^
Sorry, I don’t know of any links or sites. But 'Cuse laid an egg in that second half…now Villanova is getting beat down by Georgetown.
This one’s for Brett:
^^MWAHAHAH! Hilarious.
Well so far everything is going as planned in the Big Ten Tourney. Wisconsin and Michigan State have already advanced and Purdue just started. I’m heading down in about fifteen minutes to go to the IU game. Probably see most of the second half of the Purdue game too.
Talk about a shitty night. I head down Conseco Fieldhouse to score tickets for the IU Minnesota game and the first tickets I end up buying were counterfeit tickets. Not really counterfeit, but had been used and passed back, therefore you can’t use them again as there are no passouts. So I drop $80 on 2 tickets and see that go down the drain. I eventually scored tickets at $70 a piece. So I spent $220 for two tickets and didn’t even get in in time to see the Illinois Purdue thriller.
Come to find out the tickets I get are second to the last row, which sucks but whatever. And then Hoffarber has his career highlight by breaking my heart with a last second shot. I don’t even want to break down the game as I’m pissed and basically seeing that the end of the season is near. I mean what is IU going to get like a 6 seed now. I don’t think we can beat an 11 seed right now. I should faced reality and realized that once Sampson was released the season was pretty much over. I can’t express how disappointing this team is. Far too much talent to be a 6 seed.
Anyways my only silver lining is that CBS is forced to air Illinois vs. Minnesota. I don’t even think 5 people will tune into this game. Big Ten Championship game is tomorrow at 1:05. Go Michigan State beat Wisconsin.
I just had to vent it was a shitty night.
Yeah, tell me about it. Purdue choked their chicken big time. They blew a 5-point lead with like 90 seconds to go.
They’re a surefire #5 seed after that performance.
Everybody get their green on.
Go MSU!!!
How on earth did MSU lose that game?
Gawd I hate Wisconsin and their badger-like coach Bo Ryan. Go upstart Illinois (coached by longtime Keady assistant Bruce Weber)!
Should be a great day for basketball, including the NBA. Go Rockets!
I don’t know what the selection committee has been drinking in that room all weekend. I just don’t get it. How does IU end up with an 8 seed. Yes I know they are struggling. They did finish 14-4 in the Big Ten beat every solid team except for Wisconsin. They proceed to lose on a miracle shot in the second round of the Big Ten Tourney. How does this justify a #8 seed. Bullshit. I guess the weak nonconference schedule and the shitty performance in the last 12 games mailed our ticket in.
The best comparison I can make is Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt ends up with a 4 seed yet they play in a shitty conference. The SEC is way down this year. They lose in the first game they play in their tourney, but remain a 4 seed.
The Big Ten in general got the shaft. Wisconsin gets a 3 seed, Michigan State a 5 seed, Purdue a 6 seed and Indiana an 8 seed. What a joke.
That being said, I expect to lose to Arkansas. If we somehow get past Arkansas I think we can give North Carolina a game. North Carolina doesn’t impress me. I doubt we’d win that game, but I guarantee you that UNC will not be cutting down the nets in San Antonio.
I’ll be looking at the bracket in more detail later tonight and breaking down some of the action, but my initial reaction is of disgust with Indiana’s seed.
An #8 seed for IU was a tad low, and I detest IU. They would have been more suited for the #6-#7 range.
But how bout Butler? #7??? They gotta be steamed about that one.
I’m not buying this whole “Love the Drake” thing. It would absolutely not surprise me one iota if they lost their opening round game.
Hey, Fee, did you see where IU appointed a 10-man committee to find a new coach.
The head of the committee, Harry Gonso, is the uncle of my Edward Jones advisor.
Really? That’s pretty sweet. Any relation to the old QB that played for the last Rose Bowl team? Harry Gonso that is.
Yeah I agree with Butler too. They got screwed over. I don’t know how the committe can justify seeding Drake so far ahead of Butler even though Drake beat them in the bracketbuster. I don’t know what more Butler could have done? No respect.
Wow, I don’t even know where to begin on that. I was on a weekend trip so I only say the final 12-minutes of the game. Either way, I could NOT believe it when they showed the foul situation and it had Naymick, Ibok, Suton and Morgan ALL with four fouls and there were two guys on Wisconsin with TWO fouls. How does that even happen???
Seriously, I dislike when refs call it close but if you ARE going to call it close, at LEAST call it the same for both teams. And I could even understand it if MSU played aggressive defense and Wisconsin played passive D, but Wisconsin plays the same in-your-face style of D that the Spartans do! There’s no way you can tell me that they were that much better at than the Spartans.
Either way, if out freshman PG don’t throw it away for free points and we make a few more free throws than it still wouldn’t matter. But Purdue fans can attest that they saw the exact same thing when they won in Wisconsin’s building a few weeks back. I don’t know what the Big Ten or their ref’s love affair is with Wisconsin but that’s multiple games now where they either bought the “Wisconsin never fouls anyone” hype or were just clearly biased.
Even worse was it involved Ed Hightower who has been consistently one of the worst refs in basketball. This guy is a college ref and yet I know his name…I should NOT know the name of a college ref!!!
And the worst thing was seeing Illinois and Minnesota on the other side of the bracket…two teams that MSU had beat twice this year. We had our shot…
Anyway, fuck that…it’s tourney time.
-Indiana definitely got screwed. They lost their coach, got destroyed by MSU and then lost on a Laetner-esque play and somehow that overcame any of their past accomplishments and now they’re basically fodder for UNC. I think that could be a tough game for UNC but, holy crap…there’s no way I pick against UNC in North Carolina.
-Purdue got screwed too but frankly they’ve been looked down upon all year by the national people so this is nothing new. Sadly, I actually have them losing to Baylor in the first round. Sorry guys. Teams loaded with freshman usually do NOT do well in the tournament and Baylor can score…a lot.
-Wisconsin I have losing to USC in the second round. USC’s almost as good as defense and the OJ Mayo all-star thing may be enough to take out the Badgers.
-Finally I have my Spartans losing in the second round to Pitt. That Sam Young guy scares the crap out of me and I see him ultimately demolishing our big guys. Of course it’s Tom Izzo so you never know but this team has just been too soft and inconsistent at times to make me think they could take down Pitt who would have had an even better record if not for injuries. Of course Pitt likes to choke early in the tournament so maybe that will help the Spartans…who knows.
-The #1 seeds are all flawed in one way. UNC don’t play defense…they needed 80 points to beat a lot of teams this year. Memphis doesn’t make free throws and has smaller big men. UCLA is damn good but sometimes have trouble scoring. And Kansas is coached by Bill Self who I’m still not sure is a good game-time coach.
But even after doing my bracket, I still had UCLA, UNC and Kansas in the final four with UNC winning it all…I just don’t see any of the lower ones beating those guys. My non-#1 in the Final Four is Stanford who I have man-love for who I think can take down Memphis in a tough defensive battle. And yes, that means I have Stanford beating Texas in Houston…I hestitated on making that pick until I remembered that Texas is coached by Rick Barnes. This is a guy who had DJ Augustine and Kevin Frickin Durant last year and couldn’t make it out of the second round.
My upset specials are Baylor over Purdue, Winthrop over Washington State, St. Joe’s over Oklahoma, and Butler over Tennessee in the second round.
I can’t wait. I got both Thursday and Friday off. It’s gonna be an insane year.
Stevo
Yeah Harry’s nephew is Brad, and he is a hike school classmate of mine. Graduated a year ahead of me. Played tennis and golf with him. I think they should go after Scott Skiles!
^^
Even my grandmother, who is 81 and knows more about basketball than the average 81 year-old woman, thought the refs were ridiculous in that game.
Baylor can score a lot but their defense is also horrendous. They’re really not used to the gritty, lock-down style Purdue plays. Purdue’s inexperience with their freshmen and sophomores may offset that, though, resulting in a close 65-62 type game.
My picks are eerily similar to yours in that I’ve got Stanford in the Final 4 and I have USC beating Wisconsin. My Dad says any althletic team that Wisconsin plays will run their slow, white asses out of the gym. Particularly that stooge Brian Butch.
I won’t reveal any of my other choices…
Let me know if you have any inside information on the hiring situation. Skiles is an Indiana guy, but I don’t know if it would work. I’m open to the idea, but they need to bring someone in to turn the program around and Skiles has never really been involved in the recruiting process and such.
There are reports that Devin Ebanks IU’s top recruit next year is still considering coming to Bloomington. I’m not holding my breath.
As for the tournament I’m using the Mike Golic strategy. I’m in two different pools and I’ve done three sheets will all different winners, but I honestly think UCLA is the team to beat. This assuming everyone is healthy.
Maybe it’s just me because I haven’t wathced them enough, but I can’t even name the starting 5 for UNC. I live sports and am having trouble with this one. Hansborough, Lawson, Ginyard, ?,?. Is ginyard even right?
Do you guys have Stanford against UCLA in the final four? Would be crazy to meet for a 4th time. Surely it would be tough for UCLA to beat them 4 times in the same season.
In 2000 when Wisconsin went to the Final Four I believe they beat Purdue 4 times that year.
Wisconsin was a #6 seed and beat the #3 seeded Boilers in the B10 Tourney, and in the Elite 8 Wisconsin was a #8 seed and beat the #6 seeded Boilers. I’m pretty sure they played twice during the regular season as well.
I definitely had this and I figured that Stanford will be pissed about the screwjob wins in the regular season and will finally get it done. I could be wrong, of course. Like I said…I have too much man-love for Stanford this year. Every year I have one team where I like them a little TOO much and it ruins my bracket…and it’s usually because of a few players on the team. This year it’s Stanford (Lopez twins). Last year it was Texas A&M (Acie Law). When Illinois made the finals, it was Arizona (Salim Stoudemire), before that it was Wake Forest (Chris Paul). I’m sure it’ll get me again this year.
You may be right about that, but I know for a fact that Michigan State beat Wisconsin four times in 2000 as well. Beat them twice in the year, then in the Big Ten tourney, then took them down in the Final Four on the way to winning it all. Strangely, that’s when Bo Ryan took over and just started owning Tom Izzo year after year so maybe that’s not the best thing.
Stevo
Is it just me or has officiating in sports gotten worse the older I get. Yeah there have been some famous missed calls from back in the day like the HR ball brought over the fence by Jeffrey Maier, The 1985 World Series call at 1st base, and any officiated game in Rupp Arena, but it seems today as if officiating is just generally worse.
It’s funny you mention Ed Hightower because that is one of the few NCAA referees I’m familiar with too. Used to be a good referee back in the day, but he’s been officiating ever since I’ve been watching IU basketball and I’m 28. Having your team coached by Bob Knight for a significant amount of years, I know alot more NCAA officials names than most should. What with the run ins with Ted Valentine and such.
Anyways across the board officiating, umpiring, referreeing, they all suck. Baseball is even going to instant replay this year for HR calls and other calls. Maybe it’s because every game is televised and every call can therefore be scrutinized, but I honestly believe that the officiating is honestly deteriorating.
Do I even need to mention the NBA? It’s been a joke for years. The NFL is okay at times, but I want to rip my hair out at other times. Case in point last years regular season game pitting the Colts and Chargers. One of the worst officiated games I have ever seen. Then assigning a first year referee to some of the most important games of the year was puzzling. The Colts vs. Pats had a first timer and so did the Pittsburgh vs. New England game. What is Goodell in cahoots with Belichick?
Don’t get me started on the strike zone. It’s either gotten so tiny or so huge according to who is behind the plate. Last time I checked boys its letters to knees.
Yeah the NCAA is following this route. Horrible Horrible. How many bad calls have there been involving UCLA. What about the call in the Georgetown Villanova game. Horrendous. Something has got to be done.
Maybe Congress can look into it!!!
I see where IU hopes to have a coach named by the Final Four! WTF? Why the sense of urgency? I know you want to get a coach in place and get acclimated and all that, but damn.
They’re saying Tony Bennett tops the list. I see Mike Montgomery is possible, too. I always liked him.
I still say go with Scott Skiles.
Freakin’ IU fans, man. Crazy bunch.