NCAA Basketball Thread 2024-2025
Quick OP here just to get us up and running
Things to watch for this year:
1. Can UConn 3-peat? Hurley won back to back championships with Clingan, Tristen Newton, and company. Can he make it a third with only one returning starter?
2. Who will be this years national player of the year? Zach Edey was the best player I've seen play college basketball in my lifetime. People throw the term generational talent around alot and Edey was truly a generational talent winning back to back national player of the year awards. But, now he's gone. So who can win the award?
- the 5th year guards in Mark Sears(Alabama) and RJ Davis(UNC) are a good spot to start. Both elite shooters and engines of an offense, they should lead two really good teams.
- the 5th year centers in Hunter Dickinson(Kansas) and Ryan Kallbrenner(Creighton) are also viable options. They'll be the anchors to what should be two really good teams.
- The phenoms: Cooper Flagg(Duke), Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper(Rutgers), VJ Edgecombe(Baylor), and Tre Johnson(Texas) lead a loaded freshman class.
3. Who are the contenders?
Spoiler
Lettuce college basketball
Hubert has a lot to ****ing figure out. So sick of seeing the down then the ups then the down.
Pups -7.5 vs Texas Tech tomorrow. If I were a sports bettor, I might put a small amount on Drake to cover.
I'll reiterate, if you're not rooting for Drake, you're a bad person.
Tech fans excepted, of course.
Interested in Michigan State's 2nd round game.
Whether it's Dent or Kam Jones, the 2 seed won't have the best player on the floor
Yeah, best game so far was probably 16 v 16. Real weak round 1.
Occurred to me today. Entering the tournament at 30-3, that means Drake wins 10, then loses one.
Won the last two regular season games, then 3 in MVC tournament.
Sounds like Pups in national championship!
How steep of odds would you have laid that Duke would make the Sweet 16?
I'm undefeated on the tourney so far (just 3-0), but I went there on Duke. As in: "Look, Duke is gonna be in the Sweet 16." This is a tempting of the "Madness Factor" of Marches gone by and yet to come, admittedly. But there I sit.
Life is complete now that Eagle and Raf are together
Michigan State going down
This is Dan Hurley's 7th year at UConn. If he wins this game vs Oklahoma, it will be his first tournament win at UConn without Donovan Clingan.
I've watched like 2 games (busy, life stuff) appears I haven't missed much Thurs-Fri
UConn didn't even win by double digits
lol "TOURNAMENT STORYLINE: SEC DOMINATES, ADVANCING 8 TEAMS INTO THE SECOND ROUND"
I mean sure, that's true. It's also true that they probably also set the record for most losses in the first round, with six.
And six of their 8 wins were against 16, 16, 15, 15, 14, 13 seeds.
And then in the 8 actual games they played vs seeds 7 thru 11, they went 2-6
SEC was insanely good in the OOC this year and that was definitely a storyline of the season, but it's definitely not a STORYLINE OF THE TOURNAMENT yet
This was a fun event before Sankey bought it
Teetering on the edge of worst 1st round ever territory
I think 4 of 20 games were 1 possession in the last minute and none of those got to a tie or lead change
We are firmly in this territory now. Wonder if someone has made a metric to evaluate how good or bad the first and second rounds are.
2017
The only double-digit favorite in round two is Duke
Weird seeing Cal vs Pitino in the college game when one wasn't coaching UK. They did meet 6 times in the NBA. But since 1992, one was coaching UK when they met.
Six guys on Mississippi average double figures and all six have played 30 games
Expert performances from Chris Beard and Dana Altman today. Probably the best two doing it
