Grab a fork and a napkin and dig in.
Sometime in the late-1980s, some CBS basketball announcer decided to throw an adjective into the ether that would stick into our collective consciousness. It could have been Super or Sizzling or Splendiferous or Stupendous. It wasn’t. It was Sweet, and so are the 16 teams headed into the second weekend of the Dance.
Grab a fork and a napkin and dig in ...
Perfect. Like those heavenly round orbs of fried dough, the Wildcats are the complete package. Unlike doughnuts, Kentucky does not have a hole in the middle. March Madness may be defined by guard play, but with the front line that John Calipari boasts, the Wildcats might not even need all five players. Karl-Anthony Towns, Willie Caulie-Stein, Trey Lyles and Dakari Johnson are that good. Then again, so are Andrew and Aaron Harrison, Tyler Ulis and Devin Booker, who primarily comprise Kentucky’s backcourt. Come to think of it, maybe Kentucky is an apple fritter. Really perfect.
The potential to be the best, but often disappointing. Since 1999, the Blue Devils have advanced to 11 Sweet 16s. They have lost in the Sweet 16 seven times since then. It’s like Mike Krzyzewski hits either a blackjack or busts on 16 every time. But with Jahlil Okafor, Quinn Cook, Tyus Jones and Justise Winslow clicking on all cylinders right now, Duke looks like a really tough out.
Scrumptious and sweet but can go very long without filling. Some churros stretch a foot, maybe even 18 inches. Some Arizona scoreless droughts feel longer. The Wildcats have perhaps the deepest roster in the tournament outside of Lexington, and the balance of steady old-reliables such as T.J. McConnell and young stars such as Stanley Johnson makes for a true contender. But ultimately, one long stretch without a field goal could come back to haunt the Cats, once the field thins.
You always forget about thin mints in November, but you can be sold on them in March. Tom Izzo might be the nation’s best tournament coach, getting his Spartans to jell around late-February and soar by mid-March. In what was supposed to be a down year for MSU, Izzo instead has his squad in the Sweet 16 for the seventh time in eight years.
Hot on the inside, cold on the outside. Aside from Kentucky, the best post in the country is Bo Ryan’s bunch. Between Frank Kaminsky, Sam Dekker and Nigel Hayes, the Badgers are, well, badgers. They get at you, time and time again. The towering trio combined for 62 points in a Round 2 win over Coastal Carolina and then 47 against Oregon. Wisconsin’s strength inside masks some deficiencies on the perimeter, though, and the Badgers can be had.
Silky, smooth and dangerous. The Bulldogs rank first nationally with a 52.4 shooting percentage and 10th in scoring at 79.1 points per game. With a balanced roster and a lineup that can attack from all over the floor, Gonzaga is primed for its longest run in a while. Do the Zags have the defense, though, to truly contend?
Greasy and slick, but unfulfilling. A well-coiffed Rick Pitino isn’t the slickest guy in his own locker room. That would be Terry Rozier, who lit up Northern Iowa, a popular sleeper pick, for 25 points, five rebounds and seven assists. This is the Cardinals’ fourth straight Sweet 16 but admittedly not Pitino’s top crew. Aside from two losses to N.C. State and Syracuse late in the season, Louisville’s other six losses came against top teams. So if anything, the Cards have passed through a gauntlet.
Perennially underrated, flavorful, but really not sweet enough. The Shockers have lived up to their name, with a brilliant Final Four run two years ago. But now we know about them, they’re familiar, and not so much a surprise. Many picked them over Kansas in brackets. But when it comes down to it, this team is not Gregg Marshall’s best bunch, and without the necessary firepower aside from Fred VanVleet, it’s probably not their year.
Way too flaky, and a little nutty. This is a team that had 10 regular-season losses, including a pair of defeats to Kansas State and losses to Creighton and Washington. It’s also a team that beat Kansas, West Virginia, Iowa State, Oklahoma State, Texas, Baylor and UCLA. The Sooners have decent measurables and enough depth but probably not enough to reel off four more wins.
An acquired taste, sometimes sour, often bitter. How else could you describe Bob Huggins, who has all the looks and personality of a cop on an HBO drama? The Mountaineers are back in the tournament after a two-year layoff, but they must face Kentucky. Good luck.
Full of hot air and early to rise but ultimately too flaky. The Fighting Irish have some of the best offensive statistics in the country: 12th in scoring at 78.8 points per game, second with a 51.0 shooting percentage. What, then, explains Notre Dame’s power outages against Duke, Syracuse and Virginia? With close wins over Northeastern and Butler, the Irish are battle-tested, but are they tough enough to continue?
Wholesome, warming, but are you really going to order it? The Utes fizzled down the stretch, and although they have played well in the tournament, Larry Krystkowiak is a ways away from fielding a true Final Four contender.
Gets stale too easily. The North Carolina offense went cold in nine of its 11 losses, including 46- and 55-point clunkers in losses to N.C. State and Iowa, respectively. Without a player averaging more than Marcus Paige’s 13.9 points per game, the Tar Heels are simply rudderless at times.
Wobbly, and with dreadful consistency. No one expected the Bruins to even be in the tournament, and after one heck of a draw, and one heck of a call, here they are. Yes, UCLA has offense from myriad sources — Isaac Hamilton, Bryce Alford and Tony Parker have gone off the last two weeks — but the offensive flow is far-too-often stagnant.
Never too good, never too bad, always just about the same. Mark Gottfried has established an admirable standard for the Wolfpack: four straight tournaments and back in the Sweet 16 after a two-year round-of-32 run. But 13, 11, 14 and 13 losses in the last four years shows you they haven’t gotten over the hump.
Tastes good enough, but does it really deserve to be in this category? A middling team coming out of a middling Big East, Xavier was a surprise pick to make it this far, with an offense that just skates by and poor rebounding. Kudos to Chris Mack, though, for taking advantage of a nice tournament layout with a favorable game against Georgia State in the round of 32.
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