I was on fire. As dismal as my bracket had become whittling the field down
from 64 to 16 teams, once the field was down to the Sweet Sixteen, I was
seeing things much more clearly. This wouldn’t save my bracket, because
brackets are like kids — once you crank one out, it’s yours for better or
worse, flaws and all. But I could at least make the best of the situation
and try and make a few bucks by rooting for someone else’s kid. In other
words, it’s okay to wager on Sweet Sixteen games that fly in the face of your
bracket picks.
Thursday night was about caution. One play, Kentucky to roll up Cornell by
more than 9. It got there. Friday was about confidence. I knew Baylor
would pound St. Mary’s and send Omar Samhan off of NBA mock draft boards,
and I liked Tennessee to upset Ohio State. Winner, winner. Followed that
with Michigan State over Northern Iowa and it was a banner night.
So Saturday morning I decided to ride the wave…. five-teamer with all four
Elite Eight games and the Lakers on Saturday night. (Sorry, Rockets, you’re
just a stock to sell short now. Good effort this season, though.) Long
story short, I was on the right side of all three Saturday plays. My Sunday
plays were Tennessee -2 and Baylor moneyline. Well, you know how that
went. Victimized first by a bunch of orange headbands and then by
officiating in the Baylor-Duke game which was easily the most suspect
officiating on television yesterday of any sporting event, including
Wrestlemania on pay-per-view and roller derby on ESPN Classic.
So now this season of destruction for bracketologists everywhere has reached
its final stop, Lucas Oil Field in Indianapolis, and as much danger as there
was of all of these upsets giving us a steaming pile of double-digit-seeded
turds for a Final Four, we actually wind up with a decent dance card, so
let’s go ahead and assess this year’s Final Four and see how glued to the
television we should/will be this weekend:
THE BRACKETS
SATURDAY, APRIL 3
Midwest 5 MICHIGAN STATE vs West 5 BUTLER, 5:05 p.m. (Line: Butler by 1)
East 2 WEST VIRGINIA vs South 1 DUKE, 7:45 p.m. (Line: Duke by 2.5)
There are four different conferences represented in the Final Four —
Big
East, Big Ten, ACC, and the Horizon League. I always like having the
top
three conferences from the entire year and one dark horse represented.
As
cross sections of the actual regular season go, this combination of
conference affiliation is fairly appropriate. (Baylor beating Duke would
have given us the consensus top three conferences from the regular
season in
the Final Four, but the ACC replacing the Big 12 is fine, especially
since
the ACC’s best beat the best the Big 12 had at season’s end.) One
downside,
the way the teams are set up to play, it’s very similar to 2004 in San
Antonio where you had what felt like two undercard teams (Oklahoma State
and
Georgia Tech) in one semifinal and two heavyweights in the other (Duke
and
UConn). You even have a one-seed Duke against a two-seed Big East team
(WVU)
again. My point is that you feel like the final is actually the late
game
on Saturday night, not the Monday game. This is exactly what happened
in
2004. Trust me, I was there.
GRADE: C+
THE STORYLINES
You have the obvious one of the “Cinderella” Butler Bulldogs
(a Cinderella
that is actually favored in their semifinal game) playing five miles
from
their campus which, oh by the way, houses the gym in which they filmed Hoosiers, which happens to be Butler’s home gym. All we need is
Shooter
stumbling out onto the floor during the semifinals after Gordon Hayward
gets
intentionally fouled and it’ll all be good.
Other storylines —
— Tom Izzo bringing his team to the Final Four for the sixth time,
although
this year the Spartans have played only one team that is seeded higher
than
them (Maryland in the second round), so they’ve gotten some quirky
breaks.
— Michigan State doing it without their leader Kalin Lucas
— Coach K and Duke back in the Final Four for the first time since 2004
— Bob Huggins back in the Final Four — can he become the first coach to
win
a title in the same day he collected over five grand in vig for Paulie
Walnuts (nice sweats, Hug)?
— Will one Plumlee turn heel on the other setting up a ladder match at
Summer Slam?
GRADE: B-
THE MARQUEE PLAYERS & NBA DRAFT EFFECTS
Butler: Their top player is forward Gordon Hayward, who may actually
have a decision to make now about his future. He’s a junior who hasn’t
really been on this year’s draft radar (He’s forecasted as a late first-rounder in 2011), but this tournament may change that. A huge Final
Four
may make him assess if it can get any better for him going forward. It
probably can’t.
Michigan State: Spartans have some talent but none of it is
considered
elite NBA talent, just your classic, really good, Izzo-led college team.
Duke: Led by the three S’s (Jon Scheyer, Kyle Singler, and Nolan
Smith).
Smith probably has the best athletic package of the three, Singler
because
of his length and long-range shooting probably has the best NBA future
(although not a great one), and Scheyer…well, he’ll be the best player
in
whatever law league he winds up in. Dude can shoot it, all kidding
aside.
West Virginia: Huggins has two guys who are forecasted as mid first-rounders (Da’Sean Butler and Devin Ebanks) who can move into the lottery
with big Final Fours. We’ve seen WVU players improve stock in the post
season as recently as Joe Alexander in 2008, but I don’t know if that’s a
good thing.
So maybe four or five players total that can move the needle on their
NBA
futures. Not bad, but Hayward’s the only real compelling one.
GRADE: B-
THE COACHES
You have two of the marquee March coaches (Tom Izzo and Coach K)
playing on
opposite sides of the bracket (and thus giving us potential for a
classic
coaching matchup on Monday), a somewhat rogue, sweatsuit-wearing
vagabond
(Huggins) who will be a great soundbite waiting to happen, and finally a
young up-and-comer (Brad Stevens of Butler) who prompted my son to
scream
“Look at that little kid climbing the ladder!” when Stevens went to cut
down
the nets after the win over Kansas State.
GRADE: A
THE PEOPLE-WATCHING
You have a highly acclaimed academic school along with three Midwest
(or in
the case of WVU, “Midwest-ish”) schools that are barely into spring yet,
so
the chick watching will be minimal, and yet what’s there should at least
be
good comedic fodder. Wear your sunglasses, could be some very white
skin
there. The wild card in the people watching is West Virginia; let’s
face
it, there’s a good chance you could see dueling jug bands in the bar
district if the Mountaineers make the Finals. And I’ve always wanted to
see
dueling jug bands.
GRADE: B-
MOST COMPELLING FINALS MATCHUPS
1. Duke vs Butler (NCAA Goliath versus the hometown mid-major…who
would
the refs favor?)
2. Duke vs Michigan State (Izzo vs Coach K…who would kill the refs
first?)
3. West Virginia vs Butler (Huggins vs the city of Indy…who would be
favored?)
4. Michigan State vs West Virginia (Izzo vs Huggins, if game goes to OT just have two coaches fight at midcourt.)
OVERALL FINAL FOUR GRADE: B
Listen to Sean Pendergast on 1560 The Game from 3-7 p.m. weekdays on the Sean & John Show, and follow him on Twitter at
http://twitter.com/SeanCablinasian.
This article appears in Mar 25-31, 2010.
