The UTEP Miners are rolling into the CUSA championship game with a 15-1 Conference USA record and a 17 game winning streak, so it’s only fitting that that they will have to face the last team to beat them. Houston comes in as the #7 seed and the feel good story of the tournament, fresh off a one-point upset of #2 Memphis in the semifinals. Aubrey Coleman, the nations leading scorer, has manhandled the Cougars’ opponents this tournament, averaging 25 points a game. At #21 in the nation, UTEP has the best overall team, but Houston is the last team UTEP wants to deal with. They only won seven conference games, but the Cougars have beaten three of the top four teams in CUSA, including Memphis twice. If they manage to pull off this upset and punch their ticket to the dance, it will be one of the more remarkable underdog stories of the year. So join us here at RTC Live and make sure you don’t miss this great championship matchup!
We’ve been anxiously awaiting the next thirty days for the last eleven months. You have too. In fact, if this isn’t your favorite time of year by a healthy margin then you should probably click away from this site for a while. Because we plan on waterboarding you with March Madness coverage. Seriously, you’re going to feel like Dick Cheney himself is holding a Spalding-logoed towel over your face. Your intake will be so voluminous that you’ll be drooling Gus Johnson and bracket residue in your sleep. Or Seth Davis, if that’s more your style. The point is that we’re all locked in and ready to go. Are you? To help us all get into the mood, we like to click around a fancy little website called YouTube for a daily dose of notable events, happenings, finishes, ups and downs relating to the next month. We’re going to try to make this video compilation a little smarter, a little edgier, a little historical-er. Or whatever. Sure, you’ll see some old favorites that never lose their luster, but you’ll also see some that maybe you’ve forgotten or never knew to begin with. That’s the hope, at least. We’ll be matching the videos by the appropriate week, so for the next two days, we’ll be re-visiting some of the timeless moments from Championship Week. Enjoy.
Championship Week
Dateline:2009 Big East Tournament – Syracuse vs. Connecticut
Context: Once in a very long while, a game comes along that unites a generation of fans, and this 2009 Big East quarterfinal matchup was such a game even though it was only a quarterfinal in a conference tournament. Where were you when… will start the discussion, and any fan of the sport will be able to seamlessly jump right into the conversation no matter his age or location. Everyone will be able to faithfully answer that question in five, ten, twenty, or fifty years. “I was at my brother’s house sitting on his sofa when Devo hit the three,” will say one; “Not me, I was actually on the road that night, but I kept having my wife give me updates over the phone,” will say another. This game was such compelling theater that Madison Avenue has already made a commercial referencing it (starring Jay Bilas) and the Big East Conference has an entire website devoted to it at SixOvertimes.com. And yet, unlike most games of such posthumous magnitude, this one doesn’t have a signature moment… er, not one that counted, at least. At the end of regulation, after a Kemba Walker putback layup for UConn to tie the game 71-all with 1.1 seconds remaining, Syracuse inbounded the ball the length of the court; it was partially deflected and then caught by Eric Devendorf, who turned and drilled what appeared to be the game-winner from 28 feet. Multiple replays showed the ball still barely touching his fingertips as the red light came on, so the basket was negated and the two teams continued to play. And play they did. Even though there was no true signature moment that defined the six overtimes, there were plenty of great smaller moments: Rick Jackson’s dunk in OT to send the game into another period; Walker’s halfcourt near-miss at the end of the second OT; Paul Harris’ Charles Smith moment under the rim in the fourth; Jeff Adrien on the floor after missing the game-winner in the fifth extra period; the fact that Syracuse never so much as held a lead from the end of regulation until the sixth overtime. In fact, a reasonable argument could be made that the story of this game might be the incredible number of missed shots that both teams had to win it throughout the first five overtimes, but our takeaway here was sheer volume — the number of points (244), the minutes of live action (70), the length of the game (3 hours, 46 minutes), even the number of fouls (66) and disqualifications (eight, including six starters). In fitting with the Big East and NYC attitude, everything about this game was more, and by the end of the night when an exhausted couple of teams shook hands completely spent in the wee hours of the morning (1:22 am), everyone in the building knew that they had witnessed a classic that will not soon be forgotten in the annals of this league.
***** – quit your job and divorce your wife if that’s what it takes to watch this game live
**** – best watched live, but if you must, tivo and watch it tonight as soon as you get home
*** – set your tivo but make sure you watch it later
** – set your tivo but we’ll forgive you if it stays in the queue until 2012
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game
CUSA Championship – UTEP vs. Houston – 11:30 am on CBS (***)
The Miners have been one of the most underrated teams in the country this season, but if they can finish their run through the Conference USA tournament, they could be looking at a #5 of #6 seed in the NCAA tournament. They have now won 16 games in a row, and they will face a mediocre Houston team that is just 18-15 on the year. UTEP is the more talented team, as they rank twelfth in defensive efficiency, but they have had some trouble against the Cougars this year. The Miners won the most recent matchup, but finished the game just 2-18 from the three-point line. In the first contest in January, Houston actually won 75-65 thanks to 11-20 shooting from beyond the arc. UTEP’s Achilles heel has been their free throw shooting, and if Houston doesn’t beat up on themselves (they have a 1.4/1 assist to turnover ratio) the Cougars have a chance to steal a bid.
America East Championship – Boston University vs. Vermont – 12:00 pm on ESPN2 (***)
A few weeks ago, Boston University looked as if they had no business being in the NCAA tournament. At the end of January, the Terriers stood at just 11-11, and were struggling in the America East conference. However, BU won eight of their last nine games, and has earned a shot to dance with a 70-63 upset over top seeded Stony Brook in the semifinals. There has been a few days rest from the semifinal game until today, so they will be more rested than most teams during championship week. Vermont is an equally hot team, as they are 10-1 in their last 11 games, but they have had close calls against the Terriers this season. In February, Vermont won in Boston 76-75, and it took Evan Fjeld’s layup with nine seconds left to seal the victory. The largest lead for either team in the second half was just five points, and Vermont could not stop John Holland, who finished with 29 points. Holland shoots 85% from the line this season, and if the Terriers can grab a lead heading into the closing minutes, free throw shooting could become a factor. However, in their first matchup, BU got five points from their bench, while six Catamounts combined for 22 points, and Vermont ran away with a 20 point victory. Vermont is 9-2 at home this year, and they look strong heading into this game.
MEAC Championship – South Carolina State vs. Morgan State – 2:00 pm on ESPN2 (***)
Morgan State is by far the best team in the MEAC, and the most likely candidate to pull off an upset in the tournament this season. Nevertheless, they are going to have to get past a dangerous SC State team before they can secure their bid. The Bulldogs were just 18-13 on the year, but they actually beat Morgan State on the road in their most recent matchup. The Bears shot just 22% from the three point line, and SC State’s Jason Flagler had 24 points in the 71-68 victory. The first game was a different matter, as Morgan State won by 15 points despite another poor shooting performance. The Bulldogs do not rank among the top 250 teams in either offensive or defensive efficiency, while Morgan State ranks a relatively high #125 in offensive efficiency. If South Carolina State continues to have more turnovers than assists, as they have this whole season, they have no chance of winning this game.
Coming into conference tournament week there had been a lot of talk coming from the college basketball media that this might be the weakest bubble ever. We are loath to admit it, but they might just be right.
Ticket Punched. Lost in all the mess of the BCS conference also-rans blowing their chances every night is that one team actually earned a NCAA Tournament bid in the last .
Lehigh 74, Lafayette 59. For the 16th time in 20 years, the Patriot League will send its regular season champ to the NCAA Tournament after that same team also won the post-season tournament. In a game that was closer than the final score indicates (Lehigh led by 6 with less than 3 minutes to go), the Mountain Hawks (22-10) earned their 4th trip overall to the NCAA Tournament and first since 2004 behind a strong performance from senior Zahir Carrington‘s huge game with 18 points (on 9/11 FG), 10 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals, and 4 blocks while their star freshman C.J. McCollum added 20 points and 7 rebounds. The game between schools just 17 miles apart was the 213th meeting between the schools, but the first time that they played with a NCAA Tournament bid on the line. We would normally rip a player who comes up with something as trite as Carrington’s post-game quote, “No offense to those guys, but they just didn’t want it as bad as we did,” unless they played UConn in this year’s Big East Tournament, but we’ll give him a pass today because of how well he played. What’s next for the Mountain Hawks? Most likely a #16 seed assuming The Committee decides to throw them in the game that shall not be named.
Bubble Burst? Where do we begin? Plenty of teams that would be perilously close to the bubble in a normal year lost games that we would usually call fatal, but that might not matter this year. Yes, Virginia Tech, Florida, and Wake Forest, I am talking about you. This year you will probably get away with it. Memphis, UAB, Arizona State, Rhode Island, Mississippi, Mississippi State, and Seton Hall? You probably will not be so lucky. On the plus side there is a small chance that CBS or ESPN might get a camera on Bobby Gonzalez when the Pirates are not selected. [Ed. Note: If you aren’t familiar with Gonzalez’s body of work, check out what The NY Times wrote about him recently during his time at Manhattan and at Seton Hall.] If you’re wondering if we left somebody out, you’re right. We’re saving that elimination for its own special section.
Dumbest Play of the Year. Last year we had Jamelle Horne. This year’s recipient may not have made as egregious of an error, but his will ultimately be more costly. Allow me to introduce you to Dayton senior guard Rob Lowery. With his team fighting for its NCAA Tournament life and the game winding down, the Flyers trailed Xavier by 2 points with 33.6 seconds left when Lowery called timeout to set up a potential game-tying play. On his way to the bench, Terrell Holloway slapped at the ball which was still in Lowery’s hands. Lowery responded by swinging/slapping at Holloway and was given a technical. The Musketeers hit their free throws which essentially iced the game and now the Flyers and the uber-hyped Chris Wright will be making plans for a trip to the NIT.
It’s worth noting that while Brian Gregory continued to state that he did not see the play in the post-game press conference and continued to insinuate it was a questionable call one notable player was not made available to the media: Lowery.
Rob Dauster of Ballin is a Habit is spending the week as the RTC correspondent at the Big East Tournament. In addition to live-blogging select games throughout the tournament, he will post a nightly diary with his thoughts on each day’s action. Here is his submission for the semifinal games.
Georgetown 80, Marquette 57
Georgetown whooped Duke. They smacked Villanova. Just yesterday they knocked off Syracuse. That said, would you believe me if I told you that this may be the Hoyas’ most impressive win of the season? Marquette doesn’t get blown out. Prior to this, their ten losses were by an average of 3.5 ppg; just 3.0 in seven Big East losses. They hadn’t lost by more than nine on the season (at Wisconsin) and seven in Big East play (Pitt). 14 of their 21 Big East games were decided by five points or less. With 13 minutes left in this game, Marquette was down one. From that point on, the Hoyas blitzed Marquette, something that simply does not happen.
Greg Monroe had a two minute stretch where he showed why people are saying he is a lottery pick. From deep in the left corner, he drove baseline and finished with a dunk. The next possession, he knocked down a three. The following possession, he took a rebound and went coast-to-coast, finishing it with a gorgeous bounce pass to Austin Freeman for an and-1 layup. And for good measure, he blocked a Jimmy Butler shot 20 seconds later.
Marquette is going to win a game in the NCAA Tournament. At least one. This is a team that is scrappy, tough, and runs a difficult offense to defend.
Jimmy Butler is one of the key players for Marquette. Along with Lazar Hayward, his ability to defend inside and play on the perimeter is a huge reason Marquette is able to play – and is successful doing so – the style they play. Hell, two weeks ago he hit a buzzer-beater in overtime to beat St. John’s. He’s a pretty important part of this Marquette team. You wonder, then, why the Marquette fan sitting next to me asked, after Butler’s tip dunk in the first half, “Jimmy Butler? Who’s Jimmy Butler?” Fan fail.
Over the course of the night, as with any big time event, the MSG people like to run promotions that give away money. All week, they have been using this game with an oversized die where three of the same roll in a row wins you $10,000. They’ve done it in each of the 12 previous games, and not once did anyone win, only a few times did they even get to the third roll. Well, in both games tonight, the contestant won the $10,000.
There’s more. At halftime of the first game, three people came to center court to try and win $10,000 in a Dickie V impersonation contest. The first two were heartily booed by the NYC crowd. The third contestant, however, had shaved his head bald, was wearing a half of a gray wig, had on a fake unibrow, screamed “Are you serious?!?!?” a good five times, and received a standing ovation and $10,000. I had to pay $8 just to take part in the MSG dinner buffet. I think I need to find a new profession.
In our attempt to bring you the most comprehensive Championship Week coverage anywhere, RTC is covering several of the conference tournaments from the sites. One of our RTC correspondents is at the ACC Tournament. In addition to live-blogging select games throughout the tournament, he will post a nightly diary with his thoughts on each day’s action. Here is his submission for the quarterfinal games.
Duke 57, Virginia 46
Virginia was again playing without second team all-ACC Sylven Landesberg, who was suspended by head coach Tony Bennett for the remainder of the season due to academic issues, and senior guard Calvin Baker, who left the team for personal reasons.
Sammy Zeglinski did not score in today’s game after leading the team yesterday with 21 points. Duke did a good job of limiting his open looks and keeping him out of the lane. He shot 0-9 from the floor, 0-4 from three point range.
Duke got its usual production from the big three of Singler, Scheyer, and Smith, accounting for 48 of the team’s 57 points. No other player had more than three points. This is going to bite Duke hard at some point, because one of those players is going to have an off night, and that will spell doom for their NCAA run. This looks like no better than an Elite Eight team, but I could easily see them losing in the Sweet 16.
Give Virginia credit, they scared Duke for about 33 of the 40 minutes. They fought hard on both ends and did not back down. Tony Bennett’s team may not always be the prettiest thing to watch, but they do compete. This could be a very solid program in a few years after Bennett has a couple of recruiting classes under his belt.
Miami 70, Virginia Tech 65
Miami starting PF Dwayne Collins was again not available for today’s game due to a “stress condition” of his left leg. Reggie Johnson, who scored a career high 22 points yesterday versus Wake, replaced him in the starting lineup. This game was not nearly as successful for him, scoring only five points.
Virginia Tech’s Malcolm Delaney, the ACC’s leading scorer at 20.5 ppg, was held to seven points on 3-15 shooting today, one of his worst performances all season. He was short on just about every shot, including an airball from three on Tech’s last possession.
Miami pulled off their second consecutive upset in as many days, having defeated the 4th and 5th seeds. No one was happier than coach Frank Haith, except for maybe the Duke fans who were cheering the loudest. They will now see a worn-down Hurricane team for a chance to advance to the championship game. As usual, the lucky ones get luckier.
Who needs Dwayne Collins? Apparently not Miami. They’re playing better now than at any point since the conference season began. No Collins clogging up the middle allows the lightning quick guards to penetrate for either a lay up or a dish for three. The threes didn’t fall today (4-16) as much as yesterday, but continued penetration put Miami on the line, where they were 83% yesterday and 76% today.
In our attempt to bring you the most comprehensive Championship Week coverage anywhere, RTC is covering several of the conference tournaments from the sites. One of our RTC correspondents is at the Pac-10 Tournament. In addition to live-blogging select games throughout the tournament, he will post a nightly diary with his thoughts on each day’s action. Here is his submission for the semifinal games.
Washington 79, Stanford 64
It’s not difficult to see why Washington (along with Cal) was picked at the top of the Pac-10 this season. There’s a lot of bounce in those legs. Basketball is such an athletic sport, it’s easy to be enticed when you see a team like UW sailing around the arena like they are on pogo sticks. But it’s a game that also requires strategic use of your resources, and wanton jumping around won’t get you very far against teams that understand the game better than you do.
I referred to this above, but the athleticism that Washington has is among the top fifteen or twenty we’ve seen this year. Lorenzo Romar definitely tries to recruit a certain type of player for his system, which makes their defensive shortcomings all the more frustrating. They’ll turn you over, but they just don’t guard people in the halfcourt like they could or should given the athletes at their disposal. Supposing they committed to defense, they’d be a top ten team and the bubble would be left to other teams to worry about.
Lorenzo Romar was asked about the bubble situation after the game and he said that he doesn’t worry about it much but that he definitely wants to take the decision out of the NCAA Selection Committee’s hands. Personally, I think they’ve done enough at this point, and both Zach Hayes and Lunardi agree.
I know the Stanford band is supposed to be quirky and weird and that’s the point of it all — total irreverence as opposed to what Cal does. But man, it’s almost like they had to have tryouts to find the weirdest-looking bunch they could find over there. The tree, however, is, and remains awesome. Love the tree.
Love the Tree
Highlight of the night was UW forward Matthew Bryan-Amaning tomahawking a dunk in the second half over Drew Shiller. Check it out…
Talk about deja vu. That dunk was remarkably similar to one that MBA threw on Shiller earlier this year. Hey Shiller, stop trying to take charges under the rim, fella! This isn’t Duke.
As we move through the next few days when automatic bids will be handed out on a regular basis, we’re going to break down the teams for you so that you can start thinking about your bracket ahead of time. The pearls of wisdom are meant to help you better understand what these teams are good at and how to make fair comparisons between them — all too often, the capsules you see have a lot of information in them, but very little of it is actually helpful. If you have additional ideas, leave them in the comments. For the good/bad matchups, we’re not necessarily saying that Team X will win; we’re simply pointing out that in an ideal situation, some of that team’s strengths will be more likely to manifest against those particular opponents — so save the emails. We’re still catching up, but these should be the teams through the early part of the week.
It’s all about methodical offense and sticky defense for the Panthers. This team will not beat themselves with mistakes, so you’d better be disciplined in your approach if you hope to beat them. Sixty points is the magic number — the Panthers were 16-0 this year when reaching that score. Possession basketball is the key; a 10-point deficit in the last five minutes against UNI is nearly impossible to recover from, as they take care of the ball (only 10.5 turnovers/game) and hit free throws (75.5%).
Not many mid-majors have a legitimate seven-footer but UNI’s Jordan Eglseder is one such player. He only plays about 22 minutes per game, but he’s an effective scorer in the low post, draws a lot of fouls and is one of the best per-minute rebounders in the nation on both ends. He’s not a game-changer in the sense that he will own the paint, but he is a tough wrinkle to prepare for in the game plan.
The Panthers beat up on some bad major conference teams this year (Iowa, Iowa State, BC) in addition to knocking off some mid-major powers in Old Dominion and Siena. The one confounding loss was to DePaul in the Virgin Islands early in the year where Mac Koshwal (12/19) dominated Eglseder (2/6) inside. Don’t assume that as a trend, though, as Eglseder played well against ISU’s Craig Brackins (20/14) and Purdue’s JaJuan Johnson last season (13/5).
Good Matchups: Wake Forest, Clemson
Bad Matchups: Marquette, UNLV
#6. Old Dominion (26-8, 15-3 CAA) – automatic qualifier
NCAA Seed Range: #9-#11
Three Bruce Pearls of Wisdom:
There’s no one player you have to stop to beat ODU, but if you can slow down 6’10 center Gerald Lee, you’ll have a better chance. The versatile big man was seen in the CAA Tournament taking the ball upcourt against pressure on occasion, in addition to lending his usual 15/5 and 54% shooting from the field. He has six teammates who contribute between six and nine points per game, so keying on any one of them is precarious because the Monarchs share the wealth. They only had six occasions where a player scored 20+ points in a game this year, and five of those were Lee (Marsharee Neely was the other).
ODU is another one of those mid-majors that thrives on possession basketball. They limit your possessions by defending and rebounding among the best in the nation. They also gang-rebound on the offensive glass, giving themselves an extra chance on nearly half of their scoring opportunities. Those extra chances help to make up for what is a fairly lousy three-point (31.5%) and two-point shooting percentage (49.4%).
ODU’s signature win was at Georgetown during Snowpacalypse I in December. They did it by forcing GU point guard Chris Wright into a difficult game (2-8 FG; 4 pts) and collecting eighteen Hoya turnovers. It should be noted that if you can turn over the Monarchs, as Missouri, Northern Iowa and Dayton successfully did in the nonconference slate, they struggle scoring enough points to win.
Day 1 of the WAC tournament eliminated all the pretenders and now we are left with just the top four teams in the league battling it out. The first matchup will feature the number one seed Utah State Aggies taking on the number four seed Louisiana Tech Bulldogs. The Aggies have played the part of the steamroller lately, and after dispatching Boise State yesterday 84-60 have now run their winning streak up to 16 straight games. Despite the blowout score, Boise State tested the Aggies, forcing an uncharacteristically high 15 turnovers with a full court pressure defense. Louisiana Tech will likely try to exploit this by pressuring the Aggies as well, probably using the same 1-3-1 zone we saw in a previous RTC Live that features 6’11 Magnum Rolle at the top of the key trapping Utah State’s much smaller guard line. The key for the Bulldogs will be generating offense. Kyle Gibson still does not look like his old self, scoring just seven points yesterday, but backcourt mate Jamel Guyton scored 31 to lead the Bulldogs over Fresno State 74-66. If the Bulldogs can get that kind of offensive explosion again it should be a great game to decide who moves onto the championship game tomorrow.
In the night cap in the WAC tournament the homestanding Nevada Wolfpack will take on the New Mexico State Aggies. Neither team had any trouble in the opening round here in Reno as Nevada blasted Idaho 87-71 and New Mexico State had no problems with San Jose State winning 90-69. These two teams met just a week ago here in Reno and the Wolfpack won in a shootout 100-92, led by Brandon Fields ‘career high 32 points. If Nevada is getting scoring in bunches from players besides Luke Babbitt and Armon Johnson then it’s going to be a long night for New Mexico State. The Aggies need to get some big numbers out of guards Jahmar Young and Jonathan Gibson, and find someone to slow down Luke Babbitt. Expect another high scoring, and fast-paced matchup between these two, with the winner moving on to face Louisiana Tech/Utah State for the championship tomorrow night. The game is on ESPN2 so tune and follow along with us on RTC Live.
We’re back at the Pac-10 Tournament for semifinal Friday night at the Staples Center. Unlike most of the major conference tourneys that get to the semifinal stage, only one team — the Cal Bears — is safely into the NCAA Tournament. The other three — UCLA, Washington and Stanford — are looking to steal an automatic bid from another team somewhere out there sweating in bubble-land. For UCLA and Stanford in particular, it’s win or go home, as both teams come into tonight with losing records and will end their season with the next loss. In the first semifinal, Cal will face UCLA in an interesting battle in that even though the Bears are the top seed, UCLA will undoubtedly have the home crowd advantage. Ben Howland teams rarely miss the postseason and the two teams split the season series, so we should expect the Bruins to come hard at the Bears in this one tonight. In the second game, Washington is one of Zach Hayes’ last four teams in at this point, but the Huskies don’t want to put the committee in a tough position with a cinderella like Stanford continuing on to the Pac-10 championship game. For what it’s worth, Lorenzo Romar’s team found the matchups with Stanford very beneficial, beating the Cardinal by 17 in Palo Alto and 33 in Seattle. Join us tonight for a couple of key games with respect to the bubble picture on RTC Live!
