2020 College Hoops Thread

Ale Xander

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Entire men's tourney will be in Indiana
Division I:
Games will be played on two courts inside Lucas Oil Stadium, as well as Bankers Life Fieldhouse, Hinkle Fieldhouse, Indiana Farmers Coliseum, Mackey Arena in West Lafayette and Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall in Bloomington. Only one game at a time will be played in Lucas Oil Stadium. The Indiana Convention Center will be used as a practice facility, with multiple courts set up inside the venue.


Division II will be in Evansville
Division III will be in Fort Wayne
 

Humphrey

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This was a farce. There were more exposed noses than covered noses. Most of the time, there was a player on the court wearing the proverbial chin diaper. The referees (whose masks were in place) had no authority to sanction anyone so it's not like they could stop the game, send a player off, technical foul, etc.
I guess you could say that it gave two schools publicity that nowadays don't get any.
 

Average Reds

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Michigan seems like they are a hell of a lot better than people (including me) expected. They made a tough Wisconsin team look like a practice squad last night.
 

HomeRunBaker

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Alabama has been on an upward trend and likely reached the apex of it in 1H @LSU hitting 10-12 threes on way to 20+ point lead.
 

The Filthy One

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Temple was my second favorite team when I was a kid. I loved Mark Macon and would root for them against everyone except Syracuse. At the time, I thought they were basketball titans on a par with like Duke or North Carolina. I didn't realize at the time that was basically all John Chaney (I know they had a good program in the 50s but that was well before my time).
 

terrynever

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Temple was my second favorite team when I was a kid. I loved Mark Macon and would root for them against everyone except Syracuse. At the time, I thought they were basketball titans on a par with like Duke or North Carolina. I didn't realize at the time that was basically all John Chaney (I know they had a good program in the 50s but that was well before my time).
Long-time Temple coach Harry Litwack was an early proponent of the zone defense and used it almost exclusively. A great guard from Philly, Guy Rodgers, played for Temple in the late 1950s, around the same time Lenny Wilkins starred at PC. Final scores in the 40s and 50s were not uncommon in those days.
 

Humphrey

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Litwack was the opposing coach in Bob Cousy's final game at the helm of BC...the NIT final in 1969, which at the time was a tournament worth winning. Temple won.
 

HomeRunBaker

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Long-time Temple coach Harry Litwack was an early proponent of the zone defense and used it almost exclusively. A great guard from Philly, Guy Rodgers, played for Temple in the late 1950s, around the same time Lenny Wilkins starred at PC. Final scores in the 40s and 50s were not uncommon in those days.
Rodgers was the PG in Wilt’s game when he scored 100. I’ve read where some people in the game considered Rodgers the best passer the game has seen. One said the only one close was Maravich and Cousy himself said he dreaded going up against Rodgers because he knew he’d be chasing him around all night.
 

terrynever

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Rodgers was the PG in Wilt’s game when he scored 100. I’ve read where some people in the game considered Rodgers the best passer the game has seen. One said the only one close was Maravich and Cousy himself said he dreaded going up against Rodgers because he knew he’d be chasing him around all night.
Guy was left handed and in my mind’s eye a better athlete than Oscar. But the Big O was much stronger and a much better shooter than Guy. Maravich was incomparable to other great guards due to his skill set. You must have seen Pete in his prime. Or at least on film. Nobody like him. Well, Ernie D, maybe. And then Magic came in and changed everything.

You have to give Cousy credit for opening up the game to creativity with the ball. “Who do you think you are ... Bob Cousy?” We heard and said that a lot in the 50s and 60s.
 
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HomeRunBaker

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Guy was left handed and in my mind’s eye a better athlete than Oscar. But the Big O was much stronger and a much better shooter than Guy. Maravich was incomparable to other great guards due to his skill set. You must have seen Pete in his prime. Or at least on film. Nobody like him. Well, Ernie D, maybe. And then Magic came in and changed everything.

You have to give Cousy credit for opening up the game to creativity with the ball. “Who do you think you are ... Bob Cousy?” We heard and said that a lot in the 50s and 60s.
I only caught the back end of Maravich’s career but the highlights were incredible. When I read someone say that about the comparison the first name that came to mind was Ernie D (the second was Jason Williams).

Fun fact: I grew up less than a mile from Ernie’s house as a kid and played pickup in same games after he retired. One time my buddy who drove that day left me hanging afterward because Ernie, whose license was suspended at the time, needed a ride to Boston Garden to pick up his $1700 bi-weekly deferral check from his Lakers contact. Legend he was.
 

terrynever

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I only caught the back end of Maravich’s career but the highlights were incredible. When I read someone say that about the comparison the first name that came to mind was Ernie D (the second was Jason Williams).

Fun fact: I grew up less than a mile from Ernie’s house as a kid and played pickup in same games after he retired. One time my buddy who drove that day left me hanging afterward because Ernie, whose license was suspended at the time, needed a ride to Boston Garden to pick up his $1700 bi-weekly deferral check from his Lakers contact. Legend he was.
Great story, HRB. Ernie has lived a good life. He is loved in RI and your story shows how much a part of his town he has been and remains to this day.
 

Eagle3

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I only caught the back end of Maravich’s career but the highlights were incredible. When I read someone say that about the comparison the first name that came to mind was Ernie D (the second was Jason Williams).

Fun fact: I grew up less than a mile from Ernie’s house as a kid and played pickup in same games after he retired. One time my buddy who drove that day left me hanging afterward because Ernie, whose license was suspended at the time, needed a ride to Boston Garden to pick up his $1700 bi-weekly deferral check from his Lakers contact. Legend he was.
Maravich was incredible in college. He averaged 44 a game, but if there was a 3 point line back then it would have been 50
 

HomeRunBaker

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Maravich was incredible in college. He averaged 44 a game, but if there was a 3 point line back then it would have been 50
When he played for the Celtics in Birds rookie(?) year I was a kid and expecting to see THE Pete Maravich as I had zero understanding of how a player can age lol. Instead I settled for the knock down spot up shooting version and loved every second of it.
 

canderson

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I only caught the back end of Maravich’s career but the highlights were incredible. When I read someone say that about the comparison the first name that came to mind was Ernie D (the second was Jason Williams).

Fun fact: I grew up less than a mile from Ernie’s house as a kid and played pickup in same games after he retired. One time my buddy who drove that day left me hanging afterward because Ernie, whose license was suspended at the time, needed a ride to Boston Garden to pick up his $1700 bi-weekly deferral check from his Lakers contact. Legend he was.
We did Maravich drills from Little Dribblers through graduation - so like from 6 years old through 17. I can do them in my sleep still.

I wish I had been around to watch him play. He's the most underrated college player ever IMO.
 

Eagle3

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When he played for the Celtics in Birds rookie(?) year I was a kid and expecting to see THE Pete Maravich as I had zero understanding of how a player can age lol. Instead I settled for the knock down spot up shooting version and loved every second of it.
I was born in '64, so Maravich in college and Havlicek in the pros were my favorites as a little kid, basically my first memories of watching basketball. I remember my father comparing Maravich to Cousy because of his passing and ball handling, and he also told me that most coaches would bench guys for shooting from that far out.

He only got to play 1 year with the 3 point line, including those last couple of months with the Celtics after they picked him up after the Jazz waived him. His
knees were completely shot by then, but he's a career 67% 3 point shooter: 10 - 15 that last season
 

Humphrey

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A lot of people like The Pistol missed out on the NCAAs because the rules at the time called for the conference champs to make it, no one else. One just heard a lot of about him w/o seeing him play much.
 

Average Reds

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We did Maravich drills from Little Dribblers through graduation - so like from 6 years old through 17. I can do them in my sleep still.

I wish I had been around to watch him play. He's the most underrated college player ever IMO.
As one who remembers Maravich from college, I will play the (slight) contrarian.

Maravich put up incredible, almost unbelievable numbers in college because he was a singular offensive talent and played in a system designed by his coach (his father, Press Maravich) to do nothing more than feed him the ball. Now, I'll give him his due: I think he was the greatest pure scorer in the history of basketball. But his game was as one-dimensional as the teams he played on, which is part of the reason Maravich never played for a championship team. (In the NBA, Maravich's teams regularly missed the playoffs and he never had a deep run until his last year with the Celtics.)

At the same time, Maravich's "failures" are mostly the failure of his coaches. He was seen as such an asset that they simply did not have the imagination or talent to effectively integrate him into a team built to win. They just designed plays for him because, well, he was Pete Maravich. Which is why he's almost the Derek Jeter of basketball, in the sense that he's considered so overrated that his skills are deeply underrated. It's quite the paradox.

One of the most incredible college basketball games I have ever watched was when LSU played the #2 ranked Kentucky Wildcats on February 22, 1970. Maravich put up 64 points in one of the most amazing efforts I've ever seen, but Kentucky, led by Dan Issel (who scored 51 himself) pulled away from LSU 121-105.

https://www.nytimes.com/1970/02/22/archives/maravich-gets-64-but-lsu-loses-kentucky-wins-121105-as-issel-scores.html#:~:text=BATON ROUGE, Feb.,L.S.U.

That game is a great example of the paradox I spoke of. Kentucky coach Adolph Rupp was so unnerved by Maravich that he abandoned his coaching philosophy and decided to focus completely on offense. His (ultimately correct) theory was that they couldn't stop Maravich, but because they had one supremely talented player themselves (Issel) and a much deeper team, they could outlast him and LSU.

I remember watching that game like it was yesterday. Just an amazing 40 minutes of basketball.
 

Humphrey

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So, you figure that score would have been something like 135-125 if there had been the 3 point rule. And no shot clock either.

One of the best college hoop games I saw, from a pure entertainment standpoint, was Harvard Vs Oral Roberts in the early 70s. Oral Roberts had real good teams in the 72-74 timeframe (2 NITS, one Elite 8, where they lost in OT to Kansas); this was an era of unknown schools coming out of the woodwork for a year or two (Jacksonville, Western Kentucky). Harvard had James Brown, the TV guy; and Ken Wolfe, who was the producer of MNF for quite a while; they were a very talented bunch of head cases who were on top of their game that night. Score was 100-99 or something like that. End-to-end action. If there were a 30 second clock, no one would have come close to it save for a few times.
 

HomeRunBaker

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As one who remembers Maravich from college, I will play the (slight) contrarian.

Maravich put up incredible, almost unbelievable numbers in college because he was a singular offensive talent and played in a system designed by his coach (his father, Press Maravich) to do nothing more than feed him the ball. Now, I'll give him his due: I think he was the greatest pure scorer in the history of basketball. But his game was as one-dimensional as the teams he played on
I never saw Maravich in college but was he really a one-dimensional player when he also led the SEC in Assists by nearly 2 assists per game? It looks like he could have been at the top of the leaders nationally but not all teams tracked assists as somehow it wasn’t tracked for all teams by the NCAA stat until 1983. I mean we all know he was one of the greatest passers the game has ever seen.
 

Average Reds

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I never saw Maravich in college but was he really a one-dimensional player when he also led the SEC in Assists by nearly 2 assists per game? It looks like he could have been at the top of the leaders nationally but not all teams tracked assists as somehow it wasn’t tracked for all teams by the NCAA stat until 1983. I mean we all know he was one of the greatest passers the game has ever seen.
First of all I don't know why you were yelling at me. (I kid.)

Saying Maravich is one-dimensional isn't really controversial. Nor is it said in a derogatory fashion. So when I called him a "singular offensive talent," I mean that there has literally not been anyone like him before or since.

As to your point about assists, I'll just point out that no player in the modern game, not even Wilt Chamberlain in his prime with the Philadelphia Warriors, has ever had an offense as focused on him as LSU's offense was with Maravich. He handled the ball on every single possession, which means that, in addition to being the prime scoring option, he was also the de-facto point guard. And Maravich's skill as a passer was such that when defenses collapsed on him he could feed teammates for easy baskets. (Which means they weren't able to collapse on him, which allowed him to go back to scoring.)

I say all of this to emphasize that we are not disagreeing in any way. Maravich was the entire offensive show for LSU. At the same time, he didn't really play defense because Press (his father, the coach) didn't want him wearing down. So Maravich stayed outside and just kind of watched. (I should mention that this was not a defensive era in college basketball and Maravich was an extreme example on both ends of the court.)
 

Ale Xander

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There are some tweaks in the early and middle rounds of March Madness schedule this year because of the need for testing/quarantining.

Opening Round: Thursday March 18
First Round: Friday March 19 and Saturday March 20
Second Round: Sunday March 21 and Monday March 22

Sweet Sixteen: Saturday March 27 and Sunday March 28
Elite Eight: Monday March 29 and Tuesday March 30

Final Four Semis: Saturday April 3
Championship: Monday April 5
 

HomeRunBaker

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Does any team want to see Oklahoma State and Cade in a single elimination tourney?
Was telling buddy on Saturday that the two teams nobody is going to want to play is OSU and Florida St. Adding thought to this I’d include UConn to that group.

This is set up to be a tremendous tournament if Covid can stay the F out of the way. Sad what may happen with Bryant.
 

Humphrey

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Bryant's being allowed to play. NEC is a 4 team tournament and they're second.
 

Ale Xander

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The Zags have 3 players on the Wooden Finalists list. They're the overwhelming favorite. Baylor, Illinois and Michigan are the co-2nd favorites.
 

BaseballJones

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It's incredible to me that Duke, at 11-11, is still considered to be "on the bubble". I just read a cbssports article that said that at 11-11, having just been blown out by UNC, Duke could still get in.

"At 11-11, Duke will need a strong run in the ACC Tournament to avoid missing the Big Dance for the first time since 1995. Saturday's loss means the Blue Devils are the No. 10 seed for the ACC Tournament and will have to play Tuesday against No. 15 seed Boston College."

I'm like.... a "strong run in the ACC Tournament"? You mean like, win the whole thing, right? Say Duke goes 3-1, losing in the ACC final. They'd be 14-12. At that record, there's NO chance Duke should even be in the conversation for making the tournament.
 

HomeRunBaker

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The Zags have 3 players on the Wooden Finalists list. They're the overwhelming favorite. Baylor, Illinois and Michigan are the co-2nd favorites.
I wouldn’t favor the Zags right now against Baylor. They play 100x neither are winning less than 40 of these matchups. I’ve got them this as a toss-up at worst.

Their game in December was cancelled but Gonzaga was posted as a 2-point favorite on a neutral floor at the time. I’d have to think they lost some edge to Baylor from not playing a competitive schedule over the last two months. The Bears were improving by playing 8 Top-20 teams while Gonzaga got fired up to play BYU and San Fran a couple of times.