April 02, 2007
And Then There Was One
One game left in the 2007 season. Sigh.
I always hate to see the season end. It just means months and months of tedious baseball coverage. Oh well. At least it's a good matchup. You could definitely make a case that we have a game tonight featuring the two best teams in the country. I just checked and Pomeroy has Florida and Ohio State rated as 3 and 4, respectively. Neither of his top two teams, UNC and Kansas, made the Final Four.
The matchups on Saturday were both extremely promising, but neither produced a memorable game. Florida simply took UCLA part, pretty much exactly the same way they did in the finals last year. In the other game, Georgetown was curiously absent of the fire they showed against North Carolina. If the Hoyas had played the same way against the Tar Heels last week, they'd have lost by at least 10. Hell, they couldn't even be bothered to bitch about every single call this time. It was curious.
Either way, in both games the better team won. I suspect that Florida will win tonight, becoming the first repeat winner in nearly 15 years. Pretty impressive. I've never particularly like Florida athletics, but I really like this team and they way it played the past two years. Sure, they could have been more dominant this season, but when it really mattered, they always won.
Two interesting side-stories tonight. The first one is the amazing fact that the same two schools are playing for the basketball title that played for the football championship. That really is incredible. For even one school to achieve that in one year is epic. I doubt we'll see this happen again in our lifetime.
The other story is the nearly-as-amazing fact that Billy Donovan might actually lead Florida to back-to-back titles and then voluntarily leave for another job - one within his own conference! It may not happen, but clearly it's still a possibility or he would have squashed the rumor as soon as Tubby Smith left Kentucky. For the record, I think Donovan would be crazy to leave. There's no question that Kentucky has a greater program, but he's built something special in Gainesville. Even before this run, he's had the Gators at the top of the recruiting rankings nearly every year. It seems like every other top player every year has Florida among the schools they are considering. In that respect, they are really no different than Duke, Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas, Arizona, UConn and UCLA. Billy The Kid is building a Program at Florida. If he stays and coaches another 20 years there, they could join those few elite programs right at the top of the college basketball world.
It'll be interesting to see what happens.
But that's for tomorrow. Tonight, we still have a game. One last game.
Honestly, given how it has been handled, I think there is little doubt that he intends to take the UK job. This is Pitino 101. Put it off, put it off, put it off, then it will happen in a four hour span where the deal gets done. Yes, UF can offer as much money (though whatever raise Donovan gets will have to piled on top of Urban Meyer's contract as well, believe me).
He'll be rebuilding anyway, so the timing is right. The ego is large. I'm guessing that Barnhart gets his man.
Now, Kansas is certainly a bigger program to leave than Florida is, but Donovan has Florida on the top of the mountain right now.
Going back to the first point, without the strong connections, I don't think there's any way that Roy would have left. In fact, he turned down the UNC job three years earlier. Also, considering his connections and love for Carolina, the fact that Matt Doherty had run it into the ground was probably a factor. UNC needed a savior. Kentucky isn't where it wants to be, but it doesn't exactly need a savior.
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