Saturday, March 17, 2012

March Madness Day 2, Part 4

Michigan State 89 - Long Island Brooklyn 67
This is what a top seed is supposed to do. LIU came out and played a heck of a game. They shot 47% from behind the arc. And they kept the game close well into the second half. But Michigan State never let them actually take the lead outside of the opening minutes of the game. The weathered the LIU runs, and methodically built their lead into a comfortable win.

South Florida 58 - Temple 44
Just like last year, only one team from the First Four survived their first real tournament game. These two teams were atrocious in the first half. Don't let anyone tell you it was good defense, that wasn't it. USF shot 3 for 27 from the floor in the first half. That's right, 3 made baskets in an entire half...and they were only down 4 points at the break.

Xavier 67 - Notre Dame 63
I really thought Notre Dame had this one. They built a 6-8 point lead with less than 10 minutes to go, and kept hanging on to it, hanging on to it. Xavier would rally and get close, but ND would keep its advantage. Until 3:45 remained, when Xavier finally took its first lead since midway through the first half. After that Xavier traded tough buckets off of penetration to Notre Dame's well set up jumpers. This was a tremendous game to watch...and then the refs got involved. With 2.8 seconds left and down by 2, Notre Dame drew a foul for a 1-and-1 free throw situation. He made the first free throw, but the refs called ND for a lane violation which negated the basket and gave the ball to Xavier. Then while Xavier was trying to inbound the ball, ND was called for an intentional foul, which gave Xavier two free throws (which they drained) AND the ball back. Did these calls decide the game? No, but they did help deprive us from what could have been an even more exciting finish. Don't be the story, refs.

Kansas 65 - Detroit 50
Kansas learned from the earlier 2v15 upsets, and became the only 2 seed to advance on Friday.

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