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Eye On College Basketball
March Madness 2025 Sweet 16 Thursday Recap - Alabama, Florida, Duke, Texas Tech advance to Elite 8
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- [00:00]
Gary Parish
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- [00:09]
David Cobb
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- [01:19]
Gary Parish
Hey there, I'm Gary Parish. Welcome back to the Ion College Basketball Podcast where we sometimes discuss camel fighting Dodo birds. Leaky Black David Cobb is here with me. If you're watching on YouTube, you know what to do to that. Like button shouts to Brandon Davies. And if you haven't yet subscribed to the CBS Sports college basketball YouTube channel, it sure would be awesome if you did that while you're here. Let's get into it. Four Sweet 16 games on Thursday night. Two in Newark, two in San Francisco. Let's start in Newark where the favorite to win the 2025 NCAA Tournament advance to the Elite Eight for the second straight year. Final score Duke 100, Arizona 93 Caleb Love man, he tried his best to get his number in every arena in America, but his 35 points were not enough in part because Duke shot 60% from the field and got a National Player of the Year performance from freshman star Cooper flag. 9 of 19 from the field, 3 of 5 from 3, 9 of 10 for the free throw line. 30 points, 7 assists, 6 rebounds, 3 blocks, 1 steal in 37 minutes. David Cobb, thank you for staying up with me. Let me welcome you in here by getting your thoughts on a fun one between Duke and Arizona.
- [02:26]
N/A
It was fun. We needed these two games in this late night window to add a little juice to this NCAA Tournament and they both delivered. Even though it looked like Duke was going to run away with this thing up by as much as 19. I think in the end, Arizona did almost everything you got to do to stay with Duke in a game. I mean, they didn't turn the ball over. They shot the, well, ball well from the, from the free throw line. Caleb Love went nuclear. And yet it still was not enough. Largely due to the fact that Cooper Flag was just brilliant in a multifaceted type of way. You see the 30 points and that jumps off, but boy, it's the assists, it's the block shots, it's the hustle plays. Yeah, it was, it was a banger, man. It was, it was a phenomenal game. We almost got that. That memorable Caleb Love storyline. Not quite, but, but I'll take it. When, when you looked at this one, I thought there was a chance Duke could run away with this thing and make it a blowout. It sure looked like it was headed in that direction. But you got to give Arizona some credit for, for fighting back in this thing because there's not many teams out there who could look at a 19 point deficit against this Duke team and then somehow find their way back to make it a game.
- [03:24]
Gary Parish
Yeah, most people who find themselves down 19 to Duke ultimately lose by 25 or something like that. So for Arizona to make this a game and for Caleb Love to, you know, turn in a classic Caleb Love performance, like college basketball players come and go and particularly ones who don't flourish in the NBA, they just kind of, you know, you could look up and you hadn't even thought of this person's name in 15 years and suddenly it's like, oh, yeah, I remember him. We will all remember Caleb Love and it's not because he's going to be an NBA all Star. You know, we'll, we'll see what his professional career looks like. But we're all going to remember Caleb Love as a college basketball player because he's been a part of some big things and he made this one interesting tonight when it looked like it, it might not be on Cooper Flag. I remember talking about people talking about him with people heading into the season because they'd heard the hype but they hadn't actually put their eyes on it. So, like, what's it going to look like? And I think I. And most people would say things like if you're expecting him to go out and get 30 or score the ball like Kevin Durant did in his one year at Texas, that's just not really who he is. He's going to be the best player in college basketball, but it's not going to be because he leads the country in scoring or his conference in scoring. Some people even wondered if he would lead his team in scoring. But he was going to always fill up the box score, know he's going to get rebounds, he was going to get assists, he was going to record blocks, he was going to record steals, he was going to guard his position and he was going to impact winning in a positive way. But if you're caught up on the scoring, well, the scoring is probably not going to be there. Well now he's just going out and getting 30. So like he is now the guy who can go get you 30 plus the seven assists, six rebounds, three blocks and a steal. He stayed on the court 37 minutes in a, in a 40 minute basketball game. He's just awesome. He has been all along, especially so tonight. And I'm not ready to submit a ballot yet. Don't hold me to it yet. But we will on Monday submit ballots for National Player of the Year for CBS Sports. And given what we're watching. I, I am, I am. I guess I, I'd start by saying a little bit like Kevin L. Kevin Willard. I don't know exactly what I'm going to do next, but I feel like I kind of have an idea. It looks like Cooper Flag is going to be the national player of the year.
- [05:46]
N/A
Yo, gp the ball is in Janai Brooms court, bro. You got to do something spectacular tomorrow night if you want to. To climb back up that odd sheet. I mean the only way it happens where, where Broom wins. I was just actually talking about this with Nada. The only way Broom gets back into this conversation is if Duke loses to Alabama.
- [06:03]
Gary Parish
Right.
- [06:03]
N/A
Broom and Auburn go to the Final Four and he does the 20 and 10 thing twice in the Final Four. You know, something like that. Right. Because, but just based.
- [06:10]
Gary Parish
I mean, I was just gonna say the problem, the problem with that because I get your point. The voting. I, I think we vote later than anybody.
- [06:17]
N/A
Well, that's true. That's a great point. Yeah. Because of the. Yeah. This is it. Right? So unless Broom just goes nuclear this weekend. I mean it's, it's, it's over.
- [06:24]
Gary Parish
He needs to go for like. Yeah. 35 and 12 and you know, dunk on Vlad golden or something. I don't know. He needs something at this point. I'm, I'm assuming I'm going to cast a ballot for Cooper Flag. It feels like that's going to be the right vote.
- [06:40]
N/A
Quadruple double is what I need. I need, I need 40 points. 15 rebounds, 10 assists and 10 blocks out of you, Janai Broom. And then, then I'll revisit my ballot.
- [06:49]
Gary Parish
It'll, you know, like it's been a tight race and it still is. And if somebody wanted to make an intelligent argument for Jani Broom, I'll, I'll listen to it. But doing something like this in the, in the Sweet 16, if Cooper flag backs this with another impressive performance, gets Duke to the Final Four. And I just think, I think that'll be enough. I almost, regardless of what Janai Broom does, if Cooper Flag has another nice game and takes Duke to the Final four as an 18 year old freshman, I'm assuming my ballot will have his name on it for, for national Player of the Year. Either way, now we're going to get Duke Alabama in the East Region final on Saturday. That's going to be at 8:49pm Eastern. You'll be able to watch it on TBS. And that's because Alabama made history in the Sweet 16 final score. Alabama 113, BYU 88. Crimson Tide took 51 three pointers and made 25 of them. That's a record for made threes in an NCAA Tournament game. Previous record held by Loyola Marymount in 1990, that was 21. So Alabama didn't just break it, broke it by four, broke it very, you know, relatively speaking, early in the, in, in the second half they took 51 threes, only 15 twos. And Mark Sears was the star. 11 of 18 from the field, 10 of 16 from three. 34 points, 8 assists, 3 steals. Alabama becomes the first team to score 110 points in an NCAA Tournament game since North Carolina back in 2008. That was just a wild game to watch unfold. I mean, like, you ready for this? We've both been watching the NCAA Tournament our entire lives. We have neither, quite literally never seen anything like that because nothing like that's ever happened in NCAA Tournament game before.
- [08:34]
N/A
Yeah, it was a banger. The first half in particular because it was a close game. And then so Alabama, their, their percentage of threes, I think it was 77 of their shots or something in that neighborhood. Never in NCAA tournament history prior to tonight has a team taken that high of a percentage of their field goal attempts from beyond the arc. So historic in that way too. We've never seen that, that sort of ratio. And it's a math problem. Right. We know that with Nate Oats, the three is worth more than the two. And it seemed like Alabama was kind of content to give up the two against BYU and BYU took a lot of those twos and made a lot of those twos, but boy, I mean it was just a parade. So. So Aiden Holloway and Mark Sears, first duo of teammates ever in NCAA tournament history to each make six three pointers in a game. So I mean there's just. You go into our research room right now, it's just one after the other of the way this was historic. And yeah, so I mean I think the overall in this game was 177 and a half or something in that neighborhood. Final total, I'm not a mathematician, but I think the final total here is comfortably over 200. So yeah, it was, it was, it was a fun game. I mean it actually really did deliver. But I think it was you or Matt or one of you two guys said this and it ended up being the case. When you get a game with this sort of offensive explosivity, there's a chance somebody pulls away. And clearly Alabama pulled away here.
- [09:50]
Gary Parish
Well, if the word you remember hearing is explosivity, that was definitely from Norlander because I wouldn't, I don't, I don't use words like that too often. But this is the danger in playing Alabama. They're not a great three point shooting team. They don't actually shoot it great. They're good, but not great. But if you give them to them, they're going to take them and they're going to take them from at least four positions on the court at all times. And NATO's talked about it after the game, said they had noticed on film that BYU was going under screens and they felt like if that's the way they were going to play them, then they were just going to launch. And so Nate told us, but the second you see them go under screens, let's, let's, let's shoot. And to get up 51 in 40 minutes is wild. To make 25 even, even crazier and to do it against this team is nutty because one of the points I'd made in recent days is that if you went over to bartorvik.com and just rewind six weeks, just say, hey, let's say how people. And these are all arbitrary cutoffs. I did it intentionally there the six weeks ago mark is when heading into this game BYU had gone 11 and 1 at the loan loss coming to Houston. So I went back to where the first win in that 111 stretch came, started the, the data there and then ran it through present day. And if you did that this morning, the best four teams in the country over the past six weeks of this season have been Duke, Florida, Houston. So one seed, one seed, one seed and byu. BYU was fourth in the country. Auburn was fifth over the past six weeks. So you can reasonably say this over the past six weeks and this is not, it's not an insignificant amount of time. It's not like I'm saying over the past three games. Anybody can do anything over three games. Six weeks, a pretty long period of time. 12 games, pretty long period of time. Over the past six weeks that team had been playing comparable to a 1 seed in the NCAA tournament and Alabama just beat him by 25. That's insane. And that's a testament to the program NATO's is running to the performance. Lots of people, but most notably Mark Sears put on and it's why they are a danger to anybody. Duke has established itself in the predictive metrics as the best team in the country by a clear margin. And at this point I feel silly even trying to argue reasons why Duke won't win the national championship. Unless I start the argument with like Florida or Kelvin Sampson or Mark Sears making a million threes, you know, but this is the type of team that could do it because they are willing to take the high number threes. And if they happen to get hot, they don't have to do it over a seven game series. They just have to do it in one 40 minute game. And you know, if, if they did that and this is obviously a, a, a wild outlier. But I'm, I guess this is my point because I was asked this tonight in studio, like what happens if Alabama does something like that against Duke? Well, then Duke will get blown out too. You can't survive that. Nobody can survive 25 of 51 from 3. If you, if you run into that and they won't, but if they were to run into something, then Duke would get blown out too. Anybody would have got blown out tonight.
- [13:16]
N/A
Well, BYU outscored Alabama 50 to 16 in the paint. They were outscored by by 34 points in the paint and lost this game by 25. Amazing. I'll say this though, I don't think it's, it's possible to do this against Duke. I, I don't think, I think an NBA team might be able to do it. But I think Duke's defense, Gary, I know that Duke's defense is really good. It's really good. It might be as good as the Utah's Jazz defense is right now. Like they're, they're long, they're athletic. They're. They're really good defensively. So it's just. It's gonna be really difficult to replicate this and any. Even on. On a smaller scale. Like, obviously the Alabama Duke game is not going to feature as many possessions as this game featured. So the likelihood of you even having an opportunity to get up 51 threes is. Is pretty slim.
- [14:06]
Gary Parish
Right.
- [14:07]
N/A
Still, I mean, to your point, If Alabama hits 12 or 13, right, like, that's maybe a number that gives them a shot.
- [14:14]
Gary Parish
Yeah. I don't mean to imply that it's replicable because it's obviously not. They. They probably can't even get off 50. Like Duke is big. Like Duke is six, five in the back court, seven foot up front. Duke. Duke is big. They're not even going to be able to get off the number of threes and certainly wouldn't make the same percentage, barring something fluky. I don't mean to imply this is replicable because I actually hate it when people do that. Like, some guy will come off of a bench and knock down five threes and. And then you'll go to the postgame press conference and somebody be like, coach, if, you know little Joey can get you five threes off the bench every night, how. How impactful would that be? It's like, what are you talking about? Little Joey ain't getting you five threes off the bench. That's why he's on the bench. It's just something that happened, but it's not something you need to be counting on tonight is something that happened. My point is that that can't happen again, almost certainly, and not against an opponent like Duke probably ever. But Alabama is the type of team that will take about every other shot from three, and if they happen to get rolling from them beyond the arc, they won't do 25 of 51 on you. But what if they do 14 of 30? Like 14 of 30 might hurt you. And so that'll. That'll be why this is, you know, a game with a ton of intrigue heading into it. You've got the biggest brand in the sport, or at least one of them, the probable future national player of the year, but a team on the other side of them that was in the Final Four last season and has the type of guard who could, you know, really cause them some problems.
- [15:49]
N/A
Yeah, no doubt. I thought it was interesting. Duke faced a little adversity in this game with first half foul trouble. In particular, they had to bust the glass on Malik Brown, which I don't know that they wanted to do. I mean they said before the game that he was going to be available. Then they get in a lot of foul trouble, especially in the front court in the first half. They had to play him for four minutes. Then they, they, you know, they, they get come back on in the second half. Right. Like Arizona makes that run. So. No, I, I don't know. I, I thought it was good for Duke to get tested because they're going to get tested against Alabama. You know, they just haven't been tested a whole lot this season. But no, I mean, I give Alabama a puncher's chance. Yeah, but, but if Duke is at its capacity or near its capacity, then Duke, Duke, Duke should cruise. I mean, I'm not ultimately all that worried about, about Duke versus Alabama.
- [16:38]
Gary Parish
I think Duke wins the game unless Alabama has another better than normal three point shooting night. You'll, you'll. The, the way Alabama wins this game is NATO sits down post game and says, you know, I didn't know based on how we played all season if we were going to be able to knock down those types of shots that consistently two games in a row. But we did it and now we're on the final four for the second. So you don't have to be something like that. Keep in mind like before tonight, Mark Sears was 5 of 35 from 3 in his previous 35 attempts and then boom, just out of cannon. Awesome stuff. Fun to watch. So we get Alabama and Duke on Saturday. Now let's move over to the west region where Florida and Texas Tech both advanced on Thursday night overtime game to close the night. We'll get to that next. First, let's get a word from our partners.
- [17:28]
N/A
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- [19:34]
Gary Parish
In San Francisco Florida 87, Maryland 71. That was game one out there. Florida now one win away from the fourth, from its first Final Four since Billy Donovan took him there in 2014. They had six players in double figures, while Richard got 15, Walter Clayton got 13. Derek Queen from Maryland, the fabulous freshman had 27 points and five rebounds and what is likely his last game in a Maryland uniform, I said this tonight on Inside College Basketball. I'd be interested to get your take on it. Auburn's the number one overall seed in this tournament. Auburn is the outright SEC champion. But if you wanted to make a case that Auburn isn't even the best team still in this bracket as of this moment from the sec, you'd have a lot of data points to support an argument in favor of Florida. They're operating at an extremely high level and really didn't have much trouble with a Maryland team that had, you know, been playing really well.
- [20:31]
N/A
Yeah, no doubt Alex Condon missed a good chunk of this game too, which is sort of a frightening moment. But that's when you realize the depth and the quality of that front court because when you got Ruben Chigniello and Tommy Hog and Micah Hand Logdon's back, you know, it's like they can kind of keep rolling even without a guy like that. That's impressive. So if you were power ranking the SEC teams left in this bracket, Florida's got to be 1 is Tennessee 2. Tennessee beat Auburn in the SEC tournament. If you're power ranking the number ones, I mean, I think, I think number one seed, I think Auburn's clearly the fourth of the four right now. Florida, what they did tonight was not shocking because you had to imagine the distraction of everything that's going on with Kevin Willard was eventually going to catch up to Maryland. The emotional letdown factor of that crazy buzzer beater against Colorado State. I mean, not to mention like the reality is Maryland had one of the better first round draws, first and second round draws, right? Like they got past two double digit seeds. So of these teams in the Sweet sixteen, they were tested kind of the least. Right. And so they just ran up against a better team tonight, a team that was more focused and a team that. Maryland had a lot of distractions, I'll say that. And I, I can't imagine that that didn't have an impact on the way they performed here.
- [21:55]
Gary Parish
So let's talk about those distractions. Obviously what you're referencing is the reports that Kevin Willard is at least a possibility to be the next head coach at Villanova. He had spoken publicly about his job status in recent days and weeks, complained about financial commitment for his program at Maryland, discussed the uncertainty around the athletic department with his athletic director recently leaving for another job. He's made note multiple times that he doesn't love the idea of not knowing who his next boss is going to be, but, but being very sure that it's not going to be the person who brought him there. And he was obviously asked about, about all of this after tonight's loss, even specifically about. I don't know if you saw the video, but it's a pretty normal thing to see at an NCAA tournament game. Bunch of fans at the hotel sort of sending the team off. And there were. I don't, I read a description. It was like Maryland fans boo Kevin Willard as he's walking out of the hotel. It, it might, it might have just been one person. There was definitely a boo, but I don't know that it was a chorus of booze or a lot of people. Either way, it's something that happened and something he heard and he was asked about all of it tonight. And I do Imagine you have heard what he said, how he said it. What'd you make of. Of the way Kevin Willard handle things post game?
- [23:26]
N/A
Oh, I. I just go back to the way he's handled it for the last couple weeks, which is kind of odd. It's just unusual to see a sitting head coach be so vocally outspoken against his administration. Now I get a part of that is an AD who's no longer there, who. Who left to go to smu. But now we're. We're to a point where the. The football coach, Mike. Mike Locksley is kind of like, clapping back and talking about, well, we. You don't typically. Every family has its dirty laundry. Right. And we don't typically air it out in the public. And so it's like, at this point, how do you go back. How do you go back to Maryland after all this? That's kind of where I'm at on it is like, Villanova has not hired anybody else. The reason they've clearly not hired anybody else is because they think they might have a chance to get Kevin Willard. So at this point, I. I just. I don't see how this marriage can continue. It just feels too acrimonious to proceed at this point. And you're kind of coasting off the good vibes of still being alive in the NCAA tournament. Well, those good vibes are gone now. And there's. I. I don't understand, based on the things that he said, how he can now turn around and make his peace with that administration.
- [24:30]
Gary Parish
And listen, he might have known where this was headed for a while, although he explicitly tonight said he did not and still does not. But as I said on Inside College Basketball, he certainly sounded like a man who knows what he's going to do next, because I don't think it's a coincidence that he just started talking. Well, I'll just quote his football coach airing dirty laundry, like, after the Villanova job opens. Like. Like this dirty laundry that he was referencing was back around Christmas. It was something that happened around Christmas. Well, he didn't talk about it around Christmas, around in January. Why bring it up now? You know, this is what I mean. There is exactly two times in my life, maybe more, but I remember too vividly where I got very comfortable with my employer and was like, I think I need this and this, or, you know, let my agent handle it or whatever. But, like, got very, like, oh, right, it's time to start asking for stuff, and it's time to start saying, hey, I. I think I need this. And I should get this and why don't I have this and whatever. It's time to speak up a little bit. And do you know what both of those times had in common?
- [25:53]
N/A
What?
- [25:53]
Gary Parish
I had offers from other places. And I knew what I. If you don't, if you don't want, do what I want. If you don't do what I think I want right now, it doesn't mean I'm going to leave, but I know I can. I know I can. So let's see. Let's see what happens. And that's the way Kevin Willard sounded to me, like somebody who knows he can leave if he wants to. So now it's time to start talking and start, you know, letting out everything he's wanted to, left out, let out and has instead kept inside. And the interesting place for him now or thing for him now is that if he would have just stayed quiet, like, just said, hey, out of respect for everybody involved, like, this is my advice to coaches. Here's. It's not what I would like as a reporter because I love this stuff. I love talking about it, thinking about it. All of it. Here would be my. If I was hired as a consultant and coaches were like, gp, what should we do when this type of stuff happens? Don't talk about it. You can't tell the truth because your fans will get upset. And if you lie, that that's not good either. You know what the best thing to do I've been? Your name gets connected to a job publicly. The next time you're in front of cameras, somebody asks you about it, you know what you said? Guys, I have been like, if you're a coach next season, here's what you do. Guys, I've been watching these things unfold for forever and just know that sometimes I'll read reports and they have people's names connected to jobs and it's real. Other times it's just not. It's just not all right? And I watch coaches struggle with this and try to figure out what to say and what not to say. And to this day, I've never seen somebody figure it out. To this day, I've never seen somebody get it right. Kevin Willard, like tried to talk about it publicly last year and y'all saw what happened there. So out of respect for everything, I'm just going to tell you I'm not ever going to talk about my future at this job, my future at anywhere else. It's just a non starter for me. And it's not because I don't have real thoughts on everything. It's because I've seen so many people before me just get themselves in bad situations by trying to talk about this stuff. They either end up telling the truth and it's not accepted or they lie. And I don't want to lie to you. So just, you can ask me about this or literally anything else you ever see my name attached to and we're just not going to talk about it. I'm not obligated to talk about it and I don't think it serves any purpose. That's the way to do it, I think, because you ready for this? By T Had Kevin Willard never talked about anything. He's coming off of a sweet 16 his fans probably aren't pleased with tonight, but they are, broadly speaking, pleased with the direction of the program. And now he can weigh two things, actually leverage them against each other and come out of it wherever he wants to be. Now there is a sentiment among some Maryland fans, because of the way this has been handled, that they don't even want him back. Now the Baltimore Sun, I should say, is reporting tonight after the game that Maryland administrators have told at least one prominent booster that they believe Kevin Willard is going to leave to be the next head coach of Villanova, but that they are making a last ditch effort to try to bring him back, to try to keep him from leaving. And when I tweeted that, I haven't looked at it in a while, but like among the first responses was we don't even want him back. Let him go. He screwed this up. He quit on our team. He didn't stay focused on our team. Whether any of that stuff is true, I'm just telling you that's what part of the Maryland fan base believes now. And that's why turning around and going back, it's still possible, I guess, but it, it will not be as clean as it otherwise could have been.
- [29:39]
N/A
Yeah, well, he ain't gonna have Derek Queen if he comes back and that, that's. That. That's tough, right? If I'm ever a coach, GP I will. I will. You seem like a man who needs another job. You seem like somebody who could use something else added to your plate. So I'll hit you up and hire you to, to consult for me. But not to your point. I mean, there are ways to publicly pressure your administration through back channels. If you want a message out there in the public about the support you're getting on the nil front or whatever it may be, there are ways to get that messaging out without you having to be the. The face of it.
- [30:09]
Gary Parish
Oh, God. You know how you do it? Like, honestly, you're Kevin Willard, okay?
- [30:14]
N/A
You.
- [30:15]
Gary Parish
You. You call David Cobb. Better yet, you're Kevin Willard's assistant. You reach out to Cal Boone, whoever, Matt Norlander, and you just say, hey, listen, I want to be clear. You don't have to reach out to somebody from cbs. You reach out to whatever media member you're most comfortable with. Who. Who's the media member Kevin Willard is so comfortable with, he could tell him anything and trust that nothing gets out unless he wants it to get out. Who's that person? All right, you talk to that person and you say, listen, it looks like I might be the Villanova guy, and I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm probably going to have to do it, but it ain't just because I want to be the Villanova coach instead of the Maryland coach. But you have to understand what they're doing to me here. Like, I tried to stay one extra night in New York with my basketball team. We are a Big Ten program, and they said no because of money. You think if Tom Izzo said he needed to stay an extra night, New York City, Michigan State would say no? You think whoever Indiana's coach is, if they wanted to stay next tonight in New York City, they'd say no, absolutely not. I am not being given the same resources that these other Big Ten schools are. I need you to get that out there for me. Can you do that? From a source. Here's the tweet. Hey, John Rothstein. Here's the tweet. Sources have told CBS Sports that the only reason Kevin Willard would even consider a move to Villanova. This. That's actually not the tweet. Because you don't want to make Villanova upset, but Kevin Willard has concerns about the funding connected to the Maryland men's basketball program and feel like all the stuff Kevin actually said, just have somebody else say it. Yep, it's it. And then we can all talk about it the same way. But it ain't coming straight from you, even if deep down we know it came straight from you. Just those words coming out of his mouth created problems for him, and he could have got the same message done by just giving it to somebody else and saying, that's the truth. Tweet it from a source. Does that make sense?
- [32:18]
N/A
Honestly, I'm just surprised. This is what it took for Maryland to finally lose a game by double digits. I mean, these guys were or in every game all season long. And then they finally got ran off the court by somebody. And I gotta think, I gotta think that the, the accumulation of all this plays a. Plays a factor. Plays a factor. Without a doubt.
- [32:36]
Gary Parish
Right? So we'll see in the coming days. He said tonight he does not know what he's going to do. But like I said, he sounded like somebody who, I mean, he kept talking about, I don't know who my boss is and I have to consider everything. I'll put it this way, then we'll move on. I don't remember a coach being placed in that situation. NCAA tournament is now over for you. You've been very closely connected to a job that's open. We're going to ask you about it now it's time to talk. I don't remember a coach saying so many things that at least implied that he's unlikely to return to his job. As Kevin Willard said after this game, most coaches say nothing or very little. Like Ben McCollum was obviously asked about it after the Drake game. He just said, I'm just not ready to talk about that right now. And they said, okay, thanks coach. And that was the end of it. That was the end of it. Kevin said a lot more and on some level I respect it. Like I like people who talk, right. But I don't know that he served himself well. And I think he probably knows that he didn't serve himself well. This whole thing, I will tell you not. I don't want to say the one thing he said that's true because that implies I think everything else wasn't. But among the things he said that I believe is true, he said tonight was that he did not expect to be in this scenario and has not enjoyed being in this scenario. Like it is fun to be pursued by, you know, big jobs throwing million dollar contracts at you. But to be in some of it was self inflicted. But to be trying to navigate all of this in a very public way is complicated. And if he didn't realize that in Vance, he, he certainly, he certainly knows it. Now let's move on. Talk more basketball because now we're gonna get Florida, Texas Tech as a PLO as opposed to Maryland, Texas Tech. We'll get Florida, Texas Tech in the West Region final on Saturday. That one's going to be 609 Eastern. It'll also be on TBS. And the reason we're getting that game is because Texas tech came from 16 down to beat Arkansas 85, 83 on Thursday night in overtime. Darren Williams buried a three with about 10 seconds left in regulation that tied the score and got it to overtime. Then Texas Tech outscored the Hogs 13:11 in the extra period to win it by two. A Duthiro did play, but only five minutes. Meantime, at Texas Tech, Darren Williams, J.T. toppin and Christian Anderson combined for 62 points and 22 rebounds. And now Grant McCaslin is in the Elite Eight from the Big 12. What you make of what Texas Tech did to come back and handle Arkansas?
- [35:18]
N/A
Yeah, Darian Williams started this game 1 of 11 from the floor and then he's just hitting bucket after bucket down the stretch. I mean that, that's some onions. And they needed it, man, because this was the game where you really started to feel like they were missing Chance McMillan, who's their three point ace. I mean, probably one of the best three point shooters in the country. They haven't had him now for a couple of weeks. And with Arkansas up in this game by double digits for a sizable chunk of it, you're like, all right, well this is the time where Arkansas is getting healthier. They're getting a duthier back in the mix boogie Flanders at least giving them something. And Texas Tech has got a seven man rotation. They don't have their three point shooter. They're just not going to keep up. And then somehow, some way down the stretch, they found a way. I mean, I thought Christian Anderson, the number 113 ranked prospect in the class of 2024, was huge in this game. I mean three after three after three down the stretch. I mean this dude was listed at 5 11, 165 on his, on his prospect page. Now somehow he's listed at 6 foot 2. Now I don't know if they have some mechanism to stretch, stretch you out or something at Texas Tech.
- [36:20]
Gary Parish
They do, they do, they do have that. They can stretch you out at Texas Tech or I mean, maybe he just.
- [36:24]
N/A
Grew once he, once he got to Lubbock, but nah, he was huge in this game. A guy who didn't really give him a ton the first couple months of the season, but it's been so good down the stretch. So, you know, there's that and then there's J.T. toppin kind of quietly going for 20 points, nine rebounds, and I think he had five blocks too, so it didn't even feel like he played his best game. And yet Texas Tech found a way. Now the, the, the flip side of this GP and I, I know you didn't get to see all of it because you're doing a million different things in, in studio. But there's a late game execution element to this with Cal and with Arkansas, and there's, there's the side of this where Arkansas blows a 16 point lead.
- [37:05]
Gary Parish
So let me, so let me, so let me walk you, walk you through this because it's John Calipari and John Caliperi always is gonna create a conversation. There were some late game, okay, late in regulation, he's down three. They don't foul, they end up in overtime. In the overtime, there's a questionable decision or lack of action in the final seconds. You just walk me through what you saw.
- [37:33]
N/A
Yeah, so I mean, basically Texas Tech gets the, the go ahead bucket with under 10 seconds left in OT and Arkansas's got a timeout left. But it's one of those situations where oftentimes you'll see coaches let it play out because something might develop organically in the flow of the game. If you get the, the ball out of the basket, get the ball up court quickly, okay, maybe your guy gets downhill and can get to the basket, at the very least get fouled. But if it's not playing out right, then you use that timeout with, you know, three or four seconds left. You go and draw something up. Get the ball in the hands of Nelly Davis, right, to take the, the potential game winning shot if he gets it off from beyond the arc. In this case, John Caliperi, you're looking at the clock. D.J. wagner's going nowhere. Five seconds, four seconds, he's going nowhere. And then he never calls the timeout. And so what happens is DJ Wagner just takes a ridiculous contested two that never had has a shot and the buzzer goes off and, and that's it. And, and so he goes to the, to the, to the death here with that time out in his pocket. And he's gonna get roasted for that. I'm sure he's getting roasted for that right now. I mean, like you have been doing a thousand things. And so I don't know what the national narrative developing around this isn't in real time, but the, the one not fouling up three in regulation and then the, the lack of a time out there with the game on the line. Rough. I mean, it's a, it's a rough look from what's been a redemptive second half of the season. It's a rough way for it to end for Cal.
- [38:57]
Gary Parish
That's right. I'm less bothered by him not fouling up three just because it would have required the foul to be with about 11 seconds left. On the clock. And every coach I've ever talked to will tell you that's too early. At that point, you're just going to have to do it again. If you foul with 11 seconds of the clock, you're gonna let them shoot free throws. They might at that point just decide to try to make two. Right. Tie it up and then foul you and let's just turn this into a free throw shooting contest and we're going back and forth or they wouldn't fight. You know, like there's, it's, it's just a situation. Well, let me start over on that. You're, you're, you're, you're down to, there's 11 seconds left if they foul you or you're down three. Rather if they foul you in that moment, you might just make two and, and then foul as quickly as you can and just keep going back and forth. Most coaches will tell you it needs to be under eight, under seven, under six in that range for the foul up three to actually work as it's intended to work. So because of what happened to John in 2008 in the national title game, every time he's in a Fallout 3 situation and they don't foul people immediately. Like, I did a Twitter search for it just to see how often it was popping up and it was there. Buddy.
- [40:22]
N/A
Mario Chalmers footage.
- [40:24]
Gary Parish
Yeah, like, I didn't see that, but I'm sure it's coming. And I just, I, I, I think that's, it's less obvious than the 2008 thing was obvious, because the 2008 thing, you know, the seconds were ticking off the clock, you were under six, you could have fouled up three there and, and done it. As they say, by the book. Fouling up three here so early would not have been by the book, according to what most coaches have told me their data shows. And so that, that's less of an issue. Although it is something that happened in overtime. I didn't see the last sequence live because we're like quite literally on tv and then the game's over. And as soon as the game's over, we're off. New crew comes in and I'm jumping in a car, coming back here, getting ready to podcast. I will say this is something Norland and I talked about during the season. I want to say it was a Michigan game very similar to the end of, of this Texas Tech Arkansas game. Dusty May was on the sideline. They were letting it play out. If I remember correctly, he calls the.
- [41:27]
N/A
Timeout and then Namari Burnett hits the shot. Was it, was it. Do I got this right?
- [41:31]
Gary Parish
I, I think that might have been it. I just remember if you can find it, go back and watch Dusty.
- [41:36]
N/A
I remember y'all talking about it. I remember y'all talking about this. I mean he, he looked quite literally with his coaching, I think won the game for him in that situation.
- [41:42]
Gary Parish
Yes, that was a moment where he was watching it unfold and then realizing you got, it's a split second decision, but you have to realize at some point it's not unfolding into anything. Call the timeout. You either have to recognize you're getting something and let it go or recognize you're not and call the timeout. And I, I loved that moment in that Michigan game because it felt like Dusty was like, that's coaching. That's coaching in real time. Recognize. Trying to let it do one thing and then audibleing. Call the timeout. Now let's do something else. If the argument is that John should have done that in this space, I'll listen to that one because I am totally in agreement with, in theory, let's just let them play. Let's not call a timeout and let the defense get set up. Let's just let them play. But if you don't see something good coming and that clock is ticking down, then your best option in that moment is to, is to get in there, stop the play and see if you can draw something up on a dry race.
- [42:42]
N/A
Let me give you the other side of it. I'm not trying to defend Cal because I think it's pretty clear in retrospect he should have called timeout. But the other side of this is Rick Barnes trying so desperately to call timeout. So desperate, he's so mad he's not getting this timeout called. And then Jemima Meshach hits a 40 footer at the buzzer to beat Alabama for, for Tennessee. And how matter Tennessee fans at Rick Barnes if as that shots in the air, the referee awards the timeout. And so, I mean, right, you never know how it's going to play out. But I mean it is painfully obvious in hindsight. This possession from, from D.J. wagner was going nowhere fast. You want the ball in Nelly Davis's hands. He had a huge game and so he's going to get roasted for that. He, you know, I don't know that it's going to be the lasting image from his first season though at Arkansas. The lasting image to me from John Caliper's first season will forever be him going into rupp arena on February 1, beating Kentucky, turning around the season, getting to the sweet 16.
- [43:36]
Gary Parish
That's right. And if he wouldn't have done that, this entire thing would be viewed differently. Like, if you're Arkansas fan, there was a time in the season where it felt like you were going to feel awful all season and have big questions going into Year two. And now I think you can if you want to convince yourself, oh, he just got off to a rough start and then he lost. Boogie flan. But I mean, look, by the end of the year they're playing as well as anybody. They were in overtime of a Sweet 16 game and I know by the end of the year they weren't playing as well as anybody. Like because Duke exists and Florida exists. But you get the point. I think if you're an Arkansas fan, you can find some stuff to grab onto and be like, it's not what I expected. That's not how I expected year one to unfold. But we still ended up in the Sweet 16, we still ended up in the NCAA tournament and we still got all this nil money and we're still going to buy a roster next season that's going to give us a chance to be good again. It's just this little run that they went on I, I do think is incredibly helpful and just from a quality of life perspective and just feeling good about things. One more segment to go and we'll do it. Just before we get out of here. We'll focus on some players who had big nights on Thursday. Cooper Flag was one, Mark Sears was another. We'll do that next. First, let's get one last word from our partners.
- [44:49]
N/A
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- [45:19]
Where'd you get those shoes?
- [45:20]
Gary Parish
Easy.
- [45:21]
N/A
They're from DSW. Because DSW has the exact right shoes for whatever you're into right now. You know, like the sneakers that make office hours feel like happy hour, the boots that turn grocery aisles into runways, and all the styles that show off the many sides of you from daydreamer to multitasker and everything in between. Because you do it all in really great shoes. Find a shoe for every you at your DSW store or dsw.com Fridays on.
- [45:51]
Gary Parish
CBS, Max Terriot stars in TV's hottest show, Fire Country. And beginning April 4th, don't miss the five episode countdown to the season finale. Need to catch up. Ping episode streaming on Paramount. Plus David Cobb With Fire country in mind, tell me your favorite example of a player who heated up in Thursday's Sweet 16 games.
- [46:14]
N/A
It. It was Cooper Flag. It was Cooper Flag. And it's not just the, the hot shooting, right? It's everything. It's the passing, it's the shot blocking, it's the playmaking. It's just being, being that guy when his team needed it because we haven't seen him when the team needed it all that often because Duke hasn't needed it that much this season. You go back to November, they lose a couple games where he's either got cramps or slips or something. And so to see him execute with the game on the line in the NCAA tournament, it's, it's just a new sort of new achievement unlocked, so to speak, for, for Cooper Flag. So this he's my, my player of the night. He was spectacular and as we discussed, he's awfully close to securing his spot as the national player of the year worthy pick.
- [46:56]
Gary Parish
You go with Cooper Flag. I'll take Mark Sears 11 of 18 from the field, 10 of 16 from three, 34 points, eight assists, three steals, was 5 of 35 from three in Alabama's previous six games. And then goes 10 of 16 from three in this one. And then so that's another nice aspect of this Alabama Duke thing. You get the two star players, the All Americans coming off of of of monster games before they get ready to to deal with each other on, on Saturday. So you get two guys going into an Elite eight matchup and both of them operating at an extremely high level. Mark Sears, Cooper Flag Saturday night on tbs. Again, the five episode countdown to the season finale of fire country begins April 4th. You need to catch up. You can binge right now on Paramount plus let's get out of here. Shouts to Devin Downey Shouts to Chester, South Carolina. Terry Teagle's a legend. Puck Larnell. Thank you guys once again for watching. Listening to the Eye on College Basketball Podcast. If you're not subscribed, please go subscribe anywhere you subscribe to podcasts, Apple, Spotify. There's more of us than there are of them. That needs to be reflected in the comments. To do that, we'll talk to you again real soon. Until then.
- [48:19]
N/A
Paramount Podcasts.
- [48:22]
David Cobb
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