Memphis back to #1

Memphis got overconfident and lazy and let a pumped-up, lesser team beat them last Saturday in the final minute. Dorsey who had 22 rebounds against a very good Houston team had 1 rebound - pure laziness; they were just standing around. A review of Memphis's second half offense against Tennessee revealed they never passed the ball more than 3 times in their half court. They need to average 5+ passes when in a half court offense.

Tennessee revealed their true selves by losing their next game to Vanderbilt; Memphis came back and blew Tulsa out leading by more than a 2:1 margin in the all of the first half and then letting all of their bench play early in the second half.

The USA conference has 4 teams that can beat anyone in the SEC on any given night - Memphis (of course), Houston, UAB and Tulsa (Tulane is not quite there). Yeah, the conference took a hit a few years back when a bunch of the old Missouri Valley teams like Louisville switched, but it has come back strong.

USA is a basketball dominated conference; the SEC is a football dominated conference with a very good basketball tradition.

Memphis has a final four coach and final four talent; the real question is will they get motivated? If yes, they will easily win it all. What happened to them in 1973, with Bill Walton for UCLA going 21 for 22 in the NCAA final, won't happen again.

If you want to know who else will be in the final four look at who has the best coaches in the top 20 teams. Duke and North Carolina will be there if neither plays each other or Memphis; the fourth team???? Kansas?

No they did not go back to being #1, that would be North Carolina. I would not call Tennessee a lesser team either. If Memphis could not get pumped up or was too lazy for playing the #2 team in the nation, then maybe they did not deserve to be the #1 team in the land.

To say that Tenn. showed their true selves by losing to vandy the week after is absolutley stupid. Vanderbilt was ranked 12th at the time and what did Tulsa have? A hot 5 game win streak. Give me a break.

Memphis upset in the first round by a school like Oral Roberts. This is a team that thinks they have a reservation in the championship game come the end of March. And if thats their mindset going into the tourny, they will have a rude awakening when the get close games down to the last few minutes and everything they thought would happen gets flushed down the toilet.

Oh yea, Go Badgers baby....

All-Around schools are the best.

I agree with that 100%. Just a few more facts to prove that Vandy is a good team and beat anyone in C-USA, even Memphis. They are 18-0 at home this year, and have won 31 of the last 32 at home. Nine times has the #1 team in the country come into Nashville and 6 have gone away very disappointed, including the national champion Florida Gators last year. Something else I have disagree with, is your comment about 4 teams in C-USA can beat any SEC team on any given night. I will give you Memphis could do it, but UAB is the next level down. They have a good team and could compete with and beat alot of SEC teams but not all. They would lose to Tennessee, Vandy and maybe even Kentucky. Houston I have not seen play, so I cannot comment on them. Tulsa, really? I have a hard time buying into the fact that a team that is below .500 in C-USA could beat very many teams in the SEC.

To the OP. Memphis is a talented team but not built to go all the way in the big dance.

Memphis has the longest C-USA home winning streak ever... so you can drop that point right off the bat

Memphis was the C-USA 2004, 2006, 2007, and yes, 2008 regular season champions... Memphis was the 2006 and 2007 C-USA tournament champions... Pfft... Vandy just lost to Arkansas for god's sake They can't even do better than 10-5 in conference play right now. The way I see it, you guys should be relegated to C-USA, and Memphis should show you guys how an SEC team should play.

Memphis doesnt even want to be in C-USA. They had a bid to join the Big East conference in 03'.

History will repeat itself like it always does. Memphis wont make it past the Elite 8. They dont even play descent teams till the Sweet 16 and the win one and lose the other.

If Memphis played in a Major conference they wouldnt be as full of themselves as they are now. Will they though? No, they like to beat up on teams and get inflated egos. Cant wait for the tourny to start so you can see the true Tigers.

And if they happen to win the tourny, I will print this page out and Eat it.

I will be more then happy to take pics so I can be believed.

The only reason we lost the game against Ohio last year was because the refs called a charge foul that even the Ohio staff said was questionable. It was all about getting Oden more camera-time in the tournament for his draft pick.

And as for "beating up on teams"...

#1 - It isn't our fault that other teams suck donkey. Don't look down on us for being good, look down on them for being bad.

#2 - Calipari goes out of his way to schedule non-conference games against top schools, just to get us prepared for tournament time. Last year for example, games that were specifically requested for schedule out of conference by Calipari were against Arizona, Gonzaga, Georgia Tech, Tennessee, and Kentucky. Calipari doesn't dodge games against good teams, he tries his best to get them. That's how a team gets better.


If history repeats itself... we will be the dominating team in our conference for another 5 years. You don't win as many titles as we have and gotten to as many NCAA tournaments as we have on luck of schedule alone.

And why do you say we have inflated egos? Show me something that causes you to say that please...

And you are damned right we want out of C-USA. This basketball conference isn't even on our level... and our titles and performance show that by themselves. It isn't healthy to have a team like Memphis dominating a conference like this. It would be like Davis Love on an ameteur tour.


And just to clear this up for me, because I'm wondering...

Are you one of those people who hates Memphis for no reason? I've met/talked to alot of you lately, it seems you are breeding rapidly. I only say this because, without any basis at all, you decided to down a team. It seems you have some underlying hatred for us for some reason.

And just to clarify... when you say, "History will repeat itself... Memphis won't make it past the Elite 8" are you seriously insinuating that it should be shameful that we lose in the Elite 8? We entered the NCAA tournament in the #1 seed in 2006, #2 seed in 2007, #7 seed in 2004, and #7 seed in 2003. Better believe we will be the #1 seed this year too.

As far as I am concerned... making it to the Elite 8 and losing on national T.V. is better than the team who watches the game from their living room.

I'm not even about to dignify the UoM/UAB I just watched.

We just beat the #2 team in our conference by 40 points... and we were already up 30 at the half.

No wonder we are undefeated in conference play 2 seasons in a row... yeesh.

being a UW fan, even i have to say that they are OVERRATED!!! they have a ton of size, but they don't use it. i understand that they like to run the swing, but when you have at least two 6 foot 10 inch guys standing on the three-point line passing it around, something is wrong. have them post up more, get a missmatch!

Overrated, are you kidding me. The only time you have heard about them this season was earlier this week when they won a share of the Big Ten title, and today when they won it outright.

They dont need to be posted up down low. They dictate the game they want to play in the first half. If a team wants to run, Wisconsin will run with them. If they want to get dirty and go down low, Wisconsin will do it. Brian Butch can stroke it from beyond the arc when he wants to. Wisconsin is the only consistant performer when it comes to basketball in the Big Ten. Illinois comes and goes, as well as OSU. To say that Wisconsin is overrated is ridiculous. They are the quitest top 10 team this year.

i have heard of them earlier than this week because i live outside of madison and have season tickets. they can shoot well. if they are the only consistant team in the big ten (purdue, mich. state) how come they are almost always in a close game with the likes of iowa and such if they are so good?

they win, yes, buy they are almost always on the cusp of losing. dont even bring up the penn state game.

Um ok. Why did you quote my post and respond to it as if I was hating on Memphis. I gave Memphis credit when I was responding to the original post. The statement was made by the first poster saying that there were 4 C-USA teams that could go into any SEC teams court on any given night and win, and I said I would a agree with Memphis but not the others. A few more things. How is that Winning streak going for you now, oh wait that was put to a stop. Whether you choose to believe it or not Vandy is a good team that would give Memphis a run for their money. Memphis would more than likely pull away in the end but Vandy would hang around long enough to make them uncomfortable. My last point is, do you even know who my teams is? I doubt it, so don't tell me my team should be relegated to the lowly C-USA, because if Memphis was in the same conference as my team they would not be 30-1. Not saying they would have a losing record, but would have more than 1 lose.

You: I agree with that 100%. Just a few more facts to prove that Vandy is a good team and beat anyone in C-USA, even Memphis. They are 18-0 at home this year, and have won 31 of the last 32 at home. Nine times has the #1 team in the country come into Nashville and 6 have gone away very disappointed, including the national champion Florida Gators last year. ---------------------------------------- When I responded, it wasn't just to you in particular... your post just happened to have the most relevant points that connected to what I typed... so instead of quoting and responding to different sentences from 2 or 3 different people, I just quoted yours and went from there. As for the winning streak... until someone beats it, it is doing very well. Are you seriously insinuating that a statistic like the one we put up has lost credibility just because the streak ended? By your thinking, Tiger Woods' #1 in the world streak means nothing because, well, it ended. Not very good sense you are using there. And I wouldn't have even responded to you about Vandy if you hadn't said, "Just a few more facts to prove that Vandy is a good team and beat anyone in C-USA, even Memphis." I'm not bashing on Vandy, they at least made it to the 16 in 2007 and 2004, so they have done something... But you said, as quoted, that Vandy could beat Memphis. I don't think so boss.

We agree to dis-agree. We all love our teams, except for Eore who says his own team is overrated.

The reason you hear about them is because you live near Madison. I dont live in the state of Wisconsin, so to hear about them on a National stage is few and far between. Hence, them not being overrated.

I will comment upon this page again when the Tournament is over and both Wisconsin and Memphis lose in the first round and then where will we be?

around madison, they are considered overrated (at least to everybody i talk to.)

and my team is East Carolina! i just like watching the badgers

i expect them to make it to the sweet 16 (UW) but for how high they are ranked, they play mediocre ball.

if they want to step it up in the tourny, they will need to shoot well AND use their size. but like masterofbogey said, lets agree to disagree

I am not trying to take anything away from the winning streak, but come on. How many of those wins were against lowly C-USA teams. I am just saying that I respect the 37 game home winning streak of ND in the BE more than yours. So let me get this right. Vandy is good enough to beat the team that beat you, but stands no chance against you. Like I said more than likely what would happen is that Vandy would stick around long enough to make it uncomfortable for Memphis. Then Memphis would pull away in the end, espically if they played the game in Nashville. I am in no way trying to take away from what your team has accomplished over the last few years. Making it to the Sweet Sixteen or Elite Eight is a very good year, but unfortunately you have been picked by several to win the NC and have not won one. Until that happens people will just see you as an overrated team, it is sad to say but it is true. I do not feel this way but alot of people do.

Here's a few things about ND....

First off, they are 2-4 against ranked teams this year, and those two wins were against Villanova and Marquette.

And I think you need to look at Memphis' and ND's schedules one more time. Here, I'll make it easy for you... http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/teams/schedule?teamId=235 : Tigers... http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/teams/schedule?teamId=87 : ND.

ND has only played one ranked team at home this year... one. I'm not sure how you place a shorter streak that was easier to accomplish above ours... it's beyond me. We went undeafeted at home for more than a season and a half, just to put it in perspective.

As for Vandy... when they actually win something, we will talk about Vandy... how 'bout that. (I'm not bagging on Vandy... but you can't even compare Vandy and Memphis)

As for over-rated... when every poll in the country has you as #1, that isn't being over-rated. Some people who don't like us may call us over-rated, but then again... who cares. We win championships, set records, and almost every year we are in the same place...

Heading into the NCAA tournament while others watch us on T.V. and hope their team does better next year.

People only tend to hate the best...