Carolina Blue Storms Spartans

North Carolina's Deon Thompson lays in a shot while Michigan St.'s Goran Suton could only watch. The rest of the Spartans could not bear to see the final result in their impressive run. (AP)

By Brendan Tyman

People were saying North Carolina could not play defense just like Happy Gilmore could not putt. The Tar Heels used a dominating defensive effort to take complete control of the game and secure the school’s 5th national championship.

They jumped to a 22-7 lead six minutes into the game and did not look back in routing Michigan State 89-72. At halftime, the score was 55-34. There were 50,000 Spartans fans were disappointed at Ford Field in Detroit.

After defeating Louisville and Connecticut, State  committed too many turnovers  (21) and were getting beat to lose balls. UNC was able to get in the paint and get high-percentage shots while State was forcing bad 3-pointers.

Ty Lawson led Carolina with 21 points and six assists despite shooting poorly from the field. He was 15-18 from the free throw line. Wayne Ellington, the Final Four MVP, and Tyler Hansbrough added 19 and 18 respectively. Ellington made all 3 treys he attempted. Ed Davis scored 11.

For the Spartans, Goran Suton had 17 points and 11 rebounds. Kalin Lucas, like Lawson shot poorly from the field, tallied 14 points. Durrell Summers came off the bench to chip in13.

Head Coach Roy Williams will celebrate the second championship with a team that was considered to be unbeatable at the beginning of the season. They will share their one shining moment.

Go Ahead, Rip the ACC. But Lay Off the Big East

Story Taken from The Democratic Fanatic:

By Jim Chandley

I heard plenty of criticism of the Big East and ACC leading up to this year’s Men’s BB Tournament.

The ACC should take some serious lumps.  My Eagles were among five of the seven ACC teams to lose in the first round.  And the other two teams (Duke and UNC) were getting in regardless of what conference they were playing in.

So the ACC deserves to get ripped by fans and pundits.

That said, LEAVE THE BIG EAST ALONE.

This will happen again on April 6th. Just substitute Devendorf for McNamara.

Marquette is out.  They played one of the best games of the tournament against Missouri today and lost.  West Viriginia was the only real clunker and they put up a good fight against a strong Dayton team in the first round but fell.

The rest of the Big East teams in the tournament are better than your team and they have or are going to prove it.

Duke could be lucky enough to play Pittsburgh in the Elite Eight if (big if) they can get through a very good Villanova team.  Regardless, the East bracket will send a Big East team to the Final four.

Louisville (and it pains me to say this because I wish horrible things on rick Petino) has a cake-walk to the Final Four.  Michigan St. is garbage, the best hope to keep Louisville from punching a ticket to Detroit is for Kansas to get insanely hot and pull two upsets in a row.

UConn vs. Memphis will be a great game to decide whether or not a Big East team will come out of the West bracket.  Get your popcorn ready for that one.

In the South, UNC is very good, I won’t try to sugar coat that.  But if anyone is going to knock off a powerhouse machine like UNC, it will be the Orangemen.  Syracuse is one of the hottest teams in the country right now.  They don’t have any quit in them and if you doubt that assertion, review the tape of this game.

In short, it could very well be an all Big East Final Four.  If you think your favorite Mid-Major or middle-of-the-pack team from the Big 10, Pac 10 or Big 12 deserved one of those Big East bids, why don’t you get them to play an exhibition match with Providence, Notre Dame or Georgetown.  They’ll get smoked by them, never mind the guys who made the tourney.

March Madness Is Set

Gerald Henderson and Duke could be making an appearance at the Garden in the Sweet 16. (Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

By: Brendan Tyman

At last, the college basketball world is down to 65 Division I teams in the infamous NCAA Tournament that will begin on Thursday.

Three of the four top seeds are from the Big East Conference (Louisville, Pittsburgh, and Connecticut). The other number 1 seed is North Carolina (out of the Atlantic Coast Conference), who was considered one of the most dominant squads early in the season before falling off against some conference opponents.

Brackets are being made and there could be some interesting Cinderella stories this year. One crew to watch is Virginia Commonwealth, who is led by guard Eric Maynor. If you remember, he hit the game-winning basket against Duke two years ago. They play the sixth-seeded UCLA Bruins in the opening round on Thursday night.

UConn and Memphis should be able to play each other in the Elite Eight because the West bracket is not stacked. Meanwhile, the Midwest side presents many challenges for Louisville. West Virginia is a very tough  team in the sixth spot and they could be scary for the higher ranked clubs.

The most disappointed team today should be St. Mary’s as they were a Patrick Mills injury away from overcoming Gonzaga. Instead, they have to compete in the NIT, but they were being compared to Davidson. Mills was the point guard on the Australian group in the Olympics last summer blowing by Chris Paul

As Dick Vitale would say, “these next few weeks will be awesome baby! “