Morning thoughts + the night session

By Mark Buckets

Okay, so the first slate of games were pretty lackluster. Davidson hung tough with Maryland for a while. In a game that was dictated by runs, the Terps and Mike Jones took over at the end, when Davidson ran out of gas. Props to Stephen Curry, who wasn't particularly efficient from the field but ended up with a game-high 30.

-Texas Tech had no answer for Tyrese Rice, who gouged the Red Raiders with dribble penetration. Boston College is a team to look out for as the tourney progresses. Rice is one of the nation's more underrated players and Jared Dudley, if he stays out of foul trouble, presents matchup problems galore.

-Georgetown took care of business against Belmont. No surprises from this contest, although Hoya Nation has to be pleased that Jessie Sapp contributed 20 points.

-In a pretty non-descrpit basketball game, Butler took out upset-favorite Old Dominion. A.J. Graves, a high school quarterback in his native Indiana, broke out of a shooting slump (a steak which lasted the past 7 games as Butler struggled down the stretch) and scored 18. To aid the Bulldogs' cause, ODU couldn't throw a brick in the ocean. Period.

-Louisville and Stanford failed to deliver a thriller. Well, actually, Stanford failed to show up. Louisville turned the Cardinal over and applied pressure unlike anything Stanford had seen all year.

-Louisville's opponent on Saturday will be Texas A&M. After having this game in hand for much of the first half, Penn went on a wee bit of a run and took a two point lead midway through the second half. Acie Law continues to impress me as he stopped a surge from the Quakers with a couple of big baskets. Despite willing their team back into this game, Ibrahim Jaaber and Mark Zoller end their careers.

-It was a bit dissapointing to see Oral Roberts fizzle out of the tournament. A lot was expected of Ken Tutt and Caleb Green, but Green had one of his worst shooting days of the season and Tutt 17 couldn't make up for that. Washington State proved to me that they are a team that stays true to their system, and has a chance to sneak into the Sweet 16.

-Which brings us to the Vandy/GW game. And a game, it wasn't. Vandy jumped on the Colonials early and didn't step off the gas When Shan Foster and, in particular, Derrick Byars start to heat up, this team has the capability to advance several lines on the bracket. Not much else to say, except for the little deal of it's 5PM eastern time slot. Not only does about 3% of the country get this game(they would have to pre-empt each affiliates local news), but it presents a unique situation. Four games are played without a break halfway through. Hence the sparce crowds. I digress.


Tonight brings forth 8 games and a couple of upset possibilities. At the fore of the upset talk is the Duke-VCU game. I like the Blue Devils to march on despite the constant praise of Anthony Grant's ballclub. Sure, he coached on Billy Donnovan's Florida STAFF last year, but people are failing to realize (or blindly ommiting) the fact that Coach K's postseason record speaks for itself. Sure, Duke will need to take care of the ball and stop penetration from Maynor (Who if I didn't know better, would challenge Stephon Marbury in a game of And-1 mix tape tour moves) . Paulus is starting to seek his shot, and because of this, it opens things up inside for McRoberts (Paging Brian Zoubek, Paging Brian Zoubek)

-North Carolina, Ohio State and UCLA are taking on severly overmatched teams tonight and shouldn't have much of a problem. Although Ohio State's opponent, Central Connecticut State, is a good story. Javier Mojica has been through more adversity in his life than most anyone should. If you have time, you should check him out. Exciting player.

-Pittsburgh shouldn't sleep through their game tonight against Wright State. I'm a big Deshaun Wood fan, and you've gotta love the Brad Brownell saga. He's already stuck it to the UNC-Wilmington administartion, so everything else appears to be gravy. But in the end, Pitt's front line (in particular Aaron Gray, who needs to wake up his game) will have impose their will on the Raiders. Don't be surprised to see this game go down to the wire.

-Two 8 vs. 9 games highlight the schedule tonight. We all know of the various storylines headlining the Marquette-Michigan State contest. Both teams are hungry for first round success after a few years of early exits. I like Marquette in a close one. Here is a simple mathematical equation to solve this game. Matthews & James > Drew Neitzel. That is no slight to Neitzel, who has improved and honed his game this year, but I'll take two over one any day. Xavier and BYU are two teams who aren't exposed as much as the other 8-9 seeds, but that doesn't mean they can't play. I like Xavier's senior core led by Justin Doellman and Justin Cage (who, by the way, were freshman on XU's Elite 8 squad that lost 66-63 to Duke at the Atlanta Regional) to take care of business.

So there you have it. The roundballs are up and bouncing. Enjoy tonight's games!