More Bracket Fun

The greatest part about the American democracy is its inherent plurality. The idea of majority and minority. Two dissenting views. Of course there is no greater time for that than when everybody fills out their brackets. Kyle and Danny have already given some of their keys for wining your pool, I'm here with more. And warning: disagreements will occur.

Sleepers to forget:
Cleveland St: Sorry Danny. While the Vikings play tremendous defense, their offense is atrocious. They have the 121st most efficient offense in the country and are not a good offensive rebounding team. That makes for a lot of misses and not enough second chance points. Combined with WFU's large athletic and height advantage, well that equals one and done for Gary Waters. On the bright side, that's still better than what his successor at Rutgers did in the CBI.
Arizona: Arizona does have a great bunch of scorers in Chase Budinger, Jordan Hill and Nick Wise. The problems is that their defense is equally bad. They have the 132nd best D in the country. That just might explain how such a talented team is so mediocre. And while Jordan Hill is a good rebounder, Utah does not give up offensive rebounds taking away second chance points. And one more piece of information. The same argument people are using this year to predict a UA upset was being used last year when they were a 10 seed and had Jerryd Bayless. That ended with a 10 point loss in the first round.

Upsets to ponder later on:
West Virginia over Kansas in Round 2. Both teams should advance out of the first round although the Jayhawks being upset by North Dakota State isn't completely out of the question. But should these two match up, go with the Mountaineers. For intangible reasons just look at the job Bob Huggins did last year in getting his lower seeded team to the Sweet Sixteen. Tangibly, look at how WVU shut down Pitt's inside-out combo of DaJuan Blair and Sam Young. Now think of how they'll matchup with Sherron Collins and Cole Aldrich. Also, KU has come in losing 2 of their last 3, not exactly peaking for tourney time.
Connecticut over Memphis in Round 4: I know, I know. UConn is a 1, Memphis is a 2. But everywhere I look has Memphis going to the Final Four and UConn lost in the fray. My piece of advice: don't be fooled by Memphis. Some of their appeal is that they did so well last year. But Derrick Rose is gone and Tyreke Evans cannot dominate a game as well. They also hav e great length and can use it to dominate. But UConn can match them in that department with Stanley Robinson, Hasheem Thabeet and Jeff Adrien. The biggest difference will be the ability to score. The Tigers struggle to do so, While Connecticut is just a bit better. In a matchup like this, it can make all the difference