Saturday, March 22, 2008

NCAA Saturday: UCLA Survives

UCLA survives, advances to Sweet 16: I'm of the feeling that champions of the NCAA Tournament have to be pushed to the brink. It could come in any round, but it will happen. Don't confuse a close win with overall vulnerability.

(But, yes: Having touted UCLA since November as my pick as champ, this one had me freaking right up until the final seconds.)

Meanwhile, so much for my prediction that Pitt would oust Memphis in the Sweet 16. But two cautions: (1) Given the trouble UCLA had with Texas A&M, don't think Memphis is a lock over Mississippi State tomorrow -- or Michigan State in the Sweet 16.

Everything else since Duke was ousted to start the day was pretty chalky: Stanford fans should be thanking some deity for that win; that was an NBA Lottery-player shot from Lopez to win the game.

Coming Sunday: TWO 12/13 games in Tampa, Stephen Curry vs. Hoya Paranoia and Tennessee vs. Butler (could be the best game of the day). I'm not sure that there will be as much craziness as there was on Friday, but that's probably because 4 of Friday's Cinderellas are all playing each other.

-- D.S.

2 comments:

Michael W said...

I think Pitt fooled a lot of people. Pity.

People have to be talking about the game passing Krzyzewski by, I think. I think a lot of recent Duke teams have been genuinely good, but they are consistently underachieving. It would be one thing if the talent wasn't there, but it seems to be there. People always say that they are overrated, but they had a quality regular season. They are just underachieving, and you gotta put that on Coach K.

Anonymous said...

No love for Wazzu? They dominated 5 seed Notre Dame and some people picked *cough* Winthrop to beat Wazzu a round earlier.