Welcome to the latest Championship Week edition of Talking Hoops With Ted Sarandis. Selection Sunday is getting closer, and there’s plenty to talk about from the action on Thursday and Friday, especially just hours before we did this.
We start with the Big East Tournament, where semifinal action consisted of an overtime game and one with a lot of fouls, including ejections. The fouls and delays at the monitor added up to a regulation game taking well over two and a half hours. There were 85 free throws, nine technical fouls, three ejections, and four more players fouled out. Even more bizarre – if you can believe it – Seton Hall star Myles Powell was ejected, but then he was not.
The next topic is a few other conference tournaments, notably the ACC, where Florida State knocked off Virginia and Duke edged North Carolina in another classic between the two arch rivals. This makes the debate for the top seeds in the NCAA Tournament a little more interesting, but as we discuss, also dependent on whether or not either of Tennessee or Kentucky wins the SEC Tournament (a possibility made more real by Florida knocking off LSU on Friday) as well as if Michigan State wins the Big Ten Tournament, although there hasn’t been much said about the Spartans in this respect.
Also, we talk a little in-depth about the bad end to the season for UConn, who got annihilated by an 84-45 margin in the American Athletic Conference Tournament quarterfinals on Friday. The Huskies’ season began with some promise, but they finish the season 16-17, a result not all that surprising considering their talent base and that Jalen Adams missed several weeks of action due to injury.
As we close with a mention of the fun day ahead with 14 conference championship games, Ted also looks back at the Atlantic 10, where Rhode Island started the day by knocking off VCU.
We hope you enjoy the podcast and share it with your fellow college basketball fans. Be sure to join us after the Selection Show as we bring back College Basketball Tonight right here on Hoopville. College Basketball Tonight is a comprehensive breakdown of the NCAA Tournament, with many great guests joining Ted Sarandis and Phil Kasiecki from Selection Sunday to the national championship.
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