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Friday, March 25, 2011

OSU the Third No. 1 Seed to Go Down

I loved Kentucky's aggression and momentum down the stretch. The Buckeyes certainly didn't do themselves any favors with the famous clogged toilet offense (as coined by Bill Simmons) down the stretch.

This is the clogged toilet offense: give your star player the ball somewhere at the border of his effective range, have everyone stand around, and expect him to do something. This works sometimes in the NBA, but is terrible in college. This is the reason: everyone runs the clogged toilet offense when your best player is better than the defensive player marking him. This happens a lot in the regular season, but in the tourney, where overall defense is better, it doesn't work as well. Especially a team like OSU which has played terribly down the stretch and had no momentum. UK's defense could sag on him, not believing anyone else could help them.

Compare this to what Arizona did to beat Duke, running a PLAY for their best player to go TOWARDS the rim. It was risky, but it was aggressive, and the basketball gods like aggressiveness. Don't just sit around and wait for your guy to do something. I liked how they fought and tied it with a three when everything was pointing towards UK, but it turned out to not be enough.

On a side note, I strongly believe that UK and UConn, two teams lead by cheating coaches, will have their inflated hubris struck down. If they both make the final four, I will burn that side of my bracket. Obviously the basketball gods have different levels of bad behavior they punish for: Pitino's error was more egregious and his team lost faster. But something inside tells me these two teams are going out.

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