From: kenneth@ducvax.auburn.edu
Newsgroups: rec.sport.basketball.college
Subject: Re: What a crappy Championship game
Date: 9 Apr 92 10:12:23 GMT
Distribution: usa

In article <53797@olivea.atc.olivetti.com>, rsmith@strobe.ATC.Olivetti.Com (Russ Smith) writes:
> In article <1992Apr7.205438.7465@talon.ucs.orst.edu> navarrer@bionette.CGRB.ORST.EDU (Roy Navarre -- Botany and Plant Pathology) writes:
>>if the opposition play like a bunch of stiffs.  Still this has to be one of the
>>weakest championship teams ever to have such a dominating season. I'm not so
>>much knocking Duke, as I am knocking the rest of college basketball.  Lets
>>hope for a better year next year.
> 
> How come so many people are saying this(specifically people at work but other
> guys on the net too)? Look at Duke's club for a minute, Laettner, G. Hill and
> Parks are #1 picks, all but Parks certain lottery picks(and I think he'll be
> one too). T. Hill can probably be a #1, Hurley will be(if Bogues was Hurley
> will be). Davis and Lang aren't exactly chopped liver, and this team beat 
> UNLV last year with essentially the same club and Vegas had 3 high picks last
> draft, plus Elmore Spencer who'll be a #1 this year. Duke is loaded with 
> talent. I think they just wore down a bit, but they beat a team with bigtime
> talent by 20 points, I see nothing wrong with that.

I think you're correct that they were somewhat tired.  With Brian Davis
basically not playing too much (at least not as much as he usually does)
took some out of their legs.  As for the tech against Knight, the thing is
that I don't know if he got a tech for something that he said, which
may very well be the case.  He obviously can have a bit of an acidic tongue
at times, although this may or may not have been the case in the particular
game.  I also thought that the officiating in the Duke/IU game was excellent.
As for calls about personal fouls, they consistenly called the same things
the same way for both teams.  There must've been 8 or 10 "charging" fouls
called in that game...the same way both for and against Duke, so I don't 
think the officiating is to blame for IU's loss.
 
> The Knight T I agree with, and as I already posted I thought Inidana got the
> raw deal against Duke, but in the game with Michigan I really didn't see
> much wrong with the officiating. The one call that I wanted to see that wasn'ty
> made was on the opening tip when Laettner hit/grabbed Webber's wrist and then
> backtapped to his teammate.This is about the 3rd team I've seen him do it and
> pull it off. Chris Mullin does it alot, but recently got called for a foul
> when doing(which according to the rules it is foul) and so he's being more
> careful. I would have liked to see that called just to prove the refs were
> watching Laettner closely, since he does do alot of things the refs seem to
> miss. I didn't see more than a couple of elbows and one blow to the head
> on a scree from him, but I saw just as much from the Michigan kids.

I remember a Duke player getting mugged (the guy grabbed him around the
waist and tried to tackle him, it looked like.  He clearly was NOT going
for the ball.  And it was _not_ called an intentional foul.
 
> The game wasn't pretty but it was still entertaining, i wanted Michigan to
> win but I respect Duke for what they accomplished. They have a great program
> although they still got aways to go to match John Wooden's records.

yes, I think that Wooden's record is QUITE unbeatable.  At least, I don't
see it being broken anytime soon. :)
Duke will be rated in the top ten in the preseason next year, and will
make it to the sweet sixteen, if not the final four again.  I do not think
that Michigan will win the championship, or even make it to the championship
game in the next 2 years.  Those freshmen have come a long way this year
and are VERY talented, but I just don't think they can recoop from this.
Don't get me wrong, I'd like to see them there again, becasue they are an
exciting team to watch.  I just don't see it happening (just my  opinion).
I do hope, however, that Mr. Fisher (sp?), Michigan's coach, proves me wrong.

Ken