2nd round NCAA thoughts...

After the 1st round of the NCAA tourney, I maintained that the Big East has proven that it is the best conference in the nation. Primarily on the strength of the Be going 7-1 in the first round. While the 2nd round of the tourney saw four of those teams fall, including both the BE tourney champions Pittsburgh, and the regular season champs Georgetown, I still believe that. Only the PAC-10, which is now tied with the BE in terms of teams heading into the round of 16 has any other claim to that statement.

But even with that, I still contend the Big East is the better conference. Marquette was a defensive stop or a missed front end of a 1&1, or a missed layup away from taking down the #2 PAC-10 team, Stanford, and the Golden Eagles finished 5th in the Big East conference.

However, I will say that the top of the PAC-10 is looking much stronger and better than the top 2-5 of the Big East, because of the two head to head matchups, where while Stanford just squeeked by Marquette, Washington State just destroyed Notre Dame.

At the same time, some local sports wonks have been touting the Big-12 as being much stronger.

And yet in the head to head matchups in that regard between the BE and the B12, the BE has destroyed their one opponent. And while there is another chance to see that matchup, it is extremely doubtful whether a Villanova team that just barely made it into the tourney will be able to knock off the B12 champion in Kansas.

But, then again, not many people nationwide would have ever picked Davidson over Georgetown, or WKU over UConn, either.

But one thing we do know for sure, and most would agree with: the ACC and the SEC are just AWFUL; and have been all year, despite what "Dookie" V and Jay Bilas have to say about it.