I'm a day late and a dollar short on this one, as Bobby Knight picked them to win it all on Sportscenter last night. However, I don't think they'll win it all. I just think they're going to make a solid run in the tournament.
Since Knight stole my thunder, I'll just give you my abbreviated case for Pitt.
They play great defense. In the Big East tournament, no team scored over 70 points and only Georgetown shot over 40% against them.
They are 18-1 with a healthy lineup, including wins over Duke and Georgetown on neutral courts. If they had had Fields all season, they probably would be a 2 seed,
The number 1 seed they face in the sweet 16? Memphis. If you've read this site any, you know I'm not a big fan of the Tigers. It's the perfect match-up for Pittsburgh.
Unfortunately, Pittsburgh is becoming the trendy team to pick. You know what that means. They're destined to fail. Now, instead of being a team that no one knows about, everyone (especially Memphis) will have their guard up against them. They won't sneak by anyone now, and thus will not make it to the Final Four.
I could kick myself for not writing this last week and looking like a genius.
1 comments:
Teams that play Pitt's kind of defense get in foul trouble in the NCAA tourney. Stifling, athletic defense like UCLA, Memphis, Tenn, even Arkansas play is tournament dangerous D. Not to mention if you think Memphis' free throw shooting is a problem, how about Pitt's awful shooting in general. It's being awfully kind to even call Pitt a streaky shooting team. I realize they are better this year than in previous years, but they are still a team that went 10-6 in a grossly overrated Big East this year They just don't score the ball that well and that adds up to losing close games to better teams (like at least 3 other teams that are in their region) in the closing minutes of the game.
You'd have looked more like a genius if you had posted about what an idiot Bob Knight is for predicting that they would win, since they aren't making it past Tom Izzo's crew in the 2nd round.
Hope everyone is doing well. Give me a call sometime.
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