SB Nation User Blog: NYCCats

UK vs. UConn at the Garden

NYCCats — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 21:09:05 -0000

As we all know, our Cats will be travelling up here to New York to beat up on Calhoun's puppies at the "World's Most Famous Arena" on December 9th (game is at 9:00, preceded by St. John's vs. Georgia).

I just bought my tickets (www.thegarden.com) - sitting on the UK side, free throw line, 300 section - and I can't wait!

Here are the questions:

1) How many of my fellow ASoBers will be in attendance?

2) Does any know if UK (or an alum association) will be planning any organized gathering spot for pre- or post-game libations/Husky baiting?

3) And if the answer to #1 is yes, and #2 is no, would there be any interest in organizing something through this site? I may be willing to help with the logistics, if the interest is there. . .

Respond as you will.

NYCCats

Myles Brand passes away

NYCCats — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:06:24 -0000

Myles Brand passes away

Aged 67, pancreatic cancer. Condolences to the family (wife and son).

Derby - Who ya got?

NYCCats — Fri, 01 May 2009 12:58:27 -0000

Ok, people, not to tear everyone away from the minute-by-minute excitement that is John Wall's recruitment (insert sarcasm tag here), but there is a fairly important horse race happening tomorrow. So, predictions must be made.

Add your trifecta to the comments - winner gets. . . well, absolutely nothing, unless you went down to your friendly neighborhood OTB to place a wager. But you do get unofficial ASoB horse-picking bragging rights. So you've got that going for you, which is nice.

For review, the field is as follows:

Post	Horse	Trainer	Jockey	Odds
1	West Side Bernie	Kelly Breen	Stewart Elliott	30-1
2	Musket Man	Derek Ryan	Eibar Coa	20-1
3	Mr. Hot Stuff	Eoin Harty	John Velazquez	30-1
4	Advice	Todd Pletcher	Rene Douglas	30-1
5	Hold Me Back	Bill Mott	Kent Desormeaux	15-1
6	Friesan Fire	Larry Jones	Gabriel Saez	5-1
7	Papa Clem	Gary Stute	Rafael Bejarano	20-1
8	Mine That Bird	Bennie Woolley	Calvin Borel	50-1
9	Join in the Dance	Todd Pletcher	Chris DeCarlo	50-1
10	Regal Ransom	Saeed bin Suroor	Alan Garcia	30-1
11	Chocolate Candy	Jerry Hollendorfer	Mike Smith	20-1
12	General Quarters	Tom McCarthy	Julien Leparoux	20-1
13	I Want Revenge	Jeff Mullins	Joe Talamo	3-1
14	Atomic Rain	Kelly Breen	Joe Bravo	50-1
15	Dunkirk	Todd Pletcher	Edgar Prado	4-1
16	Pioneerof the Nile	Bob Baffert	Garrett Gomez	4-1
17	Summer Bird	Tim Ice	Chris Rosier	50-1
18	Nowhere to Hide	Nick Zito	Shaun Bridgmohan	50-1
19	Desert Party	Saeed bin Suroor	Ramon Dominguez	15-1
20	Flying Private	D. Wayne Lukas	Robby Albarado	50-1

My picks:

1 - I Want Revenge (13)

2 - Regal Ransom (10)

3 - Friesan Fire (6)

WHO YA GOT?

The Impact of Double All-Americans

NYCCats — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 16:13:44 -0000

There has been much recent (justified) chatter that UK may have two All-Americans on its team right now - Meeks and Patterson. While individual accolades are nice, I'm sure all Kentucky fans are much more concerned with how the team does. So how have teams that have had two All-Americans done where it matters the most - the NCAA tournament?

Let's look at the data.

I went back over the last 20 years, and used the AP All-American 1st-3rd teams. I ignored Honorable Mention. Looking at the raw data, there were 30 sets of double (or more) All-Americans. Only two years did not have a team that doubled up - '03-'04 and '95-96. Out of this raw data, there were 3 occurrences of triple All-Americans, which I will exclude for this analysis. Additionally, there are two "outliers" that I will also toss from the data set - Indiana last year (during the middle of their implosion), and Loyola Marymount in '89-'90 (gimmicky offense, mid-major conference, Hank Gathers factor). So that leaves us with 25 good data points, which are presented below (excluded data points also shown below for completeness).

Year	School	All-American (Team)	NCAA Seed	Finish
07-08	UCLA	Love (1), Collison (3)	1	Nat'l Semi
	Memphis	Douglas-Roberts (1), Rose (3)	1	Final
	Indiana	White (2), Gordon (3)	8	1st Round
06-07	Florida	Noah (2), Horford (3)	1	Champion
05-06	Duke	Redick (1), Williams (1)	1	Sweet 16
	Villanova	Foye (1), Ray (3)	1	Elite 8
04-05	Illinois	Head (2), Brown (2), Williams (3)	1	Final
	Duke	Redick (1), Williams (3)	1	Sweet 16
03-04		None
02-03	Kansas	Collison (1), Hinrich (3)	2	Final
01-02	Duke	Williams (1), Dunleavy (2), Boozer (3)	1	Sweet 16
00-01	Duke	Battier (1), Williams (1)	1	Champion
	Mich St	Richardson (2), Bell (3)	1	Nat'l Semi
99-00	Duke	Battier (2), Carrawell (2)	1	Sweet 16
	Mich St	Peterson (2), Cleaves (2)	1	Champion
98-99	Duke	Brand (1), Langdon (2)	1	Final
97-98	Arizona	Bibby (1), Simon (1), Dickerson (3)	1	Elite 8
	Kansas	LaFrentz (1), Pierce (1)	1	Elite 8
	UNC	Jamison (1), Carter (2)	1	Nat'l Semi
96-97	Kansas	LaFrentz (1), Vaughn (2)	1	Sweet 16
95-96		None
94-95	Wake Forest	Childress (2), Duncan (3)	1	Sweet 16
	UNC	Stackhouse (1), Wallace (2)	2	Nat'l Semi
93-94	Michigan	Rose (2), Howard (3)	3	Elite 8
92-93	Duke	Hurley (1), Hill (3)	3	2nd Round
91-92	Duke	Laettner (1), Hurley (3)	1	Champion
	Arkansas	Day (3), Mayberry (3)	3	2nd Round
90-91	UNLV	Augmon (1), Johnson (1)	1	Nat'l Semi
89-90	Loy. Marymt.	Kimble (2), Gathers (3)	11	Elite 8
	Georgia Tech	Scott (2), Anderson (3)	4	Nat'l Semi
88-89	Oklahoma	King (1), Blaylock (2)	1	Sweet 16
	Georgetown	Smith (2), Mourning (3)	1	Elite 8

Of the 25 teams, the lowest seed received was a #4 by Georgia Tech in '89-'90, and that team made it all the way to the Final Four. A whopping 19 teams (76%) received a #1 seed. So clearly, a double All-American team is usually one of the elite regular season teams.

As for the tournament itself, these results are slightly more variable, as one would expect. Four teams (16%) went on to win the title. The earliest exits were in the second round twice - Arkansas in '91-'92 as a #3 seed, and Duke also as a #3 seed a year later. What I find most interesting is 13 teams went on to the Final Four - that means the median finish (half above, half below) was a berth in the National Semis.

So what does this mean for Kentucky? At first cut, nothing, since each year and situation is independent. Likewise, this analysis does not address whether two All-Americans is causative (if you have two All-Americans, you will do well), or correlative (teams with two All-Americans also typically do well).

But it does show that the vast majority of teams that had two All-Americans are usually very good teams. If UK truly does have two All-Americans on its hands, this should be a very successful season, despite what other limitations we may have. I'm sure most of these teams cited above had some flaws, but yet were able to overcome them due to their two studs.

Will Kentucky buck the trend? Will we have two All-Americans but have a ho-hum regular season followed by an early tournament exit? Perhaps, but the historical analysis says that would be an extremely unlikely event. GO CATS!!

Was anyone watching ESPN2 at 9:47 pm on Thurs?

NYCCats — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 03:28:48 -0000

Halftime of the St. Mary's-San Diego game. They do the highlights of West Virginia's win at Georgetown and the host turns it over to Stephen Bardo for analysis. Bardo's statement: "Well, they basically itch-slapped Georgetown on their home floor."

That was not a typo - it definitely sounded like he said "itch-slapped." Is this a term I am unaware of, or did ESPN censor out the "b"? I've played it back numerous times, and I still can't tell. If they had to censor him, ESPN will likely not be pleased.

Anybody else see it and hear what he actually said?