| |
NOMINEE |
THE SKINNY |
| Overrated |
Declining TV ratings |
The Chicken Littles love to bring up the low Nielsen
numbers during the NCAA tournament as a sign that interest in college hoops is
waning. But look around. The numbers are down everywhere thanks to today's glut
of cable and Internet options. If the Subway Series couldn't pull in huge
ratings, what
can? |
| Underrated |
Senior leadership |
Because of the flood of NBA defections, the college game's
most glamorous players tend to be freshmen and sophomores. Yet every March, it
seems the teams still standing are the ones with upperclassmen who have been
playing together for a
while. |
| Annoying |
St. John's coach Mike Jarvis |
His teams are routinely greater than the sum of
their parts, but that got lost in all of his caterwauling last season about the
"Gestapo" tactics of the NCAA. Jarvis appears to be the only one on
the planet who still thinks Erick Barkley was an innocent
victim. |
| Breakthrough |
Wisconsin |
Dick Bennett did such a good job getting his Badgers to the Final
Four that if he hadn't retired, perhaps they would have trimmed another five
seconds off the shot
clock.
|
| Uplifting |
Maryland guard Juan Dixon |
When Dixon was a sophomore in high school, his
parents, who were heroin addicts, both died of AIDS. Last season he was one of
the ACC's top players, despite that fact that at 6'3", 152 pounds, he could
get knocked over by a strong gust of wind. Talk about
resilient. |
| MVP |
Michigan State guard Mateen Cleaves |
Is there any doubt? Two images from the
2000 national championship game will endure: The first is Cleaves hobbling down
the hallway after getting his badly sprained ankle taped in the locker room. The
second is Cleaves, leaning on crutches, his arm around Tom Izzo, watching
"One Shining Moment" on the screen inside the RCA Dome and crying like
a
baby. |
| Storyline to follow in 2001 |
Whither Bob Knight? |
Just when we thought he was out, he pulls us back
in.
|
