3 seed

[FfldCntyFan]

Not Jay Wright, or anybody see on CBS.

Was watching ESPN. We did well in their projections.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

No excuses need the S16 with this draw. Just get it done.

Play a game at a time.
And chunk the game down.

 

[Kolumbo]

Clemson finished with 23 wins, 2 wins better than NC State in the ACC standings, throttled NC State 3 times! beat Pitt once. Ouch, that hurts.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

That’s what a bunch of were saying during our BE play. We had bad losses and didn’t close out games against the top 3. We were more what our BE record was than our OOC record. We beat St. John’s, Seton Hall, and split with Xavier we’re a lock

Do those three, and we'd be a lock for a two.

 

[KingAG]

Another wrinkle: Andre Jackson is going home to Albany. He will either have a SPECIAL weekend or a DISASTROUS one. No in between

 

[EnochRoot]

Jay Bilas picked UConn to win it all

I'm stunned.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

They have a worse record, are 14 slots behind us in the metric the Committee uses, and are missing a starter.

That is indeed an argument.

Only fools, bullies, and insecure people try the 'don't even have an argument' gambit.

To be fair, he allowed himself some room by owning it as a thought, rather than a pronouncement . But then he couldn't resist the desperate attempt at a double haymaker to silence you.

A mature & reasonable person could make your argument, and a counterpart mature & reasonable person could allow for your having offered an argument and nevertheless simply stand pat with an already-rendered judge's decision.

Live by the throat punch, die by the throat punch.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

Another wrinkle: Andre Jackson is going home to Albany. He will either have a SPECIAL weekend or a DISASTROUS one. No in between

Will Boeheim show up to watch him?

 

[gsmooth]

That’s what I said. Favorable 5. Unfavorable 13. No other 4 is playing a 13 that’s playing in their home state. Should have given us Kent State and sent Iona to play IU. But the media is already salivating over the matchup. I always wonder how much influence TV has. Why are Houston, Texas and A&M in the same bracket? Has to be TV.

I do too. I just have a hard time thinking the committee organically came to the match up of Kentucky vs Providence

 

[gsmooth]

J Bilas has UConn cutting down the nets.

Jay Bilas and Doug Gottlieb vehemently picked UConn in 2004. Gottlieb picked UConn beating Oklahoma St in the Finals for that year. Well so did most of the country and most people penned UConn into the championship when filling out their brackets instead of the usual round-by-round procession. I guess I got nothing add here

 

[caw]

It is an interesting comparison looking at the first weekend teams.

UConn, Iona, VCU and SMC.

Iona and VCU have a combined three games against P6 teams (VCU lost against ASU and beat Pitt and Vandy). SMC has their games against the Zags and wins against Vandy/SDST and losses to Houston/Washington.

Iona/VCU/SMC have a combined 8 Q1 games this year with 3 wins.

On the other hand:

X, Kennesaw St, ISU and one of Pitt/Mississippi St.

Kennesaw State lost to UF, SDSU and Indiana (also a head to head to VCU by three). Then ISU who has 21 Q1 games and went 10-11 in those games. Not to mention another 5 games against P6 teams where they went 3-2. So 13-13 against top competition. Not great but they are tested and have a 50/50 shot of beating good teams, they swept Baylor and TCU, beat KU, beat Texas and beat KSU. Even Pitt has more Q1 wins than Iona/VCU and SMC combined. Same for Mississippi St.



Not saying UConn will win both games or that the teams in X's grouping are better but X has a much more battle tested group this first weekend.


IMO BTW South is the easiest region. The other three are all pretty even unless UConn plays to it's potential.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Jay Bilas and Doug Gottlieb vehemently picked UConn in 2004. Gottlieb picked UConn beating Oklahoma St in the Finals for that year. Well so did most of the country and most people penned UConn into the championship when filling out their brackets instead of the usual round-by-round procession. I guess I got nothing add here

Are you sure about Gottlieb? He's blasted UConn at every opportunity from the second he started working. Evidently this evening he's already been saying something along the lines of UConn not being able to beat Iona because we don't have a point guard.

Remember, this is the same tool who claimed Bucknell would knock us off in the first round in 2011.

 

[gsmooth]

Are you sure about Gottlieb? He's blasted UConn at every opportunity from the second he started working. Evidently this evening he's already been saying something along the lines of UConn not being able to beat Iona because we don't have a point guard.

Remember, this is the same tool who claimed Bucknell would knock us off in the first round in 2011.

yeah I am sure. He was singing the praises of that 2004 team. I know that's not exactly going out on a limb but he had UConn vs Oklahoma St in the finals, that I know for sure. I might be wrong on him picking UConn over Ok St. though.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

yeah I am sure. He was singing the praises of that 2004 team. I know that's not exactly going out on a limb but he had UConn vs Oklahoma St in the finals, that I know for sure. I might be wrong on him picking UConn over Ok St. though.

Fair enough. Very surprising as a) he has always dumped on UConn and b) he played for Eddie Sutton at Oklahoma St.

I have a laundry list of him blasting UConn for about two decades.

Some of his best (paraphrasing):

I have relatives in Connecticut so my family knows the school well. It's a safety school for kids that can't get into a safety school.

Jim Calhoun tried recruiting me out of high school and continued coming after me after I told him I would never play there. He told me I was the best point guard out there and that he would be the most important player on the team from day one (same recruiting class as Ricky Moore so he would have played one year with Ray). I told him I couldn't do it to myself and I couldn't do it to my family (attend UConn).

He picked against UConn in every tournament game played in each of our last two national titles (and was adamant that we couldn't win prior to each game).

He has fabricated most of the negative comments and for whatever reason has an enormous anti-UConn chip on his shoulder.

 

[gsmooth]

Fair enough. Very surprising as a) he has always dumped on UConn and b) he played for Eddie Sutton at Oklahoma St.

I have a laundry list of him blasting UConn for about two decades.

Some of his best (paraphrasing):

I have relatives in Connecticut so my family knows the school well. It's a safety school for kids that can't get into a safety school.

Jim Calhoun tried recruiting me out of high school and continued coming after me after I told him I would never play there. He told me I was the best point guard out there and that he would be the most important player on the team from day one (same recruiting class as Ricky Moore so he would have played one year with Ray). I told him I couldn't do it to myself and I couldn't do it to my family (attend UConn).

He picked against UConn in every tournament game played in each of our last two national titles (and was adamant that we couldn't win prior to each game).

He has fabricated most of the negative comments and for whatever reason has an enormous anti-UConn chip on his shoulder.

Interesting that Gottlieb would say those things, especially the safety school thing. Even in the mid 90s UConn was considered a very good public school and now it's considered great. hmmmm. .... I don't know what his issue.

It's interesting because I just thought of another time he praised the job Calhoun did when winning in 2011. He stated, "you have to have been in Storrs to know that there really is no town, it's a college just placed in a rural area and that what Calhoun has done is amazing".

Maybe I just tuned him out after awhile as I know he can have some asinine takes