* One thing I was looking forward to with the 12-team playoff was a cut down in arguments. I knew we would still have them — we argue over the NCAA basketball tournaments which have 68 teams in them — but I was hopeful that people would slow their roll since every team with a playoff argument in the four-team era would be comfortably in in the 12-team era.
Well, I was wrong. And maybe it's because I'm getting older and just want a peaceful existence these days, but the arguments on all sides are more annoying than ever.
I'm sorry that Indiana is probably getting in having no wins over particularly good teams. The reality of it is though, no P4 team with a single loss is ever ever ever going to be left out of the playoffs.
I'm sorry that a 3-loss SEC team might get in. Here again, I think something like this will happen most years. Hell, in 2007, we had a 2-loss team in the national championship game (and they won it!), and that was the 2-team playoff era.
I'm sorry that that the playoff won't be 10 SEC teams. Seems the SEC stans are a bit more insufferable than usual this year. They are the ones going after Indiana's schedule, as if Indiana should have known what was coming in 2024 and scheduled tougher.
I do think the SEC is still the best conference, but if you want to argue that they are so head-and-shoulders above the rest that it's a no-brainer that a 3-loss SEC team with 2 good wins should get in over a 1-loss Indiana with no good wins, maybe LSU should be beating USC, and Vanderbilt should be beating Georgia State, and Arkansas should be beating Oklahoma State.
* Is Dan Hurley trying to become the most hated man in America? UConn found themselves on the short end in two games in Maui this week, which is on the refs as far as Hurley is concerned.
In the first loss, he was assessed a technical foul at a crucial time. Should he have kept his cool? Nah, he says, it's the refs fault:
"I think it was the s**ty calls," he said, adding, "I would expect to come to play in an event, and I don't know too many back-to-back national championship teams that get that type of a whistle."
Oh my god, how many different ways does that statement make you want to hurl? There's the obvious lack of accountability, but also he clearly expects, as a back-to-back national champion deigning to slum it for a bit and play in this podunk tournament nobody cares about called the (checks notes) ... Maui Invitational, to get favorable treatment, not equal treatment, from the refs.
(He also had much to say about certain fouls being called at certain times of the game, which I also have no sympathy for unless you can show me the part of the rulebook that says, "don't call this foul in close games with less than two minutes to go.")
I bet I know how Hurley would respond to my criticisms, which is that hey, he's not asking for anything unusual, just what champions and superstars have been getting since the days of peach baskets.
I don't care. If we are going to endeavor to call the game equitably — and we should! — someone's going to have to be the first champs not to get special treatment.
* It's almost a cliche how hard you have to work to be a D1 head coach in, well, any sport. Eighteen-hour days, naps in your office, microwaved dinners, ignored "understanding" families — we all know these lyrics.
Is it necessary to work that hard to be a successful head coach? I suspect not necessarily, but the harder and longer your work should usually benefit the team you're coaching, obviously.
So imagine my surprise when I learned this week when I found out the Doug Gottlieb, the longtime well-known college basketball pundit that became the head coach of Wisconsin-Green Bay this offseason, did not give up his day job for it.
The Big Ten Network flashed a graphic of Gottlieb's schedule when Green Bay took on Ohio State. It includes a podcast taping at 2 PM and hosting his show from 3-5 PM.
That is nuts, and I can't believe it got the green light from UWGB when they hired him (surely they must have given that okay). That's three hours of work that could be spent helping the team in any number of ways. But it's even worse than that, because it also means Gottlieb has to spend time learning about and understanding what's going in the world of college basketball outside the hours where he's actually recording.
But it's even worse than that. What happens when a big story of some kind breaks about a team coming up on his schedule, or a fellow Horizon League member, or even Green Bay itself? I guess he'll just have to recuse himself from commenting, thereby giving his radio fans the short shrift the way he's giving UWGB fans the short shrift now?
I feel for those UWGB fans. They deserve better, and UWGB is not going to succeed as long as this is the arrangement.
Leave a Comment