Running NCAA men's tournament thread 2012

This is pretty cool:

 

Yeah, on Florida State ... The turnover bug got them. That was the fatal flaw of that group. I really liked them heading into the tournament, but they just coughed it up at will in the final two minutes last night.

 

Did ESPN re-hire Roy Firestone to conduct the SLU post-game presser?

 

That lazy, telegraphed cross-court pass in the backcourt in the last two minutes of a tie game absolutely killed FSU.

 

I will say this - with the injury to Kendall Marshall, there is no excuse now for Kentucky not to win the national title and if they don't then all of the criticism of Calipari that is out there will be well deserved.

Had they advanced to the final and lost to Carolina, I don't think anyone could kill them for that because Carolina had the bigs, the talent, the experience etc., etc., to beat them legitimately (meaning, even Kentucky played well, Carolina could beat them).

Now the only way Kentucky loses is if they gag or have a bad night as there is no team left who has the combination of post play and scoring to beat them if they play their A game.

 

And as for Florida State - as I said at the start of this, I just don't trust teams coached by Leonard Hamilton because they have two qualities that generally get you beat in the NCAA Tournament:

1.) Offensively challenged
2.) Mentally challenged

They are some of the dumbest teams I've watched over the years and it is no surprise they are headed home.

 

This shit happens every time Greensboro hosts UNC in the tournament. Heels gobble up all the tickets, and bail after they play unless there's a chance they could watch Duke lose. (Like the Lehigh game.) Recall that the terrific Washington/Connecticut Sweet 16 game in 1998 was played in front of about a hundred people because the Carolina faithful wanted to check out the Greensboro nightlife.

 

Interesting that despite all the stuff about the little guys catching up - 14 of the 16 left are from power conferences.

 

I normally shy from this reasoning because, well, shit happens in the NCAA tournament...but you're right. Depth is a concern for the Kittens, but they'll be better than anyone they face from here on out.

 

Part of it might be the pod system. Had all eight teams in Greensboro belonged to the same half of the same region, a lot of UNC fans might have stuck around to scout the Lehigh-Xavier game because the Tar Heels would be playing the winner. Without that, it's two random teams hundreds of miles away with much smaller national footprints playing a late Sunday night game.

 

Zag, I'm not one to beat the mid-major drum, but one year is a pretty small sample size to discount an overall trend. Plus, you did have two No. 2 seeds going down in the first round (I refuse to call it the second round).

 

I think the issue isn't so much whether mid or low-major teams (and let's be honest, Norfolk State and Lehigh are resolutely low major) can pull a shocker. It's the idea that with major conference teams losing guys to the draft, the mid-majors with senior-heavy rosters are as likely to go far as the traditional powers in any given year. Other than schools that have evolved into hybrids like Gonzaga and Xavier, it still takes a lot of things to fall the right way for a smaller school to do it consistently (Butler fell off the map this year, and it's still too early to say with VCU).