Final Four Flops

by Bodog Sportsbook | Apr 7 2008

Like many, you’re probably looking at the remains of your Final Four bracket wondering what the hell happened. For the first time in the history of the tournament, we finally get all four No. 1 seeds into the Final Four, only to have two semifinal blowouts.  

So what the hell did happen? Well let’s start with Memphis and UCLA. But let’s just forget about UCLA, because once we are done with Memphis, it’s easy to understand what just happened; hindsight is always 20/20.

The Memphis Microscope

When you glance at the Memphis Tigers, it’s easy to see why the vast majority had them pinned as the weakest No. 1 seed. At a second glance, it’s also easy to see why many had them being eliminated before the Final Four. Memphis plays at a break-neck speed. They run and they gun, they shoot early in the shot clock, they crash the boards hard and run a lot of one-on-one offensive sets. They gamble on defense and they were nearly last in free-throw percentage as a team. So what about that resume says “championship caliber”? Well, as coach John Calipari so aptly put it, “It’s Princeton on steroids.” You can call it organized chaos; that’s what Memphis is.

Memphis is the most athletic team in college basketball. Like last year’s champs, Memphis has three, maybe four players that might end up in the league as well. They play fast because their athletes are elite; that is the speed they feel most comfortable at. They play a lot of one-on-one, because few teams can stop their players one-on-one. Chris Douglas-Roberts has not seen a matchup that was not in his favor all year long. The same can be said for Derrick Rose. Joey Dorsey will also end up in the NBA; the 6-foot-9-inch 265-pound forward looks like Karl Malone with cornrows, minus the “special delivery” signature jam and mid-range J-piece, of course. The Tigers also have a 6-10 multi-talented sophomore in Shawn Taggart and a 6-9 smooth junior swingman in Robert Dozier at their disposal. Both Taggart and Dozier have NBA bodies. Add it all up, and you have a team that can make the best college players look like, well, UCLA.

Okay, so Memphis makes a little more sense, but what about North Carolina and Kansas?

We don’t have to talk about Kansas, because it’s safe to say that Kansas didn’t so much beat North Carolina as the Tar Heels beat themselves. The Tar Heels saved their worst game of their season - and for many of the Tar Heels players, the worst game of their careers - for when it mattered the most. To put it plainly, the Tar Heels choked.

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Choke Show
Midway through the first half, the score was 40-12. One more time, 40-12! In a game where you are playing against another No. 1 seed, going down by 28 in the first half is suicide. Everyone knew that North Carolina was going to make a second-half run; when you don’t score a field goal for nine minutes the law of percentages says something has got to give. But to erase that big of a deficit and come back is one thing. To erase the deficit and have enough left in the tank to come back and win is an entirely different story. Basically, the Tar Heels would have had to complete one of the biggest comebacks in Final Four history to win.

Many Tar Heel fans felt coach Roy Williams played his bench too much and in lieu of his starters down the stretch. Look at it this way: The game was extremely fast paced. To North Carolina’s credit, they were able to get the lead down to four points. But to do so, Williams exhausted his starters, who had pissed the game away to begin with. Coach Williams did what he had to do. In a Final Four with all No. 1 seeds, a slow start or a bad game is all it takes to send you home packing.  

One Last Shining Moment
So now we have Kansas and Memphis set to go head-to-head for the national title. Similar teams, similar styles. The only glaring difference is that Kansas seems to have the edge in depth with the battery of big men they bring off the bench. It’s like having a 6-10 center that will grab about 15 rebounds, score 20 points and have 20 fouls to give. The game-breaker in this one might be Derrick Rose for the Tigers. In what will likely be his final performance as an amateur, coach Calipari will be praying for one last shining moment from his freshman star.