The NCAA Tournament Selection Committee has chosen North Carolina, Memphis, UCLA and Kansas as the four No. 1 seeds for this year's Big Dance.
North Carolina was named the No. 1 overall seed. The Tar Heels will play the winner of the play-in game in the first round of the Tournament.
There's not much controversy in any of those four selections, as these were the four teams that most people figured would be the four No. 1 seeds. If there are any complaints, they're likely to come from Tennessee, where some fans thought the Volunteers had done enough to earn a No. 1 seed. Gary Parrish of CBS picked Tennessee as a No. 1, and in RPI Tennessee was No. 2 in the nation.
Instead, the Volunteers are the No. 2 seed in the same region as North Carolina, setting up the possibility for a huge regional final. Tennessee plays No. 15 seed American in this week's first-round game.
By picking North Carolina, Memphis, UCLA and Kansas, the Selection Committee showed that conference tournaments are meaningful: Tennessee didn't make the SEC Tournament title game, and that's why the Selection Committee knocked the Vols out of the top four.
North Carolina star Tyler Hansbrough and his friends have an interesting way of passing the time around the ping pong table:
"A game me and my friends came up with in Poplar Bluff, Missouri: It's the first person to score two points in a row, the loser has to take their shirt and lift it over their head while the winner gets to take a ping pong ball and hit him in the chest, and it's pretty painful. You don't want to lose, just because once that ping pong hits you, it's going to leave a welt for about a day or so and it's embarrassing when you take your shirt off. Also, it kinda hurts."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what they like to do for fun in Poplar Bluff, Missouri.
Above is a video of Eve Carson, Student Body President of the University of North Carolina.
Ms. Carson was found murdered in the middle of an intersection just outside downtown Chapel Hill on Wednesday. Her body ... which had two gunshot wounds, including one to the head ... laid just a mile away from her SUV, which was left abandoned. There are no suspects at this time (watch more of the story here).
The entire school is in mourning. There have been candlelight vigils held at the school's iconic Old Well as well as news conferences, memorials and speeches.
One thing there wasn't was a news conference from UNC basketball coach Roy Williams.
"In light of the news and out of respect for Ms. Carson, we feel it is inappropriate for us to hold a basketball-related news conference at this time," the school said in a prepared statement.
Hoopsvibe has uncovered this sweet video of a Michael Jordan-led North Carolina team beating a Len Bias-led Maryland team:
If you watch the whole video, you'll see that Jordan ends the game with one of the best dunks in college basketball history.
Almost as interesting as the video is the game story Hoopsvibe found. Note the byline:
By Michael Wilbon Washington Post Staff Writer Those who argue that two great players can't make a team No. 1 in the nation obviously haven't seen enough of North Carolina all-Americans Michael Jordan and Sam Perkins. Jordan had the presence of three players at times last night, shooting, stealing and rebounding in surreal sequences. His 21 points and 12 rebounds, and Perkins' 26 points and 12 rebounds, enabled Carolina to remain undefeated with a 74-62 victory over Maryland in packed Cole Field House. The Tar Heels, all-Americas or not, held no big edge until the final minute. The Terrapins, for the most part, played like a team ranked fifth in the country. Sophomore forward Len Bias, with a career-high 24 points, and Adrian Branch, with 19, at times matched the splendor of Perkins and Jordan.
I wasn't aware that anyone ever argued that two great players can't make a team No. 1, but overall, you can see the promise in Wilbon just as you can see the promise in Jordan, and the unfulfilled promise in Bias.
In case you didn't get the memo, Stephen Curry is good. Curry, the son of former NBA player Dell Curry, was the Southern Conference preseason player of the year, and he showed tonight that a whole lot of bigger schools than Davidson erred when they let him slip away.
Curry scored 24 points tonight against No. 1 North Carolina, and although Davidson fell just short in a 72-68 loss, he made clear that he's a player we all need to watch. Yes, he tries to do too much at times (2-of-13 from beyond the arc), but he's got talent. And Davidson, which went 27-4 last year and returns all its key players, made clear that it's a team we'll all watch in March.
Having said that, North Carolina has tons of talent and can win even when it's playing a so-so game against scrappy team that comes to play. North Carolina is a legitimate No. 1 team, but by playing the Tar Heels tough for 40 minutes, Davidson became the story tonight.
This will be a transition year for most of the ACC. Pretty much everyone took a hit this offseason, with only four teams really looking like locks for the NCAA tournament. There is little doubt that North Carolina will be the favorite ... but remember that this was the case last year ... and UNC was nearly the #5 seed in the ACC tournament. NC State, Duke and Clemson have the best shot at giving the Heels trouble for the title
1-North Carolina: Sometimes subtraction isn't a bad thing. The Heels lose Brandan Wright and Reyshawn Terry, but the rotation should be tighter and everyone more understanding of their roles. If UNC is going to make its title run, they better do it now before Ty Lawson and Tyler Hansbrough bolt.
2-NC State: Brandon Costner is my pick for ACC Player of the Year. With JJ Hickson running alongside him in the paint, Costner is free to show his entire game [similar to how Wright helped Hansbrough last year in Chapel Hill]. This team is ready to break out and get back into the ACC's elite. At issue is finding Engin Atsur's replacement ... since he was so key in the success of the Pack last year.
3-Duke: With Kyle Singler and Taylor King coming in, expect Duke to go back to its gun-slinging ways. Last year's team wasn't normal Duke: they struggled to find their offense and were very inconsistent shooting. The big issue this year is ... well, what happens if they keep missing those threes? Josh McRoberts is gone and there really isn't anyone reliable in the paint to score or rebound.
4-Clemson: Can the Tigers get back that team that was scorching the early part of the season? Well, they have four returning starters and has one of the better frontcourts in the conference. They just need to get their minds right. This team has the talent ... they just need to tighten the bolts and clean the sawdust.
5-Virginia: Dave Leitao better thank God that Sean Singletary came back. The ACC player of the year candidate will be asked to do even more with JR Reynolds and Jason Cain gone.
6-Maryland: Gotta love those Terps! The head-scratchers are gone, with their understudies ready to take their place. The team will rely on James Gist and Greivis Vasquez to become leaders on and off the floor. However, this streaky team must find someone who can hit a shot.
This seems to be the week in which every expert is giving his very, very early predictions for the 2007-08 college basketball season, and Luke Winn is checking in with his prediction that the team cutting down the nets in April of 2008 will be ... North Carolina.
Winn says the Tar Heels can overcome the loss of Brandan Wright, noting that they were just fine without him against Arizona. He adds:
UNC will still have a nine-deep rotation, and guards Ty Lawson and Wayne Ellington should emerge as more complete players (read: guys who also play D) as sophomores.
UCLA, Memphis, Louisville and Kansas round out Winn's Top 5. That Kansas pick is even assuming that Brandan Rush and Julian Wright both stay in the NBA draft, so he's very high on the talent Bill Self has accumulated. Tennessee, Washington State, USC, Indiana and Michigan State are in the 6-10 spots.
Now that Brandan Wright has announced he's heading to the NBA, fans of the Tar Heels can move on with their lives. While it would've been great to see Wright stick around for another year, North Carolina was prepared for this happening. So what does this mean to the Tar Heels that will be around next year?
TYLER HANSBROUGH: This will be a very interesting year for Psycho T. Without Wright, Hansbrough won't get the same amount of rest he did last year. And when he's on the court, he won't have that other great post man to take some of the pressure off him. Well, maybe not.
DEON THOMPSON: Thompson will most likely step into the starting role next to Hansbrough. Thompson showed flashes of a player who could have a nice career in Chapel Hill. Now he'll get starter's minutes and a platform to vault himself into the national spotlight.
ALEX STEPHENSON: Thompson was an offensive force off the bench last year. Stephenson was the defensive guy. Stephenson was known in high school as a premiere rebounder which should get him some good minutes this year. He will most likely be on the bench, but will rotate with Hansbrough and Stephenson in a frontcourt rotation. While he will be asked to be a defensive stopper and rebounder, his offense must improve. He's pretty handy around the basket but didn't show that he make his own play to get a shot off.
TYWON LAWSON: With no Wright or the graduating Reyshawn Terry, Lawson will be asked to score a bit more.
WILLIAM GRAVES: People forget that Graves was part of that outstanding freshman recruiting class. However, Graves elected to redshirt last year despite being a guy that could've been in the rotation. UNC brings no one in this year, so Graves will be able to fill in down low.
SENIOR CLASS OF 2008: With Wright officially gone, the Tar Heels know that they have a front line opening in the 2008-2009 season [especially if Hansbrough leaves next year]. Just as Wright came in for a one and done, so could kids like Greg Monroe, Ed Davis, Al-Farouq Aminu, Samardo Samuels or Drew Gordon who'd love to come in and play right away in Chapel Hill.
ROY WILLIAMS: A lot of these big time recruits just watched Williams look out for Wright today. The fact that Williams told Wright to go pro even though it appeared Wright may have stayed if Williams recommended that to him spoke volumes about the coach. Now a lot of these one-and-done kids may consider the Heels moreso than some other teams when they can really see that the coach has their family's best interests at heart.
When the NBA passed their rule of essentially not allowing high schoolers to enter the NBA draft, all they did was push back the inevitable. While I love the decision to make these kids take their game to an intermediate level of basketball [hey, even LeBron James and Kobe Bryant would've benefitted from at least a year of college basketball], it doesn't completely solve the issue. Just delays it.
The rule works a bit. Some of the guys who would've lept from high school into the NBA draft learned where their games really were at in college. Some are sticking it out for at least another year. Others, like Greg Oden and Kevin Durant, took a lot from their college experience ... even though it lasted just one year. Durant struggled with his decision [he's going]; Oden's still struggling [he's undecided].
So is UNC freshman Brandan Wright. In many draft sites, Wright would be the first guy taken after Oden and Durant. If there was no rule, Wright would have entered last year's draft along with Oden and Durant and been a high pick. He has a ton of talent, a ton of size and a ton of promise. But he's not ready for the NBA yet.
In the ongoing battle between North Carolina and Duke, and interesting development has transpired. Stewart Mandel of Sports Illustrated put out his list of top 10 coaches in college basketball. On this list, UNC's Roy Williams is #2 [Florida's Billy Donovan is #1] and Duke's Mike Krzyzewski is #4.
Very interesting. Of course, Mandel has some explaining for why his rankings may throw some people off:
The following list is an attempt to rank the sport's top 10 coaches right now. It is not a career-achievement list, so while a coach's track record obviously plays a huge part in his reputation, more weight was placed on his most recent performances (sorry, Lute Olson). Similarly, only those who have been head coaches for at least three seasons were considered (sorry, Anthony Grant).
As for the criteria, winning championships and getting to Final Fours is the benchmark by which all college coaches are judged. But I also placed added value on coaches who get more out of less, have recently rebuilt programs or whose imprint is clearly visible in the way their teams play.
Even as a Tar Heel fan, I will admit that Coach K has had one of the greatest coaching careers in the history of sports and his accomplishments outweigh Roy Williams' quite a bit. Even by using Mr. Mandel's criteria, it's hard to place Ol Roy above Coach K. Krzyzewski has more win, Final Fours and titles than Williams has ... even though Williams has a higher winning percentage and has helmed over two of the most prestigious programs in college sports. Mandel gives his reasons for why Coach K dropped a bit:
Coach K was the no-brainer No. 1 for nearly 20 years, but his most recent teams have been plagued by a lack of depth, several high-profile washouts and a tendency to underachieve in the NCAAs (J.J. Redick and Shelden Williams made it out of the Sweet 16 just once despite having a No. 1 seed three times).
In case you didn't get the memo, Stephen Curry is good. Curry, the son of former NBA player Dell Curry, was the Southern Conference preseason player of the year, and he showed tonight that a whole lot of bigger schools than Davidson erred when they let him slip away. 
This will be a transition year for most of the ACC. Pretty much everyone took a hit this offseason, with only four teams really looking like locks for the NCAA tournament. There is little doubt that North Carolina will be the favorite ... but remember that this was the case last year ... and UNC was nearly the #5 seed in the ACC tournament. NC State, Duke and Clemson have the best shot at giving the Heels trouble for the title
This seems to be the week in which every expert is giving his very, very early predictions for the 2007-08 college basketball season, and 
Now that Brandan Wright has announced 
When the NBA passed their rule of essentially not allowing high schoolers to enter the NBA draft, all they did was push back the inevitable. While I love the decision to make these kids take their game to an intermediate level of basketball [hey, even LeBron James and Kobe Bryant would've benefitted from at least a year of college basketball], it doesn't completely solve the issue. Just delays it. 
In the ongoing battle between North Carolina and Duke, and interesting development has transpired. Stewart Mandel of 
