And so it begins: USA Today says the St. Francis blowout is bad for the sport

[Alydar]

They can't do that due to Title IX. If the men have a 64 team Tourney then the women must have one also. I'm surprised that there hasn't been a lawsuit against the NCAA because the men's now has play in games and the women do not.

The NCAA could play two 32 team tournaments. But that is the politics of the NCAA. The problem is the automatic bids that let in teams from programs that have no business playing elite D1 teams. St F was seeded as the 64th team but in reality they were probably about the 125th. What surprises me is why the media hasn't asked the NCAA to comment on this issue because it's their tournament.

The writer who wants competitive games should watch the 1st half of Tenn's 1st game and then tell me which was more entertaining. I thoroughly enjoyed that first half.

 

[CL82]

Maybe cut the tourney to the top 32 teams

For those that think that cutting the tournament to 32 teams is a good idea, tell it to the young ladies at FL Gulf Coast, Creighton, Central Michigan, Buffalo or Quinipiac, all of whom are celebrating upset wins tonight, and none of whom would have been in the tournament had it been limited to 32 teams.

If you define the “problem“ as blow out games, then this is absolutely the way to fix it. Personally I am willing to accept the fact that there will be some blowouts in order to give teams who would not otherwise make the tournament a chance to compete and advance.

 

[cockhrnleghrn]

The answer is that young girls need to be empowered to excel in sports in the same manner as young boys. The reason there's such a chasm is that the difference between a top 10 recruit and a 90-100 recruit in WBB is probably 2 or 3 times as large as in MBB because there isn't much depth of talent. If the same number of 7 year old girls played basketball as 7 year old boys and the quality of youth coach was identical, we wouldn't have such a large differential.

 

[CMC'72]

For those that think that cutting the tournament to 32 teams is a good idea, tell it to the young ladies at FL Gulf Coast, Creighton, Central Michigan, Buffalo or Quinipiac, all of whom are celebrating upset wins tonight, and none of whom would have been in the tournament had it been limited to 32 teams.

Especially the St. Francis women, who lived their dream coming to the altar known as UCONN to play, no matter the score! They said they would remember this game for the rest of their lives! (See St. Francis players' PRE-game presser).

This isn't about sports writers. This is about growing and enjoying dreams.

 

[CMC'72]

Loved Jeff Waltz, always will.

 

[Sluconn Husky]

Renewed talk of UConn being "too dominant" is the epitome of concern trolling

 

[oldude]

And virtually all will be gone after their next game and will not be a factor.

Not sure what your point is. In a 64 team tournament, 48 teams “all will be gone” after the 2nd round. That’s the same for the men as it is for the women.

 

[OldAlum]

And once again people who do not follow or really care about WCBB are writing about UConn "ruining" the sport.

As far as the first round mismatches: I wonder if the NCAA would consider using "play-in" games. The lowest seeded teams would play each other (on home court of higher seeded team). Winners would then move on to the rest of the tourney. Maybe they could even play earlier, in that off week. With 13 playing 16 and 14 playing 15, you should get some competitive games. I think you will still get some blowouts when the winner meets the top seeds, but there is only so much you can do!
I haven't looked at the math of figuring out how it would all work but maybe it could help.

 

[oldude]

UConn is bad for the sport the way Tiger Woods was for golf at his best.

Why we’re at it we should mention a few others who were bad for their particular discipline:

Fred Astaire was bad for dancing
Pavorotti was bad for singing
Einstein was bad for Quantum Physics
etc. etc.

 

[HuskyNan]

They can't do that due to Title IX. If the men have a 64 team Tourney then the women must have one also. I'm surprised that there hasn't been a lawsuit against the NCAA because the men's now has play in games and the women do not.

I’m not sure that interpretation is correct. Title IX says that schools accepting govt funds need to spend equally on boys and girls. It’s not a sports law, it’s an equality in education law. There is nothing about tournament games or basketball specifically in Title IX

 

[oldude]

I thought UConn should have called off the press early in the 1st quarter. 4 of the starters played over 20 minutes. The fact that UConn could have won by 130 points is not a plus, it points to the absurdity of this game.

What you and the reporter for the USA Today both miss is that Geno and the Huskies need to accomplish something in these early round games, regardless of the score.

After losing to MS St last year, when the Bulldogs walked the ball up the court the entire game, Geno blamed himself for not doing anything to speed up the tempo. This year, UConn has been utilizing various presses and traps all season.

I suspect that the plan yesterday was to see if the Huskies could maintain their effectiveness if they pressed the entire qtr. As others pointed out, Geno pulled the press after one qtr.

For the entire 2nd half, Geno had the team walk the ball up the court, even when there were opportunities to fast break. This had nothing to do with trying to take it easy on St Francis. UConn needed to work on their half-court offense, which they did.

In the 4th qtr, Geno cleared the bench, but the Huskies continued to walk the ball up the court, working on their half-court offense, doing an exemplary job.

In some ways, this game was played like a preseason game vs a DII team, where Geno has his team working on things that will be important during the big games against ranked programs that start early in November.

The next two weekends UConn will have some huge games against the best teams in WBB. Geno is doing everything he can to insure that the Huskies are ready for that challenge.

 

[CocoHusky]

They can't do that due to Title IX. If the men have a 64 team Tourney then the women must have one also. I'm surprised that there hasn't been a lawsuit against the NCAA because the men's now has play in games and the women do not.

@HuskyNan beat me with her response. This is a commom misperception, Title IX has no role in post season play. Title IX simply requires that you have an equitable number of athletic scholarships available for both men and women across all sports.

 

[eebmg]

Why we’re at it we should mention a few others who were bad for their particular discipline:


Einstein was bad for Quantum Physics

Interesting choice. Einstein after some early seminal work on the Quantum principles (i.e the light photon-1905) and some further work on the Quantum description of specific heats (1909) , explaining spontaneous emission of atomic radiation(1916) and some interesting features of quantum systems (Bose-Einstein Condensates 1924) , he could not bring himself to accept the Modern Quantum Mechanics of Schrodinger / Heisenberg / Dirac 1925-1926. Many in the physics community could not understand why he shut his mind to the newer developments. He had also become quite stubborn about Unified field theories.

Still, I get and agree with your point.

 

[oldude]

Interesting choice. Einstein after some early seminal work on the Quantum principles (i.e the light photon-1905) and some further work on the Quantum description of specific heats (1909) , explaining spontaneous emission of atomic radiation(1916) and some interesting features of quantum systems (Bose-Einstein Condensates 1924) , he could not bring himself to accept the Modern Quantum Mechanics of Schrodinger / Heisenberg / Dirac 1925-1926. Many in the physics community could not understand why he shut his mind to the newer developments. He had also become quite stubborn about Unified field theories.

Still, I get and agree with your point.

Obviously, my knowledge of quantum physics is extremely limited. Thank you for your clarification.

 

[eebmg]

Obviously, my knowledge of quantum physics is extremely limited. Thank you for your clarification.

It is nice when you can teach to an audience that want's to learn. Probably helps if no tests are involved.

 

[LouS]

Agreed, Bags. But what we have here is yet another male sportswriter who has difficulty accepting or acknowledging that women can, over the long term, compete and achieve at a very high level. How dare a group of women dominate a sport? I wonder if he would write the same rubbish about Alabama’s football team. Or the Duke men’s basketball team.

Funny how all of this male-driven “bad for the game” nonsense in the sports press started as soon as Geno passed Wooden.

Its unfortunate but "you are right." I love the women's game, especially Uconn's because its REAL basketball to me. If you UNDERSTAND the game and forget the score it was shear poetry as someone said earlier. Uconn has talent, no question, BUT they play real team basketball better then all other teams male or female. Thank you Gene and Chris....

 

[cohenzone]

Why we’re at it we should mention a few others who were bad for their particular discipline:

Fred Astaire was bad for dancing
Pavorotti was bad for singing
Einstein was bad for Quantum Physics
etc. etc.

Yup. But I wish Einstein hadn’t figured out atomic energy

 

[oldude]

Yup. But I wish Einstein hadn’t figured out atomic energy

Yes, but Einstein’s work was largely confined to the theoretical side of things. The guy who applied that theory to the most dangerous instrument of destruction ever devised by mankind was J Robert Oppenheimer.

 

[Phil]

There is a solution to the blowout problem which doesn't have the unfairness of limiting the field to 32 teams.

Keep the field at 64 teams, and institute a double bye system. (Just like the old Big East Conferncen Tournament)

It takes seven rounds by can be completed without major changes to the season calendar.

The top 16 teams (seed 1-4) get two byes, and the next 16 (seeds 5-8) get a single bye.

The initial round pits seeds 9 against 16, 10 against 15 etc.

The initial round games would be much more competitive, with many closer games and many potential upsets.

 

[eebmg]

Yup. But I wish Einstein hadn’t figured out atomic energy

Here I go again.

Well, Einstein did work out the famous Energy Equivalence Principle E=mc^2 and knew the general implications of mass to energy conversion such as
radioactivity and the fusion processes which power the sun but he really did not think it feasible in the pre-world war 2 days that atomic weapons were technically feasible. He was a true pacifist and was not involved in War work except as an introduction to the US Government to accept the possibility and to assist in creating a coherent research program for atomic weapons in light of the potential Nazi threat that they would develop atomic weapons first.

The true wizards of Atomic Fission Weapons were Neils Bohr and Enrico Fermi with a strong technological assist from the Los Alamos effort led by Oppenheimer while the father of Nuclear Fusion and the Hydrogen Bombs belongs to Edward Teller.

Oops. Did not see olddude's response.

 

[cohenzone]

Yes, but Einstein’s work was largely confined to the theoretical side of things. The guy who applied that theory to the most dangerous instrument of destruction ever devised by mankind was J Robert Oppenheimer.

Sort of like Naismith invented basketball, Wooden weaponized it and Geno figured out how to deliver it in 40 minutes to any spot on the planet.

 

[cohenzone]

Here I go again.

Well, Einstein did work out the famous Energy Equivalence Principle E=mc^2 and knew the general implications of mass to energy conversion such as
radioactivity and the fusion processes which power the sun but he really did not think it feasible in the pre-world war 2 days that atomic weapons were technically feasible. He was a true pacifist and was not involved in War work except as an introduction to the US Government to accept the possibility and to assist in creating a coherent research program for atomic weapons in light of the potential Nazi threat that they would develop atomic weapons first.

The true wizards of Atomic Fission Weapons were Neils Bohr and Enrico Fermi with a strong technological assist from the Los Alamos effort led by Oppenheimer while the father of Nuclear Fusion and the Hydrogen Bombs belongs to Edward Teller.

Oops. Did not see olddude's response.

See my last reply to Olddudr. In my analogy, Naismith is Einstein and the others are the ones who took the theory and took it to places Naismith hadn’t.

 

[eebmg]

See my last reply to Olddudr. In my analogy, Naismith is Einstein and the others are the ones who took the theory and took it to places Naismith hadn’t.

I get it and I agree with your example .

I just like to give credit (or blame) to the major players involved in historical context.

 

[MD#12Fan]

Every single NEC team is not tourney ready. Go look at who is in that conference. I mean any team from that conference would get destroyed by a top 25 team. It's really a question of why does every conference deserve an auto bid ?

Good point! So, as basketball fans, let's embrace the incredible experience it is for those players to play in the NCAA tournament. They get to travel to a larger arena, stay in a nicer hotel, eat a better steak dinner, and play an elite team, all things they will never forget for the rest of their lives. It's not about UConn.
(That being said- St. Francis' coach should have embraced those things and not had his girls look like fools out there. There is such a thing as a moral victory.)

 

[SVCBeercats]

What women's sport is a success on a par with men's sports? I wonder if the author has ever written about how all the Koreans are bad for the LPGA? Fact is all women sports skirt the edge of failure. Is the WNBA a roaring success or a money loser propped up by NBA money? Heck, if lingerie football can't be financially successful, no women's sport stands a chance. And the women in lingerie football are not paid! So it does not matter if UCONN is good or bad for women's basketball. It is a moot point.