College Basketball 2010-2011 and Tourney

[Rhom]

I'm not sure what's going on with all the mid-season defections and suspensions. I saw a scroll on ESPN yesterday that Korie Lucious has been suspended from Michigan State's team for the season.

On the topic of Michigan State... I know we give UNC hell for being ranked even when they have double the losses of all the teams around them, but being ranked at 12-7 is a travesty. I know Izzo gets the benefit of the doubt because he'll probably be in the Elite Eight regardless of the season so far, but being only 5 games over .500 this late in the year and still in the rankings is inexcusable.

[Rhom]

The local radio guy (Matt "Money" Smith who is on Rome's TV and radio show sometimes) made a comment that other day that I thought was interesting. He suggested that the popularity of the NCAA Tournament has continued to weaken the regular season of college hoops. Would you guys agree with that?

For me I've typically only been somewhat into the season until football it completely over, but then I start to get more into it. The timing always seems to be perfect. Teams are getting pretty established and conference play is well-underway, but there's plenty of meaningful games left to go.

Its an interesting question. I'd say that in some ways its true. Essentially, the entire regular season is played for seeding in the NCAA tourney. (Effectively, if you aren't a top four seed, your chances of winning are very small.) If you're in a major conference and you post 20+ wins and a winning conference record, you can be virtually assured that you'll make the field.

I think the vast majority of sports fans are probably like you and only really get interested in basketball when the football season ends. In all fairness, its really only around that time that you can really tell who is good and who isn't.

[Bronn Stone]

Its an interesting question. I'd say that in some ways its true. Essentially, the entire regular season is played for seeding in the NCAA tourney. (Effectively, if you aren't a top four seed, your chances of winning are very small.) If you're in a major conference and you post 20+ wins and a winning conference record, you can be virtually assured that you'll make the field.

I agree with some of this but not the rest. I think the conference tournaments are more of the problem than the NCAA tournament. Because during the regular seasons, teams really aren't even playing to 'win' their leagues - they are playing for seeding in a tournament that isn't really the tournament. Hard to get too fired up about it.

And I would say that the 3rd and 4th seed slot isn't significantly better than the 5th or 6th. The reason we don't see #5 and lower seeds win the tournament very often is that the seeding process is pretty accurate. If you changed your wording to 'if you aren't one of the 16 best teams in basketball, your chances of winning are very small, you'd realize you don't really have much of a point.

The problem is less about the teams with 20 wins and good conference records and more about those at 17-10 with even or near-even conference records getting in. Hard to get fired up about the regular season when you know 6th place in the ACC is a virtual lock to get in. I don't mind a 68 team field, but I wish that a greater proportion of those slots were held for the smaller leagues.

I think the NCAA should guarantee slots to the regular season champions as well as tournament champions. You'd need some incentive to encourage the champions of the small-fry leagues to not throw their conference tourneys, but that wouldn't be too hard (counts as two teams for revenue splitting purposes and guaranteed say no worse than a 13 seed).

[Rhom]

So UNC and MSU want to play a game on an aircraft carrier. :stunned:

That sounds cool at first, but I don't know how its supposed to work. Its one thing to play hockey outside for a crowd, but college basketball isn't exactly White Men Can't Jump where its cool if a California breeze sends a shot off target.

[Commodore]

This is just ridiculous, gotta love the confidence.

I wonder how Jimmer's game will translate to the NBA.

http://www.draftexpress.com/nba-mock-draft/2011/

Draft Express has moved him from a 2nd round pick to the 13th overall pick.

[Rhom]

This is just ridiculous, gotta love the confidence.

I wonder how Jimmer's game will translate to the NBA.

http://www.draftexpress.com/nba-mock-draft/2011/

Draft Express has moved him from a 2nd round pick to the 13th overall pick.

I really worry that he might be another Adam Morrison. But he's been compared to Stephen Curry.

[Fez]

Well looks like my instincts regarding Buffalo and George Washington were right. George Washington has fallen to 10-10, is near the bottom of the conference standings, and looks to be just going through the motions of another not-much-happening season. Buffalo on the other hand is now at 12-6, tied for first in its conference, and interestingly has the 10th best shooting % in the country right now. If they can keep it up they are poised to do well in the MAC tournament where of course it will take a win to get their first ever invite to the Dance and barring that could still do well enough to get an invite to the NIT which is still a major accomplishment for them since it doesn't happen to often.

[Rhom]

Well looks like my instincts regarding Buffalo and George Washington were right. George Washington has fallen to 10-10, is near the bottom of the conference standings, and looks to be just going through the motions of another not-much-happening season. Buffalo on the other hand is now at 12-6, tied for first in its conference, and interestingly has the 10th best shooting % in the country right now. If they can keep it up they are poised to do well in the MAC tournament where of course it will take a win to get their first ever invite to the Dance and barring that could still do well enough to get an invite to the NIT which is still a major accomplishment for them since it doesn't happen to often.

Speaking of small conferences and tieing in with our earlier debate on the quality of the regular season, it becomes doubly frustrating for fans of these schools. I know of several years where Murray State was the class of the OVC, but was upset in their conference tourney and went home with nothing. Not even an NIT bid. So while your Buffalo school looks strong and is cruising along now, it could just as easily be your GW squad that makes noise in March. Its exciting and frustrating all at the same time.

Shifting gears a bit... I got an email from my cable advertising rep pitching their new stuff for 2011. Oprah's new network is big and Police Women of Cincinnatti is a hot buy. Go figure. Amongst all of that were demographics information for last year's NCAA tourney. Their map doesn't show the country west of the plains states, so I don't know what things look like out in the mountain and pacific time zones. What is shown on the map is a very regionalized viewing pattern for the tournament. Indiana, Ohio, and the Louisville market are the biggest ratings grabbers. I do wonder how much stronger the Raleigh market would have been had UNC made the tourney. Its also striking just how little interest there seems to be in places like Chicago and New York City.

[Rhom]

A whole week went by and we didn't even talk about Ole Roy's latest meltdown.

I remember us discussing Roy's fan-bashing tirades last season, but here they are again and I don't remember the outcome of the talks last year. Was he always this whiney at Kansas? Did the fact that he wasn't losing while with the Jayhawks just prevent us from getting to see this behavior? Are Kansas fans just better than Tarhole fans?

I think UNC is on track to make the tourney this year (as a 8 or 9 seed), but lets say that they go on a late ACC season slide and wind up in the NIT again. How much leeway does two national titles buy you at a program like UNC?

[RedEyedGhost]

What a crazy weekend! More than half the top ten losing sure makes it exciting. Syracuse losing four games straight with a game @ UConn coming up on Wednesday... looks like it's time for Boeheim to start whining in the press about how brutal the Big East is how the tournament should be 256 teams.

A whole week went by and we didn't even talk about Ole Roy's latest meltdown.

It was pretty funny on Game Day this weekend when Bilas actually apologized for them talking about it story again this week.

I remember us discussing Roy's fan-bashing tirades last season, but here they are again and I don't remember the outcome of the talks last year. Was he always this whiney at Kansas? Did the fact that he wasn't losing while with the Jayhawks just prevent us from getting to see this behavior? Are Kansas fans just better than Tarhole fans?

Yes

No

No

He routinely would complain about anything and everything while he was at KU; I just guess the east coast media wasn't that interested in it.

I think UNC is on track to make the tourney this year (as a 8 or 9 seed), but lets say that they go on a late ACC season slide and wind up in the NIT again. How much leeway does two national titles buy you at a program like UNC?

I think Roy could NIT it for a few more years before the seat would start getting too hot. Internet fans are already up in arms, but until it start to affect university donations I don't think the athletic department will care.

Regarding post-season league tournaments, a few seasons back during one of our games one of the commentators (Gottlieb or Bilas iirc) brought up the idea that the conference tournaments should be started after the majority of the non-con schedule, but before any regular season conference games begin. And guarantee NCAA bids to the winner of both the tournament and the regular season. I've always thought that was an interesting idea, but it will never happen.

[Bronn Stone]

Regarding post-season league tournaments, a few seasons back during one of our games one of the commentators (Gottlieb or Bilas iirc) brought up the idea that the conference tournaments should be started after the majority of the non-con schedule, but before any regular season conference games begin. And guarantee NCAA bids to the winner of both the tournament and the regular season. I've always thought that was an interesting idea, but it will never happen.

Wow. Not sure I like it. Coaching a team that already had an NCAA berth would be a real challenge. Almost impossible to keep the kids focused.

[Fez]

GW continues to be 'meh', while Buffalo continues to impress. They've now won 6 in a row after a dominant 81-58 win over Toledo to now stand at 14-6, best in the conference. I'm starting to really think this team can really go places (compared to the usual place Buffalo teams go), and with the 7th best FG% in the country the shots are really falling for them this season. That combined with a pretty good defense is starting to make me think this could be the first ever team to make the dance.

[Rhom]

This Kentucky team is starting to piss me off. Regardless, I can't pass up the chance to talk shit about UNC.

Larry Drew II is transferring from Chapel Hill. :stunned:

Coach Roy Williams said at a news conference that Drew's father -- Atlanta Hawks head coach Larry Drew -- informed him of his son's decision to leave in a phone call Friday morning. Williams said he was "shocked" by the news.

"Basically there was no arbitrating, there was no trying to see if we could rectify anything," Williams said Friday afternoon. "That was the decision that was made and he thought it was in Larry's best interest.

There's something going on in Tobacco Road and I'm not quite sure what it is. His playing time has dropped this year over last, but its certainly not been a major drop off and he's been a big part of their upswing in recent weeks. :dunno:

Oh and one other thing... Triskele, I'm okay with UO having 80 different uniform combinations for their football and basketball team, but since when did anyone start painting forest dioramas on the court?!!? Bizzarre.

[RedEyedGhost]

Did we not talk about Oregon's new floor this summer? I could have sworn we did. It's not great, but the more I see of it the more I like it.

More on Roy: Rashad Mccants dad apparently isn't a fan.

:shocked:

I'm curious how exactly Roy wrecked Rashad's career? The kid won a national championship and was a lottery pick in the NBA draft. Sounds like Roy did a pretty good job to me, and it's not his fault that Rashad couldn't keep his shit together and remain in the league.

I've heard that Drew left the team because he had become the scape goat for their troubles last year and the start of this season; to the point that the freshman class asked Roy to remove him from the starting lineup. Roy did that, Drew responded with 9 assists in 19 minutes off the bench and then bailed.

KU-Missouri on Monday, it's in Lawrence so we should pound the fuck out of them. But Selby is out again; he didn't play on Saturday b/c of a stress reaction that they're worried could become a stress fracture.

[RedEyedGhost]

The rankings should be interesting tomorrow. Over the weekend I heard several talking heads saying that Texas should move up to #1 with OSU at #2. Honestly, I would love for that to happen - chip, meet shoulder - what great motivation that would be. One of them even went so far as to say that the reason was because UT's 9 pt win over Baylor at home was better than our 23 pt win over Iowa State at home. How quickly they forget, we won at Baylor by 20. Awesome.

This week 32 voters had KU ranked higher than UT, and 32 voters had UT higher than KU. Our average ranking was 2.63, and theirs was 2.78. Most of the discrepancy is Pitt being ranked behind us and ahead of UT (one guy has Duke at #2), so it's possible that five teams will get #1 votes (if some keep OSU at #1 and if Pitt jumps some people because they've had a great week). Should be interesting.

Now if only we can get healthy: Josh Selby missed the past two games with a stress reaction in his foot, and Thomas Robinson is out 2-4 weeks because of a meniscus tear in his knee that he had surgery to repair (

), another of our top six is wearing a walking boot pretty much every second that he is off the court - Tyrel Reed. At least our best true small forward (Travis Releford) is finally getting back into game shape after missing a couple of weeks with a bad ankle sprain that occurred right when he was getting into a great groove.

[Rhom]

I would go Kansas #1 and Texas #2; but considering the Longhorns won in Lawrence I would have not problem with them leap-frogging the Jayhawks to #1. OSU should not be in the discussion.

I realized this weekend that I have been talking less about Kentucky basketball in these past two seasons than I did when Billy Gillispie was here. Part of it I'm sure was the fact that there was much more drama back then, but I think last year I was either afraid to jinx the great run or didn't want to come across as an obnoxious net fan. This year, I have had a real problem putting into words my feelings on the team. The opening paragraph of this article really says it all:

22 points. That's the difference between a 5-5 SEC record and a 10-0 SEC record for this version of the Kentucky Wildcats. Kentucky has lost 5 SEC games by a total of 17 points. The additional five added in there would be what it would have taken to win those games. Throw in 3 more points, and this team could be 23-1 overall.

During the Florida game last week, Jimmy Dykes threw out a stat that blew my mind as well. Since 2000, Kentucky has lost a total of 8 games by two points or less... four of them were this season. (Of course we have since lost two more by a total of four points...)

I watched our loss at Vandy last weekend with an odd feeling that I never expected to have after we hired Cal: I never thought we were going to win the game. In Tubby's last two seasons and more times than I care to admit under Billy G, I was beginning to feel that way; but I never thought I would experience that again. Sure, I know there will be games that we lose; but I never thought I would expect us to lose. This is a flawed, flawed team. There are many missing pieces, and yet the team is talented enough to win every game they play when the ball bounces their way once or twice.

I've always thought that over the course of a season these things always equal out... so maybe our 6 close wins will come in late March early April!

The other ray of hope is that Jones, Lamb, and Knight will not impress scouts enough to go pro and they'll be there with the super class next season.

[RedEyedGhost]

I would go Kansas #1 and Texas #2; but considering the Longhorns won in Lawrence I would have not problem with them leap-frogging the Jayhawks to #1. OSU should not be in the discussion.

OSU has the "best" loss of the three contenders, at Wisconsin. KU lost at home, and Texas lost badly to USC.

I realized this weekend that I have been talking less about Kentucky basketball in these past two seasons than I did when Billy Gillispie was here. Part of it I'm sure was the fact that there was much more drama back then, but I think last year I was either afraid to jinx the great run or didn't want to come across as an obnoxious net fan. This year, I have had a real problem putting into words my feelings on the team. The opening paragraph of this article really says it all:

During the Florida game last week, Jimmy Dykes threw out a stat that blew my mind as well. Since 2000, Kentucky has lost a total of 8 games by two points or less... four of them were this season. (Of course we have since lost two more by a total of four points...)

I watched our loss at Vandy last weekend with an odd feeling that I never expected to have after we hired Cal: I never thought we were going to win the game. In Tubby's last two seasons and more times than I care to admit under Billy G, I was beginning to feel that way; but I never thought I would experience that again. Sure, I know there will be games that we lose; but I never thought I would expect us to lose. This is a flawed, flawed team. There are many missing pieces, and yet the team is talented enough to win every game they play when the ball bounces their way once or twice.

I've always thought that over the course of a season these things always equal out... so maybe our 6 close wins will come in late March early April!

That's the folly of youth. Their talent can only carry them so far, and this year's group just doesn't have the mental toughness to get in done in those tight games on the road - I think the biggest missing piece is that extremely talented upperclassmen to be a stabilizing force that you had last year with Patterson.

This year's group will still be a very dangerous team in the tournament.

The other ray of hope is that Jones, Lamb, and Knight will not impress scouts enough to go pro and they'll be there with the super class next season.

I wouldn't get my hopes up too much if I were you. NBA drafts on potential, so I have no doubt they'll pick Jones and Knight in the lottery. I had thought Lamb would be a multi year player, but he's had some really great games so I'm sure he'll go mid first round.

[RedEyedGhost]

1. Kansas (22) 24-1  1,549

2. Ohio St. (14) 24-1  1,536

3. Texas (23)    22-3  1,535

Wow, that's a tight vote!

[RedEyedGhost]

Tim Higgins, I have something for you.

[RedEyedGhost]

i just got home (Johny Depp is doing some appearance in Westwood for his new movie and it took me two fucking hours to get home) an WTF happened REG?

K-State has been one of the more disappointing teams this year, but maybe they're about to wake up??

He happened. I'm surprised Coach Self didn't get T'd up a couple of times, because he looked like he wanted to punch Higgins in the throat several times (ESPN had this stupid coach's camera thing most of the game).

Knight and Musburger were even talking about how Self and Higgins have gotten into it during a couple of other games this season. The game started off with 10-2 fouls on us-them, with at least 8 of our fouls being called by Higgins. That gave them a 10pt lead the confidence they needed to keep us from getting in control. Markieff got called for an intentional elbow on Pullen when he had his elbow pressed into Kelly, setting a screen, Pullen was forcing through the screen and ran into 'Kieff's forearm, which does not fit with the new rule at all. Marcus was called out of bounds when we were making a run (a score there would have cut it to 3-4, but instead they scored and got it back to 9), when he wasn't out of bounds. The worst call of the night though had to be after Elijah Johnson was blatantly fouled on a nasty alleyoop, no foul called, until Johnson got T'd up on taunting when he literally said two words (and neither appeared to be foul).

Big props to K-State though, they took advantage and made shots - a ridiculous 56.3% for the game (50% from 3). They definitely wanted it more, and this might have just salvaged their season, because they have been on a collision course for the NIT. Even if Higgins hadn't been on a rampage I still think we would have lost, K-State was on fire.