Stomp The Lunatic

On a night when all the favorites had won, it made sense that March had saved an upset for the final Sweet 16 game. 6th seed Tennessee took a one point lead into halftime against the 2nd seed Iowa State. But they came out strong to start the 2nd half as Nate Ament hit a three-pointer and Ja’Kobi Gillespie drove to the hoop for a layup to quickly extend that lead to 6.

Then, on two back-to-back possessions, Tennessee’s Jaylen Carey got an offensive rebound and tipped the ball back in while the Volunteer defense continued to shut down Iowa State, and with about 12 minutes to play, Tennessee was up 14 points. And they never looked back.

Nate Ament had 18 points and Ja’Kobi Gillespie added 16 points to lead the Volunteers, but to be honest, the thing that really won the game for Tennessee was their defense that held Iowa State to 39% from the field and 22% from three-point range on the way to a 76-62 victory to claim the final spot in the Elite 8 – the third consecutive year that Tennessee has reached the regional final.

Congratulations to our leaders after the Sweet 16. Thanks to getting 7 of the 8 Elite 8 teams, Mark Walsh has claimed the lead with 780 points, giving him a 30 point lead over Stacy Dooms. We have a 4-way tie for third between Brian Betz, Will Richter, Chris Stolzer and Mike Wyatt at 740 points. And another 4-way tie for seventh between Mary-Rian Bradley, Matt Reilly, Al Lester and Bo Luy at 730 points.

In the Upset Pool, Matt Reilly still leads with 252 points, but his lead has shrunk to 5 points as Mark Walsh and Mack Fournier are tied for 2nd at 247 points. Shirli Zelcer is in 4th place just 6 points behind, and Al Lester rounds out the top 5 at 237 points.

In the Second Chance Pool, we lost all our perfect brackets by the end of the night. But we still had 6 people who went 7 for 8 to be tied for first at 280 points. Congratulations to my wonderful wife Elizabeth Hodgson, Mack Fournier, Sonny Mao, Natalie Parker, Steve Thornton and Wendy Joseph. It seems only fair that my wife have some success in the pool with me making her watch all this basketball in March.

Congratulations to all our leaders!!!! And of course, the 8 teams that made it to the Elite 8. By the end of the weekend, only 4 will remain with the opportunity to travel to Indianapolis to play for the NCAA men’s national championship.

I am sure that Tom Izzo and the Michigan State Spartans wish they had the first 10 minutes of the game back. Despite getting a bunch of offensive rebounds, they could not make a basket, and the Connecticut Huskies jumped out to a 25-6 lead.

The Spartans would chip away in the first half to cut the lead down to 8 at halftime. They even took a lead with 10 minutes to play when Jaxon Kohler got fouled on a layup and hit the free throw to take a 45-44 lead. But the Spartans would go cold from the field again, and UConn would get a three-pointer by Alex Karaban, a layup by Solo Ball, and then Jayden Reed would steal the ball, get fouled and hit a free throw to give the Huskies back a 7 point lead.

But the Spartans would continue to chip away. With two minutes to play, Michigan State ran a high pick and roll to Carson Cooper, who charged down the lane and made a huge dunk to cut the lead to one. But on the next possession, Alex Karaban hit the dagger with a deep three-pointer to extend the lead back to 4.

Michigan State would try to get the ball back into Cooper, but his drive got stopped so he kicked it back out to Jeremy Fears, who hit a three-pointer from the top of the key to cut the lead back to 1 with about a minute to play.

Tarris Reed from UConn would get the ball need the hoop but was fouled with the shot clock running down. And the 58% free throw shooter hit both free throws to make it a 3 point game. Jeremy Fears would try to quickly drive to the hoop, and missed the layup but got fouled. His two free-throws cut the lead back to 1.

Michigan State tried to trap in the backcourt, but once it crossed the half-line, they fouled Alex Karaban. The senior calmly came to the line and hit both free throws. The Spartans would come back down the court clearly looking to drive to the basket and score quickly. But the Huskies played strong defense and wouldn’t let Fears get a path to the basket. They forced the ball out of his hands, and with the clock winding down, Kur Teng missed a well-defended three-pointer with about 5 second left, and Carson Cooper got fouled trying to get the rebound.

Cooper hit the first and missed the second. While it was unclear if it was intentional or not, it was a great try and a miss that would allow the Spartans to get a rebound and try to tie the game as it bounced softly off the front of the rim. But the Huskies’ Tarris Reed Jr outleaped everyone for the ball and was fouled.

And with the season on the line, as he did with about 45 seconds in the game, the worst free-throw shooter on the court calmly drilled both free-throws and sent the Huskies to the regional final against Duke.

Congratulations to the Huskies on surviving and advancing – it should be an incredible regional final in Washington, D.C. on Sunday.

In the first half, it looked like Alabama could continue their run and upset the Big 10 regular season champions. The Crimson Tide led at halftime by 2 points in a half that they led for a good amount of the half including getting all the way out to a 9 point lead. At 49-47, the half was being played at Alabama’s pace of play.

But Michigan came out in the second half and slowed the game down into more of a half-court game. They would start the second half off on a 15-5 run and they simply didn’t look back at that point. Alabama’s hot shooting slowed down and the Wolverines took advantage.

Yaxel Lendeborg scored 23 points and Elliot Cadeau added 17 points for the Wolverines. But the biggest difference might have been the fact that Roddy Gayle Jr and Trey McKinney combined for 33 points off the bench.

Alabama’s Labaron Philon Jr did everything he could as he scored 35 to lead the Crimson Tide. But Michigan was able to shut down the rest of Alabama in the second half, and they won 90-77 to advance to the Midwest Final in Chicago.

The #1 team in the country was on the ropes. St. John’s took a 1 point lead into the locker rooms at halftime, and after watching Duke score the first 5 points of the second half, the Red Storm went on a 15-1 run, capped off by a three-pointer by Ruben Prey and a jumper by Ian Jackson.

The Blue Devils found themselves down double digits. Then, as Duke started chipping away, the telecast posted the following stat. Duke is 5-0 this season when they fall behind by 10+ points during the game. And sure enough, Isaiah Evans hit a jumper and a three-pointer to cap off an 18-7 run to give Duke the lead.

The teams would trade off baskets back and forth until about 4 minutes to play when Evans hit a step back three-pointer to give Duke a 70-69 win. After a defensive stop, the Blue Devils got the ball into Cameron Boozer’s hands, and he drives the lane and hits a floater and got fouled. After the free throw, Boozer had given Duke a 4 point lead with 3 to play.

After another missed three-pointer, Duke extended the lead to 6 when he got the ball in the corner, faked a three-pointer to get the defender to fly by him, took a couple dribbles towards the hoop and hit the jumper.

Zuby Ejofor from St. John’s would hit a deep three-pointer from the wing to cut the lead to 3, but Caleb Foster would make a nice drive to the basket after running the shot clock down and then muscle the ball up to the basket for a tough lay-up.

Dylan Darling would miss a three-pointer but Dillon Mitchell got the offensive rebound and kicked it back outside. This time, Ejofor would try the deep shot and miss, but the ball goes out off a Duke player. Finally, after some strong defense, Bryce Hopkins got the ball in the corner, drove the baseline and made a nice reverse layup to cut the lead to 3 points with 52 seconds.

St. John’s would foul Cameron Boozer by holding onto him as he was getting ready to set a screen, but the Duke star missed the front end of the one-and-one, so St. John’s still had a chance. And Zuby Ejofor would get fouled on his drive with 14 seconds to play. Ejofor would only hit one of the free throws to cut the lead to 2. So, St. John’s was forced to foul Isaiah Evans.

And sure enough, Evans missed the first free throw before hitting the second one. St. John’s got the ball into Dylan Darling, who took the ball to the wing, acted like he was going to drive to the basket, and then shot the three-pointer. But it barely hit the rim before going out-of-bounds.

Duke would get the ball into Cameron Boozer, he would hit both free throws to ice the game, and the Duke Blue Devils survived to advance to Sunday’s East Regional Final in Washington, D.C.

We are 30 minutes away from watching what might be one of the best games of the tournament – and we are only in the Sweet 16.

The ACC regular season and conference tournament champion Duke (34-2) will be playing the Big East regular season and conference tournament champion St. John’s (30-6).

I am still not 100 percent sure how the Red Storm ended up a 5 seed, and who both teams angered in order to put them in the same region with each other. This probably should be a Regional Final or a Final 4 game – instead we get to see them play to kick off Friday’s Sweet 16.

And that is just the start. We got Michigan vs Alabama, UConn vs Michigan State and Iowa State vs Tennessee. You really can’t ask for a better set of games. Super looking forward to it.

Arizona jumped out to a 26-15 lead on Arkansas early and never looked back as they cruised to a 109-88 victory. I have to admit that watching Arizona dismantle a very good Arkansas team does not make me as excited as I was two hours ago. I still think Purdue has a chance because they play a completely different style of basketball from Arkansas. But it certainly doesn’t make you feel good when you know that defense is your team’s biggest weakness and your upcoming opponent just scored 109 points.

So, I switched over to the Illinois vs. Houston game. With it being 24-22 at halftime, I figured it had to be a better game than watching Arizona stomp all over Arkansas. And then laughed as Illinois went on a 17-0 run early in the second half and then hold on to beat Houston by 10. Still, the Big 10 has to be thrilled with its performance, as it won 3 of the 4 games today. Sure – they were guaranteed to win at least one game with Iowa and Nebraska playing, but after Illinois’ victory over Houston in the Cougars’ backyard means that the Big 10 will now be guaranteed at least one team in the Final Four – as the Fighting Illini will play the Hawkeyes for the opportunity to head to Indianapolis.

Congratulations to Illinois, Arizona, Iowa and Purdue on advancing to Saturday’s Elite 8 games.

As for the Stomp the Lunatic Pool, Matt Reilly has been tied up by Bo Luy at 650 points – they have a small 10 point lead over Matt’s second bracket, Heath Lindvall and Dan Fischer. Ryan Hilton is in 6th place – just 20 points behind. And Brian Betz, Mark Walsh, Will Richter and Mike Wyatt round out the top 10 at 620 points in a tie for 7th.

In the Upset Pool, Matt Reilly leads at 243 points, and has a 3 point lead over Shirli Zelcer. Lochlan Middlebrook is in 3rd place at 222 points, followed by Tony Wilson in 4th place at 220 points, and Matt Reilly’s second bracket along with Bo Luy being tied in 5th place at 218 points.

As for the second chance pool, 10 entries were able to pick all 4 games correctly tonight. Those 10 perfect brackets are owned by Lauren Martin, William Craft, Michael Cheung, Karen Barton, Jim Wambach, Audra Chamowitz, Jerry Caldwell, Steve Thornton, Wendy Joseph and my wonderful wife, Elizabeth Hodgson!!!

Congratulations to all our leaders. We also unofficially can congratulate Brent Hassell, although he has won the prize no one wants. With Houston’s loss to Illinois, Brent’s last team alive has fallen. So he is locked in at 190 points to clinch last of the eligible entries in the Standard Pool. This is normally where we say the classic trash talk, “You shouldn’t have challenged the Lunatic!” – but we all know that is not true. The Lunatic is lingering in a tie for 95th place so everyone should have challenged him. With Matt Reilly having two of the top 5 entries, the more appropriate statement is “You shouldn’t have challenged Matt!”.

Four more exciting games tomorrow. Duke and St. John’s kick us off in Washington, DC at 7:10 pm, with Michigan and Alabama kicking off in Chicago at 7:35 pm. And then, in the late games, we have an outstanding matchup between UConn and Michigan State at 9:45 pm with the finale being Iowa State and Tennessee at 10:10 pm.

Should be some fantastic basketball as we will lose 4 more teams to get down to the Elite 8 this weekend!

In another tight game, Iowa managed to tie the game with 5 minutes to play at 65 when Alvaro Foiguieras hit a three-pointer. And then both teams went cold. Neither team scored for almost 3 minutes.

With about 2 minutes left, Iowa’s Bennett Stirtz drove to the lane and kicked it back out to Cooper Koch at the top of the key. He then passed it back out to Stirtz who had rolled out to the wing, and Stirtz hit the three-pointer to give the Hawkeyes the lead.

Nebraska tried to match the three-pointer, but Rienk Mast’s three-pointer from the wing missed and Iowa’s Alvaro Foiguieras rose over everyone to get the rebound. Stirtz would once again drive to the basket and kick it back out to the top of the key – this time to Foiguieras. And Foiguieras found Tate Sage wide open in the corner, who calmly hit the three-pointer to give the Hawkeyes a 6 point lead.

Pryce Sandfort would take a deep three-pointer that missed and rolled off to the corner. Nebraska’s Braden Frager would chase the ball down, take a dribble out to the three-point line, and make the shot from the corner to give the Cornhuskers life.

But on the in-bounds play after a timeout, Karl Combs bombed the ball down the court to Foiguieras who hit the break away lay-up and got fouled. His made free-throw would extend the lead back to six.

Sandfort would miss another free throw from the top of the key causing Nebraska to start to have to foul to try to extend the game – but they still had fouls to give. This turned out to be important as the Hawkeyes did a great job of getting the ball in and avoiding the defenders coming in to foul until Tate Sage found Foiguieras in the corner, and the junior forward drove the baseline for a dunk to make the lead 8.

Nebraska would miss a few more three-pointers, Iowa would hit a free throw, and Pryce Sandfort would hit a meaningless three-pointer with a couple seconds left on the clock as Iowa would advance to the South Regional Final with a 77-71 upset victory.

You don’t see a lot of 9 seeds make it to the Elite 8 – they are getting hot at the right time of the year. Congratulations to the Hawkeyes!!!!

Texas’ Tramon Mark did everything humanly possible to get his Longhorns to the Elite 8. Even after a scare where he landed on Fletcher Loyer’s foot and twisted his ankle, Mark came back and continue to score at will against the Boilermakers. Mark finished the night 11 of 15 with 29 points to lead all scorers. No matter what Purdue did, it seemed like Mark was going to score whenever he wanted to. This made the Lunatic horribly nervous as the game continued to stay tied deeper and deeper into the night.

There were a lot of reviews – CJ Cox got clobbered with an elbow by Matas Vokietaitus in the first half. Trey Kaufman-Renn and Camden Heide got a double technical foul which looked like a hook-and-hold on TKR. Honestly, I am not sure either should have gotten a technical, but if anyone should have, it was the Boilermaker. I think they felt they needed to calm down the physical play – but it did not stop anything. There was another appeal by Texas to try to get another hook-and-hold on TKR, but it was ruled that he was just getting post positioning before getting fouled (which as a biased Purdue fan, I feel was the correct call).

To my defense (on my biased calls), I had told Elizabeth earlier that I didn’t think Texas’ Vokietaitus deserved a technical for the elbow, he was trying to get out of the double team and clobbered Cox, but while excessive contact, it looked like he was trying to make a basketball play and not trying to kill the Purdue guard.

Everyone who was playing in the paint was in foul trouble – that was because both teams were either driving hard to the hoop or posting up.

With a little over 5 minutes left, Mark hit a three-pointer with a hand in his face to give Texas a 70-66 lead, and the Lunatic was downright panicking. But Kaufman-Renn and Braden Smith would get fouled and hit their free throws to tie the game with about 4 to play.

Matas Vokietaitus got fouled in the paint with a chance to give Texas the lead from the line, but he missed the one-and-one. And the Boilers did what they had most of the game, they got the ball down into post – this time to Oscar Cluff, and his layup gave the Boilers a two point lead.

Dailyn Swain would drive to the basket but miss the layup and Purdue had a chance to extend the lead. CJ Cox missed a three-pointer, but Cluff got the rebound and kicked it back out. Purdue would have Braden Smith drive the baseline but it was blocked by Vokietaitus. It was first ruled a shot clock violation, but then after review, it was clear there was still 0.5 seconds off the clock. What wasn’t clear was if the ball went off Oscar Cluff or Dailyn Swain – the refs ruled it was Texas’ ball despite the disagreements from the announcers (since obviously at this point, I am very biased). The announcers were surprised that Painter didn’t challenge it – but I think he was right. They just reviewed it and felt it was off Cluff’s hands, that was not going to be overruled by looking at it again.

Purdue might not have gotten the basket, but they took over 40 seconds off the clock. At this point, it was clear who Texas wanted to get the ball, and CJ Cox was chasing Tramon Mark all over the court trying to stop him from driving. Eventually, with the shot-clock going down, Mark took a deep jumper and missed. Worse, Mark then fouled Braden Smith as he brought the ball up the court – the clock stopped, but Smith went to the line. And shockingly, Smith only hit one of the two free throws – it was still a one possession game. Bad thoughts start going through the Lunatic’s mind as he watched his 83% shooting senior guard miss the second free throw. He had to remind himself that Texas had not been great from three-point range.

Purdue guarded the perimeter well so Dailyn Swain eventually drove to the hoop – his shot in the lane would be short, but Chendall Weaver would be in the right place to tip it in and cut the lead to 1 point with a minute to play.

The Boilers would give the ball to their star point guard. And with the shot clock winding down, Smith drove hard to the basket, beat his man down the lane, and made the layup! Jordan Pope would try to tie the game with a three-pointer that was short, and there was a battle for the rebound leading to a jump ball with about 20 seconds. When the ball got in to the Texas center Vokietaitus, Fletcher Loyer immediately fouled him to send him to the line. He had been struggling in the tournament from the line, but with the season on the line, he made both free throws to cut the lead back to 1 point.

Texas played the inbounds well, forcing the ball into CJ Cox, where he got fouled. With all the senior leaders on the Purdue team, it would be the sophomore with the most important free-throws of his life. And CJ Cox like a hero drilled both of them to keep the lead at 3 points. And the Lunatic thought – this is OK, as long as the lead is 3, we can’t lose in regulation – just keep trading baskets and we win.

Texas brings the ball in and get it to Dailyn Swain. The Purdue defender closed in quickly to take away the three-pointer, and Swain drove right by him. He gets all the way to the hoop, makes the layup and gets fouled by Oscar Cluff with 11 seconds left. And with the biggest free-throw of his life, Swain drills it to tie the game. And the foul was big since it was Cluff’s fifth – Purdue had lost their center that had been so important in getting offensive rebounds and posting up in the paint.

Everyone kind of expected that Purdue would run their patented pick-and-roll between Smith and Kaufman-Renn. Smith brought the ball up the court, let the clock tick down so they got the final shot, but TKR never came up to the free throw line – it was an isolation play with the NCAA all-time assist leader looking to win the game himself. Smith drove to the lane, it was well defended, but Smith got the ball up onto the backboard and rim, but it was just a little bit too strong.

And there was Trey Kaufman-Renn. The senior has not gotten the accolades that he did last year as adding Oscar Cluff as a paint presence reduced some of his scoring. So, it was so incredibly awesome as the game looked like it was heading to overtime to see Kaufman-Renn’s hand rise above everyone and tip the ball back towards the basket for the game-winning shot. All season long, Trey Kaufman-Renn has done whatever the Boilers needed him to do to succeed – he traded individual accolades for what was best for the team. And when the team needed him the most, the senior was in the perfect position and tipped the ball in with perfect precision to send the Boilermakers to the Elite 8.

All five Boilermakers starters scored double digits. And whether it was Loyer’s three-pointers to spark them in the first half, Cluff’s late game rebounds, Cox’s defense on Mark at the end of the game along with his clutch free throws, Smith’s drives to the basket that drew points, or Kaufman-Renn’s 20 points on 8 of 10 from the field including the game-winning tip-in, every starter played their role and helped the Boilers advance to the West Regional Final.

Congratulations to the Boilers!!!!! Boiler Up!!!!! The Lunatic still is struggling to calm down. I am so happy!!!! The Boilers are in the Elite 8!!!!

My heart is still beating at a level that is probably not healthy. Apparently, the Iowa vs. Nebraska game that started 20 minutes after the Purdue game is already over – so have no clue what happened there other than a score (congratulations to the Iowa on their continued magical run).

So many thoughts going through my head. I have been wandering my house looking for anything to eat or drink that can calm me down (without going to alcohol that will surely knock my sleep-deprived mess into unconsciousness). I am so happy. I was so nervous. Trey Kaufman-Renn is my hero. All of the Boilers are my heroes.

Oh my goodness, there are still two more games tonight. And they are great matchups – Houston vs. Illinois and Arizona vs. Arkansas. I need to get my wits back so I can write something sensible about the game. I would love to also find out what happened in the Iowa vs. Nebraska game.

But I need a minute. I have lots to talk about but I need to catch my breath.