On paper a great final 4

Russ Smith

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Basically the 4 best teams throughout the year, all #1 seeds and 3 of the most storied programs in College basketball history.

I thought Curry made a mistake at the end of the Kansas game he should have jumped in and drawn the foul intstead of passing. First he got Rush off his feet and stepped aside instead of jumping in, then he got Collins rushing him and passed instead of jumping in. Easy to say in hindsight of course and
he gave the guy an open look, but he had the chance to draw the foul IMHO.

Memphis and UCLA, UNC and Kansas, should be some good games. Right now to me UNC is playing the best of the 4.
 

Dback Jon

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It will be a great Final 4. Would have liked to see Davidson crash the party, but having all #1's is nice as well.

UCLA and UNC in the final

UCLA wins
 

Southpaw

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Not for me.

Give me Xavier, Davidson, Butler and Western Kentucky. Bet this one goes in the dumpster for ratings.
 

Rivercard

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Not for me.

Give me Xavier, Davidson, Butler and Western Kentucky. Bet this one goes in the dumpster for ratings.

Yeah, I'm not too interested in this final 4 either. It's pretty sad when I start rooting for Memphis. UNC is probably the best team of the four. Yawn......
 

ajcardfan

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I think the ratings will be very good.

I like Kansas in an underdog role. I think they will enjoy playing with the pressure off. I'd rather see them, or Memphis, win it.
 
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Russ Smith

Russ Smith

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I think Memphis and UNC are playing the best ball right now. The interesting thing is UNC has one player(Quentin Thomas), Kansas 0 and Memphis 0 who've ever played in a final 4 before. UCLA is loaded with guys who have played in one or two, so you'd think the edge in not being intimidated by the magnitude of the event is with UCLA. The problem is the guy carrying them to this point, Love, will be in his first final 4.

I think any of the 4 teams could win which is why I think the games should be good, last year you just sort of knew Florida would turn it on and win after they got by Oregon, I was actually surprised how close Ohio State got.
 

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Not for me.

Give me Xavier, Davidson, Butler and Western Kentucky. Bet this one goes in the dumpster for ratings.

Amen, brother.

I can live with Memphis winning but the others bore me.
 
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Russ Smith

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Hats off to memphis their guards were just too big UCLA never got the right matchup I would have preferred to see Westbrook start on Rose but even that didn't totally work. Great team and great defense shut UCLA down late in the game.

Boy does Kansas look good so far against UNC, I expected them to play them tough but right now they're dominant.
 

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Memphis has played well all year, and the team has been built for a run like this. Rose has been an amazing force this year, along with CDR and the rest of the tigers.

I'm surprised at Kansas being able to do what they've done against UNC so far.
 

ajcardfan

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WOW! Kansas is kicking N.C's butt so bad, Billy Packer just called the game with 7 mins left in the first half! The Tar Heels look so ssslllloooooowwwww. I thought Kansas could win, but man, not like this!

I also thought UCLA-Memphis would be a nailbiter, but they completely took Collison out of the game and Love was a nonfactor in the 2nd half.

So far, fantastic coaching jobs by Self and Calipari.
 

ajcardfan

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Kansas-Memphis

Surely this one will be close, won't it?
 

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Kansas-Memphis

Surely this one will be close, won't it?

I hope so.The others were snooze fests with the winning team jumping out early. At least Memphis/UCLA was close at halftime.

Once Davidson went out, the only interesting team left, at least to me, was Memphis.

By the way, if you can't stand listening to Billy Packer micromanage every possession, mute the sound and turn on CBS radio. John Thompson and Bill Raftery, who sucked on TV, are more relaxed and quite good calling the game on radio.
 

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Kansas is kicking N.C's butt so bad, Billy Packer just called the game with 7 mins left in the first half!

Boy I hated that. My favorite teams are the Cardinals and Jayhawks. One of my coworkers is Bears and Tarheels. It was bad enough dealing with this guy during the Monday Night Meltdown two years ago. This guy was so self-satisfied, sure that the Bears had it all along. I felt it all coming up again for the first 10 minutes of the second half. Anyway, it worked out pretty nicely. I don't know how much is left for Memphis. Those guys look ridiculous. But people in Crimson and Blue are going to be pretty happy for quite awhile regardless.
 

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Cheesebeef

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Thanks, Renz. Nice find. Very good article.

Thugball and compliant PAC refs helped inflate UCLA's record. But, on a bigger stage, that boring, unimaginative offense was exposed.

Can Howland change? He wouldn't at Pittsburgh, when he had the same kinds of tournament problems. My guess is he won't ever win it all.

same kind of "tournament problems"? I'm pretty sure his "problems" at UCLA are the same kind of problems a lot of other teams would love having (1 national title game and 3 final fours in 3 years... yeah, big problems.) Not everyone can be as successful as people that you adore and defend like Rod Graves.

Man, are you serious?
 

MaoTosiFanClub

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I don't think it's Howland's system as much as it is him not recruiting enough players that can put the ball in the basket. Way too many guys who are useless on the offensive end get big minutes for the Bruins.
 
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Russ Smith

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Plaschke has as much insight on UCLA as I do on Stanford women's basketball, none. The reason Love was yelling at Howland was he was being double teamed all over the court as Dozier ignored Luc and sucked down onto Love. And Luc sat out there shooting jumpers I think he was 1-6 in the first half the first bucket being a layup where Love was doubled and Westbrook found Luc wide open(he still made it into a tough shot).

Howland who's usually pretty protective of his players even said it in the postgame he was asked why Love didn't touch the ball more in the 2nd half and his answer was "because they weren't guarding our power forward they were doubling Kevin." That was so frustrating to watch Luc wound up 5-13 completely unguarded teh whole game. He finally figured it out and went to the offensive glass but too late, Keefe in his limited minutes figured out immediately what was going on, so did Aboya, but Luc who's been seeing that defense all year kept on shooting jumpers the first 30 minutes.

AS for the UCLA needs to get more athletic, gee Plaschke do you think that's why they signed Jrue Holiday, Malcolm Lee, Jerime Anderson and Drew Gordon all of whom are more athletic than most of the guys on the current roster?

The problem next year is size they lose Mata-Real, Love, DC, possibly Westbrook and I think Luc probably files for the draft(he's wanted 2 the last 2 years but was hurt both times). So they'll be much smaller but more athletic. If Westbrook decides to stay one more year they'll be exceptionally athletic in the guards. Gordon is a terrific athlete but very unpolished as a 5/4, not even close to Love as a post.

Memphis was just much better there were adjustments Ben could have made such as admitting early that Collison couldn't guard Rose, but in the end he was running a relay race where no matter what order he put his 4 guys, they were slower than the other team. THe key to the game was supposed to be limiting fastbreaks, Memphis over and over got easy buckets in transition off UCLA turnovers or bad shots. Westbrook for all the good things he did he also had 3 turnovers that led directly to layups and forced several drives that got blocked into fastbreaks. Collison was brutal 2 points 5 turnovers 5 fouls. UCLA's guards got dominated and last time I checked UCLA's guards are more athletic than their bigs.

UCLA lost because they couldn't score in the last 6-7 minutes, they couldn't stop Memphis from scoring, and the shoot 3's and foul strategy turned a 7 point hole into a 15 point hole as UCLA missed 3's and Memphis made the FT's.

UCLA is 13-3 in the last 3 years under Howland in the tourney, 2 losses to Florida a team that started 3 lottery picks, one this year to a team that started 2 lottery picks. The problem is if Howland does what Plaschke suggests and starts recruiting more big scorers, he won't be able to get them to play great defense. He picks players to fit his system, he just needs to find a better balance where he has enough shooters and offense to avoid the lengthy droughts they had all year.

We'll see when the dust settles, if Westbrook comes back UCLA is still likely the favorite to win the conference next year, Jrue Holiday is already a better player than Westbrook put those 2 together and they'll be terrific, they just gotta find someone to play inside next year.
 
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Russ Smith

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I don't think it's Howland's system as much as it is him not recruiting enough players that can put the ball in the basket. Way too many guys who are useless on the offensive end get big minutes for the Bruins.

Exactly Ben fits guys into his system but he's been unable to get enough scorers. UCLA fans wonder why he ever recruited Budinger who openly admits he wants to run up and down not play the system KO wanted, but that's why Ben recruited him so hard. He figured peer pressure and winning will get him to work harder on defense if he comes here and he can score which we need.

If Westbrook comes back with Holiday next year the guards are going to be special, the main problem this year was outside shooting Memphis took away DC and with Shipp completely vanishing after the first 3 minutes, there was nobody else. Roll would have been useless he only scores against zones, but they need more guys who can make an open shot, watching Luc flail away completely unguarded was just brutal.
 
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