As part of our ongoing NCAA Tournament coverage, RTC is unveiling a detailed look at each of the Final Four teams throughout the week. Kentucky and UConn have already released. Today: Wisconsin.

In the days between Selection Sunday and the actual start of the NCAA Tournament, Wisconsin flew under the radar. In a West Region lacking the punch of, say, the loaded Midwest Region, the #2 seed was picked by just 20 percent of ESPN.com‘s bracket entrants to advance to the Final Four, while nearly half of those brackets instead favoring Arizona. But after riding the a little home-cooking through the Milwaukee pod in the first weekend then taking care of business in Anaheim against two of the hottest teams in the nation (Baylor and Arizona), it is the Badgers that are left standing, delivering the first Division I Final Four in Bo Ryan‘s successful career.

Wisconsin Earned Its Third Final Four Appearance With A Dramatic Win Over Arizona On Saturday (Jae C. Hong, AP Photo)

Pre-NCAA Tournament Capsule. Coming into the season, expectations were somewhat measured for the Badgers. With last year’s frontcourt stalwarts Ryan Evans, Jarred Berggren and Mike Bruesewitz all having used up their collegiate eligibility, Ryan was going to have to rely more on his veteran backcourt of sophomore Sam Dekker and some additional to-be-determined frontcourt players. Very early in the season, we got a big hint as to which of those candidates had the most potential, as junior seven-footer Frank Kaminsky, after scoring only 10 points in his first two games, dropped 43 points on just 19 field goal attempts in the Badgers’ fourth game of the season. From that point forward, Kaminsky regularly scored in double-figures for Wisconsin, and he did so in a highly-efficient manner. Meanwhile, in fewer minutes, freshman big man Nigel Hayes was also establishing himself as a force to be reckoned with, turning a preseason question mark into a serious strength for Ryan’s club.  With the backcourt of Traevon Jackson, Ben Brust and Josh Gasser locked into their roles and Dekker taking the obvious next step in his development, Wisconsin got off to a great start, winning its first 16 games of the season and jumping into the national top five. Playing with more pace and offensive punch than they had in previous years under Ryan, the Badgers were recognized roundly as maybe the coach’s best bet at a Final Four.

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It’s Final Four week and as all of the fans and media anxiously await for the Saturday evening to arrive, the on-air crew at Turner Sports is preparing to broadcast its first-ever national semifinals. We all know and love Ernie Johnson for the tremendously entertaining work he does on the best sports show on television, Inside the NBA, but during this upcoming weekend he will again cross over into our world as the primary NCAA host for the Final Four (TBS) and the National Championship Game (CBS). In this special Rush the Takes podblast, Ernie discusses how he and colleagues Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith prepare for their annual foray into the NCAA Tournament, what Turner has in store for the Final Four with its innovative “Teamcasts,” and whether RTC might be the long-awaited sponsorship opportunity for EJ’s Neat-O Stat of the Night. Oh, and he may have also done a Chuck and Shaq impression or two. It’s fantastic stuff, and we really hope you give it a listen.

Ernie Johnson Spoke With Us About the Upcoming Final Four

Be sure to add the RTC Podcast to your lineup on iTunes so that you’ll get all of our ongoing coverage throughout the NCAA Tournament.

Rush the Court is releasing its season superlatives throughout this week. Our RTC All-America teams were released on Tuesday, while our National Coach of the Year came out yesterday, and our National Player of the Year is below.

In this era of so many talented one-and-done players, it can be viewed as a bit of a career achievement award when a senior earns National Player of the Year honors. While that could be the case for our unanimous RTC National Player of the Year who put together a legendary four-year run in Omaha, Creighton senior Doug McDermott saved his best for his final season in a Bluejays uniform. The forward led the nation in scoring at 26.9 points per game, while shooting 52.6 percent from the field on an astonishing 627 field goal attempts. In an offense centered around McDermott’s creative scoring acumen, Creighton averaged 79.5 points per contest, shot 49.9 percent from the field, and led the country with a stellar 42.1 percent mark from the three-point line. Needless to say, the Bluejays were an explosive group all season with our NPOY McDermott leading that charge.

McDermott’s National Player of the Year honor is meant to memorialize his senior season accomplishments, but it would be inappropriate not to mention all the career milestones he also achieved during the campaign. On March 8 in his Senior Night game against Providence, McDermott exploded for a career-best 45 points, and in the process, he became the eighth player in college basketball history to surpass 3,000 career points. By the end of the season, McDermott had compiled a total of 3,150 career points, which is good for fifth on the all-time list. Not too shabby for a kid from Ames, Iowa, who didn’t have a bunch of great offers coming out of high school. During the postseason award circuit, “Dougie McBuckets” became the first player since Patrick Ewing and Wayman Tisdale in 1985 to be named to three straight AP All-American first teams. It’s been a tremendous career for the Bluejay.

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March Madness is finally upon us, and we here at RTC are here to make everything a little bit easier for you. From the First Four until One Shining Moment, we’ll be dropping daily tidbits of knowledge regarding the teams in each region.

Wisconsin 

• In a family full of athletes, it’s about time Wisconsin’s Frank Kaminsky has started to dominate. After his sister was named Missouri Valley Freshman of the Year in volleyball, Frank Kaminsky Sr. noted, proudly: “I knew it was just a matter of time before he caught up.”
• Frank Kaminsky was nothing more than a role player during his first two years in Madison, but this season he has emerged as Wisconsin’s best player. To many, Kaminsky always had the skills to succeed, but needed to realize how good he was. “He became much more confident over the course of that playoff run,” Benet [Kaminsky’s high school] coach Gene Heidkamp said. “That’s the big thing with Frank. He had the skill set, the size and the ability, but he was hard on himself and he wasn’t always confident. Once he started feeling good about himself after that 39-point game, he just kind of took off from there.”
• Though Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan has been up north for the entirety of his college coaching career, his Philly roots are what has driven much of his coaching style. Ryan is “very tough-minded. And I think that whole thing in terms of street toughness, the understanding that there’s an appreciation for what you have. The willingness to never quit, never give up,” [Wisconsin associate head coach Greg] Gard said. “He came from a family that had limited resources financially, so you have an appreciation for what it takes; what hard work really is.”
• A Sheboygan, Wisconsin, native, sophomore Sam Dekker is especially proud to be leading his hometown team to the Final Four. “Sheboygan is a big, big Wisconsin Badger-rooting city, and I was always a big Badger fan growing up,” Dekker said Monday. “So to be in this situation, have the jersey, is really special to me and is special to a lot of people back home.”
• Frank Kaminsky may be Wisconsin’s star, but point guard Traevon Jackson has been the Badgers’ “unsung hero,” in the words of TBS analyst Steve Kerr. Kerr would go on to say that “He [Jackson] has hit a ton of big shots in his career. He was huge against Arizona. Not only offensively, but his toughness and his leadership.”
• Kentucky may be the blueblood in Saturday’s Final Four match-up, but Wisconsin struck first, winning its first National Championship in 1941, seven years before the Wildcats won its first of eight titles.

Kentucky

• Sometimes it’s the Harrison Twins; sometimes it’s Julius Randle; heck, last week it even was Marcus Lee. For Kentucky, it will be interesting to see who its X-factor will be on Saturday.
• Kentucky head coach John Calipari is one of the best in the business, but for some of his freshmen, what has made him great this season isn’t what he has does but rather what he hasn’t done. Calipari has been giving his guys more and more freedom, and even let freshman Julius Randle call a play last weekend. In the words of Randle’s high school coach, Chris Mayberry, “That’s how he [Randle] plays his best basketball, is to have the freedom to do some things. He’s going to make some mistakes, but he can do so many good things.”
• John Calipari doesn’t attribute his team’s postseason turnaround to the media scrutiny it faced, but rather to maturing as a team. Calipari noted, “But that really takes time when you’re playing seven freshmen in your top eight, and each of them scored 25 points a game in high school, that you must do less, and that would mean more for you. So it’s a process. What anybody said or wrote had no bearing on us.”
• A probable top five pick in the upcoming NBA Draft, Kentucky freshman Julius Randle is most likely a one-and-done player. However, he’s hoping that doesn’t happen. Instead, Randle hopes to be a “One Championship and Done.”
• Kentucky is seemingly where it belongs, but this season, it didn’t reach the Final Four in traditional Kentucky fashion. The Wildcats are hoping that this unconventional path will make them a tougher out this weekend. In the words of Calipari, “But they [the Wildcats] withstood it. They were under immense fire. They never wavered. They believed in the leadership… So that is a great story of ‘How in the world did you guys overcome that?’ Well, it made us stronger. It made us tougher.”
• Much of Kentucky’s emergence over the last month can be attributed to its improved three-point shooting. Freshman James Young, one of UK’s top snipers at 35 percent from beyond the arc, credits point guard Andrew Harrison rather than the shooters themselves for the improvement. “It’s making it a lot more fun for us because he’s penetrating more and the defense is all collapsing. So we got a lot more wide-open shots and just us staying focused is really helping us,” said Young. “We’re shooting with a lot more confidence than we have been and we’re getting a lot of extra shots up, coming in each day shooting at least 30 minutes worth. And really just staying confident with all our shots.”

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This was a really fun RTC Podcast. In this, our Final Four Preview Edition, the guys spend the first half of the show revisiting many of our takes from the preseason and throughout the season on each of the Final Four teams: Florida, UConn, Wisconsin and Kentucky. It’s compelling stuff, both in how spot on we could be about these teams at certain points of the season, and how off we could also be at others. We then broke down the two upcoming games Saturday and revisited the #cheerfortheears meme, the reward of which will be collected on Friday night in the great city of Dallas. The full rundown is below. Join us!

Four Teams Remain

Be sure to add the RTC Podcast to your lineup on iTunes so that you’ll get all of our ongoing coverage throughout the NCAA Tournament.

• 0:00-8:48 – Trip Down Memory Lane: Florida
• 8:48-17:45 – Trip Down Memory Lane: UConn
• 17:45-24:36 – Trip Down Memory Lane: Wisconsin
• 24:36-36:13 – Trip Down Memory Lane: Kentucky
• 36:13-39:00 – Reflecting on the Archive Carnage
• 39:00-44:57 – UConn vs. Florida Preview
• 44:57-50:30 – Wisconsin vs. Kentucky Preview
• 50:30-52:26 – #CheerForTheEars

1. Fans in the AAC can start working on their cell phone and texting jokes as Houston hired Kelvin Sampson to be its next coach. Sampson was successful at both Oklahoma and Indiana before a variety of issues that have been documented in great detail before derailed him leading to a five-year show-cause penalty in 2008. Sampson has spent the last six years floating between jobs in the NBA and was serving as an assistant for the Houston Rockets so he might not even have to move for his new job although he might be moving into a bigger house with the upgrade in his salary. Much like the Bruce Pearl hire this has to be considered a huge get for the program, but we have to wonder how long he will stay there..
2. After what has to be considered a successful first season for Steve Alford things are looking pretty good at UCLA. However, accusations by a spurned sports agent that he provided former Bruin Tyler Honeycutt with impermissible benefits could halt that progress. The school had previously investigated the matter and said that the NCAA ruled the case closed, but with the new documentation they will have to investigate the matter further. This is the second such incident involving UCLA in the past two years (Shabazz Muhammad being the more well-known case), but we wouldn’t consider it an issue with the school. Our bigger question is why do these issues typically arise with mid-level players and not the real stars?
3. With many of the bigger jobs being filled or in the process of being filled the attention on the coaching carousel shifts to the mid-tier schools. One example of this is North Carolina Central coach LeVelle Morton, who is reportedly interviewing at Florida Atlantic and Marshall. Morton has led the Eagles to better records in each of his five seasons culminating in a NCAA Tournament appearance this season. His move might not move the needle nationally, but it could lead him to an even bigger job in the future.
4. Chane Behanan cannot seem to avoid getting in trouble. The former Louisville forward, who was kicked off the team for marijuana use, has already enrolled at Colorado State, but took a trip back to Louisville this week. At 1 AM on Wednesday morning he was cited, but not arrested for marijuana possession after a police officer smelled marijuana in a car in which Behanan was a passenger. Behanan reportedly admitted to having a marijuana cigarette. Although he was not arrested he will have a court date later this month. Avoiding the whole social discussion regarding the legalization of marijuana one has to question Behanan’s maturity at this point for getting arrested for something after he has already been through so much.
5. Next season could be a rough one for Missouri after Jabari Brown announced that he would enter the NBA Draft. Brown joins fellow junior Jordan Clarkson in potentially leaving Missouri early although both could withdraw their names from the Draft by April 15 depending on what they hear. Brown was a first-team All-SEC player this season and led the conference in scoring at 19.9 points per game. Like Clarkson, Brown is also projected to be a second-round pick so it would seem to make sense for him to return, but it would not be the first time that we have seen a player leave early for that type of fate.

As part of our ongoing NCAA Tournament coverage, RTC is unveiling a detailed look at each of the Final Four teams throughout the week. Kentucky has already released. Today: UConn. Brian Otskey (@botskey) is the NCAA Tournament’s East Region correspondent.

Where did this come from? I am not sure anyone out there had this #7 seed, which suffered a humiliating 81-48 defeat at Louisville on March 8, as a Final Four contender. Yet here they are. The Connecticut Huskies are here, and boy, did they earn it. After trailing Saint Joseph’s for a large portion of its opening round game, Connecticut manhandled Villanova to get to Madison Square Garden where it then dispatched Iowa State and Michigan State in thrilling fashion over the weekend. The Huskies are the underdog team in Arlington this week, but make no mistake; they too have a chance to win a pair of games at Jerry World.

Regardless of how they got here, Shabazz Napier and UConn are now as dangerous as ever. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Pre-Tournament Capsule. Connecticut played a mediocre non-conference schedule this season as games against Maryland, Boston College, Indiana and Washington looked good on paper but those teams all turned out to be not so good after all. The Huskies, as you will hear about a lot this week, hosted Florida on December 2 at Gampel Pavilion, a game they won thanks to a freakish last-second play. Shabazz Napier’s first shot attempt was so poor it hit the backboard and bounced back to him where he proceeded to drain an open jumper to hand the Gators their second loss of the season. Florida has not lost another game since then. Who had that game as a Final Four preview at the time? Nobody. Kevin Ollie’s team hosted Stanford a week before Christmas in another key non-conference game. This was a strange contest as the Huskies built a 13-point lead with 16:48 to play but could only manage an astounding eight points over the rest of the way in falling by two points to the Cardinal. Conference play saw the Huskies get off to a slow 0-2 start before returning home for a non-conference tilt against Harvard, which they won. Including the Harvard game, Connecticut won 13 of its next 15 games before a humiliating 81-48 defeat at Louisville on the final day of the regular season. The Huskies were swept by SMU and Louisville, but took two of three against Cincinnati (including a win in the AAC Tournament) and swept Memphis (three games). In the American championship game, Connecticut fell to Louisville for the third time this season. A 26-8 (12-6) record was good enough for this team to earn a #7 seed from the Selection Committee.

How They Got Here. For all intents and purposes, Connecticut should have lost to St. Joe’s in the #7/#10 game. Ken Pomeroy, in his game recap, gave the Huskies just a 16.3 percent chance of winning (down three with 49 seconds left). However, the Huskies survived and advanced thanks to tremendous rebounding and Amida Brimah’s three-point play. In fact, rebounding has been one of the main reasons why the Huskies are in this position right now. A poor rebounding team all year long has outboarded two of its four NCAA Tournament opponents and been competitive on the boards in those other games, including Sunday against fearsome Michigan State where Connecticut was +1 on the offensive glass and only -2 overall. After knocking off the Hawks, the team’s offense turned into the Napier show as he absolutely steamrolled Villanova before setting his sights on Iowa State and Michigan State in front of what was, for the most part, a jubilant home crowd at the Garden. This home court advantage undoubtedly helped the Huskies (the players admitted as much), but do not be fooled. This team is legitimate, having now taken out the #2, #3, and #4 seeds in the East Region.

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When it comes to wrapping up a college basketball season, I have a hard time doing an All-American team, because, for one, it just seems hard to narrow down four and a half months of basketball to just five names (or even 10 or 15 if you add a second or third team). Instead, in the interests of recognizing more of the players that filled up my brain this season, what I’ll do here today is take all 37 possible uniform numbers (only the digits zero through five are possible uniform numbers in NCAA basketball, to aid referees in calling fouls), and pick one player for each number. Note that I am not always going to pick just the best player here. My own prejudices and likes/dislikes will factor in, plus I want to be able to pick a guy that I will remember most from this season. In the case of a tie, a senior will get the nod. Here is my list of Players of the Year by jersey numbers.

0 – Ryan Watkins, Sr, Boise – His team didn’t even make the NCAA Tournament, but Watkins’ senior season was one to remember. The nation’s best offensive rebounder for the second year in a row, Watkins’ efficient offense and tough defense was a constant for a Broncos team that underachieved elsewhere.

00 – Royce O’Neale, Jr, Baylor – As far as the scorekeeper is concerned, a single zero and a double zero are the same number, but what fun is that? The transfer from Denver was anything but a big zero for the Bears this season, playing a big role for Scott Drew as an inside-outside threat and another big body in the Baylor zone.

Jabari Parker May Leave Duke Without So Much As A Single NCAA Tournament Win, But He Was Spectacular Offensively For The Blue Devils This Year
(Photo: Ethan Hyman)

1 – Jabari Parker, Fr, Duke – After a quick nod to George Washington’s guard Maurice Creek, who bounced back from a career severely hampered by numerous injuries to turn in an inspiring senior season, we’ll acknowledge the fact that when we look back on 2013-14, Parker will be the guy who wore a #1 that we’ll remember most vividly. In what will likely be his lone season in Durham, he put his vast array of skills on display, leading his team in points, rebounds, blocks and sheer number of spectacular plays.

2 – Russ Smith, Sr, Louisville – A deep number with candidates ranging from big guys Sim Bhullar and Khem Birch to guards like Xavier Thames and Briante Weber, the nod here is a no-brainer. Smith’s career under Rick Pitino has been a whirlwind. After barely playing his freshman year, he earned big minutes as a sophomore only to show himself as a inveterate gunner who never saw a shot he didn’t like. But in his junior and senior seasons, he actually turned into a – gasp! – highly efficient offensive player. His three-point shooting improved every year and his game off the bounce was always explosive. And defensively? For the past two years, he’s been the best perimeter defender in America. Read the rest of this entry »

Seven Sweet Scoops is a weekly column by Sean Moran, the RTC recruiting guru. Once a week he will bring you seven notes from the high-stakes world of college basketball recruiting. We also encourage you to check out his contributions at The Intentional Foul, dedicated to recruiting coverage and analysis. You can also follow Sean at his Twitter account @Seanmohoops for up-to-date news from the high school and college hoops scene. If you have any suggestions as to areas we are missing or different things you would like to see, please let us know at rushthecourt@yahoo.com.

Note: Scout.com used for all player rankings.

Tonight the top high school players in the country gather to participate in the 37th annual McDonald’s All-American game held at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois. Twenty-four of the top ranked high school seniors will provide the college basketball world with a glimpse of what can be expected from the next touted class of youngsters on ESPN at 9:30 PM ET. The high school class of 2014 might not have the star power similar to last year in a game that featured the likes of Andrew Wiggins, Julius Randle, Jabari Parker and Aaron Gordon, but there are still several good storylines and match-ups to keep an eye on during tonight’s contest.

1. Chicago Natives At Home

There are three McDonald’s All-Americans from Chicago this year, including two of the top five players in the country. Five-star center Jahlil Okafor and five-star power forward Cliff Alexander will suit up for the East and West squads, respectively. The two played together on the AAU circuit this past summer and faced off in high school action several times over the last three years. Okafor is considered the No. 1 player in the country and is headed to Duke next year, while Alexander is ranked No. 5 and has committed to Kansas. Alexander put together a monster senior campaign, but it was Okafor who won the Illinois state title. Okafor and Alexander excel with different styles although they are both low post scorers. The 6’11” Okafor has the more refined post game and is almost impossible to stop in a one-on-one situation while Alexander is a DeAndre Jordan clone who looks to dunk and block everything in sight. While these two might not match up in tonight’s game, you can be certain that they will both have the hometown crowd on their feet. To go along with the Windy City twin towers, there is also diminutive 5’9” point guard Tyler Ulis (#29). The four-star prospect is headed to Kentucky and will be the quickest player on the court. The floor general is great at beating his man off the dribble and creating easy shots for his teammates. Ulis will suit up on the East squad along with Okafor, while Alexander will play for the West.

It doesn't matter who comes back for Kentucky, I don't know how they could keep Tyler Ulis off the floor. He's a leader w/ terrific vision.

— Evan Daniels (@EvanDaniels) April 1, 2014

2. Where Will Myles Turner Go?

There is only one prospect in the game that remains uncommitted and he is 7’0” center Myles Turner, who is also the No. 2 ranked recruit in the country. This time last year the Texas native wasn’t even considered a top 100 player, but after a meteoric rise last summer he is now the hottest commodity in high school. Turner just recently took an official visit to Texas after previously visiting Ohio State, Duke, Oklahoma State and Kansas. He has also taken unofficial visits to SMU and Texas A&M, and is also reportedly considering Arizona and Kentucky. It’s been a whirlwind journey for Turner, who plans to sit down with his advisers and family after the Jordan Brand Classic to discuss his choice of suitors.

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The lasting takeaway from the tournament that began UConn’s 2010-11 season is the same memory that defined the NCAA Tournament that ended it: Kemba Walker’s brilliance. The year of Kemba may have reached a crescendo in March and early April three years ago, but it began back in November 2010, when Walker’s three-day, 90-point bender propelled the unranked Huskies to an unexpected Maui Invitational title. Lost within that preseason title run was our then-insignificant introduction to Connecticut freshman Shabazz Napier. The Massachusetts native has never been short on confidence, but back then, his self-assurance served only to speed up the game around him. Napier went 7-of-22 from the field in Maui, committed more turnovers than assists, and was a largely inconsequential element of the Huskies’ early-season championship run.

UConn Is Headed Back To The Final Four, In No Small Thanks To Their Experienced, Mature Floor General Shabazz Napier

Of course, almost any Husky not named Kemba could have fallen into that category – both in Maui and beyond — but Napier’s opening act at the school was a representative dose of a freshman season in which reckless play and poor decision-making turned him into quite the efficiency drain. On the season, Napier shot under 33 percent from three-point range, made just 42 percent of his two-point attempts, and posted an astronomically high turnover rate of 22.3 percent. For the sake of reference, the freshman’s ball-dominating teammate, Walker, had a turnover rate nearly half that of Napier that season (11.6 %). Comparisons to NPOYs aren’t always the fairest, but either way, the statistical breakdown of Napier’s freshman year is incapable of hiding the immaturity that he brought with him to Storrs. He ended that season as a national champion and a key piece of UConn’s future, but significant refinement was needed for Napier to ever realize his potential.

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