MARCH MADNESS is upon us, who are your final four teams?
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MARCH MADNESS is upon us, who are your final four teams?
The NCAA basketball rendevous is once again upon us. The brackets just came out today and this promises to be a very competitive tournament as teams gets ready to win the coveted title as NCAA Champion. This time of the year is my favorite and it is my favorite sporting event besides the World Cup soccer.
Who are your final four teams? Have you filled out your brackets already? Bear in mind that there could be plenty of upsets.
My final four teams are:
Stanford
Xavier
Duke
Oklahoma State
Who are your final four teams? Have you filled out your brackets already? Bear in mind that there could be plenty of upsets.
My final four teams are:
Stanford
Xavier
Duke
Oklahoma State
Nigeria shall wallop the dormitable lions
-
furiously frank
- Eaglet
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One of my final 4 teams have been knocked out...Stanford are out. They got beaten by Alabama. My bracket is getting messed up as a result of unpredictability of the tournament. Any team can rise and beat anybody.
Xavier, Oklahoma State, Kansas and Duke are still in the race on my bracket.
Xavier, Oklahoma State, Kansas and Duke are still in the race on my bracket.
Nigeria shall wallop the dormitable lions
-
theYemster
- Eaglet
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kENTUCKY OHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! Those rednecks are going to lynch Tubby Smith 
"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.....
"“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”
MLK.
"“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”
MLK.
GT BABY............I just wish Chris Bosh was around this year, then the Jackets would have cruised through everyone.
But those boys can play some ball and with BJ Elder returning on a healthy heel then they will definitely saddle those rednecks from Oklahoma state
But those boys can play some ball and with BJ Elder returning on a healthy heel then they will definitely saddle those rednecks from Oklahoma state
"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.....
"“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”
MLK.
"“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”
MLK.
-
furiously frank
- Eaglet
- Posts: 13124
- Joined: Mon Dec 22, 2003 7:18 pm
Surging Huskies Get Back Their Bite
Talented and Deep, U-Conn. Eyes a Title
By Eric Prisbell
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 1, 2004; Page D01
PHOENIX -- At the start of the season, Connecticut was the toast of college basketball. The Huskies appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated and Slam magazine, the players' favorite, and received all but five first-place votes in the Associated Press preseason poll.
By mid-February, U-Conn. was underwhelming after losing two straight Big East Conference road games. Coach Jim Calhoun said his players were too nice and questioned their toughness. Sports Illustrated's Web site even called the Huskies one of eight teams that definitely would not win the national championship.
Now, U-Conn. has come full circle. The Huskies are more than just the favorite to capture their second title in San Antonio in the next week.
Their dominance so far in the NCAA tournament has earned them comparisons to some of the most talented teams in the past decade.
"The bandwagon needs new springs," Calhoun said. "So many people have been coming off and on it, the wagon has been getting a little creaky."
The Huskies (31-6) have won seven straight games since the regular season ended, and only two -- Notre Dame and Pittsburgh -- have been by fewer than 16 points. Every facet of the Huskies' attack and defense appears to be peaking as April arrives.
While the three other Final Four participants, Duke, Oklahoma State and Georgia Tech, have had superb seasons -- there is no Cinderella team -- clearly a separation exists between the Huskies and the others.
"I think they are the best team because they have more ways to beat the other teams than anybody else," said Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski, whose team will face U-Conn. on Saturday. "They can beat you with their defense. They can beat you with their rebounding. They can beat you with their inside game. They can beat you with their outside shooting, and they can beat you with driving. And they have the experience. All of us have some of those but not all of them."
The most frightening aspect perhaps is U-Conn.'s defense, which has been stifling much of the season -- the Huskies led the nation in field goal percentage defense -- but was upstaged by U-Conn.'s star-powered offense.
In the postseason, however, the defense has only intensified. U-Conn. didn't allow its first two NCAA tournament opponents -- Vermont and DePaul -- to shoot better than 33.9 percent. And in its past two games, the Huskies harassed Vanderbilt star Matt Freije into missing 15 shots and dug Alabama into a 24-point halftime deficit.
The emergence of Rashad Anderson poses another threat. Anderson has started 10 of the past 11 games after Denham Brown was slowed because of tendinitis in his left knee. Calhoun calls Anderson instant offense, someone who seemingly "takes his first shot from the scorer's table" before he checks in.
The Huskies have trailed only once, against Pittsburgh in the Big East final, since Anderson was inserted into the starting lineup. His three-point shooting -- he made all six of his first-half attempts against Alabama -- turned the regional final into a rout.
Even if Anderson is cold and U-Conn.'s defense is porous, teams must contend with four bodies that are 6 feet 10 or taller and fairly mobile. The group of Emeka Okafor, Josh Boone, Charlie Villanueva and Hilton Armstrong comes at teams in waves both defensively and offensively.
Throughout the tournament, opponents hoped to dupe U-Conn.'s big men with pump-fakes down low and provoke them into early foul trouble. What Calhoun knew teams could not adequately prepare for was the unrelenting nature of the foursome.
"It gets you a little tired," Alabama's Chuck Davis said, "going up against guys like that when they are always fresh off the bench when they have that many guys that size."
The most imposing, of course, is shot-blocking maven Okafor, when healthy. The junior, who could be the top pick in June's NBA draft, not only changes an opponent's plan of attack, but he also allows his guards some relaxation on defense.
"Say you get beat on defense, you can send your guy to Emeka," Anderson said. "You don't have Coach yelling down your neck, 'Rashad, what are you doing?' . . . Opposing offensive players are scared to go to the basket on his side."
A true indication of the Huskies' supremacy lies in the fact that few can agree on their biggest threat. While some coaches say it's the rotating group of post players, others pinpoint the back-court tandem of experienced players Ben Gordon and Taliek Brown.
"The most difficult thing in playing U-Conn. is the speed of their transition game and their guards," Vanderbilt Coach Kevin Stallings said. "It is difficult to body up against them because the strength of the team and how fast they are. When you are able to guard them outside, they can take you down low; when you are forced to help out on the dribble and they hit the outside guys for shots, then all hell breaks loose."
Gordon and Brown can handle the ball. Gordon can break down defenders and create his own shot on the perimeter and near the basket after penetrating. Brown, whom Calhoun calls one of the "gutsiest, greediest" players he has coached, controls a game at times nearly without flaw. Against Alabama, the senior had 10 assists and only one turnover.
After his team lost to U-Conn. in Phoenix, Alabama Coach Mark Gottfried said he was a "believer," and that the Huskies are the strongest team he has seen since he was a UCLA assistant in 1995 and played a Ray Allen-led U-Conn. team.
While a San Antonio coronation is not quite inevitable for the Huskies, it feels like November again in Storrs, Conn.
"I would have been disappointed in myself," Calhoun said, "if I couldn't take this talent, these types of people who are so goal oriented, to the Final Four."
Staff writer Barry Svrluga contributed to this report.
Talented and Deep, U-Conn. Eyes a Title
By Eric Prisbell
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 1, 2004; Page D01
PHOENIX -- At the start of the season, Connecticut was the toast of college basketball. The Huskies appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated and Slam magazine, the players' favorite, and received all but five first-place votes in the Associated Press preseason poll.
By mid-February, U-Conn. was underwhelming after losing two straight Big East Conference road games. Coach Jim Calhoun said his players were too nice and questioned their toughness. Sports Illustrated's Web site even called the Huskies one of eight teams that definitely would not win the national championship.
Now, U-Conn. has come full circle. The Huskies are more than just the favorite to capture their second title in San Antonio in the next week.
Their dominance so far in the NCAA tournament has earned them comparisons to some of the most talented teams in the past decade.
"The bandwagon needs new springs," Calhoun said. "So many people have been coming off and on it, the wagon has been getting a little creaky."
The Huskies (31-6) have won seven straight games since the regular season ended, and only two -- Notre Dame and Pittsburgh -- have been by fewer than 16 points. Every facet of the Huskies' attack and defense appears to be peaking as April arrives.
While the three other Final Four participants, Duke, Oklahoma State and Georgia Tech, have had superb seasons -- there is no Cinderella team -- clearly a separation exists between the Huskies and the others.
"I think they are the best team because they have more ways to beat the other teams than anybody else," said Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski, whose team will face U-Conn. on Saturday. "They can beat you with their defense. They can beat you with their rebounding. They can beat you with their inside game. They can beat you with their outside shooting, and they can beat you with driving. And they have the experience. All of us have some of those but not all of them."
The most frightening aspect perhaps is U-Conn.'s defense, which has been stifling much of the season -- the Huskies led the nation in field goal percentage defense -- but was upstaged by U-Conn.'s star-powered offense.
In the postseason, however, the defense has only intensified. U-Conn. didn't allow its first two NCAA tournament opponents -- Vermont and DePaul -- to shoot better than 33.9 percent. And in its past two games, the Huskies harassed Vanderbilt star Matt Freije into missing 15 shots and dug Alabama into a 24-point halftime deficit.
The emergence of Rashad Anderson poses another threat. Anderson has started 10 of the past 11 games after Denham Brown was slowed because of tendinitis in his left knee. Calhoun calls Anderson instant offense, someone who seemingly "takes his first shot from the scorer's table" before he checks in.
The Huskies have trailed only once, against Pittsburgh in the Big East final, since Anderson was inserted into the starting lineup. His three-point shooting -- he made all six of his first-half attempts against Alabama -- turned the regional final into a rout.
Even if Anderson is cold and U-Conn.'s defense is porous, teams must contend with four bodies that are 6 feet 10 or taller and fairly mobile. The group of Emeka Okafor, Josh Boone, Charlie Villanueva and Hilton Armstrong comes at teams in waves both defensively and offensively.
Throughout the tournament, opponents hoped to dupe U-Conn.'s big men with pump-fakes down low and provoke them into early foul trouble. What Calhoun knew teams could not adequately prepare for was the unrelenting nature of the foursome.
"It gets you a little tired," Alabama's Chuck Davis said, "going up against guys like that when they are always fresh off the bench when they have that many guys that size."
The most imposing, of course, is shot-blocking maven Okafor, when healthy. The junior, who could be the top pick in June's NBA draft, not only changes an opponent's plan of attack, but he also allows his guards some relaxation on defense.
"Say you get beat on defense, you can send your guy to Emeka," Anderson said. "You don't have Coach yelling down your neck, 'Rashad, what are you doing?' . . . Opposing offensive players are scared to go to the basket on his side."
A true indication of the Huskies' supremacy lies in the fact that few can agree on their biggest threat. While some coaches say it's the rotating group of post players, others pinpoint the back-court tandem of experienced players Ben Gordon and Taliek Brown.
"The most difficult thing in playing U-Conn. is the speed of their transition game and their guards," Vanderbilt Coach Kevin Stallings said. "It is difficult to body up against them because the strength of the team and how fast they are. When you are able to guard them outside, they can take you down low; when you are forced to help out on the dribble and they hit the outside guys for shots, then all hell breaks loose."
Gordon and Brown can handle the ball. Gordon can break down defenders and create his own shot on the perimeter and near the basket after penetrating. Brown, whom Calhoun calls one of the "gutsiest, greediest" players he has coached, controls a game at times nearly without flaw. Against Alabama, the senior had 10 assists and only one turnover.
After his team lost to U-Conn. in Phoenix, Alabama Coach Mark Gottfried said he was a "believer," and that the Huskies are the strongest team he has seen since he was a UCLA assistant in 1995 and played a Ray Allen-led U-Conn. team.
While a San Antonio coronation is not quite inevitable for the Huskies, it feels like November again in Storrs, Conn.
"I would have been disappointed in myself," Calhoun said, "if I couldn't take this talent, these types of people who are so goal oriented, to the Final Four."
Staff writer Barry Svrluga contributed to this report.
"That Justice is a blind goddess
Is a thing to which we blacks are wise.
Her bandage hides two festering sores
That once perhaps were eyes."
Langston Hughes, 1923
Is a thing to which we blacks are wise.
Her bandage hides two festering sores
That once perhaps were eyes."
Langston Hughes, 1923