How long should it take to get a busted bracket?
A person has better odds of winning the lottery than picking a perfect NCAA Tournament bracket, yet, every year for as long as can be remembered, a bracket has been filled out, and dreams immediately follow of picking every game correctly. Although even coming close has not been a reality.
Yesterday, it took the first game of the 2019 Big Dance to bust my bracket.
Minnesota beat Louisville 86-76. Yes, Richard Pitino, Rick's son, beat the school where Rick won a national championship (and later vacated) but was fired and is now suing the school for more than $40 million.
Logic in that pick was always go with the ACC team if it is close. It wasn't really close and dreams of a perfect bracket have been shattered once again.
When it comes to picking SEC teams there is no tried and true logic except maybe for Kentucky.
The SEC started well if you are just counting wins. LSU struggled with Yale but prevailed in the end, 79-74, but Auburn, winners of the SEC Tournament, had a tidal wave of luck to down New Mexico State, 78-77, who had a chance to win but guard A.J. Harris passed up an open lay-up with six seconds left.
He kicked it out for a three-pointer that missed. You have to have luck to survive and advance.
. . .
Arkansas State University Athletic Director Terry Mohajir has done a great job of leading the Red Wolves in hiring football coaches and facilities.
Now he faces the challenge of finding a women's head basketball coach, and he is conducting a nationwide search for the right person.
Hopefully, that nationwide search includes a stop in Little Rock and an interview with Greenbrier native Steve Wiedower, a top assistant for Joe Foley's women's team at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
Wiedower coached for Foley for six years before becoming the head coach at Russellville High where he coached his daughters Kenzie and Kaylee.
Once they graduated, the successful Wiedower returned to the UALR sideline in 2015.
After beginning his collegiate playing career at Oklahoma City, Wiedower lettered two years at ASU, playing against the University of Arkansas in the NIT in 1987.
Today, he is on his way to Oregon for the postseason. UALR faces Gonzaga in the NCAA Women's tournament tomorrow. It is UALR's sixth NCAA appearance, all under Foley.
. . .
Only 17 horses ended up running in the Rebel Stakes on Saturday, which was another sacrifice by Oaklawn Park. It wanted 20.
Oaklawn had already pitched in another $500,000 to make the purses $750,000 for each division. Local horse Long Range Toddy won the first division coming off the pace to win by a neck in 1:42.49. Shipper Omaha Beach went wire-to-wire in the second division and won in 1:42.42.
The biggest winner of the day was thoroughbred racing, especially the 3-year-old Kentucky Derby hopefuls.
. . .
Oh the memory. When Mike Davis was the head coach at Indiana he did lead the Hoosiers to the Final Four in 2002 with Maryland, Kansas and Oklahoma, the first time in 15 years no team from the state of Kentucky made it that far.
Indiana lost to Maryland in the championship 64-52, but the game that stuck in the memory of many was the Hoosiers' 81-69 win over No. 10 seed Kent State in the Elite Eight played in Rupp Arena.
Indiana made 15 of 19 three pointers (78.9 percent).
Kent State's first-year coach Stan Heath was hired by Arkansas five days later.
Davis coached Indiana for four more years before being fired. He then went to Alabama-Birmingham for six years, followed by six years at Texas Southern, who he just left for the head coaching job at Detroit Mercy.
Sports on 03/22/2019