Tuesday, March 4, 2008

New rankings finally up

Finally got an updated set of rankings up.
Some thoughts and observations from the last two weeks of BBall.
-So much for the good momentum for Beilein's boys. An ugly loss at home to Big Ten bottom dweller Northwestern put the kibosh on any positive feelings that might have been generated by winning three straight and four out of five. The followup game at Penn State wasn't much better. It's hard to see if any progress has made program wise this year. I still Beilein was a better option than sticking with Tommy Turtleneck, but it may take longer than expected to turn the ship around. The jury is still out, but the early returns aren't promising.
-The Bracket buster weekend proved that this is still the MVC's world and the rest of us are just playing in it. Missouri Valley teams went an astounding 8-2 when only three other conferences were more than one game over .500 (America East 3-1, Colonial 7-5, & MAAC 6-4). Particularly noteworthy were Drake's win over Butler on the road, and Creighton's thrilling one point win at Oral Roberts
-I think the Tennessee game showed why Memphis will be the #1 or #2 seed most likely to get upset before the Sweet sixteen. They are very athletic and have relied on their superior athletes to blow away most of their opponents this year. They aren't stellar in half court offense, don't shoot free throws well at all (through games of 3/2, they are the third worst FT shooting team in the country), and if they face a team with a lot of talent early (like Florida or Oklahoma) they could go down. With the poor free throw shooting, they could also be susceptible to a disciplined, deep team that decides to put them on the line a lot.
-I would love to see a Texas / Gonzaga matchup at some point in the tourny. A Pargo / Augestin could be a classic.
-I will try and get an updated bracketology up tonight.