Couple of good links...

Carter sucks...
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/basketball/nba/03/29/bobcats.carter/index.html

Good highlights
http://sports.espn.go.com/broadband/ivp/index?id=2818481

Great comparison...
http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-22-143/Tex-Winter-Compares-Kobe-Bryant-and-Michael-Jordan.html

Looks like Kevin Willis is about to ride the Mavericks bench to a title…

Reporter question: “So Donnie (Nelson, Mavs GM), how did Kevin Willis look in today’s workout?”

Answer: "He looked good. Body wise, he still looks like he's in his young 30s. We came away pretty impressed…”

Ah the Final Four…

Ohio State vs. Georgetown

Ohio State is good because…Senior SG Ron Lewis is clutch saving the Buckeyes twice in the final seconds in this year’s NCAAs…Freshman point guard Mike Conley Jr., who is averaging 11.0 ppg and 6.1 apg is the best athlete, best decision maker and best PG left in the final four…C Greg Oden (15.4 ppg, 9.5 rpg) is a defensive menace, with long arms and excellent athleticism, blocking or changing every shot within 10-12 feet of the basket, plus he’s a terrific help side defender and has a mean streak to boot…they are a team who can push tempo, make threes and score inside on drives to the basket…they change ends quickly, this sounds rudimentary, but they capitalize on turnovers or missed baskets well, especially Oden who runs very well for a 7 footer…

Ohio State struggles because…Oden gets in foul trouble and is a rudimentary offensive player, shooting a flat jump hook or dunking is the extent of his offensive repertoire…as a team the Buckeyes can go cold from the perimeter, which means defences pack it in against them…they do not have an in-between game, which could help space the floor…they are an average defensive team outside of Oden…they do not rebound as well as they should considering how athletic they are…

Ohio State X Factor…Ron Lewis…if he’s making threes, Ohio State will force Georgetown to guard more open space and open up drives to the basket, plus the younger players seem to feed off of his confidence…

Ohio State Coaching…I like Thad Matta’s ability to make adjustments…his teams are prepared, but do not always execute consistently, especially this one, mostly because of their youth…Matta will have to be prepared, because G-Town will change up defences a lot and the Hybrid Princeton is very hard to guard the first time your players see it…

Georgetown is good because…Jeff Green, who plays the point forward position in G-Town’s hybrid Princeton Offence (14.4 ppg, 6.2 rpg, 3.2 apg) is the team's best everything…passer, post scorer, defender and rebounder, he’s the New Jack Scottie Pippen…he’s just a winner who makes plays…C Roy Hibbert, at 7’2” (12.7 ppg, 6.9 rpg) is the first actual peer Oden has ever faced…Hibbert has learned to be a perfect position player on defence, playing with his hands up, showing exceptional footwork for a guy who is really only an average athlete, and not committing silly fouls…on offence he can roll to the basket into a classic hook with either hand, drop step to both sides and uses his size (and bulk) much better than Oden and he’s an excellent interior passer both in the high and low post…in short he more schooled and much more experienced…Guards’ Jonathan Wallace and Jessie Sapp supply shooting and strong drives to the hoop respectively…and more importantly do not take bad shots…as a team the Hoyas allowed opponents to score just 56.9 points per game this season, which ranked then fifth in the nation…

Georgetown struggles because…Hibbert does not change ends well in transition, Oden (well actually so could my sister) can outrun him all day…Rivers off the bench is turnover prone…foul trouble can plague strong defensive teams like G-Town…

Georgetown X Factor…while freshman DaJuan Summers is the trendy pick (probably their best athlete and when he scores well, they win), Patrick Ewing Jr. is the hustle guy, who brings tremendous energy to a team that is very controlled and focused on executing…if Ewing Jr. is making all the “little” plays, than that frees Green and Hibbert up for the big plays…

Georgetown Coaching…John Thompson III has his team playing the Hybrid Princeton offence to perfection…they defend well, and are committed to help side defence and switching on every player but the opposing C…they mix zones well with their man to man defensively…they execute better than any team in the nation…

Prediction…it’s very hard to play G-Town well the first time…today’s player is simply not used to a team that screens up high and cuts backdoor on EVERY possession…in the second half and overtime of the UNC game, the Tar Heel players were looking over their (sore) shoulders for the screener instead of focusing on the man they were guarding and the Hoyas executed their offence in overtime to perfection, outscoring the Heels 13-3…plus G-Town forces tempo so well…if they could slow down UNC, the fastest team in the nation, they can certainly slow down Ohio State… Oden clearly a better athlete than Hibbert and if he turns to face him up with a hard dribble drive, instead of posting him, he could destroy him for sure, same if Ohio State is able to run and make Hibbert chase Oden in transition…however, in the end, I think Georgetown will dictate tempo, execute on offence and win the game…make it G-Town 72, OSU 69

Florida vs. UCLA

Florida is good because…everyone can handle the ball…this might be the best overall ball-handling team since the 1989 Illinois tournament team…Taurean Green is a streaky shooter but can heat up fast (13.3 ppg, 3.6 apg)…Lee Humphrey can really shoot it an takes mostly good shots…Al Horford (13.2 ppg, 9.2 rpg) is a man amongst boys, using his Anthony Mason-esque game to dominate inside…Joakim Noah (12.2 ppg, 8.5 rpg) is like Mikki-Moore on crack, all manic energy and hustle, although he is very limited offensively…Corey Brewer is their best on the ball defender and can score in the mid-range, a rarity in the NCAA…Florida defends out to 25 feet with all 5 players…as a team they mix well on offence, with anybody being able to contribute 30 points on any given night…they are terrific rebounders, averaging 15.8 more boards per game than opponents through this year’s tourney…

Florida struggles because…they turn the ball over like crazy, with the Gators have turned the ball over 96 times in the tourney, and have forced only 77 turnovers…they do not pass well out of the double team, especially in the post where Horford is a turnover waiting to happen when doubled…

Florida X Factor…Corey Brewer’s defence on Aaron Afflalo…if Brewer makes Afflalo disappear, the Gators will win…period…

Florida Coaching…Billy Donovan has had another great year, however, in the loss to Vanderbilt, he was out-coached by Commodores coach Kevin Stallings who exploited the Gators with a lot of zone, closing out on the perimeter shooters, but leaving the bigs alone if they were outside of 8 feet, exposing that Noah and Horford are not great shooters facing up….Donovan will have these guys prepared, and they’ve been there before…

UCLA is good because…they play defence and can lock you down inside and out…they have great guards in Aaron Afflalo (16.9 ppg) who is as tough a guard (think Bobby Phills) as they come, a good scorer from anywhere, and very strong going to the basket, while Darrin Collison (12.8 ppg, 5.7 apg, 50% FG, 46% 3ptFG, 80% FT) is truly a remarkable player who combines his tremendous efficiency and speed with very strong on the ball defence and hawking in the passing lanes…in the post, Lorenzo Mata, Lu Richard Mbah a Moute and Alfred Aboya are all long, tough defensive players and excellent rebounders, especially on the offensive glass…

UCLA struggles because…the bigs are not scorers….Mata and Aboya’s hands leave something to be desired, while Mbah a Moute has regressed, reportedly from sore knees…Afflalo and Josh Shipp can go cold, and when they do there is nobody to pick up the slack…as a team they did well upping the tempo a little bit vs. Kansas, but generally like to slow it down…so when get sucked into a faster tempo, they end up being exposed as a very unbalanced scoring team…Collison sometimes gets impatient with his teammates who sometimes cannot keep up on the break because he is so fast…

UCLA X Factor…SF Josh Shipp, who sat out last season's NCAA tournament with a hip injury, is the glue guy and third scorer (13.1 ppg, 3.9 rpg) who can create his own shot and score in the midrange…with Brewer on Afflalo, either Humphries or Green will have to guard him, which is a mismatch, since he’s too big and strong for either…

UCLA Coaching…Ben Howland is a defensive coach at heart and has instilled the bruising, Big East-coast, defensive, ball control style he had success with at Pitt…he has never had a better defensive team at every position…he will need to use his timeouts judiciously to slow down any lf those patented Florida scoring sprees, but his team is experienced and eager to erase the memory of last year’s title game loss…

Prediction…My head says Florida is more talented, faster, and returns everyone from the squad that won it all last year…My heart loves an upset and thinks UCLA will be tougher, grittier and get a superlative performance from Afflalo, or even a wildcard performance from Mbah a Moute…my head wins, with Florida being too much for UCLA, which is a shame cause I’m really getting sick of all that poncey fist pumping from Noah…call it Florida 77, UCLA 62