Why are the East Coast sports writers dising this year's Final 4????

[sportscrazy]

This is absolute madness.  I am so sick of these east coast sportswriters and broadcasters saying how this years final four is not the best teams.  Those teams they are referring to (UCONN, NOVA and Duke) got beat by better teams period.  They are prejudice b/c these teams are not from the Big East or ACC.  Does anyone honestly believe that Florida is not better than Nova after watching that game.  How about LSU dismantling Duke's offense.  Oh how bout GMU taking UCONN's big men to school.

I would love to hear everybody's comments on this including yours Mike.  I know everyone is tired of hearing about how much better the big east or acc are.  I should throw in the big 10 which has the highest RPI of any conference.  They did not even get one team in the sweet 16.  By the way I wonder what the schools in the NIT have to say after being whipped by South Carolina.

[The_Bionic_Pig]

This is absolute madness.  I am so sick of these east coast sportswriters and broadcasters saying how this years final four is not the best teams.  Those teams they are referring to (UCONN, NOVA and Duke) got beat by better teams period.  They are prejudice b/c these teams are not from the Big East or ACC.  Does anyone honestly believe that Florida is not better than Nova after watching that game.  How about LSU dismantling Duke's offense.  Oh how bout GMU taking UCONN's big men to school.

I would love to hear everybody's comments on this including yours Mike.  I know everyone is tired of hearing about how much better the big east or acc are.  I should throw in the big 10 which has the highest RPI of any conference.  They did not even get one team in the sweet 16.  By the way I wonder what the schools in the NIT have to say after being whipped by South Carolina.

Well Billy Packer has a new Crush
Anticipating JJ Redick's graduation, Billy Packer has latched on to a new young fella that has caught his eye....

And for those who didn't know, that's Jay Bilas ->

And last but no least Digger Phelps who in my opinion thinks entirely too much of himself. 

[hogfan064]

The sports media hates the South. 

[RedSatinHog]

They were all primed and ready to cover UConn, Nova, Duke, and Syracuse if/when any of them made the final four.

If Syracuse had gotten to Indy, they'd be hyping  "Gerry McNa-mania" on an hourly basis.  They had pretty well crowned Nova, UConn, and Duke as their king on a rotational basis all year.

[stan the man]

What else do you expect from the Media.  Most of them are from the Northeast and their opinion is all that matters.  Its a shame that  ESPN does not have any competion either from the Midwest or the South.  They would put those goons to shame.

[Patch]

Digger's *** highlighter/tie match is just about the most annoying gimmick I've ever seen. Someone needs to rip that thing out of his hands and shove it up his @ (I'm sure Digger has already done this to himself a couple time for fun)

[RedSatinHog]

This is absolute madness.  I am so sick of these east coast sportswriters and broadcasters saying how this years final four is not the best teams.  Those teams they are referring to (UCONN, NOVA and Duke) got beat by better teams period.  They are prejudice b/c these teams are not from the Big East or ACC.  Does anyone honestly believe that Florida is not better than Nova after watching that game.  How about LSU dismantling Duke's offense.  Oh how bout GMU taking UCONN's big men to school.

I would love to hear everybody's comments on this including yours Mike.  I know everyone is tired of hearing about how much better the big east or acc are.  I should throw in the big 10 which has the highest RPI of any conference.  They did not even get one team in the sweet 16.  By the way I wonder what the schools in the NIT have to say after being whipped by South Carolina.

Well Billy Packer has a new Crush
Anticipating JJ Redick's graduation, Billy Packer has latched on to a new young fella that has caught his eye....

And for those who didn't know, that's Jay Bilas ->

And last but no least Digger Phelps who in my opinion thinks entirely too much of himself. 

Did you happen to notice Digger's stunned reaction last night when the ESPN gameday crew brought up UALR in '86?  He was at a complete loss for words for a few seconds, and it was priceless.

[hogfan064]

What else do you expect from the Media.  Most of them are from the Northeast and their opinion is all that matters.  Its a shame that  ESPN does not have any competion either from the Midwest or the South.  They would put those goons to shame.

I wish there would be a more Southern based sports operation come out and compete with ESPN.  I know you have regional stations like FSN, Cox, and CSS, but we need something more.  The South is College Football. 

[sportscrazy]

The South is just as competitive in basketball as it is football now a days.  If you look at the past final fours I do not see any real pattern in the last 16 years.  Some years some regions do better and other years other areas are stronger.  It is time for the national media to admit the parody that exists and start covering the entire country in regards to basketball not just regions and their favorites.

[hogfan064]

The South is just as competitive in basketball as it is football now a days.  If you look at the past final fours I do not see any real pattern in the last 16 years.  Some years some regions do better and other years other areas are stronger.  It is time for the national media to admit the parody that exists and start covering the entire country in regards to basketball not just regions and their favorites.

The South has always been competetive in basketball.  For whatever reason people forget Duke and UNC are located in the south.  I'd say 3 of the top 5 programs alltime are from the South.  UNC, Duke, UK, and then you have UCLA and Kansas.  Notice none are from the northeast. 

[pikehog]

Because none of the teams they deem as the best are there.

[wincrimson]

Easy.

Because 3/4 teams come from the South. Lousiana, Virginia, and Florida... they can't stand it!!

[Niels Boar]

The #1 seeds weren't better than the teams that sent them packing.  The correct interpretation in my opinion is that there weren't any great teams this season.  The #1 seeds were of the lowest quality in some time, maybe ever.  The #1 overall seed lost late in the season to an NIT team and on Senior Day to a bunch of freshmen.  Unheard of.  UConn couldn't get out of the quaterfinals of their conference tourney and never looked one iota better than anybody they played in the NCAAT, including Albany.  Villanova was a donut team no better than, maybe not as good as, the Runts.  Memphis is talented but young and from a really weak conference. 

That doesn't mean that the FF isn't of low quality, too.  UF, UCLA, and LSU should all have been a year away and a player or two short of a FF.  George Mason should be infinity away from a FF.  They didn't win the regular season or tourney of a mid-major conference.  They lost to Misstake for goodness sake.

It's a bad year for college BB in terms of overall quality of play.  It's a good year if you like close, competitive games and a tourney with no sure things.  You could change the outcome of about a total of 10 seconds of play and completely reset the FF.  I underestimated the SEC relative to other conferences.  On an absolute scale I still don't think it was very good, and it may win both postseason tourneys.

[Dirk Piggler]

Ill never forget Doug Gottlieb stating on College Game Night that the SEC was the worst major confrence in the country. He said that the SEC doesnt even deserve to get 6 teams into the tournament. Along with the SEC's tournament inadequacies, Doug also stated that all the SEC does is beat up on each other. All of those morons on that show were talking all year about how the Big East should get 9 teams into the tournament, yet not a 1 team from the Big East got to the Final Four. The only reason ESPN gives two craps about this years final four is because of George Mason, and we all know how ESPN hypes the ever loving hell out of everything i.e. Duke Lacrosse team, TO, Ron Artest, etc, etc,.

[3kgthog]

ESPN is bitter. They spend their entire season covering the Big East and ACC. Now that none of those teams are left, their talking heads are actually having to do a little research and study up on the SEC teams and George Mason. That sugary sweet taste of Coach K's junk is no longer present in their mouths. Now they are being forced to endure that biscuits and gravy, bacon, gumbo, and grits taste of the Southeastern Conference and they don't like it.

[HoopS]

And I love it!   I'm pulling for an All S. E. C.  Championship game precisely to stick it to the man, uhh, ESPN abd it's talking heads.

[94 Hawg]

not surprising that some of the media are trying to discredit this years FF. For the last several years the idea of re-seeding the final four has been discussed in order to ensure the "best" teams are matched for the NC. IF George Mason wins the thing, there is no telling what kind of "fail safe" measures the NCAA may be asked to consider in order to protect the major conference teams. I like the tourney this way, while I agree that none of this years FF will be remembered as one of the greatest ever, the tourney itself may be.

[imahoggie]

no pretty teams left. there is no way they can sell george mason to the national audience as cinderella when all the talking heads keep saying that they arent cinderella anymore. the teams left dont do it with their offensive skill but their defensive ability. but this year will go down as the best tournament ever in my opinion.

[silvertip]

The solution is obvious. We must move Washington, DC to Ogallala, Nebraska.

Then all the old TV networks plus CNN, FoxNews, etc would be forced to set up shop in Ogallala, so they could get their daily spoon-feeding of 30-second sound bites that they call "News."

All the tax money being poured into the cess-pools that line the East Coast would have to be redirected to Ogallala, to support the ruling government class. The financial industry would have to move there so all their bribery/lobbying based profits would not be wipied out by airline tickets. And so the domino effect would continue until even the ESPN guys would have relocate & learn that cows don't usually attack & aren't that dangerous.

Once we get that done, then the Hawgs must join the Missori Valley Conference.

Half-assed measures will only treat a few symptoms. You have to get at the root of the problem.

[razorback3072]

Here's the bottom line.  This years FF makes the "experts" look like idiots.  All year long they hyped the Big East, Big 10 and ACC while trashing the SEC and how down they are.  Obviously something has to be  flawed with the NCAAT because they have been proven wrong.  No way that could happen.  If Wichita St. had made it they would be tooting their own horns about how they lauded the MVC.  As it is, none of their babies are left.   

Here's what matters.  ALL four of the teams in this year's FF had to beat a #1 seed to get there.  If that doesn't mean they are the better team then don't play the tourney, just declare a winner at the end of the regular season.