The Biggest Winners and Losers of the 2017 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament | Bleacher's report

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Virginia Kyle GuyDavid J. Phillip / Associated Press

The Virginia Cavaliers beat Monday night in Minneapolis Texas Red Raiders 85-77 in overtime to win the 2017 NCAA men's basketball title, but more than one winner and one loser emerged from this glorious tournament.

The biggest losers of the past three weeks may be all the disgusting troglodytes on social media who said the national championship was going to be hopelessly boring. Aside from the instant all-day match between Villanova and North Carolina in 2016, this game was by far the most entertaining game in at least a decade.

The opening weekend lacked its usual stock of dramatic films, but the last match was a suitable cornerstone for the last four rounds of the tournament.

Celebrities such as Ja Morant and Carsen Edwards have been extraordinary, as well as much less impressive performances among the eighth seeds, the Big East and the favorites of the season to win the whole thing. Some coaches were the big winners; others were in the opposite category.

Read on for the rest of the biggest winners and losers of the 2019 NCAA Tournament.

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Ja MorantElise Amendola / Associated Press

Few players were better than Ja Morant in the 2018-19 season.

Zion Williamson was. Perhaps you could defend Cassius Winston and / or RJ Barrett. That's it, though. The magic man of Murray State was much more than a minor conference hero. He averaged 24.5 points, 10 assists, 5.7 rebounds and 1.8 steals, and soared to a top-three finish in the next draft of the NBA.

But unless you live in Kentucky or shell out $ 5 a month for an ESPN + subscription, you barely have the chance to see Morant. Prior to the OVC tournament, the Racers played only four televised games nationally. –and "nationally" is probably not the right word, as two of these four competitions were part of the SEC network. He even injured his ankle two minutes after the start of the Belmont match on ESPNU.

People had probably heard of Morant and had probably seen more than a handful of his ridiculous athletic demonstrations on House of Highlights or Twitter, but the NCAA tournament was the first time that many people were watching the majority of a Murray State match.

To put it mildly, Morant kept his promises.

In the opening match against Marquette, he recorded the ninth official tripled-doubled in the history of the NCAA's men's tournaments– This third of the season–finishing with 17 points, 16 assists and 11 rebounds. It was supposed to be an incredible battle between Morant and Markus Howard, but Howard's 26 points were completely overshadowed by what Morant did by leading Murray State to an 83-64 victory.

Even in the defeat against Florida State in the second round, Morant was impressive early and finished with 28 points. Murray State simply had no answer as to the height, depth and athleticism of FSU.

Morant had already proved early in the season against Auburn (25 points, eight rebounds, seven assists) and Alabama (38 points, nine rebounds, five assists) that he could accumulate numbers against a real competition. This was just further proof that the Zion Sweepstake finalist was always going to get noticed.

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Mick CroninElsa / Getty Images

Only six programs have participated in each of the last nine NCAA tournaments: Duke, Kansas, Michigan State, North Carolina, Gonzaga and Cincinnati. The credit goes to head coach Mick Cronin for giving the Bearcats the status they enjoyed under Bob Huggins: a must-see annual Big Dance event.

Excluding matches from the NCAA tournament, Cincinnati has a record of 229 to 70, dating back to the start of the 2010-11 season. That's a winning percentage of .766, and that's better than what the state of Michigan (225-77) achieved during the same period.

But Tom Izzo led the Spartans to five Sweet 16s and a pair of Final Fours. Cronin is 6-9 in the tournament with the Bearcats and has not participated in the Sweet 16 since 2012.

Most of these years, they had a valid excuse not to go far. In 2011, Cincinnati met Kemba Walker in the second round. In 2013, 2015 and 2016, it was No. 10, No. 8 and No. 9, respectively, and it was not expected to win multiple games. In fact, last year was the only time the Bearcats had a seed that is supposed to reach Sweet 16, and they were victims of one of the incredible victories after their Nevada win.

The immediate release of this year has raised questions as to whether Cronin's style is built for March–especially now that people can no longer ask Tony Bennett's question in Virginia.

In playing what might as well have been a home game in Columbus, Ohio, the normally excellent Cincinnati defense gave up 79 points in a defeat against Iowa. It's tied for the fourth highest number of points that the Bearcats have allowed in any match of the past three seasons. The Hawkeyes fired 11 of their 22 over a distance of three points.

However, the real problem–as it has been for most of the last decade–was the Cincinnati offense. He scored at will in the early painting against Iowa's terrible defense, then inexplicably fell in love with the deep ball, missed the vast majority of those shots and lost the match. This lack of discipline on both sides of the field falls on Cronin.

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Fletcher MageeMitchell Layton / Getty Images

The way Wofford retired from the tournament was hard to watch. Fletcher Magee set the NCAA record in three points in the first-round win over Seton Hall, but the sniper did not find his mark against Kentucky and missed his 12 attempts. Great work on the part of the Wildcats to watch as much as possible and make every shot difficult, but it's just a hell of a chance for a guy who has made at least four triples in 15 of his previous 16 games.

Wofford is still one of the biggest winners of the 2019 NCAA Tournament, as these little terriers proved that they belonged to the field with big dogs.

They took a 34-18 lead over Seton Hall, watched the Pirates move up to take the lead with less than eight minutes to play, and then relentlessly buried Myles Powell and Co. with a 17-0 record. Most of the anguished minor conference teams reportedly collapsed after the Big East team came back into force, but the Terriers did not essentially miss any shots in the last seven minutes.

Then, to fight against Kentucky despite the aforementioned leave of Magee was perhaps even more impressive.

Of course, the Wildcats did not have PJ Washington, but they still had five former McDonald's All-Americans-Reid Travis, Nick Richards, EJ Montgomery, Keldon Johnson and Immanuel Quickley–and a pair of excellent first-year guards at Tyler Herro and Ashton Hagans. With so much talent, they should have erased a small school whose star player could not buy a bucket.

This was not the case, and it showed that the KenPom (# 18) and NET (# 13) rankings were on the mark with the Terriers. It was a top 20 team that would probably have qualified at least for Sweet 16 if the selection committee had developed it appropriately.

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Breein Tyree and Kermit DavisSean Rayford / Associated Press

Speaking on behalf of all those who argue in parentheses, separating seed # 8 from seed # 9 is almost impossible.

My current position in the Bracket Matrix ranking is embarrassing, largely because I just end up throwing darts at No. 8-10 seeded and I constantly miss them from at least one line. This year, I had Oklahoma and UCF screened 8, and Syracuse, Ole Miss and Utah State, No. 9. The committee had the opposite.

But the No. 8 went to 0-4 in the first round for the first time since 2001, so you can decide who did the wrong sowing.

Not only were the No. 9 seeds swept, but they also wiped the ground with the "favorites".

I was in Colombia for the UCF-VCU and Oklahoma-Ole Miss games, and they were neither competitive nor entertaining. Oklahoma took a 12-0 lead and never looked back. VCU just did not have an answer for Tacko Fall (13 points, 18 rebounds, five blocks).

At least the state of Washington-Utah and Baylor-Syracuse were tight competitions in the middle of the second half. However, the Huskies have destroyed the Aggies in the last 10 minutes and the Bears have gradually moved away from the Orange.

The average margin of victory ended up being 16 points.

Aside from the heartbreaking defeat of UCF against Duke, none of those seeded number 9 fought hard in the second round. A No. 8 or No. 9 had reached the Sweet 16 at five of the previous six tournaments, but this was not the case this year. Yet, No. 8 seeds were the big loser.

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Payton Pritchard and Kenny WootenMichael Conroy / Associated Press

For most of the regular season, we lamented the atrocity known as Pac-12. When we published the article from "Worst Major Conference Ever" in early January, the Pac-12 had a score of 7.47 at KenPom. Coincidentally, this is also where the season ended: well behind the other five Power Conferences and almost a point behind the CAA. Thus, we can now confirm that this was the worst season of a major conference for at least 18 years.

And yet, three Pac-12 teams have won a place in the NCAA tournament and have done more than expected.

Arizona State has snuck into the field as the penultimate team and has defeated St. John's in the first quarter. Washington was ranked 9th and smoked the state of Utah in the first round.

The big winner was the one who deserved the least to be there.

Even after finishing the regular season on a four-game winning streak, Oregon had to win the conference tournament to get into Big Dance. That's exactly what he did, surviving an overtime battle with Arizona State in the semifinal and beating Washington at the championship game to win 12th place.

At that time, the Ducks were on fire and played an incredible defense led by Kenny Wooten (blocks) and Ehab Amin (robberies). They eliminated Wisconsin's No. 5 for a 72-54 win in the first round, then defeated UC Irvine by an almost identical score of 73-54 in the second round.

They were the only team ranked lower at No. 5 to reach the Sweet 16, and they came to play. Oregon gave Virginia all he could stand in a 53-49 against-nail, knowing he had nearly crushed the Elite Eight with Nike glass slippers.

Head Coach Dana Altman is now 13-6 in the NCAA Tournament in the past seven seasons, and the Ducks are expected to play an additional role in 2020 if Louis King stays for a second season.

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Max HazzardChris Carlson / Associated Press

A year ago, the first two rounds of the tournament were a magnificent chaos. In addition to the beautiful Virginia UMBC, we ended up with two seeds # 7, two seeds # 9 and two seeds # 11 in the Sweet 16. Summary of the seeds of the 16 teams and the total number was 85-The highest rating since 2000.

But if you filled your support this year hoping to get similar results, you were deeply disappointed.

The total number of Sweet 16 seeded this year was 49, tied with the 2009 tournament, making it the lowest number in the history of the NCAA. Oregon (# 12) was the only underperforming team that had a # 5 seed to reach the second weekend, and the Ducks did not even qualify remotely as a history of Cinderella.

(It is interesting to note that the 2009 tournament had exactly the same Sweet 16 seed construction: all seeds # 1 to # 3, # 2 seed # 4, # 5 seed and # 12 seed. this year, No. 12 seed, Arizona, came from the same conference as this year's.)

However, at least some short stories about Cinderella have appeared.

No. 12, Liberty and Murray State, hurt the first round, as did No. 13 UC Irvine. And although the Florida were destroyed in the second round by Florida State, the Flames and Anteaters played well for the first 25 minutes before collapsing against their leading opponents.

Even Wofford and Buffalo were sort of Cinderella stories, even though their starting position was better. They defeated Seton Hall and Arizona State, respectively, in the first round, and Wofford also passed Kentucky.

However, it was unfortunate not to join a Loyola-Chicago, a Gulf Coast or a George Mason. If UC Irvine had beaten Oregon in the second round, it was the ideal formula for Sweet 16 with 15 big teams and a wild card little known that the rest of the country wanted to win.

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Mamadi DiakiteKevin C. Cox / Getty Images

A lack of early surprises made the first two rounds boring for many fans, but the result was well worth it, as the Elite Eight games were exceptional.

The least entertaining regional final was probably the first between Gonzaga and Texas Tech, and this is a raw description for a back-and-forth affair in which neither team leads with more than five points until the end. final two minutes. The three candidates in the first round (Jarrett Culver, Rui Hachimura and Brandon Clarke) scored at least 18 points. Texas Tech's elite defense narrowly won the war against Gonzaga's elite offensive, largely thanks to a pair of three points from Davide Moretti.

The next show was the Auburn-Kentucky showdown in SEC. The Wildcats took a fast two-digit lead, but a four-point play late in the first period and a five-point possession shortly after the break caused the Tigers to recover. Neither team was able to buy a three-point bucket for most of the afternoon, but Auburn won.

Then there is Virginia vs. Purdue, also known as "The Carsen Edwards Show". The Purdue star finished with 42 points, but Kyle Guy and Mamadi Diakite had the last word. After struggling for the first 3.5 games, Guy caught fire in the second half and exchanged hay factors with Edwards. And it was the Diakites who pulled the shot of the tournament, forcing the extension to the ring after Kihei Clark had a missed free kick.

But the best match was Michigan State vs. Duke. The massive swings of the first half were followed by a second half tense rebounds back and forth. The game featured acrobatic parties on both sides, a bucket winner from an unlikely source (Kenny Goins) and a major upheaval that broke most of the media that was not already in shambles. That was all you could want from an Elite Eight game–unless you're a fan of Duke, of course.

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Markus Howard and Quincy McKnightJulio Cortez / Associated Press

Everyone was expecting the Pac-12 conference to be the disappointing NCAA tournament conference, but the Big East was the biggest disaster.– and there was not even a second runner-up.

Only four teams from Big East participated in the tournament, which was a disappointment even before the start. And you can argue that only three teams deserved to dance, knowing that St. John's was the last invited guest team.

However, the Johnnies do not last long and lose a hideous and revenue-packed brick festival against Arizona State in the top four. They lost 33-15 in the first period and never had a lot of chances to fight until the return.

At first, the story was similar for Seton Hall, who followed Wofford 34-18 about 15 minutes into the match. The Pirates fought back temporarily to take the lead, but they became icy while the Terriers caught fire in the last seven minutes and lost 16 times.

Marquette was also the victim of an explosion, but his loss was much more embarrassing. Seton Hall was a seed number 10 and supposed to lose. Marquette was a No. 5 seed and was beaten by No. 12 Murray State. One of the best three-point shooting teams in the regular season, the Golden Eagles scored 8 of their 31 in-depth attempts and escaped the gym in the first 10 minutes of the second half.

Villanova was the only Big East team to win a match, but even the defending national champions had disappointing results. The Wildcats barely survived Saint Mary's in the first game, and then they were beaten by the Purdue in the second round.

All in all, the league produced a record of 1-4. He beat No. 11 seed by four points and lost the other four games by a combined margin of 70%.

For what it's worth, the Big East has also pooped in bed at NIT. Five teams took part in the "consolation" tournament, and scored 3 to 5 without a single win against a major opponent of the conference. It was a difficult year for what was once the best university basketball conference.

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Carsen EdwardsTimothy D. Easley / Associated Press

In addition to Ja Morant, Carsen Edwards could have been the biggest winner of the entire 2018-19 season.

Edwards was excellent in the second year last year, but he was eclipsed by a starter training filled with seniors. KenPom knew that Edwards was a stud farm and considered him the ninth best player in the country, but Dakota Mathias, Vincent Edwards and Isaac Haas were the most familiar names who also played very well for one of the country's top teams. .

This year, Purdue entered the season as "Edwards and the Question Marks". We knew that Ryan Cline could shoot and we knew that Matt Haarms could stand up and lift his hair. Apart from that, boilermakers figured to be Edwards or bust.

He flourished as one of the most used players in the history of major conferences.

According to KenPom, Edwards took 37.5% of Purdue's shots while on the ground, which is good for the country's sixth highest rate. But these places are usually reserved for minor conference heroes such as Chris Clemons and Mike Daum. Since the beginning of the 2006-07 season, the only major players in the conference with a higher rate were Terrell Stoglin of Maryland (37.8%) in 2011-12 and Doug McDermott of Creighton (38.6%) in 2013-14.

During the tournament, Edwards converted these shots at a remarkable rate. He scored 28 times out of 61 (45.9%) of the three-point range and averaged 34.8 points, scoring 42 points against Virginia and Villanova. At this rate, he would have finished with about 209 points and destroyed Glen Rice's record with 184 tournaments Could Purdue have gone to the national championship game?

In four games, Edwards (139 points) nearly finished with more points than Kemba Walker (141 points) in six games in 2011. He finished well ahead of what Stephen Curry produced (128 points) while leading Davidson to the Elite Eight 2008..

Before the tournament, The Athletic's Sam Vecenie had Edwards screened as the 44th pick in the NBA 2019 draft. In his pre-Final Four update, Edwards jumped up to number 25. We'll have to wait to see his He declares the draft, but he may have won a few million dollars with this race.

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Luguentz SleepingJohn Locher / Associated Press

Each year, since the number of players reached 68 teams for the NCAA tournament in 2011, one (and only one) outstanding "play" team won a match in the round of 16. years–Compliance Commitment 2011, 2013 La Salle, 2014 Tennessee, 2018 Syracuse-m & # 39; said The team has even made the round of Sweet 16. And who can forget VCU who passes from the first to the fourth final in the first year of this new era?

This was one of the biggest peculiarities of the tournament in recent seasons: a team that probably does not deserve to be on the field wins every year a match against one of the top 24 players. This is an immediate reminder, anything is possible in this glorious single elimination monster.

But the series is over this year.

Arizona State beat St. John's and Belmont beat Temple in Dayton to qualify for the first round. But that was obviously all the Sun Devils had left in their tanks. They outshot Buffalo 25 points in the second half before losing with a defeat of 91-74.

Belmont has developed a much tougher fight against Maryland and should have really won this game. The Bruins were led by a dozen in the first half and were ahead during most of the proceedings. They had the ball with a chance to win in the final seconds, but a turnaround cost them a surprise.

It was probably an anomaly rather than a change in what to expect to go forward, though.

A seismic gap separated the top 28 teams (ie seeded No. 7 or better) and the rest of the field, then there was another drop of No. 10 seed until the bubble. Usually, seeds # 6 are not this much better than seeds # 11, but they were this year.

Who knows? Maybe the two outstanding teams from the top four will qualify for the second round next season.

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Bryce BrownCharlie Riedel / Associated Press

The end was painful, but what an incredible race from Auburn to reach the Final Four for the first time in the history of the program.

This quest was almost never launched, as the Tigers were pushed to the limit in the first round against the New Mexico State. In the final 65 seconds of this game, Auburn made three turnovers, missed two free throws, perhaps the most stupid foul of the entire tournament and failed to get what would have been a rebound decisive. The Bruce Pearl guys did not seem to belong to the First Four, let alone the Final Four, but they had won one way or another and had progressed.

After this initial fear, the Tigers began to dominate.

They jumped all over Kansas from the start, leading by 26 at halftime. Powered by Bryce Brown and Chuma Okeke, their three-fly approach was right. Although it was a disappointing season for the Jayhawks because of their high standards, this first half was where he began to feel as if the Tigers were destined to reach the Final Four.

In the next 17-point win over North Carolina, Auburn was unable to miss. Eight different Tigers combined for 17 three points. Even more impressive was their ability to hang with the Tar Heels on the glass. UNC had destroyed its first two opponents in this department and was one of the best rebound teams in the country, but the Tigers ensured that it was not the end of their season.

The story was similar in the Elite Eight victory over Kentucky. Despite the loss of Okeke, the team's leading rebounder, facing a torn ACL in the match against the UNC, Auburn has maintained his rebound margin against a team having a penchant for the destruction of opponents on the boards. The Tigers did not even shoot well (7 of 23 from the depth) during the overtime victory, but they had 10 steals and seven blocks to defeat that loss for Okeke.

This was a good result for March 31, as the Tigers were absolutely owners of the month. They went 11-0 with a pair of victories over Tennessee and this ridiculous series of consecutive wins against the three most winning programs in NCAA history.

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Mfiondu Kabengele and Rui HachimuraJae C. Hong / Associated Press

Three of the four regions had a good dose of end-game dramas.

In the East, Duke played three games decided on the ring. Maryland and LSU barely survived the first lap, and the Tigers defeated the Terrapins on a trench rug of Tremont Waters within two seconds of the end. In addition, Liberty has slightly upset the state of Mississippi.

That's seven of the 15 games decided by five points or less. The madness of March at its best.

The situation was not as hectic in the Midwest, but this opening between Auburn and the New Mexico State had more than enough calamity at the last minute. The states of Iowa and the state of Ohio also won and Kentucky had two hard wins and one loss in overtime.

Speaking of overtime, the South played three games: Tennessee on Iowa, Purdue on Tennessee and Virginia on Purdue. The Sweet 16 battle between Virginia and Oregon was tight from start to finish, as was Villanova's first victory over Saint Mary's. Even the Virginia vs matches Gardner-Webb and Tennessee vs. Colgate were interesting longer than expected.

And then there is the West.

The regional final between Gonzaga and Texas Tech was excellent, but we had to undergo a ton of eruptions to reach that point. Only three of the eight games in the first round were decided by less than 15 points, the closest being Florida State's 76-69 win over Vermont. Between the second round and Sweet 16, all six games had a final margin of at least a dozen points.

Frankly, the only entertaining win in the first three rounds of the Western World is Murray State's 83-64 win over Marquette – only because we were captivated by Ja Morant's pursuit of a triple-double.

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Cassius Winston and Xavier TillmanRob Carr / Getty Images

Was a dynamic duet in this year's dance better than Cassius Winston and Xavier Tillman of Michigan State?

Good answer: no.

If before the start of the tournament you had to choose a single two-headed force to propel his team into the Final Four, the obvious choices would have been Zion Williamson and RJ Barrett of Duke, Rui Hachimura of Gonzaga and Brandon Clarke or Grant of Tennessee. Williams and Admiral Schofield. Instead, none of these teams was successful, while Winston and Tillman were directly responsible for the elimination of the Blue Devils.

We already knew that Winston was special. The man is a three-point shooter with 43% career who also ranked among the top three in the nation for the rate of assistance each of the past three seasons. He became a much more assertive driver this year and became one of the country's most reckless players. even though it's 6 "1" and often seems to "run" with molasses.If it was coming back for its last year, Michigan State would be your obvious favorite to win the 2020 national championship.

However, the question remained unresolved for the last month of the regular season: who else would live up to the situation for Michigan State?

Joshua Langford was an excellent second fiddle until his end-of-season injury in late December. Nick Ward was also a critical contributor until he broke his hand in mid-February. He never failed to recover his form.

In the absence of these young leaders, a second-year striker was born from his ashes.

Une fois dans la formation de départ fin février, Tillman est devenu une force de la nature aux deux extrémités du sol. Seaux, rebonds, blocages, défense post-up. Vous le nommez; il l'a fourni. Il avait en moyenne 15,3 points et 8,5 rebonds lors des quatre premiers matchs du Michigan State, et c'est sa défense contre Williamson (et ses 19 points) en Elite Eight qui a propulsé les Spartans vers leur huitième Final Four en 21 ans.

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Amiral SchofieldTimothy D. Easley / Associated Press

Pour les trois matchs du Tennessee, les 20 premières minutes ne semblaient pas avoir d'importance.

Les Volunteers ont mené 36-20 à la fin de la première demie lors de leur match inaugural contre Colgate, mais les Raiders ont riposté pour prendre une avance de 52-50 à la moitié de la seconde mi-temps. Le Tennessee est revenu sur la piste lorsque l'amiral Schofield a inscrit 11 de ses 14 derniers points dans la finale à 4:05, mais ce match est passé d'un coup fatal à un match serré en un clin d'œil.

Deux jours plus tard, le Tennessee menait Iowa 49-28 à la mi-temps et semblait se diriger vers une victoire facile. Mais une attaque des Volontaires qui a marqué 20 points un peu plus de cinq minutes dans le match est devenue très froide et n’a marqué que 16 points au cours des 17 premières minutes de la seconde mi-temps. L'Iowa était capable de se battre pour forcer les heures supplémentaires avant que le Tennessee l'emporte par la peau des dents.

Étant donné qu’une grosse avance n’a pas fait beaucoup de bien au Tennessee lors des deux premiers tours, il a inversé le script et entraîné 40 points contre 28 à Purdue à la mi-temps de l’épreuve de force des Sweet 16. Les Boilermakers ont poussé leur avance à 51-33 au début de la seconde demie, mais les Vols ont pris feu et l'ont ligotée à 65 minutes moins de 10 minutes plus tard.

Tennessee aurait remporté la partie comme prévu si elle n'avait pas commis une tentative de trois points à Carsen Edwards à deux secondes de la fin. (Plus d’informations à ce sujet prochainement.) Purdue a réussi à vaincre le mineur contrarié en prolongation.

À la fin, l’équipe qui menait à deux chiffres à la mi-temps a remporté la victoire aux trois matchs, mais le processus n’était pas aussi simple qu’il aurait dû l’être. Le Tennessee a creusé une avance de 16 points et de 25 points aux deux premiers tours et a effacé un déficit de 18 points au troisième.

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Chris BeardMarcio Jose Sanchez / Presse associée

Texas Tech n’a perdu qu’une victoire avant de remporter le championnat national, mais ne laissez pas cette finale déchirante vous distraire de l’incroyable travail que l’entraîneur-chef Chris Beard a fait de ce programme au cours des dernières années.

Avant le record de 27-10 de la saison dernière, cela faisait plus de 10 ans que Texas Tech avait remporté 20 matchs en campagne. Les Red Raiders ont perdu la plupart des leaders de l'équipe qui avait atteint l'Elite 8 l'an dernier, mais ils se sont améliorés d'une manière ou d'une autre, enregistrant une fiche de 31-7 cette année.

À l’époque des superstars uniques, Beard and Co. l’a fait avec une formule très différente, axée sur la défense.

La moitié de la rotation des huit membres principaux consistait en des transferts antérieurs. Tariq Owens (St. John's) et Matt Mooney (Dakota du Sud) ont été transférés entre diplômés cette dernière saison. Brandone Francis est venu de Floride il y a trois ans. Deshawn Corprew était un transfert JUCO du South Plains College.

Beard a amené Davide Moretti d'Italie. Et pas l'un des trois autres gars–Jarrett Culver, Kyler Edwards et Norense Odiase–était un consensus parmi les 150 recrues de sa classe respective.

Donnez cette liste à la plupart des entraîneurs et vous envisagez au mieux une saison .500. Mais Beard a fait de ce groupe inhabituel un quasi-champion et l’une des meilleures défenses de l’histoire de la NCAA.

Texas Tech a tenu quatre de ses cinq premiers adversaires sous 60 points. La seule exception était une victoire 75-69 contre l'offensive la plus efficace du pays (Gonzaga).

Alors que l'UCLA poursuit ses recherches sans fin pour trouver son prochain entraîneur principal, préparez-vous à entendre le nom de Beard beaucoup dans les nombreux jours qu'il faudra encore aux Bruins pour le comprendre. L’homme n’a été qu’un entraîneur de D-I pendant quatre ans, mais il est clairement l’un des meilleurs du secteur.

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Samir DoughtyJeff Roberson / Associated Press

On se souviendra toujours de la victoire de Virginia sur Auburn contre Auburn et sa controverse.

Mais ne parlons pas du double dribble manqué. (Les arbitres auraient facilement pu commettre une faute sur Bryce Brown lors de ce match. Deux torts ne font pas un droit, mais cela témoigne de la difficulté de faire cet appel que personne dans l'une ou l'autre équipe n'a même réagi étrangement au double dribble.)

Parlons plutôt de Samir Doughty encrassant Kyle Guy lors de la tentative victorieuse de trois points, car cela s'est produit trop souvent pendant le tournoi.

Tout d'abord, c'était absolument une faute. Enregistrez votre "Swallow the whistle" et "Laissez les joueurs décider du résultat" pleure quelqu'un qui se soucie de lui. Vous ne pouvez pas dégrader un tireur comme ça lors d'une clôture. Peu importe qu'il reste 15 minutes ou 1,5 seconde au jeu.

Il en va de même pour la faute de Lamonte Turner sur Carsen Edwards à la fin du temps réglementaire entre le Tennessee et Purdue, ainsi que pour la faute de Bryce Brown sur Terrell Brown dans le premier match de Auburn. Lorsque vous contestez un tir aussi agressif, vous courez le risque de prendre contact et de laisser le jeu se décider à la ligne des lancers francs.

In all three situations, the shooting team was down by two points. Auburn survived the first mistake when New Mexico State was only able to make one of its three attempts, but Guy eliminated the Tigers by sinking all three of the high-pressure freebies. In the other instance, Edwards made two of the free throws and led the Boilermakers to victory in overtime.

Perhaps those fouls happened because those defenders were the furthest thing from shot blockers. Doughty, Brown and Turner blocked a combined total of eight shots this entire season. It's one thing to close out on a shooter during the normal flow of the game, but actually contesting shots while controlling your body against a shooter who is—at least somewhat—trying to draw the foul is a different challenge altogether.

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Tony BennettMatt York/Associated Press

The monkey is finally off Tony Bennett's back.

Long before the UMBC loss, Bennett's slow-paced, pack-line defense had already been labeled by many as a style that simply isn't built for success in March. The Cavaliers had been either a No. 1 or No. 2 seed in four of the previous five NCAA tournaments, but all they had to show for it was one trip to the Elite Eight.

Moreover, before this year's Elite Eight game against Purdue, Bennett's tenure at Virginia consisted of one win in five tries against a team seeded No. 7 or better–the 2016 Sweet 16 victory over No. 4 Iowa State.

But years of bad luck finally regressed to the mean in one unbelievable three-game sequence.

Purdue's Carsen Edwards poured in 42 points against Virginia, but Mamadi Diakite forced overtime on a frantic buzzer-beating shot. The Cavaliers got the win in the extra session despite trailing by two with less than a second remaining.

They were also down two with less than a second on the clock against Auburn in the Final Four when the controversial foul happened. Kyle Guy calmly drained all three free throws to send Virginia to the first national championship game in program history.

And the Wahoos once again needed a late comeback to win it all. De'Andre Hunter canned a game-tying three-pointer with 12 seconds left, Braxton Key provided the overtime-forcing block and they got the eight-point win in overtime.

It just goes to show how thin the line is between greatness and sadness in this tournament. If Diakite doesn't hit that shot, we're doomed to another year hearing about Bennett's inability to win the big one.

Instead, it's officially time to start debating whether Bennett is one of the five best coaches in the game today.

18 of 18

RJ BarrettAlex Brandon/Associated Press

Sixty-seven teams failed to win the national championship, but one in particular felt like a colossal disappointment.

From the moment Duke started kicking Kentucky's teeth in at the Champions Classic in early November, the Blue Devils were the overwhelming favorite to win it all. Because of how special Zion Williamson and RJ Barrett were, we spent nearly five months entertaining debates about whether Duke or the field was the smarter bet for this tournament.

However, the No. 1 overall seed never much looked the part of a favorite.

Even in the 23-point win over North Dakota State in the first round, the Blue Devils came out slow, trailing for a good chunk of the first half and only leading by four at intermission.

In the two subsequent games against UCF and Virginia Tech, Duke's normally excellent three-point defense was nowhere to be found. It struggled to score in the paint against UCF's Tacko Fall, and it had no answer for Virginia Tech's Kerry Blackshear Jr. on the glass, allowing the Hokies' lone big man to corral 11 offensive rebounds. In both games, the Blue Devils tested the limits of "survive and advance" when the opposing team missed multiple game-winning or game-tying shots in the final five seconds.

And in the loss to Michigan State, Duke got destroyed in turnover margin while its season-long struggles with both threes and free throws proved problematic.

We've seen plenty of incredible teams suffer a tough loss in the NCAA tournament. In 2010 (Kansas), 2011 (Ohio State) and 2017 (Villanova), the No. 1 overall seed didn't even reach the Elite Eight. In 2014 (Florida), 2015 (Kentucky) and 2016 (Kansas), the No. 1 overall seed lost in the Elite Eight or Final Four. Who will ever forget last year's No. 1 overall seed (Virginia) losing to UMBC?

But those teams each had one bad game, which can happen to anyone. With Duke, it felt like the alleged best team in the country lost three consecutive games.

The Blue Devils' 2018-19 legacy would have been better off if they had just lost to UCF in the second round. We could've chalked it up to the combination of Aubrey Dawkins catching fire and Fall causing problems in the paint no other team could—the wrong place at the wrong time for Williamson and Co.

Instead, three nail-biters leave us to question whether this team was actually that good in the first place.