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| Sunday, December 3, 2006 |
They’ve just announced on the Fox BCS hype-fest that the Florida Gators have been chosen to play the Ohio State Buckeyes for the (mythical) Division-I college national championship.
This was probably a foregone conclusion, as Florida vaulted past Michigan in the final polls. Adding intrigue and controversy to the situation, OSU’s Jim Tressel declined to participate in the coaches’ poll.
Florida passed Michigan and returned to No. 2 in The Associated Press Top 25 and the USA Today coaches’ polls released Sunday.
While the Gators had a slim lead of three points over Michigan in the AP poll, they were 26 points ahead of the Wolverines in the USA Today poll — a margin that could help get Florida into the national title game. The coaches’ poll is one of three components used in the Bowl Championship Series Standings, along with the Harris poll and a compilation of six computer ratings.
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Ohio State’s Jim Tressel did not vote in the USA Today coaches’ poll to avoid the perception of a conflict of interest, a move the newspaper said could jeopardize his future in the selection process. “We are excited to play in the BCS title game against a tremendous opponent,” Tressel said in a statement. “After consultation with my director of athletics, Gene Smith, and based upon our unique position in the BCS standings, I believe it is only fair that we not participate in the final poll.”
Monte Lorell, USA Today’s managing editor for sports, said Sunday in a statement, “We are disappointed with coach Tressel’s decision, but our oversight role does not grant us authority to compel his participation. The agreement with the American Football Coaches Association obligates the panel of coaches to disclose final regular season ballots, without exception. “Coach Tressel’s future involvement in the poll will be part of our annual review with AFCA executive director Grant Teaff.”
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Teaff, a former coach, said Tressel’s decision was “not something that we would like to have happen, but it’s kind of an unusual circumstance.” Until last year, the coaches’ ballots were not made public. Now, the final regular-season ballots are released. “It’s just a tough situation,” Teaff said.
You can’t blame him, really. It’s an awkward situation for a coach guaranteed a shot at the title to have the opportunity to help pick his opponents. Indeed, one without integrity could easily pick a lesser opponent by voting the #3 or #4 team #1 and leaving the higher ranked teams off the ballot.
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| Tuesday, April 4, 2006 |
Pat Forde has an excellent roundup of Florida’s trouncing of UCLA to win the NCAA Tournament.
For five straight years, Florida’s marches through March were short and not terribly sweet. The Gators were always in the NCAA Tournament — and always back out after the first weekend. This time, Florida stayed until the end, and in the process, scorched Bracketville to the ground. The final embers were still smoking here late Monday, after the Gators put a Zippo to UCLA’s britches, 73-57.
The Bruins might own dances past, but this waltz was all blue and orange. A program that couldn’t finish became a juggernaut that couldn’t be beaten, and only once could even be threatened. Florida won its games in this dance by 26, 22, four, 13, 15 and a sweet 16 points. The 16-point average margin of victory was the highest by a champion in five years.
The onslaught was capped off by an unprecedented title-game beatdown of a higher seed. The last time a lower seed won on the Biggest of All Mondays by this many points? Never, at least since they started publicly seeding teams in 1979. “I felt like we were going to win this game by a large margin when we came in,” versatile wingman Corey Brewer said. “Nobody gave us any respect all year. We proved it. We took our respect.”
Actually, respect for the Gators mushroomed over the past three weeks, to the point that they were the common-sense favorite entering the Final Four. But they had to endure the America’s Team talk before playing George Mason, then got an earful on Sunday about how were they ever going to penetrate that UCLA defense.
“All our guys heard about for the last day and a half was how great defensively UCLA is,” Florida coach Billy Donovan said. “I don’t think our basketball team got a whole lot of credit about how good they are defensively.”
They get all the credit now, after turning this Final Four into a crashing anticlimax to a riveting tournament.
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| Tuesday, March 28, 2006 |
NYT reporter Michael Schmidt says not to feel bad about blowing your NCAA brackets this year. You are not alone.
Know anyone who has the Final Four intact in the office pool? No way.
After all, not one top-seeded team made it. The last time that happened was 1980. Who could have picked the Patriots — not Tom Brady & Company, but the ones from George Mason?
Was there a secret to making sense of possibly the most unpredictable N.C.A.A. tournament? For Russell Pleasant, a 46-year-old software engineer from Omaha, it took a lucky mistake. When he filled out his bracket earlier this month, he thought George Washington would reach this weekend’s Final Four. Instead, he ended up picking George Mason, round after round after round, all the way to Indianapolis. Now, he finds himself a rare survivor among millions of broken hearts with busted brackets across the nation. In ESPN.com’s 2006 Men’s College Basketball Tournament Challenge, Pleasant had one of the four entries among three million with U.C.L.A., Louisiana State, Florida and George Mason in the Final Four.
Last season, 4,172 people picked all four teams in ESPN.com’s pool. But last year’s Final Four featured a more predictable lineup: two top-seeded teams, North Carolina and Illinois; a fourth-seeded team, Louisville; and a fifth-seeded team, Michigan State. At cbs.sportsline.com, none of the two million brackets submitted this year had all four teams. In the Yahoo Sports pool, just one of more than a million entered had all four.
Even with the ridiculous number of upsets this year, I would have figured dozens of people would have gotten the Final Four right just through the law of large numbers. Five people out of seven million? Wow.
Update: Josh Lewin is currently in 4th place in ESPN’s pool. Sadly, he picked UConn, eliminated by George Mason this weekend, to win the whole thing.
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