The winner of the Blue-grass Battle, and more importantly (although maybe not to them) the first spot in Monday’s Championship game belongs to the #1 seed Kentucky Wildcats.  Every time Louisville made a charge, Kentucky seemed to have the answer.  And then, the Wildcats played stifling defense over a 5 minute stretch to extend their lead to a comfortable place where they could get away with just trading baskets.

Although I have to admit that I am still confused on the ending, Louisville seemed to have this weird idea in their head that they could trap Kentucky in the back court to force a turnover, and then would foul after they crossed half court.  Except whenever Kentucky got across half court, they would aggressively attack the basket and walk away with a breakaway dunk.  And then, when Kentucky got their last dunk, Louisville looked like they just gave up – they seemed to walk it up the court, then wait to get into their offensive set, and then took so much time to get a missed three pointer.  By that point, it made sense not to foul – there wasn’t enough time after wasting 15-20 seconds to come back.

So, the Wildcats will now await the winner of the Buckeyes and Jayhawks to try to finally get Calapari his first ever NCAA title – as well as add their names into the history book of many championship teams from Lexington, Kentucky.

The Lunatic will now cruelly remove the scenarios involving Louisville – as they are no longer actual scenarios.  If the un-official scenarios are accurate (and I have read them correctly – I am trying to go quickly before Charlie goes to bed :-), even more painful congratulations are in order.  That is because all 4 scenarios remaining say that we have a winner of the upset pool – Keith Schleicher.  Unfortunately, this victory is bitter-sweet for Keith – since Keith entered the pool for fun this year.    This will open the door for either Rick Flynn (rooting for Ohio State) and Keith Lancette (rooting for Kansas) to take the big prize.