NCAA Day 1 wrap-up / thoughts

Honestly, we have no hope if we play Louisville.  It's not because of basketball skill, but because Pitino owns the referees.  After they called the play below a foul, I realized that Louisville would never lose a meaningful game unless they played Duke. 

 

One sweet 16 team out, and another one pending if SDSU blows it.

Fuck Luke Hancock. That is all.

Tipoff at 5:15 EST (approx)...hope Wisconsin game goes long....a 5:45 tip would be better. GO BLUE!!!!

THERE'S STILL A GAME GOING!  GO AGGIES...AHHHHH

(I don't love March Madness or anything)

That block if called correctly could have given us a national title. Thanks for the reminder...

Only if St Joe and NC State could have held on their late game lead, I would have been 15 out 16 today. So close...

Today makes me appreciate last year's run even more.  All the effort, all the passion, all the highs and lows and buzzer beaters and OT's by 68 teams to get a shot at the title . . . and only two of the 68 will make it.  

We were one of those two.

 

I despise N.C. State.  One of the biggest choke jobs I've ever seen.

Could have been worse. 11-5 on the first day for me.

Missed on St. Joe's and NC State.  Doing okay so far.  No billion for me though.

12-4 on the day.  Lost a Sweet 16 team in Oklahoma.  Good day of basketball.  Would have liked to seen NC St. and Cincinnati advance but I'll surivive...but probably won't be making much dough this year (though it's obviously too early to tell).

We were the lowest scoring winner in day 1, but we also held our opponent to the 2nd lowest points scored in Day 1.

By contrast, Sparty scored 36 more points than us, but gave up 38 more.

After watching Louisville barely survive and literally claw their way back to win in the final 3 minutes, I'll take a pedestrian performance in which we won by 17. We were never outplayed. Many winning teams can't say that for good stretches of their games today, most notably, Louisville and San Diego State. Florida also struggled quite a bit until the later part of their game.

Michigan played good defense today. That's the silver lining.

15/16 on the day, which... I have no idea how that happened but whatever. The only one I missed on? Had Manhatten over Louisville. At least the close game validated my reasoning for picking Manhatten (except not really since I only picked them because screw the basketball god of Kentucky).

Regardless, I am entirely excited that the NDSU/SDSU from completely different states matchup held true. Thank you overtime.

OOOMMMMMGGGG stop posting your guys bracket results. No one gives a damn. All I hear tonight is randon people trying to tell me what their bracket is looking like. And considering the fact that the first round games mean so little for points whether you were 15/16 or 9/16 theres almost no difference. 

OOOMMMMMGGGG stop posting your guys bracket results. No one gives a damn. All I hear tonight is randon people trying to tell me what their bracket is looking like. And considering the fact that the first round games mean so little for points whether you were 15/16 or 9/16 theres almost no difference. 

 

Edit: You guys caused me my first double post ! 

We had a good win but it was against one of the worst tourney teams and was somehow a very unimpressive 17pt win (ha). Anyway, I like to attribute it to the team not really "getting up" for the game but the way we played has been the pattern in our last 3-4 games. In fact, many games outside of the Illinois title game have shown us to be a poor defensive team that lives and dies by the 3 ball. Even in wins we'd often go down double digits before finding our rhythm. EVEN THEN, we'd often outscore with the 3 ball while not necessarily playing average defense but capitalizing on when they miss open jumpers, free throws, etc. From here on out it's my honest opinion that we cannot win with anything less than our "A game". No more "one great half" type games. No games where we're tossing up quick, bad shots from 40ft the moment were up or down 5pts, etc. It's obvious to say that Stauskas/Vert have to show up. Yet, the forgotten fact about last year was that Burke didn't really, well, go "full Burke" until the 2nd half of the Kansas game. We had Mitch transform from an arguably underperforming Freshman to a monster that played hard, smart and like a Senior in the tourney from the first to last minute. He carried us, not Burke. Trey (and others) got to relax a bit with his upped inside & mid play to crush those crazy VCU/SYR/FLA defenses (I'd add Louisville if not for the bogus Burke fouls). They didn't have a two man team anymore. So, it's obvious to say we need the usual shooters to hit but I think the key to winning another game in this tourney is in the hands of GR, Morgan & Horford in that order. GR must not play with the uncertainty and general lack of contact he is often known for. He has to be this years Mitch in the tourney. He has to simply go off and play rough, in control but realize he has the most pure talent/tools on this team. He cannot be the guy that the NBA projects as "likely a 2nd rounder" because when he chooses to go off, he has the highest ceiling on this team. As for Morgan, it's his last run so he has to be ready to rough it up inside. Horford? Oh, man. All I can say is that the guy will have to (absolutely have to) show the ability we know he has but he almost seems like he doesn't want. He largely looks completely disinterested much of the time. Yet, like GR3 but less often, we have seen him show the ability of a solid B1G starter! Not a bench guy but a starter only he so rarely shows it even when healthy that it's more confusing than frustrating. We NEED him to play at the level we know he can to advance. Texas has big bodies and great athletes on the back end/edges. They don't mind running. They will just pound the glass/paint all day if we let them. We're going to have to foul their big guys rather than give them gimme 2s under the bucket. We have 2 playable guys with any size and one is almost too timid for his own good. So, our jumpers need to fall (obviously) but we need SOME inside presence along with the dual attack of a focused GR, who can play larger than his size when he wants to. From here on, no bad halves. No waiting/hoping for Stauskas to hit every 3. From here out we have to play our top game vs any team with size. I'm oddly more concerned about Texas than a possible Duke game. Outside of us, I think the usual suspects are just that. Wizzy/msu should coast to the S16, I think Syracuse is "back" and people forget they started 24-0, UF is UF and the winner of that game will be a F4 lock, Louisville has to be blown out as the refs just don't call them on much, WSU will likely be out after their first and some upsets I had picked and others I didn't despite being warned. Only "shocker" for me being NDSU but everyone I know seemed to choose them or want to in their bracket. I had the other upsets today. I filled out 10 in the ESPN app and both my "homer Michigan" & "non-homer" brackets are only 2 games off (ndsu/oregon). Out of 11M+ brackets filled less than 12k are perfect after day 1 (ha). I'm tied with many others for 773,872nd place.

One Oklahoma win away from being perfect. Oh well

Assholes everyone's got one. Who cares!!