I hate this stretch, after the brackets come out, where we have three looooong days to do nothing but dissect the bracket, until you have every region, every game, every possible matchup memorized. Some random basketball thoughts, mostly non-bracket related, as I will save those for later in the week (here's one bracket thought, though: KU got fuuuuucked. Hard. With no vaseline.)
- I have no idea what the hell is wrong with Texas. Wait, I know exactly what is wrong with them: Rick Barnes. He has made a complete mess of that team. I hate to make everything about KU (no, really) but it's a perfect comparison here. The teams started the year ranked #1 and #2, respectively. KU had 14 players who deserved minutes; Texas had 12. Bill Self red-shirted two of them, gave the other 12 their chance to prove themselves in practice and against the shitty non-conference teams, then cut the rotation to 8.5 guys. And KU has only lost two games so far. Rick Barnes, on the other hand, changed starting point guards about 4 or 5 times, hit the panic button and benched a senior who had started every game in his college career, and regularly played all 12 guys in a single half. And their season completely went to shit. There's a lesson in there somewhere.
I'll give Barnes some credit; he's a hell of a recruiter (Kevin Durant, TJ Ford, DJ Augustin, Damion James just the last eight years) but at some point you've got to be able to handle the x's and o's. This team has more pure talent than anyone in the country, and he hasn't been able to do a thing with it.
And with all that said, I'm seriously considering picking them to beat Kentucky and go to the Elite 8.
- Not totally relevant, since Cincinnati won't be making the tourney.....but after watching multiple Cincy games this year, thank goodness that Calipari left Memphis, which re-opened Xavier Henry's recruiting, which brought him to KU, which used up the scholarship that was being saved for Lance Stephenson. What a punk-ass that kid is. There's no way I could've cheered for that thug; I had a hard enough time trying to cheer for Tyshawn Taylor, who comparatively is like the Usher to Stephenson's Suge Knight on the Thug Scale. You could throw Stephenson onto 2Pac's team in Above the Rim, and he would fit right in- right down to having a gun in his gym bag underneath his bench. Holy hell.
- Along similar lines, a fun game I like to play while watching Kentucky games (when I'm not marveling at how amazing John Wall is) is counting how many seconds DeMarcus Cousins can make it without throwing his arms up in frustration, whining to a ref, sniping at a teammate, crying towards Calipari, or sneering at an opposing player. So far I've made it to 38. I can't remember a more immature player; it's like watching an eight-year-old. It's too bad Glen Davis already has the nickname 'Big Baby', because that is the perfect moniker for Cousins. I can't come up with a better description of him. Maybe I'll go with 'Dipshit.'
- All year long I've maintained that Syracuse is the best team in the country; I think that their 'A' game is better than anyone else's 'A' game. Simply put, when they are playing their best, nobody else is beating them. However, losing a couple in a row to end the season, and possibly being without Onuaku (when they're only 7 deep to begin with) is starting to change my mind.
And I don't really know what to think about KU. On one hand, they have yet to play a complete 40 minutes of basketball (the closest they came was at Temple, and they won by 30.) So while it's promising that they were able to go 32-2 without playing particularly awesome, it begs the question: it's now March, will they ever put it all together for a whole game? Their A- to C+ game was enough to go 15-1 in the Big 12, is it enough to win the championship?
I've only picked KU to go all the way twice in my life ('97, '02.) As of now I'm leaning towards this year being the third time. We'll see, I'm only on my third draft of my bracket, I carry that thing around like Happy Gilmore and his hockey puck.
More thoughts later.
