Hooray For Links! February 21

I was never a big proponent of doing link dumps and the like on this site because, well, it didn't really make sense to me. Why would I simply reproduce things that are already out there? But as I did my own scouring of the Intertubes for college hoops content, I realized there was just too much quality (and, at times, utterly awful) stuff out there to simply leave untapped. So I give you Hooray For Links! which should appear at completely random intervals. Because without links, it's not really a blog, it's just a place to put thoughts I might not want to forget.

Them links be after the jump.
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- Before we get into anything of substance, great Louisville blog Card Chronicle shares this video of a rapping UL fan, makes world worse place. Reminds me of a young Ghostface. I really should've dedicated a single post to this.

- I really enjoyed Grant Wahl's article in Sports Illustrated a couple weeks ago on the Dribble-Drive Motion Offense that everyone seems so excited about. Now, if you aren't a hardcore basketball person, this whole piece is a waste of your time. It's an in-depth look at how the philosophy was originated, how it works, who is using it and what personnel suits it best. If you enjoy dunks, cheerleaders and screaming at the TV, you probably shouldn't read this. Anyway, the DDM offense has been made most popular by John Calipari and Memphis, which is odd because the Tigers don't really have the ideal players (i.e. jumpshooters) for the offense. But they do have Derrick Rose and Chris Douglas-Roberts, who are both perfect for the penetration and kick offense. They also have Joey Dorsey, who is ideal for this offense because it requires no post scorer and puts a team's big man on the weak side of the ball for offensive rebounds and drive-and-dishes. Still, you wonder if the shooting will be Memphis' tragic flaw. The offense was created by Vance Walberg, who was a JuCo coach at the time, then got a job at Pepperdine and recently resigned/got fired (the one problem with the article is it makes little mention of Walberg's tenure and departure at Pepperdine). Over 300 teams across the country, at all levels of play, now use it and the article contains praise from Larry Brown and Bob Hurley. So if your retinas aren't singed from Bruce Pearl's suit (by the way, the Vols are perfect for DDM and they don't run it), look for that offense Saturday night.

- Kansas State Head Coach and Crazy Person, Frank Martin seems to be getting a lot of love for KSU's success this season and this feature by Chip Brown at the Dallas Morning News continues that trend. Martin, despite being a raging lunatic on the sidelines, actually does seem like he cares about his kids and knows the game. HOWEVA, he still has a very shady past and it seems like no one knows about it besides me and Robert Andrew Powell, the Miami New Times reporter who broke the 1998 story on Martin fabricating addresses for the state champion high school team he coached (which included Steve Blake and Udonis Haslem), an investigation that led to his resignation. Certainly people deserve second chances and performance speaks for itself, but read the 1998 story and then read Brown's feature and see if there aren't some serious contradictions in some of Martin's "do it the right way" quotes.

- I don't like pointing out when I'm right -- actually, who am I kidding, of course I do -- but back at the end of January I had post on the four teams I thought were capable of winning a championship. I picked Kansas, UNC, UCLA... and Louisville. The CHN message board destroyed me for this at the time and much time-wasting vitriol ensued. Well we all know what Louisville has done since and in a recent post at the fabulous Basketball Prospectus the fabulous Ken Pomeroy (I'm not gay) pegged the Cardinals as his "No. 6" team behind the obvious top five of Memphis, Duke, UNC, Kansas and UCLA (this was posted on Feb. 13, so I figure Tennessee is now in there, moving Louisville to No. 7... but I was still right! /stares into distance).

- I've been following the bizarre story of Tim Parmeter, Eastern Arizona JuCo coach who, as originally reported by Gary Parrish, was coaching through the murder-suicide of his ex-wife and child but was recently fired amid allegations that he had a sexual relationship with a 16-year old while he was married. I'm not going to elaborate any further on it, and I've gotten some comments here that were both interesting and abhorrent, but if you haven't seen this bizarre story, here is a good follow up from the Arizona Republic.

- I'm really sick of the Kelvin Sampson thing and, besides posting on The Big Lead's anonymous source that said he was going to be fired last Friday which obviously turned out to be wrong, I'm going to ignore it on here. But this piece from Andy Katz served as a great one-stop source for all the nonsense surround Sampson.

- Against all odds, ESPN.com's college basketball coverage has been outstanding lately. In the beginning of the year they just seemed to regurgitate the same played-out storylines but there have been a number of really good, deep pieces lately. I'd like to think a big part of that is the addition of Philly's own Dana O'Neill, former Philly Daily News writer, who turned in a GREAT feature on Alcorn State and the unglamorous life of basketball in the SWAC. It's long but a great read for those sick of the power conference slobbering.

- Keeping with the ESPN theme, Chris Low takes a good look at the long, hard journey of Tennessee-Martin's Lester Hudson, who is one of the most talented players in the country. Hudson has overcome a rough childhood and academic problems to make it to Division I, and he is probably is good enough to play in the major conferences.

- And one more to throw at you, Heather Dinich's feature on Towson junior Tony Durant, who just happens to be the older brother of Kevin Durant. It's a great look at the odd emotional predicament Kevin's success has caused for Tony, who I somehow didn't even know about until I read this piece.

- Two posts from fellow Ravenous Shark Fightin' Blue Hen Dan Steinberg at the outstanding DC Sports Bog. First a great reaction to the idiot court storming from Syracuse fans when the Orange beat Georgetown at home last week. Second, an ever greater post, a report from last night's Virginia Tech-Maryland game where Dorenzo Hudson puked on the floor. If you are a sick, twisted freak here is the video.

- This Deadspin post has all sorts of Bob Knight goodness. Apparently current Nets coach and former Indiana manager was a bit of a douche back in the day, and may have taped Bob Knight giving a terrifying, profanity-laced tirade at halftime of a game, which has made its way onto the Intertubes. Within the post is the story on Frank and audio of Knight's shitstorm. And here is Terry Hutchens original story on the tape.

- Awful Announcing notices something that I too have noticed recently. Brent Musberger (pictured above) is careening toward senility (during a college game he blurts out that the Wizards want to trade Caron Butler!). Between this, his insistence on calling every player only by his first name ("What a rebound by Jamarcus") and his bonechilling ogling of Erin Andrews (I know, pot/kettle/black), I am worried Brett might poop himself during a conference championships game this year. And if only for the comment section, here is Deadspin's approval rating on Musberger. (Yes, I've also found the Brent Musberger Drinking Game, here's to binge drinking Brent!).

- This story has been written about 12 million times but in case you just can't get enough Duke-hating, some fella at MSN tries his hand at explaining why nobody likes the Blue Devils.

- From Scott Van Pelt Style, apparently former Duke forward and obnoxious towel waver Reggie Love is a bodyguard for our next President Barack Obama.

- From the motherland CHN, a nice column on Gonzaga, specifically the dichotomy between Josh Heytvelt and Jeff Pendergraft. Kinda follows a previous sentiment I had on the Zags that with all these All-Americans they have lost the scrappiness and chemistry that made those old Gonzaga teams so great.

If A Season Ends And You Aren't Around To See It, Does It Piss You Off?

So an odd thing happened last night. My favorite college basketball team, Syracuse, lost to South Florida, effectively ending its hopes at an NCAA bid. Before I discuss what that means to me, a brief background of my fandom.

It's very intense. I shouldn't really have to mention this because the mere fact that I'm writing a damn sports blog is probably enough proof, but I have a pretty ardent passion for sports. When it comes to my favorite teams, there is no way to just casually watch a game. No matter who they play, when they play or who is playing, I will inevitably yell at the TV, pleading with Arinze Onuaku to box out or Jim Boeheim to switch to man-to-man for once or for someone, anyone, to make a damn foul shot. There are times when I try to detach myself from the outcome, curtailing my expectations and looking at the quality of a particular Syracuse team with as much practicality as possible. "OK, they aren't going to win at Georgetown. They cannot. If they just don't get embarassed I'll be happy." Two hours later, as Jonny Flynn's game-winning heave rattles in-and-out I fall to me knees pull the hood on my sweatshirt over my face and ponder all the fortunes that would've come along with Flynn's shot going in. I go back to all the missed lay-ups, missed foul shots, bail-out fouls and foolish turnovers and now say to myself, "We should've won that game! We outplayed them!" And this happens multiple times per year. It's an emotion ingrained in the hardcore sports fan that is as instinctual as grief or love. It's unavoidable.

That being said, I'm not feeling any different today, with my squad's season essentially over, than I did yesterday. In fact, since I knew the game wasn't on TV and it was against the worst team in the conference, I forgot Syracuse was even playing last night, until I checked ESPN's scoreboard around 8 p.m. and saw the Orange down 15 or so. And when I saw it, I barely reacted. I knew the ramifications of that score holding up and I knew how likely that was, and yet there was nothing. And this concerned me as a fan. If this game had been on TV, I would've locked myself in the bathroom with a box of Girl Scout cookies screaming profanities periodically until it was empty. But when it showed up in text in front of me, I just quietly said, "Fuck" and clicked somewhere else. And today when a friend of mine reminded me what happened I had a similarly understated reaction. It seemed that my intensity wasn't the result of any special connection with my team, but just with wanting to witness a specific outcome and experience the joy/sorrow that accompanies that outcome. My fandom had nothing to do with Syracuse, just with winning. So by this logic, I should be able to turn on any game, convince myself I really care about one of the two teams and experience the same excitement I would with a game featuring my favorite team. Chances are the next time Syracuse is on, even though its season will be ostensibly over, I will still root for it with the same amount of aforementioned ardor.

And I suppose this is why gambling is so popular and I suppose there is some broader thesis on the essence of being a sports fan that would take 10,000 words to delve into and probably wouldn't serve anyone anyway. We are sports fans just because. To explain it in totality wouldn't make that next game any different. But what is kinda interesting about this little quandary, is how it relates to the debate over college basketball's regular season.

The general assumption in collegiate sports is that the college football season matters and the college basketball season does not. The reasoning being that if you lose one game in football, the whole season is over and you can lose several in basketball and still have a shot at a title. By this reasoning, singular college football games are exciting and singular college basketball games, by and large, are not as exciting (rivalries excluded). I'm not going to comment on football, I'm just using it as a counter-argument. I want to focus on the "regular season college basketball games aren't as exciting" argument and say that, after what I experienced with the South Florida loss, that is incorrect.

If the "excitement" part of any witnessed sporting event including your favorite team is based on win and loss -- and that emotional association with the outcome is unavoidable -- then isn't the context of that regular season game irrelevant? For instance, let's say your team, a top 20 team but not a title contender, is playing two games in February. One is against an in-conference team with a similar record and could be vital for conference title purposes, tournament-seeding and all that stuff. The other is against a team outside of the NCAA picture and your team is heavily favored. The former game is not on TV, the second game is. It turns out both games are extremely close and decided in the last minute. You try your best to follow the first one on Gamecast or something, keeping abreast of the score. You watch the second game from start to finish. Your team wins both games. Which experience is more exciting?

It's the TV game, even if it means significantly less in the grand scheme of things (the "grand scheme of things" being something completely undefinable in sports and yet half-heartedly assumed to be "winning"). And that's why I didn't feel that much remorse or grief when Syracuse lost to South Florida. Because it doesn't take anything away from the reason we watch sports in the first place. To be genuinely excited about something that is essentially trivial (and as an "escape" and all that other shit, you get the idea). The playoffs are a different story because the excitement of winning a title is far different than any singular game and generally rates on a separate, far-more-transcendent level of sports enjoyment but for the regular season, every game is exactly the same. If the Orange win Saturday's game against Georgetown on ESPN I will be ecstatic; it will make the rest of my day significantly better. But they still won't be a tournament team and I will know, just like the fans of 340 other Division I basketball teams, this won't be the year I reach that transcendent level of sports excitement. But just because that one moment isn't going to happen, doesn't mean all those other moments become irrelevant. It's an incredibly optimistic way to look at a singular sports season. Just like the robotic drones that play our sport say without fail in every press conference: "Just take it one game at a time."

So thanks Syracuse, for losing to an incredibly shitty South Florida team. I have a new, positive outlook on the season even if you will be achieving absolutely nothing.

The End Is Near: Duke Might Be Likable

I need to tread lightly with this post, but here goes.

I have hated Duke basically as long as I've been a basketball fan. It used to be for the same reasons as everyone else. They were rich, cocky and white, with usually their coach and a few select stars carrying the torch of douchebaggery for that oh so cultured student section. Sure, there were a ton of Duke players that do not exhibit any of these traits. Grant Hill, Carlos Boozer, Elton Brand... actually, any player that succeeded in the NBA was alright in my book. Those guys had the right to be arrogant if they wanted, they could back it up and weren't just a product of privilege/hype/media coverage. But everyone knows the real icons of Dookiness, the guys who embodied all that hatred, we don't need to name them.

Anyway, so I used to hate them because of all that, plus the excruciating media coverage, the Vitale/Patrick dynamic, the floor-slapping, the favorable officiating and the seemingly familiar face/athletic ability that didn't appear to be any different than the guy's I went up against in high school. This hatred was probably predicated on the fact that Duke was almost always good, and I was not a fan of them. I've found that I've hated them the same reason the Patriots are hated now or the Yankees have been hated for eternity. As I became a more rational sports fan, I realized that anyone who hates a team for those reasons is an idiot. Media coverage and whiteness are not crimes against humanity. But that's not to say I didn't stop hating Duke.

With the help of my new rationality and Will Blythe's book To Hate Like This Is To Be Happy Forever, probably my favorite sports book ever, I had new reasons to hate Duke. They represented everything that is wrong with America. I'm not saying that to be a sensationalist, it's the truth. They represent an elite, entitled America. They think they deserve things for being Duke the same way the majority of Americans think they deserve things for being America.

In Blythe's book he profiles the difference between UNC and Duke. I'm going to save his outstanding cultural analysis of that rivalry for when that game rolls around, but one element of his argument was that Duke was imperialistic. A bunch of rich, elite kids from the North, coached by a Polish guy from Chicago, settling in the heart of North Carolina, an area full of humble, middle-class folks, who were genuinely passionate about few things: religion, family and basketball. Not American Express or taunting or media favoritism or anything in basketball that doesn't happen on the court. Duke, and more specifically Coach K, stormed Durham and turned the town into something the rest of North Carolina couldn't identify with, and thus, resented. Now I'm from the Philly area, but if you have certain political views, it's not hard to empathize with those UNC fans. I hated Duke for the reasons they did, which is far different, and I think far more substantial, than the reasons of the general public. I think you could even say that Duke has stormed the college basketball landscape in general and turned it into something true hoops fans couldn't identify with as well, but that might be painting with too broad a brush.

Anyway, those are the foundations for my hatred of Duke over the last few years and last season was a microcosm of my new rationalism. Sure, the standard annoyances were there, but it was the immediate arrogance and expected success of that team, full of big name recruits like McRoberts, Paulus, Henderson, Thomas that made their eventual demise so much more enjoyable. For most of the season, the media loved them, the Crazies loved them, they loved themselves. "We were All-Americans, we got a scholarship to Duke fucking University, we are going to stomp anyone who comes near us." But as sometimes happens in college hoops, things don't work out as they should. Talent doesn't trump heart and it doesn't denote chemistry. Watching them lose to VCU, a mid-major team with a young upstart coach and an unsung star, Maynor, who in reality, was more talented than anyone Duke had, was ever so sweet.

Now, at the beginning of this year, I knew something was up. They only lost McRoberts, which could be considered addition by subtraction, and they brought in three All-Americans. Given the general exodus of veteran talent amongst the top teams and the media's jock-sniffing of the Devils I thought Duke would be top 7 team for sure. But when they were out of the top 10 and lambasted for their lack of inside presence and point guard play, I was almost disappointed. Was Coach K removed from his pedestal above the colleges hoops world? I saw the doubts, but where were the benefits of the doubts? Hopefully they are even worse than people are saying. Hopefully they are still overrated somehow. Then I watched them play.

Let me tell you something. Not only is Duke better than expected, they are the most fun team to watch in the country and they are the BEST TEAM IN THE COUNTRY. Yes, it's true. I don't want to jump to conclusions, but I've got to think Coach K's time with Mike D'Antoni this summer influenced this. They are playing small ball like the Phoenix Suns. They certainly don't have Nash or Stoudemire, but they spread the floor with versatile shooters and ball-handlers, drive and kick flawlessly and create enough defensive chaos to keep teams from exploiting their weaknesses inside. They have speed and ballhandling matched by maybe no one in the country besides, ironically, UNC and can get scoring from about eight different guys. Henderson, King and Singler is the best wing combo in the nation and cause constant mismatches, ala, Shawn Marion for Phoenix. A more detailed analysis of their greatness would be pointless, it's not hard to watch them play and see why. (Or just read this outstanding article by Grant Wahl at SI.com)

You might say, well how does style of play change how they are assholes? Well, besides King, there is a quietude to this team that is unassuming. When you can't pick one player to hate, whereas in the past there was always one figurehead of Duke-ism, from McRoberts to Redick to Battier all the way back to Laettner, you realize this team seems to embrace a team concept in both their style and their attitude. And if Coach K truly did change his style to adapt to what he had, rather than change what he had to embrace his style, isn't that a lack of stubbornness that we could have never expected out of him? And when we see this dynamic, a program that has gotten along forever by practicing their own brand of arrogance on their own island amidst the college basketball landscape trying to get things done like everyone else, should we embrace them? I say yes, and I will watch them with joy every time they are on. (I still hate the Crazies though, they haven't changed at all).

Yes, the end of our Duke-hating paradise might be near, and in what is surely no coincidence, Dick Vitale is nowhere to be found. Certainly I wish Dukie V well, but this might be a year he's better off missing.