March madness?

[Thunder]

Originally Posted by kewljason

His expertise, if he has any is with the pro game.

I take it you think really highly of him too Kewl You do know he was a 76er for most of his career right

But in all honestly the game of basketball isn't played that much more differently at the pro level than the college level except that I think they play at a faster pace at the college level and the pro level is a bit more physical. Rebounding is still rebounding, playing defense is playing defense, taking 3 steps and not having a traveling violation called still applies to both leagues.

[Thunder]

If you told me Butler would be winning when they only made 6 fg's in the entire half I would have said you were insane. Just as I thought they would, UConn has been dominating on the boards and inside the paint but give credit to Butler's defense for forcing UConn to play their game. If UConn wants to win, they really do need to pick up the pace. And please bench Napier. He SUCKS. He's a turnover machine! Butler is winning mostly because they're making far less mental mistakes than UConn.

[darco77]

What the hell was that? Reminds me of a "heated" Big Sky Conference match.

[Dyepaintball12]

I actually started to feel bad for Butler in the second half. So many missed shots.

[Thunder]

It's very hard to win a basketball game when you have no inside game whatsoever. I think Butler scored what, 2 points in the paint the 2nd half? After watching the games on Saturday and now this game, I'm convinced the reason why the scores were so low was because the rims were very tight. Somebody wanted to make a lot of money betting on the under but I guess that theory belongs in the zen zone.

[kewljason]

Originally Posted by Thunder

It's very hard to win a basketball game when you have no inside game whatsoever. I think Butler scored what, 2 points in the paint the 2nd half? After watching the games on Saturday and now this game, I'm convinced the reason why the scores were so low was because the rims were very tight. Somebody wanted to make a lot of money betting on the under but I guess that theory belongs in the zen zone.

I don't think 2 points in the paint is what did them in. They knew Uconn would have the advantage inside. I would say it's pretty hard to win a game that you shoot 18% from the floor for the game. As a matter of fact, I have never even heard of a team shooting below 20% in a game. I am sure it has happened, I just haven't seen or heard of it. And while Uconn won the game, they weren't much better at 34%. Pretty hard game to watch if you are strickly a fan.

I don't know about your tight rim theory, thunder, but I have heard it said before that basketball games played in a very large football arena, is difficult on shooters. It somehow looks different and the perception throws off their shooting. It is said that is one of the big advantages syracuse has. They are used to playing in the large arena and when visiting teams come in, they often struggle.

[Bojack1]

Originally Posted by kewljason

I am a big east fan myself, Bojack, as my favorite team, Nova is in the big east, but I just can't buy that argument. While the big east is naturally a powerhouse in basketball, with many tradition powers, like any other conference they also have their share of cupcakes.

Now about Uconn's non conference schedule. Stonybrook, Vermont, Wichita State, New Hampshire, UMBC Fairlie Dickinson, Coppins State. I would certainly hope they did well out of conference.

I like the david vs golith story of Butler. And Butler is the true david, not VCU as was portrayed by the media. Before the final four games, I looked up student enrollment. Uconn, Kentucky and yes VCU were all in the 25,000 range, which seems about average for major universities, although dwarfed by some of the big boys, like Ohio State, Texas, USC, Notre Dame, Michigan, Penn State. Butler? 4200! And what that really is about is money. I would love to compare the number of personel and budget of different recruiting departments. And it shows, with 3 of their starting players being local Indiana products. After 2 straight trips to the big game, that might change in the future. The will be competing with the big boys recruiting wise.

Cmon KJ, you're better than that. I will agree you reeled off some cupcakes for UConn's non conference schedule, but thats just cherry picking. They beat Mich State when they were thought to still be a tough team. They beat Texas, and Kentucky before the tournament as well. And look at the big east teams themselves, all decent to good teams. If you want to compare then go by strength of schedule, UConn wins that hands down. Butler, though quite an entertaining underdog, is deservedly so. Their whole schedule leading into the tournament was quite unimpressive. But up until last night they were able to win in big games. They lost to a better team, from a much better conference.

No matter how big or small a school is does not always reflect their recruiting status. Look at Duke, pretty damn small school compared to the competition they regularly face, yet they arguably have the best program in college hoops for decades now. Duke has about 6200 undergrads, which is what primarily plays for the team. They have another approximately 6800 post grads, but most are not student athletes, at least not in any basketball sense. So they slightly are larger than Butler, but close enough to wash your argument based on what they have accomplished being a small private school competing and beating out the big boys year in and year out.

[kewljason]

Originally Posted by Bojack1

Cmon KJ, you're better than that.

Cmon Mr Bo, your going to challenge my character because I don't agree with you that the big east was this far superior conference that they were portraited to be?

Uconn won the game and deserves to be the champs. They had an amazing month of March with both the run in the Big East tournament of 5 games in 5 days and the run in the NCAA tournament.

But the Big East was overrated. The total tournament results prove this. One team's (uconn) success does not over shadow a poor performance by the league. Pitt the top team in the league knocked out early in the second round. Notre Dame a 2 seed crushed in the second round by a 10 seed. St John's blown out first round, as a favorite. Georgetown blown out first round by the 4th best team from the colonial athletic conference. And yes, My favorite team Villanova, over-ranked in the top 10 most of the year, losers again in the first round to another colonial athletic conference team. If you are keeping score the CAC was 2-0 against Big east teams. Maybe they were the best conference?

If the big east was truly this superior conference, they would have placed 4 or 5 of their 11 teams into the sweet 16. Shouldn't of been that hard to do since 9 of the 11 were favorites in the first round. Instead the combined record of the 11 teams was 9-9 through the first two rounds, mostly as favorites and they managed only 2 teams in the sweet 16. One could argue that they both were only able to advance because they were able to beat other big east teams to get there.

[Bojack1]

Originally Posted by kewljason

Cmon Mr Bo, your going to challenge my character because I don't agree with you that the big east was this far superior conference that they were portraited to be?

Uconn won the game and deserves to be the champs. They had an amazing month of March with both the run in the Big East tournament of 5 games in 5 days and the run in the NCAA tournament.

But the Big East was overrated. The total tournament results prove this. One team's (uconn) success does not over shadow a poor performance by the league. Pitt the top team in the league knocked out early in the second round. Notre Dame a 2 seed crushed in the second round by a 10 seed. St John's blown out first round, as a favorite. Georgetown blown out first round by the 4th best team from the colonial athletic conference. And yes, My favorite team Villanova, over-ranked in the top 10 most of the year, losers again in the first round to another colonial athletic conference team. If you are keeping score the CAC was 2-0 against Big east teams. Maybe they were the best conference?

If the big east was truly this superior conference, they would have placed 4 or 5 of their 11 teams into the sweet 16. Shouldn't of been that hard to do since 9 of the 11 were favorites in the first round. Instead the combined record of the 11 teams was 9-9 through the first two rounds, mostly as favorites and they managed only 2 teams in the sweet 16. One could argue that they both were only able to advance because they were able to beat other big east teams to get there.

Oh no KJ, not questioning your character, just your deductive reasoning and your use of hyperbole. I never said the big east was a far superior conference, just a deep one with decent to good teams, and now one of them being the national champ. I tried to explain it with other sports before, I'll try again. Most baseball people would argue that the American League East is the best division in baseball. With the Red Sox, Yankees, Tampa Bay, all being playoff contenders, and the Orioles resurgence under Buck Showalter, and Toronto consistently at least being at or around a .500 team. Its not a fact they are the best division, but you would be hard pressed to find an expert to say otherwise. Anyway, they had no representatives in the world series last year. Does that mean that Texas or the Giants have stronger divisions, NO. The east in baseball and in college basketball are deep and good. Every team in the conference had big wins. And all teams being at least good makes for a great conference. Going to a one and done tournament doesn't mean much in the way of who is actually the best. On any given day anybody can lose a game. If UConn plays Duke 10 times they probably lose more then they win, but UConn happens to be the champs anyway. The measure of a conference is not exactly what they get done in the tournament, but how many teams get the invite, just may be a better barometer. The fact they did have representation all throughout the tournament culminating with a national title, doesn't hurt the case however.

[Automatic Monkey]

Amazing low score in the game last night, like it was a girls' game or something!

I'm convinced UConn plays so well in the second half because their top player(s) are small guys who aren't going to fatigue like a 6'10" white guy will. They are also a disciplined team who will not foul needlessly.