The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Sunday Gravy: Sorting through March Madness
Nothing is more irritating than walking into a coffee shop to see every seat occupied, mostly by people spread out with their computers and working their phone on business calls. Apparently, purchase of a café latte also comes with a full-day lease for office space.
⏩ One-hundred and forty points? Ninety-four in the first half ? Insane.
⏩ So St. Francis (Pa.) coach Joe Haigh’s goal against UConn was to set the NCAA tournament record for most 3-pointers attempted? His team jacked up 57 from beyond the arc. They made 10. Probably because most were blind heaves from 30 feet. Hey, coach: it’s about quality, not quantity. Unless, I suppose, you’re playing the Huskies.
⏩ Once again, Miami was outcoached, outhustled and outplayed by Quinnipiac. Trish Fabbri has built quite a program up on York Hill. It’s too bad their reward is a date with UConn.
⏩ It’s not St. Patrick’s Day until I’ve watched John Wayne and Victor McGlaglen beat the tar out of each other in The Quiet Man.
⏩ One television analyst surmised the reason for the upswing of recent upsets in the NCAA tournament is because there’s so much talent in Division I basketball.
A more accurate assessment would be that the era of one-and-done freshmen is sapping the overall strength of college basketball.
Big programs are landing the blue-chip recruits with bright futures. It’s also undeveloped and undisciplined talent. Excessive roster turnover is also a disadvantage. Senior leadership and experience goes a long way in the NCAAs. The best mid-majors usually have them in spades. Power five flameouts like Oklahoma, Arizona and Virginia relied heavily on underclassmen.
There’s still talent. It’s just watered down. That’s what’s leveling the playing field.
⏩ It’s tougher than ever for teams outside college basketball’s seven major conferences to get into the tournament. There were nine teams from the ACC in a field of 68 with only three at-large bids from small conferences. Rooting for the little guys — as opposed to Syracuse, which lost 10 of 18 ACC games to finish in 10th place — is what make the tournament special.
⏩ UMBC’s victory over Virginia is the biggest upset in NCAA tournament history, but let’s pump the breaks on comparing it to the 1980 Miracle on Ice. Virginia was in the midst of a nice season but it hasn’t accomplished anything — its last Final Four appearance was in 1984 and their trip to the Elite Eight in 2016 was the farthest they’ve advanced in the past 23 seasons.
⏩ What’s more troubling? The endless discussion about baseball games talking too long or the ridiculous ideas to remedy this “problem?” Because the ideas keep getting worse.
Minor league games this season tied after nine innings will begin every extra inning with a runner on second base. They’ve also implemented a strict pitch clock that will award a ball if not followed.
There’s no question Major League Baseball is hoping to push these new rules through soon, and it’s an abomination to the game. This has less to do with appeasing fans and more to do with appealing to television networks and new sponsors.
⏩ Want to know what truly takes an eternity? The final minutes of a closely-contested basketball game.
Take Friday’s game between Marshall and Wichita State. The final minute of regulation in what should have been a thrilling upset by Marshall took 18 minutes and 26 seconds. It wasn’t merely the strategy of repeated fouls by the team that’s trailing. Most viewers can probably live with that, I think.
There were three separate video reviews to ensure the right team was awarded the ball — one took forever — and another to correct illegal substitutions. Play was delayed even longer as referees talked to each other, then the coaches, before putting the ball in play. It was brutal.
Instant replay micromanagement is a drag on sports and making everything borderline unwatchable.
⏩ If MLB was running the NCAA tournament, they’d solve the problem by forcing every possession in the final minute of closelycontested games to begin with a 3-on-2 fast break.
⏩ It’s a flashback to the old days for the University of New Haven baseball team, which returns from Florida a perfect 12-0 and ranked 14th in Division II. It’s going to be a big year for coach Chris Celano and a loaded squad that made the NCAA tournament last year.
And we know that somewhere Frank “Porky” Vieira is reading this and smiling.
⏩ Speaking of UNH guys with perfect records, Cassius Chaney scored a second-round knockout at Madison Square Garden last weekend to run his record as a professional boxer to 12-0. Chaney, one of the all-time leading scorers for the UNH basketball team, is now the 90thranked heavyweight in the world.
⏩ Danny Hurley seems to be atop the UConn men’s basketball wish list. But he’s not the best coach in Rhode Island. If the Huskies really want to make a splash they should throw all their chips on the table and go hard after Providence’s Ed Cooley. UConn would be back to the NCAA tournament in no time.
Wishful thinking? Yes. Cooley is a Providence native working magic at his dream job, and making over $2 million in the process. UConn would have to raise the stakes significantly. Even then, it might not be appealing. Who would have thought we’d reach a day when UConn represented a step down from Providence?
⏩ Hurley would still be a major haul, if UConn can reel him in. Pittsburgh and Oklahoma are among his other suitors.
⏩ Shot selection in college basketball is mind-boggling. What’s with all the 40-footers? Last we checked you don’t get more points for shooting from the NCAA logo.
⏩ Enjoy the last two days of the best long weekend of the year. Here’s to a few more March Madness upsets.