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NCAA Tournament Quick Hits: Round of 32 (Saturday)

By Chris Godfrey

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In what seems like an instant, the NCAA Tournament field has narrowed from 68 teams to 24. With eight more teams destined to be eliminated tomorrow, we are quickly approaching the business end of the bracket, where every round has a really cool name. Last night, eight teams advanced to the Sweet Sixteen, and there were many thrills to be had along the way. As usual, even though I’d love to give 500 words to them all, I’m making a hard L-cut to the corner for a quick hit on each of yesterday’s games. 

  • I don’t care if UCLA wins the NCAA Championship. They do not deserve to be in the NCAA Tournament. The fact that they’ve defeated SMU and UAB to reach the Sweet Sixteen does nothing to change that. Colorado State, Temple, or even Murray State would have most likely did the same thing if given the opportunity. In my opinion, each of those three schools were more deserving than the Bruins. However, credit is due to the Bruins for how they have played during the first weekend. I picked them to beat SMU, figuring that a team with zero games of NCAA Tournament experience wouldn’t fair well against a team with the letters UCLA on the front of their jerseys. The Mustangs were afraid of the stage and the Bruins rose to the occasion. Seeing the Bruins play to their talent level made it perplexing to think of why the Bruins were in the position of being an undeserving 11-seed in the first place. Yesterday’s win against UAB was a present offered by the good people at Iowa State University, who seem to have the opposite problem that plagues the Bruins (the Cyclones can get to the tournament easily, but upon arrival, quickly forget how to do the things that got them there). Losing the UAB game would have been a microcosm of the Bruins’ season (shocking losses to inferior teams that stunt momentum), but instead, the Bruins took care of business. UCLA shouldn’t be here, but they are, and they are officially dangerous.

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  • It’s almost as if Kentucky isn’t even taking this part of the tournament seriously. The Wildcats slept through most of their game with Cincinnati, and then hit their on switch for a brief moment in order to cruise to victory. When do the games start getting difficult for this team? Maryland or West Virginia don’t seem like much of a challenge, even though the Mountaineers would really challenge their intestinal fortitude. Notre Dame is on the other side of the bracket as a possible regional final matchup, but they just don’t have the size to make that game interesting. We’ve already seen what UK can do to Kansas, and Wichita State doesn’t pass the eye test as a team that can compete with the Cats. Is this team going to moonwalk to the Final Four, and if they do, doesn’t that make them ripe for the picking against Arizona or Wisconsin?
  • Rondae Hollis-Jefferson drew one of the toughest assignments in college basketball yesterday — Ohio State freshman D’Angelo Russell. In a matchup between an extremely talented offensive player and an elite defender, sometimes the stopper gets the best of the scorer, but rarely does the stopper steal the show. Hollis-Jefferson’s defensive efforts on Russell were at times mesmerizing, especially for the many people that just witnessed Russell dismantle VCU’s vaunted havoc defense two days ago. In reality, it takes a team defensive effort to stop a player like Russell, but Hollis-Jefferson showed a level of on-ball defensive skill that could keep him in the NBA for a long time. On the offensive end, Arizona was paced by TJ McConnell, a kid who was playing college basketball at Duquesne a few years ago. Yesterday, he found himself offering up a virtuoso performance in terms of game management and shot-making. He finished with 19 points (8-13 FG), 6 assists, 6 rebounds, and 5 steals.  Arizona has had many great point guards, but never one that has been able to pull the strings in a game like McConnell (maybe Steve Kerr, but I wasn’t around for that era).
  • The Xavier Musketeers played a nearly perfect game to take out Georgia State. The statistics are almost staggering. The Muskies shot 67% from the field, 53% from distance, and 88% from the line. Most teams would be lucky to have a player who can drop those numbers in an NCAA Tournament contest. Instead, Xavier got that effort from their entire team. Amazingly, they needed every bit of it to put away Georgia State. The tournament darlings played a valiant game, well enough to win under most circumstances. They even benefited from the return of a limited Ryan Harrow. However, the X did not miss, shooting over 80% in the second half. Cinderella ran into a team with a chainsaw. End of fairy tale. Even in defeat, the Panthers’ father and son duo stole the show due to RJ Hunter’s play and Ron Hunter’s infectiousness on the sidelines and behind the mic. The best part of this particular Cinderella story is that neither of the most prominent faces are fading into obscurity. RJ will be a pro either next year or the year after, and Ron will have AD’s clamoring for him to be the face of their power conference program. There are many more chapter’s to this story. Until those chapters are written, let this clip be a reminder of what’s truly important in life, and how special sports can be when it has the great fortune of intertwining with these moments.
  • I’m shifting from the emotional stuff, and moving on to some breaking news…the college basketball world owes me (and seemingly only me) a personal and heartfelt apology. For weeks, I cried about the fraudulence of the Big East, and their banner carriers, Villanova. While I felt all six schools selected for the tournament were deserving, it seemed far fetched that any of them would make any noise. In my case, this sentiment even included Villanova. However, after a 4-0 start on Thursday, I was on the verge of admitting that I was wrong. I even scheduled my mea culpa. I was planning to write a 1,000 word apology to the Big East, where I would praise them for their tournament efforts. Instead, Providence and St. John’s laid eggs on Friday, and yesterday saw the wheels fall off for the conference’s top three teams. I said before the tournament that if Villanova got a 2-seed and were matched with Michigan State, they would lose in the second round. My prophecy almost came true, but the committee gave Villanova a top seed, leaving Virginia to deal with Sparty, and sent North Carolina State Nova’s way. The Wolfpack, who already had a win versus Duke on their ledger, seemed like a nightmare matchup for the Wildcats as well. I picked the NC State over Villanova upset less than 20 seconds after NC State’s logo appeared on my television screen during the selection show. The Truth is this, the Big East is a step ahead of the SEC (excluding Kentucky), but probably a few steps behind the other power conferences. Not only was Villanova soundly defeated by a middle of the road ACC team, Georgetown and Butler also lost games to top competition from the Pac-12 and ACC (two conferences that are a combined 16-0 in this tournament so far and could go 20-0 by the end of today). The new Big East has been able to establish relevance by consistently garnering bids, but the talent level of the conference needs to be bolstered if its teams want to be factors in March.
  • Pat Connaughton and Jerian Grant have formed a sinister one-two punch for Notre Dame. On paper, it seems like the Irish would have no chance against Kentucky, but I’m rooting for them to get the opportunity. These two guys will their team to victory on a consistent basis, and it’s incredibly entertaining to watch. While putting away Butler, Connaughton and Grant made highlights with their play and with their poise. Connaughton’s block to send the game to overtime and Grant mixing a smoothie for Roosevelt Jones before scoring a clinching bucket will be the plays that you see on Vine and Sportscenter, but the most important play of the game came during a dead ball situation. After Zach Auguste took us back to fourth grade with an open court double pat, Connaughton immediately grabbed the distraught Auguste and snapped him back into the game. This was right before he backed up his words of encouragement by deflating Alex Barlow’s game-winning attempt. In overtime, Auguste was engaged and he continued to be the team’s workhorse inside and overall X-factor (remember that it took 25 points from Auguste against Northeastern to even get the Irish to this round). Those are the moments that win championships in tournaments that Kentucky is not entered in.
  • Remember when everyone was hyping Utah as a potential Final Four team? That happened before a late season swoon that saw them lose some questionable games during the regular season and an additional one in the conference tournament. All of that strife seems awfully distant at the moment, now that the Utes are into the Sweet Sixteen with tons of momentum. Utah has gone through a pesky 12-seed in Stephen F. Austin and a likely over-seeded Georgetown team, but they have handled both teams accordingly — with relative ease. They will likely see Duke in the next round, and you have to think that this team matches up very well with the Blue Devils. Look for Utah to be the next team to knock off a number one seed. The Utes are back in form.
  • North Carolina dispatched of an Arkansas team that wasn’t quite ready for the moment. It was an impressive performance because the Tar Heels took a favorable matchup and made the most of it. That shouldn’t be taken for granted in this tournament. Especially since Michael Qualls (27 points, 10 boards) and Bobby Portis (18 points, 14 boards) did all they could to stay within reach. The Tar Heels have a likely date with Wisconsin in the next round, and it’s unclear how they will match up with the Badgers. The team did lose to Iowa earlier this year, which isn’t a good sign, considering that the Hawkeyes are very similar with their length and interchangeable parts. I don’t expect much from them in the next round if Wisconsin is the opponent, but based on talent alone, there is enough in the tank for UNC to beat any team in the country.

Next: Updated 2015 NCAA Tournament Bracket: One of the Mighty Fall

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