.

By the way, I really like ASU come tourny time. Herb Sendik can coach, they play very unselfish ball, have a heady/crafty point guard (some white guy wearing #12), and a true difference maker in James Harden. That guy reminds me a little bit of 'Do Tucker.

Big East Realignment

Alright Matt, you win. The Big East has too many damn teams. Not that I ever disagreed, but him asking me tonight who is/isn't a member of the Big East is a little embarrassing. Let's do a little re-shuffling, just for shits and giggles.

Big Ten
The dream of making Notre Dame member #12 ain't happening. Lets eliminate the one squad with the least conference history and most isolated geographically - Penn St, making the Big Ten have ten teams again. What a concept.

Members: Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, NWestern, Michigan, Michigan St, Ohio St, Indiana, Purdue


BEF - Big East Football
Sort of a new conference including Penn St and the Big East teams that play football. Looks like a good hoops conference. UNC Charlotte is adding football soon...had to put them somewhere and needed a 10th member. Of course Boston College should still be in the BE, but that opens up an entirely new can of worms with the ACC and all that noise.

Members Louisville, Cincinnati, Penn St, Pitt, West Virginia, Rutgers, Syracuse, UConn, South Florida, UNC - Charlotte


NFL - No Football League
ND stays independent for football - joins this conference in all other sports. A little mining of the A-10 makes it a decent hoops league. If any of the formerly relevant programs (you hear me St Johns/DePaul?) ever pulled their head out of their arses, it would be even tougher. Eliminate St Louis and UMass if you want to go with 10. Simple geography separates them into a West and East divisions:

NFL West - Marquette, DePaul, Xavier, Dayton, Notre Dame, St Louis
NFL East - Georgetown, St Johns, Villanova, Seton Hall, Providence, UMass


There you go.

My Apologies

I apologize to all Badger fans for putting them in the NIT a few weeks ago. Somehow, I bought into the hype that the Big-11 is a good conference and Penn St, Illinois, and Ohio State (that game tonight was one of the most un-entertaining basketball games I've seen since Dick Bennett was coaching) are solid basketball teams. I was wrong. Not because the Badgers beat them, because they're pretty junk. That's my bad. Anyway, Wisconsin's last five games include 3 layups (Indiana, Michigan at home, @ Indiana) and one pretty easy game @Minnesota (the Gophers are terrible). @MSU is a tough game.

So, when the Badgers win 4 of their last 5, a couple games in the Big-11 tournament, and make the NCAA's....I apologize for counting them out. It's a preemptive strike, if you will. Betting against Bo in the regular season will never happen again.


In Other News:

Blake Griffin went for like 43-20. Come on, that's crazy. How about the Bucks tanking the rest of the season so they can draft this guy.

MU got off the losing skid beating a brutal St Johns ballclub. McNeal went for 20-7-7-5 steals. Yikes! Jimmy Butler is looking like a decent option coming off the bench.

Under The Radar

My guy Larry Wayne called me to proclaim his NCAA Tournament sleeper - Northwestern. This was when they were controlling Illinois, up 6 with a few minutes left. They processed to shit the bed. Larry then called them: "my NIT sleeper." Ha. Here's a few under the radar team/players I've seen this year:

Players:

James Harden, Arizona State - The Pac-10 doesn't get much airtime before 10 PM, but this guy's legit.

James Johnson, Wake Forest - Jeff Teague gets all the pub for Wake...Johnson is the Swiss Army Knife. Plus, he's like a double black belt in karate...that has to count for something, right?

Curtis Jerrels, Baylor - If the Bears played any D, they'd be a serious tournament sleeper and this guy would get some notoriety.

Trevor Booker, Clemson - A f_cking man-child. THIS was one of the better dunks while watching live in a long time.

Teams:

Clemson - I know, I know...they're like top 10. But NOBODY in your office will pick them in the Great 8. Trust me.

Dayton - No, I'm not just saying this because they beat Marquette. When I've watched, they seemed to play well together and have more athleticism than you would expect Dayton to have.

Villanova - Sort or under the radar in the Big East with UConn, Pitt, MU, Syracuse, and Notre Dame getting the (good, or bad in ND's case) pub. They can score in bunches lead by 9th year senior Scottie Reynolds. I can't imagine someone shutting them down in rounds 1 or 2 in the tourney.

BYU - All 5 of the Cougs losses have been "good" (Wake, @ASU by 1, @UNLV in OT, @Utah, @New Mexico). I'm actually hoping they lose a few more and get like a 10 seed. First round win will be guaranteed and will give fits to the #2 seed in round 2.

Miami (Fl) - A whole bunch of close losses.

Clemson 74, Duke 47

It gives me great pleasure to report this score.

Jess Settles Award Nominees

Seems like these guys have been playing college ball since 2001. Evan Eschmeyer thinks these guys have been around forever.

Dom James, Marquette

Scottie Reynolds, Villanova (Only a junior!)

Josh Shipp, UCLA

A Bunch Of Guys, Pitt

AJ Abrams, Texas

Luke Recker, Iowa

Wink Adams, UNLV (Didn't he beat UW in the tourney like 5 years ago?)

Leader in the clubhouse- Ronald Steele, Alabama. I'm certain he beat MU in the first round when James/McNeal were frosh. I'll bet Steele was NOT a frosh at this point. Also certain that this was Steve Novak's final game. Jeesh, Steele might have been Sprewell's teammate at Bama.

Memo To Big-Time College Programs

If Del Curry has anymore hoopsters in high school - give them a scholly....even if you think they are too skinny, or slow, or whatever. While watching Steph Curry and Davidson beat West Virginia, they mentioned another Curry in the college ranks. Steph's brother is a frosh averaging 22 ppg - for Liberty. How many big name schools are kicking themselves?

Who The F_ck Is Oral Roberts?

Championship Week. Just a primer for the big dogg...the NCAA Tourney. The early part of the week is just killing time with the small conference tourneys you've never herd. Don't even know where these schools are on a map, let Chuckie Hacks help.

- Belmont (25-9), Atlantic Sun. The Bruins (There are bears in Tennessee?), both Atlantic Sun regular season and tournament champions, are located in Nashville, TN. They housed those tricky Dolphins of Jacksonville University (Famous Alumnus: Artis Gilmore, Dee Brown) 79-61 in that thrilling A-Sun championship game, making their third straight trip to the dance. Their team consists of a bunch of guys. On to the school. I'm petitioning to rename their nickname to Cowboys as the following country music stars call Belmont their alma matter: Minnie Pearl (of Hee Haw fame), Trisha Yearwood, Brad Paisley, and Lee Ann "Tony" Womack. That's a proverbial music factory for just over 4,500 students. The most impressive listed alum is "NHL enforcer Stu Grimson." How the F#ck did Stu Grimson go to a small, private school in Tennessee without a hockey team and end up in the NHL? Anyway, good luck Bruins...have fun with Kansas in the first round. Upset Chances: The same chances of me winning a singing contest vs Brad Paisley...bad.

- Sienna (22-10), MAAC. Quick, where is Sienna located and what's their nickname? Don't even act like you know. They are the Saints located in Lourdonville, New York...2 miles from Albany. You think Belmont was small, Sienna has a grand total of 2,900 undergrads. There are high schools in Wisconsin bigger than that. Oh, but were they built on a former asparagus farm? I don't think so! The Saints actually have a really good win under their belt beating Stanford (sans the good Lopez) in some shitty tournament early in the year. Also, the MAAAAC has produced a few pesky NCAA teams recently in Manhattan, Iona, and Niagara. Sienna beat the Rider Lawnmowers in the MAAAAAAAAAC title game. Upset Chances: Not good.

- Davidson (26-6), Southern Conference. The Wildcats can play some ball. Sure, they rolled a bunch of cream puffs in conference play, but held their own against some damn good competition. Lost to North Carolina by 4, Duke by 5, UCLA by 12, and NC State by 1. That's nothing to sneeze at, I mean, it's Davidson. Everybody knows they have Dell Curry's kid, Stephen. That's all you need to know. This kid can shoot, and shoot often. Plus, these kids are smart. Davidson, aka "The Princeton of the south," has produced a number of Governors, Congressmen, Pulitzer Prize winners, and even a President...Woody Wilson. That all adds up to...Upset Chances: Good, real good. I see them scoring that annual 12-5 upset in their future.

- Oral Roberts (23-8), Summit. Other than a tasty beer from St. Paul, I had no idea what a Summit was. I guess it's also a D1 Hoops conference. Located in Tulsa, Oral (hee, hee) has had a few good squads over the years. They actually made the Great 8 in 1974. Oral doesn't really have a good win this year but did hang tough at Texas, losing in the final minutes. They got the auto bid by beating IUPUI (WTF???) in the Summit finals. Their leading scorer has only started 3 games, which is odd. Famous NBA alumni? Try former Buck Haywood Workman, who was pretty awful. To answer the question: Who was Oral Roberts? He was a Christian televangelist. Yup, they named a school after a televangelist. Upset Chances: Slim and none, and slim just left the building.

- Butler (29-3), Horizon. Butler (located in Indy) isn't an unknown, rather the best of the "little guys." The impressive wins are not there (Ohio State, anyone?), but they return pretty much the entire team from last years Sweet 16 squad which lost to Florida...limiting the Gators to their lowest point total of the tournament. That's impressive. As for the school, they play in Hinkle fieldhouse. The same barn where "Hoosiers" was filmed and where that actual game (Milan over Muncie Central) was played. Who can forget Jimmy Chipwood doing his best Bobby Plump impersonation..."Coach....I'll make it." Upset Chances: Well, they might not be a lower seed until the Sweet 16. I say they win one and done.

Will this help you with your brackets? Hell, no. BUT, when you drop enough knowledge to convince your office secretary to pick Sienna in the Final Four...you can thank ME.

Miscellaneous

For whatever reason, I got a free trial issue of The Sporting News in the mail. They ranked the top outfields in the NL. The Brewers were 6th. Doesn’t putting Braun out there automatically put you in the top 3? The Rockies were 1, that's fine. The Cubs second? Alf, Pie and that Fukedome guy? I'd rather have Braun, Cameron, and Hart....unless Fuckdumb is Ichiro.

They also give no love to the Brewer bullpen, ranking them 11th in the NL.

For what it's worth, here's the best college basketball players I've watched this year:
Kevin Love, UCLA
Everybody on Kansas
Wayne Ellington, North Carolina
Tanner Bronson, Wisconsin
Chris Douglas-Roberts, Memphis
Kyle Weaver, Wazzou

I like my boss. The first two days on the NCAA Tourney are better than Xmas in my eyes....so, here's how the conversation went about asking off for those days.
Me: "Hey Boss, I'm not gonna fill out a vacation request form for the NCAA tournament... because if it gets denied, I'm not gonna show up anyway."
Boss: "I don't give a shit, I'm not gonna be here either!"
Awesome!

Hey Look, An Actual Classic??

In between the reruns of American Gladiator, Arli$$, and Stump The Schwab, you can actually find a "classic" sporting event on ESPN Classic. Imagine that. I found one today: 1992 LSU @ Arkansas basketball. I couldn't change the channel. It was so fast, so well played, so exciting it made most of today's college games pale in comparison. LSU had Shaq(as a Junior), Vernell Singleton and a few white long range gunners. Arkansas countered with Todd "All" Day, Lee Mayberry, and a slimmed down version of Oliver Miller...someone who could actually (somewhat) match up with Shaq. Oh, and don't forget about the two hall of famers on the benches: Dale Brown and Nolan Richardson. Back and forth, big play after big play. Hell, it was tied at 74...WITH 7:00 MINUTES LEFT! The game went into overtime with the Razors prevailing like 106-97. Just a great game to watch. The real shocker is that these were not even close to the two best teams in the country. Come March, Arkansas was a #3 seed, while LSU was a #7!! That speaks to the quality of college hoops back then.

What's my point? Nothing really, except I sound like an old stodgy guy saying "well...back in my day, things were a lot better...." When it comes to college hoops, damn right that's what I'm saying! You think if Shaq played today he would stay in college until his Junior year? Doubt it. I still love college roundball, but the NBA stealing these players after one year is hurting the product....not that you needed me to point that out.