Running 2010-11 BKC thread

Yeah, Brogdon is supposed to be nice. Paul Jesperson might be able to contribute, too, as a bomber from the wing. It's a shame they play the same position as UVa's two freshman starters.

 

Sounds like UVa overloaded on shooters. Billy Baron (from my alma mater) went from 19 points on opening night to the end of the bench, and consequently rejoined dad at URI. Given that a couple guys quit during last season, something's up with Bennett.

 

Lots of coaches have guys transfer the first year or two. Bill Self had a bunch leave at Kansas and it all worked out pretty well for him. Of the guys that left last year, one didn't want to go to class and the other didn't fit the new system. Baron leaving is probably a case of the six-man freshman class being one too many. They do have a lot of wing players, but Farrakhan graduating will free up a lot of playing time.

 

Selection committee is going to have a hell of a time sorting who's in and who's out in Conference USA. Memphis beat UAB tonight 62-58 and Southern Miss waxed UTEP 64-51, which leaves us with this:

Memphis 20-6, 8-3
UTEP 19-6, 7-3
USM 19-6, 8-4
UAB 18-7, 8-4

My guess is Memphis is in as an at-large, and whichever of the other three gets the furthest in the tournament (or wins it outright) gets a second bid. Although C-USA is better this year than it has been in awhile, it still doesn't look like more than a two-bid league.

 

Unless they plotz in the tournament, it's a sin if UAB gets screwed.

 

Also, this team lives and dies by the 3. That won't be the case if they have two scorers inside next year. Right now the talent available can't put together a good 40 minutes, but they've shown signs of being decent, building big leads against UNC and at Duke. They led in the second half at Boston College and beat VT and Minnesota.

 

Mike Davis is 0-for-the-C-USA Tournament. A plotz is entirely possible.

 

By my reckoning, if USM is 25-8 or, better yet, 26-7 after the CUSA Tournament, I don't see any way they don't deserve an at-large. That would allow them one road loss (at UCF or at Tulsa) and a loss in the tournament finals, especially if it's Memphis, the rest of the way. They are very capable of managing that.

Of course, they are also very capable of taking the decision out of the committee's hand by either winning the tournament or falling on their face. However, Larry Eustachy's teams at Southern have generally played pretty well in the tournament.

 

Pitt loses. Notre Dame falls. And now Nebraska beats Texas. Three of top four teams have lost this week and four of the top seven. Wow.

 

Hokies unwilling to give up their yearly top regional NIT seed.

 

When Virginia Tech does that in Charlottesville, it's hard to feel for Seth Greenberg, no matter how much he barks about getting the cold shoulder from the selection committee. And I'm otherwise a big Greenberg fan.

 

I'm as big a Wahoo fanboi as there is on this board, and I would NEVER have predicted that result. I wouldn't have predicted it with 10 minutes left, when UVa was doing its standard "Get a lead, then take the air out of the ball, don't score for 10 minutes and lose" move.

I'm looking forward to Selection Sunday, when they show the graphics about the bubble teams and see "at Virginia, Virginia" under "bad losses" for the Hokies.

Also have to share my brother-in-law's gambling woes here. He had a three-game bet, straight up, with the following picks, in the order of when the games finished:

St. John's over Pitt
UVa over VT
and...Tennessee over Georgia. Whoops.