Week of 3/2 Games Thread

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#102      
From the cheap seats
Watching MSU games, often it looks like MSU has 6 guys playing defense because Izzo sometimes is inside the 3-point line. I also follow SIU basketball because of past ties there and I'd like to see the Saluki coach given a T because he often just sits there as games go down the drain. Perhaps a "lack of interest" T?
The B1G refs should make Izzo an honorary member and give him a striped shirt.
 
#103      
WolfpackIllini
Chase321 said:
I don’t understand how someone can think that watching these games. Duke lost to UNC not long ago. UConn lost at home to Creighton. They came close to losing to some other bad teams at home. Arizona lost to a KU team recently that just got stomped on by ASU. Michigan just lost an important player and while great overall has looked less than great in some games. It’s a one and done tournament. What makes you think these teams can’t be beat before the F4?
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Absolutely.
Illini all the way, baby!
 
#105      
Birdus
The UCLA loss got me more riled up than the SCUM beat down. We win that one and we are alone in second right now in seeding and that would have been a great place to be.
 
#107      
NarrowJ
EyeoftheIllini said:
Any good games today?
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A lot of low major tournaments have begun already (Jacksonville vs Bellarmine game just started)

But if that's too boring for everyone we have:

Minnesota @ Indiana
Texas @ #20 Arkansas
#22 Miami (FL) @ SMU
Loyola Chicago @ #25 Saint Louis
Ohio State @ Penn State
Maryland @ Wisconsin
#15 Purdue @ Northwestern
Baylor @ #7 Houston
USC @ Washington
 
#108      
rdk573
OrangeBlue98 said:
Only five teams have a legitimate shot to win a title-Arizona, Michigan, Duke, UConn, and Florida. It’s going to be an incredibly boring tournament until the Final Four.
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Along those lines, Its interesting that prior to the Michigan Game, Mike LaTulip thought we had a legitimate chance of the final four. After the Michigan game on his podcast, he really dialed that prediction back and while not stating it implied that SW 16 is probably our ceiling unless we get really lucky..
 
#109      
EyeoftheIllini
NarrowJ said:
A lot of low major tournaments have begun already (Jacksonville vs Bellarmine game just started)

But if that's too boring for everyone we have:

Minnesota @ Indiana
Texas @ #20 Arkansas
#22 Miami (FL) @ SMU
Loyola Chicago @ #25 Saint Louis
Ohio State @ Penn State
Maryland @ Wisconsin
#15 Purdue @ Northwestern
Baylor @ #7 Houston
USC @ Washington
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I enjoy the low major tournaments, but not the early round games. I probably watch the finals of those tourneys more than I watch the high major tournaments.

Not an inspiring list of games though. Maybe tune in to the STL game as some scouting for my bracket. Same for Houston game for same purpose. Thanks for the list.
 
#110      
Fighter of the Nightman
Second place is 1st loser said:
Is it me or has pretty much every result that we needed over this past week has come through? I'd think that MSU is the only team fighting us for a #2 seed(NCAA Tournament) that isn't floundering.
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Yep, it really was a great week for us so far, and I am greedily hoping for more! At this point, I would argue this is our dream scenario:

(A) Jump to the first #2 seed so we can theoretically get UConn (the presumed last #1) in our region.
(B) Get a First Weekend location in St. Louis, which would be secured by accomplishing (A). This one even more specifically involves our fellow prospective #2 seeds, #3 seeds and #4 seeds losing so no one can pass us, too.
(C) Slide up from the #4 seed to the #3 seed in the BTT, allowing us to avoid Michigan until the brackets are likely finalized while still getting two chances at Quad 1 or even Quad 1A wins.

For those to happen, we need the following results this week. Ones that have already happened are in green or red depending on if they went our way or not. Numbers below are current Bracket Matrix seeds in our "general seeding neighborhood" to give context for why we would prefer a certain result. Needless to say, some are much more realistic than others, lol...

Monday, March 2
#3 Iowa State loses at #1 Arizona (ISU is currently the top #3 seed and a real threat to move up)

Tuesday, March 3
#2 Florida loses vs. Mississippi State (this was never likely, lol)
#2 Illinois wins vs. Oregon
#3 Nebraska loses at UCLA (an Iowa win plus Illini win on Sunday now gets us the #3 seed in the BTT, plus Huskers are St. Louis competition)
#3 Texas Tech loses vs. TCU (TTU probably wouldn't have passed us, but you never know!)
#4 Kansas loses at Arizona State (this was REALLY helpful, as they were creeping up and could prefer St. Louis)
#4 Alabama loses at Georgia
#4 Virginia loses vs. Wake Forest (not that big of a deal, as UVA isn't too close to getting above the #4 line)

---> So of 6 out of 8 games we'd be keeping our eye on this week went in our favor, with the only 2 not going our way being INCREDIBLY unlikely. All of the "swing" games went our way!

Wednesday, March 4
#2 Houston loses vs. Baylor
#3 Purdue loses at Northwestern (NU or not, this is a Quad 1 win ... we can't have Purdue improving its resume too much)

Thursday, March 5
#2 Michigan State loses vs. Rutgers (lol)

Friday, March 6
N/A

Saturday, March 7
#1 UConn wins at Marquette (we want them to remain a #1 seed)
#2 Florida loses at Kentucky (this one is HUGE if we have any hope of being the first #2)
#2 Houston loses vs. Oklahoma State
#3 Iowa State loses to Arizona State (keep that train rollin', ASU!!)
#3 Purdue loses vs. Wisconsin
#3 Texas Tech loses at BYU (this is less important after they already lost to ASU)
#4 Kansas loses to Kansas State
#4 Alabama loses vs. Auburn
#4 Virginia loses to Virginia Tech

Sunday, March 8
#1 Michigan wins vs. #2 Michigan State (assuming MSU beats Rutgers, this is huge to keep them definitively below us)
#2 Illinois wins at Maryland
#3 Nebraska loses vs. Iowa (this is the final result that gets us out of the #4 seed in the BTT, given Nebraska's earlier loss to UCLA)

The odds ALL of these go our way are next to zero, but we are off to a very good start and a lot of these results are hardly crazy. It would certainly be a "best case scenario," but if we take care of business and keep getting a little lucky with other results, we could very well find ourselves the top #2 seed playing in St. Louis and licking our chops for a rematch with UConn in the Elite Eight (super obviously assuming we can come to play and win our first 3 NCAAT games!).

It will be an exciting week!!
 
#113      
wc_illini
Chad Fleck said:
There probably should be far more technical fouls assessed to coaches than there are in today's game. It's insane that they are allowed to act like petulant toddlers and we all accept that as passion.
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It would probably be better for the coaches' own health too
 
#114      
wc_illini
rdk573 said:
Along those lines, Its interesting that prior to the Michigan Game, Mike LaTulip thought we had a legitimate chance of the final four. After the Michigan game on his podcast, he really dialed that prediction back and while not stating it implied that SW 16 is probably our ceiling unless we get really lucky..
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Regardless of how much he thought we were outclassed, there's way too much variance in one game to change your prediction that much.
 
#115      
NarrowJ
rdk573 said:
Along those lines, Its interesting that prior to the Michigan Game, Mike LaTulip thought we had a legitimate chance of the final four. After the Michigan game on his podcast, he really dialed that prediction back and while not stating it implied that SW 16 is probably our ceiling unless we get really lucky..
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Can you link to this? Want to see how much or what was “implied”… MLT isn’t one to overreact to single game sample… would like to view it so I can form my own opinion

Edit: Were talking about S16 so it’s the equivalent of “you couldn’t beat Michigan so you probably can’t beat a Texas Tech/Purdue/Nebraska/Tennessee team either” just doesn’t make any sense
 
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#116      
Fly Illini Fly!
rdk573 said:
Along those lines, Its interesting that prior to the Michigan Game, Mike LaTulip thought we had a legitimate chance of the final four. After the Michigan game on his podcast, he really dialed that prediction back and while not stating it implied that SW 16 is probably our ceiling unless we get really lucky..
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Talk about putting words in someone's mouth lol. Legitimately never said or implied that.
 
#117      
illinifan1987
Talk about putting words in someone's mouth lol. Legitimately never said or implied that.
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GIF by Giphy QA
 
#121      
DICKnaggie
Insane how underutilized Martinelli is at NW. How are they not running more actions for him?
 
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