South Region Discussion

[UAEebs86]

Guys, what's the tip time for Sunday?

Don't think it's been announced yet.

[AZCatGirl]

Announced now. This is Tucson time.

[Siempre Verde]

6:40. Release just tweeted.

Though I’m wondering if the release is wrong. Seems so far after the previous tip.

[dovecanyoncat]

Gotta make time for the crowd change over.

[UAEebs86]

6:40 San Diego time? (Which I know is the same as Tucson time right now)

[UAEebs86]

Gotta make time for the crowd change over.

Don't think there's a crowd change over for the 2nd session.

[dovecanyoncat]

Gotta make time for the crowd change over.

Don't think there's a crowd change over for the 2nd session.

Assholes!

[AZCatGirl]

[azcat49]

Sundays game we will need Mathurin to show why he is an all American and lottery pick. He needs to get to the line like he did against UCLA.

We also need Terry to continue his hot play and Tubelis to step back into form

[Beachcat97]

Sundays game we will need Mathurin to show why he is an all American and lottery pick. He needs to get to the line like he did against UCLA.

We also need Terry to continue his hot play and Tubelis to step back into form

Tubelis was silky smooth today. If not for the foul trouble, he'd have scored 20+

[97cats]

more than just South but thought i would post here

1-seeds

Arizona Wildcats
Original seed: No. 1
First-round result: Defeated No. 16 Wright State, 87-70

Prior to Friday's win over Wright State, Tommy Lloyd had won a multitude of NCAA tournament games as Mark Few's longtime assistant at Gonzaga. This time, he experienced a postseason victory as the head coach of a team with a top seed. With Kerr Kriisa (10.1 PPG) sidelined with an ankle injury, Arizona still managed to connect on 55% of its shots (55% from 3, too) against Wright State.

In his first season as a head coach, Lloyd won his first NCAA tournament game as a Division I head coach and also gave the Wildcats their first NCAA tournament win since 2017. They scored 39 points on uncontested looks, per ESPN Stats & Info, too. Bennedict Mathurin (18 points) and Christian Koloko (17 points, 13 rebounds, six assists, five blocks) helped Arizona advance.

They weren't perfect (see: 19 turnovers), but the Wildcats are 16-1 in their last 17 games and a legit contender to not only reach a Final Four in Lloyd's first season, but also cut down the nets if they get there.

Up next: vs. TCU (Sunday, 9:40 p.m. ET, TBS)

https://www.espn.com/mens-college-baske ... s-round-32

[CopaCat]

TCU's defense is nasty.

Not watching this one. How's their size? Because the nastiest D in the country is still going to have trouble with us unless they've got some guys 6'10 or taller.

Their starting C, Lampkin is 6’11, 270 lbs…..their next biggest is F, Miller, 6’7, 215 lbs. and then F, Obannon 6’6, 215 lbs. They also have F, Cork 6’9 228 lbs & F, Coles 6’7 225lbs both off the bench on a 9 man rotation.

Staring G Miles, 6’2 195 lbs & G Baugh, 6’4 195 lbs. Bench: G Peavy 6’7, 215 lbs & G Farabello 6’3 178 lbs.

So that means we have a size advantage.

If their interior defense is as good as most are saying, then it means CK and AT have to be stronger than they've ever been with the ball. These guys will strip the ball again and again, and we can't count on the refs bailing us out.

I like our chances against any team where our size advantage is a factor.

Quite a few people were using Seton Hall's size as the primary reason TCU was going to lose tonight. Well... Our size is certainly more imposing, but still it won't be easy against their bulldog defenders.

Our key will be running our offense at max efficiency. No 19 turnovers and stupid shots. We do that and we will have a great chance. Good D will be paramount as well. Our D against Wright St was so/so when we weren't blocking shots. Way to many easy looks.

This will be our toughest test in a while. Tougher than USC and UCLA IMO. These guys have wins over KU, Texas, TT, and Iowa St(all in the round of 32). The Big 12 was clearly the best conference this year if we are basing it on current NCAA tournament results.

This will be our Final 4 litmus test.

[EastCoastCat]

All games moving forward will be tough. Just figure out a way to win.

Our defense will be the key on Sunday.

[Chicat]

No easy paths. Just win…

[HiCat]

TCU's defense is nasty.

Not watching this one. How's their size? Because the nastiest D in the country is still going to have trouble with us unless they've got some guys 6'10 or taller.

Their starting C, Lampkin is 6’11, 270 lbs…..their next biggest is F, Miller, 6’7, 215 lbs. and then F, Obannon 6’6, 215 lbs. They also have F, Cork 6’9 228 lbs & F, Coles 6’7 225lbs both off the bench on a 9 man rotation.

Staring G Miles, 6’2 195 lbs & G Baugh, 6’4 195 lbs. Bench: G Peavy 6’7, 215 lbs & G Farabello 6’3 178 lbs.

So that means we have a size advantage.

If their interior defense is as good as most are saying, then it means CK and AT have to be stronger than they've ever been with the ball. These guys will strip the ball again and again, and we can't count on the refs bailing us out.

I like our chances against any team where our size advantage is a factor.

Quite a few people were using Seton Hall's size as the primary reason TCU was going to lose tonight. Well... Our size is certainly more imposing, but still it won't be easy against their bulldog defenders.

Our key will be running our offense at max efficiency. No 19 turnovers and stupid shots. We do that and we will have a great chance. Good D will be paramount as well. Our D against Wright St was so/so when we weren't blocking shots. Way to many easy looks.

This will be our toughest test in a while. Tougher than USC and UCLA IMO. These guys have wins over KU, Texas, TT, and Iowa St(all in the round of 32). The Big 12 was clearly the best conference this year if we are basing it on current NCAA tournament results.

This will be our Final 4 litmus test.

TCU vs #6 Kansas | Big 12 Tournament
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kv8_1nnRCYg

[Alieberman]

Updated list:

These are the only teams I'm worried about in the South Region:


Michigan
Tennessee
Ohio State
Villanova
Illinois
Houston
TCU

Teams I'm not worried about:

Bryant
Wright State
Colorado State
Longwood
Loyola Chicago
Delaware
Chattanooga
UAB
Seton Hall

[RaisingArizona]

TCU's defense is nasty.

Not watching this one. How's their size? Because the nastiest D in the country is still going to have trouble with us unless they've got some guys 6'10 or taller.

Their starting C, Lampkin is 6’11, 270 lbs…..their next biggest is F, Miller, 6’7, 215 lbs. and then F, Obannon 6’6, 215 lbs. They also have F, Cork 6’9 228 lbs & F, Coles 6’7 225lbs both off the bench on a 9 man rotation.

Staring G Miles, 6’2 195 lbs & G Baugh, 6’4 195 lbs. Bench: G Peavy 6’7, 215 lbs & G Farabello 6’3 178 lbs.

So that means we have a size advantage.

If their interior defense is as good as most are saying, then it means CK and AT have to be stronger than they've ever been with the ball. These guys will strip the ball again and again, and we can't count on the refs bailing us out.

I like our chances against any team where our size advantage is a factor.

Quite a few people were using Seton Hall's size as the primary reason TCU was going to lose tonight. Well... Our size is certainly more imposing, but still it won't be easy against their bulldog defenders.

Our key will be running our offense at max efficiency. No 19 turnovers and stupid shots. We do that and we will have a great chance. Good D will be paramount as well. Our D against Wright St was so/so when we weren't blocking shots. Way to many easy looks.

This will be our toughest test in a while. Tougher than USC and UCLA IMO. These guys have wins over KU, Texas, TT, and Iowa St(all in the round of 32). The Big 12 was clearly the best conference this year if we are basing it on current NCAA tournament results.

This will be our Final 4 litmus test.

UCLA is a much better basketball team than TCU. Yes it will be a tough game. Yes we will have to play a cleaner game but we should be able to handle TCU. As for it being our litmus test. Not really. IMO each of these upcoming games (if we are lucky enough to advance through the region) will be tougher than the prior one. Just the way it should be.

Bottom line: we have to play better than we did last night. I'm confident that we will.

[HiCat]

Updated list:

These are the only teams I'm worried about in the South Region:


Michigan
Tennessee
Ohio State
Villanova
Illinois
Houston
TCU


Teams I'm not worried about:

Bryant
Wright State
Colorado State
Longwood
Loyola Chicago
Delaware
Chattanooga
UAB
Seton Hall

TCU is the only team I'm worried about on Sunday.

[pc in NM]

Apropos of nothing, I woke up this morning with a consuming sense of anxiety that the tourney is overwhelmingly difficult, and scary as hell!!!

I just started with a "Black Eye" (A cup of coffee with two shots of espresso added). I may need a couple....

[RaisingArizona]

Apropos of nothing, I woke up this morning with a consuming sense of anxiety that the tourney is overwhelmingly difficult, and scary as hell!!!

I just started with a "Black Eye" (A cup of coffee with two shots of espresso added). I may need a couple....

Saving the Irish coffee for game day?

[pc in NM]

Apropos of nothing, I woke up this morning with a consuming sense of anxiety that the tourney is overwhelmingly difficult, and scary as hell!!!

I just started with a "Black Eye" (A cup of coffee with two shots of espresso added). I may need a couple....

Saving the Irish coffee for game day?

The critical resource, especially as we move ahead in the tourney, is to make sure that my Pez Dispenser is fully loaded with Xanax...

[wyo-cat]

Apropos of nothing, I woke up this morning with a consuming sense of anxiety that the tourney is overwhelmingly difficult, and scary as hell!!!

I just started with a "Black Eye" (A cup of coffee with two shots of espresso added). I may need a couple....

I’ve heard it called a Red Eye.

[pc in NM]

Apropos of nothing, I woke up this morning with a consuming sense of anxiety that the tourney is overwhelmingly difficult, and scary as hell!!!

I just started with a "Black Eye" (A cup of coffee with two shots of espresso added). I may need a couple....

I’ve heard it called a Red Eye.

A "Red Eye" is a single shot, I believe...

[Beachcat97]

Survive and advance. Can’t let this season end against TC-freaking-U.

[dmjcat]

Sundays game we will need Mathurin to show why he is an all American and lottery pick. He needs to get to the line like he did against UCLA.

We also need Terry to continue his hot play and Tubelis to step back into form

We need to stop the freaking turnovers.

20+ TO's on Sunday and there will be a greater than 50% chance our season is over.

I'm hoping the TO's in the 1st round were the result of jitters from our players participating in their first NCAA tournament game.
Other than Ballo none of the other players have ever been in an NCAA tourney game (don't know about Kier?)

[Beachcat97]

Feel like this team’s story extends past the 2nd round of the tourney. We’ve been too good, too dominant.

[RaisingArizona]

That kid on Wright State with the man bun is a great defender. We played sloppy but they deserve some credit as well.

[Captain Obvious]

TCU is the exact type of team that has historically given Arizona problems. Physical teams that slow the tempo and make it a half court game have a chance against us. TCU packs the paint and they will do that tomorrow to see if we can hit our outside shots. This is where dribble penetration is key. Drive, draw, and dish and play over their heads. Mathurin needs to drive inside more. If they take an early lead we're in trouble. TCU isn't an offensively oriented team which means they'll hit 15 three's tomorrow. We have to limit the turnovers. We turn it over 20 times tomorrow I guarantee we're finished.

[HiCat]

TCU is the exact type of team that has historically given Arizona problems. Physical teams that slow the tempo and make it a half court game have a chance against us. TCU packs the paint and they will do that tomorrow to see if we can hit our outside shots. This is where dribble penetration is key. Drive, draw, and dish and play over their heads. Mathurin needs to drive inside more. If they take an early lead we're in trouble. TCU isn't an offensively oriented team which means they'll hit 15 three's tomorrow. We have to limit the turnovers. We turn it over 20 times tomorrow I guarantee we're finished.

Good lord Debbie Downer.

[RaisingArizona]

The anxiety here is unwarranted IMO. Tubelis doesn't get called for a foul on that block he likely continues going off and we put the round 1 game away early. Even without Kerr we're really, really good. The tournament is full of chance of course but we're positioned very well for a deep run.

We have to play better to reach our goals but we picked a good game to play our sloppiest. We'll get it fixed.

Worth keeping in mind that TCU actually is far more turnover prone than we are . Over the course of the season they've turned it over on 21.1% of their possessions as opposed to us doing so 17.8% of the time. We play swarming defense and we may just run them off the floor.

[RaisingArizona]

Oh and ...

GO MICHIGAN!

[Longhorned]

All games moving forward will be tough. Just figure out a way to win.

Our defense will be the key on Sunday.

This. I agree with the narrative about TCU's defense giving Arizona trouble but they're going to need a damn strong offensive performance to establish their defense inside the arc.

On offense, the one thing I'm still waiting to see from Arizona is capitalizing on the defense favoring our lob to Koloko/Ballo in the block, and the pass to the cutter. I understand that a lot of our turnovers yesterday were just sloppy, but many of them were from forcing what was closed. For example, since the season ended you've now got two defenders committed in the block the second the ball is in the elbow. Instead of exploiting that, we continue to turn it over by forcing the pass inside.

Maybe we didn't want to give our Sunday opponent tape, but TCU is going to be laser-focused on doubling in the block and closing the passing lanes to the cutter. That doesn't mean we have to force it or shoot a 3, but we do need to make a sandwich, pour a glass of milk, do some fucking thing.

[HiCat]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evPp6fYjyz8
Seton Hall vs. TCU

TCU's pg very quick.

[U.P. Zona Fan]

Sundays game we will need Mathurin to show why he is an all American and lottery pick. He needs to get to the line like he did against UCLA.

We also need Terry to continue his hot play and Tubelis to step back into form

We need to stop the freaking turnovers.

20+ TO's on Sunday and there will be a greater than 50% chance our season is over.

I'm hoping the TO's in the 1st round were the result of jitters from our players participating in their first NCAA tournament game.
Other than Ballo none of the other players have ever been in an NCAA tourney game (don't know about Kier?)

Kier played for Tom Crean so.... No.

[UAEebs86]

After reading this thread, I'd place TCU somewhere between 1990 UNLV and 1974 UCLA.

[Alieberman]

I wish we could have a UofA watch party with all of you guys to watch our Cats and drink some drinks.

I would invite you all if I could!

Except Captain Obvious. That dude would complain about the type of chips I bought

[RaisingArizona]

After reading this thread, I'd place TCU somewhere between 1990 UNLV and 1974 UCLA.

Thanks. Now I'll have Anderson Hunt nightmares this evening. When he passes away they better put "that was an offensive foul" on his tombstone.

[UAEebs86]

After reading this thread, I'd place TCU somewhere between 1990 UNLV and 1974 UCLA.

Thanks. Now I'll have Anderson Hunt nightmares this evening. When he passes away they better put "that was an offensive foul" on his tombstone.

If it's any consolation that was 1989.

[RaisingArizona]

It's not

[UAEebs86]

It's not

I feel your pain. I had plane and game tickets to go to the Elite Eight game in Denver with my best friend (would have been against Seton Hall) but I was so depressed I blew off the whole trip.

[Merkin]

This won't help either, but Lute in his book said it was a Lofton flop.

[RaisingArizona]

This won't help either, but Lute in his book said it was a Lofton flop.

That's because Lute was all class. The video evidence is pretty suggestive of a push off but I may ge looking at it through a modern officiating lens.

[RondaeShimmy]

Our turnovers come when they're trying too much to showboat and be showmen. Usually when they have sizeable leads, they start to get too excited and just slinging passes without much care.

If it's close, I usually don't remember seeing much of this carelessness. But for the reasons above, I think this team could be in danger of getting Illinois'd against a more mature teams.

See this graph I posted in the past.

This isn't a surprise, our games turn into AAU games when we have a huge lead

Hate to say it but there's a chance of 2005 Illinois happening to us again

[97cats]

TCU is going to come out and look to punch AZ right in the mouth, they are like Colorado with better players and better coached.

they will turn it over and can go healthy stretches having difficulty scoring the basketball. in these open spots its imperative AZ capitalizes and scores pushing the issue - TCU wants to ugly it up and thats much easier to execute when close or leading, strong desire to slow down the game and hold the ball as the TV timeouts evaporate.

terrific team to play with a lead on, awful to fall behind.

if the score is within five after the under 16min TV timeout in the second half, then AZ is in for the fight for their tournament lives.

another note, its tournament time.... the whistles are softer and the play-ons encouraged - AZ must make the adjustment on both ends and exert their physical prowess and dominance.

[RaisingArizona]

Apologies to Mike Miles but conference version ofJabari Walker is better than the anyone on TCU.

16 pts 10.4 rebounds shooting 49.5/41.4/80. He's improved so much and is going to be a superstar next year if he sticks around. Reminds me a bit of Derrick Williams to be honest.

Colorado was playing like an 8-11 seed by the end of the year. They just had too many bad losses to overcome.

[Beachcat97]

TCU is going to come out and look to punch AZ right in the mouth, they are like Colorado with better players and better coached.

they will turn it over and can go healthy stretches having difficulty scoring the basketball. in these open spots its imperative AZ capitalizes and scores pushing the issue - TCU wants to ugly it up and thats much easier to execute when close or leading, strong desire to slow down the game and hold the ball as the TV timeouts evaporate.

terrific team to play with a lead on, awful to fall behind.

if the score is within five after the under 16min TV timeout in the second half, then AZ is in for the fight for their tournament lives.

another note, its tournament time.... the whistles are softer and the play-ons encouraged - AZ must make the adjustment on both ends and exert their physical prowess and dominance.

Awesome breakdown, 97. Appreciated.

How do you think our lobs to CK will go? Seems like we're at our best when we get easy looks for CK and AT. The defense collapses on them, and it frees up our guards to create or pop a three.

[Captain Obvious]

I wish we could have a UofA watch party with all of you guys to watch our Cats and drink some drinks.

I would invite you all if I could!

Except Captain Obvious. That dude would complain about the type of chips I bought

Nah, I'm not that mean. Besides feeling bad for them, I give credit to anyone that has to put up with me.

[dmjcat]

The anxiety here is unwarranted IMO. Tubelis doesn't get called for a foul on that block he likely continues going off and we put the round 1 game away early. Even without Kerr we're really, really good. The tournament is full of chance of course but we're positioned very well for a deep run.

We have to play better to reach our goals but we picked a good game to play our sloppiest. We'll get it fixed.

Worth keeping in mind that TCU actually is far more turnover prone than we are . Over the course of the season they've turned it over on 21.1% of their possessions as opposed to us doing so 17.8% of the time. We play swarming defense and we may just run them off the floor.

Unwarranted???

The odds of a #1 seed reaching the Final Four is 41.67%. Thats worse than a coin flip.

Anyone not concerned is either nuts or just drinking too early in the day.

Go Cats!

[RondaeShimmy]

another note, its tournament time.... the whistles are softer and the play-ons encouraged - AZ must make the adjustment on both ends and exert their physical prowess and dominance.

They were playing really soft, probably from the pac 12 touch fouls softening teams again.

They have to stop complaining so much to the refs. At some point they have to realize they're not going to get the calls. I know he's your guy, but Mathurin is the worst at this.

[RaisingArizona]

The anxiety here is unwarranted IMO. Tubelis doesn't get called for a foul on that block he likely continues going off and we put the round 1 game away early. Even without Kerr we're really, really good. The tournament is full of chance of course but we're positioned very well for a deep run.

We have to play better to reach our goals but we picked a good game to play our sloppiest. We'll get it fixed.

Worth keeping in mind that TCU actually is far more turnover prone than we are . Over the course of the season they've turned it over on 21.1% of their possessions as opposed to us doing so 17.8% of the time. We play swarming defense and we may just run them off the floor.

Unwarranted???

The odds of a #1 seed reaching the Final Four is 41.67%. Thats worse than a coin flip.

Anyone not concerned is either nuts or just drinking too early in the day.

Go Cats!

Are we talking about beating TCU or making the Final Four?