In a move that we are certain will generate a ton of praise around the college basketball world (and the blogosphere), CBS has decided to not renew everyone’s least favorite curmudgeon Billy Packer (h/t to The Big Lead for pointing this out). After 27 years at CBS and having called the national championship game every year since 1977, CBS has “decided to move into another direction” (a phrase I’m sure many of our readers have heard before).
Like most college basketball fans, I’m excited to see Packer and his bitterness leave the airwaves (although I’m sure that rtmsf is sad to see a Wake Forest alum lose his job). While Packer has certainly become an institution (of hatred) in college basketball, it seems like in recent years, Packer has been more controversial than normal although that may just be a recency effect.
Among Packer’s “memorable” moments:
-1996: During a Georgetown-Villanova game, he calls Allen Iverson a “tough monkey”. He apologizes and John Thompson (the original, not JT3) says it’s a non-issue because he says Packer is not a racist.
-2000: When two Duke female (yeah, I know an oxymoron) students ask to see his press pass, Packer reportedly responds “Since when do we let women control who gets into a men’s basketball game? Why don’t you go find a women’s game to let people into?” Once again Packer apologizes.
-2004: Criticizes the NCAA selection committee for giving 1-loss Saint Joseph’s a #1 seed in the East Regional. This leads to a small disagreement between Packer and the CBS guest–St. Joseph’s coach Phil Martelli. The Hawks go onto reach the Elite 8 (beating Packer’s alma mater Wake Forest in the Sweet 16) before losing to Oklahoma State in a tight game.
-2006: Packer rips into the selection committee for taking mid-majors over BCSconference schools. The mid-majors responded by having Bradley and Wichita State make it to the Sweet 16 and George Mason make it to the Final 4.
-2008: With 27:30 left in the national semifinal, Packer tells viewers that the game is over. Surprisingly it isn’t. I’m sure the CBS bigwigs weren’t too thrilled that Packer essentially told viewers they could stop watching with 27:30 left in the game.
I’m sure there are others dating back to the beginning of his time on TV, but frankly I’m too young to remember the more distant controversies.
In an attempt to remain “fair & balanced”, we should note that Packer is most likely the 2nd person casual college basketball fans think of when they think of announcers–a distant 2nd to Dick Vitale. We’ll leave you with this YouTube clip from last year with Packer and Jim Nantz discussing his potential legacy (disclosure: I haven’t listened to this because I’m at work and I forgot my headphones–it’s a Monday):
Like most basketball fans I spent last night watching Game 2 of the NBA Finals and assumed the game was over well before it actually was. Unlike most people I also sent taunting text messages to the Lakersfans I know with 1:21 left in the 3rd quarter when Boston went up by 20. I was feeling pretty confident in my rather moronic display of hubris when Boston was still up by 24 with 7:40 remaining in the game.
Unfortunately, I had forgotten Billy Packer’s faux pas from just over 2 months ago when he awarded Kansas a place in the NCAA championship game when they went up by 26 with 27:30left in their game against UNC–the Tar Heels subsequently cut into the margin enough to make the game competitive and make Packer look like an idiot once again. To be fair, 20 points with 16:21 left and 24 points with 7:40 left is certainly a much, much bigger margin than what Kansas was working with, but nonetheless I should have turned to the Bill James Lead Calculator before I sent those text messages (not to mention the voice mails).
A quick calculation would have revealed the following “facts”:
- At the time of my text messages (20 point lead with 16:21 left), the lead was 28% safe.
- At the time the Lakers started their comeback (24 point lead with 7:40 left), the lead was 91% safe although it would have been “over” (100% safe) according to James if the Celtics had the ball at that time.
Fortunately, the Celtics survived the Lakers 3-point barrage and Vladimir Radmanovic’s 5-step breakaway dunk to win or I would still be getting text messages and voice mails right now.
Moral of the story: Before you decide to call “ballgame” (and taunt everyone you know), ask yourself “What would Bill James do?”
Update: Apparently rtmsf decided to make a post about this late last night (an advantage of being on the West Coast) and being the idiot that I am (see the aforementioned reference to taunting text messages) I decided to throw up a post without looking at the blog even though I had mentioned that he might consider writing a post about it last night. Anyways, I just went to The Big Lead and saw that our blog was linked to and realized that this was a duplicate post. Hopefully, you can at least enjoy my stupidity. Hey, it was better than the “19-0. Next. . .” text that I sent when I saw Eli Manning jogging out onto the field with 2 minutes left. . .
Normally I am not one to enjoy seeing another team’s fans suffer unless they are a rival in which case I will taunt them mercilessly. However, I did not have a rooting interest (spiritual or financial) in last night’s game so part of me felt bad for Memphis as they choked away the game and the title. I just uncovered something that makes their collapse a little more enjoyable.
Just knowing that Justin Timberlake had to sit through the last 2 minutes of regulation and the inevitable loss in OT will make the replays much more enjoyable for me since he’s already run through Britney Spears (pre-KFed), Cameron Diaz, Scarlett Johansson, and Alyssa Milano not to mention countless other girls we haven’t heard about. At least we know that last night he experienced the same empty feeling that all of us have experienced at one time or the other. So what now, Timberlake?
Well, at least he had to suffer until he got back to that. . .
Editor’s Note: We are aware there are better pics of Miss Biel online, but we try to keep a family-friendly blog here so you’ll have to use Google Images for that stuff.
I provided my instant (revised) analysis very early this morning and rtmsf will be providing his a little later today. I thought I would provide you with some of the thoughts of various other sportswriters.
-At the Alamo, this was one to remember: Bob Ryan, who most of you may know from his frequent appearances on ESPN, offers his thoughts on the game and the Kansas team, which may get lost in all the talk about missed FTs and Chalmers huge shot.
-The Shot Heard ‘Round the World: RTC’s most well-known fan (and SI writer/CBS college basketball studio analyst) Seth Davis provides a short Q&A in between the game and his early-morning wakeup call to be on Mike & Mike.
-Chalmers’s Effort on Both Ends Keys Jayhawks’ Win: Camille Powell credits Mario Chalmers’s play on both ends for the title, which most writers missed because everybody has focused so much on his 3 with 2.1 secs left.
-Plenty of Twists, One Final Turn: John Feinstein, author of the famous “Season on the Brink”, offers his perspective on the title game.
-A Dominant Half by Rose Falls Short by One Shot: Thayer Evans breaks down Derrick Rose’s performance that was one shot (either Chalmers’s 3 or a made FT by either Rose or Chris Douglas-Roberts) away from being named MOP.
- Rock Chalk, Champions: Grant Wahl offers his extensive analysis of the Jayhawks victory. This is probably the most thorough piece we have seen on the championship game so far.
- What is the Best Shot in NCAA Tournament History?: SI’s Andy Gray offers his take on the top 5 shots in NCAA tournament history. We’d be interested to hear where you think Chalmers’s shot ranks.
- NCAA Championship Grades: It seems fitting to end our link post with title game grades (courtesy of Bill Trocchi) for the student-athletes.
In the interest of full disclosure, I had a draft for this ready with a little over a minute left in the game congratulating Memphis for winning the game and making their FTs when it mattered since they had made their last 4 when Chris Douglas-Roberts stepped to the line. . .
After 2 blowouts in the semifinals, we finally got a close game. After a first half that lacked any real flow to it with both teams playing well offensively in spurts but never at the same time, the game took on the character we all expected with up-and-down end-to-end action. As we expected, Kansas dominated inside while Memphis won the perimeter battle. The shot charts for Kansas was particularly astounding as for most of the game Kansas scored nearly 70% of its points in the paint with most being lay-ups.
A couple of observations: 1) Billy Packer was right. As much as we hate to say it, he was dead-on when he said John Calipari should stop setting up picks for Derrick Rose since the Jayhawk big men showed absolutely no interest in staying on the guy setting the pick. This essentially put Rose up against a double-team every time without the pick man rolling to the basket hard. Bill Self almost cost Kansas the title when he switched to the box-and-one to help slow down CDR, who was destroying Brandon Rush at that point. The box created enough separation that the Tigers’ screens were useless so they stopped setting them, which freed up Rose to go by his man. I don’t understand why Calipari would even set the picks for Rose, who can blow by anybody at this level by himself. Picks can make it easier, but not when the opposition doubles the ball and the pick man doesn’t create a good passing angle. Fortunately for Memphis, Self made it easy for Calipari by switching to the box-and-one. Rose took over the game almost from the moment that Kansas switched to the box-and-one.
2) Rose should be the #1 pick in the draft. I love Michael Beasley’s game (and his “We’ll beat them [Kansas] in Africa” quote), but I just think Rose will be a much more valuable commodity at the next level as there are a lot more good PFs than PGs in the NBA. When Rose gets a full head of steam, he’s unguardable. He may struggle his rookie year adjusting to life in the NBA (the $106 per diem will buy a lot of Gummy Bears) due to his tendency to be a little bit out of control at times and the fact that he will finally play against guys who are on the same level as him. However, I can only think of two guards (Deron Williams and Chris Paul) that I would take over Rose for the next 5-10 years and that’s only because they are proven commodities while Rose still has to prove that he can handle himself at the next level. That said, as ridiculous as Chris Paul has been this year, Rose has a higher ceiling than either of them. While Rose was unable to close the deal, I don’t hold it against him (look to CDR for that) as he showed me more than enough during the tournament to make me a believer.
3) The Kansas inside game disappeared late in the 2nd half. For the first 30 minutes of the game, it seemed like I was going to be writing the Tigers 2007-2008 obituary by talking about how they got destroyed in the paint. It was probably a combination of Kansas not working hard enough to get the ball inside and Memphis packing it in late in the 2nd half. Either way, this (along with Self’s bizarre decision to go box-and-one) almost cost the Jayhawks the title. After Mario Chalmers hit his miracle 3 to force OT, Kansas reestablished itself inside and cruised to victory.
4) Heart attacks sky rocket in Lawrence and Memphis tonight. Ok. I was trying to write this paragraph during the last 2 minutes of the game to post before going to bed. Originally it was “Memphis hits the FTs when it mattered” (4/4 at that point) then it was “Rose = $$$” when he stepped to the line. This observation obviously didn’t want to be written so I’ll move onto #5.
5) FTs killed Memphis. This should have been the #1 point and it will be the headline of this game as long as people talk about it. It’s sort of humorous that the media finally stopped hounding Calipari about the Tigers’ FT shooting coming into this game and they laid an egg in the biggest moment. The last minute-plus was basically the anti-Rumeal Robinson as CDR was the guy that Memphis fans wanted to be in that position. After going 11/14 before the last minute-plus, Memphis finished 1/5 giving Chalmers the chance to hit a 3 that will only grow in legend in Lawrence, Kansas.
6) Holy $&!% I can’t even begin to come up with a word to describe how big that 3 by Chalmers was. The only other thing I can compare it to is Keith Smart’s shot in 1987 to help Indiana beat Syracuse. While this didn’t officially win the game, for all intents and purposes Chalmers shot won the game. There was no way Memphis was going to come back after they choked away the game at the line and Chalmers hit that shot. I would criticize Calipari for not taking the foul at that point, but it appears they Rose tried to commit a foul but it wasn’t called. After the shot, the game like this post-mortem was over.
Since there is a rather important game tonight and I need to get something done today before that, I will keep this relatively short. As you may or may not be aware, there are other things going on in the college basketball universe today and we’re here to keep you informed.
- Oklahoma State preparing to offer Self a job: Somehow Bill Self has managed to keep this brewing media storm to a minimum leading up to tonight’s game. That certainly wasn’t the case the last time a Kansas team was in the Final 4 and its coach was a potential candidate for another position. I don’t think it will play a factor in the game, but it is something to watch for in the early minutes of the game to see if it is affecting the Jayhawks. If you happen to forget, don’t worry because the CBS guys will probably remember you about a hundred times before, during, and after the game tonight.
- Oregon State to name Craig Robinson as its new coach: This normally wouldn’t be particularly noteworthy as Corvallis hasn’t exactly been a college basketball hotbed lately although it has some history with two Final 4 appearances (most recently in 1963) and two well-known NBA players (Gary Payton and A.C. Green). However, since this is an election year and because Robinson is the brother of Michelle Obama (wife of probable Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama), we figure this will get a decent amount of ink. Robinson had a mediocre record (30-2 during his 2 seasons at Brown. We think Barack’s brother-in-law is in for a very rude awakening as the Pac-10 is a little different from the Ivy League. Robinson certainly has his work cut out for him as the Beavers went 6-25 last year including earning the distinction of being the first team since 1978 to go winless in Pac-10 competition. Maybe I’m a little weird, but my first thought when I heard the news was if it would be a recruiting violation to use Barack to recruit players.
- Xavier’s Lavender arrested: Ok. Let me get this straight. You’re a good college player, who might have a prayer at making a NBA roster if you play well at the Chicago pre-draft camp and things fall right. Getting caught with pot while being “drunk and disorderly” is pretty low on the list, right? Have fun in Europe, Drew. We suspect that his agent will probably try to get him on a team based out of Amsterdam.
- Gordon to declare for NBA Draft: This would have been higher up on the list except everybody knew it from the moment the Hoosiers went out in the first round. We enjoyed seeing Eric in Bloomington for the first two-thirds of the season before he went in the tank much like the rest of his team.
If you’ve read this blog before, you know that we have an affinity for historical context when it comes to college basketball. We like to think about how teams and players match up statistically in the NCAA Tournament given the parameters of greatness already set by precedent. For example, much has been already written about this year’s F4 perhaps being the strongest of all-time, illustrated by the combined 143-9 record coming into last weekend and the four #1 seeds. We love that stuff.
To that end, we could be on the verge of another historic college basketball event the likes of which we haven’t seen for a generation. Memphis currently sits at 38-1, which already gives the Tigers the record for most wins in a season, but if they win their 39th tonight versus Kansas they’ll be able to make a claim of greatness that only one team has been able to make since the UCLA run ended in 1975 - with a victory, they will become the first one-loss team in the post-UCLA era to win a championship. Only the 1976 Indiana team (32-0) would surpass the final record that Memphis is contemplating tonight.
Memphis Tigers - All Time Great Team?
Now, why does this matter? We think it is important because a 39-1 record would squarely place 2007-08 Memphis into the argument of one of the greatest teams of the post-UCLA era. This is especially true given the caliber of opponent that they have beaten in the last three rounds (#5 Michigan St., #2 Texas, #1 UCLA) and how they have beaten them. A 50-20 halftime score against Michigan St.; a clamping down of Texas and DJ Augustin in their home state; and rendering the vaunted UCLA defense completely ineffective on Saturday. Additionally, Memphis’ scoring margin of +18.6 this season would rank it #2 in the last ten years of champions (Duke 2001: +20.2), so this team is all kinds of legit in historical terms.
It’s also interesting to consider that outside of the unbeaten 1976 Indiana team, no other team in the modern era has managed to win a title with less than 2 losses! Here are the results for the group of teams with zero or one loss entering the Tourney.
1977 - San Francisco (29-1) - lost first round to UNLV
1979 - Indiana St. (33-0) - lost title game to Michigan St.
1988 - Temple (29-1) - lost regional finals to Duke
1990 - Lasalle (29-1) - lost second round to Clemson
1991 - UNLV (34-0) - lost semifinals to Duke
1996 - UMass (35-1) - lost semifinals to Kentucky
1997 - Kansas (32-1) - lost regional semifinals to Arizona
1999 - Duke (37-1) - lost title game to UConn
2004 - St. Joseph’s (27-1) - lost regional final to Oklahoma St.
2005 - Illinois (37-1) - lost title game to UNC
2008 - Memphis (38-1) - ???????
Without question, Indiana St., UNLV, UMass, Kansas, Duke and Illinois were on the verge of greatness had they won the national championship. We think Memphis is on that same plane. While it’s true that CUSA sucks and doesn’t provide much in the way of competition for the Tigers during the regular season, Memphis challenged itself this year with nine OOC games against NCAA Tournament teams, including UConn, Arizona, Gonzaga and Tennessee. They certainly have the talent to be in the argument with many of those other one-loss teams, and their performance to date (despite all the naysayers, ourselves included) substantiates its inclusion among the pantheon of great teams should they pull it off tonight.
After Saturday night’s blowouts, we can only hope that tonight’s title bout will give us a great game to finish off the season. I think both teams have too much talent to get blown out, but I never would have expected UNC to fall behind 40-12 before nearly making Billy Packer look like an ass (again).
I’ll offer my take and hopefully rtmsf will add his too later (see below).
Aside from a shaky performance at the free throw line against Mississippi State that made their 2nd round game much closer than it should have been, Memphis has totally dominated the opposition on its way to Monday night. I don’t think I am going too far into the realm of hyperbole when I say that their performance in the last 3 games has been as dominant as any team I can remember from the Sweet 16 to the National Semifinals. The even more amazing thing is that a lot of people were picking the Tigers to lose each of those games. The Tigers gave us all an indication of how far off we were in the first game of that stretch when they destroyed Michigan State in their Sweet 16 game as they led 50-20 at half. After easily beating Texas in Houston to advance to the Final 4, the Tigers had a little tougher time with the Bruins who hung tough for a half. Despite the close score for most of the game, I never got the sense that Memphis might lose the game. Of course, the poor FT shooting was at the back of my mind. As I noted in my post immediately after the game, Chris Douglas-Roberts and Derrick Rose completely dominated the game with Rose controlling the game from end-to-end and CDR controlling it inside the 3-pt line. Joey Dorsey also submitted what may be the greatest 0-point performance in a Final 4 by a non-PG (I can’t think of a great 0-pt performance by a PG, but just trying to be safe). Memphis also got a solid performance out of Shawn Taggert. One thing that has gone largely overlooked in the CDR-Rose lovefest was how good the Tigers played defense, which is something they have been doing all year. Perhaps it is because they are so captivating on offense or the fact that they rely on length and instincts rather than the Shane Battier step-in-front-for-the-charge style that the ESPN analysts seem to love so much. In any case, the Tigers’ defense is what really gets things going for them. Perhaps, if their key guys stuck around for another year or two or Rose came in a few years earlier (and they learned how to shoot FTs), we would be talking about this Memphis team along the lines of a 21st century Runnin’ Rebs team.
As for Kansas, like I said on Saturday night I’m not really sure what to say. They had one of the easiest paths to the Final 4 (based on opponents’ seed) that I can remember and the cruised all the way to San Antonio with the exception of the Davidson game where they looked tight. However, they made up for it on Saturday night against #1 overall seed UNC. Their performance in the first 15 minutes of the game was among the best I have ever seen at the college level. They were all over the court hounding UNC into countless turnovers as they jumped out to a 40-12 lead. The image of the game for me was little-used, but much-hyped freshman Cole Aldrich ripping the ball away from everybody’s national POY Tyler “Psycho T” Hansbrough. After Billy Packer declared the game was over with 7:32 left in the 1st half, Kansas fell apart and appeared to be headed towards an epic collapse when UNC brought the game to 54-50 with 11:16 left in the game. The Jayhawks survived with a late run of their own (possibly due to UNC running out of gas too). If you watched the first half of the game, you are aware of the tremendous pressure that the Kansas guards can exert. That pressure will certainly be put to a challenge against the Tigers’ talented backcourt.
A couple key things to watch tonight: 1) What tempo does Kansas want to play at? Kansas showed us on Saturday night that it can thrive on a fast pace against a very talented team. However, as you have probably read Kansas has the ability to play at both a quick (talented guards & inside guys who can run) and slow pace (guards who can penetrate & multiple inside guys with developed post games). Normally I would recommend that Bill Self flip a coin and use that to decide which way to play because Kansas can win either way, but against Memphis that is a different story. While the Tigers have talented, athletic guys at every position, they are much better when the game is up-tempo and they can use their athleticism. The Tigers lack a traditional inside game and don’t have many great outside shooters. Thus, Self should really thing about trying to slow the game down. It sounds crazy given how good Kansas looked against UNC (and it’s easier said than done), but doing so would give the Jayhawks their best shot at winning their first title since Danny Manning and Larry Brown led them to the promised land in 1988.
2) Who will guard Derrick Rose? Kansas has 2 exceptional defensive guards in Mario Chalmers and Russell Robinson, who both did a great job harassing UNC in the first half. As you may have heard, Rose is a completely different beast. As good as the Jayhawk defenders are, I don’t think they can stay with Rose if it is an uptempo game. However, if Bill Self listens to me and slows the pace of the game down, Kansas can use both in addition to Brandon Rush to try to contain Rose. I am assuming Rush will draw CDR, which is a tough assignment in itself, but he will need to help off CDR if and when Rose gets by his man.
3) Will Dorsey stay out of foul trouble? Shawn Taggert is a nice player, but he isn’t really built to battle the big guys from Kansas. If Memphis is going to win the title, they will need Dorsey on the court as he is the only one with the strength to give the Tigers an edge in this match-up. Dorsey will have to win the battle (or at least limit the Jayhawks’ advantage) against Darrell Arthur, Sasha Kaun, & Co. if Memphis wants to cut down the nets in San Antonio.
Opening Line: Pick ‘em.
Prediction: It looks like the money in Vegas is going towards Memphis winning as the line has shifted to Memphis -2, which is a pretty big shift for a game that was originally a pick ‘em less than 24 hours ago. I could see this game going either way, but in the end I think the brilliance of Rose (assuming he lays off the Gummy Bears) and solid all-around play of CDR will carry the day. Plus, as I’ve learned decision markets are usually pretty reliable indicators of what will happen so I’m going with the Tigers in a hard-fought battle.
rtmsf take:
We’re still in considerable shock at just how dominant Kansas looked vs. North Carolina Saturday night. For the first ten minutes of that game, it appeared as if KU was playing Colorado in the Phog; NOT the de facto tournament favorite led by everybody’s favorite superhero, Tyler Hansbrough. Kansas was bigger, quicker, faster, and simply wanted it more. One thing we believe was a major factor but has been left unsaid in much of the MSM was that the KU players spent the entire week hearing Roy this and Roy that and they wanted to stick it to him for leaving the program in the manner that he did (even though his departure predates all of their arrivals at KU). Of course, all of the players and certainly Bill Self will deny this forever more, but KU played that first half as if something had been stolen from them. Carolina didn’t play with the same fire and intensity, and it showed (40-12). We’ll leave it to the KU fans to provide this info, but we can’t remember the last time a Roy Williams coached team was so thoroughly and completely dominated as they were last night. If it has happened at all, we’re guessing it would have been in the 90s.
As for the other semifinal, UCLA’s tendency to endure prolonged scoring droughts ultimately proved ineffective when facing a team with the caliber of Memphis’ talent. We were surprised with just how thoroughly dominated Darren Collison was by Derrick Rose as well as UCLA’s maddening inability to get the ball to Kevin Love in the post. Part of that was the Tiger defense making it very difficult for Love to find his preferred spots, but part of it is also attributable to poor decision-making by Mbah a Moute, Collison and others. It wouldn’t ultimately have mattered, because the Bruins were an offensively flawed team and they were never going to score enough points to threaten Memphis, but it still surprised us.
So we’re now left with the two least flawed teams in the tournament. It’s been well documented that Memphis struggles with FTs, and it showed in their one semi-scare against Mississippi St. in the second round; it’s also been commonly discussed that Bill Self teams have a tendency to choke under pressure, and KU certainly had a scare against Davidson and looked shaky at times yesterday after leading by 28 points. But these are ultimately nitpicks because both of these teams are beyond excellent and filled with NBA talent all over the floor. So which of these two squads is better and will win Monday night?
The thing that really stood out to us when we were watching the Carolina massacre was just how big and athletic Kansas looked compared to UNC (a team that itself has a reputation for size and athleticism). We think that this is the one area where Memphis can be exploited. UCLA was unable to capitalize on this advantage because only Love was a capable scorer on the blocks. Kansas can get offense underneath from not only Arthur, Jackson and Kaun off the bench, but also apparently from Cole Aldrich (who looked fantastic (8/7) in his 16 minutes yesterday). We think this is the mismatch that will have Bill Self salivating for the next 20 hours or so.
Memphis will counter with the silky smooth Derrick Rose (25/9/4 assts) and Chris Douglas-Roberts (28/4), but with the perimeter defense that we expect from the KU guards (who held the UNC perimeter players to 16-47 shooting), we think that Memphis is going to have trouble finding enough offense to match the Jayhawks. Put simply, there’s absolutely no way we see that the KU defense allows 83% of Memphis’ points to come from the backcourt as UCLA did, and who among the Memphis bigs will pick up the scoring slack? Dorsey? Taggart? Dozier? If that group collectively scores over 15 pts, we’ll be shocked.
So despite what the decision markets and our compadre on this blog suggest, we’re going with the Jayhawks to cut down the nets tomorrow night. Bill Self gets his first title, and John Calipari starts to hear the ignoble distinction of being the best active coach to not win a championship.
Wow. If the Memphis-UCLA game gave us a dominating performance, this game gave us a roller-coaster ride. I called one of my friends who is a UNC fan when Kansas was up by 22. He didn’t answer (not a surprise) so I left a message that consisted mostly of me laughing. I kept on expecting a return call from him in the 2nd half, but mercifully that call will never happen.
1) I don’t think I have ever seen a quality team get blown out as decisively as UNC did at the beginning of the game. Kansas was all over the court and UNC looked like their feet were in cement. The only thing I can think of that comes close to this was the 2001 Duke-Maryland Final 4 game that Packer and Nantz refered to the entire game. Although Packer blew it when he said “This game is over” with 7:32 left in the 1st half, he was quick to criticize the Jayhawks for letting the Tar Heels back in the game late in 1st half.
2) The next 15 minutes were a completely different story. Kansas wore down after their torrid start. UNC didn’t even play exceptionally well to make the game close again. Kansas just kept on making dumb plays and coming up short on 3s while UNC played solidly hitting a few 3s to get themselves back in the game. UNC cut it to 54-50 with 11:16 left. At that point, I fully expected UNC to win this game.
3) Amazingly the guy who may have saved the season for the Jayhawks was Sasha Kaun, who made several nice plays just before the 6 minute mark to give Kansas some much needed breathing room (because they were choking if you didn’t notice).
4) In the end, Kansas used a late spurt to win rather easily (in relative terms). Tyler Hansbrough and Wayne Ellington both had decent if unspectacular games. The key for UNC was that Ty Lawson was awful going 2 for 8 (1 was a meaningless jumper with 20 secs left) from the floor and allowing Kansas to force a ton of UNC turnovers. I know it was the whole UNC team that was turning it over early, but Lawson should have made sure that Kansas didn’t steal the ball every freaking time in that first half stretch. I’m not really sure what to make of this Kansas team. Which team will show up on Monday night?
5) Tip of the hat to the Kansas fans for what I thought was a “Rock, Chalk, Jayhawk” towards the end of the game.
We’ll provide you with a more in-depth analysis later, but we figured we would offer some of our early thoughts.
1) Derrick Rose and Chris Douglas-Roberts totally dominated this game. UCLA didn’t have an answer for either one of them. It looked like Rose wasn’t attacking as much when UCLA put Russell Westbrook on him, but for some reason Ben Howland decided to keep Darren Collison on Rose for most of the game until Collison fouled out with 2:53 left. As much as we hate to say it, Billy Packer was right when he kept on saying that Westbrook should guard Rose and Josh Shipp should guard CDR, who probably would have abused Shipp, but at least one of Memphis’s studs would have been contained a little better. Rose is definitely ready to go to the NBA and CDR should be a nice addition to a team if a coach can find a way to incorporate his unique game into the offense. Both guys also did a great job knocking down FTs at the end making the last minute a mere formality rather than a tension-filled FT contest that many people were expecting if Memphis was in a close game. CDR also provided the game’s defining play with his baseline dunk on Kevin Love. It reminded us of Kobe’s “Who’s the MVP?!?” dunk on Nash a couple years ago.
2) Memphis got to play at the pace they wanted. It was evident early on that the game was going to be fast-paced. UCLA was able to hang close for the first half, but eventually the pace wore them down. This was particularly evident with Kevin Love who barely touched the ball in the 2nd half and looked sluggish moving up and down the court. In the end, Memphis’s ability to run and its deep-bench full of guys who can all run (except Pierre Niles) proved to be the deciding factor as they opened up a big gap late in the 2nd half and cruised from there.
3) Despite early foul trouble, Joey Dorsey and Shawn Taggert did a great job battling Kevin Love all game. Love won the battle in the first half, but the rotation of big bodies and the fast pace of the game wore out Love. We hope that Love stays in school at least one more year because he still needs some more work before he goes to the NBA. Tonight should have shown him as much. While the Memphis inside guys aren’t NBA-quality players, they have NBA-level athleticism and strength. Love has the requisite strength, but he isn’t athletic enough to go to the league right now. He will never be a Dwight Howard, but some more running over the summer will help cover up some of his athletic deficiencies. He has been able to get away with it all year because they pace has been slow and he has been the strongest guy on the inside, but today was a preview of what the NBA will hold and hopefully Love will consider that before declaring for the draft.
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allen iverson, billy packer, bradley, cbs, clark kellogg, dick vitale, duke, george mason, georgetown, john thompson, kansas, mid-major, mid-majors, ncaa tournament, oklahoma state, phil martelli, saint joseph's, unc, villanova, wake forest, wichita state | Tagged: unc, georgetown, bradley, ncaa tournament, duke, kansas, billy packer, dick vitale, oklahoma state, wake forest, cbs, allen iverson, mid-majors, clark kellogg, george mason, villanova, john thompson, saint joseph's, phil martelli, mid-major, wichita state | 
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Posted by nvr1983
during his 2 seasons at Brown. We think Barack’s brother-in-law is in for a very rude awakening as the Pac-10 is a little different from the Ivy League. Robinson certainly has his work cut out for him as the Beavers went 6-25 last year including earning the distinction of being the first team since 1978 to go winless in Pac-10 competition. Maybe I’m a little weird, but my first thought when I heard the news was if it would be a recruiting violation to use Barack to recruit players.
