Friday's Sweet 16 Picks

Nice little night of basketball, capped by Kansas State's incredible double overtime victory over Xavier. This was one of those games where it truly was a shame that one of the teams had to lose. It's impossible to recap the number of plays made by the Musketeers, particularly Terrell Holloway and Jordan Crawford. But an equal number of plays were made by the Wildcats, with Jacob Pullen putting on the finishing touches. That thriller overshadowed Butler's somewhat surprising upset of Syracuse, who inexplicably shrank down the stretch after taking a four-point lead. Elsewhere, Washington's Quincy Pondexter picked up three fouls in the first half and never really got into the flow of the game as West Virginia pulled away in the second half, and a plucky Cornell team finally succumbed to Kentucky, revealing the Wildcats to be a ferocious defensive team, if one that struggles to score in the halfcourt at times.

One note about Xavier-Kansas State before I get to picks for Friday. Down three with under ten seconds left, KSU coach Frank Martin (smartly) ordered his charges to foul, in order to prevent Xavier from attempting a game-tying three. Chris Merriewether followed those orders, but was whistled for fouling Holloway in the act of shooting. Credit Holloway for making a smart play, but divide blame between Merriewether and the officials. Merriewether's contact with Holloway came after Denis Clemente clearly grabbed Holloway. No foul was called, but Holloway, sensing the contact, went up for like 30-foot runner, hoping to trick the officials into giving him three free throws, something you see in the NBA quite a bit. The officials didn't need tricking, but Merriewether's contact resulted in those three FTs, which Holloway coolly knocked down.

I've thought for a long time that officials wait far too long to call fouls when one team is obviously trying to give one. What happened Thursday night is a rare occurrence, but at least two badthings can happen when the refs swallow their whistles. First, if the defending team is given too much leeway in slapping, they can cause the ballhandler to cough up the pill. Second, a team trying to foul but not being given the call will only try to foul harder, which leads to intentional foul calls and raised tempers. I don't know if Martin told the crew that his team was going to try to foul, but the officials needed to be looking for it, and they weren't.

On to picks for Friday's remaining Sweet 16 games:

#2 Ohio State vs. #6 Tennessee (Midwest)

Bracket: Georgetown (over Oklahoma State) | Pick: Tennessee

Comment: I really don't have much of a conviction about this one. I didn't see either team much during the regular season, had both teams losing in the first weekend in my bracket, are didn't see a lot of them during their tournament wins. I'm giving the edge to the Vols, an under-seeded team that handed Kentucky one of its two losses and whose seed may have been affected by a misleading final score in the semifinals of the SEC tournament (the game was close until the last eight minutes or so). My hunch is that Tennessee's pressing defense will be too much for the Buckeyes. Evan Turner is a terrific player and a passable point guard at this level, but that's not the style he thrives in running the show. In the wacky Midwest, is anyone really gonna argue with me?

#3 Baylor vs. #10 St. Mary's (South)

Bracket: Villanova (over Old Dominion) | Pick: Baylor

Comment: Again, two teams I don't know a ton about and two teams I picked to lose in the first weekend. I was dead wrong about the Gaels' Omar Samhan; he's arguably been the tournament's most valuable player thus far. The thing is, he still hasn't done it against an NBA caliber big man, and my concerns about his quickness and athleticism -- on both ends of the floor -- remain. Baylor, however, has that NBA caliber big man in Ekpe Udoh, and this intriguing matchup is the key to the game. The crafty Samhan should try to get Udoh into foul trouble, and he may find a way to score on him. If he doesn't, and I don't think he will, St. Mary's probably doesn't have enough to keep up with LaceDarius Dunn and the rest of the high-octane Bears.

#5 Michigan State vs. #9 Northern Iowa (Midwest)

Bracket: Kansas (over Michigan State) | Pick: Northern Iowa

Comment: If Kalin Lucas were healthy, I'd take the Spartans. But the MSU point guard tore his Achilles in the second round against Maryland, and while the Spartans hung on to beat the Terps without him, I'm not sure they can be successful over the course of a whole game against a good team like UNI. The Panthers like to slow the tempo down and Lucas is the one Spartan who could have sped it up. I don't like betting against Tom Izzo in the tournament, but I think Cinderella marches on.

#1 Duke over #4 Purdue (South)

Bracket: Duke (over Siena) | Pick: Duke

Comment: A few weeks ago, this was a possible Final Four matchup. Then Robbie Hummel went down with a knee injury -- add Hummel and Lucas to Syracuse's Arinze Onuaku and West Virginia's Truck Bryant and this tournament is missing a lot of key players, huh? -- and Purdue stumbled down the stretch. The Boilers bounced back to impressively beat Siena and Texas A&M, doing so with characteristic Big Ten toughness. Unfortunately for Purdue, Duke finally has the bodies to match that toughness. Brian Zoubek, Lance Thomas, and the Plumlee brothers are not the nation's most skilled big men, but they provide fouls and rebounding. And without Hummel, there isn't enough skill on the Purdue perimeter to counter-act Kyle Singler, Jon Scheyer, and Nolan Smith.