After twelve days of pretty amazing basketball and intense CTC competition, it all comes down to one game (and maybe a single point) to decide the 2011 CTC overall title. With only four games today – all worth 80 points apiece – it is a real feast or famine day, so there can be a lot of movement on the final leaderboard.
ACC CHAMPIONSHIP (80 points)
A thorough BSB investigation determined that Duke-UNC is the second-best rivalry in all of sports. And, now we are ready for yet another chapter. Today’s ACC title game will be the 6th time since 2001 that these two basketball superpower in this title game, and the winner of each of the first five of them has then gone to the Final Four that April. That is an incredible statistic. Alexi, who is currently leading the ACC, will win the 2011 CTC ACC title with a Duke win. A UNC win will give Dan the 2011 ACC crown.
#1 North Carolina vs. #2 Duke
It should be obvious, from these two weeks, that I love the smaller conferences and, during the season, get pretty sick of having to watch Duke and UNC every Wednesday or Thursday night, playing against some cannon fodder that has no chance of winning in Cameron or the Dean Dome. But, there is little better than wars between two elite teams, especially those that hate each other as much as these two do. I haven’t been all that excited about any single ACC tournament game this year…until now. This one is a must-see battle. UNC was playing at an extremely high level coming into the tournament, but needed everything they had to erase big deficits against both Miami and Clemson, along the way, winning their semi in OT. Duke, on the other hand, was not really scared in either of their tournament games against Maryland and Virginia Tech. Nolan Smith was healthy enough yesterday to drop 27 on the Hokies, so that isn’t a big issue today. We will see how the youth of UNC responds to the big moment against the immense experience that the Dookies bring to the table. The CTC is pretty split on this one, with 19 people having one of these two teams as their champion (Lynch had Va Tech). 8 people (Stri, Waters, Scoot, Cheryl, Dan, Primm, Gross, and Mac) have UNC. The other 11 have Duke.
FINAL SCORE: Duke 75 – North Carolina 58
With a thorough beatdown of their arch-rivals, the Blue Devils secure themselves yet another ACC title and yet another NCAA tournament #1-seed. The Devils scored the first 8 points of the game and never looked back, opening the lead up to 19 at one point and never trailing themselves all game. It was a pretty anticlimactic ending to an okay ACC tournament. In bad news for the rest of the country, Nolan Smith looked totally healthy again, leading Duke with 20 points. 11 people nailed Duke as their ACC champ.
SEC CHAMPIONSHIP (80 points)
The two teams left standing after 10 SEC tournament games are both playing at extremely high levels and should be heard from deep into the month of March. It should be an interesting game that, much like the ACC title game, pits a team with age and experience against a team with very little, but a ton of talent. The two games together may give us a bit of an idea on just what is driving today’s college hoops game and whether or not the Calipari/Hewiit style of recruiting (get the most talented kids regardless of one-and-done NBA ambitions or willingness to cater to a team’s system) is really better than the Coach K/Ben Howland way (get less-heralded kids with strong work ethics who are not thinking of immediate NBA riches and their draft positions, but rather simply of how they can get better as basketball players). Do you want Ashton Gibbs, Chandler Parsons, and Lance Thomas as seniors or John Wall, Terrence Jones, and Derrick Favors as freshmen? Honestly, I don’t know, but it’s the interesting dilemma that big-time college coaches are faced with these days. The SEC’s current leader, Stri, will win the 2011 CTC title with a Florida win. Rikey will win the 2011 CTC SEC title AND the 2011 CTC overall title with a Kentucky win. J will win the overall title with a Florida win.
#1E Florida vs. #2E Kentucky
Florida (who won the tough Eastern Division) actually had a much more difficult road in this tournament than Kentucky (who finished second in the East). The Gators had to go through two tough tournament teams – Tennessee and Vanderbilt – while Kentucky faced a probable CBI team in Ole Miss and a probably NIT team in Alabama. But, they both got here just the same and will play for it all in the SEC today. I am very eager to see the individual battle between Chandler Parsons and Terrence Jones, plus the point guard battle between highly-touted Brandon Knight versus the 5’7″ jet Erving Walker. The CTC is only somewhat split on this one. The majority of the field (12 entries) has Kentucky. 4 people have Florida (Stri, Waters, Cheryl, and Mac), and four more have already lost with either Vandy (Doogan and J), Mississippi State (Lynch), or Alabama (KA).
FINAL SCORE: Kentucky 70 – Florida 54
In another game that wasn’t all that close, UK closes out an impressive run through the SEC tournament with a convincing win over Florida, giving the ‘Cats another SEC title, and Rikey the 2011 CTC Overall Title. These Kentucky freshmen look really good, and I would not want to be matched up with them next week. A dozen people got this championship pick right, including Rikey and Bry, which catapulted them ahead of J into 1-2 in the overall standings.
ATLANTIC TEN CHAMPIONSHIP (80 points)
The A-10 expansion of about a decade ago has really been great for the league. Adding perennial national contender, Xavier, as well as solid programs like St. Louis and the two teams that will play for this year’s championship – Richmond and Dayton – was a pretty nice step for a league that has dealt with the defections of teams like Villanova, Pitt, West Virginia, Penn State, Rutgers, and Virginia Tech to richer conferences. In today’s final, the world will get to see – on CBS – two of the great additions to the league play for it all. And, it could be a great day for the A-10. If Dayton beats Richmond, the league should get 4 teams in The Dance tonight, which would tie the record for the league, which received 4 bids in 1993, 1997, and 2003. Bubble teams all over the land are hard-core Richmond fans today, as is Waters, who wins the 2011 CTC A-10 title with a Spiders win today. Rikey will take the title with a Dayton win.
#3 Richmond vs. #9 Dayton
Well, the 9-seed won the Big East tournament last night, so it is not ridiculous to think it could happen here in the A-10, as well. In fact, Dayton certainly has the talent to be this conference’s last team standing. With Chris Wright and Chris Johnson, this team expected to be in the Dance from the start of the year. They definitely didn’t expect to have to win this tournament to do it, though. Jawan Staten is a terrific freshman point guard, but he is a freshman, and he is up against one of the best in the country in Kevin Anderson. Also, there will be a great battle on the inside, as well, with Wright going up against first-team all-A10 player, Justin Harper. It is not surprising that no one has Dayton winning this tournament, but it is a bit surprising that only one (Waters) has Richmond.
FINAL SCORE: Richmond 67 – Dayton 54
The Spiders complete the tournament victory, ensuring their selection in the field of 68 (and it was probably a good thing, considering what happened with the bubble teams). The last chance for the A-10 to place 4 teams in the field was quelled today, when Dayton just didn’t have enough in the tank to take down Richmond. Waters was the only one to have Richmond winning this tournament, so he picks up a cool 100 points on the rest of the field.
BIG TEN CHAMPIONSHIP (80 points)
The top of the bracket was rather easy for top-seed Ohio State to navigate, but Penn State coming out of the bottom of the bracket – which contained Purdue, Wisconsin, and Michigan State – is incredible, and should get the Nittany Lions into the tournament, regardless of the outcome of their game against the nation’s number one today. What is interesting is that, with this game tipping off at 3:30, it probably will not come to an end until about 5:30 or so. With the brackets being announced at 6:00, the Committee’s opinion on Penn State is probably already made up before this game even begins. Personally, I think that it is bad for Penn State, from a seeding perspective, but good for them in terms of selection. The Committee probably has them in or not and won’t really be able to be swayed if the Lions get blown out today. But, if they win, normally, their seeding would be improved substantially, but, with all the different things that the Committee has to take into consideration, it will probably be a lot of work to up PSU’s seeding at the 11th hour, if they are to beat OSU. Primm has already clinched the 2011 CTC Big Ten championship trophy.
#1 Ohio State vs. #6 Penn State
Like I said above, I think PSU is in already. But, there is no doubt that they very close. They, obviously, would feel MUCH better, though, if they were to make it official by taking the Big Ten title here, especially if Dayton wins their early game. OSU is, in my mind, clearly the best team in America, but their one potential weakness is their lack of depth, so it should be interesting to see how Thad Matta works the rotation in their third game in three days. On the other side, this is PSU’s fourth game in four days, and a lot of their success falls on the shoulders of one guy – Taylor Battle. If Battle, a jump-shooter and slasher, is fatigued and short on the jumpers, the already somewhat anemic PSU offense becomes basically impotent. No one has the Lions here, but a dozen entries pegged the Buckeyes as their champ (Bry, J, Stri, Alexi, Waters, Lil Lohse, Scoot, Dan, Rikey, Gersh, Primm, and Mac.
FINAL SCORE: Ohio State 71 – Penn State 60
In the final game of another amazing two weeks of college hoops, the country’s best team won the Big Ten title in convincing fashion over the upstart Nittany Lions, who played their way into the tournament this week. Jared Sullinger was a man-child all week, and was named MOP of the tournament, despite only making 12 of his 36 field goal attempts. 12 more people hit this champ here.
