With Kobe on this streak of 50-point games — and hate all you want, but dropping 50 in four straight times, plus two 60s, is something we might not see again for years — the standards for what it takes to stand out are all out of whack. Take Vince Carter, for example. Last night he dropped 40 points on the Bobcats, including a buzzer-beating dunk to force OT. Normally, that’s enough to at least get a couple e-mails going amongst the Dime crew. Last night? Nothing … Jersey was down two in the final seconds of the fourth when Jason Kidd airballed a jumper. VC was there under the rim, though, caught it and threw down in one motion. In overtime, Vince had a three-point play and a big trey to help the Nets pull away … Josh Boone, who someone in the Dime office may or may not have called “a burger with cheese” a while back, had a career-high 21 points on 10-for-10 shooting … And someone in the office also may or may not have called Greg Oden “a stiff” a while back. To that guy’s credit, he’s since changed his mind. Oden was in foul trouble (again) yesterday in Ohio State’s Elite Eight matchup with Memphis , but came up big when he had to (again) to get his team into the Final Four. Big man had 17 points, 9 boards and one block, and dominated during a second-half stretch where OSU pulled away. Oden’s a defensive guy, but he has shown he can score and has potential to be a force on offense in the League, too … And how come more people aren’t talking about OSU’s Ron Lewis? He had another big game, scoring a team-high 22 points for his third straight 20-plus point game in the tourney. We could see him getting some NBA run, filling it up as a spot shooter for somebody … UCLA is back in the Final Four, thanks to Arron Afflalo. He scored 15 of his 24 points in the second half, carrying the Bruins past a more-talented Kansas team. When Afflalo put his name into the draft pool last year, we didn’t think he was ready. It wasn’t even a matter of needing to get bigger/faster/stronger and there was no question his defense was on-point, but we needed to see more offense. Afflalo would have gotten drafted last year anyway, but probably as a second rounder. Coming back for his junior season was the smartest thing he could have done. All year the guy has shown he’s a pro with the rock. He makes pro moves, stuff like drawing fouls and knowing how to get his shot in clutch situations. And he’s shown he can put his team on his back and take over. He’s been so good as a scorer this year that his defense isn’t even being mentioned as often. And when he wasn’t scoring yesterday, he was drawing the defense and hitting open teammates for shots. This summer he’s probably a Lottery pick if he leaves school, a late-first rounder at worst … Run-of-the-mill Jazz win against Memphis on Saturday: Carlos Boozer (28 pts, 15 rebs) and Deron Williams (21 pts, 13 asts) went off, a third man stepped up offensively (Matt Harpring this time with 24 points) and the glue guys like Andrei Kirilenko and Paul Millsap held everything together. And Memphis not having Mike Miller (knee) in the second half made things a little easier on Utah … Eddie Jones on Miami’s loss to Philly: “Just playing bad basketball. We played some great minutes. In the first half we probably played 19, 20 of great basketball. But we came out in the second half, man, and just played some bad basketball. We’re letting teams do whatever they want to do.” … See how they do Michael Doleac? On Friday he was probably the best Miami player on the court (albeit in an embarrassingly bad loss to Indiana), and last night he only gets five minutes of burn … Gilbert Arenas gave the Clippers 30 points in a loss. On Friday one of the Dime crew was in D.C. and went to a Cedric the Entertainer show. Cedric had a joke about Gilbert’s new commercial and how you get sucked into feeling sorry for him. He also had a few Shaq and Kobe jokes that we can’t really get into, and talked about his 6-year-old son getting crossed up by a mini-Iverson … If you missed it the other day, the Knicks signed Kentucky’s Randolph Morris to a free-agent deal. Since he was in the ‘05 Draft but was allowed to go back to school, Morris was eligible to be signed as soon as UK’s season was over. Actually, we read he could have been signed at any point. If Morris gets some tick this year, will he be the first guy to play college and pro ball within the same season? That’d be crazy … We’re out like love for Doleac …