Watching two games at once (take 2)

Well it was a rather lackluster first round. Only one upset occured, and if you read my previous posts, you know Kansas St.'s victory over USC wasn't that big of a surprise. UCLA rolled, West Virginia took care of Arizona, Notre Dame made sure George Mason didn't have another great run, Wisconsin got a pretty good game out of Cal St. Fullerton, Pitt didn't have a problem with Oral Roberts, Stanford easily dispatched Cornell, and A&M survived against BYU.

I was wrong about the Wazzu/Winthrop game, probably the only one that looking back at my bracket I shouldn't have picked. However it doesn't hurt me too much, as I've got Notre Dame winning the second round matchup, more on first round losing picks later. If Kent St. would have played 30 minutes, instead of 20 against UNLV, the Golden Flashes would be in the second round, but if you aren't ready for the NCAA tourney, then you don't deserve to move on. Baylor put up a good fight, but when ever you give up 90 points in a ball game it's tough to make any sort of a comeback. That's the pick I'm most disturbed about, because Baylor has fought and scrapped all season long, and recieved an emotional lift, being the final team mentioned in the selection process. They've coem a long ways since their scandal a few years ago, and I thought they would carry that regular season momentum all the way into the post season. Guess I should have read more into that Big 12 loss to Colorado.

Now onto Duke. The Blue Devils have an angel on their shoulder. They have to. A loss to 15th seeded Belmont would have sent shockwaves through college bball, much the same way App St. defeated Michigan a few months ago. Don't forget, coach K was within a whisker from taking the LA Lakers job not that long ago, and since then, his teams have greatly underachieved. Since their last National Title in 2001, Duke has made one final four (2003), but hasn't made it past the sweet 16 in the other 5 previous tournaments, including last years loss to VCU. Now people may say that's pretty good, and it is, as I'm sure 95% of college basketball programs would take that in a heartbeat. However Duke should be held to a higher standard, partly because of their history, but mostly becaues of the national media coverage. Compare the six year stretch from 2002-2007, to the six year stretch that began the Duke love affair (86-91). In that first six year stretch Duke made five Final Fours, three Title games, and one National Championship. However during that period of time in the late 80's in early 90's Duke was a #1 seed just one time (1986). Compare that to this most recent six year run, and Duke has been a #1 seed 4 times, yet has just one Final Four to their credit. If you haven't figured it out by now, it means that Duke is OVERRATED, and last night's game, along with last years loss to VCU proved it.

I'm not a Duke hater, I enjoy watching their style of play. Coach K has always taken great basketball players, and for the most part, great role models. He may not be the classiest coach when at gametime, but off the court he is a good face for the sport. He's helped in bringing college basketball and the NCAA tourney into the national conscience, and he should be applauded for all of it. Anyone think it's any coincidence that before Duke became this nationdwide media darling, they struggled to get #1 seeds in the tourney, but since then the selection committee bends over backwards to get them set up for the Final Four? It's no coincidence, the committee knows exactly what they are doing. All that being said, I've got Duke losing in the second round, and fully expect that to happen, barring ACC ref's calling Saturday's game against WVU.

Now onto today's games. Most important game of the day in terms of brackets is 'Nova and Clemson. I chose 'Nova in this game, and have them in the sweet 16, so that will be the one I'll have my eye on the most, along with the Drake WKU game, as the Bulldogs are also in my sweet 16. Everything else should go chalk, and if for some reason Miami beat St. Mary's, or Gonzaga beats Davidson, or Oklahoma beats St. Joe's, I'm not going to worry about it that much. Reason is, my philosphy once the tourney begins, and I have all my selection made, that I only care about my sweet 16 and elite 8 teams winning. Like I said in an earlier post, it's nice to get that #15 beating a #2 correct, if you're lucky, but it won't mean much if you have two of your elite 8 teams losing in the first round. The pools are won and loss in the elite 8, and the longer you can have your 8 teams in tact the better. Yesterday I got three games wrong, good thing is, all three of those teams were losing in the second round.

Anyways, that's all for now. I'll actually get to watch basketball all afternoon and evening for a change. Enjoy the games.