College Basketball Fever

Even though there's a ton of talent in college basketball this year, it's taken a minute for me to really get into it. That probably has to do with being completely subdued for the last few weekends, including when the Memphis Tigers dismantled the Georgetown Hoyas (at least that's what I heard). Oh yeah, and the fact that Maryland absolutely sucks this year. How do you lose to Ohio and American after winning 44 of the last 45 games against non-conference opponents? Hopefully they'll turn it around in conference play, but in order to impress the committee they may have to be nearly flawless at this point.

But, I digress. After watching some ball yesterday, I think I'm getting that college basketball jones back. Texas losing to Wisconsin without their leading scorer; Dayton drilling Pittsburgh like they were a Division II freshman team instead of one of the last remaining unbeaten teams; an exciting Oklahoma/West Virginia game where I got my first look at Blake Griffin (while he doesn't put up the insane stats of the other more ballyhooed freshman, he does pretty much everything well and I think he'll be better at the next level than in college).

Memphis/Arizona was the game I was actually looking forward to, but unfortunately it coincided with the Patriots run at perfection (congrats, now if you can concoct a three game winning streak it'll really mean something). I did some flipping but ultimately the buzz died down once I learned that Jerryd Bayless, another fabulous freshman who I think would have given Derrick Rose fits, wouldn't be playing.

I mention that game specifically because the bulk of most team's non-conference play is over, and now the meat and potatoes of the schedule--conference play--will be underway soon. Fair or not, you always try to draw some conclusions from non-conference play, trying to analyze which teams have separated themselves from the competition. To me, Memphis has separated themselves from pretty much everybody.

I know that North Carolina is number one, but Memphis has played a brutal out of conference schedule and come away unschathed. Sure, they were favored to win all of those games, but being favored to win and winning are two different things (like Maryland was favored to kill American). They now get to play the 16 of 18 games against over-matched Conference USA foes (they still have Gonzaga and Tennessee). To say they'll go undefeated in the regular season is a bit presumptuous, but after watching the Patriots do it while I hated on them every week, honestly name a game that they'll lose. I know that's the beauty of college basketball, but I'll take the opposite approach: I'll believe it when I see it.

The Tigers are just too balanced and too good for anybody in the nation to beat them on paper. Obviously there's Rose, who according to Chad Ford is a hybrid between Deron Williams and Chris Paul but more athletically gifted than both. But, you also have Chris Douglas-Roberts, the most overrated-underrated player in the nation (meaning that he's not underrated but everybody says he is); Joey Dorsey, who looks and plays like a damn football player (just ask Roy Hibbert); and Robert Dozier, another athletic forward who gives teams problems. The one question you would ask about this team is their ability to consistently connect from outside, but, on paper, they have to be the favorites to win it all at this point.

Dallas won yesterday against the Hawks. That is all. No praise until they start playing consistently.

Happy New Year to everybody. You'll be happy to know that one of my resolutions is to write more in the new year. Like, maybe at least once a year.

Oh yeah. I wanted to advertose my MySpace page to people because I currently have no friends. Maybe I really don't... but at least check me out.