2018-19 College Basketball thread

[HerRealName]

I never want this LSU - Maryland game to end. What a great game.

[Young Drachma]

LSU traveled pretty blatantly there, but hey...it's March I guess.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Yeeeeah. It ain't been pretty.

I'm down 4 S16s already.

Conversely, my women's bracket that I had less confidence in than any previous year, 15/16 on day one including all three lower seeds that won. My only miss was a 10/7 that didn't happen. Having said that I figure I'll go 8-8 today lol.

undoubtedly

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Young Drachma

LSU traveled pretty blatantly there, but hey...it's March I guess.

It'll be vacated anyway so I guess they figured why not.

[Brian Swartz]

Question: I thought it used to be a thing that you couldn't play anyone from your own conference in the first two rounds? MSU vs. Minny today made me think of this. I thought what they used to do at least is switch Minnesota with a 10-seed from another region to avoid such matchups. Anyone know what the current rules are on this, since they're not what I thought they were?

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

Question: I thought it used to be a thing that you couldn't play anyone from your own conference in the first two rounds? MSU vs. Minny today made me think of this. I thought what they used to do at least is switch Minnesota with a 10-seed from another region to avoid such matchups. Anyone know what the current rules are on this, since they're not what I thought they were?

If you have only played them once in conference you can play them early.

I’m other news I’m in Vegas and just woke up. Ugh.

[Thomkal]

What stays in Vegas...

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

Question: I thought it used to be a thing that you couldn't play anyone from your own conference in the first two rounds? MSU vs. Minny today made me think of this. I thought what they used to do at least is switch Minnesota with a 10-seed from another region to avoid such matchups. Anyone know what the current rules are on this, since they're not what I thought they were?

from
How the field of 68 teams is picked for March Madness | NCAA.com

Each of the first four teams selected from a conference shall be placed in different regions if they are seeded on the first four lines.

Teams from the same conference shall not meet prior to the regional final if they played each other three or more times during the regular season and conference tournament.

Teams from the same conference shall not meet prior to the regional semifinals if they played each other twice during the regular season and conference tournament.

Teams from the same conference may play each other as early as the second round if they played no more than once during the regular season and conference tournament.

Any principle can be relaxed if two or more teams from the same conference are among the last four at-large seeded teams participating in the First Four.

To recognize the demonstrated quality of such teams, the committee shall not place teams seeded on the first four lines at a potential “home-crowd disadvantage” in the first round.

[Logan]

Every quote from Zion that I read makes me love him more:

Zion on whether it’s fair that CBS can follow him around with the Zion-cam while not being compensated: “Like my mom taught me, worry about the things you can control.”

Zion on the Tacko Fall comment about not allowing him to put him on a poster: “What is he supposed to say? That I’m going to dunk on him?”

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Logan

Every quote from Zion that I read makes me love him more:

Zion on whether it’s fair that CBS can follow him around with the Zion-cam while not being compensated: “Like my mom taught me, worry about the things you can control.”

Zion on the Tacko Fall comment about not allowing him to put him on a poster: “What is he supposed to say? That I’m going to dunk on him?”

Sadly, a couple years in the NBA and he'll almost certainly be as clueless as the rest of the league tries to be.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Through the first 28 games of the women's tournament, I'm 27-1, tied for 6th nationally on espn. (Yes, only 5 perfect brackets remain now, there were 278 perfect about 2 hours ago)

[Thomkal]

woot Jon

[JonInMiddleGA]

First round complete, 31-1.

Only missed Drake's one point loss to Mizzou.

[Brian Swartz]

Dang, that's impressive. Apparently on the men's side there is now only one perfect bracket left out of 17 million … which will end soon I'm sure.

[miami_fan]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

First round complete, 31-1.

Only missed Drake's one point loss to Mizzou.

I wonder how many brackets were ruined because very few people have watched the Lady Vols play this year?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

I wonder how many brackets were ruined because very few people have watched the Lady Vols play this year?

I wondered too, but only about 32%.

The DePaul loss seemed to be the one that wrecked a bunch, they were a 76% pick.

[Young Drachma]

Speaking of Tennessee, is this the end of the Holly Warlick era? And what of the UT tree do they try to coax to town to restore the program before it's too late?

[Brian Swartz]

Whole lotta blowouts today. Not surprised to see Nova and Kansas losing, but I did think they'd put up more of a fight.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Young Drachma

Speaking of Tennessee, is this the end of the Holly Warlick era? And what of the UT tree do they try to coax to town to restore the program before it's too late?

God I hope so but I'm not at all confident about that.

My own theory is that Phat Phil is still mad about losing his coaching job & is actually sandbagging the athletic department (why else would anyone hire the new OC?) so he'll keep Holly Aintworthalick .

[Galaril]

Good God Tennessee. How do you blow a 25 point lead against a 10th seed?

[Thomkal]

And here I was about to call Iowa out of it...

[hoopsguy]

At halftime of this game, I was wondering what would need to happen in the remaining seven games to lift the 2019 NCAA from the most dull version I've ever witnessed.

Not out of the woods yet, but having a compelling game here after all the blowouts yesterday is a good start.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Galaril

Good God Tennessee. How do you blow a 25 point lead against a 10th seed?

You obviously haven't watched them much this year lol.

Admiral bailed 'em out in the first game, Williams & Bone in OT today. I mean, you can't hate the potential for a different hero every game but I sure wish they didn't need heroes so often.

[Lathum]

Hoping my huskies can hang in there. Pretty excited for the game. I’m on a plane headed back from Vegas. Bought the WiFi just hoping to follow along and the video is working through the MMOD app.

[tarcone]

Its tough to win when you are down 25 in the 1st half.

You saw both teams that Iowa was this year. Unfortunately the 1st half team was around more than the 2nd half.

[tarcone]

The #2 seed Iowa women are beating Mizzou for the sweet 16. Iowa has one of the best players in the nation on their team, Megan Gufstason. She is the 2 timr B1G POtY.

[Lathum]

Coby White is our ofnhis god damn mind.

[JonInMiddleGA]

LOL.

I moved into 1st place in the ESPN women's bracket when Texas A&M survived Marquette.

That lasted about 5 minutes, as I missed FSU/South Carolina and fell into a tie for #269

[Brian Swartz]

Originally Posted by hoopsguy

I was wondering what would need to happen in the remaining seven games to lift the 2019 NCAA from the most dull version I've ever witnessed.

I've never really understood why so many people put this on the first weekend. I've always thought the second one was the best, and that's what really defines the tournament for me.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

I've never really understood why so many people put this on the first weekend. I've always thought the second one was the best, and that's what really defines the tournament for me.

I think the first weekend is the most "fun", just from the sheer volume of games in the first two days. And on Thursday morning everybody's bracket is still intact.

After that is probably where the tournament is defined for history but it goes from being about fun to about teams doing their business.

[Brian Swartz]

Hmm. I enjoy the S16/E8 more just because there's still plenty of games but not so many that you have to choose who to watch, and everybody at that point is pretty good. The concentrated quality or whatever is much superior. Even if it's a 13-seed Cinderella or whatever, they still beat some quality to get there so they are playing well. The whole bracket thing has never been as big of a deal to me, so that's probably part of it as well.

[bhlloy]

I do agree with the OP though. In terms of close games this has been notably the least exciting first weekend I can ever remember.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

Hmm. I enjoy the S16/E8 more just because there's still plenty of games but not so many that you have to choose who to watch, and everybody at that point is pretty good. The concentrated quality or whatever is much superior. Even if it's a 13-seed Cinderella or whatever, they still beat some quality to get there so they are playing well. The whole bracket thing has never been as big of a deal to me, so that's probably part of it as well.

I started doing brackets when I was, I dunno, 8 or 9 years old. That's 40+ years now. About half in the pen & paper era, about half in the online era.

Without a doubt what I'll remember about this year to my dying day is having a #1 (women's) bracket for all of five minutes. I've been 98th-99th percentile several times at different points over the ESPN bracket era but this was the first time I'd ever been at (or tied for) #1.

And it literally came down to which game would finish first (game clocks were less than 20 seconds apart), so I even had drama to go with it

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I started doing brackets when I was, I dunno, 8 or 9 years old. That's 40+ years now. About half in the pen & paper era, about half in the online era.

Without a doubt what I'll remember about this year to my dying day is having a #1 (women's) bracket for all of five minutes. I've been 98th-99th percentile several times at different points over the ESPN bracket era but this was the first time I'd ever been at (or tied for) #1.

And it literally came down to which game would finish first (game clocks were less than 20 seconds apart), so I even had drama to go with it

And that's not to discount the tournament / games themselves in the least.

I still have scorebooks that I kept as a kid during games I was watching on TV. The highlight of those games being Jack Givens 41 pts vs Duke in the '78 title game. Goose Givens is now 62 years old for crying out loud.

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

LOL.

I moved into 1st place in the ESPN women's bracket when Texas A&M survived Marquette.

That lasted about 5 minutes, as I missed FSU/South Carolina and fell into a tie for #269

Still, that's super cool.

[spleen1015]

Is it hard to listen to Chris Weber for anyone else?

[hoopsguy]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

I've never really understood why so many people put this on the first weekend. I've always thought the second one was the best, and that's what really defines the tournament for me.

I don't know that I necessarily define the overall quality of a tournament by the first weekend, but it does represent 3/4 of the overall games. And having a few of those games actually hanging in the balance over the last ten minutes makes that experience more fun.

[miami_fan]

I agree with Jon. This first weekend is about fun. After that it is about being the best.

[spleen1015]

I agree with the notion that this feels like the least exciting first weekend I can remember.

Having said that, I am finding my excitement towards sports is waning as I get older.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by spleen1015

Having said that, I am finding my excitement towards XXXXXX is waning as I get older.

You could put virtually any word in that sentence & I'd concur

[hoopsguy]

Dawkins for UCF has put on a show. They just won't let Duke pull away.

[Jas_lov]

Wow! Duke survives

[bhlloy]

A couple of dodged bullets on no-calls there for Duke, but all my brackets are very grateful

[SirFozzie]

How did that tip in not go in?

[stevew]

I can't believe that didn't go in

[bhlloy]

Pick a narrative - that’s exactly the kind of early round wake up call a favorite needs vs that game shows us that they aren’t as good as we thought they were

[BishopMVP]

Originally Posted by bhlloy

Pick a narrative - that’s exactly the kind of early round wake up call a favorite needs vs that game shows us that they aren’t as good as we thought they were

The rest of the team outside Zion is exactly as bad as I thought they are vs (a competent) zone.

[hoopsguy]

LOL @ Grant Hill, "No memes this year!"

In terms of Duke vs zone, I felt last weekend that them getting MSU on opposite end of the bracket was a worse draw for them than it was for Sparty. Nothing that I saw this afternoon altered that opinion ... if both teams are best versions of themselves, Duke wins going away but average version of each is a rough, rough match-up.

[jbergey22]

Favorites are now 15-0 on the moneyline in the 2nd round. I bet a lot of sportsbooks are cheering heavily on UC-Irvine and not having to pay out 16 team moneyline favorite parlays.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Through 1.5 rounds my women's bracket remains in the top 0.1%, 82nd place nationally. I'm 38-2 so far (missed Drake-Missouri day one, missed SC-FSU on Sunday).

Monday will be critical for my women's bracket as I have 4 upsets (by seed number) picked out of the eight games.