Eddie
For years we've been urging the Southeastern Conference to relocate its annual post season tournament in Atlanta, despite the constant resistence from certain schools and people living around the football entinity known as Birmingham, Alabama.
Thanks to none of the above, but a special tip of the hat to the NCAA, we present for you the greatest Southeastern Conference basketball tournament ever, starting Thursday at The Omni in Atlanta.
LSU, Alabama and Kentucky will hook up with Georgia Tech to bring back memories of days gone by. Heck, the Rambling Wreck would be an official member of the SEC today if the conference schools hadn't been so pig-headed a few years ago when Tech wanted to be readmitted.
With no place else to turn, Tech sought a helping hand from the guys in the Atlantic Coast Conference and the Engineers have arrived as big-timers.
Nevertheless, basketball fans around the country will witness first hand what SEC fans have been missing for years, a great two days of college basketball in a city which knows how to appreciate the game.
It's rather doubtful the leading sports columnists of the Atlanta papers will be writing about assistant coaching changes in football while the big show is going on at The Omni.
A few years ago on opening day of the SEC basketball tourney in Birmingham (in fact it was just when the SEC tourney was reinstated), the lead story on the page one of the sports section was a football article.
This week, you are much more likely to read about the John Williams, the Buck Johnsons, the Kenny Walkers and the Mark Prices. And even a story or two on the likes of a Jim Farmer or a Richard Madison. And that's the way it should be. Despite the probability of facing a team like Georgia Tech on its home floor, Atlanta has to be a welcomed relief for fans, media and even teams like LSU and Kentucky who have had to experienced far too many a night in football country at a time when the round-ball should be king.
Boy, it's good to be going to Atlanta. Maybe, just maybe the powers of the SEC will get their heads out of the sand and give Atlanta a chance to host the SEC. All those absurd comments about Atlanta being ACC Country is hogwash. Atlanta is no more ACC than Birmingham is Sunbelt Country.
The SEC has basically forfeited the South's biggest city, the region's greatest media center and conference's biggest potential asset to sweeten up to a city (Birmingham) which doesn't deserve the league offices, let alone the annual basketball tournament.
If the SEC presidents want to rotate the event occasionally around the campuses, fine, That also would be great. Certainly, the tourney should first go at least once more to Nashville and then to Baton Rouge and Knox ville and perhaps Tuscaloosa (other schools either don't have large enough playing facilities or enough lodging accommodations).
After that let's put the games where they belong, in Atlanta. It would truly be a neutral
court. It wouldn't be a Kentucky Invitational at Rupp Arena or a Alabama and Auburn Invitational at Birmingham. My vote is for Atlanta, each and every year.
My, what a week of NCAA Tournament action can do to the so-called media experts who continue to preach the gospel according to St. John's (aka Big East) and Sir Bobby (Big Ten).
All basketball fans could hear all season was how big, bad and great were the ACC, Big East and Big Ten. Those big-city media people snickered at the likes of the Southeastern Conference.
What the SEC has not been smart enough to figure out is a way to beat patsies in non-conference schedules, reduce that devastating 18-game double round-robin SEC schedule and then play a grueling post season tournament on top of it.
While other conferences fatten up non-league records, they then remain high in the polls the remainder of the season by insisting that when No. 4 loses to No. 1, that No. 4 should remain No. 4 and when No. 4 upsets No. 1, then No. 4 should be No. 1 and No. 1 should be No. 2. Or whatever.
Much of the problem lies with the SEC schools themselves.
For example. Alabama coach Wimp Sanderson was upset with one of our columns which suggested that the Bama regular season schedule wasn't one of the nation's tougher one.
His claim was that his schedule was just as tough as Kentucky's. That his top four non-conference foes (Utah, Maryland, UTEP and Nebraska) were as tough as Kentucky's (Louisville, Kansas, Indiana, North Carolina State). Hurnm? You be the judge.
He pointed out that all four made the NCAA. True, but three of the four bowed out in the first round and Maryland was beaten in the second game. Three of UK's top four opponents remain in the Sweet Sixteen.
Then, Wimp explained that the remainder of UK's non-conference card was just as weak as Alabama's. The remainder of UK's include Northwestern State, Chaminade, Hawaii, Cincinnati, Pepperdine, East Carolina and VMI. Alabama's other non-SEC competition came in the form of the same Northwestern State, Rider, Murray State, Mercer, and Florida State. Again, you be the judge.
First of all, you've read in this space before that I've noted that UK's schedule is not as tough as it used to be. It's not. But....
There is one other factor. UK had Louisville and Indiana at home, and while Alabama was on the road at Maryland and on a neutral court for UTEP, they were losses.
Wimp, ye got a great team, and you've done a great job, but maybe you've been reading too many of those football writers' basketball reports in Alabama. They just don't understand that a basketball is really
round.
Still, Alabama's schedule was tougher than some others in the league, such as LSU, Georgia, Ole Miss, Vanderbilt and Auburn.
Speaking of Wimp, we must remind you that this conversation was just after his club beat Xavier Friday in Charlotte, a couple days before it became apparent that Wimp and his Tide will be going up against Kentucky for a fourth time Thursday in Atlanta. That's another story. The NCAA, for the first time in a long, long time, has decreed that it's okay to seed a conference champion against a conference opponent prior to the regional finals.
That was company policy until this year. Some times, it's almost impossible to spread teams out when a conference has six or seven clubs participating, but that isn't the situation this year. The SEC has only four clubs in the NCAA and three are in the Southeast.
It's somewhat strange that UK would have to face a team (Davidson) on one of its own home courts to open the tourney, especially when you consider that UK was the region's top seed. Then, obstactle No. 2 is the probability of going through the old Louisville issue, taking on an in-state foe (Western) which doesn't appear on Kentucky's regular season schedule.
Mission Impossible No. 4 is the challenge of beating a very highly ranked conference power (Alabama) a fourth straight time.
If Kentucky survives that, Mission No. 5 would be either a fourth straight win over LSU or taking on ACC power Georgia Tech.
And that's just to get a shot at the Final Four.
Hey, Eddie, I thought you had friends on the selection committee.
A tip of the hat to Auburn's Sonny Smith, LSU's Dale Brown and Alabama's Wimp Sanderson.
Fortunately, none of those coaches listen to the so-called experts or they'd be home planting a garden instead of competing for a berth in the Final Four at Dallas.
LSU proved what we knew all along. Those Tigers are darn tough in the Deaf Dome at Baton Rouge. Purdue and Memphis State also found out the hard way.
Ditto for Illinois. A couple of well-known hoop experts have been saying for some time that no one wants to meet the Fighting Illin. Apparently, word hadn't filtered down to Tuscaloosa. Bama proved once and for all the Tide can play with anyone. Just as the Tide did a couple years ago in beating Georgetown at Los Angeles.
And Auburn dealt the crushing blow to those non-SEC believers when Sonny Smith's crew totally destroyed the big city slickers from St. John's.
The Final Four many not have a single SEC team, or it could have as many as two, but one fact remains crystal clear. SEC is more than a football conference. If you don't
believe me, just ask the boys from the Big Ten, Big East and the Metro.
By the way, what happened to those conferences, along with the Big Eight, on the way to the Final Four?
By the end of the first week of NCAA tourney play, all four Big East teams had been sent home while five of six Big Ten clubs had been beaten and three of five Big Eight schools were no longer active.
The SEC has enjoyed the best results with all four invitees still in action while the ACC has four of six still alive.
For what it's worth, here's my picks for games this week. In the East I like Duke and Navy fighting for a Final Four berth with Duke going to Dallas.
In the Southeast, look for upset city. Dale Brown will have his Tigers on an emotional high after two very big wins in Baton Rouge. While Georgia Tech has the homecourt advantage, fans from other visiting schools will be rooting for LSU. It may be the only time in history that LSU has been a sentimental favorite outside Baton Rouge. I like the Tigers.
Kentucky versus Alabama. There are two theories on this game. One has it that Alabama is too good to be beaten four times in a row by anyone. Those same people said Alabama was too good for UK to beat the Tide in Tuscaloosa and those same people said there was no way UK could beat Bama a third straight time in the SEC tourney, even in Lexington. They say this is on a neutral court in Atlanta.
On the other hand, there are those who insist that Alabama may be wondering if Kentucky has a jinx over the Tide. Alabama enjoyed second half leads in the last two contests (one of them was in Tuscaloosa), but still lost.
It may sound corny for one to say a Kentucky team is a club of destiny, but the Wildcats have been finding more ways to win games than Carter has liver pills.
All season long experts have been saying Kentucky has been lucky, that the SEC is a weak-sister league, that UK cannot win with a three-guard offense.
Still, Kentucky and LSU will meet for the Southeast title in Atlanta on Saturday. You can pick this one.
In the Midwest, Kansas will outgun Scott Skiles and then waltz by Iowa State in the finals.
The West could give us a rematch of Kentucky and Louisville in the Final Four. Auburn will take UNLV and Louisville will send Dean Smith home. I like the Cardinals in a close one ever Auburn in the finals. We'll save the Final Four predictions for next week.
NOTES AND TIDBITS . . . Many are speculating that Western assistant Dwane
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