Just a quick note: When I talked earlier about the aesthetic superiority of college basketball, I wasn’t thinking of last night’s Memphis-UCLA game. Ye gods, what an ugly display. That set basketball back so far they should’ve replaced the rims with peach baskets at halftime.
I think Memphis coach/ huckster John Calipari said it best:
“We just couldn’t make a basket,” Memphis Coach John Calipari said. “Please make a basket. Make a free throw. Anything. Kick one in.”
It was vaguely consistent with my view of the game, in that Memphis was playing like an NBA team (one or two passes, followed by a one-on-one move), and was completely stifled by a bunch of guys playing good team defense. But for all they played as a unit on the defensive end, UCLA played like a bunch of amnesiacs on offense– it was like they couldn’t remember that they were even supposed to try to score until about five seconds were left on the shot clock.
What a mess. The LSU-Texas game, on the other hand, was fairly entertaining. I think I’m rooting for the Tigers now, and not just because they made J.J. Redick cry. (Of course, I’ve probably doomed them with that statement, but, hey, it was fun while it lasted…)