Andy & Ari On3 - We turn you into a college basketball expert ahead of Selection Sunday | The CFP might not expand?

Episode Date: March 15, 2024

This show is sponsored by FanDuel. Go to fanduel.com/Staples to sign up and receive $200 in bonus bets if your first $5 bet wins.(0:00-0:59) Intro(1:00-9:28) CFP Update(9:29-16:47) James Fletcher III Intro, Bubble Watch(16:48-18:53) Bid Thieves(18:54-21:42) Top Players(21:43-23:59) Purdue the Top Seed?(24:00-25:46) Tennessee's Outlook(25:47-27:33) North Carolina's Outlook(27:34-29:02) The Last #1 Seed(29:03-35:34) Personalities of College Basketball - Dan Hurley and Rick Pitino(35:35-37:09) The Dangerous McNeese State(37:10-39:34) Other Dangerous Teams - Indiana State, Drake, James Madison, and Samford(39:35-42:33) Teams that could get Hot in March - Kentucky and Creighton(42:34-45:31) Coach Calipari heading into March(45:32-47:39) Dan Hurley and UConn(47:40-48:52) Nebraska's Seeding(48:53-51:59) Mascots of Mid-Majors(52:00-52:36) Conclusion - Happy St Patty's Day!We’ll get to your primer on the college basketball season, but first a little football news. The commissioners who run the College Football Playoff have agreed on a revenue split and a TV deal for the CFP beyond 2026, but they haven’t settled on a format. The 14-team model commissioners had proposed is not a sure thing because ESPN doesn’t want to pay more for additional games.Now it’s time to talk about a postseason tournament that knows what it is. On3’s resident bracketologist James Fletcher III joins to help make you sound like an expert this weekend as you drink green beer and watch the NCAA Tournament bracket reveal.We’ll take you through the 2023-24 basketball season from the start to this weekend. We’ll remind you of the established stars (Purdue’s Zach Edey, North Carolina’s Armando Bacot) and introduce you to the new stars (Tennessee’s Dalton Knecht, Indiana State’s Robbie Avila).James will break down the teams on the bubble and explain who has a chance to make the field with another conference tournament win or two. We’ll also be on the lookout for any bid thieves.James also will take you through the top of the seed lines and fill you in on the teams that could wind up in the Final Four if they get hot next week.Want to watch the show instead? Head on over to YouTube and join us live, M-F, at 8 am et! https://youtube.com/live/43EqsfpoUBI

Welcome to Andy Staples on three. Happy Friday before selection Sunday. Happy Friday before St. Patrick's Day. Green beer and brackets are coming our way. And we're going to help get you ready for the bracket reveal on Sunday. We'll also be back on Monday to help break down the bracket. But we'll have James Fletcher III on three's resident bracketologist will join us today. We're going to help get you ready for the NCAA basketball tournament. You will sound like an expert at the

end of this show because James is an expert. Not because I am, but because James is. And we are going to help you get set. We'll start with how the season started. We'll kind of take you through the season and we'll get to right now where there are bids to be stolen in the conference tournaments. There are bubble spots that are popping as we speak. It's going to be a fun weekend. First though, let's talk about a different kind of bracket. The college football playoff. We got an update because the commissioners who oversee the college football playoff have agreed on a framework of a contract with ESPN that will last through 2032. Now, what does that mean? It means all that stuff we've been talking about with a 14 team format, not quite done yet. They're not dealing with that right now. They figured out how to split up the money, which I think is the important part to most of them. And I think that's the big part. Everything else kind of works itself out afterward, we think. Obviously, they'll fight over this stuff, but here's how it works. As we expected, the Big Ten and the SEC taking most of the money.

Before, there was a split. Remember, there were five power conferences before the Pac-12 imploded, and the five power conferences got more, but they split their share equally amongst themselves. That's not happening anymore. The Big Ten and the SEC will get $21 million per school. The ACC will get $13 million per school, $12 million per school to the Big 12, $1.8 million per school to the group of five. We've been wondering all along,

have some of these things that have been pitched as potential format ideas, have they been used in trade to get more money for the Big Ten and the SEC? We'll see about that. One thing that seems to be off the table, and basically because, maybe because of the public backlash, but also maybe because they traded it for money. If they did move to a 14-team playoff, the idea of the Big Ten and the SEC getting the only buys, thus making their conference championship games protected, they are off the table. That's not going to happen. They are not going to do that. We don't yet know because you've got schools and conferences that are fighting for more access. You have the idea that if you're the ACC of the Big 12, if you accept a guaranteed number of bids, but it's lower than the SEC in the Big 12, you're cementing second class citizen status, but you still get more bids. Remember that Deary Annie question yesterday about could the ACC get a second team into the 12-team playoff this year? And it's not a slam dunk. So maybe they do want two guaranteed bids, but all of that stuff is going to get figured out

a little bit later, which is interesting. It makes me wonder. They are still expected to go with a 14 team playoff for 26 through 32. But now that they've tabled that for a minute, is it possible they allow a 12 team playoff to happen? And say, you know what? This might be better. Maybe we just keep it here. Greg Sankey, the commissioner of the SEC, went on the SEC network at the SEC basketball tournament yesterday and said basically 12 and 14 are bookends and just leave the bookends on the shelf. So basically, they got their money taken care of. The other details can be worked out, but the SEC and the Big Ten for sure have the most power,

the most money. All you ADs who say, well, how are we going to possibly pay players if they become employees? Where are we going to find an extra $20 million? We just found 15. If you're in the SEC or the Big Ten, because that's the raise you're getting, you're getting about 15 million more a year per school. So congratulations, Indiana, you just found your payroll. Congratulations, Mississippi state. You found your payroll. It is a huge cash infusion for those schools. And we have to find out, and we will find out when the next round of negotiations begins, was this what it was all about? Was this the part that really mattered to them, the money part? Or do the other parts matter? Do they want to guarantee themselves more access?

The most access. I mean, the Big Ten and the SEC will get the most access anyway. And then what will the ACC and the Big 12 fight for? What will matter to them the most? Andrew asks, what does this mean for conference championship games? They're going to keep having them, but if they become irrelevant to the grand scheme, if they become uninteresting to people, then they're going to the grand scheme, if they become

uninteresting to people, then they're going to have to adjust them. So we'll see what happens to them going forward. I still think there's a really good chance if they did go to 14. And again, that's not a guarantee right now, but I think 14 is still expected for that next format. If they did go to 14 and there were two buys, then I think the SEC championship and the Big Ten championship most years would be for the two buys. Most years. Some years, it'd be the ACC championship or the Big 12 championship, but I think most years it would be the SEC and the Big Ten. So I think that would kind of protect them somewhat. But we'll see.

Because here's a scenario. I'll give you one. Let's say in the 12-team format, let's say you have the Big 12 championship game, and there's three really good teams in the Big 12. Two of them make the championship game. One does not. But the championship game is a blowout.

And the team that lost the championship game winds up not making the playoff. The team that won makes it. And the team that didn't play makes it. That would be a problem. That would cause a lot of consternation. A lot. So we'll see what happens. But I do think those probably will have to get adjusted going down the line. I know Ross Dellinger from Yahoo has suggested this, and I know some of the ADs and commissioners he talks to have suggested this,

that maybe your regular season champ automatically gets in and then you play basically a playoff game, an elimination game to get in between two and three or between three or four. It kind of depends because with at-larges, it makes it very different. And then with multiple auto bids, it makes it very different. So they're going to have to figure out how to tweak that format a little bit. But they figured out the money. And the cynics among you are like, well, that's all they cared about anyway. Kind of hard to argue at this point, but they will argue format. There will be fights over that too, because they argue about everything,

but we will not know exactly what that's going to look like for a little while. What we do know, we are getting a bracket on Sunday. We are getting tons of conference tournament basketball today, tomorrow, and Sunday. There's never been a better time to join FanDuel.

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You name it. They got it. So go to FanDuel.com slash staples and sign up today. We welcome James Fletcher III, On3's resident bracketologist. He's been staying up very late every night. He's now getting up very early. James, what is going on? What happened last night that we need to know about that will affect Sunday? Well, we had plenty go on last night throughout the course of the day. Really?

You had a real elimination game in the ACC tournament between wake forest and pit pit came out on top there. So Wake Forest, they're out. They're not going to make the NCAA tournament this year. They'll probably get an invite to the NIT. We'll see if they accept it. But for Pitt, they live to fight another day. Can they win against North Carolina today? That would be a huge boost to their resume. Then later on in the night, of course, we had New Mexico knock off Boise State. They were a bubble team, so that will have them breathing a big sigh of relief. Colorado survived against Utah, really just made sure that Utah is out of the picture.

And then in the Big East, we had one big upset. Providence kept their season going. They were really in a win or you're out situation as well against Creighton. Creighton, a team that has looked really good in recent weeks, even blew out UConn not that long ago, but they lose against Providence. So Providence can keep building their resume. Villanova had a chance to do a similar thing against Marquette. It came right down to the wire, went to overtime, but Marquette came out on top. So Villanova probably out of the field as well.

So yeah, we've got a lot of moving pieces around the bubble right now. That's where we've seen just, I mean, throughout the day yesterday, it was teams were in, they were out, they were back in. It's been a long 24 hours on the bubble. Well, not to mention a competing bracketologist, but Joe Lunardi has A&M, Texas A&M, as his

last team in after the Aggies beat Ole Miss last night. A&M plays Kentucky today. I would assume if they beat the Wildcats, they should feel pretty comfortable. Although, Buzz Williams and company after a couple of years ago when they made the SEC tournament final and still didn't make the field, probably not comfortable unless they hold up that trophy in Nashville. Yeah. I don't think Texas A&M fans are going to feel comfortable regardless of the outcome this weekend, unless like you said, they get that automatic bid where the committee cannot leave them out of the field. But if you're Texas A&M, yes, a win over Kentucky is huge for your resume.

You're right there with comparable numbers to these other teams. And so you would feel like a quad one win on a neutral floor against a team like Kentucky with that prestige, with, like we've talked about before, a surging Kentucky team. That's important to the committee as well, that win would be massive for their resume. However, they've still got to shake all of those bad losses, those quad three and four losses that they have on their resume. They've got already more quad one wins than anyone else in this bubble conversation. But it's those losses in the bottom half that are

killing them right now, that are dragging them into this conversation. And so regardless of if they can pick up one more quad one win, now if they get like one or two more, they get into that Sunday conversation, I think then you can probably consider them a little bit safer. But until they can do that, I think you've got to still wonder how much is the committee going to ding them for those bad losses well and another team that you mentioned the committee and how they look at how teams are playing now Kentucky is surging and I've always been told the committee has to consider changes, how your season evolves, that sort of thing. That makes Ohio State a really interesting team to me, James, because they're moving through the

Big Ten tournament right now. They play Illinois today. This would be a huge win if they could get it. But correct me if I'm wrong, they're six and one since Jake Diebler took over for Chris Holtman. Chris Holtman was fired midseason. That includes a win against Purdue, probably the number one overall seed in the whole tournament. And it feels like the Buckeyes are playing like a different team. So does the committee give that any weight? Because I know like Ohio State is creeping toward being on the bubble.

Like if they win today, their resume alone probably puts them on the bubble, but could possibly the way they're playing since changing coaches put them over the top. Yeah. Ohio State's a team that I didn't really have on the bubble coming into the conference tournaments, but was aware of them. I was still watching them,

similar to how I was watching Kansas State. It was like, right now they don't have a clear path, but if a lot of these other teams start losing early in the conference tournament and they make a run to Sunday, then, yeah, I'll look at their numbers head-to-head with these other teams and I'll consider it. Now we've got enough teams that have been knocked out that they're sort of the next-in- line team that still has some kind of path.

It's a very narrow path, but they've got some kind of path towards the NCAA tournament field. And so they're starting to creep up into that bubble conversation. Like you said, they're a team that you've got to start watching, start looking at the numbers, but I think that they're going to have to make a run no matter what to Sunday or excuse me, to the final of that

big 10 championship. So they're going to have to pick up more quality wins along the way. And I think where the Ohio state conversation kind of goes off is they already had a resume that could have been compared to some of the other teams on the bubble coming into conference tournament play. But what I think offsets that strong run of form that we've been talking about, that six and one, you've got a win over Purdue. It is in some way offset by the fact that you fired a coach. It's just a weird look to put a team into the NCAA tournament after they fired their coach in the middle of the season for not living up to expectations. It's just, it's a weird dynamic that the committee is going to have to deal with. Do we reward an interim coach for overachieving? Or do we look

at this team and say, you fired your coach. You didn't even think you were going to make the NCAA tournament. Why would we give you a spot? So we're in a really weird spot right now for sure. And it will be interesting to see what the committee has to say about it on Sunday. And in case you're wondering what happened to Chris Holtman, by the way, he got named DePaul's coach yesterday. So he landed on his feet. Hooray for offset language in the contract. I'm sure the Ohio state administration is saying, And the beat marches on, and Stanford's coach got fired yesterday. We're also into hiring firing season, so we'll probably get a few more firings after the conference tournament.

Hopefully, we'll not have coaches announcing their own firings in their press conference like the Utah State women's coach the other day. I felt so bad for her, but she handled it with much more class than i ever would have uh james got 14 bids are clenched there are 18 automatic bids remaining 36 at larges and let's let's talk bid thieves because i think we we got guaranteed another bid thief in the atlantic 10 tournament. Dayton lost to Duquesne. Big win for the Dukes. But we talked about Dayton on Monday's show, where it was kind of poetic justice that Dayton,

which was denied a chance when it was maybe the best team in the country, to play in the NCAA tournament in 2020. Now back, potentially going to make the tournament. They have the resume to make it as an at-large, right? Yes, they will still be in that at-large conversation. They probably dropped from a potential five seed to they're going to be in that six, seven conversation now heading into selection Sunday, but they're still safely in the field. There is no real path for enough teams to pass them. There's not even enough teams playing basketball anymore to pass them up and knock them out of this field. So Dayton will feel safe, but for the Atlantic 10, it is a huge

blow because coming into that conference tournament, Dayton was not the one seed there. Richmond was number one, Loyola Chicago, who we all remember from their run in the NCAA tournament a few years back. Those were the top two seeds in that conference tournament. And so if you were the Atlantic 10, you were thinking, wow, we could be a two bid league. We could get Dayton in easily with their at large resume and then have a Richmond or a Loyola Chicago. Who knows? Maybe even the four seed UMass have one of them win the conference tournament and look at what we've got now. Those dreams are gone at this point because as you mentioned, Dayton lost, but so did Richmond and so did Loyola Chicago and so did UMass.

The top four seeds all eliminated in the quarterfinals of that A-10 tournament, almost unprecedented. Well, somebody else is going to win that tournament. So they're getting in and sorry if you're an at-large bubble team, if you're, if you're a power conference bubble team, that probably means you're, you're looking at, at one less spot at the end of the tournament. Let's take everybody through this season, James, let's talk about what has happened here. And I think we went into this season thinking that, you know, there's some established stars. Zach Eadie, obviously coming back to Purdue.

You had a Rondo Baycott coming back to North Carolina. You had Hunter Dickinson moving from Michigan to Kansas. So you had this NIL for sure had an effect on this where we're seeing guys be in school three, four years now and getting to know them. And I feel like this feels a little bit more like when I was a kid where you did actually kind of get to know the players a little bit and it wasn't just a new team every single year. Yeah. And you look at the types of players that are becoming stars in college basketball. What are they? They're sinners and they're point guards. And there's a definite reason for that because the NBA game has gone so heavily towards wings. You want to have tall athletic guys who can shoot the three and drive

to the basket. You want versatile centers. So these really big guys, these seven footers who are bigger, they're stronger, they're playing in in the post there's just not as much space for them to play in that NBA so what do they do they go where the most money is for them to have a sustained basketball career there's no guarantee if you hop in the NBA draft you might not get drafted you might end up in the G League for one two years you get a two-way contract but in college basketball you know that for another one, two, three, sometimes even four extra years beyond when you break out, you can make sustained money. You can even enter the transfer portal if you need to to up your value the next season. So we're seeing the Hunter Dickinson's, the Zach Eadies, who has carved out potentially a future in the NBA for himself by continuing his success and growing in different

areas. But Normando Baycott as well, those kinds of guys, yes, they are sticking around much longer in college basketball because this is where they are going to be the biggest deal they've ever been in the sport. You look at a guy like Drew Timmy, someone who was right there in this conversation with these guys as the biggest stars in college basketball just a year ago. Now, I'm not sure there's many fans who can tell you where he's playing today. So it is just a – I mean, just in general, the sport of basketball, it's such a short window, so you might as well make the most of it.

These guys are making the most of it, and they have become the biggest stars we have in college basketball by sticking around for a few years, using NIL to kind of prolong what is the best part of their career. Those point guards as well, some of those undersized guys, they've been in the mix with it too. So you mentioned Zach Eadie, and Zach Eadie and Purdue probably going to be the number one overall seat. And I know the folks who have not watched much this season, but will jump in in the tournament are going to go, oh, the team that lost to Fairleigh Dickinson last year. It's kind of a similar situation. It feels to me, James, like when Virginia was coming back after losing to UMBC the year before. Virginia at that point was the first one to ever lose to a 16 and they came back and won the national title the

following year. And they, you know, look, they had the jokes all season. They had the jokes going into the tournament. That's going to be Purdue this year. Matt Painter, that reputation is going to follow him until he can just take them deep in the tournament with this crew. Yeah, there's going to be a lot of questions about Purdue, and somewhat rightfully so, because you can't be a one-seed and lose to a 16-seed. It just should not happen. The format of college basketball, especially nowadays, with NIL, with everything, the transfer portal, you should not be rooting to Fairleigh Dickinson as Purdue. But if you put that aside, this team has not shown you any indications all season that

that's going to be the case. Now, did last year's team? Probably not very many. So you've still got some hesitance from people across the country of, will they burn me again? People feel like they've been burned multiple times, but especially last year by this Purdue team, when they hope that they're going to make a deep run in the NCAA tournament. Why should they believe that this year is different? I think Matt Painter, same coach, Zach Eadie, your same star player. He was national player of the year last year. He will be again

this season. So what is the biggest difference? I think it's Braden Smith at point guard, his development last year, a freshman thrust into the postseason. You start seeing these different looks be thrown at Zach Eadie. Now, all of a sudden, as the point guard, the pressure is on you to either find ways to get him involved or create yourself and find ways to get other people involved. He struggled with that, a little bit of panic as a freshman being put in that position. Now he's a sophomore. He's one of the best point guards in the entire country. And so I think his development is going to be the difference for them this season in those early rounds as they look to escape.

And as we're talking about one season, so a team under the SEC that we thought would be good, did not realize would be this good is Tennessee. It's an old team. It's got a lot of familiar faces. Is it Kai Ziegler? Didn't play in the, in the postseason last year.

Cause he got hurt right before the postseason started, but Josiah, Jordan, James, Santiago, Vescovy, you know, we we've seen those guys before, Mashak,

but they add Dalton Connect, a transfer from Northern Colorado, who I don't think anybody realized how good this guy could be. No, I think he was a touted scorer, but that was all that we knew about him. We knew he was going to score the basketball when he was on the floor. There were questions about his defense. Would he be able to

stay on the floor for Rick Barnes, who cares deeply about the defensive end of the floor? There were questions. I talked to people around the industry coming into the season. They said, this Tennessee team, yeah, they could be great. This could be the perfect fit. He added these offensive players. That was always the problem for Rick Barnes, but is he really going to play them at the end of the game? Is he really going to keep Dalton Connect out there when he gets blown by for a layup? Well, the answer is yes, because Dalton Connect's going to go get that layup back and then add a three-pointer on top of it on the next possession. Dalton Connect is so good on offense, so far above what we thought he would be, that he has really changed this Tennessee team and the perception of it

from a defensive team that's going to be super streaky on offense, that may have it, may not on any given night, to a team that has a go-to guy who you know down the stretch, they're going to get it in his hands, they're going to run pick and roll, and they're going to get out of his way every time down the floor and you better figure out a way to stop it now before last season North Carolina had all the hype in the preseason because they were coming off an appearance in the national title game that they probably I mean they had a really good run through the NCAA tournament following that 2021-2022 season. Last year, they kind of disappointed. It feels like this year's the team

that last year's team was supposed to be. The chemistry feels good. Cormac Ryan has been awesome. And then Armando Baycott has been what we expected him to be. Yeah, the North Carolina team, you're right. They've really got the chemistry clicking. It's been a different dynamic once you've removed Caleb Love from that situation. R.J. Davis and Armando Baycott sometimes has nothing to do with anyone having to leave, but sometimes having two star players is just easier to manage than having three. And so that's what it looks like for North Carolina. It looks like when you have RJ Davis on the ball,

you don't have to question which guards bringing it up the floor. What are their tendencies? Armando Baycott's able to just, he knows exactly what RJ Davis is going to do. He's going to come up. He knows where he wants the screen set. He knows how to get to the block so that RJ can hit him down there. They've got it all figured out.

And it's just a lot easier when from there you've got Harrison Ingram in the corner. You've got Cormac Ryan in that other corner. It makes it just a better spread out team, which knows its roles a lot better than I think last year's did. And for Caleb Love, he goes to an Arizona team. How about RJ Davis winning ACC player of the year and Caleb Love winning Pac-12 Player of the Year? Now both of them headed to the NCAA tournament, so I think that that move worked out pretty well for just about everyone involved. Meanwhile, these guys were all clustered at the end of the one line and the top of the two line in terms of

seeds. You've got Arizona and Tennessee. It felt like we're duking it out for that last one seed, but now it feels like maybe it's Tennessee and North Carolina duking it out for that final one seed. Yeah, it really is. After that Duke win, North Carolina's resume got a little bit of a boost. It got up there in the conversation of Tennessee and Arizona. So as you look at it now, Tennessee and North Carolina are going to have the most opportunities to build their resume, to cement their spot. So as we look at it today, if Tennessee can run the table, if they win the SEC, they are the one seed. If North Carolina can make a deeper run in the ACC tournament than what Tennessee can do in the SEC tournament, then we'd start talking about North Carolina as that two seed. And for Arizona,

if you're holding out hope, I think that there's a very slim margin where if Tennessee loses, North Carolina loses and Arizona wins the PAC 12, I think that they will at least remain in the conversation and we'll have to rerun the numbers at the very least to see if Arizona gets that one seed back. Well, they did avenge the loss to USC a few days later. So they lose to USC in the Pac-12 regular season final, beat them in the Pac-12 tournament pretty handily. And so I don't know if that necessarily helps as much. Avenging losses is bigger in football, I think, than in basketball.

But we will find out. One thing I wanted to talk to you about James that I found really interesting. Our colleague, Eric Prisbell wrote a fascinating column and I had not thought about it this way, but Eric points out that college basketball lost a series of iconic coaches in very rapid succession. You had Roy Williams, then you had Mike Krzyzewski and Jay Wright, then you had Jim Boeheim. And now it feels like there's a personality vacuum. And it might not be that the personalities are lacking. It's just our awareness of those personalities feels lacking. And so we got to figure out who are going to be the iconic coaches. When we talk 10 years from now, is it going to be like, oh, Dan Hurley's in another NCAA tournament. Maybe he's going to fight somebody this year.

Like, will he be on that level? Yeah. I think that Hurley is certainly in that group of coaches who has the potential to rise onto that tier. And what we really lacked, and I thought Eric wrote a great piece on, yes, there is a vacuum there in the coaching sphere, as well as in college basketball because of the short time that they're there, the players. And so you need those coaches to be superstars. You need those big personalities to keep things going. And really outside of Bill Self and John Calipari at the top, there's kind of a cushion after that where you start looking for people. Dan Hurley is in that mix. I think Nate Oates at Alabama, Bruce Pearl at Auburn.

Those are all people who have these big personalities that aren't afraid to let their voices be heard, talk about whatever they want to talk about. But I think that what we lacked from the Coach K's, the Roy Williams, was a transition. We didn't get a transition because COVID happened and everything felt like it was kind of paused. And we started wondering, are these older coaches, these veteran coaches, are they going to leave? Well, then the transfer portal NIL comes into play. And a couple of them just said, look,

I've got my money. I've lived a good life coaching. This is not the college basketball that I signed up for. I'm just going to leave. I'm going to walk away. Some of them said, look, I'm already at the end. It's time to retire anyways. So I'm going to hang it up now because this new era is just a little bit too much for me. So what we didn't end up getting is that moment, right? Where a, a Dan Hurley knocks off coach K and he's you know screaming and fist pumping on his way to the tunnel we didn't get anything like that where you watched it on a big national stage in the NCAA tournament and you said wow that's the next personality you did get Hubert

Davis knocking off Coach K but it it was but I think with Hubert he he can be one of the best coaches in college basketball. I don't think there's any question about that. He's done well at North Carolina, a few ups and downs, but I've liked what he's done overall. He's really good at building a roster, getting the team together, but he's not a big personality. Hubert's not a guy you're going to be quoting after the game saying, wow, look it.

I mean, that guy is just – he'll get you fired up. No, he is a calm team builder. He'll get fired up when he needs to, but he's not the personality that some of these other names that we're talking about work. Well, speaking of personalities, there is one who is back. We, we think back in the NCAA tournament this year, depending on how things go these next few days. Rick Pitino at St. John's, you know, he went viral after a loss, you know, three weeks ago saying my team can't move laterally. We can't run. We have no team speed.

I have to replace all these players. Well, guess what? They're playing UConn in the Big East tournament. I don't think it matters if they beat UConn. They have a very good chance of making the tournament, though. Pitino has not changed. Reporter named Nicky Latarulo was interviewing Patino at the Big East tournament, said, what do you have to do to knock off UConn?

And Patino, without missing a beat, we need six of their players to get COVID. Yeah, Rick Patino, he's never been apologetic about the things that he wants to say. And look, apparently he pushed the right buttons with that St. John's team yeah oh is this going to come crashing down he just insulted his players well it looks like they took it to heart it looks like they said well let's go prove coach wrong and let's go make the NCAA tournament because they haven't lost since so

St. John's looks like they're going to be in the NCAA tournament we're going to get Rick Patino back in March Madness and that will be a moment, potentially a chance for us to get one of those moments I was just talking about. What happens if one of these coaches, these young up-and-comers, or these guys that are pretty ingrained but they never really made the jump from that really good coach to that iconic college basketball coach, maybe knocking off Rick Tino and having some big moment is part of their trail to becoming that. Yeah. Yeah. And Patino, especially he's

going to make history. If he gets this team in, if they, if they're in the bracket on Sunday, which we expect them to be, it'd be the sixth school that he's coached to the NCAA tournament, Boston, Providence, Kentucky, Louisville, Iona, and then St. John's would be number six. That is insane. That is an incredible number. Yeah, the guy can coach basketball. There's no question about that. We talk about some of these different coaches and what opportunities should they get.

Should they get another chance after whatever NCAA violations or scandals, whatever the case is, if you need a guy who can just coach a basketball team tomorrow, Rick Pitino is right up at the top of the list. I don't think there's many coaches that you're taking ahead of him to get a team into the NCAA tournament in his first season. And it really kind of highlights, I think, and not to kind of steer left on you here, but it highlights why what Kenny Payne said in his final press conference before being fired was so wrong. Kenny Payne said, it takes three or four years.

I need three or four years. Rick Pitino showed up to Iona. How many people had heard of Iona before Rick Pitino was the coach there? They're in the NCAA tournament. Jeff Rulon was known for some really surly press conferences back in the day at Iona, Rick Pitino was the coach there they're in the NCAA tournament Jeff Rulon was known for some really surly press conferences back in the day at Iona but that was about it yeah yeah you're right and now here we are already so and Kenny Payne who had Rick Pitino's old job

at Louisville I think it just it's in in bigger relief that it is Rick Pitino doing that. And you mentioned, it's interesting that you mentioned coaches who've had NCAA issues. Rick Pitino lost the job at Louisville because of an NCAA investigation. Well, guess what? Will Wade, late of LSU, just got McNeese State into the NCAA tournament. We're going to see Will Wade in the tournament. Yeah, Will Wade is going to see Will Wade in the tournament. Yeah. Will Wade is going to take this McNeese state team and they are one of the most dangerous double digit seeds.

You do not want to see them. If you are a five seed in this tournament, I pretty much, regardless of who they face on that five line, I think I'm probably picking McNeese state to advance because they've got Will Wade. There are three lost team at McNeese State. Again, another team where you look at and you say, before this year, where was McNeese State? When did we last talk about McNeese State, the Cowboys, as anything related to the NCAA tournament? Will Wade shows up, year one, he brings in all these players, and Shahada Wells has become a star.

He will be the big mid-major name outside of Robbie Avila. I know we love him on the show. He will be the one from these automatic bid teams that will become a star. The way that he plays, he's playing intense and he will score the basketball. He's going to play as hard as Will Wade needs him to play to try to get a win each and every game. So Shahada Wells, watch out for him to have a big performance in the NCAA tournament and really take Will Wade and this McNeese State team as far as they can go. Well, you walked me right into my next question, James, because that's what we got to help our

folks when they're filling out their brackets. So there you go. Look at where McNeese state winds up. It's probably a 12, five game. We all know, we know how the 12, five games tend to go. Who else among the double digit seeds should people be really worried about if their team draws them? Yeah, you got Drake and Indiana state. I still think Indiana state they're right there. They're in that mix to be in the field, still in that last four in. So they're going to have to win a game to get there. But once they get there, I do think that they are still dangerous. Really, their only stretch where they had bad results was with one of their star players out of the lineup. So if they get him back in the mix, you talk about Robbie Avila, the interesting matchup that he provides different teams, Josh Schertz,

his coaching, what it's looked like this year, they will be dangerous. Drake, same situation. Darian DeVries, his son Tucker, they are – I mean, Tucker DeVries could be playing at any of these high major schools, any of these top ten teams would take him in their lineup today and put him in the mix because he is a great scorer, the guy who can shoot, he can create for himself when he needs to. And so Drake has got that kind of mid-major star power as well to get something done in the NCAA tournament. And then I look at a team like Samford as one of those just,

they kind of go along and you wonder like they play an interesting style of basketball and we know matchups are what makes the NCAA tournament you you get them matched up against a team that wants to run a little bit slower of a pace and they're able to control things they're able to get out and run play buckyball as they call it bucky McMillan former high school coach Alabama, won that state title over and over, coached guys like Trenton Wofford, Colby Jones, who have gone on to have big NCAA and then NBA success. This is a team that is dangerous depending on the matchup that they face.

Then the last team that I'll mention that I'll throw in here for the listeners to kind of get a grasp of who can make something happen. James Madison. They've already made something happen. You remember way back in November, they knocked off Michigan State. And we all kind of wondered, what is happening at Michigan State? Well, it turns out this James Madison team is really good. Three losses all season.

Same as McNeese State. And you don't just lose three games in an entire college basketball season by accident. This team is really good, and they will be a threat under Mark Byington to knock somebody off when we get into this next week or so. Now, we talked about that. How about the teams that if they get hot, maybe Power Conference or just the teams that are so talented that if they get hot, they can win a national title. You saw UConn was as hot as it could be last year. Now,

we looked at UConn as a team that could potentially win the national title last year going into the tournament, but they reached kind of another level in the tournament on the way to the national title. Who in this field is that talented that maybe they're not a one seed or a two seed, but if they have everything working, they can make a run and win six games? Yeah, I'll start outside of those top two seeds. Like you said, Kentucky. Kentucky is the big one.

They've got the star power. They've got the talent. We've seen it kind of come together. We've seen the defense look better in recent weeks. If you get Reed Shepard at his peak, you can beat anyone down the stretch. If you get Rob Dillingham and his offensive scoring punch, bring him off the bench. If you're able to get that through the middle of the game, you can beat anyone. Antonio Reeves has very quietly been one of the best players in college basketball anyone. Antonio Reeves has very quietly been one of the best players in college basketball this season because he's got all the attention on these

other two guys. He's able to be that tertiary playmaker, that guy who's in the offense. He can play off the ball. He can put it in his hands if he needs to and make a play, but he has improved. He's looked a lot better. You look at that in addition to their big man rotation getting a little bit more solid defensively. And this Kentucky team, if they're able to get hot and keep getting up for each and every game, they are as dangerous as anyone in this NCAA tournament field. Another team on that three line that I look at, and I think if they get hot, I don't know who's stopping them is Creighton. The combination of three point shooting and interior presence that they have. I love what Trey Alexander brings. He is a downhill guy. He can get to the basket. You have

Ashworth, Miller, and then Baylor Shireman who Baylor Shireman, I'm gonna tell you right now, I think he could be one of those March Madness stars that just bursts onto the scene that people fall in love with. A guy who you will see put up double, double after double, double, averaging 18 points, averaging more rebounds than their center, Ryan Kalkbrenner, this season. And a guy who just has an all-around game. He does just a little bit of everything. And so he's going to be fun to watch throughout March. Can he have one of these big, you know, 20 and 10 performances that he's had throughout the regular season and really just catch fire from beyond the arc? Because if so,

I think people are going to, like I said, fall in love with his game and what Creighton can do in this tournament. Well, it's interesting. We, you know, in the chat, we had Dave say, I've seen Kentucky blow leads so easily. I don't know. It's not a matter of we think they're going to win. It's a matter of we think maybe they could. But let's talk about Coach Cowell a little bit because he probably is on the level of those iconic coaches, but we haven't seen him go deep in the NCAA tournament lately. And it feels like his own fan base has turned on him. They feel like they're coming back around this last few weeks, but if they don't get out of the first weekend, James, or if they go to sweet 16 and then get blown out by, by somebody who's on route to a final four, I'm not sure that cuts it. It can tell. I did tell. Obviously he's got a lifetime contract, but he's got to capture this at some point, right? Yeah.

Entering the season, you kind of heard, or even entering last year, you heard that next year is the year. Then this year, it was this year's the year. He's got to have NCAA tournament success. He's got this big recruiting class. And so the idea last year was, look at all these players he has coming in.

You can't not give him, you can't rob him the opportunity to coach that group. Well, he comes in, he gets this group. Everybody's in love with him. Then they hit a skid. They start dropping and fans start wondering, is it time to move on from Calipari? There were rumblings of that throughout the regular season on and off. Like you said, they blow leads. You wonder what is wrong with this team.

Well, then they kind of got it figured out. They got it together, and now we've reached March. So for John Calipari, I think it is big. He needs NCAA tournament success. That's what Kentucky fans care about. At the end of the day, whatever happens in the regular season, yeah, they're going to be hot and cold depending on the big games that happen, the results that go down. But what he needs to keep that fan base happy is deep NCAA tournament success. And eventually he's going to have to put up another national championship or they are not going to be happy because it's been quite a while now since they were able to lift that trophy. I think that this year is one of his best chances in recent memory to do so. But if he's not able to, I do think, thankfully for him, he's got another really good recruiting class coming in next year

where he can kind of reset the clock and say, well, you let me coach this group, let me coach that group too. And I don't see him on the hot seat by any means right now. The last time Kentucky made the second weekend of the NCAA tournament was 2019. It was five years ago. Now, one year they didn't play a tournament, so we'll give them that one. And they had a really good team that year. Unfortunately for Cal, that was probably a team that could have gone deep.

But, I mean, it's a crazy stat when you think about how well he's recruited, how, how good they are, how talented they're, the level of players that have come through, you know, the last time they made a final four, 2015, nine years ago, it's been 12 years since that national title. So yeah, the pressure is on him to, to win it. He is at that level though, of the coaches that we can name that the casual fan, you show them a picture. They know who that is. Dan Hurley. Let's talk about him.

Let's talk about the defending national champs, UConn, because it feels like they've been so good this season that we've just sort of forgotten about them except they lost you know a game down the stretch to Creighton like that's the only time we even talk like oh okay maybe they're not invincible but it feels like Dan Hurley rebuilt this team to go win it again they feel very battle-tested and and complete yeah last, last year when they made that run, when they got into the Final Four and then they eventually won the title, the whole time I was sitting there going,

they've got Stephon Castle coming in next year. You look at what they were going to lose off of that team and then look at what they were bringing in, you were like, they have got the talent. They can be right back in this picture next year. Now they're there. They have done it again, and they are one of the top contenders to win the national championship, to go back-to-back, something that has not been done in quite a while in the sport.

It's so hard to do. It's so hard to win in the NCAA tournament regardless. I mean, look at John Calvary in Kentucky. You don't have to look any further than that for evidence. It is really hard to win in March because you've got to get up one day, then you get a one-day break. Now you've got to face another opponent. Then you get a week off.

You've got to do it again and then do it again. It's all single elimination. You've got to win those six games in a row to get this done. Winning six games in a row, hard regardless. But UConn, they look like they're built to do it because they'll just put you away in the first half they will they will dominate I think it'll happen against the 16 seed probably against the eight or nine seed I don't think they will play a competitive game until we get into the deeper rounds of the NCAA tournament and that'll be to their advantage

because they'll still be much fresher than some of their opponents who have to grind out wins, maybe go to overtime. You know, you've got to rely on a buzzer beater. What that does to you just drains you. I think that this UConn team is built to win and go deep in the NCAA tournament, potentially another Final Four appearance. So our friend Nathan in the chat has a question for you. He's a Nebraska fan. They play Indiana in the Big Ten tournament today. How high or low can Nebraska be in the bracket,

depending on how they fare this weekend in Minneapolis? Yeah, Nebraska is a team that they keep just kind of slowly moving up. Every time I run the numbers, I feel like they're kind of inching their way higher up. As these other teams drop games, they just keep kind of inching their way higher up as these other teams drop games. They just keep kind of chugging along. They're doing their thing in Nebraska, pretty much a lock now in the NCAA tournament. So now they can start thinking about seeding. And right now the cap for what they can do is win the Big Ten tournament. Of course, what that would do for them, probably get them a little artificial boost at the end

and get them into that five, six seed conversation. I think other than that, though, if you make a deep run, you could probably get into that seven seed conversation. But eight or nine seed, probably where that Nebraska team is going to end up. Seven seed, probably the cap without a conference title. And then you start looking at do they get that little boost as a Power 5 conference champion to get an extra seat or two added to their name? Before we let you go and before we let everybody get ready for their weekends

because, listen, St. Patrick's Day and the bracket, that's an unbeatable combination. Here we go. I got a game for you, James. We have 14 bids clenched. All right. We're going to play. Do you know the nickname of the automatic qualifier? Okay. Because there will be people who fill out brackets based on team nicknames. And I will say, I'm going through the list. There's a lot of alliteration on this list. I'm noticing that. And I'm realizing I don't know all of these either. I know most of them, but I don't know all of them.

All right. Well, you mentioned McNeese State, the Cowboys already. So we'll give you that one. James Madison. They're the Dukes. That's an easy one. That's an easy one. They're good at football too.

Here's one that should be easy for you too, because this team is in the NCAA tournament very frequently. St. Mary's. That's the Gales. I had to remind somebody that their mascot was on the screen. And they said, what is that mascot? I said, that's a Gale. It's a wind.

No, it's not a wind. It's a Gaelic person, right? Yeah, that's it. I think that's it. G-A-E-I-L. Not like a G not a wind. It's a Gaelic person, right? Yeah, that's it. I think that's it. G-A-E-I-L, not like a Gale Force wind. It's Gaelic as in the people. Okay. College of Charleston. Oh, man. I feel like I should have. I had to look this one up. They're the Cougars.

The Cougars. I was not look this one up. They're the Cougars. The Cougars. I was not getting that one. Named after a cougar in the zoo at Charlestown Landing. They used to be the Maroons. So there you go. All right. Colgate. This should be an easy one.

This is a fun one. Colgate is... Oh, man. Are they the... A share name with an NFL team. I'm thinking the Patriots. The Raiders. Oh, the Raiders.

South Dakota State. These guys are also very good at football. They're the Jackrabbits. I know them. That's exactly right. Exactly right. Longwood. The Lancers.

Yes. Alliteration for the win. Another one if you like the brawl of the wild. One of the best named rivalry games in the history of sports. Montana State. Montana State

is the... They're the Bobcats, correct? Yes! You almost said Grizzlies and that would have made people very mad that's exactly right montana state the school that the duttons like because they're in bozeman all right i'll give you one more this one is cheating for me because i used to go to baseball camp there when i was a kid and it was 15 miles from from where I grew up Stetson the hatters that's right and it's a hat yeah that's it the mascot is like a flying hat

the Stetson hatters your a-sun champs big party in the land Florida they're making the tournament we're all making the tournament because we can sign up for fan duel and play we can fill out our brackets james i cannot wait to talk to you monday when we have a bracket in hand it's gonna be fun we're gonna have to break it all down like you said uh st patrick's day i'm sure plenty of people will be taking a second look at their bracket on monday morning so exactly exactly Drink your green beer responsibly, everybody. We love you. We'll talk to you when the bracket is revealed.