Connecticut Wins 2011 National Championship

(Photo: ABC News)


Propelled by a whirlwind of scoring in the second half of the National Championship game, Connecticut captured the 2011 NCAA National Championship in men's basketball by beating Butler 53-41. The 2011 NCAA title is Connecticut's third National Championship in men's basketball. All three of Connecticut's Championships have come under the stewardship of head coach Jim Calhoun. Calhoun previously led Connecticut to NCAA titles in 1999 and 2004.

UConn is Back at No. 1

Connecticut is the No. 1 team in America again. The Huskies have re-taken the top spot in the AP Top 25. North Carolina is No. 2.

Drive and Dish thinks Connecticut and North Carolina are the best teams in the country. We wouldn't be surprised to see them play each other in the National Championship game (although the loss of Jerome Dyson could prevent the Huskies from getting that far).

Pittsburgh is ranked No. 3. Oklahoma and Memphis round out the top five.

AP Top 25 (3-2-09):

Rank	Team	Record	Votes	Previous
1	Connecticut (67)	27-2	1792	2
2	North Carolina (3)	25-3	1678	4
3	Pittsburgh (1)	26-3	1612	1
4	Oklahoma	26-3	1576	3
5	Memphis (1)	26-3	1543	5
6	Louisville	23-5	1462	6
7	Duke	24-5	1340	7
8	Michigan State	23-5	1302	9
9	Kansas	24-5	1190	15
10	Wake Forest	22-5	1158	13
11	Villanova	23-6	913	10
12	LSU	25-4	894	18
13	Marquette	23-6	860	8
14	Gonzaga	23-5	837	17
15	Missouri	24-5	795	11
16	Washington	22-7	704	21
17	Xavier	23-5	629	19
18	Clemson	22-6	564	12
19	Purdue	22-7	545	16
20	UCLA	22-7	497	22
21	Arizona State	21-7	347	14
22	Butler	25-4	302	24
23	Illinois	23-7	287	20
24	Florida State	22-7	272	23
25	Syracuse	21-8	99	28
Others Receiving Votes: Creighton 52, Brigham Young 41, Utah 22, Saint Mary's 13, Dayton 11, West Virginia 10, Davidson 9, Texas 9, California 8, South Carolina 7, Providence 7, Washington State 4, Arizona 3, Oklahoma State 2, Boston College 1, Rhode Island 1, American University 1, Utah State 1

UConn's No. 1 Streak Reaches Three Weeks

For the third straight week, Connecticut is the No. 1 ranked team in America. Thus far, the Huskies are the only team to keep the No. 1 ranking in the AP Top 25 for more than one week in calendar year 2009. Oklahoma remains at No. 2 and North Carolina remains at No. 3.

Pittsburgh and Memphis round out the top 5.

AP Top 25 (Feb. 16, 2009):

		Record	Votes
1	Connecticut (66)	24-2	1794
2	Oklahoma (4)	25-1	1709
3	North Carolina (2)	23-2	1676
4	Pittsburgh	24-2	1589
5	Memphis	22-3	1465
6	Michigan State	20-4	1443
7	Louisville	19-5	1280
8	Wake Forest	19-4	1217
9	Duke	20-5	1048
10	Marquette	21-4	1045
11	Missouri	22-4	1041
12	Villanova	20-5	983
13	Clemson	20-4	939
14	Arizona State	20-5	830
15	Kansas	20-5	651
16	Xavier	21-4	646
17	Gonzaga	19-5	599
18	Illinois	21-5	589
19	Purdue	19-6	582
20	UCLA	19-6	473
21	Butler	22-3	373
22	Washington	19-6	334
23	LSU	21-4	294
24	Syracuse	19-7	207
25	Dayton	23-3	194
Others Receiving Votes: Texas 83, Utah State 72, Ohio State 45, Arizona 38, California 34, Utah 34, West Virginia 26, Florida State 18, Davidson 15, South Carolina 10, Minnesota 6, Boston College 5, Kentucky 5, Miami (FL) 2, Tennessee 2, Wisconsin 2, Brigham Young 1, Robert Morris 1

Connecticut = No. 1 (Feb. 2)

Connecticut is the new No. 1 team in America. The Huskies replace Duke as the highest ranked team in the AP Top 25.

Last week, Duke replaced Wake Forest as the No. 1 ranked team in the AP poll. But Wake Forest beat Duke 70-68 on Wednesday, before falling to Georgia Tech on Saturday.

Oklahoma takes over the No. 2 position in this week's poll, and North Carolina moves up to No. 3. Duke and Louisville round out the top 5.

Drive and Dish has been skeptical of the claim that Wake Forest is a legitimate Final Four contender. After the Demon Deacons beat Duke, we adopted the position that Wake Forest has the requisite talent and the size needed to contend for a Final Four, but that they may not have enough maturity/experience to get them there this year. And we've also stated that North Carolina is likely to make a return trip to the Final Four, but that they're unlikely to win the National Championship. But make no mistake, the UConn Huskies are a legitimate Final Four and National Championship contender.

AP Top 25

1. Connecticut (64) 20-1 1,792

2. Oklahoma (5) 21-1 1,691

3. North Carolina (3) 19-2 1,639

4. Duke 19-2 1,563

5. Louisville 17-3 1,464

6. Pittsburgh 19-2 1,427

7. Wake Forest 17-2 1,409

8. Marquette 19-2 1,358

9. Xavier 19-2 1,176

10. Clemson 18-2 1,077

11. Butler 19-1 1,051

12. Purdue 17-4 961

13. Michigan State 17-4 876

14. Memphis 18-3 798

15. UCLA 17-4 787

16. Texas 15-5 724

17. Villanova 17-4 698

18. Gonzaga 16-4 632

19. Minnesota 18-3 426

20. Syracuse 17-5 415

21. Kansas 17-4 316

22. Washington 16-5 216

23. Illinois 18-4 198

24. Arizona State 16-5 146

25. Utah State 21-1 99

Others Receiving Votes Dayton 95, Davidson 85, Missouri 39, Penn State 37, LSU 36, West Virginia 33, South Carolina 33, UNLV 29, Florida 24, Providence 14, USC 8, Notre Dame 7, Siena 4, Kansas State 4, Northeastern 3, Ohio State 3, Kentucky 2, Arizona 2, Florida State 1, Northern Iowa 1, Virginia Military 1.

Duke Claims No. 1 (January 26, 2009)

Duke is the new No. 1 team in America. The Blue Devils sit atop the AP Men's College Basketball Top 25 for the first time since the 2005/06 season. Duke's climb to No. 1 comes as no surprise: last week's No. 1 team, Wake Forest, lost its first game of the season to unranked Virginia Tech on Wednesday. Duke beat North Carolina State and Maryland convincingly during the week, which practically guaranteed them a promotion from last week's No. 2 ranking.

Wake Forest's stay atop the polls was short-lived: last week, the Demon Deacons captured the No. 1 ranking in the AP Top 25 for the first time since 2004. But thee days after taking over the top position in the AP poll, Wake fell at home to the unheralded Virginia Tech Hokies.

The Big East leads all conferences with four teams in the top 10: Connecticut is No. 2, Pittsburgh is No. 3 , Louisville is No. 7 and Marquette is No. 8. The Atlantic Coast Conference has three teams in the top ten, with the aforementioned No. 1 Duke, No. 5 North Carolina and No. 6 Wake Forest.

Only three non Big East or ACC teams appear in the top ten (No. 4 Oklahoma, No. 9 Michigan State and No. 10 Xavier).

AP Top 25:

1. Duke (62) 18-1 1,789

2. Connecticut (6) 18-1 1,694

3. Pittsburgh (3) 18-1 1,647

4. Oklahoma (1) 19-1 1,539

5. North Carolina 17-2 1,529

6. Wake Forest 16-1 1,509

7. Louisville 15-3 1,351

8. Marquette 17-2 1,209

9. Michigan State 16-3 1,136

10. Xavier 17-2 1,084

11. Texas 14-4 1,017

12. Clemson 17-2 929

13. Butler 18-1 916

14. Arizona State 16-3 834

15. Syracuse 17-4 808

16. Purdue 15-4 724

17. UCLA 15-4 544

18. Memphis 16-3 530

19. Illinois 17-3 401

20. Gonzaga 14-4 381

21. Villanova 15-4 276

22. Saint Mary's 18-1 247

23. Washington 15-4 218

24. Kentucky 16-4 217

25. Georgetown 12-6 189

Others Receiving Votes Notre Dame 154, Minnesota 138, Kansas 84, Florida 65, Missouri 52, Virginia Tech 37, Baylor 34, West Virginia 32, Davidson 27, Utah State 23, Dayton 14, California 13, UNLV 4, Florida State 3, Ohio State 1, Virginia Commonwealth 1. Dropped From Rankings Notre Dame 19, Minnesota 21, Florida 24.

Basketball Season Nears; Tidbits Returns

The leaves are falling from the trees, nightfall is coming earlier every day, college basketball teams began practicing last Friday and NBA training camps have been grinding it out for two weeks. Drive and Dish has been slumming for the last few months, but with Fall in full session and basketball season on the horizon, the Drive and Dish editorial board has elected to resurrect the ever popular Drive and Dish "Tidbits" series:

1.) Tuesday night, rookie point guard Derrick Rose scored 30 points as his Chicago squad beat Dallas 109-105 in NBA preseason action.

Drive and Dish readers may ask "who the hell cares about the results of NBA preseason games?" And normally, they'd be absolutely correct to pose such a question. But last night, Derrick Rose (a 19 year old rookie point guard) served notice to the rest of the NBA that he has the (rare) ability to take games over.

Rose will likely have ups and downs over the course of his rookie campaign, but anyone who's caught as much as a glimpse of his play during the preseason should understand that the kid is the real deal. And one would suspect that opposing NBA guards will understand that in short order as well.

2.) Shawn Siegel, of CollegeHoops.net, talks to New Mexico men's head basketball coach Steve Alford:

"Our goal is to win the Mountain West Conference and get into the NCAA Tournament. After that, we want to be in a position to advance as far as we can in post season play."

3.) Big East coaches have picked UConn to win the conference and have named Notre Dame's Luke Harangody Big East preseason Player of the Year.

4.) UNC Asheville's 7'7" center Kenny George, the tallest player in college basketball, will be sidelined for the 2008/09 season -- and likely for good -- amid reports part of his right foot was amputated.

5.) Georgia Tech senior D'Andre Bell is out for the year too, due to the discovery that he suffers from the congenital condition spinal stenosis. Bell plans to undergo surgery to correct the disorder.

6.) Santa Clara center John Bryant has returned to the court after having been stabbed three times at the beginning of the school year (Bryant was stabbed three times during one altercation, not stabbed in three separate altercations).

Bryant figures to be an NBA prospect, but, nonetheless, one wonders if Bryant has ever considered pursuing a career as a hip hop artist. After all, 50 Cent's hip hop career took off largely because he had the street cred of having been shot nine times (it certainly didn't take off because of his superior lyrical flow). I don't know if Bryant can rap, but now that he's been stabbed, he's definitely got his street bona fides.

The Weekend of the Upset

The weekend of January 19 & 20 will likely go down as having been 2008's weekend of the upset in college basketball.

Yesterday, #1 ranked and previously undefeated North Carolina was stunned at home by the enigmatic Maryland Terrapins, 82-80. More here. And here.

On the West coast, Tim Floyd and O.J. Mayo's USC Trojans upset #4 UCLA, 72-63.

Out in the Big 12, Michael Beasley and Kansas State stomped #10 Texas A&M 75-54. Earlier in the week, A&M had also been upset by Texas Tech, as Tech coach Bob Knight netted his 900th career win.

In the Big East, Cincinnati surprised #15 Pitt, 62-59.

And the upsets didn't end on Saturday. Today, Connecticut knocked off #13 Marquette 89-73, in Storrs, CT.

Although most sports fans' eyes were on the NFL, as the NFC and AFC Championship games were played today, the weekend's real action was in college basketball.

Over the last two days, college basketball teams from coast to coast elevated their games and pulled off huge upsets, both at home and on the road.

Drive and Dish would just like to say: Now that's what we're talkin' about!