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Mizzou Links, 4-2-10

By Bill Connelly

NCAA Tournament Links

  • ESPN.com: NCAA concludes 96-team field would be best fit for expanded tournament
  • ESPN.com: NCAA tries to defend expansion, fails
  • The Dagger: John Feinstein exposes the hypocrisy of NCAA tourney expansion
  • Rush the Court: NCAA Basketball 2010: The BCS Version
  • Basketball Prospectus: Remember the 65-Team Tournament?

Like I've said before, we all object to tourney expansion, but when it actually happens, if done correctly, we'd yell, scream, stomp our feet ... and then enjoy the matchups and pretty quickly forget our objections.  There's no NEED for expansion, but in the end, we really wouldn't care for too long.  So there's that.  But leave it to the NCAA to screw up a seemingly un-screwup-able detail.

The first-round games for the 64 non-bye teams would take place on Thursday and Friday, with the winners playing the top eight seeds in each region on Saturday and Sunday. Winners on Saturday would likely play again on Tuesday, and the Sunday winners on Wednesday.

Those winners would then move on to the regionals, playing alternate days starting on Thursday. Shaheen said the NCAA hasn't decided on whether to keep the same sites for second and first-round games or to make the midweek sites the same as the regionals.

We all assumed the tourney would start on the same day of the current play-in game, with the 64 non-bye teams playing Tuesday-Wednesday, leaving us with the same Thursday-Sunday slate of greatness, only with more competitive games because 1-3 seeds would be playing teams that would have been NIT high seeds instead of the SWAC and America East champions of the world.  Really, the thought of a better slate of Thursday-Sunday games was the main reason I thought we'd end up talking ourselves into this format when all was said and done.

Instead, we'll get the semi-crappy games like Louisville-UAPB on Thursday-Friday ... and the round of 32 will be played on Tuesday-Wednesday?????  Good god, NCAA.  That was the one no-brainer detail that was going to make things interesting, and you completely and totally botched it.  Well-played.  And let me get this straight: if, say, a 9-seed makes a run to the Elite Eight, they'd be potentially playing on Friday, Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday?  Really?  A) That team would be playing five games in nine days, with never more than a one-day break.  That seems tooooootally fair (not).  B) That team would miss about EIGHT DAYS OF CLASS (leaving on Wednesday, missing the ENTIRE next week, no break in between).  God.  You're not even trying.  This shouldn't be that hard to figure out.  Hire me.  I'll figure it out for you, and people will enjoy it, I swear.  You'd even be able to somewhat pretend that you have students' interests in mind with what I decided for you.  Win-win.

Big 12 Basketball Links

FOOTBALL

Big 12 Football Links

  • Dr. Saturday: Mandate for Change: Turner Gill is Kansas' new Mr. Nice Guy

Other Mizzou Links

  • Mizzou Softball
    MUtigers.com: No. 4 Tigers Host No. 15 Cowgirls
    The Trib: Tigers text twist: BTW, ur pitching 2moro
  • Mizzou Baseball
    The Missourian: Utility player becoming leader

Other

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