nfl schedule

Well, we know now that the Steelers won't play Arizona, SF, Baltimore, or Cincy in week 1. Full schedule comes out on April 5th. Any guess on who the first opponent will be? How many NBC games? How many other prime-time games? My over-under is 3.

Sweet 16 failure

Yet another trip to the sweet 16. Yet another exit before the elite 8. What went wrong this time? Yes, they missed a ton of easy shots. But even with those, is there anyone who really thinks that Pitt is a better team than UCLA? If they played 10 times, UCLA would win at least 7 I bet with this cast of characters. On to next season. Starting lineup will likely be Fields, Ramon, Young, Cook, and Biggs but there are a ton of newcomers so it is hard to say. And what will their style be? Ramon and Young aren't exactly known for being defensive stalwarts.

Round 1

After a little bit of an issue in round 1, Pitt easily got past Wright State. But red flags should be flying around them. They blew too many fast break chances. They threw the ball away too many times. What will happen when they face VCU and their press defense? Pitt's lack of ball handling skills was shown in spades in Louisville game #1. This second round game against VCU has all the hallmarks of Pitt running into trouble again.

Thoughts on other round 1 games:
- Louisville over Stanford: No surprise. Louisville should be able to give TAMU a game.
- TAMU over Penn: Harder they thought it would be. TAMU seems like a sexy final four choice. I bet they don't make the sweet 16.
- VCU over Duke: See above
- Butler over ODU: How did they lose twice to Wright St?
- Maryland over Davidson: Maryland vs. Butler should be a good game
- Ohio St. over CCSU: No. 1's don't lose in the 1st round
- Xavier over BYU: Xavier vs. OSU will be a war. An upset would not surprise me. Maybe CBS gets lucky having this going to 100% of the country.
- Indiana over Gonzaga: Why do I have no belief in teams like Indiana
- UCLA over Weber St.: Hope Pitt doesn't look past VCU hoping for the Dixon-Howland cage match
- Georgetown over Belmont: Another sexy Final 4 pick. But I believe in this one.
- BC over Texas Tech: BC vs. Georgetown will be the other war on Saturday. Old Big East rivalry. Should be physical, should be fun.
- UNC over E. Kentucky: EKU gave UNC a nice run. But that just woke UNC up, so their fans should be happy with their response.
- Michigan St. over Marquette: I thought that Marquette would show better than this. The flip side is that the Spartans vs. Carolina is the #3 game on Saturday. Another upset opportunity. But the Spartans will need to bring their best game.
- Vandy over GWU: Yikes, that was ugly. That guy at Jay's wedding is probably unhappy. Oh well. Maybe I undersold Vandy?
- WSU over Oral Roberts: Sounds like Wazzu made a nice 2nd half surge. I think they should beat Vandy and then have a very interesting game with Georgetown. I think the country is underselling the Cougars.