Art Chansky’s Sports Notebook is presented by The Casual Pint. YOUR place for delicious pub food paired with local beer. Choose among 35 rotating taps and 200+ beers in the cooler.
They call it March Madness for a reason.
We are only halfway to Elite 8 weekend, but we’ve already seen four games that both thrilled and surprised us. And I’ve got an inkling about which team is getting to the Final Four and will win the whole dadgum thing.
First the thrilling part. Kansas State beat Michigan State and its Mr. March coach Tom Izzo in overtime in what has to be one of the greatest games in NCAA Tournament history, with the teams trading big baskets throughout regulation.
The Wildcats from the Big 12 have a 5-foot-8 point guard named Markquis Nowell, who transferred from a college in the Ohio Valley Conference called Little Rock to Kansas State in Manhattan, Kansas, which they call The Little Apple. You can’t make this stuff up.
Nowell took the floor in the Big Dance and led K-State over Kentucky in the second round, when he scored 27 points and had 9 assists. Wait, it gets better. The victory sent his team to the Big Apple and Madison Square Garden, and where do you think Nowell’s from? You guessed it, up 5th Avenue in Harlem.
Overtime was supposed to be Izzo time. Except Nowell was on his way to 20 points and an NCAA tourney record of 19 assists. One of the assists may have been on a trick play while he was holding the ball near his bench and looking at his coach as the defense relaxed for a second. Nowell suddenly lobbed the ball to his basket for a reverse dunk by one of his towering teammates.
Did I mention Nowell had left the game with a severely sprained ankle? He came back and turned the ankle again. While stumbling, he heaved the ball toward the basket, where it slammed against the backboard and went in for a 3-pointer, the exact margin of victory before a meaningless last-second layup.
And now Kansas State advances to the Elite 8 in the East Region against ninth-seeded Florida Atlantic, which out-toughed the same Tennessee team that beat up Duke in the second round.
In the West regional, UConn blew out Arkansas, which was trying to reach its third straight Elite 8. In the second Sweet 16 game in Las Vegas, Gonzaga trailed UCLA by 13 points, rallied to go ahead by 10 with two minutes left before needing a 3-pointer from the March Madness logo to win. Coach Mark Few and the Zags made a series of unbelievable blunders and should have lost.
Gonzaga will not beat UConn, which has the best team you may have never seen. Coached expertly by Danny Hurley, the Huskies play suffocating defense and get great shots with slick offensive sets. They will advance to Houston and, no matter who else gets there, will win the NCAA championship, the school’s fifth.
You can bet on it.
Featured image via Associated Press/Frank Franklin II
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