Running 2023-24 NCAA Basketball Thread

Last night I watched a replay of Saturday's Tennessee-Kentucky game. The Vols looked very good, but the overwhelming impression I left with was that Kentucky is terrible defensively, an absolute disaster. That was as horribly undisciplined a team as I can recall ever seeing.

 

Rivalry explained

 

If the committee thinks Tennessee’s assignment to Memphis will generate more ticket sales than someone else might, then the Vols may be headed to Graceland.

 

Have no interest in playing in East Arkansas.

 

Ed Cooley's pretty great.

I'm not sure he'll turn around Georgetown.

 

A whole lot of Georgetown fans who were predicting immediate success under Cooley are now saying the rebuilding process will take years because Ewing left the program with nothing. I'm not sure I buy that in the age of transfers. This year's team is not a whole lot better than the previous two trainwrecks. Plus, Georgetown faces *very* uncertain stadium prospects if the Leonsis plan comes to fruition and the Caps/Wizards move to Virginia (I'm still not sure that it actually will). DC leaders have said that if the Caps/Wizards leave, they're not gonna want to deal with a huge arena that goes unused 300 days of the year, likely meaning it'll be a teardown. That would leave the Hoyas in dire shape, because their on-campus gym is a tiny relic and there is exactly zero chance of a new on-campus arena being built. And Georgetown struggles to draw at an arena that's three miles from campus; the prospect of playing even farther away at Ted's Virginia palace isn't great.

 

Cooley chose not - and properly so - to try and bring his best Providence players with him. (Kim English didn't hesitate in bringing Josh Oduro to Providence, for example.) Cooley was going to be limited in year one.

 

They can rent the Smith Center from GW. That would be rich beyond words.

 

They would rent Smith Center and then still be too chickenshit to play GW.

 

I'm willing to see what he can bring in for Year 2. It was obvious the cubboard was bare when he got there because Georgetown was that bad.

They've got three losses by a point, that OT loss to Providence. They could easily be 12-8 instead of 8-12

 

College basketball is a hard sell in DC. No excuse for Georgetown, GW, AU and George Mason not to play each other. Easy road trips and they might even generate some interest in local basketball.