Virginia wins 62-51. The 14-2 run at the end of 1st half being the difference.
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Virginia wins 62-51. The 14-2 run at the end of 1st half being the difference.
Not a statistical analysis at all, but since some fans like to look at cold hard postseason results, I compiled the NCAA Tournament records of various head coaches for the past 5 seasons. Keep in mind that "the past 5 seasons" includes the current season and last year's pandemic season, so this is only the 2017, 2018, and 2019 NCAA Tournaments. I looked at every head coach who made at least one Sweet 16 in those three years, and listed all coaches with at least 3 wins.
Mark Few, Gonzaga 10-3
Roy Williams, UNC 9-2*
Bill Self, Kansas 9-3
(John Beilein, Michigan 9-3)
Jay Wright, Villanova 8-2*
Chris Beard, Texas Tech 8-2
Tony Bennett, Virginia 7-2*
Mike Krzyzewski, Duke 7-3
Matt Painter, Purdue 7-3
Dana Altman, Oregon 6-2
Leonard Hamilton, Florida State 6-3
Tom Izzo, Michigan State 6-3
Bruce Pearl, Auburn 5-2
Michael White, Florida 5-3
Porter Moser, Loyola Chicago 4-1
Frank Martin, South Carolina 4-1
Bob Huggins, West Virginia 4-2
Chris Mack, Xavier/Louisville 4-3
Scott Drew, Baylor 3-2
Kelvin Sampson, Houston 3-2
Bruce Weber, Kansas State 3-3
*Won the 2017, 2018, or 2019 championship. For everyone else, the number of losses tells you the number of tournaments they made.
Leonard Hamilton is tied for 11th above, but when you remove the inactive John Beilein, he's tied for 10th. You can also question whether 6-2 Dana Altman is really ahead of 6-3 Leonard Hamilton. He missed the 2018 tournament, but he won as many games in fewer tournaments, and made the 2017 Final Four.
Anyway, this is another way of saying that Hamilton is right there in Top 10 territory.
Virginia is still not right. Without major improvement on both ends of the court over what they've done in the last 4 games, they'll lose at Louisville on Sat and be pretty unlikely to advance more than 1 round in the ACCT.
Ever since teams went to sticking on shooters and forcing Clark and others to drive and finish, the O has been broken. The D has been less than stellar all year, but has REALLY been bad as of late. I have no answer there. Just a TON of missed assignments/responsibilities. Not much time to figure it out, but hopefully only one game from now to next Thur means plenty of practice time.
Watching Syracuse-Cheats.
Buddy Boeheim is pretty good. Looks like the All American neighbor boy from a 60's sitcom
Buddy is turning into Bootsie.
Syracuse tried their best to give it away.
I guess there is an argument that this loss makes Carolina more desperate when they play us this weekend, but I think the intensity of the Duke-UNC rivalry sorta makes that moot. They were gonna play hard against us no matter what.
But, take care of some business against Ga Tech first...please!
Interesting decision by Syracuse to intentionally foul when up three with about 12 seconds left. Twice in the last two minutes UNC had gotten four point possessions by making a free throw, missing the second, getting the offensive board and hitting a three. Putting them at the line like that was potentially inviting disaster. Syracuse was outrebounded by 20 for the game, including 26-13 on the offensive end. Fortunately Love missed both free throws and Syracuse secured the board.
Oh yeah, Heels looked good.
Agreed UC. I think that perhaps there was a miscommunication because even if your plan is to foul you don't do it in the backcourt with 11 seconds remaining. I am not sure it is the right play anyway with the cheats having two four-point plays that got them back in the game. Sure am glad he missed that first FT.
Even in the tournament, over the last 5 years Hamilton has fared pretty well relative to other coaches.
But that wasn't the claim. The discussion was whether or not he's been a top-10 coach over the last 5 years. Over the last 10 years (or longer)? I agree he's not a top-10 coach.
On top of that, Syracuse also threw away an inbounds pass in the last two minutes leading to a turnover. That’s another reason why I don’t like the intentionally fouling strategy. UNC could have made both free throws (or even just the second), stolen the inbounds pass, and then won or tied it.