Before I begin my break down of the tournament, I just want to say a few things about my road trip over spring break with my dad. It was as if I escaped prison for a week; I mean it was nothing less than awesome. As you may know, my school is not the best place to meet people with an interest in sports, so going on a week long road trip with my dad, who’s almost as nuts about sports as I am, and also meeting up with my brother along the way has been the highlight of the year so far. Usually people base their road trips around which cities they are going to visit and what sites they want to see. Not us, we based it solely around the times the tournament games were being played so we could stop at the appropriate sports bar or hotel. Buffalo Wild Wings in Pittsburgh, ESPN Zone in Chicago, a hotel in Milwaukee, and my brother’s house complete with HDTV near Cincinnati. We managed to visit the Louisville Slugger Factory along the way where I purchased a signed Derek Jeter slugger. I kind of had to; if I didn’t it would be like going to Germany and not tasting the beer or going to Amsterdam and not... never mind. I would write more about the trip but the blog post would just be simply too long to read.
Ok, on to the tournament. Now as you can see above, my bracket doesn’t look too bad. I have a few hiccups, mainly in the Big 12 conference: Texas, Texas A&M, and Kansas. The funny thing is that I knew the Big 12 conference wasn’t that strong and I even mentioned that to my brother when he was filling out his bracket. I know this conference very well due to my life-long affection for the University of Texas but I thought that Kevin Durant and Acie Law would be too clutch to go against, I was wrong.
The problem I noticed with Texas all year besides the fact that their starting five is new this year and all very young, is that they cannot pass for the life of themselves. This has got to be one of the worst passing teams I’ve seen. D.J. Augustin will be good in the future but not this year; he was a huge problem for the Longhorns. The team passes around the perimeter where they usually gun the ball or Durant drives up for the lay in. As soon as they try to pass inside, they turn the ball over from either a bad pass or the inability to get open. This is exactly why they lost in the Big 12 championship against Kansas, they blew a 22 point lead because they started to gun the ball in the end of the 1st half and the beginning of the 2nd half and missed most of their shots. You can’t win games if you don’t know how to pass the ball; this is such an underrated concept in both the NCAA and the NBA. The only reason why I picked them to go on to the Elite Eight was because of Durant and the fact that I was seduced by the idea of him carrying his team the way Carmelo did in Syracuse five years ago.
As for Kansas, as you can see, I really struggled with the West region, I hated that bracket and I knew it would get me into trouble. I didn’t like UCLA, Kansas, or Pitt, so I had to go with the lesser of the evils. Since Kansas was the only one out of those three that won their conference tournament, I decided to go with them.
The rest of my Final Four I was pretty confident in. I knew Florida would definitely be there. I knew that Georgetown was too talented and big to not get in either. When your best guys are 7’2” (Roy Hibbert) and 6-9” (Jeff Green), only foul trouble can keep you out. Ohio State was another team I was very confident in even though their two best players are both freshmen, Greg Oden and Mike Conley Jr. However, they did have two scares in a row against Xavier and Tennessee; by the way these were two of the best games in the entire tournament. Last night’s UNC-Georgetown game is up there too.
From what I’ve seen so far, I can still confidently stand by my prediction of Florida over Ohio State in the championship. I think Florida can easily take care of UCLA (By the way, I still can’t name one player from UCLA’s team). With Ohio State and Georgetown, (which should be an amazing game) I think it’ll come down to the battle of the big men and you can’t really go against Greg Oden in that situation.
Florida can take care of Ohio State in the championship for a number of reasons. First, they already did earlier this year. Second, Florida has a ridiculous experience advantage. The starting five for Florida consists of all seniors (Joakim Noah, Al Horford, and Lee Humphrey) and juniors (Corey Brewer and Taurean Green). The starting five for Ohio State consists of two seniors (Ron Lewis and Ivan Harris), one junior (Jamar Butler), and two freshmen (Mike Conley Jr. and Greg Oden). Oh and this just in, Florida is trying to repeat as champions. And finally, Florida will come out victorious further proving that Florida is better than Ohio State in every aspect from football to basketball to vacation spots to counting up election votes. (Oh man, I’m turning into my dad by making a reference to politics in every subject :-\) Even if I am somehow completely wrong about all of this you can be rest assure that Saturday and Monday will be nothing less than amazing.
Sports Moment of the Week
March Madness has taken over Division II as well believe or not. The championship game between Winona State and Barton was crazy. Winona State was up 2 points. Anthony Atkinson of Barton makes the basket, then Bobby Buffaloe of Barton steals the ball from Zach Malvik of Winona State, tips it right to Atkinson as he makes the layup to beat the buzzer making Barton College Division II champions. The madness part about it was that all of these events took place within the final 11 seconds of the game.
The problem I noticed with Texas all year besides the fact that their starting five is new this year and all very young, is that they cannot pass for the life of themselves. This has got to be one of the worst passing teams I’ve seen. D.J. Augustin will be good in the future but not this year; he was a huge problem for the Longhorns. The team passes around the perimeter where they usually gun the ball or Durant drives up for the lay in. As soon as they try to pass inside, they turn the ball over from either a bad pass or the inability to get open. This is exactly why they lost in the Big 12 championship against Kansas, they blew a 22 point lead because they started to gun the ball in the end of the 1st half and the beginning of the 2nd half and missed most of their shots. You can’t win games if you don’t know how to pass the ball; this is such an underrated concept in both the NCAA and the NBA. The only reason why I picked them to go on to the Elite Eight was because of Durant and the fact that I was seduced by the idea of him carrying his team the way Carmelo did in Syracuse five years ago.
As for Kansas, as you can see, I really struggled with the West region, I hated that bracket and I knew it would get me into trouble. I didn’t like UCLA, Kansas, or Pitt, so I had to go with the lesser of the evils. Since Kansas was the only one out of those three that won their conference tournament, I decided to go with them.
The rest of my Final Four I was pretty confident in. I knew Florida would definitely be there. I knew that Georgetown was too talented and big to not get in either. When your best guys are 7’2” (Roy Hibbert) and 6-9” (Jeff Green), only foul trouble can keep you out. Ohio State was another team I was very confident in even though their two best players are both freshmen, Greg Oden and Mike Conley Jr. However, they did have two scares in a row against Xavier and Tennessee; by the way these were two of the best games in the entire tournament. Last night’s UNC-Georgetown game is up there too.
From what I’ve seen so far, I can still confidently stand by my prediction of Florida over Ohio State in the championship. I think Florida can easily take care of UCLA (By the way, I still can’t name one player from UCLA’s team). With Ohio State and Georgetown, (which should be an amazing game) I think it’ll come down to the battle of the big men and you can’t really go against Greg Oden in that situation.
Florida can take care of Ohio State in the championship for a number of reasons. First, they already did earlier this year. Second, Florida has a ridiculous experience advantage. The starting five for Florida consists of all seniors (Joakim Noah, Al Horford, and Lee Humphrey) and juniors (Corey Brewer and Taurean Green). The starting five for Ohio State consists of two seniors (Ron Lewis and Ivan Harris), one junior (Jamar Butler), and two freshmen (Mike Conley Jr. and Greg Oden). Oh and this just in, Florida is trying to repeat as champions. And finally, Florida will come out victorious further proving that Florida is better than Ohio State in every aspect from football to basketball to vacation spots to counting up election votes. (Oh man, I’m turning into my dad by making a reference to politics in every subject :-\) Even if I am somehow completely wrong about all of this you can be rest assure that Saturday and Monday will be nothing less than amazing.
Sports Moment of the Week
March Madness has taken over Division II as well believe or not. The championship game between Winona State and Barton was crazy. Winona State was up 2 points. Anthony Atkinson of Barton makes the basket, then Bobby Buffaloe of Barton steals the ball from Zach Malvik of Winona State, tips it right to Atkinson as he makes the layup to beat the buzzer making Barton College Division II champions. The madness part about it was that all of these events took place within the final 11 seconds of the game.
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