Historic upset? | Page 2 | Syracusefan.com

Historic upset?

General20 said:
I wouldn't even call it an upset. While several players on Kentucky have better long term potential, the two best players on the court last night were both wearing Wisconsin jerseys (for the record I think Frank Kaminsky is the best COLLEGE basketball player I have seen in a long time). Wisconsin wins that game 6 or 7 times out of 10.

Bad year for Kentucky to have the team they did. Last year they would have rolled through the tournament on size alone. This year there were five very good teams, that also had very good 7 footers - Kentucky, Wisconsin, Duke, Gonzaga, and Arizona. Its one thing to be a very good team, but you go to another level when you are a very good team with that kind of size. If you notice, none of those teams lost to anybody but each other in the tournament. In my bracket I have Wisconsin and Gonzaga in the championship game. Really the only team capable of stopping Gonzaga from getting there was Duke, and you have to give credit to them, they stepped their game up a ton. The team that beat Gonzaga and destroyed Michigan St. doesn't even resemble the Duke team from the regular season or the one Notre Dame ran out of the ACC tournament.

Its going to be a great national championship, and the two best teams in the country are playing in it.
Expand...


I'll be rooting for Wisconsin but I think Duke wins this. I agree that they've become a different and better team than the one we played and I think Wisconsin was focused on Kentucky and won't be able to come up with that kind of an effort two nights later.

Regarding upsets and hype, I still remember Billy Packer comparing Connecticut beating Duke in 1999 with NC State-Houston or Villanova- Georgetown when the Huskies were 33-2 and had been ranked #1 more weeks than Duke had.

Wisconsin-Kentucky wasn't an upset, (Wisky might have been 38-0 if they played the Wildcat's schedule). It was what the tournament is really all about: a CONFRONTATION. I'll take Abdul Abulbul Amir vs. Ivan Skavinsky Skavar over David vs. Goliath any day.

 
Last edited:
What is so special about this uk team? Honestly, towns is a good college player but will he be a good pro? Not so sure. Im not sure if i see nba allstar potential out there. Id take uk w wall, cousins and boogie all day. If this is a historic upset then uk 09-10 loss to wv is the greatest upset in sports history.
 
Kentucky was a 7.5 pt favorite last Saturday. I scooped up the Wisconsin ML right away and can say I made a good amount of money and am really happy.
 
No way. Kentucky was -240 which means, to you non numbers people, if they play 34 times, Kentucky was only expected to win 24 times.
 
The UNC team with Perkins Jordan and Worthy would have absolutely blown away this Kentucky team. So would the Georgetown team that UNC beat.
 
Ringostar57 said:
The UNC team with Perkins Jordan and Worthy would have absolutely blown away this Kentucky team. So would the Georgetown team that UNC beat.
Expand...


Anthony Davis said the 2012 team was better and I agree with him. For one thing, they had Anthony Davis.
 
How is it an upset when you're the better team?
 
To clarify...I used the term "historic upset" because I've heard a few media people throw that comment around. Hence the ? mark.
 
Not even close. Kentucky had some nice OOC wins, but they played in a conference which had 1.5 good teams and they were 1.0 one of those.

bevosu said:
Good basketball game...historic upset? I don't buy it.

Kentucky's great record...helps to play in a weak conference. Wisconsin had the more experienced players. Wisconsin isn't chopped liver. They know how to play the game. I thought they had a good chance, and I think a lot of other people did.
Expand...
 
If UK plays in a real league they lose at least one conference game. SEC this year not much better than the Big West that UNLV rolled through in 1991.
 
OrangeOnions said:
I don't consider a 5 point dog beating anybody as a historic upset.
Expand...

What was historic was the height of arrogance achieved by UK fans and the depth they sunk to in the end. I don't remember any school's fan's eating so much crow. Losing the championship game is one thing. Losing to a bunch of 3-star Wisconsin players in the quarterfinal is kind of unthinkable for the fan base. And you know a ton of people bought tickets for Monday night. Thousands!


crow1.png
 
Kentucky was taken to OT three times during the season by basically average teams.
To their credit...they rallied to win.
But their streak had people overlooking how good Wisconsin, Arizona and Duke are.

Imagine if Wisconsin had starting point guard Trae Jackson completely healthy.
He was a bolt of lighting in the minutes he played yesterday.
Bronson Koenig did a great job...but he's still the # 2 guy.

Will be at least a couple of great matchups against Duke:

Dekker and Winslow
Kaminsky and Okafor

Should be great game.
 
jgeorge322 said:
What is so special about this uk team? Honestly, towns is a good college player but will he be a good pro? Not so sure. Im not sure if i see nba allstar potential out there. Id take uk w wall, cousins and boogie all day. If this is a historic upset then uk 09-10 loss to wv is the greatest upset in sports history.
Expand...
Towns reminds me a lot of Jared Sullinger. He has great moves but essentially is a below the rim player. He's been great in college by making lots of short shots but he's not necessarily a strong to the rim player. Alot of what he does will get smacked in his face in the NBA. Okafor has the same ability but is more aggressive imo. WCS has no offensive skill other than the dunk. He's a great defensive player but how far does that get you in the NBA. I don't see either Harrison being great in the NBA. Aaron can shoot and score, Andrew is a D-leaguer to me. Neither are very good defenders. Lyles is probably the best NBA prospect and Ulis will be a good PG that can shoot. They were a very talented team, but not as great as many made them out to be. Inexperienced. They had deficiencies in the backcourt, and leadership. Cal should have made Lyles the focus of their offense and probably played Ulis more. Relied too heavily on the Harrison's and Towns ability to score inside as college players. Better competition during the season would have brought these issues up earlier. And as someone else pointed out, for perhaps the first time this year, UK did not have the best player on the court.
 
cuseincincy said:
Towns reminds me a lot of Jared Sullinger. He has great moves but essentially is a below the rim player. He's been great in college by making lots of short shots but he's not necessarily a strong to the rim player. Alot of what he does will get smacked in his face in the NBA. Okafor has the same ability but is more aggressive imo. WCS has no offensive skill other than the dunk. He's a great defensive player but how far does that get you in the NBA. I don't see either Harrison being great in the NBA. Aaron can shoot and score, Andrew is a D-leaguer to me. Neither are very good defenders. Lyles is probably the best NBA prospect and Ulis will be a good PG that can shoot. They were a very talented team, but not as great as many made them out to be. Inexperienced. They had deficiencies in the backcourt, and leadership. Cal should have made Lyles the focus of their offense and probably played Ulis more. Relied too heavily on the Harrison's and Towns ability to score inside as college players. Better competition during the season would have brought these issues up earlier. And as someone else pointed out, for perhaps the first time this year, UK did not have the best player on the court.
Expand...

That's why it's fortunate for Towns he'll be a top 5 pick. Sullinger cost himself millions by coming back for a sophomore year.
 
bevosu said:
Good basketball game...historic upset? I don't buy it.

Kentucky's great record...helps to play in a weak conference. Wisconsin had the more experienced players. Wisconsin isn't chopped liver. They know how to play the game. I thought they had a good chance, and I think a lot of other people did.
Expand...
I know I don't look at it as historic. I picked it to happen in my bracket.

The only reason anyone is looking at it as historic is because of the hype machine following KU this year. Duke beating UNLV was more surprising considering UNLV had crushed them the year before and both teams had near identical rosters. Kentucky barely beat them last year and had to replace their best players while Wisconsin was a fellow 1 seed that returned nearly everyone. The people that think it was historic don't actually know basketball and should stop talking about it.
 
cuseincincy said:
Towns reminds me a lot of Jared Sullinger. He has great moves but essentially is a below the rim player. He's been great in college by making lots of short shots but he's not necessarily a strong to the rim player. Alot of what he does will get smacked in his face in the NBA. Okafor has the same ability but is more aggressive imo. WCS has no offensive skill other than the dunk. He's a great defensive player but how far does that get you in the NBA. I don't see either Harrison being great in the NBA. Aaron can shoot and score, Andrew is a D-leaguer to me. Neither are very good defenders. Lyles is probably the best NBA prospect and Ulis will be a good PG that can shoot. They were a very talented team, but not as great as many made them out to be. Inexperienced. They had deficiencies in the backcourt, and leadership. Cal should have made Lyles the focus of their offense and probably played Ulis more. Relied too heavily on the Harrison's and Towns ability to score inside as college players. Better competition during the season would have brought these issues up earlier. And as someone else pointed out, for perhaps the first time this year, UK did not have the best player on the court.
Expand...

I see WCS sticking in the NBA because he can defend at least four positions. You will have a 10 year career if you can do that and get up and down the court.

Not saying he will evolve to this, but he is basically like DeAndre Jordan coming into the league. DJ looked lost on offense and that is putting it VERY kindly.

I'm torn on Towns. There is something to be said for being able to execute when you should. He clearly can do that. But he 1) never stands straight up (he looks hunched) so he shortens himself and 2) his reach isn't great.

The positives are that it looks like he will have at least 1 or 2 go-to moves on offense and he hits FTs, which Okafor really struggles with.

The Harrisons are bunk in the NBA. Lyles looks like he can play. I'm not sure about a lot of the other guys.

One note on Jah - he looks to me like his high end is Brooke Lopez or Big Al Jefferson, which means a very solid career. Will be a scorer on O that commands double teams, but won't be a defensive menace.
 
I'm with SWC. Switch the conference each team played in, and Wisc very well could have been the undefeated team.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Forum statistics

Threads
170,343
Messages
4,885,774
Members
5,992
Latest member
meierscreek

Share this page

Online statistics

Members online
19
Guests online
920
Total visitors
939
Totals may include hidden visitors.


...
Top Bottom