Wes Flanigan - a solid hire

I think the promotion of Wes Flanigan to Head Coach at Little Rock was a solid hire. If not a home run, it was at least a solid extra-base hit. There are several factors that make it so.

First, Wes is ready to become a head coach. He played at a high-D1 level and has been an assistant at two high-D1 programs and also at UAB, which is similar to our situation. Not to mention the fact that he also was an assistant here in Little Rock. He has seen a wide spectrum of college basketball and learned what to do (and not to do) from a number of head coaches at different levels. He has been involved in successful and not-so-successful years. He has recruited from the deep South, the Southwest, and the Great Plains. No, he has not had head coaching experience, but then at one point neither had Adolph Rupp, John Wooden or any of the great head coaches. You have to start somewhere.

 Second, Little Rock is poised to rachet our program up a notch. We have been mired in the so-so region of basketball for a good many years, and then we had the break-out this last season. It is IMPERATIVE that we maintain that momentum. Right now continuity is of paramount importance. We do not need anything rocking the boat right now. Chasse Conque has had a year to watch Wes in action as an assistant. If Wes were unqualified (in any way) to be the head coach, then the AD was under no obligation to promote him and no one would have thought much about it if he had not. The fact that he did means that he was well satisfied that Wes is ready for the responsibility, and he is the person in the best position to know. We saw last year that Chasse is his own man, and if he hired Wes, it was because he was personally convinced that it was the best thing for the program.

Third, the players seem to be in favor of Wes being the new coach. Now, it would be suicidal to let players choose their boss, but if they do already like the incoming coach, that is a big plus.

Could we have hired someone with more impressive credentials than Wes Flanigan? Possibly. But I do not think we could have gotten someone with a great deal better resume. Plus, whoever we hired would not have been able to provide a seamless transition, which we  badly need right now. No doubt recruiting has already begun to replace the very large class that will be leaving after next season, and if we are to avoid a big drop-off, that recruiting MUST be a success.

Is this the best candidate we could have gotten in absolute terms? Probably not, although I doubt we would have gotten anyone a great deal better. To his credit, Chasse resisted the ego trip of getting to say he was conducting a national search following a 30 win season, made the decision, and moved ahead. However, taking under consideration the factors in play, Flanigan was a good choice, and probably the best choice. And we now can hit the ground running.

Would you have guessed this one?

His total points plus rebounds (4663) is the highest in NCAA history. Who was he? La Salle's Tom Gola. How soon we forget!

How good was Pete Maravich's defense?

No one cares, of course, but was it even adequate?

Josh Hagins

Josh will go down in history as one of the all-time Trojan greats. He is all over the record books, plus his leadership qualities were excellent. There is not much I could say about him that has not already been said. However, one of the things that I will remember most about Josh is the fact that he wanted to come to Little Rock, and when he came, he stayed. Even when we changed coaches. Even when his playing time was not what he might have liked. Even when we had bad years. How common is that? This was his team, particularly this last year. Even his considerable statistics can be replaced (although it might have to be by committee), but a large question remains as to whether we can quickly get someone to step into his leadership role.

Derek Fisher is Mr. Trojan, but if he had not had such a successful pro career, we probably would be regarding Josh Hagins in the same light as Fish.

Jermaine Ruttley

Perhaps no player on this team symbolized what it took to make this team work more than Jermaine Ruttley. He went from his team's leading scorer to a "barely scorer." He did not even end up as one of the top five in minutes played. On top of that, his minutes actually decreased in the latter games as Mareik Isom found his shooting stroke and Daniel Green got healthy. So what did Jermaine do? He did his job. One of his spots was as a part-time point guard, and he did an excellent job in that role. His assist/turnover ratio ended at 2.67, which most starting point guards would be proud to have. Hats off to Jermaine, a true Trojan!

I would make the switch

Losing a coach can indicate that there are good things going on in your program, and it certainly gives fans something to talk about in the off-season. But quite frankly, right now I would welcome a little more stability and not quite as much drama.

Five years from now? What then?

Coach Beard did a good job for us this year, and I absolutely do not fault him for seeking to advance his career by moving on to a more lucrative job. But Chris Beard is not my concern. The program is my concern. We had a great year, the best in program history, but five years from now will we have benefitted substantially from Coach Beard's having been here other than some pleasant memories of one very successful season? I hope so, but one year or two years does not equal a better program.

Did the coach help the program? That is not a question you can answer definitively until several years after the coach is gone. If there was no foundation laid for future success, then the answer would be "no."

The quiet time

This is the time of year when it is difficult to keep focused on Trojan basketball. The long season is over, with the emotional highs and lows (many more highs than lows this year). The recruiting season does not start for a few more days. My interest in the NCAA tournament wanes as each team I like is eliminated. But, things cycle around, and it will pick up soon. In the meantime, Go Trojans!

The best coach - minus recruiting?

In the college environment, this would be almost impossible to determine. However, I would love to see a panel of  bona fide experts discuss who have been the greatest basketball coaches of all time, strictly in terms of what they did with what they had.

The Big O: a double/double machine

Cincinnati's Oscar Robertson has the 11th- and 15th- highest single-season double/double totals in NCAA history, even though steals, blocks and assists were not counted when he was playing. According to Hoopedia, he once had 33 consecutive point/rebound double/doubles - and he stood only 6-5.

Roger Woods

If Roger Woods had just been in Little Rock a little longer, he would have been all over the Trojan record book. Over his two years, he averaged 10.9 points/game and 5.3 rpg and shot 50.1% from the field. Plus, for much of that time, he was the primary (only?) inside scoring threat we had. He brought a toughness we badly needed. He was listed at 6-5, but most folks figured he was shorter than that, yet he mixed it up with considerably taller players on a regular basis, and often more than held his own because of his aggressiveness and strength. Some had predicted that he would not flourish under Coach Beard's system because his style of play was not suited to it,  but he averaged double figures and had our best shooting percentage from the floor, so he got the job done.

The horrible possibility

To demonstrate how illogically college basketball's championship process is constructed, consider this. Some conferences allow all eligible teams to participate in their post-season tournament, and pick the winner as their NCAA representative. Thus, a team could be 0-29 in the regular season, win four games in the tournament, then win seven games (counting an assumed First Four contest) in the NCAA tournament, and be the National Champions with an 11-29 record. Likely? Not at all, but it is at least theoretically possible; and any system that contains even the possibility of an 11-29 team being the National Champion is badly broken and needs to be fixed.

The first Three-peat

Long, long before UCLA's dynasty came along, or Kentucky or Duke, for that matter, there was the University of Chicago Maroons. Over the 1907, 1908 and 1909 seasons, they were 56-4, and won three straight national championships. Those were their only three titles, and their basketball team no longer competes at the Division 1 level, but for a while, back in the Good Ol' Days, they were the champs - the first "three-peat" in college basketball history.

Sharpshooter to the north

Our friends at Missouri State have one entry (at least) in the NCAA Division Record Book. Blake Ahearn made 94.6% of this free throws over his career from 2004 to 2007.

Final Records Watch for 2015-16

Here is  the final Records Watch for the 2015-16 season. Lots of action this year, mainly thanks to Josh Hagins, but also some other chipping into the record book. The “record book” in this case is the Media Guide put out by the Athletic Department.

CAREER GAMES PLAYED

Josh Hagins – 128 – 1^st

CAREER FG MADE

Josh Hagins – 525 – 5^th

CAREER 3PT MADE

Josh Hagins – 175 – 5^th

CAREER FT%

Josh Hagins – 81.7% - 7^th

CAREER ASSISTS

Josh Hagins – 468 – 3^rd

CAREER STEALS

Josh Hagins – 179 – 3^rd

CAREER POINTS

Josh Hagins – 1475 – 3^rd

SEASON 3PT%

Marcus Johnson – 46.6% - 3^rd
(by a small fraction – Nick Zachery also rounded to 46.6%)

 SEASON FT%

Josh Hagins – 83.7% - 6^th

SEASON ASSISTS

Josh Hagins – 165 – 5^th

SEASON ASSISTS/GAME

Josh Hagins – 4.71 – 11^th

SEASON BLOCKS

Lis Shoshi – 39 – Tied for 10^th

SEASON 3PT MADE

Marcus Johnson – 75 – 8^th

Also, we obviously could add onto the list Coaching Victories in a Season – 30 – for Coach Beard.

 

Recruiting and coaching

Which is more necessary to the long-term consistency of a program? A good coach can help a team perform at its best - overachieve. Above average recruiting can help cover up below average coaching. There is a point (evidently) when coaches no longer really have to recruit, but can just pick who they want; but very few programs arrive at that level. I am going to say that coaching is the constant - but recruiting sure helps.

A streak is born

True freshman Deondre Burns' first year in Little Rock was not a notable one. He played only 94 minutes, and his statistics were nothing to write home about - except for one of them. He shot twelve free throws and made all of them. I have no idea what the school record is for consecutive FTs made at the start of a career, but he is at least in the running for that mark.

Recruiting for next season

Because of the extra large senior class we will have next season and the two transfers waiting to become active, recruiting for next season will not be crucial. However, the year after will be a critical one. Very critical. We need to get started now.

The game that had to come

It was not likely that we were going to win the national championship, so "that game" had to come sooner or later. The way basketball is structured, most of the teams are going to end the season on a down note. (One of the wonderful benefits of the tournament system.) We ran into a good team. Not the best team in the Big 12, but not one of the worst, either. And the Big 12 is the best conference in the nation, according to the rating services. And Georges Niang is probably an All-American. Even a good Sun Belt team generally will have problems with that situation.

Speaking for myself, I will not remember that loss very long or very much. It doesn't matter too much at this point. There were four other losses this year; this just happened to be the last one. It is the thirty wins I want to remember.

No one should be surprised at Wichita State

No one should have been surprised that Wichita State has won two games in the Tournament, nor even if they win several more. Fred VanVleet is their point guard - one of the best (if not the best) in the country. He and Ron Baker just might be the best guard combo in the nation. VanVleet personifies toughness. When he was injured and missed four games earlier in the season, it completely threw the team off their game, as might have been expected. They came into the tournament 24-8 out of the tough Missouri Valley Conference, so it is not like they had not had a pretty good season, anyway. And Gregg Marshall is widely recognized as one of the best coaches in the game. Plus this team had an undefeated regular season and a Final Four appearance to their credit within the careers of Baker and VanVleet. So why should anyone have been surprised that at this point in their careers, the Shockers are NOT a team that anyone wants to play?

My guess is that Chris Beard stays

                 Chris Beard may get an offer he just cannot afford to pass up, and we may lose him after one remarkable season, but here are the reasons I think he will be back at least one more time.

                Yes, Chris has done an amazing job with a patchwork roster, and all those who know the game tip their hats to his effort. However, we all know that with a few things not breaking right, that 30-4 NCAA run could easily be 25-7, and it would be a good season, but not a great one. Plus, grabbing a few still-available players does not prove that Chris can recruit at the high-D1 level on a consistent basis. I happen to think he can, but an AD is probably going to want to see some proof of that before he commits a five-year contract to the situation. Plus, to be candid, Chris’ greatest asset could be his worst enemy. Common sense tells any thinking person that volcanic enthusiasm can very easily become volcanic anger unless it is tempered with some self-control, and the one thing ADs want to avoid is to end up on the front page instead of the sports page. I think most ADs will want to see just a little more track record before they jump on that train.

                Second, Chris knows what he has coming back. He has a potential POY candidate in Marcus Johnson. Plus a big man in Lis Shoshi who has an almost unlimited ceiling. Plus a 6-9 three-point shooter who could be crazy good next year. Plus Jalen Jackson, who could be a big-time scorer. Plus Evan Moorman and Thomas Brandsma added into the mix, and he knows what they can do. Plus money conference talent coming in the persons of Oliver Black and Dayshawn Watkins. In short, next year’s team just might be more talented this this year’s. If Chris puts back-to-back seasons with at least high-20’s win totals, then he will begin to get some attention at the very highest levels, even if we do not go to the Dance next year. This year has let people know who he is; next year will let people know what he can do.

                Yes, Chris Beard might leave, but I am guessing he will be here at least one more year, even if his long-term plans are to move up.

Southern Cal loses!!!

Yes! I can't stand their coach.

The Shot

Each generation of fans of a given basketball program will remember The Shot (sometimes more than one of them). That one play that stands out in our minds as a defining moment in a segment of a team's history. Certainly Josh Hagins' step-back three-pointer in the Purdue game will qualify. Other plays in that game were just as important, but that one we will remember as long as we are fans. In all honesty, he probably misses that shot more times than he makes it, but he made it this time, in a special game, in a special season - and thus it will have a special place in our memories. "I was watching when Josh Hagins made The Shot."

Build our brand

Providence coach Ed Cooley said they need a win in the tournament to "build our brand." Well, we finally have a brand - "Little Rock" - thanks to some far-sighted management by our bright young AD. Now we, also, need to build it. I think we have done a wonderful job of that this season in several respects. A tournament win would cap it off, but the progress is already there.

Playing for the candle

The Trojans baked a beautiful cake this year, 27-4 and a regular season Sun Belt championship - the first in my tenure as a fan. Then they put the icing on the cake by winning the Belt tournament to go to the NCAA. That is only the second time I have been able to do that.

So what remains? Well, every cake needs candles, doesn't it? A win in the Dance would be like putting a candle on a birthday cake. 'Tain't likely, but stranger things have happened.

Needed: the perfect game

We have commented before that because of certain deficiencies this team has a relatively small margin for error, but that they have done a magnificent job of overcoming those deficiencies in order to win games. Perhaps more than ever before, we will have to play a near-perfect game in order to defeat Purdue. It can be done. We are not a 20-point underdog - more like 10 points. The experts are not predicting a blow-out.

Turnovers will have to be low. We will have to shoot a high percentage. We cannot let the rebounding margin be too large against us. We have to limit their shots and contest the ones they do take. Just fundamental Trojan basketball. But we cannot have an "off" night. Not this time around. No wiggle room here.

A dangerous trend

You will notice that the vast majority of the teams participating in the Pay-to-Play tournaments, and even in the NIT, are non-money conference teams. I view this as a dangerous trend. I understand why those teams might not want to play for a less-than-glittering prize. However, we recently came far too close for comfort to having the Money Five conferences form a Super Division that shuts out the little guys. If the only teams that participate in the "other" tournament are the little guys, then that will just be one more argument for the big guys to "let them have their own tournament, since they in essence are already doing it."

Denzel Valentine - Michaelspappy's Player of the Year

You can have Buddy Hield. Look at Valentine's stats:

19.4 ppg
7.6 rpg
7..6 apg
1.0 steals/game
46.4% overall
44.7% from the arc
85.3% from the line
2.90 A/TO ratio

Good riddance to Monmouth

I am thrilled that Monmouth did not make the NCAA tournament. Their sideline antics turn the game of basketball into a farce. Good riddance!

NBC analysis of the Sooners

No. 2 Oklahoma (West): A truly elite 3-point shooting team, the Sooners are converting 42.6 percent of their shots from distance. Three-point shooting, however, is a notoriously fickle thing. The old adage of “Live by the three, die by the three,” is probably over-simplifying an over-reliance on 3-point shooting, especially in a post-Golden State world, but the issue for the Sooners is diversification. Nearly 40 percent of their points come from beyond the arc, which ranks as the 12th-most in the country. The problem is that the Sooners aren’t very good on 2-point shots, converting a paltry 48.1 percent of those attempts, ranking outside the top-200. Those revolutionary Warriors in the NBA? They ranked second during their championship season in 2-point percentage (51.1) and are even better this year (52.8). The Sooners are great 3-point shooters, but if that fails, there isn’t much of a backup plan.

(In other words, once Barney Fife has fired his bullet, he is just up the creek without a paddle.)

LINK

The 2016 National Champion - Kansas

OK. Since no one else will do it, I am going to do it! I am declaring a Regular Season Men's Basketball Champion. My criterion? The final regular season AP poll. Kansas was #1.

Enjoy it!

Moments like this don't come too often in the history of a small program, so let's bask in our own glory for a few hours. Purdue worries me. We got a bad draw, but if we were to win, it would have been a huge upset no matter who we had played.

Whoopeeeee!!!!

A storybook season comes to the apex. Fans all over America now know who Little Rock is, and that we are pretty good. Still one more part of the story to be written.

I hope the Ivy League champ gets stomped next year

Since the Ivy League is deserting its policy of sending the regular season champ to the NCAA tournament and instead joining the insanity of the rest of college basketball, I hope their tournament champion (if it isn't the regular season champ) gets stomped by 40 in the first round of the Dance. It would serve them right.

The longest day of the season

This team is where it ought to be: playing for the right to play in the NCAA. We won the regular season with room to spare, and if the system were logical, that should have put us in the Dance, but because of college basketball's cockeyed logic, it doesn't. So we have to win tomorrow. One more game. One more great effort at the end of what will be a memorable season regardless of the outcome. But this team deserves to Dance. We shall know in a few hours.

The fear of losing

Fayetteville is not afraid of playing us (or any of the other teams in the state). They are afraid of losing to us. Granted that  the odds of that are very long indeed, but that result is at least theoretically possible, and it is bare possibility of which they are AFRAID. So afraid that they will not take the chance of playing us, ever.

Dance with four games?

Not all conferences allow all their teams to play in the conference tournament, but some do. Therefore, while not at all likely, it is entirely possible for a team not to win a game all season, but then win four (or however many) games in the tournament and be the conference's representative in the NCAA tournament. Then you would have a 4-25 team playing for the national championship. Now, really, do you think a team that bad deserves that honor? Obviously not. But that is how the system currently operates. Therefore, I conclude that the system is broken and needs to be fixed.

A T-shirt for the big guys

"Real men live INSIDE the arc."

The players have responsibility also

Jim Boeheim's big beef right now is that the NCAA should not punish the players by imposing more sanctions. The players are part of the program, and they chose that program. If the program had sleeze about it, then they ought to have checked into it. Granted, they were just young men at the time and could not be expected to have the experience of a lawyer or investigator, but they did make the choice, and they have to live with the choice. It is not logical to say that they ought to be immune to penalties to the program when they chose to be in that program.

Lost the fear factor?

In sports, having a psychological advantage is huge. Call it "getting the bluff" on the opposition. If they go into the contest with doubt in their minds, the battle is half over. We had a three-game lead on the field going into the final App State game. We would have had a seven-game winning streak going into the tournament, with considerable discussion of us as an at-large team in the NCAA tournament. Then we lost to one of the weakest teams in the league. Now we are beatable. Now we can be had. Now we are just another very good mid-major team. Now whatever doubt there might have been (if any) in the other folks' minds is gone. Now our momentum is completely gone. Expensive loss, in more ways than just the standings.

Denver as a poster child for white-collar basketball

Denver just finished their season, and their stat sheet is predictable: once again a large percentage of their attempts (42.3%) are from the arc, once again they shoot lights out all across the board and share the ball well - and once again they get pounded on the boards and play very porous defense.

The lack of rebounding on a team that concentrates on three-point shooting is somewhat understandable, since their players are theoretically going to spend more time outside than other teams, and thus on the offensive end of the floor they logically will be at a disadvantage on the boards. However, the lack of defense does not necessarily follow logically. Sometime (when I have LOTS of time) I am going to do a study of "white-collar" teams (teams that like to bomb from long range but shy from the dirty work) and see if there is a correlation between that and the level of defense teams play. I am theorizing that there will be a pattern. However, it will not be a logical connection, but a psychological connection. Some teams just do not want to get their hands dirty doing trivial things like playing defense.

(Have I mentioned how much I dislike the three-point shot?)

How to keep a team sharp

One real problem that a coach has in a situation like ours is keeping a team fresh and focused. We appeared to be in need of a break in the App State game, so having a few days off was a good thing. However, with too many days off there is always the chance of losing your "fighting trim" and not being sharp when you come back against a team that has played the night before. Beard has been around the Horn and should know how to do that. We have the advantage of having a team that is deep enough in talent that the competition in practices should be at least reasonably close to what we will see on the floor.

So long to Bruiser

Bruiser Flint was fired today. I am sorry to see him go, but I suppose it was inevitable. The Drexel program was in free fall. There had been some really good times in years past, but that does not earn you much lately. I loved his nickname, and it pretty well summed up his teams. Tough, physical, fundamental. Usually their defense was reliable, but in the last few seasons it had deteriorated, and there was not sufficient offense there to make up the difference. Bruiser will get a job somewhere else, I am sure, and I will watch the rest of his career with interest.

This time of year is an insult to college basketball

Because this is the time when "sports fans" finally "get around to it."

"I will pay attention to college basketball when I get around to it, meaning whenever there is no longer any vestige of football left to occupy my attention. I will then condescend to act like I really care for a couple of weeks."

Watch out for Arkansas State next season

Sure, they had a 20-loss season this year, but we all know the reason why. But they presumably will return a lights-out shooter in Devin Carter and a double/double machine in Anthony Livingston. Not a bad foundation on which to build, to say the least. If they get a new coach in place quickly so that he has time to recruit sufficiently, and if he is a motivator, theirs could be one of the turn-around stories of 2016-2017.

And now the stain

And now we learn of Bo Ryan's marital fidelity. I guess he wasn't quite as Old School as he pretended to be. Disgusting!

Replacing "go to" scorers

At crunch time, the odds are very likely this year that the ball will be in the hands of Josh Hagins, Marcus Johnson or Roger Woods. Two of those will be gone after this season. That means that someone is going to have to step into that role - actually two somebodies, because you need to have three of them on the court at any given time, and one of them might be in foul trouble. There are several candidates even on the current roster, e.g., Mareik Isom and Jalen Jackson. Plus that does not count the new faces that will be on the active squad next season. We should be all right.

Waiting - BUT

This is the time of the year when teams in our position just have to wait and see where their post-season prospects will fall. The nice thing about our position is that we are there BUT we don't know where we will be. It is not IF we will be there.

Let the season champs dance

I am solidly in the corner of letting the regular season champs go to the NCAA tournament. All the tournament-winner system accomplishes is rewarding sub-par performances.

Kansas' Big 12 streak

Kansas' run of conference championships is all the more remarkable when you consider that in the previous eleven, the Big 12 was the top conference twice, was second four times, and was out of the top three only twice.

The Badgers are back!

On January 13^th of this year, things were bleak at the University of Wisconsin. On December 15, long-time head coach Bo Ryan had retired and Greg Gard had been named interim head coach (with no assurance of a promotion). At that time the team was 9-9 and had lost four of their last five games, the final straw being a loss at lowly Northwestern. Not only did it appear very unlikely that they would continue Ryan’s streak of never finishing worse than fourth in the Big Ten, but the chances of their reaching the NCAA tournament seemed hazy, at best.

Then something happened. The Badgers since then are 11-1, with their only loss coming at Michigan State – a brutal place to play this season. They seem to be almost certain to make the Big Dance and are tied for second place in the conference. What was a very “wrong” situation suddenly became very “right.” Their statistics still do not overwhelm you, but they are now keeping control of games where they would have lost control in the first half of the season. Leading scorer Nigel Hayes is not a great shooter – not even a very good one – but he is making 73.9% of a team-leading 222 free throw attempts. (By contrast, the Trojans’ leader in FTA is Roger Woods with 115.) Super-frosh Ethan Happ is averaging 11.8 points/game and 7.9 rebounds. (Yes, he redshirted last season – naturally.)

So, UW opponents, the brief respite is over. The Badgers are back, with a vengeance! And to make things every more depressing to their foes, not one player in their rotation is a senior.

We officially have an Eraser

Lis Shoshi has 38 blocks so far this year, with at least three games to go. That puts him among the all-time single-season leaders in the Media Guide. Having a rim protector can make a big difference to a defense.

And Jack still holds the record

Remember a few years back when Tiger Woods had won a few major titles and had been anointed by the media as the sure-fire bet to break Jack Nicklaus' record for majors victories? Well, Jack's record still stands. I kept saying, "Just wait until he gets married," and I was right. I also said, "IF he stays healthy," and he did not. Career records are VERY hard to break.

No one will want the Trojans

If we should make the NCAA tournament, the Trojans will be a team that none of the big-name teams hoping to make deep runs will want to play. Deliberate pace. Few turnovers. Several good three-point shooters. Good free throw shooters. All those factors combine to make us a dangerous opponent, even for a team with a lot more talent than we have. Usually we do not beat ourselves, which means the other team actually will have to play, and with focus.

ONE turnover

Among the most impressive things I have seen from a Trojan team was their performance last night against Arkansas State. Only ONE turnover. In the entire game. How often does that happen? That compares with Jones-Jennings' 30-rebound performance.

Let the records fall!

It seems that every other day brings some new milestone for the Trojan program this year. I am going to enjoy it while it lasts, because this is not something that is going to happen every year, or every decade, or even every generation.

Scheduling next season

If we hope to have more than the one slim chance of getting to the NCAA tournament (the Belt tourney), then we need to schedule some teams that would get some attention if we beat them. San Diego State and Tulsa barely qualify, since they are on the bubble themselves. Texas Tech probably would qualify, but we did not beat them. You have to beat someone "of note" in order to get someone to note that you did.

Storming the court

Just one man's opinion. Should the NCAA allow fans to storm the court? Not unless the NCAA wants to be responsible for the medical bills and legal liability stemming from someone being injured in the mele. Players belong on the court. Players do not belong in the stands, and if one goes into the stands, he needs to be punished severely. Fans belong in the stands, not on the court. If everyone stays where he belongs, things will go fine and no one will get hurt.

Coach of the Year

Our own Chris Beard is the hands-down, no-brainer  choice for that award. However, if he were out of the running, my vote would go to Keith Richard at Monroe or Scott Cross at Arlington.  Both have done excellent jobs this year.