NCAA Basketball 2011-12 Catch-All

hoosierjoe wrote:

IU entered at 18th and 20th. It's nice to get some recognition, but I find the polls useless until conference play starts. Sorry, I find it hard to be impressed by 8-1 teams who have beaten up on San Diego Tech State School for the Blind and Costal Carolina. And yes, IU is just as guilty of this as anyone.

Best analysis of the IU-UK game I have read so far: http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-tr...

Grantland is a great site, except for Bill Simmons.

I like the court storming breakdown at the start.

Although I think Indiana used to be one of the places where that wasn't done. It's still that way at Louisville. We don't storm the court because we expect to win every game at home. I assume the same standing rule at Kansas, Duke, UNC, and UK. You'd think UCLA wouldn't on tradition, but they haven't exactly been strong lately, similar to Indiana.

But it's nice for some of the kids out there. I won't begrudge anyone their fun, as long as they let the visiting team off the court safely.

It was a huge upset win over a heated rival on a last second shot. No one was thinking about storming the court until it just happened.

It was storm the court worthy.

That storming of the court was the release of 4 years of frustration. We still don't condone storming under most circumstances, but beating #1 who happens to be a bitter rival and doing it at the buzzer? Storm away, kids. I'm happy for those students, the players and for Coach Crean. It would have been easy for any or all of them to walk away from the mess left by Kelvin Sampson. But now finally they got to experience what made IU games special to those of us who had been there for the "good ol days". Hopefully, this is the beginning of another wonderful era of Hoosier basketball.

Charleston beats the Vols for the second year in a row. Just 5 more days till they take down Louisville!

Louisville-Memphis rivalry begins anew today.

Just one more time to savor the last time we beat them in 2005:

Always fun to watch a Calipari team choke.

His tears still taste good.

Pro-Memphis here; their young coach went to high school with my little brother.

Well, 2 undefeateds fell last night... Louisville and Indiana.

Cardinals did it to themselves with missed FTs. Didn't see much of the Hoosiers.

Oh well. Dream Game Sat.

Stele wrote:

Oh well. Dream Game Sat. :cool:

Remember, tomorrow is my 30th birthday....you don't think UK is going to disappoint me with a loss at Rupp, do you?

Congratulations to Iowa for actually getting me to "cheer" for them.

Pretty ugly game in Lexington today. 70 combined free throws, 32 and 29 % shooting for each team, including 22/18 from 3. Blah.

If Louisville could have just got outrebounded by 10 instead of 21 they'd have won. Pretty sad effort.

And that'll definitely knock us out of the top 10.

But UK can't handle full court pressure worth a damn. They coughed up 20 turnovers. And there should have been a couple more, with some clear walks not called.

Louisville made a ridiculous 13-0 run at the end of the first half, with the starting PG on the bench, and running man-to-man instead of the matchup zone. Yet for some reason with 4-6 min to go in the game and back down 10, Pitino never switched back to the M2M. I swear he loses more games than he wins with his (lack of) coaching. He gets great players and motivates them well, but when it comes down to in-game adjustments, he just doesn't get it done lately, if ever.

It's K-State at Kansas tongiht in what should be a really good game. Have I mentioned how much I love ESPN on the 360? As a cable-free person, it makes basketball season awesome.

The Lawrence Journal-world presents the faces of Frank Martin. He's the most fun opposing head coach since Norm Stewart. Only he's actually cool.

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I'm gonna miss that guy when we leave the Big 12. Nothing better than beating your opponent and watching their lunatic coach explode.

My eyes!
No 4 button jackets, eee-gads no more.

Just heard something about Dan Shulman winning a sportscaster of the year award. Guess that's to makeup for having to sit beside Dick Vitale all those hours. Trying to stay on task and talk about the game at hand is an extra challenge with him running his mouth.

Whoooooooooo!!!!!!!!

I am not sure how that happened but I will take it.

Yeah solid win last night, Jayhawker. Gratz!

Louisville continues to slide... and continues losing players to injury... I've been avoiding the thread a bit, didn't really want to rant. But what the hell, I'm getting frustrated, might as well vent.

Part of me can just point to the injuries and say hey our record is pretty good considering. But every loss except Providence we have been right there in it, within 2-4 points in the 2nd half, and not been able to close. And watching us play zone while the opponents just pick it apart with high post, baseline, and 3-pointers all the last several games just makes me sick. It's like Pitino is scared of playing M2M. The times we have played man full court, we look amazing. We made that 13-0 run against UK in the 1st half, we made runs to come back and win against Vandy, Western, and someone else a few weeks back... all on the strength of man to man pressure. But when we sit back in the zone, we let the opponent dictate tempo, and when playing a good team, we lose.

Pitino claims he can't press full court with our injuries and whatever. But we have guys sitting on the bench that play 2-4 minutes, and he won't give them a chance to get out there for a sustained period. At this point, I'd rather lose with 10-15 minutes of Angel Nunez, Jared Swopshire, and Kevin Ware (I know you guys have probably never heard of them), than keep the starters out there for 35+ minutes and run out of gas and lose anyway.

It's painful to watch. We keep turning the ball over, shooting a terrible FT%, pretty bad FG% too, and leaving guys open on defense. So what is the root cause of all of these things? Fatigue! Give guys a little more rest, and they'll play sharper, be a step quicker, have their legs under them for shots, and so on. It's the most obvious thing from watching every game, and yet the guy that gets paid 4+ million can't see it. And none of his assistants (including his son) seem to be able to point it out either. So we just keep riding the starters into the ground, and piling up losses. If something doesn't change, we're digging our way right into the NIT.

So, Kansas is pretty good. I felt like they would beat #3 Baylor at Allen Fieldhouse, but I did not think it would be a spanking. Tyshawn Taylor and Thomas Robinson are making strong cases to both be first team All-Americans. Robinson has continued to just be a dominating force, while Taylor has dropped in 28 points in each of his last two games.

The Jayhawks still have road games against Mizzou, Baylor and K-State. That will be the real test and dictate if they can win their 8th straight conference title. Many picked Kansas to finish behind all three, but Bill Self has found the right mix again. The key is keeping Robinson and Withey out of foul trouble, which will be tough on the road. So far it has been easy.

Withey gets a lot of the credit for how good Kansas has been, because last year he was a typical 7-foot beanpole with no presence. But he has added a lot of muscle, and as the season has progressed, he is now playing like he has muscle. If he can block 5-10 shots and get his 10 points, it makes all the difference. Last year's team really missed Cole Aldrich, and damn if Withey has not finally become that kind of defender. Kansas' guards are so good, that when they have a shot blocker inside, it makes it really hard to find a solid shot to take.

I thought Kansas was overrated at #13 to start the season. I now think a #2 seed is likely, and I won't be surpised to see them pull down a #1 seed. It's insane as this team is by far the weakest and most shallow team Self has had. But he has a ton of talent coming in next year. Most assumed this would be Kansas' down year. And it still might if if Robinson or Withey gets injured. They literally have no more bigs on the bench if they lose either guy. There is very little margin for error.

What a day. Close games everywhere. Overtimes, last second shots, and upsets!

And only Murray St stands undefeated... go Racers!

Yeah, Ohio State was the only top-15 team that had an easy go of it, huh? Crazy stuff.

Don't want us to be #1 again. I think it changes egos too much.

Speaking of overtimes, today's home game vs OU was likely the only game I'll be able to see in person this season. And a winner!

The Aggies are in a rough place with a brand new coach who was diagnosed with Parkinson's before he ever coached a game for us, and more recently, our star PG recruit who committed to A&M 4 years ago left after the first semester. Mid-season, pretty sh*tty to teammates at the very least. I don't know that any reason was given, but he was getting a lot of playing time. Now, we have another star PG recruit coming in next year, who committed this past summer, and that may have played a role. Who knows. But now we only have one PG, a senior.

Some of us are terrified that we could be heading back into the wilderness after becoming perennial tournament invitees 7 years ago.

Tune to ESPN immediately. Ags ahead of KU at KU. We don't have our best player. Our only PG got hurt right before halftime, but is still playing.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Tune to ESPN immediately. Ags ahead of KU at KU. We don't have our best player. Our only PG got hurt right before halftime, but is still playing.

And it gets away from them. Will the Aggies score 50?

Alas. Really liked what the Aggies showed tonight though, for the most part.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Alas. Really liked what the Aggies showed tonight though, for the most part.

It was a good game. I think Self will have some tough practices in store for the guys this week.

I'll take 70 in the Big 12, though. But after ISU on Saturday, Kansas has a four game stretch that will include road games against Mizzou, Baylor, and K-State. That's going to show where KU really is.

Oh man. WV just got hosed at Syracuse. Shot goaltended off the backboard. 3 refs somehow miss it. Should have been tied at least. Maybe SU would have won with 10 seconds left and the ball. Maybe it would have went to OT. But that was terrible officiating.

Getting really sick of the Big East home calls this year. WV got one for them the other night when they called that timeout against Cincy and didn't get a Technical called on them. Maybe this is karma for that, but still.

Only so many official league apologies can be issued a year... just get the call right.

There's a bunch of stuff of ESPN praising Fred Hoiberg for what he's done at Iowa State. I've got to say, if I was a fan, I'd be embarrassed that the team is made up of a convicted felon and a bunch of kids that got kicked of their previous teams.

Hey Doug Gottlieb is a convicted criminal and he got to transfer schools and now has a job on ESPN.

Iowa St

Stele wrote:

Iowa St :shock:

If you know the Big 12, that would not have been a shock. There is a reason they call it Hilton Magic. They've been down for a few years, but they've really got a nice team this year.

Trivia - Danny Manning was 0-4 in Ames. Man I hated seeing KU go up there back in the day.