Today's Random Thoughts

A couple quick thoughts for you today:

1) After noticing that Bernard King was having his number retired by Tennessee last night, I decided to honor King in my own way and pop in my video of his classic 1979 film debut, Fast Break. I only watched a bit of it, but I was reminded how implausible a story Fast Break is. While the number of times that one needs to suspend belief are too numerous to count, I think the one thing that I just can’t accept is that any team would actually respect the wisdom of a coach who wears cut-off shorts. That just seems totally implausible. The fact that that coach is Gabe Kaplan just adds further insult to the viewer's intelligence.

2) From the "patting myself on the back" file, here’s what I said a few weeks back about two of Marquette’s biggest keys to their success at that time:

In Marquette's last two victories, I've seen two key things that have elevated them beyond their struggles in their first two games of the year. First, Dominic James has been shooting very well from long range. Second, Ousmane Barro is playing really, really well. I think the James thing is something of an aberration and that he'll be back to normal pretty soon, but I think Barro's improvement is real.

Yesterday’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel cited Barro as currently being "Hot," due to his recent string of double-doubles, and cited James as "Not," due to his wildly inaccurate shooting of late. I’d link to it if the Journal Sentinel’s website wasn’t all screwed up right now. But rest assured, I feel vindicated (and perversely happy that early speculation that James would turn pro after this year is really taking a hit now–I’d love to have him around another year...). And luckily for MU, there's been a lot more to their success of late than those two things.

3) I can accept North Carolina losing to Virginia Tech, since the Hokies have a pretty good team, but I’m utterly perplexed by Texas A&M losing to Texas Tech. How does Tech beat A&M twice this year? This makes no sense to me.

4) For a quick high school thought--I can’t be the only one thinking it–given the massive uproar over the massive disturbance a few weeks back during the Bay View vs. Milwaukee Tech game at Tech, what happens should they meet in regionals or sectionals? Both teams are pretty good, and though I’d bet against it happening, it’s not totally implausible that they’d meet in the sectional final to go to state. Wouldn’t that be an interesting night at the McGuire Center...

5) When I hear that Duke’s out of the top-25 for the first time since I was in high school, I can’t help but wonder what former interim coach Pete Gaudet is up to these days...

6) Was the normally well-spoken Rick Majerus on drugs this past weekend when he called the Wisconsin vs. Iowa game. Because I’m pretty sure that I heard him refer to Greg Stiemsma as the Badgers’ second best outside shooter. Aside from that game where Stiemsma was knocking down 15-footers like his life depended on it, I can’t think of a night where I’ve been confident watching him shoot outside of 4 feet. Disappointing to hear such a horrific misstep from Majerus, who’s typically really well informed about the teams from his home state.

Back soon with more thoughts. This figures to be my most important basketball weekend of the year, so I should see some interesting things...