NCAA Basketball 21-22 Catch-All

[Biiiiig exhale]

Oh man, that UNC/Louisville game is gonna be scrutinized for days. That was wildly officiated, and whichever team lost would have lots of ammo to complain.

I'm shocked at the calls, because despite Corey Alexander's constant refrain of it being clean and consistent... It was weird. Missed fouls, makeup calls, mystery fouls. Louisville's El Ellis drank the Good shooting potion, clearly. Dude was unconscious in the second half. We're fortunate to have escaped with a road win.

Welp. ~9 min into the Duke/UNC game, and the heels are down 19. I think it's time to go play videogames.

[facepalm]

And down goes a rather laggardly Duke against a UVA that couldn't hit anything from 3... Until the game winner.

The same UVA UNC destroyed a few weeks ago. What the crap.

Another grinder of a game at Clemson... 2 flagrant calls (1 justified, 1 questionable) and a technical foul against the heels. Those points and extra possessions kept the Tigers close enough that it took fighting to the very end. Ugly. Fortunate that when UNC was down in the first half, Clemson missed some open looks. There was potential for Yet Another Loss.

Hopefully they'll learn something and carry it forward to the game with FSU this weekend.

In other news, Arkansas took down #1 Auburn in OT, and Purdue ran away from Illinois in the 2nd half.

Our season is pretty much done. Got killed by injuries and COVID. I’ll be surprised if we win 2 more games

R.I.P

Ego Man wrote:

Our season is pretty much done. Got killed by injuries and COVID. I’ll be surprised if we win 2 more games

R.I.P

Yeah, it's been kinda brutal this year. Lots of kids ruled out for the season due to injuries and whatnot. Others leaving for personal reasons.

The ACC is totally not great this year. I've heard some folks are ranking it behind the WCC (which has Saint Mary's and Gonzaga?).

Man, I don't know who has it in for FSU, but they just can't catch a break (unless it's a bone or something else important, those they get in droves). When Mills went down in the 1st half, I was like "Oh crap!" Glad to see him walk off the floor under his own power, but didn't realize he wasn't coming back. That's what, 4 of their primary scoring players now benched for an indeterminate amount of time (and at least one for the remainder of the season?) Yeesh.

Crazy good shooting from the 'Heels in the first half. Caleb Love was better from beyond the 3 pt line than inside it. I *facepalmed* when he went for that highlight reel dunk and blew it... AGAIN. You'd think he'd maybe settle on making the shot and completing the play over trying to make a sportscenter top 10.

Wake fell to Miami, and NCSU continues their trek down the sewer line with a loss to Pitt. Saw Purdue lost to Michigan which (along with Michigan's other 8 recent wins) has the ridiculous effect of boosting their NET back into the 30s. This in turn restores UNC's home win over them back to a Q1 victory (1-7... [sad party favor noise]).

Tennessee gets retribution vs Kentucky. Barnes keeps his lead against UK during his tenure in Knoxville.

Game wasn't ever out of UTs control.

EDIT: This sums up the night. The 5'9" Ziegler (probably shorter) guy wrestles the ball away from UK and gets it to Josiah-Jordan James for the bunny. You might recall a vid that went viral of JJJ tripping during a layup against Texas Tech earlier in the year as one of the most awkward things you'll see happen on the court.

EDIT 2: Hah, great line: The fans didn’t storm the court. The players stormed the fans. Our fans take crap sometimes, but TBA is a much better basketball environment than those outside of the SEC realize.

Man, I was absolutely afraid of tonight's game against Pitt. Out muscled, out played, and shot the ball out of their damn minds. I think there are still about 9 min to go, but it's been over since the first half. Just another "effort and toughness" kind of game from this squad. The hot / cold thing is painful to watch.

Tyrian wrote:

Man, I was absolutely afraid of tonight's game against Pitt. Out muscled, out played, and shot the ball out of their damn minds. I think there are still about 9 min to go, but it's been over since the first half. Just another "effort and toughness" kind of game from this squad. The hot / cold thing is painful to watch.

Apparently I missed them cutting it to 6, and then flub a possession after getting an inbound steal. Perfect.

Selection show preview

1 Gonzaga Auburn Arizona Kansas
2 Baylor Kentucky Purdue Duke
3 Villanova Texas Tech Tennessee Illinois
4 Wisconsin UCLA Providence Texas

Yeah, those seem like pretty solid picks across the board. Maybe some movement across the 3-4 line, but I suspect things are getting closer to locked in. Still, there are several games left to play.

UNC grinds one out in Blacksburg today. Not pretty, but a win is a win, and we're sorely lacking in that department.

The Pitt win apparently dropped us to last 4 in according to Lunardi, but I'm not entirely convinced they have a tournament worthy resume even now. They basically have to win all the remaining games (or at least play convincingly @ Duke), and probably win at least one game in the ACCT to have a shot. And it really may come down to bubble teams winning their conference tournaments. Surprises there might knock a team like UNC off the bubble.

Be prepared for those takes after what happened with Michigan-Wisconsin today.

I'm amazed somebody got punched at a Wisconsin game and it wasn't Brad Davison.

Juwan tried to walk away and the Wisconsin coach grabbed his arm. Then words exchanged, and Juwan is pushed back by his players and clearly the assistant says something that gets him pushed/hit (not a punch) in the face. Then the players go crazy. Several of them on both sides should miss a game for throwing punches.

Already seeing a ton of people blame Howard. But he tried to get out of there, and then it got escalated. Yeah he probably should be suspended for the swing but dang, the Wisconsin guys are not innocent.

Howard will likely get the blame because of prior incidents (like having to be held back from charging Mark Turgeon at last year's Big10 T). Not saying it's warranted, just that people love to take 2 points and make a line.

But yeah, it seems like there are a number of players that should face penalties. Was it as bad as the Kansas / K-state thing from a couple of years ago (the one where De Sousa picked up a chair?).

Loud part:

COACH JUWAN HOWARD WAS SUSPENDED FOR THE REST OF THE SEASON!!!

Quiet Part

Spoiler:

Just the regular season, not the B1G tourney or NCAA, so five games.

And fined. Wisc coach fined less, no suspension.

Multiple players suspended 1 game for the punches thrown in the aftermath.

Not a good look for either one, and both of them acted like they had no responsibility in the aftermath.

UNC grinds another one against a freakin scrappy Louisville outfit. I wasn't sure they had it in them, considering they'd just played a physical game up in Blacksburg, and our bench is so weak that the starters essentially play the entire 40 min (this is going to be a problem if they make it to the NCAAT).

I think everyone is basically looking at the Duke / UVA game to see where things land in the battle for the top-4 spots in the ACC (and those lovely double-byes in the conf tourney).

I can't believe the season is almost over. In some ways, I'll be glad to move on. But I sure do prefer college basketball to almost all other sports, so I'll hate seeing it go.

With that win over Auburn, my Vols have beaten three top 5 teams this year (so far).

Yeesh. Syracuse comes to Chapel Hill and nearly pulls off the win. Thanks to Caleb Love finding his range in the last 5 min of the game (and then following up in OT), the Heels escape. Cole Swider (for Syracuse) was ridiculous. With his 36 points, he was hitting just about everything he threw up. I think he shot 70% for the whole game before thankfully fouling out in OT.

Now to go to Cameron and get blitzed again (come on, it's K's LAST HOME GAME EVER.. we have zero chance), hope to win a game in the ACCT, and then hold our collective breath until Selection Sunday is over.

I've been so out of college basketball given how bad Cal is for the last 5 years I didn't even realize this was Coach K's last game.

As anyone who follows me in the college football thread, I care only about one school Cal... and very little about the other schools regardless of their tradition or the "bluebloods". The only traditions I care about are Cal, the Stanford Axe, and the sanctity of the Rose Bowl.

But given it's coach K's last game, I do have a very special place in my heart for Duke. It was March 1993... just a sophomore at Cal. Until then I had watched zero Cal football games. I didn't really care much for basketball either but since I was in the Bay Area, all I heard about was Oakland's Jason Kidd and how big a deal he was. Well it was tournament time, and Cal was going to play Duke in the 2nd round of the tournament, coming off back-to-back NCAA championships. This was a duke team with Bobby Hurley, Christian Laettner, and Grant Hill. I have no idea what the line was but Cal was a 9-seed against 3-seeded Duke. Basically we had no chance.. and then the unthinkable happened.

IMAGE(https://i.ibb.co/PGGn0Gk/s-l1600.jpg)

I went berserk... that was the seminal moment of my entire Cal fandom. From that day on, no red.. EVER on my clothes... season tickets basically straight through until I left for New York, where I went to bars asking for one TV be turned to Cal football/basketball for 7:30 pm west coast tip off/kick offs. I moved to LA in early 2004 and had season tickets and flew up to Berkeley for EVERY HOME GAME, until I moved back up to the Bay Area in 2008, where of course I've been to every home game and more than my fair share of away games. Every pro-Cal, anti-stanfurd, anti-SEC rant that comes out of me can trace its way back to Cal beating duke in 1993.

So to Coach K and Duke... THANK YOU.. and GO TARHEELS!

Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

The fouling down by 12 is a nice touch.

Yeah too bad Mike. Maybe next year... Oh wait.

I just.. I can't even..

WHAT THE HELL?! HOW DID WE DO THAT?!

I'm so thrilled right now I can barely speak!

Tyrian wrote:

I just.. I can't even..

WHAT THE HELL?! HOW DID WE DO THAT?!

I'm so thrilled right now I can barely speak!

After hearing all the ESPN talk about Duke during the whole UT v Arkansas game, I'm glad Duke got beat. Thanks and congrats.

It was insufferable. They wouldn't call the game we were trying to watch for all the Coach K talk.

MannishBoy wrote:
Tyrian wrote:

I just.. I can't even..

WHAT THE HELL?! HOW DID WE DO THAT?!

I'm so thrilled right now I can barely speak!

After hearing all the ESPN talk about Duke during the whole UT v Arkansas game, I'm glad Duke got beat. Thanks and congrats.

It was insufferable. They wouldn't call the game we were trying to watch for all the Coach K talk.

I mean, Coach K is an incredible coach with a meaningful legacy. But he set this whole thing in motion by PRE-ANNOUNCING his retirement. He turned his last year in basketball into a circus, with each game being the "last time that [opponent X] will play Duke at Y place". He picked a year where his last home game was against UNC. He put that pressure on his players and staff.

I honestly think playing the season out, and then announcing your retirement once it's done is the better way to go about it. Bah.

Anyhow, that was probably the best game the Tarheels have played all season. I hope they can continue that momentum into the ACCT and beyond, but I'm honestly happy to have that one (if nothing else). Should lock our tournament slot in some sense, though I think I'd rather be a 10 than an 8-9 (given the 2nd game in the weekend would likely be against a #1 seed).

Tyrian wrote:

I honestly think playing the season out, and then announcing your retirement once it's done is the better way to go about it. Bah.

Right, the way your coach did it is the best way.

Stele wrote:
Tyrian wrote:

I honestly think playing the season out, and then announcing your retirement once it's done is the better way to go about it. Bah.

Right, the way your coach did it is the best way. ;)

Well, from the perspective of not creating a media circus, absolutely. I mean, K's been talking about how he didn't like how everything became about him... except he set the stage! And sure, I am probably biased towards how UNC handled it most recently, I still think that a case can be made that one is objectively better than the other, but I am clearly not the best person to make the distinction.

Yeah I'm just messing with you. I've said it to my wife multiple times this season that Roy did it better.

I'm ok with announcing before the playoffs in whatever sport. Gives players that extra edge. Pretty sure that's why UCLA beat Louisville in the 75 final four. Dang Wooden.

But yeah this whole ACC season has been exhausting.