1. Regardless of the appearance of documentaries, you’ll have to pardon Steve Fisher for not dwelling on the past these days. We’ve listened as Fisher’s made the talk radio rounds early this week, and the farthest back he cares to reminisce is a discussion of how San Diego State fared in last season’s NCAA Tournament. We don’t blame him. With the amount of passion and enthusiasm he’s apparently bringing to his preparations for Connecticut on Thursday, you’d never guess that it also happens to be his 66th birthday that day.
2. Sometimes it’s best not to over-analyze and just take inspiration from wherever you can find it. You couldn’t fault Central Florida’s Donnie Jones for feeling a tad unfulfilled from playing in the CBI after a 14-0 start and an appearance in the Top 25 early in the season. Nevertheless, he’s found renewal of purpose by reflecting on what Shaka Smart and VCU have achieved in this year’s Tournament so far. The Rams are the, um, defending CBI champions, you see, and Jones wouldn’t mind it one bit if his Knights followed in their footsteps next season.
3. We don’t see how it’s possible for people not to be on the Buzz Williams bandwagon after watching him the whole season, let alone just the first two games of the Tournament. Sporting News’ Mike DeCourcy has an interesting examination on how, by losing fourteen games during the season and doing a little homework, Marquette figured out how to win.
4. The overall number one seed that is Ohio State? Keep ’em. The Cinderella stories of VCU and Butler? All yours. Jimmer? No thanks. The other quarters of the bracket each have their allure, but Eric Prisbell of the Washington Post says if you want star power, you head to Anaheim and check out the West Region (San Diego State, Duke, Arizona, Connecticut).
5. Play word-association with any college basketball fan and say the word “efficiency.” By reflex, just about every respondent will fire back, “Wisconsin.” Is it just us, or do Badger supporters — and sometimes even the players and coaches — always seem to be asked to defend Bo Ryan’s style of play? There’s certainly no need for that, and we love Jordan Taylor’s take on the matter: “If we’re that boring, change the channel.” We like to compare Wisconsin basketball to a guitarist who prefers atmosphere over flash, and we really enjoyed the article from OnMilwaukee’s Andrew Wagner on the Badgers’ quest for substance over style — at least not the kind of style to which viewers are accustomed.

jstevrtc (547 Posts)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011 at 4:01 am by jstevrtc and is filed under morning 5, Regular Features. Tagged: arizona, bo ryan, butler, buzz williams, central florida, connecticut, donnie jones, duke, jimmer fredette, jordan taylor, marquette, ohio state, san diego state, steve fisher, vcu, wisconsin. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.