Notre Dame is next and a chance to go to the Final Four for the third time in four season. UK and Notre Dame have a long history. They played every season for many years. UK leads the series 42-19. Notre Dame has won two of the last three times. Both were in South Bend. They have met twice in the NCAA's. First time in 1958. UK beat them in the Mideast Regional final by 33 points in route to a national championship. In 1970 UK beat them again in the Mideast semi finals 109-99. Dan Issel had 44 points and Notre Dame's Austin Carr had 52! I would have loved to have seen that game. The last time Notre Dame made a regional final was in 1979. They were in the FInal Four with UK in 1978 but lost to Duke in the semi's in a very close game. That's the only time ND has been in a Final Four. I'm sure our old friend Digger is just salivating over this game tomorrow night.
For this ND team, they are 32-5 on the season. They won the ACC tournament by beating Duke and North Carolina in back to back games. That doesn't happen often in that tournament. The only non conference loss was to Providence very early in the season. They have two losses to teams not making the NCAA's,Pitt and Syracuse.They are as good as it gets offensively. They are an outstaniding shooting team. They shoot 51% from the field and 39% from the three's and 74% from the foul line. They have good assists to turnover ratio and they are even on the boards with 32 a game. Jerrian Grant is a do it all player. He can go inside or outside. He can bring the ball up the floor and take it to the rim. He will play in the NBA soon. Connaughton is a deceptively good athlete. A very good shooter and defender. He also moonlights as a pitcher in the minor leagues in the summertime. Jackson looks like a really good point guard. He can shoot well from the outside and take it to the rim. Zach Auguste is their lone true big man at 6-10. They cannot afford to get him into foul trouble. They look like they only play 6 people so fatigue could play a big role in this game. ND is not a good defensive team. Wichita got a lot of good looks and were able to drive it to the basket. They just missed a lot of easy shots early and had to play uphill the rest of the game. ND barely eeked out two wins early in the tournament. I said then they are either going to be one of those incredibly lucky teams to win the tournament or they get knocked out with a huge loss.
This will be a classic matchup of defense vs offense. UK is good as gets defensively and ND is as good as it gets offensively. Most times the defense wins out in this type of matchup. I like UK by about 10. Close early but UK wears them down and wins 78-68.
Game time 8:49 pm Saturday night and will be televised by TBS.
http://www.und.com/sports/m-baskbl/n...skbl-body.html
http://www.bigbluehistory.net/bb/sta...NotreDame.html
For this ND team, they are 32-5 on the season. They won the ACC tournament by beating Duke and North Carolina in back to back games. That doesn't happen often in that tournament. The only non conference loss was to Providence very early in the season. They have two losses to teams not making the NCAA's,Pitt and Syracuse.They are as good as it gets offensively. They are an outstaniding shooting team. They shoot 51% from the field and 39% from the three's and 74% from the foul line. They have good assists to turnover ratio and they are even on the boards with 32 a game. Jerrian Grant is a do it all player. He can go inside or outside. He can bring the ball up the floor and take it to the rim. He will play in the NBA soon. Connaughton is a deceptively good athlete. A very good shooter and defender. He also moonlights as a pitcher in the minor leagues in the summertime. Jackson looks like a really good point guard. He can shoot well from the outside and take it to the rim. Zach Auguste is their lone true big man at 6-10. They cannot afford to get him into foul trouble. They look like they only play 6 people so fatigue could play a big role in this game. ND is not a good defensive team. Wichita got a lot of good looks and were able to drive it to the basket. They just missed a lot of easy shots early and had to play uphill the rest of the game. ND barely eeked out two wins early in the tournament. I said then they are either going to be one of those incredibly lucky teams to win the tournament or they get knocked out with a huge loss.
This will be a classic matchup of defense vs offense. UK is good as gets defensively and ND is as good as it gets offensively. Most times the defense wins out in this type of matchup. I like UK by about 10. Close early but UK wears them down and wins 78-68.
Game time 8:49 pm Saturday night and will be televised by TBS.
http://www.und.com/sports/m-baskbl/n...skbl-body.html
http://www.bigbluehistory.net/bb/sta...NotreDame.html
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