SB Nation User Blog: ericdedwar

Could TWill go as high as 12?

ericdedwar — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 01:30:46 -0000

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/423/story/782273.html

According to Charlotte Observer columnist Rick Bonnell, TWill had an impressive workout with the bobcats and coach Larry Brown, who loves the defense, hopes he's available at 12. From what I've read this is the second best workout Brown has seen this year (stephen curry being the top). The only downside I see is that the Bobcats have an athletic forward and already play pretty good D. What they really need is someone who can shoot the ball (like curry).

Calipari recruits; UofL odds

ericdedwar — Wed, 20 May 2009 04:41:13 -0000

1) all the buzz today is about UK's landing of 4 5-star hoops stars including no.1 PG john wells. Let's assume Meeks and Patterson jump, which, if that happens, could potentially leave Calipari with 5 freshman starters. The last time we saw this sort of nonsense was Michigan's Fab Five. By the time you factor in the new coach, you are looking at possibly the most cleared table in NCAA history. What will UK do with this roster of young bucks and the new skipper? What is their ultimate upside?

2) Some oddsmakers have futures lines up for next year's NCAA championship. Not surprisingly Kansas is getting the best odds at 6-1. With UK's latest news they come in second as 10-1. BUT THE BIG SHOCKER is that in UofL checked in with the third best odds of cutting down the nets at 12-1. For reals!?! I figure we are probably a little worse off then we were last year. Which is to say, we're going to be good. We'll contend for a Big East title and we'll make a run in March. But am I missing something? Are we way better than I think we are?

Discuss.

Poll

In 2010, UK will top out with:

An SEC championship

40 votes

An NCAA first round flameout

38 votes

Advancing to the elite 8

167 votes

National Championship title!

44 votes

A 3 to 5 year stretch in Leavenworth

82 votes

371 votes | Poll has closed

Cheezus

ericdedwar — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 00:33:47 -0000

1) I will never again rely on CBS to show me a game if it is one I MUST see. The cut away early in the second half basically ruined my weekend. Sports bar from here on out.

2) Since I didn't get to actually watch the game, it's hard to say how we looked. I saw joggy bits and pieces on justin.tv, but even good play looks bad there, so it was hard to tell where we were messing up. Though it looked like we weren't really taking care of the ball. Then when we finally made out comeback even my justin.tv feed had switched over to marquette.

3) So really all I know is that I was crapping my pants for 45 minutes with no real indication of how the game was going. Hopefully a close game like this will be beneficial to us going into the Arizona game. I am starting to wish maybe that St. Mary's had gotten the invite instead of Zona. But whatever, I think we stand a better chance of being ready for Zona than for Siena. Or maybe Siena is just an awesome team, like I said, I have no real way of knowing.

4) I'm just glad we won. God bless the Cards. Deep breath then on to Indy.

Morehead St.; Ohio St.; Wake Forest

ericdedwar — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 02:55:11 -0000

Morehead St. -I don't know a thing about them. I hope we win.

Ohio St. - Despite my near-constant Big Ten bashing campaign, I really haven't seen OSU play more than 20 minutes this year. You know why? Because the Big Ten is unwatchable. Does that mean they can't win? Perhaps not, but it means Pitino's assistants better get jacked up on Red Bull before studying game tapes. That is, of course, assuming we can get by Morehead St.

Wake Forest - I feel I'm much closer to my depth here. I've watched wake play on and off all season and a definite trend emerges. You might think it is as simple as good wake, bad wake. But I really think there is something deeper and more diseased at work in their losses. Something much less solvable then "get your head in the game."

First let's applaud them on an excellent first half of the season. They played very well, surprised everyone and won 16 straight, earning the a No. 1 ranking in week 10 (thanks in no small part to the Card's victory over Pitt) before going 8-6 over the second half of the season. So what happened? How does a team storm through their early season only to get stifled by Va. Tech; Ga Tech; Miami; & NC State in three weeks? Well, despite the fact that they did close out their season well with wins against Md. & Clemson (before losing to Md in the ACCT) the only explanation I can come up with is that people start seeing them coming and were able to solve them. They can rebound and shoot a high percentage when Teague penetrates. They are NOT (despite some claims) a good 3 pt shooting team. In fact they rank almost dead last in the ACC in that category shooting 31%. And with 13 assists and almost 16 TOs a game, one might be led to believe that with this team, if you cut off the head, the body will die.

Does this make them less dangerous for the cards? It doesn't make them less dangerous, it just makes then less dangerous then the highlight reels would l suggest. Will we beat Wake if both teams make it to Indy? I don't know - Teague is a great guard who could go berserk. But I think that their weaknesses and our specialty match up very well for the cards. Pressure the hell out of Teague, he'll make mistakes. Close the lane, he'll start jacking 3s and he's not all that hot out there. Wear them down (there is a considerable dropoff in minutes after their 6th man) and we should be able to take care of business. You know, if we can get by Morehead St. and Ohio St.

Go Cards!.

with so much good news, what is there to complain about?

ericdedwar — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 03:42:58 -0000

Love the overall 1 seed. Really thought UNC would get it. But I like the nod. Probably doesn't really matter as long as we get dayton/indy. We've got a lot of good teams in the bracket, obviously, but it's the NCAAs, good teams are everywhere. I won't begin to complain.

So my only complaint is that now we've got the ESPN crews' collective slobber on our man parts. And I like it better when they are hating, though you wouldn't know it by my constant bitching. The good news is that everyone picks UNC to take the championship, so we've still got something big to motivate us.

good thing for UNC

ericdedwar — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 19:52:27 -0000

that THEY don't have to win their conf tourney to get a 1 seed. If only every regular season major conf. champion could say the same thing.

Don't get me wrong, I understand a certain level of skepticism regarding teams vying for a 1 seed. But seems that the cards have gotten a much bigger piece of that pie than say UNC, Pitt or UConn have gotten. The standard is obviously built upon how many weeks a team spent at no. 1 on the AP poll. Simply hovering around the top doesn't carry the weight of actually being the nation's best rated team.

But to further illustrate my point, let me examine a couple of Bilas' statements about what he looks at:

two weeks ago he was discussing Maryland as a bubble team saying that it wasn't the losses that he was looking at, but the wins. "I want to see who a team has beaten to know that they can have a chance of beating those types of teams in the tourney. Anyone can lose games, but can you win the big ones"

today Bilas said - regarding UofL's claims to a 1 seed - "Look at who they lost to earlier in the season: Minnesota, UNLV, Western Kentucky, those losses don't add up to a 1 seed.

double standard if you ask me.

Please God make Lunardi right

ericdedwar — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 17:52:11 -0000

I've never said that before. Probably never say it again.

Lunardi's most recent bracketology has moved the cards to a 1 seed, alongside UNC, Pitt & Uconn. I don't see it happening. But hopefully I'm wrong. And if that isn't sweet enough we have Memphis in our bracket.

At first glance this is a best case scenario. I might pick 8&9 seeds that aren't Utah and BC, but that's just quibbling. West Virginia and UT are in there too. Don't really need to see a Huggins team a 3rd time and UT has some dangerous (if underachieving) team. But again, that's minor stuff, we could get to the final four without seeing UNC, Pitt or UConn. Which is sweet.

duke, duker, dukest

ericdedwar — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 02:25:12 -0000

Within mere hours of Gottlieb's smarmy declaration that Duke had a shot at a 1 seed, Duke effectively refuted that ridiculous claim. It is now less outlandish to think of three 1 seeds from the Big East than to suggest two ACC teams deserve top billing. Though that ain't happening either.

While Duke was in very little danger of earning a top seed, they were perfectly situated to be a topic of conversation among the analysts who are working hard to denigrate UofL's claim. Now that particular avenue of chatter has been closed to traffic.

How does this help Louisville? Well, practically speaking, not much at all. But from a PR standpoint, the fewer teams that can ascend to a 1 seed, the more realistic the remaining contenders seem, and the better word of mouth they get, and word of mouth can be important.

So who is left?

UNC is a lock. This is indisputable. But any number of things can happen to the remaining three slots.

OK is a crowd favorite, but a loss to Kansas (or anyone) in the Big 12 Tourney will likely tarnish them just enough for Memphis to sneak in.

Memphis, who can't currently help themselves, has to rely on some folding by the teams in actual, competitive conferences. I think every sane fan has a beef with this possibility since the tigers have beaten exactly no one worthwhile. NO ONE.

Mich St. has a very solid resume, and it's strange to me that they aren't more frequently discussed as a 1 seed. Their credentials are MUCH stronger than either Memphis or OK, if you'll pardon a loss to Northwestern. Which as a cards fan, you must.

Obviously Pitt and UConn's resumes speak for themselves, but I think UofL will have to lose in their first BET game for both of those guys to get one seeds. I just can't figure out which of them is a more likely 1. What do you all think?

One seedy fanpost at a time

ericdedwar — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 18:33:48 -0000

Maybe I'm too hung on conspiracy theories, or maybe I'm one of those overly defensive fans who feels like his team never gets as much respect as some of its peers do. Maybe I'm wrong - maybe when the selection committee meets the table is cleared of preconceptions and the data comes to the forefront. Of course even if that is true, data is often as relative as conjecture. If one poll says we're 4 and one poll says we're 5, which one is right? And what do all of the seeding variables mean to UofL?

CardsFanTx says the selection committee doesn't put as much weight behind the conference tournaments as they do the regular season. But when you have a conference as interlocked as the Big East is, it stands to reason that the tourney will provide natural breaking points to use as seeding benchmarks. With that said - If Louisville wins the season then loses its first game of the tourney, the committee will pair that up with some of our uglier losses and give the 1 seeds to UConn and Pitt.

I don't think the door swings both ways though, if either Uconn or Pitt wins the regular season I think THEY could lose early in the tourney and still score a 1 seed since both of those squads spent some time at no. 1 this year while we never cracked higher than our preseason 3 (4?). Of course one of those teams is going to lose again, which helps . It is conceivable that if we win out our last 3 games but UConn beats pitt and wins the regular season title, that perhaps we can still snare a 1 seed as long as we make it further than Pitt in the BET.

I also think that despite what the committee says, it is going to use whatever measuring sticks it has available to make the case for the sexiest 1 seeds. The committee will do whatever it wants unless there are very serious flaws in the logic, hell sometimes it'll do what it wants in SPITE of serious logical flaws.
So then in my mind it comes down to this: There are 7 or 8 teams that I think have one-seed potential. UNC, OK, UConn, Pitt, Memphis, UofL, Duke and possibly Mich. St. (MSU seems at first blush to be a long shot, but their RPI is almost exactly the same as UofL's and at some point someone is going to raise a stink that RPI, Sagarin & KenPom all rate the Big 10 as tougher than the Big East. It's a crock of shit, but it could easily get brought up). Which of those teams does the committee like better? Which make the most marketable brackets? In my mind the committee would prefer things to shake out like this for purposes of storyline:

1) UNC 2) UConn 3) OK 4) Pitt.

The NCAA, ESPN and those involved have spent a lot of energy this season talking about these 4 teams because they each have highly marketable, newsreel-ready stars. Hansbrough, Thabeet, Griffin and Blair. They can hang tons of effortless coverage off these big guys. The legwork has already been done, furthermore these guys have been set up all year as the NCAA's major players, the drama comes naturally. But these lousy teams are messing up the NCAA's shit up by losing late season games they are supposed to be winning. So if the committee can't have its fave four who do they want?

Of the remaining four contenders Duke is the sexiest, but they probably have the most work left to do to atone for their late -season missteps. I think Louisville is the logical next best option. We've gotten a lot more national airplay and SportsCenter coverage than Memphis & Mich St. so there is a familiarity. Mich. St. would be the third choice to rope in Big Ten country. Memphis represents the weakest conference in the discussion and overall the smallest fanbase though they are much closer to a top seed than Duke and certainly MSU.

Which of these teams is the most likely to get the 1 seed? Well, that depends entirely upon which of the Fave Four falters.

If either Pitt or UConn drop, Uof L is the natural, deserving replacement.
If Pitt & UConn hold strong and OK drops off, the sooners probably get replaced by Memphis, even though the Tigers biggest wins are over UT & Gonzaga (both of whom are horrible this year, and when you consider that Georgetown and Syracuse both have W's over Memphis, this is a sickening 1-seed but I don't see a world in which the Big East gets three 1 seeds.
If UNC ends up losing two more games (one to Duke) then Duke's stock will rise to the point that it will replace UNC as the 1 seed. NCAA bylaws state that 1 ACC team must have a 1 seed - preferably UNC.
If more than two of the Fave Fours and two of the second choices stumble and the rivers run black and the locusts come, they will bring with them a 1-seeded spartan team.
For any marquette apologists out there who wonder why I've ignored them, allow me to es'plain - the only way Marquette gets a 1 seed is if they Beat UConn tonight, UofL in the Hall on Sunday and Pitt at PEC next wednesday. Don't get me wrong, the Golden Eagles could beat any of the aforementioned and win one, even two of these games. But in the pantheon of unlikelinesses I place them stringing together those 3 wins in 8 days somewhere between Earl Clark coming back for a senior year and Jim Calhoun willingly taking a 50% paycut.

No. 1 ranking full of Pitt-falls

ericdedwar — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 07:09:12 -0000

HA! See what I did there? Pitt Falls? Tip your waitresses.

If I were coaching a potential no. 1 team I'd definitely vote for anyone else. Dangerous place to be. What does this mean for the Cards? Well, Forde already has dropped our name as being a contender for a 1 seed. That could be the kiss of death, but i think the biggest obstacle to becoming a 1 seed (right behind a bunch of losses) is not being part of the conversation. I think teams that get the top ranking must have some media support. We haven't had that until now. Not that we really have much of that now, but we're on the right path.

We still can't afford any losses, but at least we we are in a position for other people to make legit arguments for us instead of finding reasons (hilltoppers, UNLV, ND) that we don't belong. We're still on the outside looking in, but if a case could be made that we control our own destiny, well, it's getting stronger day by day. We've got all week for things to unfold while we prepare for Marquette. If Marquette comes strong against UConn then Sunday's game might become the biggest of the year for us. I still think that the BE gets two 1 seeds, but the door has maybe reopened a crack for the ACC to pull it off.

The really good news is that Pitt is going to be pissed when they play UConn, which would be huge. We still need a good BET showing, but now we truly know how beatable these monsters are, and that goes a long way to eliminating any psychological advantage they may have had over us.

No more losses, the one seed is there for the taking.

It wouldn't hurt if OK loses again.

Also Calipari must be beside himself right now. Without saying a word he's making a strong case that getting a couple of good wins and then destroying a weak slate of opponents is the best road to a 1 seed as tougher conferences devour each other.