Conference Tournaments Starting March 13th

The last of the Conference Tournaments got underway on Thursday with battles in the ACC, Big 12, SEC, Big 10, and (not to be outdone by the big boys) the Southland Conference. In less than 72 hours, all of the Conference Tournament Champions will be crowned and the brackets will be set for the Big Dance. This has almost been too much fun. I took a beating in my Conference Tournament brackets today, but it doesn't matter, this has been a ridiculously enjoyable (and slightly pathetic) process. Let's get through these last five Conference Tournaments. As always, my predicted champion is in bold.

• Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) - North Carolina - With all of the college basketball I've watched over the past few weeks, I have YET to catch an ACC game. This is a little sad, as the ACC is one of the better leagues in the country and has two of the nation's best teams fighting for league supremacy. If UNC and Duke met for a third time this year in the ACC championship game on Sunday, I'll be sure not to miss it. Everyone knows about UNC's national player of the year candidate, Tyler Hansbrough. What everyone might not know is that sophomore guard Ty Lawson is the player that can make this Tar Heel team nearly unstoppable. Lawson has the ability to control the flow of any game. His skills allow UNC to play a more up-tempo, run-and-gun style of play (when they so choose), along with executing their half-court sets. There might not be a quicker point guard in all of college basketball. The one major worry for UNC is the ankle injury that Lawson sustained this season. If this injury lingers in any way, or negatively impacts Lawson's speed and cutting ability, it could be of major concern for Tar Heel Nation. The ACC is ranked #1 in all the land with regard to conference RPI. There are some good teams here but it really comes down to UNC and Duke. I thought about picking Duke here for a brief moment, but I think I still have visions of them losing to VCU in the first round of the tournament last year. Duke is very good and very young. They will have their moments of glory in the future. I just think that this is UNC's year to shine. Even though I don't completely trust Roy Williams, I still like this Tar Heel team. Again...Liz, if you can convince me otherwise about Coach Williams, please do. Notable seeds: #1 North Carolina, #2 Duke, #3 Clemson, #4 Virginia Tech, #5 Miami, #6 Maryland, #9 Florida State

• Big 12 Conference - Texas - I wasn't sure who to go with here as there have been times where I really like what I've seen with Texas and Kansas. Guards D.J. Augustin and A.J. Abrams of Texas are outstanding. I'll say it over and over and over. One of the keys a team MUST have to succeed in March is great (not good) guard play. Texas has this. But wait! Kansas has amazing guards as well with Mario Chalmers and Brandon Rush. This Kansas team might just be the deepest and most talented team in the nation. But talent alone does not bring a program a national champion. This leads me to my biggest concern for both of these teams come the NCAA Tournament. I wouldn't trust either of these coaches to win a big game for a middle school basketball team, let alone a top-10, division one basketball program. Bill Self of Kansas and Rick Barnes of Texas scare me. Barnes has an amazing ability to continuously over-think and coach his team right out of a game. Self hasn't done squat with a ton of talent in his time with the Jayhawks. I'm stumped. If talent alone won championships, I'd name Kansas as my predicted national champion right now in a bracket that hasn't even been determined yet. So what I'm left to do is some old fashioned reverse psychology. I'd like to think that this is the year that Kansas puts it all together, that Bill Self doesn't do anything too stupid or irrational, and the Jayhawks finally deliver in the Final Four. Because this is what I think, I HAVE to go with the Texas Longhorns in this Big 12 tournament! Texas will defeat Kansas in the championship game and this will give Self and the Jayhawks the kick in the ass they need to realize that they actually have to work hard and play all 40 minutes of every game in the NCAA Tournament. Please, oh please, be so. Michael Beasley is the reason you should watch any Kansas State game you come across. Beasley is running neck-and-neck with Tyler Hansbrough for player of the year honors and helped Kansas State defeat in-state "rival" Kansas for the first time at home in 24 years. Notable seeds: #1 Texas, #2 Kansas, #3 Kansas State, #4 Oklahoma, #5 Baylor, #6 Texas A & M, #12 Colorado

• Southeastern Conference (SEC) - Tennessee - This wasn't a difficult choice to make. Bruce Pearl's Volunteers are the most talented and most athletic team in this conference. Vanderbilt has some skills (and a very cool home court), but nobody in this league should give Tennessee much of a problem. Two-time defending champs, Florida are in a rebuilding year with a bunch of young talent. Kentucky somehow went 12-4 in conference play and have crept themselves back into (probably) getting an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. LSU now sucks. I like Tennessee running away. The thing I'm most intrigued about with the SEC tournament is to see what color suit Bruce Pearl will be wearing during the games and in the highlights. Or if he'll be wearing a suit at all. Notable seeds: #e1 Tennessee, #w1 Mississippi State, #e2 Kentucky, #w2 Arkansas, #e3 Vanderbilt, #w3 Ole Miss, #e4 Florida, #w5 Alabama

• Big Ten Conference - Wisconsin - Zzzzzzzzzzzz. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. I was visiting friends at Notre Dame last year during Conference Tournament week and watched some games in the student union while my friend was proctoring a class (or something to that effect), and the game being "played" on the flat-screen television in front of me was Michigan vs. Minnesota. Oh my good lord!!! What the hell happened to this conference over the last 10 years??? It's actually a little sad if you think about it, kind of like a heart-throb actor or sex-symbol model still going through the motions in their late 50's. It saddens one's soul to see something that was once so relevant and magnificent become so pathetic and decrepit. Bo Ryan and his Wisconsin squad still win a bunch of games each year with second-rate talent running a boring system. Tom Izzo and Michigan State seem to be there year after year, but they are also playing slow-down basketball that makes one want to throw a phone at the television. Michigan State scored 36 points earlier this season against Iowa. 36 points!!! Now I love my Hawkeyes, but when a so-called "good team" can only muster up 36 points against a bad Iowa team, then something has gone terribly wrong. The only two teams that offer a glimmer of good-basketball hope in this conference are Indiana and Purdue. Indiana could have been a very good team but Kelvin Sampson had to go and break NCAA rules and the Hoosiers have not been the same since. Super-freshman Eric Gordon and senior D.J. White have enough talent to make watching an Indiana game relatively painless. Purdue's success this season is a great story as nothing was expected from them and they are being led by a bunch of freshman and sophomores. Purdue also won both games against Wisconsin during the regular season. But at the end of the day, I see Bo Ryan and his boring Badgers taking the Big Ten crown. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Notable seeds: #1 Wisconsin, #2 Purdue, #3 Indiana, #4 Michigan State, #5 Ohio State, #6 Minnesota, #8 Iowa

• Southland Conference - Stephen F. Austin - This is the 30th and final Conference Tournament bracket for me to fill out and break down!!! It feels like graduation! The only thing I know about this Conference is that Northwestern State made it to the NCAA Tournament a few years ago and upset Iowa in the first round. Absolutely broke my heart. I believe Iowa was a #3 seed that year. Otherwise, I am totally useless with regard to this conference and filled out my picks control-bracket style (taking the higher seed in every game). Notable seeds: #1 Stephen F. Austin, #2 Lamar, #3 Sam Houston State, #4 Southeastern La., #5 Northwestern State

Yes...I did in fact go with all #1 seeds today. I'm a little troubled by that, but the only two picks I really wavered on were not going with Duke and Kansas. Besides, I'm getting slaughtered in picking Conference Tournament champions and maybe by going with the favorites, I'll be able to get that winning percentage to creep up a little higher.