Nevada falls short against NC
2 hours ago
Prior to last night, I had never taken the time to watch Mid-Night Madness when the time came. I was more interested in diving into college basketball previews and glossing over last seasons statistics. To be honest, Mid-Night Madness never really interested me, probably, because my home team (Georgia) has never had a program relevant enough to pull such an event off. So, from a fan perspective there really wasn't much of interest for me. The only reason I had any interest in watching "The Madness" this year, was because I, like many have an interest in seeing the best teams in action, even if they are playing themselves. First of all the broadcast team of Adrian Branch, Andy Katz and who ever the other guy was, was horrible. They offered little to no actually insight, just rambling on about the best player on each team. The antics where equally bad, I for one had no interest in seeing UNC's players dress up as elvis, or Tom Izzo ride in on an Indy race car (even though is was a good pun, seeing as the Final Four is in Indy this season). In addition the scrimmages had even less substance that I had envisioned. They where virtually no-contact and jump shots where rarely contested if ever, not to mention the amount of run out dunks, that got the students excited, but just made the game even sloppier. By watching these practices, there is no way to tell if one of these teams is more prepared than the other. Kentucky's Big Blue Madness was probably the most entertaining, seeing as the people in Lexington are completely nuts. Kentucky sold all its tickets to the event in less than 2 hours, and Calapari looked like Obama when he addressed a crowd full of his supporters. It wasn't all bad, there where some nice touches to the program, like when ESPNU went to Fargo, North Dakota to see the Bisons' Mid-Night Madness and some of the dunk contest dunks I saw where pretty exciting. All in all thought it still wasn't satisfying. Sure these universities can get 20 or 22 thousand people to show up for a bunch of cheesy skits and dance numbers, but for the college basketball purists there is not much offered when it comes to Mid-Night Madness.
Last season was easily the best season in the last decade (or ever?) for Northwestern basketball. After finishing 2-14 in Big 10 play in 06-07 and 1-17 in 07-08 the Wildcats finally broke through and finished 8-10. The record wasn't good enough for an NCAA bid, but it did earn the Wildcats an NIT bid. Among those 8 wins, were impressive road victories against Michigan St. and Purdue, as well as a non-conference triumph over Florida State. Many milestones were achieved along the way, including beating a top ten team on the road for the first time since 1953, winning consecutive games against ranked teams for the first time ever, and reaching the NIT for the first time in this decade. With a solid core returning, Northwestern could be in the hunt of its first ever NCAA tournament berth. The Wildcats' stud is Kevin Coble, who will probably never play in the NBA, but has a game that was tailor made for the Princeton style offense that Northwestern runs. Coble is as unique as any player in college basketball, a political science major, who was a game that reminds some of Dirk Nowitzki. He can score from any spot on the floor, and possess deadly range that extends way beyond the college line. He uses his quickness to execute perfectly timed back door cuts and can create a mismatch with almost any defender. Returning with Coble is junior point Michael "Juice" Thompson. Thompson, set Northwestern's freshman record for assists, and last season came up big against Michigan St., scoring 20 points and hitting several key shots. John Shurna, who was much more of a role player last season, was part of U.S.A.'s U-19 team and will get plenty more burn this season. Rebounding and interior defense still remains a problem though, unless 7-foot 280 pound Sophomore Kyle Rowley can reel in more than 1.8 rebounds a game. Interior defense is where the Wildcats have been hit the hardest, but the front court is solid, and this years Big 10 does not present its self to have any dominant back to the basket bigs at all. Finishing off close games was also a huge issue for Carmody's squad. If Northwestern had executed a little bit better down the stretch they could have already punched their first ticket to the dance. Its been a ruff stretch for Bill Carmody, who doesn't have a ton of fans in Evanston, but he may have earned the trust of some last year. This year presents itself with hope and many more opportunities for the 10th year coach. Looking at the schedule, the Non-conference slate provides plenty of challenging, but winnable games against formidable competition (Butler, Notre Dame, NC State, Stanfored), and the Wildcats finally have the tools to be successful in Big 10 play.
Mark Titus is not well known for his basketball prowess (he is a walk-on at Ohio St.), but he is an internet legend. Titus is the author of Club Trillion, a blog founded by himself as well as fellow bench warmers Danny Peters and Kyle Madsen. Club Trillion is a very humorous blog, in which Titus not only pokes fun at himself for being a bench warmer, but uses a unique sense of humor to make everything he writes pure comedic gold. Club Trillion gives readers a true genuine view from the end of the bench, some thing that you can't find anywhere else, because all the focus in college basketball is on the guys who are actually productive members of their teams. Despite being a walk-on, Titus is actually not a bad basketball player at all, scoring over 1,000 points in high school, but he has definitely found a home on the college basketball pine. His career highlights include grabbing his first defensive rebound against Iowa as a sophomore, and hitting his second career three pointer against Presbyterian (also as a sophomore). However, none of that detracts from how great the blog is, which currently has had over 1.7 blog views since November 2008. The Blog has been featured on local TV, as well as ESPN.com and Bill Simmons' Podcast. Basically Club Trillion is one of the most wildly entertaining blogs on the internet, and I highly recommend that you check it out, I think its great that we see a walk-on get some serious recognition, because a lot of times they are just as interesting as many of the stars we see in today's game."When the time came for us to get in, there would usually only be 1 minute remaining in the game and after sitting down for 39 minutes, we really had no interest in trying to be all that productive. So we devised the plan of trying to get the "trillion" which occurs when we play 1 minute and do absolutely nothing that would appear in the box score, thus making our stat line say 1 minute played followed by a bunch of zeroes. I know what you are saying to yourself right now. You are saying, "That is side-splittingly hilarious. These guys are probably just a comical party waiting to happen." You are absolutely right."
Chase Adams (Pitt from Centenary)- The Summit League defensive player of the year last season doesn't have to sit out this season, because Centenary is moving to DIII. Adams also shot 39% from deep as a Junior, making him an offensive threat as well
Derrick Jasper (UNLV from Kentucky)- At 6'6" he is very big for a point guard, but the former California high school standout should be one of the best guards in the Mountain West, after seeing limited playing time at Kentucky.
Jai Lucas (Texas from Florida)- Lucas is a pass first point guard, who can set up Texas's many scoring options. Dad was a #1 pick in the NBA draft, brother (John Lucas III) played at Oklahoma St.
Guard- Kalin Lucas (Michigan St. Jr.): Lucas was the unquestioned leader of last season's runner up squad, and earned Big 10 player of the year honors, with a solid stat line of 14.7 points and 4.6 assists a game. Lucas is steady on offense, and a sneaky defender, able to defend other guards 3 to 4 inches taller than him. Despite all of that and the fact that Lucas was the captain of a 31-7 team last season, he still seems to be underrated. He might not have the stats that other flashy guards have, but he showed up when it counted last season, hitting the game winner against Kansas, and dominating UCONN's guards in the elite 8. Lucas should be on everyone's pre-season All-American team, and don't think he won't be looking to make a statement when the Spartans play UNC in the ACC/Big 10 challenge.