Monday, April 6, 2015

A Little More Hoops

Back when Princeton lost to Michigan State in the second round of the 1998 NCAA men's basketball tournament, it was TigerBlog's job to get the players and get them to the interview area.

The game was played at the Hartford Civic Center, and TB and the Princeton players were waiting in a holding area behind the platform where the Michigan State players were already speaking.

Princeton's players were upset, obviously. They had put together a season of historic proportions, one in which the Tigers had gone 26-1 in the regular season, moved into the top 10 of the national rankings and won an opening round game against UNLV.

Then, for 40 minutes, Princeton went toe-to-toe with Michigan State, unaware that two years later, four of those same Spartans would be in the starting lineup as they won the NCAA title. 

And then it ended. Boom. Or more like Swish, as in the swish of a Mateen Cleaves three-pointer that snapped a tie game in the final minute.

And now, a few minutes later, the players were sent to meet the media.

As the Michigan State players answered their questions, the Princeton players stood there frustrated, waiting their turn. If there had been a microphone nearby, it would have picked up the muffled sound of a curse word or two, muttered under someone's breath.

TigerBlog thought about that, and every other time he's seen that situation play out, when he read about what Andrew Harrison muttered about Wisconsin's Frank Kaminsky after his Kentucky Wildcats saw their dream of a 40-0 perfect season destroyed in the 71-64 loss to Kaminsky's Badgers Saturday night.

Was it the classiest moment of anyone's life? No. Is Harrison really, really lucky that this wasn't a case where their races were reversed? Yes. If that had been the case, Harrison would have been done.

To his credit, Kaminsky said it's no big deal and that he's over it. 

It's something that TB is surprised doesn't happen more often. He's seen athletes on the losing side of a billion games in a billion big spots - at the NCAA basketball tournament and lacrosse Final Four especially.

It's remarkable that as many athletes keep their composure as do and that examples like this are few and far between.

What's the point anyway of asking kids who lost questions? What questions get asked? How do you feel? When did it get away? That kind of stuff.

What answers do you get? Well, we tried to win, we wanted to win, have to give them credit. That's about it.

Maybe it's time to revisit the procedure. Just send the losing coach into the interview room. Let the players talk inside or just outside their lockerroom, where it's less formal and there's a greater chance to maintain composure.

Either way, Kentucky will not be 40-0. Like the Princeton women, they ended up with one loss. Princeton's season ended two weeks ago, with a loss in the second round to Maryland.

Still, there were accolades to be awarded, and Princeton is getting its share.

Courtney Banghart was named the winner of the U.S. Basketball Writers' Association Coach of the Year. She received her award in Tampa yesterday before the women's Final Four.

If the way the 2015 season played out is any indication, it's that the top programs in women's college basketball have achieved great separation from the rest of the field and have every advantage in the world.

For a team like Princeton to do what it did this year? How could anyone else be the Coach of the Year?

Oh, and the picture of her on the story on goprincetontigers.com? It's a great one. It shows her to be calm, focused, determined, competitive and totally in control. 

Then there's Blake Dietrick, who was the Ivy League Player of the Year and a seven-time Ivy League Player of the Week. Dietrick earned AP honorable mention All-America honors, becoming the second player - along with Niveen Rasheed - in program history to be an All-America.

Dietrick also competed in the national three-point shooting contest. She didn't advance out of the first round after making 14 three's, finishing fifth. The top four advanced, and the score to beat in Round 1 was 17.

TigerBlog turned on the three-point contest on TV just in time to see the slam dunk part. TB hates slam dunk contests. And home run derbys. Anyway, the closest he came to seeing Dietrick was when she was standing in the background on the court with the rest of the competitors during the dunking.

And that's hoops season for you.

Oh, except for a prediction for tonight's championship game.

TigerBlog picked Duke to win before the tournament started, and he thinks the Blue Devils will win tonight. He's rooting for Wisconsin, of course, but he thinks it'll be Duke.

Maybe 78-71. Something like that.

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