Post by elp525 on Mar 17, 2011 9:03:38 GMT -5
Thursday March 17, 2011
by Mike Casazza
Charleston Daily Mail
TAMPA, Fla. - After four first-round games spread over the past two days, the 2011 NCAA Tournament second round begins today at the St. Pete Times Forum as No. 22 West Virginia and Clemson play the day's first game at 12:15 p.m. on CBS.
The field was expanded to include an additional three teams this year, and the 68-team concept has invited some criticism as well as some oddly qualified teams.
Thirteen of the 37 at-large teams have 11 or more losses, the most ever. Five of the 13 have 14 losses, which is one fewer than from the previous 25 years combined.
"I don't know why they'd say there's not a great team," Kentucky Coach John Calipari said. "Great, that word is overused."
Calipari, whose team is the No. 4 seed in the East Region and plays No. 13 seed Princeton, has been to two Final Fours and one championship game. He said his Southeastern Conference Tournament champion has played "as well as anybody in the country" in winning eight of its past nine games and is in a group of contenders.
"What I would tell you is there are four or five teams that have separated from the rest of us," he said. "And then maybe there are 10 that are all pretty close. And then there's another 30 or 40, but in that 30 or 40, any of those guys can get to the NCAA Tournament."
West Virginia Coach Bob Huggins, who with a win today against the Tigers could meet his old pal Calipari Saturday, counts his team in the group than can be win.
The Mountaineers (20-11) won their final three games of the regular season and lost a week ago in their first game in the Big East Tournament. They arrived fresh and confident after a season in which the freshman class busted, leading scorer Casey Mitchell was suspended for three games and WVU won just twice in eight games decided by five or fewer points.
"When we lost Casey for those three games, I stood in front of them and said, 'We're going to go win,'" Huggins said. "I told them (Tuesday), 'There isn't any reason why we can't go win.'
"When you think about some of the people we've beaten and some of the players we've played against, we're not going to play against anybody better than Kemba Walker, whose maybe the best player in the country. We're not going to play against guards that are better than Ben Hansbrough. We're going to play against some that are probably as good, but we're not going to play against anybody better.''
* * *
WVU SPENT part of Monday's practice preparing for Clemson and part of Tuesday's practice preparing for UAB, which lost to Clemson Tuesday night in Dayton, Ohio, in the first-round game. The Mountaineers watched that game and saw in Clemson a bit of themselves and a bit of their biggest rival.
"They're a lot like Pitt," junior guard Truck Bryant said.
That's on the defensive end, where the Tigers will guard the length of the floor, but sag off the 3-point line in order to protect the paint. Clemson tried to keep UAB point guard and Conference USA player of the year Aaron Johnson out of the paint as much as possible.
"He's, what, 5-foot-7," said WVU senior point guard Joe Mazzulla, who is seven inches taller. "He's real good, but if you watched, a couple times he left his feet and didn't have anywhere to go with the ball. But I think he assisted on five of their seven 3s in the first half.
"We want to get in the lane and we want to penetrate, but we don't want to over-penetrate. We want to force them to collapse the lane and then kick it out for open jump shots. The key is making those open jump shots."
Clemson runs Coach Brad Brownell's version of the motion offense WVU uses and the Tigers succeeded Tuesday night getting the ball inside against the Blazers.
The Tigers, like the Mountaineers, don't have great depth or size in the frontcourt, but do focus on getting shots close to the basket with any of their players. They had 40 points in the paint in the 70-52 victory.
"UAB played behind Clemson's guys," Mazzulla said. "That's not the way we play and I don't think it's going to be as easy to get it in the post."
WVU and Clemson haven't met since 1992, but they very nearly played twice last season in the 76 Classic, in Anaheim, Calif., as well as the NCAA Tournament.
The Tigers were upset by Texas A&M in the 76 Classic opener and the Aggies lost to the Mountaineers in the next round.
Clemson lost to Missouri in the opening round of last year's NCAA Tournament and WVU beat Missouri in the second round.
"Maybe they've got a different coach and run different stuff, but we almost played them twice last year and we scouted them twice last year, so we're at least pretty familiar with their personnel," assistant coach Erik Martin said.
* * *
PRINCETON'S PLAYERS and coaches contend they're not running the same traditional Princeton offense that's replete with passing to set up shots and create space for backdoor cuts. The Tigers, who beat UCLA 43-41 in a classic upset in the 1996 Tournament, average 69.6 points and scored at least 75 in nine games.
"I think that we're definitely rooted in the fundamentals of the Princeton offense," Coach Sydney Johnson said.
"At the same time, I think that the players that we have, there's a little bit more athleticism, they're a bit more dynamic, and so we may not need three or four passes and a cut-through before they can get a shot."
On the other side is Kentucky, which is known for the dribble-drive motion crafted by Calipari.
He called it "Princeton on steroids" because it does a lot the things the Tigers do, though with better athletes. This season the Wildcats do even more of what the Tigers do.
"As a matter of fact, we're running some Princeton stuff," Calipari said. "And why? Because we need space to do our dribble drive. So when you see us in a handoff, a backdoor, 'My gosh, they're running Princeton.' Yeah, we're running a little bit of it to get us space to run our driving motion."
by Mike Casazza
Charleston Daily Mail
TAMPA, Fla. - After four first-round games spread over the past two days, the 2011 NCAA Tournament second round begins today at the St. Pete Times Forum as No. 22 West Virginia and Clemson play the day's first game at 12:15 p.m. on CBS.
The field was expanded to include an additional three teams this year, and the 68-team concept has invited some criticism as well as some oddly qualified teams.
Thirteen of the 37 at-large teams have 11 or more losses, the most ever. Five of the 13 have 14 losses, which is one fewer than from the previous 25 years combined.
"I don't know why they'd say there's not a great team," Kentucky Coach John Calipari said. "Great, that word is overused."
Calipari, whose team is the No. 4 seed in the East Region and plays No. 13 seed Princeton, has been to two Final Fours and one championship game. He said his Southeastern Conference Tournament champion has played "as well as anybody in the country" in winning eight of its past nine games and is in a group of contenders.
"What I would tell you is there are four or five teams that have separated from the rest of us," he said. "And then maybe there are 10 that are all pretty close. And then there's another 30 or 40, but in that 30 or 40, any of those guys can get to the NCAA Tournament."
West Virginia Coach Bob Huggins, who with a win today against the Tigers could meet his old pal Calipari Saturday, counts his team in the group than can be win.
The Mountaineers (20-11) won their final three games of the regular season and lost a week ago in their first game in the Big East Tournament. They arrived fresh and confident after a season in which the freshman class busted, leading scorer Casey Mitchell was suspended for three games and WVU won just twice in eight games decided by five or fewer points.
"When we lost Casey for those three games, I stood in front of them and said, 'We're going to go win,'" Huggins said. "I told them (Tuesday), 'There isn't any reason why we can't go win.'
"When you think about some of the people we've beaten and some of the players we've played against, we're not going to play against anybody better than Kemba Walker, whose maybe the best player in the country. We're not going to play against guards that are better than Ben Hansbrough. We're going to play against some that are probably as good, but we're not going to play against anybody better.''
* * *
WVU SPENT part of Monday's practice preparing for Clemson and part of Tuesday's practice preparing for UAB, which lost to Clemson Tuesday night in Dayton, Ohio, in the first-round game. The Mountaineers watched that game and saw in Clemson a bit of themselves and a bit of their biggest rival.
"They're a lot like Pitt," junior guard Truck Bryant said.
That's on the defensive end, where the Tigers will guard the length of the floor, but sag off the 3-point line in order to protect the paint. Clemson tried to keep UAB point guard and Conference USA player of the year Aaron Johnson out of the paint as much as possible.
"He's, what, 5-foot-7," said WVU senior point guard Joe Mazzulla, who is seven inches taller. "He's real good, but if you watched, a couple times he left his feet and didn't have anywhere to go with the ball. But I think he assisted on five of their seven 3s in the first half.
"We want to get in the lane and we want to penetrate, but we don't want to over-penetrate. We want to force them to collapse the lane and then kick it out for open jump shots. The key is making those open jump shots."
Clemson runs Coach Brad Brownell's version of the motion offense WVU uses and the Tigers succeeded Tuesday night getting the ball inside against the Blazers.
The Tigers, like the Mountaineers, don't have great depth or size in the frontcourt, but do focus on getting shots close to the basket with any of their players. They had 40 points in the paint in the 70-52 victory.
"UAB played behind Clemson's guys," Mazzulla said. "That's not the way we play and I don't think it's going to be as easy to get it in the post."
WVU and Clemson haven't met since 1992, but they very nearly played twice last season in the 76 Classic, in Anaheim, Calif., as well as the NCAA Tournament.
The Tigers were upset by Texas A&M in the 76 Classic opener and the Aggies lost to the Mountaineers in the next round.
Clemson lost to Missouri in the opening round of last year's NCAA Tournament and WVU beat Missouri in the second round.
"Maybe they've got a different coach and run different stuff, but we almost played them twice last year and we scouted them twice last year, so we're at least pretty familiar with their personnel," assistant coach Erik Martin said.
* * *
PRINCETON'S PLAYERS and coaches contend they're not running the same traditional Princeton offense that's replete with passing to set up shots and create space for backdoor cuts. The Tigers, who beat UCLA 43-41 in a classic upset in the 1996 Tournament, average 69.6 points and scored at least 75 in nine games.
"I think that we're definitely rooted in the fundamentals of the Princeton offense," Coach Sydney Johnson said.
"At the same time, I think that the players that we have, there's a little bit more athleticism, they're a bit more dynamic, and so we may not need three or four passes and a cut-through before they can get a shot."
On the other side is Kentucky, which is known for the dribble-drive motion crafted by Calipari.
He called it "Princeton on steroids" because it does a lot the things the Tigers do, though with better athletes. This season the Wildcats do even more of what the Tigers do.
"As a matter of fact, we're running some Princeton stuff," Calipari said. "And why? Because we need space to do our dribble drive. So when you see us in a handoff, a backdoor, 'My gosh, they're running Princeton.' Yeah, we're running a little bit of it to get us space to run our driving motion."