March Madness Day 8

Kentucky 82 - Baylor 70
And it wasn't this close. I'll say this much, if the Kentucky team that played today comes to play for the next two games, none of these other teams can stop them. I didn't see Kentucky play all year, and figured a bunch of talented freshmen could be had by a talented, disciplined team. Baylor is clearly not that team. Not disciplined enough and not invested enough in defense. But it didn't matter today, Kentucky played a terrific, mature game and are easily the odds on favorites to win it all still.

Kansas 80 - North Carolina 67
Horribly disappointing last 3 minutes from North Carolina, but much credit goes to Kansas' defense. The first half of this game was Carolina ball. Fast-paced, lots of offense creating good looks. The second half was Kansas ball, uglier offense, but tenacious defense, and Carolina couldn't keep up defensively for the full 20 minutes of the second half. You could kind of see it coming, because even though both teams weren't shooting great in the second half, Kansas was generating better looks than Carolina. The Tar Heels continually settled for difficult shots when it got hard. Does having Marshall make the difference? Based on the second half I'd say it makes a big difference, but not enough to win the game. You are who you are, and Carolina isn't a scrappy team. Kansas is, and that's what got them through to the Final Four.

The end of this game looked a lot like the end of the Kansas-Purdue round of 32 game. All of a sudden Kansas clamped down defensively and Purdue simply couldn't generate any offense. Same thing happened to Carolina here. Roy Williams and Bill Self accumulate a great deal of talent, but today, Bill Self got his team to execute to their strengths better.