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By
Adam Stanco
BasketballWriter@cs.com
March
24th, 2005
NCAA Tournament: What happened?
A week ago you were
bathing in a tub full of twenties. Your name was in lights. Or at least
on the subject line of the email proclaiming the winner of the office
pool.
Then reality gave
you a spanking.
Bucknell slingshot
down Goliath. Syracuse collapsed. And UW-Milwaukee slid into the Sweet
16. Suddenly the cash laden fantasy tub evaporated and the email worked
its way towards someone else’s inbox.
What happened?
A week ago you were
optimistic, now your bracket is a Picasso, a bewildering splatter of red
scratches. Even if two of your Final Four selections live until the
third weekend of the tourney, the vultures are floating. Everyone
has Illinois and North Carolina.
As you medicate the
bracketitis chewing through your skin, you ask yourself just one more
time… What happened?
Chicago Region
Illinois
UW-Milwaukee
Arizona
Oklahoma State
Giving coaching
legends Lute Olson and Eddie Sutton talented players is equivalent to
handing a hammer to a bar brawler. Awful dangerous on their own, each is
capable of violence when armed. Pushing Arizona and Oklahoma State
through two rounds, Olson and Sutton quietly smashed their opponents. Of
course, they needed a hammer to do it.
For the Wildcats,
Salim Stoudamire scored 45 points in two games, despite attempting just
29 shots from the field. Stoudamire shoots like a left-handed J.J.
Redick.
Ivan McFarlin pumped
in 49 total points on 18-of-23 shooting for Coach Sutton. Yet, most
remarkable of all, is the emergence of Oklahoma State’s JamesOn Curry.
The freshman is averaging 15.5 ppg in the NCAA Tournament and spicing up
dish after dish. No player infuses his team more than the electric
Curry. He’s been especially valuable given the ineffectiveness of the
Cowboys’ renowned star. Joey Graham has 15 points in two tournament
games.
This year’s
Cinderella, UW-Milwaukee, took down Alabama and B.C., but in order to
earn any real respect as a giant-slayer they need to pop Illinois. Even
though the Illinois – UW-Milwaukee match-up is considered a one-sided
affair, the two teams have only lost a total of two games since
the beginning of January. Still think a win over the Illini is
impossible? Not if the Panthers score magic number 83 – that’s the
amount they’ve scored in their first and second round victories.
Albuquerque Region
Washington
Louisville
Texas Tech
West Virginia
In a bracket
prognosticators predicted would be ruled by guards, all four surviving
Albuquerque teams punched two rounds deep because of their backcourts.
But it wasn’t Jarrett Jack or Chris Paul who bullied their teams ahead.
It was the lesser knowns.
Nate Robinson has
been his spectacular self for Washington. Louisville’s Francisco Garcia
is torching every defender who dares guarding him. Ronald Ross, of Texas
Tech, is averaging 26 ppg in the tournament. Even West Virginia’s
underrated Mike Gansey, who hadn’t scored 20 points in a game all
season, reached the mark twice in the Big East Tournament. He then fired
for 29 in a second round upset over Wake Forest.
Wake wasn’t zapped
because of poor play by Paul, it was because they failed to defend and
because John Beilein is a special coach. No team in the tournament plays
harder, passes crisper, or hustles with the same intensity as West
Virginia does. Despite an obvious lack of athletic ability and
break-you-down ballhandlers, their unique offense results in a seemingly
endless succession of open looks. With Beilein matching coaching chops
with Bob Knight, the basketball gods must be blushing. How else can one
explain how a former Hoosier is meeting up with a team that looks an
awful lot like Hickory High?
Syracuse Region
UNC
Villanova
Wisconsin
North Carolina State
They represent the
most memorable championship teams in the 1980’s. North Carolina won a
title in 1982 on a Michael Jordan jumper. Jimmy V pinballed hysterically
to find someone to hug after N.C. State won it all in 1983. And the
biggest upset in sports history could be Villanova’s 1985 shooting show
over Georgetown. Aside from Wisconsin, the Syracuse region is one
Michael J. Fox away from being a VH-1 special.
Today’s teams have
their own identity, though. Julius Hodge, of North Carolina State, is a
fascinating talent. The 6-foot-6 guard brilliantly directs a variation
of the Princeton Offense and attacks defenders as if they just showed
him Polaroid’s of his mother in bed with Dirk Nowitzki.
Nova and Carolina
are weapons factories. Allan Ray, Randy Foye, Mike Nardi, Raymond
Felton, Rashad McCants, Sean May, and Jawad Williams can each pour in 20
on any given night. They’ve easily cruised past their first two
opponents. The team finding third round success, however, will be the
one led by a bench player.
For UNC, that would
be Marvin Williams. The freshman scored 40 points in just 49 minutes
against Iowa State and Oakland. He is also the only player left in the
tournament who could ultimately challenge Utah’s Andrew Bogut for the
top spot in this summer’s NBA Draft.
Injuries rope
Villanova’s Jason Fraser to the bench, but just three years ago he was
one of the most hotly recruited players in the country. He’s only now
starting to play like it. In a reserve role, Fraser put 21 points and 15
boards on Florida.
As for the Gators,
since going to the National Championship in 2000, they’ve fallen in the
first or second round for five straight seasons. And had Mike Miller
missed a last second floater against Butler in the first round of that
2000 tourney, it would actually be six
straight.
Austin Region
Duke
Michigan State
Utah
Kentucky
It all wreaks of
familiarity.
Kentucky edged Utah
in the 1998 National Championship. Duke and Michigan State also
participated in the ’98 Sweet Sixteen. The Blue Devils and Spartans
combined to play in the next three title games, winning two of them.
They’ve all returned for an encore.
Magic. Laettner.
Adolph Rupp. Despite all the prestige synonymous with the letters
stitched on the front of the Kentucky, Michigan State, and Duke
uniforms, the most important name in this year’s tournament can be found
on the back of a Utah jersey. And it spells out B-O-G-U-T.
Andrew Bogut dropped
24 and 11 against a relentless run of triple-teams by UTEP and passed
out seven assists around Oklahoma’s imposing post players. A win over
Kentucky and the Aussie’s individual effort would equal the 1996 NCAA
Tournament performance of the player he most closely resembles, Timmy
Duncan. Coincidentally, that Wake Forest squad was bumped in the
regional finals by Kentucky.
Before you petition
CBS to start shooting CSI: Austin in an attempt to find reasons
why Syracuse didn’t join these four in the Advance Dance, consider one
fact. Outside of Gerry McNamara, none of the Orange made 20 threes on
the season or shot better than 29% from behind the stripe. Without a
second scoring option, the Cuse fell apart as soon as McNamara misfired.
Duke and Michigan State each have multiple deep threats, so expect one
of them to move on to the Final Four. Unless, of course, Bogut starts
dunkin’ even more than Duncan himself once did.
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