Big Blue Links for Saturday:
Jerry Tipton of the Herald-Leader on tonight’s battle of the blurs:
Kentucky point guard John Wall, certainly no cartoon figure although his exploits this season tested the bounds of credulity, might give Aminu a new perspective on speed when the teams play in the NCAA Tournament second round Saturday night.
DeMarcus Cousins certainly thought so. He frowned and shook his head, as if in pity, at the suggestion that someone believed Smith was faster than Wall.
Mark Story of the Herald-Leader on how Wake plans to agitate Big Cuz:
Will Rogers - who famously said he never met a man he didn’t like - never encountered Chas (pronounced Chase) McFarland on a basketball court.
In its Feb. 22 edition, ESPN The Magazine featured the Wake big man with a headline that asked “why does everyone, no, really, everyone, want to take a swing at Chas McFarland?”
Jennifer Smith of the H-L previews UK women’s NCAA opener:
Matthew Mitchell isn’t from Kentucky, but he often sounds as though he might be.
When the coach talks about UK basketball and what it means to the commonwealth, he sounds as though he spent his childhood shooting hoops in his driveway re-enacting the 1978 national championship.
“Kentucky is such a unique place and the passion for basketball is so strong here,” he told the media gathered before No. 19 UK’s start in the NCAA Tournament on Saturday afternoon at Freedom Hall.
Luke DeCock of the Raliegh News and Observer writes that Wake has reason to smile:
When Wake Forest’s players entered the interview room at the New Orleans Arena on Wednesday, there was little interest and a lot of gloom. As the last of eight teams to proceed to the podium, pushing East Coast deadlines at 7 p.m. Central Time, Wake was questioned only by three North Carolina reporters and one local reporter — and given the Demon Deacons’ run of five losses in six games, it was a grim line of inquiry.
Forty-eight hours later, the Deacons were back, and they couldn’t stop smiling. Thursday’s overtime win over Texas took an unimaginable amount of pressure off Wake Forest, from last season’s upset by Cleveland State to this season’s slide to the finish. As the Deacons prepared to play Kentucky tomorrow, there’s suddenly reason for optimism.
Dan Collins of the Winston-Salem Journal reports that Wake knows what it faces:
The challenge will now be to take the floor with the same passion and intensity for tonight’s game against No. 1 seed Kentucky, scheduled for around 8:30 at New Orleans Arena. The Wildcats, who steamrolled East Tennessee State 100-71 Thursday, will be as heavily favored as one would expect a 32-2 team playing an opponent that is 20-10.
There’s no guarantee that the Deacons’ best effort will be enough. But anything less could obviously make for a long day against the brawny and fast Wildcats.
Lenox Rawlings of the Journal thinks Wake has a shot:
That’s not saying the Deacons will upset the No. 2 choice for the NCAA championship, behind Kansas. That’s not saying the Deacons will come closer than the nine-point spread. That’s not saying John Wall should haul his sweet dribble to the NBA before sundown Sunday, driven out of town by that one-man Texas posse Ish Smith.
But stranger things have happened. N.C. State beat Houston in 1983. Villanova beat Georgetown in 1985. In this year’s first round, deep seeds Ohio U., Murray State and Cornell flipped the tables on Sweet 16 pretenders Georgetown, Vanderbilt and Temple.
Continue reading ‘BBL: Deacons stand between Sweet 16 and Kentucky’





