Built Ford Tough

http://blogs.courier-journal.com/jodydemling/2012/02/29/nerlens-noel-nixes-florida-providence/ I know he has visited Syracuse and Kentucky already and plans on visiting UNC and Georgetown soon. I believe UConn will be getting a visit as well. Last I heard, Syracuse and Kentucky are the two favourites for him right now.

Speaking of tournament hopes, Mississippi State is in Overtime against South Carolina right now. They are down by 1 and if they lose this game to a team who is 2-12 in SEC play, they are going to really need a miracle tournament run in order to make the tournament. EDIT: Tied now after a Dee Bost three and a Bruce Ellington layup for Mississippi State and South Carolina respectively. EDIT #2: Sidney gets an And 1 and just as he makes the basket the link dies lol.

Kabongo with a nice drive and dish to McClellan for the 3 and then stole the inbounds, although Texas couldn't take advantage of the extra possession. Texas is playing with more energy since that last timeout, though.

Texas can't stop Osby early on. He has 11 points on 5-5 shooting already. For arguably their most important game of the season, Texas sure came out flat in this one. Their tournament chances are hanging on by a thread as is, and if they lose this one their chances become even worse. You would never know that by watching the way that they played to start this game.

That game got out of hand fast. UNC flipped a switch and in about 5 minutes they had a 30 point lead. Off to Texas/Oklahoma, now. I'm not. I have to work and won't be able to watch any of it.

UNC plays like they are capable of and they blow this game wide open. Went from an 8 point lead to a 23 point lead in a matter of 3 minutes. I really think they were looking past this game to Saturday's showdown with Duke or something. The entire team, other than Zeller, looked completely disinterested in this one.

Dirty move from Marshall to find Henson for the And 1.

If he is ruled ineligible, it means he can not play college basketball ever. Did you follow the whole Enes Kanter and Kentucky thing last year? If so, it would be the same as that. In case you don't know what happened, Kanter played in Turkey and receieved money, housing and things like that from his Turkish leage team and it was ruled by the NCAA that he receieved more funds than needed for standard living, so he was not allowed to play with Kentucky last season. With Muhammed, by what I gather, he may have received money from these two men and if that is the case, the NCAA could rule that he is ineligible for receiving money if any sort of rules were broken. You can receive money so long as no NCAA rules are broken. If they deem rules were broken, he won't be allowed to play in the NCAA. As for the blind side thing, I have no idea as I never watched the movie nor am I all that familiar with what the movie is based on.

That last sequence pretty much summed this game up. Henson misses a dunk, Zeller misses a tip in, Zeller misses another tip and then Zeller misses a layup, although he did get fouled. Such a sloppy, poorly executed game.

He just recorded his 285th assist this season in the game against Maryland, which is a new single season record for the Tar Heels. He really is one of the most gifted playmakers I've seen in college basketball over the past 10 years.

Barnes has been brutal today. Missing open looks, committing stupid fouls and can't get into any sort of rythym at all. Even though he struggled offensively in the last game against Virgina, at least he was playing well defensively and did a nice job on the glass. He has done nothing in this game.

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/story/17511404/ncaa-warns-schools-to-be-wary-over-top-recruit-muhammads-eligibility Would really suck if Shabazz is ruled ineligible as I was really looking forward to watching him play next year, regardless of where he decided to go to school. The guy looks like he is going to be a star and would be a very exciting player to watch. I know that pretty much every power school were interested in him at one point or another. Hopefully he isn't ruled ineligible or anything like that.

Maryland should feel really lucky that they are only down by 11 as they were awful out there in the first half. They probably missed at least 5 open/semi-open shots from 5 feet or closer. They've also given up some open looks to Barnes and Bullock on the perimeter, but luckily for them Barnes has missed two wide open 3's and Bullock missed one as well. If Carolina plays even half as well as they are capable of, they probably have another 14 or so points and thsi is is a 20-25 point halftime lead.

Len absolutely stuffed Henson there. Huge block. Henson looked absolutely shocked after it was blocked.

Well, it was fun while it lasted, lol. I'll be here all night as I plan on checking out Myck Kabongo after this game, although I'll be watching the Leafs game as well (Texas game on my laptop).

I honestly had no idea, my stream was grainy and lagging at the time, lol. Nice move from Mosely on that last Maryland possession.

That was a hell of a pass from Marshall to find Bullock (or was it Hairston?) underneath. Great recovery from the Maryland defense to block the shot (I think two people got it as well, lol), though. It looked like it was going to be an easy two. Stoglin is just straight chucking right now.

Beautiful cut by Faust there and an equally impressive finish on the dunk with Hairston all over him. EDIT: Stupid foul by Barnes, especially since it will likely force him to sit for the rest of the half.

UNC's length inside is really getting to Maryland. They've missed some great looks right around the basket because of the presence of guys like Henson (who also has 2 blocks), Zeller and McAdoo. They are just throwing it up at the rim instead of gathering themselves. Speaking of Henson, I was really impressed by the two post moves he has scored on in this game. Usually he just catches the ball and uses his length to shoot over guys, but he actually showed nice footwork on one move and then a nice fake that lead to a turnaround hook on another. Nice to see him getting on the block and not settling for outside jumpers.

Playing in a no accountability system like Triano ran and seeing how Bargnani was treated in seasons past, I can definitely see where it is coming from. He has basically felt entitled to minutes, shots, whatever since coming into the league playing under Triano. Now that I see why he was benched (at least supposedly) last night, I'm glad Casey did it. If DeRozan was out there ignoring what was asked of him and lollygagging around out there, he deserved to be benched.

In today's segment of BFT talking to himself, I'll be discussing the UNC/Maryland game with, well, myself. If anybody is interested in breaking my near 20 consecutive post streak and discussing the game with me, here is a link to the game: http://www.firstrowsports.eu/watch/110486/1/watch-maryland-vs-(6)-north-carolina.html

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20120227/SPORTS03/302270093/ Like I always say in these situations I'll wait until a month or so after the NCAA Tournament before I ever take these sort of comments even remotely seriously, but it is interesting to see them coming from a guy who pretty much everybody has always assumed would be a 1-and-Done in MKG ever since he was a junior in high school.

Like I said last night, there must have been some other reason for his benching that we didn't see on TV and, according to Doug Smith, that is the case: Makes sense, considering we have heard this before when talking about DeRozan. Fair enough. Ed Davis had similar treatment (although his benching was related to lack of boxing out and not playing with sufficient energy) about 2 weeks before the All-Star break and since then he has been playing the best ball of his season so far. Hopefully DeRozan does the same.

The tweet is deleted now, but after the game, a game in which he was benched for the entire 4th quarter despite scoring 17 through three and playing very good defense on Kevin Martin, he tweeted this: Keep in mind, Casey basically benched him in favour of Kleiza who was 3/10 from the floor and had two huge blown defensive assignments (leaving Parsons wide open for 3 and then not boxing him out enabling him to get an offensive board which eventually led to Kevin Martin free throws with 11 seconds left). Casey's rational, at least according to Ryan Wolstat was that he was resting him for tomorrow, which, to quote DeRozan, is straight bullshit. DeRozan played no more than he normally would've and is coming off of the All-Star break. I'm pretty sure he could handle coming in for the final 6 minutes which would only put his minutes at 33 for the night. He sure as hell didn't have a problem playing Bargnani for 40+ minutes a night. I have no problem with Casey benching somebody, I fully agree with him nailing Bayless to the bench as he was brutal tonight and by no means am I saying DeRozan should be immune to this kind of treatment. He certainly has had games this season where he should've been glued to the bench, but it makes absolutely no sense at all for him to get benched tonight unless something happened during a timeout or something that we aren't aware. He was playing well on both ends of the floor tonight and was a big part in the Raptors making a game of it in the 2nd half. Maybe it will light a fire under him, but it really was just a strange time to send this kind of message with him playing his best ball of the season over the past 10 or so games.

Thank god for Chandler Parsons making some hue plays down the stretch (three, mid range jumper, offensive rebound). I was really starting to get worried that Toronto might come away with a win down the stretch. On another note, I'm really baffled at Casey's coaching tonight. He benched DeRozan for the entire 4th quarter despite the fact that he scored 17 through 3 quarters and held Kevin Martin to, I believe, just 6 or 8 points through 3, yet he left Linas Kleiza out there who was complete garbage all night long offensive and defensively. He then benched Ed Davis despite him grabbing 15 boards and being all over the place defensively. I guess I'm happy that it may have cost the Raptors the game, but seeing the lineup of Carter/Barbosa/Kleiza/Johnson/Johnson out there to close the game was a joke under normal circumstances, let alone a rebuilding year.