Tuesday, March 13, 2007

More disturbing issues with NCAA selection

The Syracuse snub gets worse each time you analyze it. Consider: SU won six of its last 8, Stanford lost four of five and Ga. Tech lost before the quarterfinals of the ACC. Those whiffs are deathknells for bubble teams in normal years, as I noted last year in discussing two bubble teams that fell into the NIT and one that reached the NCAA. Comparing '06 with '07, Syracuse is Indiana, Ga. Tech is FSU and Stanford is Michigan. Just more support for the notion that SU got screwed.

I am accusing the Committee of explicitly pandering to its members who harken from conferences where the bubble teams who received bids play (Pac-10, SEC, Big Tenplusone, ACC) at the expense of SU and KState (and of course, Drexel), whose conferences were NOT represented on the Selection Committee. I am ALSO accusing the Committee of actively trying to save Stan Heath and Trent Johnson's jobs because each is known as a good person (whereas KState Coach Bob Huggins is a sonofabitch); neither Drexel's Bruiser Flint, SU's Boeheim or Huggy are on the chopping block. All the explanations in the world will not convince anyone who has watched college hoops or analyzed the teams that the selection of Arkansas or Illinois or Stanford (lost by 34 at home to a military academy!) over Syracuse has any basis in reality.

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