The Providence Friars (19-12) fought off a feisty DePaul team, 83-74, keeping its tournament hopes alive, at least for now. Unfortunately, they really need a win against Louisville to earn a bid. If they give the Cardinals a great game, it will probably keep them in the conversation, but at 19-13, they’d likely to be on the outside looking in when it’s all said and done.
The bottom line is, if you’re a fan of one of those other teams on the bubble, you want Providence to lose, and lose bad.
SI.com’s Peter King believes that Anquan Boldin won’t be a Cardinal next season and that the Giants and Eagles are possible trade partners with Arizona.
The Eagles and Giants, two receiver-needy teams, are in position to deal for Anquan Boldin, who I continue to say will not be a Cardinal by July. Philly has 21, 28 and 53, the Giants 29, 45 and 60. I find it hard to believe the Eagles won’t trade for Boldin. Very hard. He’s a perfect fit, and they’ve got the cap room to sign him.
Less than a month ago, Philly GM Tom Heckert said that the Eagles were set at receiver with DeSean Jackson and that’s why the team didn’t pursue free agent T.J. Houshmandzadeh. But Housh is also three years older than Boldin and if the Eagles have had their sights on Anquan this entire time, then Heckert’s comments could have been a smokescreen. As King notes, Philadelphia is certainly in position to offer Arizona decent compensation for Boldin, who could team with Jackson to give Donovan McNabb a quality receiving corps.
Lately, I’ve been hitting the Joe Lunardi bracketology page over at ESPN on a daily basis — the guy knows his stuff. But I scrolled down and found myself intrigued by one of the comments (by EliSilverman):
Here’s some math to prove just how much better the Big East is than any other conference. The Big East has the lowest average projected seed amongst the top conferences (3.7), surpassing the ACC (4.2), Big 12 (5.5), PAC 10 (6.4), SEC (8.0) and Big 10 (8.1). Now, here’s a bit more math….I predict there’s a 75% chance that the semi-finalists of the Big East tournament also become the Final Four in the Big Dance.
All right, I’m not a math major — I just have an engineering degree — but in order to prove conference strength, it’s not accurate to only average the projected seeds of the teams that get in the tournament. By that logic, Conference USA is the strongest conference because its average projected seed is 2.0 (Memphis).
Eli might say, “Everyone knows that C-USA isn’t the toughest conference because it only has one team in the tournament.” Well, by that logic, the Big 10 is the strongest conference because Lunardi projects that it will get eight tourney bids, one more than the Big East. You can’t have it both ways.
What makes the strongest conference? Is it the quality of the teams at the top? Or is it the strength of the conference from top to bottom. If it’s the former, then the Big East has a great argument. Pitt, UConn and Louisville are legitimate Final Four threats (and are all ranked in the top 5), while the ACC, Big 10 and Big 12 only have one team ranked in the top 7. If you’re going by total conference strength, then it’s hard to beat the Big 10 since it looks like eight of its 11 teams (73%) could get bids. (I know, it’s dumb to have 11 teams in a conference called the Big 10, but that’s another post.) The Big East has 16 teams (a fact glossed over by Big East supporters), so seven bids out of 16 teams (44%) isn’t quite as impressive.
Personally, I go by Jeff Sagarin’s computer rankings. The guy knows his stuff, so if he says that the ACC is the strongest conference top-to-bottom, then I believe him. And if he says that the Big 10 is second, then I’ll believe that too.
And as for the “more math” part of Eli’s post, where he says there is a 75% chance that the Big East semifinalists will make up the Final Four, I’d take that bet any day. First, that’s not “math,” that’s a prediction, and an arbitrary one at that. Second, for that prediction to come true, Pitt, UConn, Louisville and a fourth Final Four team (Villanova/Marquette/Syracuse/West Virginia) all have to be in separate regions. It’s likely that Pitt, UConn and Louisville will be split up, but I’d say that the chances of all three making the Final Four (PLUS a fourth Big East team emerging from the fourth region) aren’t quite 75%. Maybe 5%, and that’s being generous.
Peter King of SI.com believes that the Rams will likely select an offensive tackle with the No. 2 overall pick in next month’s NFL draft.
Now that St. Louis has released Orlando Pace, there’s very little doubt the Rams will use either pick number three or pick 35 at the top of the second round to pick into the teeth of a tackle-rich draft.
Well, King’s notion certainly makes sense considering the Rams now have a Grand Canyon-sized hole at left tackle. And this is certainly the draft to take a tackle with Baylor’s Jason Smith and Virginia’s Eugene Monroe both being viewed as top 10 picks, if not top 5.
But the wild card in this situation is Wake Forest linebacker Aaron Curry, who would also fill a need for the Rams and appears to be the best prospect in the entire draft. If the Lions don’t take him, St. Louis could pull the trigger and make a solid, safe selection in the versatile linebacker.
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