Tenn a #2 ? That's is pretty surprising. FSU and Michigan left out over a few MVC teams and some other nondescripts is a debate as well. UF is set up beautifully to provide the first round upset drama in facing their ex-assistant coach John Pelphry with South Alabama. I like UConn or Duke and I like both to be in the Final.
http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegebasketball/mayhem/brackets/viewable_men :shock: Wow. Did UCLA get a good draw or what? I've never even heard of Belmont and the rest of their bracket looks like a stroll down easy street. They have an excellent shot at the Final Four despite their youth... ...............JO'Co
Ita a shame. There are at least 15 teams in the tourney that could not beat a good high school club!. UCLA has itself in the same situation as the Wooden days! jif
Wait a minute, JIF. UCLA, under Wooden, was the greatest sports dynasty of all time in muy opinion. Thasy beat everybody, every year.
MCG, I can't think of anyone more shocked than I over our #2 seed. :shock: The way we faded, I would have thought #4 or #5 at the highest. I'll take a #2 seed butwe must turn the slump around or it will not matter where we are placed.
There are always a lot of surprises and teams that feel wronged. I do think the best thing would be to ditch the Conference tournaments across the board. Have all the guaranteed bids go to regular season Conference Champions. Then invite 128 teams to the NCAA, that would most likely take care of all the bitching and moaning, and play games on Sat/Sun and you'd be down to 64 teams after the weekend that ordinarily is devoted to conference tournaments. Heck you could take 256 teams and get it down to 64 teams with only 2 games Thurs-Sunday. Terry
George...UCLA in The Wooden Era ALWAYS was in a terrible bracket and they were not challenged until the final 4. I believe in those days it took only 4 wins to get to the championship game. jif
Tom, You're right. Teams seeded 2 through 4 may have what is usually a favorable match-up but from the second round on things get dicey no matter what.
:roll: Uh...JIF. Wooden's teams obliterated everybody, in any round, any time, any where. They also played some incredibly tough teams out west that you never heard of, because UCLA eliminated them before anyone could see how good they were. During Wooden's streak, the only non-UCLA NCAA champ was Texas Western (now Texas-El Paso) and that was only because the Bruins weren't allowed to play freshmen. Their frosh team that season, coached by Denny Crum, was led by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and All-Americans two deep... ................JO'Co
:idea: Let's take a look at the NCAA champs from the year I was born, to the end of the Wooden era... 1950 CCNY (24-5) 1951 Kentucky (32-2) 1952 Kansas (28-3) 1953 Indiana (23-3) 1954 La Salle (26-4) 1955 San Francisco (28-1) 1956 San Francisco (29-0) 1957 North Carolina (32-0) 1958 Kentucky (23-6) 1959 California (25-4) 1960 Ohio St. (25-3) 1961 Cincinnati (27-3) 1962 Cincinnati (29-2) 1963 Loyola(Ill.) (29-2) 1964 UCLA (30-0) 1965 UCLA (28-2) 1966 UTEP (28-1) 1967 UCLA (29-1) 1968 UCLA (29-1) 1969 UCLA (29-1) 1970 UCLA (28-2) 1971 UCLA (29-1) 1972 UCLA (30-0) 1973 UCLA (30-0) 1974 North Carolina St. (30-1) 1975 UCLA (28-3) Uh...where are all the eastern champs? The only one that I see is CCNY in the year that I was born and they used illegal players to do it. But I DO SEE Cal and San Francisco twice. Even the vaunted "Tobacco Road" went from 1957-1974 without a title and only won in '74 when Wooden's hippies couldn't keep a straight face with a huge lead... The best teams in the 60's and early '70's besides UCLA were USC, USF and Long Beach State (with Jerry Tarkanian). There were other outstanding operations at Oregon and Pacific and lots of other schools that were all overshadowed by Wooden's juggernaut, as was the entire NCAA. .............JO'Co
:wink: BTW- Wooden's 1964 NCAA Champs are still the SMALLEST team in basketball history to win a national title. No player on the team was over 6'5" and three were under 6'0", including both of his All-American guards, Walt Hazzard and Gail Goodrich. Even the first NCAA Champ, Oregon in 1939, was taller; much taller than Wooden's '64 Bruins. How's that for coaching basketball?