Schedule strength doesn't faze Calipari
Besides inexperience, the factor most in question about Kentucky going into the NCAA Tournament involved strength of schedule. Because North Carolina, Connecticut and Louisville had down years, UK went into the tournament with its most modest regular-season strength of schedule rating in at least 15 years.
Something to fret about?
UK Coach John Calipari didn't think so. Heading into the tournament, he dismissed the notion that Kentucky will suffer from sticker shock when it faces a more talented opponent than it's used to seeing.
"I don't think it'll hurt us in any way," Calipari said of UK's rating as the 31st toughest schedule, according to collegerpi.com. "When you look at our schedule, you say, 'Wow. They played a good schedule. They took on all comers.' "
The numbers suggest you say, UK played a good schedule. But not the toughest.
Of the four No. 1 seeds, UK played a weaker schedule than Kansas, Duke or Syracuse, according to the Sagarin or collegerpi.com ratings.
Of the 65 teams in the NCAA Tournament, Kentucky's schedule rates almost squarely in the middle in terms of difficulty. Thirty-one teams played a tougher schedule. Thirty-three played a weaker schedule.
Significant?
"I doubt it," said Jay Bilas, a college basketball analyst for ESPN and ABC. "If they played North Carolina and Connecticut at their strongest, maybe they'd be 28-5. So what? They'd still be unbelievably good."
Bilas considered Kentucky the second-best team going into the NCAA Tournament.
NCAA Tournament history and this year's first round suggest there's no need for UK fans to worry.
Of the last 15 national champions, seven had played a worse-rated regular-season schedule than Kentucky's in 2009-10, according to collegerpi.com. Those seven were Kansas in 2008 (No. 63), Florida in 2007 (No. 46), Florida in 2006 (No. 75), Syracuse in 2003 (No. 38), Maryland in 2002 (No. 106), Michigan State in 2000 (No. 37) and UCLA in 1995 (No. 67).
In first-round games this season, teams with a tougher-rated regular-season schedule won 20 games and lost 12. Among Southeastern Conference teams, Kentucky and Tennessee won against opponents with weaker-rated schedules. Vanderbilt and Florida lost.
Vanderbilt's loss to Murray State marked the biggest difference in a game won by the team having played weaker competition. Murray State's schedule rated No. 287, according to Sagarin, and Vandy's No. 45.
Calipari suggested that the way opponents regularly play their best against UK makes a critical difference.
"Us, Kansas and a few other teams, you're going to get everybody's best shot," he said, "and it prepares you."
Fab Five or Kiddie Cats?
With a national championship, Kentucky might become the greatest young team in college basketball history. Or, perhaps, even a title would not allow UK to supplant Michigan's Fab Five as the team to think of when pondering precocious freshmen.
Chris Webber or DeMarcus Cousins? Jalen Rose or John Wall? Juwan Howard or Daniel Orton? Jimmy King or Eric Bledsoe?
Rose, a guard on the Fab Five, passed when asked which team was best.
"It's kind of a Catch-22," Rose said. "If you're me, there's no right answer. If I say the Fab Five, people feel I'm old, bitter and hating on Kentucky. If I say Kentucky, people blow me up on Twitter. 'What are you talking about?'
"I'm a fan of Coach Cal and their team. I'm rooting for them to do well."
The Fab Five advanced to the Final Four as freshmen and returned as sophomores. That's quite a standard.
But basketball aside, Rose rated the Fab Five ahead of UK's freshman-oriented team in terms of social significance.
"We became a cultural phenomenon," Rose said. "Bald heads. Black shoes. Black socks. Baggy shorts."
By comparison, the John Wall dance is pretty tepid stuff.
"Jimmy King and I were talking about this (last week)," Rose said. "In 1992, we were not loved and adored."
The Fab Five were different and, thus, threatening to some.
Rose enjoys how society changed since the Fab Five. He noted the popularity of Kentucky's team as represented by the omnipresence of the John Wall dance.
"You can see anybody across the nation doing it," he said. "You see it on (ESPN's) SportsCenter. That's a breath of fresh air and makes me smile."
Copyright (c) Lexington Herald-Leader
Who is the greatest College Basketball coach of all time?Men's College baskeball has had its fair share of legends directing games from the sidelines.
Which coach was the greatest in the history of NCAA basketball? Any head coach for a Men's NCAA team can be included for rating, although I think I have put together a list of all the greats.
Coaches should be rated on their winning percentage, number of national championships, total number of wins and any other relevant statistics. Intangibles like the coaches' impact on the way the game was/is played or what other great coaches he has worked with/influenced should also be considered.
So now I turn the floor over to you... the experts.
Who is the greatest men's college basketball head coach of all time?
Copyright 2010 Sportelligence, Inc
Final Four 5A boys basketball and more
The Desert Valley Region has proven to be the most difficult in Class 5A.
Phoenix St. Mary's (5A-I) and Phoenix Horizon (5A-II) both reached the semifinals of their respective tournaments. Both have great shots of going home with state championship trophies Wednesday.
Tuesday's 5A-II semifinal between Horizon and Anthem Boulder Creek is intriguing. Boulder Creek, the No.1 seed that escaped a two-point quarterfinal win against Scottsdale Desert Mountain (another Desert Valley team), is coached by Randy Walker.
Walker led Horizon before taking a college assistant job three years ago.
Walker just got done beating his former top assistant, Todd Fazio, of Desert Mountain. Now Walker has a chance to beat his former program.
Tempe Marcos de Niza rallied from a seven-point deficit in the final 40 seconds to beat Phoenix Central -- without Marcos' defensive stopper, Ramon Abreu. Incredible.
More incredible was Scottsdale Chaparral's rally from 14 points down at Tucson Ironwood Ridge and win in overtime. Chaparral also hails from Desert Valley Region.
Chaparral's Aaron Windler, Horizon's Paul Long and St. Mary's David Lopez all are Big Schools Coach of the Year candidates.
What Lopez has done at St. Mary's this season can't be dismissed. He took a team that returned only one player -- 6-foot-6 senior forward George Matthews -- and rallied the Knights late in the season when it wasn't even among the top 16 teams in the power ratings.
St. Mary's just got done beating Fiesta Region teams Chandler Hamilton and Mesa.
Now comes Phoenix North, the preseason No.1 that struggled to beat Brophy Prep and Tempe Corona del Sol in the first two rounds.
Mesa Mountain View's Gary Ernst is another Big Schools Coach of the Year candidate. Mountain View wasn't ranked in the top 5 in preseason. It plays in Tuesday's 5A-I semifinals against Laveen Cesar Chavez, a team it beat in a close, high-scoring affair late in the season.
I never saw this coming: The emergence of Tempe McClintock 6-5 junior guard/forward Cameron Forte.
Forte had his two best games in victories over Phoenix Sunnyslope.
Saturday's first-half in which he had 28 points was one for the ages. It elevated him to elite status in the state. And if high major colleges don't take a serious look at this versatile kid, they're mistaking. He has got to be on everybody's radar after Saturday's 39-point performance.
Hats off to Tucson Santa Rita coach Jim Ferguson and senior point guard Terrell Stoglin for winning a state title that came so teasingly close the past three seasons. They lost heart breakers in the final each of the past three years. They finally got over and beat Gila Region rival Amphitheater by two in a high-scoring game before (ugh) less than a thousand spectators in Prescott Valley.
Great to see a good man go out on top in his final game as coach. Winslow's Don Petranovich, who began the girls program in 1976, watched his Winslow girls beat Fort Defiance Window Rock in the 3A girls final with grit and determination, the byproduct of eight state championship teams in his career. Winslow reached the title game 16 times. It got to the final seven of his final eight seasons. He mellowed with age, but the game never passed him by.
Don't expect former Gilbert Highland dynamo Nick Johnson to return to the Valley for his senior season. Findlay Prep coach Mike Peck has vowed to keep the powerhouse together, preferably in the Las Vegas area, despiting having to find a new high school for the players. The players take classes at Henderson International, but the school is dropping grades 9 through 12 at the end of May. Michelle Johnson, Nick's mom, said that her son won't return to Arizona to finish out his prep career. She said that if Findlay isn't able to find a new school, Nick will go back East to a prep school. Johnson, who is being recruited by Arizona State and Arizona, is the team's third-leading scorer at 14.4 points a game. He is second in assists with 3.8 a game. Findlay (29-2) doesn't play again until April 1, when it will try to defend its title in the ESPN RISE national high school invitational.
Copyright (c) 2009, azcentral.com
High School Coaches Weigh In On The UConn WomenHow would the undefeated UConn women's team fare against a top-ranked high school boys basketball team? A sampling of some high school coaches:
Windsor Locks coach Mike Mascaro: "A boys high school team with athleticism and size would win," he said. "The boys/men's game is a faster game."
Xavier coach Mike Kohs: " I think in many years the elite teams like Windsor, Hillhouse, Bridgeport Central and Crosby could beat UConn. The speed and athleticism of some of the top boys teams would cause problems for them. ... This year the women are obviously a premier team and maybe the best UConn team of all, with some of the top players in the country in Maya Moore and Tina Charles. I do think that a top boys team would be UConn's toughest opponent this season."
Canton coach Eric Deegan: "I think a quality boys basketball team would be very competitive with the UConn women. Many teams in the state could not compete with UConn, but I believe teams like Bloomfield, Windsor and Cromwell could potentially beat them. It would be an interesting event, for sure."
Windsor coach Ken Smith, whose team was No. 1 in The Courant final state ratings last season, not only says UConn would win, but also would do well against some men's college teams: "They are so fundamentally sound I think they could beat some college teams. They understand what a team is supposed to do. Geno [Auriemma] does a great job of getting them to understand the big picture, and high school kids don't understand that yet."
East Hartford coach Anthony Menard: Menard said that 10 years ago the boys "would kill" UConn. But today he has a different view: "The evolution of the women's game makes it much more competitive. If a boys team had really tall, productive players who could really get off the floor that could give them an advantage. ... But I'd still probably give the edge to the women."
Bloomfield coach Gary Barcher: Though Bloomfield is No. 2 in The Courant area ratings, Barcher said that's no guarantee of a win against UConn. "UConn is that good," Barcher said. "I think they could play with us. The age, difference, the experience, and they're athletic."
Rockville coach Peter McCann: McCann, a walk-on on the UConn men's basketball team in 1996-97, said the UConn women would beat most, if not all, of the boys high school teams in the state: "They shoot it real well, pass real well, and play harder than any team you'll see on TV. Auriemma not only gets the best players in the country, but also gets them to play the hardest; or he recruits the hardest-playing best players. They practice against college guys every day. I don't think the physical play would bother them."
Maloney coach Howie Hewitt: Hewitt said all that needs to be said about such a matchup is to realize that the Huskies practice against male UConn students.
"They're not a team, but most of the guys played high school ball," he said. "The women more than hold their own in practice against the guys."
Capital Prep coach Levy Gillespie: "I think the talent, skill and cohesiveness of UConn gives them the edge over a quality boys high school team in that UConn is a solid collection of national talent, while many boys high school teams are based on talent from a relatively small geographic area. ... Some high school teams might have a slight athletic advantage, but that is negated by fundamental skill and basketball IQ."
Copyright (c) 2010, The Hartford Courant
Sooners must beat Texas
February isn't college basketball's biggest month. Obviously, that belongs to tournament-filled March. But it's February that sets up all the madness.
Critical wins and losses in the final four weeks or so of the regular season set up the participants. It's when cases for NCAA Tournament berths are made.
However, Oklahoma coach Jeff Capel admits his team's case isn't worth much.
"I don't know if we even have a r?sum? ... to be honest with you," he said. "We just have some games that we've won and some games that we've lost."
The Sooners do have a r?sum?, but it's flimsy at best.
With a 12-9 record overall and 3-4 in the Big 12 Conference, little they've done stands out. They're No. 90 in the latest Ratings Percentage Index and just 3-6 against teams ranked in the RPI's top 100. Generally, it takes an RPI ranking in the top 50 to even get in the at-large discussion.
Anything less than a meteoric rise over the final month of the regular season will distance OU from an at-large berth for the NCAA Tournament.
Luckily for it, opportunity knocks at 3 p.m. today at Lloyd Noble Center when No. 10 Texas (19-3, 5-2 Big 12) visits.
"If you're not ready for this, you're not ready for anything," OU guard Cade Davis said. "Hopefully, we'll use that as an influence to get us going."
Today's day-long tribute to Sooner basketball legend Wayman Tisdale should provide an emotional lift.
But it will take more than emotion to lift OU out of its most recent funk.
They've lost three of their last four games. The only victory was an 89-84 squeaker over Iowa State Jan. 27. The last was a lackluster 63-46 loss at Nebraska last Saturday.
Leading scorer Willie Warren is still hobbled with an ankle injury. After missing two straight games, he played last Saturday. He was a shell of himself, scoring just four points. His status for the Texas game is still questionable.
Healthy or not, the Sooners can't wait any longer for quality wins to arrive. Today's game is the first of four against ranked teams over the next three weeks.
Capel said he hasn't focused on what lies ahead. Today's game is the only one that matters.
Associated Press content (c) 2009
Centralia fends off Clark in overtime for victory
For the second game in a row, the Clark College men's basketball came up short in overtime.
Craig Seiler scored a game-high 17 points and Andy Damitz added 16 as Centralia held off the Penguins 71-68 on Saturday night at Centralia.
Zach Waldher led Clark (5-12, 3-6 NWAACC West Division) with 14 points and six rebounds, and Washougal High grad Grant Ziegler added 10 points.
The difference in the game was rebounds as the Trailblazers (4-12, 4-5) held a 45-33 advantage.
"We are executing well and playing solid defense," Clark coach Mike Arnold said. "But we are not controlling the boards."
Clark, which has dropped its last five games, gave up numerous second chances to the Trailblazers.
Next up for Clark is a home game Wednesday against Grays Harbor. Tipoff is schedule for 8 p.m., following the women's game at 6 p.m.
Centralia women 76, Clark 57 - The fifth-ranked Trailblazers remained unbeaten in the NWAACC West division as they stopped Clark's two-game win streak.
Lacey Kruse, a White Salmon grad, scored 10 points to go with 10 rebounds for the Penguins (9-7, 6-3). Chelsea Dyson added 10 points.
Centralia (17-2, 9-0) was led by Courtney May's 23 points, while Ali Campbell had a double-double with 14 points and 10 rebounds.
Copyright 2010 columbian.com
Once dominant in college basketball, Pac-10 endures season of mediocrityFor more than two decades, Mike Montgomery could always pinpoint at least one juggernaut -- usually UCLA, Arizona or the Stanford team he coached -- that would carry the flag for the Pacific-10 Conference and position itself in the national rankings for the bulk of the season.
"There was always somebody, if not two, then three," said Montgomery, who spent 18 years at Stanford and is now in his second season at California. "And this year there just doesn't appear to be. I don't remember a year like this."
No major conference in the sport's modern era has endured a year like this. Depicted more as a punch line than a power conference, the Pac-10 is in the midst of a historically subpar season, putting it in danger of becoming the first major conference since the NCAA tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1985 to receive just one berth.
Because of a confluence of events -- self-imposed sanctions at Southern California, early player defections to the NBA and a rotten leaguewide showing in nonconference play -- the Pac-10 tournament champion may be the conference's lone representative in the NCAA tournament. After receiving six tournament berths in each of the past three seasons, the Pac-10 could be on its way to earning fewer bids than the West Coast or Missouri Valley conferences.
"I don't think you should just end up with just one team," Oregon Coach Ernie Kent said. "I just don't think that."
But no greater Pac-10 authority than former Arizona coach Lute Olson recently told a small group of reporters that the conference is probably at its lowest point since he arrived at Arizona in 1983. No Pac-10 team is nationally ranked, and two weeks ago none of the league's teams received one vote in the Associated Press top 25 poll.
As a whole, the conference is rated eighth -- behind the Mountain West and Atlantic 10 -- in the Ratings Percentage Index, the mathematical measurement of teams' strength that the NCAA tournament selection committee considers when weighing postseason bids. And the Pac-10 has the same number of teams (one) ranked in the top 50 of the RPI as the Ivy League and two fewer than the Colonial Athletic Association.
"A lot of teams are really close to being even," Washington Coach Lorenzo Romar said of his league.
Or equally mediocre. Oregon won its first two games in conference play only to lose at home to Oregon State, which four days earlier had lost to Seattle -- a team that is transitioning from Division II to Division I -- by 51 points. Stanford lost to California by 26 points only to beat UCLA and USC in its next two games. And Washington lost three straight league games only to pummel California and Stanford by a combined 48 points.
Not since the 1978-79 season has every Pac-10 team won a conference game so early in the season. Montgomery has said he would not be surprised to see the regular season champion lose six conference games.
The parity makes for an enthralling conference race but doesn't necessarily help teams in pursuit of one of the 34 NCAA tournament at-large berths. It doesn't help that most of the league's perennial stalwarts have fallen on hard times.
UCLA, which made three consecutive Final Four appearances between 2006 and 2008, has a losing overall record. Arizona has hovered around .500 and is at risk of ending its streak of 25 straight NCAA tournament appearances. And USC, which has made three straight tournament appearances and has looked at times like the most promising Pac-10 team this season, self-imposed a postseason ban because of NCAA rule violations.
One of the biggest reasons for the sorry state of the conference is the number of players -- including O.J. Mayo (USC), Kevin Love and Russell Westbrook (UCLA), and Brook and Robin Lopez (Stanford) -- who left early for the NBA the past two seasons. In 2008 alone, 11 Pac-10 players were selected in the draft, including three -- Mayo, Westbrook and Love -- in the top five. And guard Brandon Jennings, now a Milwaukee Bucks rookie, opted to play last season in Italy rather than try to become academically eligible at Arizona, where he had committed.
Montgomery said that if many of those players remained in school, then five Pac-10 teams would now rank in the top 20. UCLA Coach Ben Howland, whose program has been hit as hard as any by players leaving early, added: "You just have to point out that we just lost 13 guys to the first round of the NBA the last two years, the most draft picks than anybody in the country. The Pac-10 is doing something right."
For Pac-10 teams, there was also self-inflicted damage during nonconference play, which is critical in helping teams secure quality victories and a relatively high RPI that benefits all conference teams during league play. Not only did Pac-10 teams go 2-12 against ranked opponents, but its teams won just 63 percent of its nonconference games, a percentage worse than that of the other five power conferences as well as the Mountain West and Missouri Valley.
"Overall as a league, we didn't have what you would call any key signature nonconference wins," USC Coach Kevin O'Neill said. "When you look at that, that usually determines who is in the top 25."
There also were costly losses: UCLA to Cal State Fullerton, Stanford to Oral Roberts and San Diego, Oregon to Montana, and Oregon State to Seattle, Illinois-Chicago and Sacramento State. The one team (USC) that earned impressive victories -- beating Tennessee and Saint Mary's -- is not even eligible for postseason play. And California, the team with the highest expectations entering the season, has been riddled by injuries.
Montgomery acknowledged that early-season losses hurt the league in the long run, but added that here is "not much we can do now that we are only playing within [the] conference."
Jerry Palm, who simulates the RPI on his Web site CollegeRPI.com, believes the best comparison for the Pac-10 is last season's Southeastern Conference, whose nonconference RPI was worse than the Pac-10's this season. But the SEC had one team (Tennessee) earn an at-large bid with strong nonconference play and another (Louisiana State) earn one with in-conference dominance.
Palm said the Pac-10 could end up as a one-bid league because it lacks a team dominating league play as well as a team -- at least one eligible for postseason play -- with strong nonconference credentials. Is there still time for the Pac-10 to recover this season and earn five or six berths?
"Well, that is going to be difficult," Montgomery said. "We kind of made our bed in November and December."
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