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Sunday, December 22, 2024
North Carolina was dominant at times in the 2016-17 season, maybe more so than any other team in the country. That was not the case in the NCAA Tournament, but it was still good enough for the Tar Heels to complete what they couldn’t the year before.
North Carolina will get a chance to finish what it started last year. Gonzaga gets a shot at finishing what it started nearly 20 years ago.
For an event that started with a relative thud by its lofty standards, the 79th NCAA Tournament sure has made up some ground as it hits the homestretch, and it will culminate this coming weekend with one of the more fascinating Final Four quartets in some time,
Half of this year’s Final Four is set, and we can already say this much: good luck choosing just one sentimental favorite.
It can be argued rather easily that no two programs in college basketball have been so consistently good for the last 30 years while still being kept from making a Final Four appearance as Gonzaga and Xavier. In that regard, it’s only fitting that both will now square off on Saturday, with one guaranteed to make its first-ever national semifinals appearance.
The first rounds of the 2017 NCAA Tournament weren’t a bad six days. But competitive games are basically a minimum standard in the tourney. We crave unpredictability, yet this year’s tourney is lacking it.
Through five days, the 2017 NCAA tourney has become marked by its lack of surprises, and Saturday was no different, regardless of what seeds say.
With all respect to the four teams eliminated in play-in games, Thursday always marks the start of the NCAA Tournament as most know it. As far as opening days go, it was somewhere in the middle.
The postseason is just a couple days old, and already it’s been one wild ride for the Pac-12.
Much the same as the NFL season opening on a Thursday night or Major League Baseball beginning on a Sunday night, the NCAA Tournament beginning with play-in games on a Tuesday night-starting with two 16 seeds against each other-will never feel right. That said, as long as the NCAA continues playing its First Four, then Tuesday night was a pretty good start for a tourney.
