College Basketball

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:40 pm

Well, with an abysmal slate of so-called "pro" teams here in Chicago, I've actually been watching some non-March college basketball games. Right now, I'm watching Illinois destroy #1 Wake Forest by 30 pts with 6 minutes to play.

It seems about once a decade, I get interested in college hoops aside from tournament time. Does anyone else take an occasional break from the pro game and watch the pseudo-pros?

Post by **ImLawBoy** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:44 pm

I've never been a big NBA fan (not even during the Jordan years), but I like college basketball. Sadly, Michigan got trounced yesterday, but at least my other alma mater is giving the Big Ten something to crow about.

Cam · Post by **Cam** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:45 pm

I primiarily watch the college game. I don't like the NBA game anymore. I find the college game more exciting to watch.

Tareeq · Post by **Tareeq** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:48 pm

There are two kinds of basketball fans. Those who attended schools which have good basketball teams, and those who watch the NBA.

Mr. Fed · Post by **Mr. Fed** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:53 pm

I'm utterly indifferent to pro ball, but watch most of Stanford's televised basketball games. Too bad they're in a down cycle. They had some pretty good years not too long ago.

Chrisoc13 · Post by **Chrisoc13** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 10:06 pm

?? Last year was a pretty good year for stanford. Wernt they a number 1 seed? Thats a pretty damn good year in my book. Although, they could have gone farther in the tourney, but still a good year.

My team (BYU) is never very good. Just ok. Sometimes they stun some people (like oklahoma state last year) but most of the time they just get by enough to make it into the tourney. Oh well. Its still fun to watch and they never lose at home (well, very rarely at least). I cant stand NBA for some reason though, just college basketball. Same with most sports though. College sports just seem so much more real to me.

flycatcher · Post by **flycatcher** » Wed Dec 01, 2004 11:01 pm

Tareeq wrote:There are two kinds of basketball fans. Those who attended schools which have good basketball teams, and those who watch the NBA.

Thats probably not as true in the South, i know plenty of Duke fans who have never gone to Duke or graduated from highschool for that matter, the same with UNC and NC State

Grifman · Post by **Grifman** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 12:32 am

Jeff V wrote: Does anyone else take an occasional break from the pro game and watch the pseudo-pros?

You mean people actually watch that crap the NBA tries to pass off as basketball, LOL?!?

Grifman

Grievous Angel · Post by **Grievous Angel** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 1:10 am

Considering my Kansas Jayhawks can whip the Chicago Bulls any day of the week, it's no wonder that my attention is diverted from the NBA. And I feel really bad for poor Kirk Hinrich, an ex-Hawk who is stuck being the best player on the worst team in professional basketball.

D.A.Lewis · Post by **D.A.Lewis** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 1:22 am

My four things in life

1) Family
2) My Health
3) UCLA Basketball
4) Gaming

Zaxxon · Post by **Zaxxon** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 1:29 am

Exrod · Post by **Exrod** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 1:58 am

I am a Purdue alum, but cheer for all the Big Ten (11) teams in general. I will even root for Indiana, much to my wife's horror. I live in Detroit so we get all the MSU and UofM coverage.

The Illini totally owned Wake tonight.

I run a men's church basketball league. We have two divisions, one rec ball and one competitive. At this point in my competitive league I have one team starting 5 ex division 1 basketball players. They scored over 100 points the last two weeks. I scored a season high 9 this week, go me.

Freezer-TPF- · Post by **Freezer-TPF-** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 1:59 am

Tareeq wrote:There are two kinds of basketball fans. Those who attended schools which have good basketball teams, and those who watch the NBA.

I love college hoops but have little use for the NBA. I haven't watched consistently, other than some of the finals, since the Dr. J. era.

The ACC is really going to be tough this year. Too bad the two trespassers ruined our perfect home-away/double-round-robin scheduling. I'm very pleased that my Hoos have looked better than expected so far, including a nice 18-point win over Zona.

And in the ACC/Big 10 "challenge" this week, the ACC takes 7 of 9. Good going, Wake and MD.

Eightball · Post by **Eightball** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 2:45 am

Terps lost to Wisconsin, at Wisconsin. Lost by 4, played just awful. But they tore up Memphis earlier in the week. We have a damned good team, but the ACC is going to be brutal this year. I think we should have a bet...how many ACC victories the Wahoos get this year......

flycatcher wrote:Thats probably not as true in the South, i know plenty of Duke fans

And they're all the devil.

Grifman · Post by **Grifman** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 7:26 am

Jeff V wrote:It seems about once a decade, I get interested in college hoops aside from tournament time. Does anyone else take an occasional break from the pro game and watch the pseudo-pros?

Actually, going further with my previous comment I find your question funny. Growing up in ACC country, I know many many people that love college basketball and don't watch or care about the pros. Also given the larger number of colleges for people to root for and the limited number of NBA teams, I'm wondering what led you to believe that the NBA is more popular than the college game. Personally, I think it's the other way around.

Grifman

jonsauce · Post by **jonsauce** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 9:25 am

I never watch the NBA unless the Pistons are in the playoffs, which is rare

I grew up in East Lansing and attend Michigan State now so I have always been a college basketball fan and probably will be for a long time.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 9:38 am

Grifman wrote:
Jeff V wrote:It seems about once a decade, I get interested in college hoops aside from tournament time. Does anyone else take an occasional break from the pro game and watch the pseudo-pros?
Actually, going further with my previous comment I find your question funny. Growing up in ACC country, I know many many people that love college basketball and don't watch or care about the pros. Also given the larger number of colleges for people to root for and the limited number of NBA teams, I'm wondering what led you to believe that the NBA is more popular than the college game. Personally, I think it's the other way around.

Grifman

Chicago is a "pro" city. None of the college or even area minor league teams around here get a fraction of the coverage that the Bulls get, for instance, and the Bulls only won twice so far this year. The Bulls also continue to pack in the fans, even though the team has been abysmal since MJ left.

When an area college team gets hot (Illinois is close enough to qualify), the media starts paying attention and highlights actually get shown on the news. The games are still relegated to cable channels, though (many Bulls games are on broadcast TV OTOH), so exposure is limited and spotty. The only time that ever changed was back in the late '70's when DePaul had a decent team for a string of years and became popular enough to move to venue larger than the campus court they had been playing at. Almost as soon as they signed the stadium and TV deal, the team went down the crapper, never to be heard from again.

It makes sense that smaller cities would latch on to college sports in a more passionate manner. Typically, it's the only game in town, and there is a single team to support. In a metro area with 8 million people, though, it is far easier for everyone to rally around a single pro team than to try and extend the same coverage to Illinois, DePaul, Loyola, Northwestern, UIC, NIU, Bradley, Illinois State, Notre Dame (or peripherial schools with a strong local interest including Marquette, SIU, Valparaiso, Wisconsin and Purdue).

Personally, my interested in college sports only increases when a local team does well. I don't even particularly follow my alma mater unless they happen to have a good team.

YellowKing · Post by **YellowKing** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:04 am

I can't stand NBA. It's the whole attitude of the athletes in general. I guess that's true of all pro sports, but the NBA just seems to be a particular haven for people with too much money, too little brains, and a big chip on their shoulder.

Living in NC though, I'm a huge college basketball fan. The ACC is going to kick ass this year. Duke is not going to be as good as I had hoped due to losing some players early to the NBA, but will still be competitive. UNC looks really good, and should give everyone a run for their money.

That Wake game was a total embarrassment, but it was good to see Clemson and Virginia pull out wins.

Toe · Post by **Toe** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:14 am

I was born and raised in Kentucky.

College basketball rules! (but maybe that because there is nothing else here, hehe).

UK and Louisville both are going to have strong teams this year.

Zaxxon · Post by **Zaxxon** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:22 am

YellowKing wrote:That Wake game was a total embarrassment

Ahh yes, yes it was.

</gloat>

The Meal · Post by **The Meal** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:31 am

My alma mater had exactly two Divison I sports: Nordic (Cross-Country) Skiing and Men's Ice Hockey. I never made it to a ski-meet, but I had hockey season tickets for six years.

Coming from that background, it's pretty tough for me to get fired up about the two traditional Division I Men's Sports (Hoops and Football). I had a couple of brothers go to Michigan State, so I sort of follow that team, but I can't get all rah-rah-rah about it or anything. In fact, it sort of creeps me out when folks who didn't go to one of those colleges gets all hyped up about how "their" team is doing. I know that sports are more entertaining to follow if you've got teams you like and teams you despise, but unlike pro sports (where anybody has as much allegiance to any one team as any other), college allegiances don't seem to be as arbitrary as that. When cousin Jeb, who barely made it out of sixth-grade when he turned seventeen gets all fired up about Auburn football, I get a bit creeped out by that. Jeb, can you even spell "crimson?"

Just me though. I know many supporters of many different college teams are on these boards, and that you've all got your own reasons for following certain teams. (Like I said, I understand that sports are infinitely more entertaining if you can find teams to root root root for and teams to utterly despise.) I just get a little weirded out by it, is all.

~Neal

Freezer-TPF- · Post by **Freezer-TPF-** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:43 am

Now that we have a major league baseball team coming to Washington, DC, our next hope is that we will soon have professional basketball and football teams here as well!

/rimshot

Post by **godhugh** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:53 am

Since I grew up in Champaign, IL I've always rooted for the Fighting Illini (went to their Final Four celebration at the Assembly Hall back when Kendall Kill, Kenny Battle, and Nick Anderson were on the team). Wisconsin has always been my College Football team since the Illinois program was rather corrupt.

Anyway, it was good to see them smoke WF last night. Hopefully a couple more of their games will be broadcast down here in Texas.

Zaxxon · Post by **Zaxxon** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 11:23 am

godhugh wrote:Anyway, it was good to see them smoke WF last night. Hopefully a couple more of their games will be broadcast down here in Texas.

I'm in Indianapolis so I'm in a bit of the same boat. My Tivo queue shows some UIUC games televised nationally coming up, and if they remain in the top few ranked teams, I don't think there will be any shortage of nationally-televised Illini games.

tswright · Post by **tswright** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 2:06 pm

Freezer-TPF- wrote:Now that we have a major league baseball team coming to Washington, DC, our next hope is that we will soon have professional basketball and football teams here as well!

/rimshot

The Wiz are actually pretty good this year, especially in the diluted Eastern Conference. Antawn, Hughes, Jarvis Hayes, Arenas, Peeler, Jeffries, Haywood... they're stacked. Once they get Etan Thomas and Kwame back, they're gonna have unparalleled front-court depth.

The Skins do suck though.

Rich in KCK · Post by **Rich in KCK** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 2:28 pm

Tareeq wrote:There are two kinds of basketball fans. Those who attended schools which have good basketball teams, and those who watch the NBA.

Someone probably already said this but I think the college game would be more popular in any city that didn't have a pro team. Here in KC the loyalty to a basketball team is split for the most part between KU & MU. The majority of the people I know who watch each teams basketball team did not go to either school.

disarm · Post by **disarm** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 4:04 pm

i'm an IU grad, so i follow indiana a little bit...and living in indianapolis means virtually all the games are on tv. although i didn't see the game, i was very surprised to see how well they hung on against north carolina. i'm not getting my hopes up that they can continue playing like that though...

Tareeq · Post by **Tareeq** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 4:26 pm

Rich in KCK wrote:Someone probably already said this but I think the college game would be more popular in any city that didn't have a pro team. Here in KC the loyalty to a basketball team is split for the most part between KU & MU. The majority of the people I know who watch each teams basketball team did not go to either school.

And Kansas City's pro team plays in Sacramento.

Debris · Post by **Debris** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 4:27 pm

I can't stand the NBA and can barely tolerate the college game. Actually, I can only stand NCAA basketball during the tourney.

I guess my biggest problem with basketball is that at the end of a game, one strategy is for a team to intentionally foul the other team. What kind of sport is that? It just seems so absurd that a can win the game by cheating within the rules of the game.

So, see you all around March!

Eightball · Post by **Eightball** » Thu Dec 02, 2004 5:49 pm

Freezer-TPF- wrote:Now that we have a major league baseball team coming to Washington, DC, our next hope is that we will soon have professional basketball and football teams here as well!

/rimshot

Man, it'd be SO nice to have professional football in Washington....

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