From the time I first saw Chuck Daly, Pat Riley and my all-time favorite, Larry Brown, who used to wear the cool sport coats with the patches on the elbow, roaming the sidelines coaching in the NBA, I aspired to someday be an NBA head coach. Because I read about the great Moses Malone putting a note in the Bible, wanting to be a great NBA player someday, I decided at age 11 to do the same thing. Somehow, I didn’t
I don’t like the NCAA Tournament. I don’t like that college basketball’s regular season provides little postseason incentive. I don’t like that the coach is a bigger personality than the players. I don’t like that the games are played on neutral courts. I don’t like that one bad game or bad call or bad break can end a team’s season. I don’t like that “close” becomes a synonym for “well-played.” And I don’t like that poor play determines the outcome much
The NCAA tournament has given us plenty to talk about after its first weekend. We’ve been treated to six overtime games (the tournament record is seven), big time upsets (Duke, Syracuse and Kansas all failed to win more than one game) and memorable finishes (ask THE University of Dayton). But between all of the madness that has commenced this week, one game has managed to stand above the rest: No. 8 seed Kentucky vs. No. 1 seed Wichita State. [Read more…]
Despite there being plenty of NBA action left in these remaining weeks leading to the playoffs, NBA players still find time to enjoy the madness that is the NCAA Tournament. After another day of exciting match-ups in the first half of the Round of 32, former college stars and players took to twitter offering support to their respective schools. Whether it was a win or loss, NBA stars have stood by the schools that they favor, offering congratulations to the
It’s mid-March, and that certainly means it’s time for the NBA to take a backseat to the NCAA Tournament, because, well, there’s just nothing like it. In the first day and a half we’ve seen four overtime games, two buzzer beaters and several other games come down to the last few seconds. Oh, and Duke lost Mercer. Mercer. [Read more…]
The NCAA College Basketball Tournament is underway. Millions of people had hopes of raking in the cash with Yahoo! and Quicken Loans offering a $1 Billion reward for a perfect bracket. However, most of their hopes have been dashed, thanks in large part to two unlikely upsets. Los Angeles Lakers guard Kent Bazemore is all about it, having played for a mid-major school that made a Cinderella run of its own, stringing along unlikely upsets with Old Dominion from the Colonial Athletic
With the announcement of Bruce Pearl’s hiring as Auburn’s new basketball coach, a memory of a mid-major battle hit me. In December of 2005, coming on the heels of my Manhattan Jaspers’ upset of the Florida Gators and subsequent 2 point loss to Chris Paul and Wake Forest the previous spring, which cost us a trip to the Sweet 16, we met Bruce Pearl’s UW-Milwaukee Panthers in their house. UW-Milwaukee’s trip to the Sweet 16 the season before and a current Top
Syracuse may have been snubbed from the East Region and a potential appearance at Madison Square Garden for the Sweet 16 and Elite 8, but the Orange will play even closer to home for the 2nd and 3rd rounds of the NCAA Tournament. Despite being placed in the South Region, Syracuse will open up at the First Niagara Center (formerly HSBC Arena) in Buffalo, N.Y.—the draw closest to campus that they could have possibly gotten. While it’s no guarantee how far