Watch out now, but John Calipari is quickly trying to become the next Coach K. Sure the wins aren’t there yet, and neither are the titles, but in terms of helping former players/aspiring coaches get a start in the profession, right now there is no one better than Cal. Read More »

A couple of themes dominated last night’s NCAA tourney Sweet 16 games: Defense and Onions. First you had UConn defensive stalwart Hasheem Thabeet putting together his first dominant game of the tourney (15 pts, 15 rebs, 4 blks) to push the Huskies past Purdue. Then Villanova slapped a stifling total team defensive effort on Duke, ball-pressure and denial for which Coach K‘s boys seemed totally unprepared. And then Missouri’s new-school “40 Minutes of Hell” paved the way for them to get past Memphis … As for the onions? Look no further than Levance Fields. Read More »

Thank God for the great Americans at COED Magazine. Someone had to put together photo galleries of the cheerleaders from every school in the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16, and they stepped up to the plate. Read More »

The first weekend is in the books, the field of 65 is down to 16, and I seriously need a break from watching basketball. After the first two rounds of the Big Dance, here are my big winners (big losers coming soon):

THE HIT LIST

Cole Aldrich — Going into the Tournament, nobody was talking about Aldrich in regards to the 2009 NBA Draft. Read More »

Duke, Gonzaga and Purdue gave us the “Madness” part of March yesterday, but UConn, Memphis and Villanova made the biggest statements when it comes to what really matters: winning the ‘chip. In its 20-piecing of UCLA (which to be fair, was basically a home game in Philly), ‘Nova looked as good as any team in the East region has looked in the Tournament, putting them right there with Duke and Pitt as Final Four favorites out of that bracket. Read More »

After struggling in their first-round game against Cal State-Northridge, Memphis finally played like a 2-seed should. As for 1-seed UConn, they never missed a beat from their first-round mollywhopping of Chattanooga. Read More »