the truest of forms

I’ve come to realize that a lot of issues that I’ve been contemplating can receive some good insight through discussion from the solid minds of those that read my blog! Therefore, look forward to 3 posts that have some heft behind them, at least in my opinion. There may be some sports posts sprinkled around them, but I think this’ll be really good. Two of them I’m still wrestling with, and the third will just be a lot of sharing of what I’ve come to recognize as truth in the last year.

(By the way, I’ve got Georgetown and UCLA tonight)

As most of you know, Steve Alford left Iowa for New Mexico after a mediocre 17-14 season and rumors of being on the hot seat. There were a few highlights in his tenure at Iowa: 23-9 last year, a couple of Big Ten Championship runs…but, all that being said, we had a total of 1 NCAA tournament victory under him in 8 years!! 1!!! I say, good riddance! I’m glad he left. In his wake, I’ve got some mid-major coaches that are solid prospects if we can get them.

Chris Lowery – Southern Illinois: 29-7 this year, 22-11 in 05-06, and 27-8 in 04-05. The guy’s a winner and he can recruit!

Mark Fox – Nevada: 29-5 this year, 27-6 the year before…he’s on a long contract extension, but that’s ok.

Todd Lickliter – Butler: 27-6 this season, 102-54 in the five seasons prior.

Iowa should go after at least one of these guys! Anybody got any other feasible candidates?

My eyes are pretty blurry after filling out multiple brackets this morning, and although I changed up what my brackets looked like pretty significantly, I’ve definitely got some motifs running through all of ‘em…

1) I don’t trust Big 10 basketball. Purdue is hot, Wisconsin and Ohio State are pretty good, but definitely beatable. I’ve got some mini runs going with Illinois and Ohio State, but I think decent teams in the ACC, Big East and Big 12 can beat them. And Oden is overrated.

2) I really like Kansas this year. I’m not really sure why, and they may lose in the first round AGAIN and screw me over, but if they get to the sweet 16, they’ll be strong.

3) Duke will make it to the Sweet 16 and lose. Kevin Durant is really good. Iowa stinks. Air Force should be in over Stanford. In terms of #1 seeds, Florida has the easiest path and Ohio State has the toughest.

4) Lower ranked teams that I think can make runs: Louisville, Nevada, Winthrop, Georgia Tech, the Zags, Vanderbilt (from Dickie V) and Tennessee. Again, I don’t have very many specific reasons why I chose them…I also like Texas and Texas A&M, but they’re pretty high…

5) Here are the teams that I think can/will make it to the final 4 (collected from my many, many brackets…): Florida, Wisconsin, Butler, UCLA, Kansas, Southern Illinois, Texas, North Carolina, G’Town, Vanderbilt, Tennessee, Louisville and Texas A&M.

If I’m only picking 4 teams I’m taking: Florida, Kansas, Georgetown and Louisville.

Who ya got?!

I definitely have mixed feelings about graduating this year, but I’m glad that I’m going out during a year of great men’s athletics at Bethel. Here’s what they’ve done so far…

Bethel Hockey: MIAC Champions with an 12-3-1 record in conference (17-9-1 overall) and a series of crushing victories in the divisional playoffs. They’ve earned an automatic bid for the class 3 national tournament and are playing their first game tonight in River Falls, Wisconsin.

Bethel Football: MIAC Champions with a 9-2 record (and a beat down of St. John’s at their place) and an automatic entry into the national playoffs. They lost in the first round of those playoffs, but still a great season.

Bethel Basketball: Finished 3rd in the MIAC with an 18-8 record and only a couple of seniors on the team. They lost early in the playoffs in an overtime contest.

I didn’t get to a lot of basketball games, but I’ve seen a lot of hockey recently and they’ve been killing people out there. If they win tonight the next round is in Green Bay on Saturday…it’d be a pretty tempting trip.

I hope all you alums are at least a little pumped about it…?

**Update** Bethel (the #14 seed in the tournament) beat Wisconson-River Falls (the #4 seed) 2-1 and now are playing at St. Norbert’s (the #1 seed) this Saturday night in Green Bay. The tournament is now down to 8 teams. I’ll be there with the Bethel crew, riding on a fan bus for 4+ hours both ways. It’s gunna be sweet