Brackets Are Here, Jon Rothstein, PMT Death Match + Justin Fields Traded To The Steelers

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March Madness is finally here, and we're going to break it all down. Someone in the selection committee is a real pervert.
We're going to talk about that. We have John Rothstein on the show, as is tradition.
He is going to break down all the regions, tell us us some fun nuggets we also have to talk to him about potentially losing friends and a wife and kids over march madness we sleep in may problems at home problems at home we got who's back of the week justin fields has been traded we're going to actually talk about that after john rostein so anyone who wants some thoughts on that we We also had some other moves in the NFL that we will discuss.

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Bye! Bye! dot com slash contracts for coverage details limitations and exclusions okay let's go now in the street there is violence and then a lot of work to be done no place to hang out or wash in and then i can't name all on the sun Oh no We're gonna rock down to Electric Avenue And then we'll take it higher Oh we're gonna rock down to Electric Avenue It's Part of My Take presented by Marshall Sports Welcome to Part of My Take presented take presented by draft king sportsbook use code take right now when you sign up with the draft king sportsbook app you get up to 150 instantly in bonus bets when you bet five bucks and only at the draft king sportsbook app with code take today is monday marchth, and we have our brackets.

My bracket's busted.

We have our brackets, and someone in that committee is a real sick pervert.

I actually think it's probably someone that Hank knows because he's been smiling ear to ear since the brackets have been announced.

The Pardon My Take region, it wasn't just that they had to put me versus PFT, Wisconsin versus James Madison in the first round. They also put Vermont and Duke in the same quadrant.
Yeah, Hank. They just loaded it up.
Famous graduate of Duke University, Henry Lockwood. Famous graduate of Vermont, Jake Marsh.
Yeah. That is actually, we'll get to our game, but the worst part about what they did to us is not just the two of us because we can survive anything.

We're stronger than steel, stronger than iron.

We can survive anything.

It's the fact that the winner of our game will then go up against either Hank and Duke or Jake and Vermont.

And they both will be like, we don't really care as one of our teams loses to those fucking bums.

I've seen this movie before. Here's what's going to happen here's what's gonna happen it's gonna be it doesn't matter who wins between me and big cat yeah because jake marsh is gonna be into the second round and he's gonna say i just i'm actually kind of rooting for james madison or wisconsin yeah i want vermont to win but i i want you guys to be happy yeah oh yeah he's gonna have a smile on his face when he shakes her hand hey sorry sorry I just beat you yeah I'm the best in the office again I despite the fact that this is perverted and it's sick and it's disgusting and there's somebody that's listening to part of my take right now in some college ivory tower oh they're all loving it some athletic director and he's silently jacking his dick off just listening to us in pain slow I want that person to know that they're a pervert.
But that's actually not the sickest thing they did. The sickest thing they did was put UVA in.
Yeah. That's disgusting.
UVA. You should be ashamed of yourself.
Let's give some shout-outs to the people who got snubbed. The bubbles burst.
It was a crazy weekend of basketball. Saturday, you saw basically the bubbles shrink and shrink and shrink because NC State won, beat North Carolina.
They weren't going to get in. New Mexico won the Mountain West.
They probably weren't going to get in. Temple beat FAU, and then it became a Temple UAB.
One of those teams was not going to get in. And the bubble just got smaller and smaller and smaller.
And the loser, the big loser, was the Big East, who ended up getting three teams in, which is crazy because they're the second-ranked conference. Some people are saying, our friend Frank Fleming, is saying that because the Big East is broadcasted on Fox and the Mountain West is broadcasted on CBS, what is the tournament broadcast on? That would be on CBS, Big Cat.
Interesting. Also, we have another theory.
Max, could you please share it? The committee is anti-Italian. Wait, fuck.
I nailed it. Anti-Italian American discrimination.
No, this is an example of anti-Italian. Why? Why is it going against the Big East? Because the Big East is Italian.
It's an Italian league. I actually agree with you.
Yeah, no, I agree with that. You got some Catholic schools.
You got New York schools. You got Providence, Patino.
You got Patino. Then you got legends like Rolly Massimino, Great Italian.
Jim Boeheim. Carneseca.
Jim Calhoun. Patrick Ewing.
Patrick Ewing. John Thompson.
The most famous Italians you can find out there. That's the Italian league the first Italian-American coach of Georgetown University Kyle Neptune, ends in a vowel, Italian Jay Wright looks like he could be Italian Jay Wright is Italian He's not Italian, but he got there as quick as he could The suits are Italian It was though, the Big East got screwed St.
John's wasn't even in the last four out yeah Seton Hall who beat UConn the number one overall seed wasn't in Providence didn't get in it's bullshit yeah it's it's kind of crazy too when you look at what the NCAA did by inventing the net ranking right it's a NCAA official or was it NCAA evaluation tool to determine what teams are better. It's their own metric that they invented that they claimed to rely on.
They did this, and they did it so that they could have some data to show people when they complained about bubble teams. Right.
And they invented a whole new formula, and then they just threw it out the window when it came time to decide on which teams were it's it's ridiculous but it's also very funny that they just create it as a distraction like hey maybe this will shut make people shut the fuck up for a while right and then we'll just put in the teams if oppenheimer had spent those like four years inventing the atomic bomb and then harry truman just surrenders yeah right afterwards yeah before they drop it like it's it's so dumb what they did i Do they have an explanation? Well, so here was one. So Matt Norlander, who works for CBS, talked to the committee.
They said, Q1, New Mexico would have been out if it didn't win the Mountain West. Also, Q1 wins were why Michigan State got a nine, which was pretty shocking.
Also said the Mountain West wins mostly came in conference. That's why so many teams see that low..
So there's two competing things. Mountain West teams are like our league got seeded low and Big East fans are like, but you got six in and we got three in.
It's bullshit. I think it's quad one wins is what they're looking at, but that also doesn't make sense because Michigan State had three quad one wins.
I think Providence had six. So was no rhyme or reason and then you have Duquesne who got an 11 seed who I'm pretty sure they were just the committee got lazy and they're like whoever wins this game is going to get an 11 seed there's no reason James Madison shouldn't have gotten an 11 seed over like James I agree better than Duquesne they got James Madison got a 12 Duquesne got an 11 it's crazy.
Duquesne got the same seed as like, hold on, I got to find it. It's almost like they just looked at the name of the school.
Oh, Duquesne. Yeah, that feels like an 11 seed to me.
Put him in there. All right, so New Mexico, who they admit was on the bubble, is number 22 in net, and they have the same seed as Duquesne, who was 83 in net, and Oregon, who is 59 in NC State, who is 63.
They really – this might be the first year where, like, the arguments about how the bracketologists, the committee, did it is all valid. Like, it feels like they just kind of winged this thing.
Yeah. Both in seeding and who they left out.
Obviously, the bubble getting so tight. You know, Virginia, that should have just been an easy, like, do we want to watch more Virginia? It's so funny that not only did they take a team that they knew would piss people off.
Yeah. Uh, because they might not have been deserving to get in, but also that they picked the one team in America that would piss the most people off because now we all have to watch a Virginia standalone game.
Standalone game. Also just one last thing about Michigan Michigan State, who I thought should have been in.
But when you put the resume up, you could definitely poke some holes in it. When they were revealing the bracket on CBS, they asked about Michigan State.
And someone said, it might have been Clark Kellogg, was like, they're playing really well even though they haven't won a game okay yeah they're competitive games they

haven't won games but they're playing really well so it's it's awesome just having a bracket in your hands holding the bracket looking at it smelling it when it comes out of the printer and it's still warm everything about a bracket i love it's the best i i just went with my balls i i did a balls first pick and i think i'm going to keep this bracket i think i'm going to trust my initial reaction on the bracket. Who do you have in

the 12-5

matchup? 12-5 matchup in the south yeah i have uh i have the jamie dukes i have james madison winning two games and hank by the way this is the time if there was ever a time you versus jake duke versus vermont they are the cat amounts if you lose to vermont you should get a cat oh all right hank is i tried hank has this is gonna this is pardon my take civil war in this quadrant and hank does not give a fuck and we knew it was happening i do have i filled out a bracket as well there's one oh one matchup missing wisconsin jmu i wanted to give you guys the floor maybe Maybe try and pitch me. Okay, I'll pitch you.
It's hell for me because I just bought back into this Wisconsin team. They played their balls off in the conference tournament.
I mean, I've watched every single Wisconsin game. They were playing very bad basketball in February.
They fought hard. Beat the refs? They beat the refs on Saturday.
They played toe-to-toe with Illinois. Illinois is really good.
They have two guys that just you can't stop. So I was like feeling excited.
I was like, this is a team that I talked about it in January. They have the makings, every piece that's needed for a run.
JMU is a problem. They're really fucking good.
They score the basketball. They score the basketball.
They shoot the three. Wisconsin doesn't defend the three.
I'm just hoping that height and scoring down low can work. But it's a lose-lose for me because if Wisconsin beats JMU, they're the favorites.
They're the five seed. And if we lose, it's like, ha-ha.
This one's going to probably hurt. It won't hurt as bad as 2015 because nothing will.
But it will very very bad what about like sweet 16 2016 early date florida that hurt very bad probably won't hurt as much as that because it's it's the first round it's the first tucky won't hurt so be number four it'd be number four on on wisconsin basketball losses they get's right like wisconsin money was got yeah supposed to win this game we're the underdogs for a reason as we should be um but hank to make my case this will actually i'm not sure if this is going to make the case for me or against me uh i think i'm gonna be there so it's about 15 minutes away from where the wedding is going to be it's like the universe lining up for me i'm going to go there straight from the wedding it's a black tie wedding too it's a haitian black tie wedding and i'm going to go 12 minutes down the road go to barclays that might actually work against us because if you look at the history of barstool and the teams that we root for breaking hearts if there's somebody there in person that person usually loses right maybe not from your perspective as a patriots fan but for most everybody else is like this does feel like it's going to be we are underdogs and and we are playing with house money but it does feel like it will be more heartbreaking for me if i were to be there in person to watch it lose okay but counterpoint hold on don't fill it out yet counterpoint um i just can visualize i'm gonna be streaming me just at people love to watch me die on streams the numbers spiking as the game gets worse and worse and then the like you know every 10 minutes a clip coming out of happy pft not on mushrooms but looking like he might be on mushrooms i haven't said i'm not going to to take mushrooms. Okay, so he might be on mushrooms.
Happy PFT while everyone just watches me die. Now, the last thing I'll say in defense of Wisconsin, this will 100% be the trendiest 12-5 upset.
Yeah. Everyone's going to pick JMU.
I was looking at the matchup because I was like, I'm nervous. I was looking at Ken Palm, Bart to find it texting all all my friends who make power ratings it's going to be a very difficult game uh for Wisconsin to win because I think James Madison is very good and they were criminally underseated but just gotta just gotta be taller just gotta be taller and AJ Storrs just gotta be awesome just Hepburn you mean AJ score AJ score soor And Max Klezman has to Get his groin replaced It's going to come down to This is actually the perfect litmus test for rest vs rust Yeah, that's it Hank, do you believe in a rest or rust? We're playing good ball right now Jamie's had a lot of time to recover What did you put in there? Well, here's the other thing too You would love for me for me to die against duke so that that is correct i'm thinking about the vibes i don't want to get lashed out on in person on friday oh true i can't wait for wisconsin with you because pft won't be there and then you're going to convince yourself that you're going to get revenge for 2015 and lose to duke which will be the best content case so i wrote wisconsin.
Okay. It's really – Jamie, who gets the world.
Again, they did this – someone did this on purpose. Yeah.
Someone did this on purpose. I said it on Monday.
I was like, I'm not trying to be a narcissist, but remember when we had standalone games, Bears versus Commanders, Bears versus Patriots? Someone in the universe is like, how can we squeeze it out of them and try to break them up via sport?

Thank you.

It's good for the show.

You know what?

Heck, you're one of them.

You're one of the perverts out there.

You probably put a phone call in.

But even if it was just 12-5, I would be like, okay, that's kind of a coincidence.

The fact that Duke's there, sitting there, some sick fuck is just, oh.

I know. I wish maybe it would have been great if it was just like and villanova's in the tournament duke first that would have rocked all right so we unveiled hank's pick for that game uh on wednesday's show we'll unveil max's pick for that game yeah and then on friday we'll unveil memes his pick and then next month much anticipated memes pick yeah next monday i'll unveil my pick but out.
I'm just so excited. I'm so excited for college basketball.
It's my favorite. I mean, we should talk about conference tournament week because it was incredible.
I reached that point where I think last night I was up again at like 12 o'clock at night watching our UT Arlington boys struggle with Grand with uh who they play Grand Canyon but it's just these five days I've just had nothing but basketball in my brain I don't even know I I just need to see a ball be bouncing at all times yeah hearing the squeaks yeah and there was just so many crazy games I mean the fact that NC State that was one of the craziest runs, five days. And to beat Virginia when Virginia should have fouled on a bank in three-pointer and then kind of low-key throttle NC.

Like, they were up that entire game.

It was crazy.

And then we had, like, every tournament had its own weird thing happen.

Kentucky losing in the first round.

Tennessee losing in the first round. Bama getting smoked.
SEC was a bloodbath yeah wait I can't say that you could say okay it was a B bath yeah B bath uh Houston getting absolutely trucked by Iowa State uh Wisconsin beating Purdue was the happiest I've been in a while running my sports teams. I mean, that was a crazy game too.

Yeah.

And the, the big pain for me is like,

I've,

I like this Badgers team.

They're so fun to watch,

especially when they're shooting the ball.

Well,

they have fun guys.

They're not the typical,

like slow it down.

Virginia.

Let's just fucking,

you know,

go 30 seconds,

just passing the ball around and then get a,

you know,

a good layup.

It's very hard for me to root against a guy named Chucky.

I can't be like, God damn it. Chucky.
I fucking hate, you know, fucking hate you know it's like that's chucky yeah yeah but so and then pack 12 had craziness like and then you know every single conference it felt like the only conference that went chalk was the big east and yukon just marches on just dominating everyone yeah i feel like this is a big setup for yukon to just destroy people again yeah so uh So, who would you say, because I was going to say that NC State

to me feels like

America's team, or America's sweetheart.

America's sweetheart, because DJ Burns

can't root against that guy, just throwing his

ass into people. He looks like Escalade.
He's

the new model of an Escalade, and he's

just mowing people down with his ass, and then

the fact that he's such a silky smooth passer

too, watching a big dude that can pass

like that is so fun.

NC State feels like the team that most of

America has fallen in love with, but

I'm going to go to the next episode. The fact that he's such a silky smooth passer, too.
Watching a big dude that can pass like that is so fun. NC State feels like the team that most of America has fallen in love with.
But besides them, who would you put as the sentimental favorites? Sentimental favorites. Good question.
But can I just say one thing about NC State and where they're seated in the bracket? I know that we're just going off vibes and everything, but I was thinking about it. You have Houston and Tennessee futures.
I do. I have Kentucky, UNC, and UConn futures.
If Kentucky wins their first game and Texas Tech wins their first game, I was just thinking about how I'm just going to watch that game and Patrick Mahomes is going to be standing behind the bench and just another future gone by Patrick Mahomes. Yeah, he's going to steal it.
He's going to somehow come in and drop 30. Yeah.
It's like, God damn it, this guy. All right.
Team of America's team. America's sweetheart.
America's sweetheart. That's great.
I mean, you usually don't find out until you get that upset, but based off vibe. Will Wade, McNeese.
We also need big sexy merch for sure. Oh, yeah.
Yeah. I mean, yeah.
He's got to be our guy. He is the best.
Does he have a nickname yet? I think- Just big sexy? I've heard Escalade memes just keeps calling him big sexy. What about the Cybertruck? The Cybertruck? We can workshop something, but we need to make a deal there.
Yeah. You're the perfect person to ask about that.
It's coming on the show, actually.

Yeah.

It was Indiana State who didn't get in.

I feel bad for Indiana State.

It fucking sucks because they were so fun to watch this year.

That definitely would have been the team that everyone was rooting for and pulling for.

Oh, I've got another America's sweetheart, but they're going to get bounced in the first round.

Okay.

Long Beach State.

Yeah. Because their coach, he and the university mutually agreed to part ways after this season.
Yeah. Essentially, he was fired.
But they're like, hey, you can stick around and you can coach for the tournament. Then they just won their conference tournament.
So he's still their coach. And Dan Munson's a legend coach.
Like he, if you want to actually like draw the line of like, when did Gonzaga become Gonzaga? It's Dan Munson. Yeah.
He was the coach of Gonz gonzaga he was assistant coach for a really long time then their head coach when they made their very first deep run where everyone was like what is this school where is it yeah um yeah him they fired him and he's like yeah i'll keep coaching him for this conference tournament you're fired he's like okay can i still coach the team yeah and they came back they were down i was watching that game they were down like 10 in the second half and came back and won that game. He said afterwards that Jim Harbaugh is full of shit when he says, who's got better than us? Nobody.
He's like, yeah, I do. I do.
My life's pretty sweet. Yeah.
So like a guy who's fired being that happy about his life, which I guess is still to coach basketball. It's hard not to root for that guy.
By the way. If they win, if they beat Arizona in the first round, is he coaching for his job? Like, couldire him? They should rehire him.
Another one, Keats, NC State's coach, all-time, all-time coaching for your job. He had a line in his contract that if he ever wins the ACC tournament in a contract year, he gets an automatic two-year extension.
So he got an automatic two-year extension on Saturday night just by winning that game. That's cool.
And he was on the hot seat. They were going to fire him, and it kicks in, and he just got all these bonuses.
All right, I'll give you one other team that I think could be the capture America's heart. Alabama.
Samford. Samford's playing Kansas, 13-4.
Kansas has been trending downwards. They've had a lot lot of injuries they got bounced quickly in the first round against Cincy in the big 12 tournament Samford plays so fast they chuck and like that's the type of team that everyone falls in love with just a bunch of like undersized guys who hit threes and played a crazy pace so Samford could be that team and Kansas is like you always got to look what's the story even though Kansas is down it's like 10 years from now if Samford beat Kansas everyone be like wow remember when Samford beat Kansas yeah it's Kansas they lost to a school named Samford yeah right uh if you're looking at the Jake Marsh storyline Super Bowl I see one in the the second round.
Tennessee, Texas. Rick Barnes.
Yeah. I love that.
I really wish the committee had done Purdue versus St. Peter's in the first round.
Yeah, me too. That would have been great.
But, yeah, this bracket looks great. All right, so do you guys want to do a quick Final Four that we can then adjust at a later date? Yes.
All right, do you have yours, Hank? Mm-hmm. Okay.

Give it to me. UConn, Arizona,

Kentucky, Gonzaga.

Mmm. UConn, Kentucky

rematch

from, what was that, 2014?

Kentucky wins

the national championship. Okay.

Okay.

I have UConn,

Arizona, Houston,

Tennessee. Okay.

I have, this is my first

Thank you. Okay.
Okay. I have UConn, Arizona, Houston, Tennessee.
Okay. I have – this is my first – I haven't even done it all throughout.
I think it's going to be the storyline revenge factor. It's going to be UConn, North Carolina, Marquette, and Creighton.
And everyone's going to be like, why did you leave you know the entire Big East three out of four of the final four teams are Big East team. Counterpoint do you know what network this is gonna be played on? Oh yeah CVS.
And what network is the Big East played on? Fox. Fox Something to think about.
Shit that's not gonna happen. It would be very yeah it's actually gonna be.
It actually would be State, Colorado State. Yeah, it would be great if that did happen.

It would be a big fuck you.

Yeah.

Seeding committee.

I'm rooting for that, I think.

I would love to just see the – I just like whenever the committee gets embarrassed,

whether it be college football, whether it be college basketball.

Committees are bullshit, and I'm convinced that all of these committees can be – the job of the committees can be done better by like 75% of the fans or AI.

Just anyone who's been paying attention.

I know for a fact I know college basketball guys who are way more informed about college basketball and who's good and who's bad than this stupid committee.

Yeah. Committees exist just that one person doesn't get blamed for stuff.
Yeah. It's them it's like when somebody says oh you know i have to take this to the board yeah and get the board's approval on it no it's just the having a board or having a committee is very useful so you can be like no it's this nebulous entities problem right that you got fucked over there's there's no one person that like a saint john's fan can call up on the phone and be like fuck you yeah that's all that's all we want is fans like give me somebody to tell us to fuck off yeah give us a hot yeah establish an open hotline to at we should do that for voicemails maybe maybe for wednesday's show oh yeah what do we what do we what was that segment we used to do we should bring that back for march madness uh was it like when your dad texts you parental advisory parental advisory Yeah, pissed off parents.
And then we had another one where we used a hashtag that was good. Oh, yeah.
That people would tweet us. Higher education? No, no, no.
When people tweet us and they were mad and we'd read them off and they were great. It might just be like mad online.
Yeah, we got to bring that back. Because that was great to hear from the fans when they feel like they're hurt.
Yeah, yeah. So if you are if you're in a grieved party if you feel like you've been wronged by the committee just tweet at us hashtag mad online yeah let us know why let us know what school they fucked over and we will read the best ones yeah um they the end of the cbs show they thank the committee shut the fuck up it's a bunch of dudes sitting in women probably sitting in in like business casual attire in a sheridan conference room eating like lukewarm spinach artichoke dip and just sitting there being like oh this team looks pretty good thank you for your service you spent six hours today and it's probably i don't know if it's spent art dip or if it's like just cold cut sandwiches.
It's just gross food. You had to eat dry sandwiches for a day.
You had to eat a turkey club that didn't have almost any mayonnaise on it at all. Yeah.
Like a very dry sandwich. Thank you for your service.
You basically served overseas in Iraq. Yeah.
You just, you, you, you keep standing up and looking at the cookies again, being like, oh, is this oatmeal raisin? Then sitting back, I'll have half. And then you have another half.
Then you have another half you have another half you've had seven cookies dude they probably who put duquesne at number 11 they brought in the pitcher filled with water in like the metal vase and it was probably filled to the top too far when you poured it into your little stemmed glass it probably spilled a little bit on the on the white tablecloth that was housing all the craft services so it was a tough day for everybody that fucking one idiot who's been accidentally drinking decaf for the whole day. And he's like halfway through.
He's like, fuck, this is decaf. Yeah.
It probably took him like 10 minutes to get the PowerPoint set up. Yeah.
You didn't have the right connection cable. They're morons.
So no, no thank you to the committee. You guys did some bad jobs, bad jobs.
I actually am more like the bubble got burst by everyone. This was the craziest conference tournament week.
I'm more mad about the seeding. I think they did some really bad shit with the seeding and fucked over some teams.
That's really what it comes to. In terms of the teams that got left out, I think you just – you have to look at the ACC and then you look at the Big East teams that got left out and be like, which team – like, Clemson was, what, a six seed? Yeah, I think so.
Yeah, they stink. Yeah.
Yeah, Clemson's a six seed. Joe Girard's going to get absolutely eaten alive by New Mexico.
They play fast. Yeah.
Fastball. This is also a very funny time of year because I'm very bad at gambling.
I'm on a historically bad run right now. But I also think that I'm smart enough to pick Colorado to win a play-in game

and then pick Colorado to win their second-round game over Marquette.

I already bet Colorado.

Yeah.

On Wednesday.

We're smart.

We're sharp.

Yeah, no, it's fine.

You got to get into it.

So what else we got for the bracket?

Anything else, Hank?

Duke? Are you going to be a Duke fan? Yeah. I like how you just decided that right now.
Sure. I mean, I don't have a college basketball team, so they're the closest thing I got.
Duke went out sad. Yeah.
I mean, this team is not good. They went out sad.
Who do they lose to again? NC State. Oh, yeah, NC State.
Yeah. My brain is just melted with basketball.
You ask me what happened, and I'm just like, I think, I don't know. Well, Max, do you have any other thoughts? Villanova.
How mad would you have been if Wisconsin had lost at the refs? Oh, with Zach Eadie? Yeah. Very mad.
I mean, anyone who wants, everyone who roots for a Big Ten team should be thankful that that was the last time we have to watch a Big Ten ref, crew, ref, Zach Eadie. I still think Purdue's a very good team.
They're better than they were last year. But it's just maddening watching a seven-foot guy get treated like he's a five-foot guy and with kid gloves, and every single time he gets touched, there's a whistle.
He's barreling it's nuts so i was that was that felt really good that was a very fun win to have it is funny because the refs feel bad for zach edie right which is really strange for a guy that that he's that physically imposing and you're like oh poor zach edie he doesn't look like he's having any fun out there they did it to michigan state the night before too it was just egregious call after egregious call I had one last thing Max you were never even close to the bubble that you keep saying that that's not true no you kind of wasted her time yeah like you wasted all that anger and you weren't even close to the bubble if Villanova beats Marquette then beats Providence and is in the Big East final and loses to UConn, they are 1,000% in. That would be six quad one wins.
I don't think so. 1,000%.
We know how the committee feels about Italians, Max. And what network is the Big East on? It's true.
And the whole quad one thing is bullshit. Like Michigan State got that seeding because of their quad one wins.
They have three of them. Yeah, Seton Hall has more.

St. John's has more.
Yeah, I thought Michigan State should be in. Seton Hall had

five quad one wins. I know, and they beat

UConn. Yeah.
It's crazy.

And Max,

you were never close to close.

Yes, I was.

Was Providence even the last four out?

Were they last four out? No, they were not last four out.

They weren't last four out.

And they went around further than you in the Big East tournament.

But we were ahead.

We already beat them twice.

We were ahead of them going into the Big East tournament.

So the last four out was Oklahoma, Seton Hall, Indiana State, and Pitt.

You were not even.

You wasted our time.

But if they beat Marquette and then beat Providence to get to the Big East final,

they're 1,000% in.

Yeah, I don't think so. I don't think so, buddy.
I don't know why you say that. I don't think so because you weren't even close.
Did you call him Frank? You weren't even close. Yes, you're saying that because they lost.
That would have got them to 20 wins with six quad one games. Actually, I don't know if Providence would have been quad one.
Justice for Pug. Justice for Pug.
Oh, yeah, so we should say that is another Fleming curse. A crazy stat.
John Fanta put this out there. For the first time in 45-year history, the Big East Conference, a team went over five games, over 500 in conference play and did not make the NCAA tournament.
That team is Seton Hall. Damn.
That's tough. That is tough.
That is very tough. It's just a bubble.
The bubble went crazy. It was all those teams just stealing bids.
I mean, the A-10 had every single team being upset. But, yeah, we have a bracket, and I'm very excited about the bracket.
I love my bracket. My bracket's perfect, and it's 100% correct, and nothing ever bad is going to happen to it.
Who do you think Purdue's going to lose to? I think they lose to TCU. Samford.
Samford's in the Elite Eight. I picked some of these teams because I want to see these storylines develop.
I want to see Will Wade win win two games yeah i want to see mcneese beat kansas uh samford also the everyone needs to know that you have to fill out your bracket you have to have a really strong conviction about one crazy upset and then have that team lose by 30 yeah and then your entire bracket's gonna you guys are highlighter guys right um i i go back and forth depending depending on the year highlighter i don't have i don't have like a device that i need to use every single year i go with the flow oh highlighter for sure right hank yeah oh always highlighter right right max circle you circle circle and then you fucking and then weirdo not and then put a line through it you gotta be yeah you gotta be able to. Yeah.
If I have a highlighter for me, I'm a highlighter guy.

If I got a pen, guess what?

It's big time.

I want it to be as quick as possible, and I don't always have a highlighter close by it.

I will always have a pen.

Yep.

Yeah.

All right.

Well, we'll get more into the bracket with John Rothstein, and we also are going to have

Titus on on Wednesday where we dive really deep in, have more crystallized thoughts.

Let's do who's back of the week.

By the way, I mentioned at the top, we are going to talk fields after john rostein got a lot of thoughts on that he was traded so we're not ignoring it there's making a sandwich and then there's crafting a sandwich and when i want something perfectly crafted i go straight to boar's head for over a century boar's head has been dedicated to crafting premium deli favorites every ingredient is carefully carefully chosen, every recipe made with a purpose. Their oven gold turkey, smoked master ham, and ever roast chicken are made from premium whole cuts, hand trimmed, and perfectly seasoned.
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Discover the craftsmanship behind every bite at boarshead.com. Okay, Hank, who's back of the week? Who's back of the week is Black Dick.
Okay, good, good. Grady Dick and Anthony Black did a jersey swap at the end of their game on Sunday.
That's pretty cool. It's like when Chris Long used to always stand next to Fletcher Cox.
I would say Long Cox. And then one time Jalen Hurts got there and said Long Cox Hurts.
That was awesome. Yeah.
Just guy stuff. Yeah.
Always makes me laugh. Nothing like a good jersey swap.
Who's back to be? Scotty Scheffler? This guy is good. He's a problem.

He is a big problem.

Another comeback victory at the players. Repeat

champion at the players. Fifth major.

Fifth major. Wyndham Clark

had a putt to tie, force a playoff.

Went inside the cup,

rolled around, popped back out. Did a

180 degree loop, came out. I may

have bet on Wyndham Clark to win.

That was a tough loss. That was

crazy. It was wild, yeah.
It was really close Thank you. roll the round, pop back out.
Did a 180-degree loop, came out. I may have bet on Wyndham Clark to win.

That was a tough loss.

That was crazy.

It was wild, yeah.

It was really close going down the stretch there.

It was like Brian Harmon, Shoffley.

Is Shoffley ever going to win anything?

He just doesn't like to win.

Zander.

The only thing Zander does,

his name is always at the top of the leaderboard on Saturday.

It's always right next to Patrick Cantlay.

It's always like Cantlay, Shoffley. I think he's like 0 for 9, and he's been in the final group 9 times.
Oof. Maybe it's 0 for his last 9 because he's won a couple times, but...
Can't break through. Can't break through.
Tough. What about a Xander is it where you're a kid and your name is Alexander and you decide to go by Xander instead of Alex? I think some kids are named Xander.
Yeah, Xander. Xander and Jimmy Tatro in his show.
I don't think his name is Alexander. That would be wild.
You think his name is just Xander? Yeah. I think it might be Xander.
I think people do Xander now. I mean, people do all kinds.
No, his name's Alexander. Of course it's Alexander.
Oh. That's what Xander's, it's short for Alexander.
I didn't know that. You thought just Xander was a name? I think people do name Xander.
Well, yeah, why would you just go Alex? Yeah, Alex, that's what I'm saying. If your name is Alexander and you choose to go by Jander, that tells me all you need to know.
He should go by Alex until he wins a tournament. Yeah.
Well, he's won tournaments. No, but he wins one since he's been choking.
Does he choke? You could call it today a choke. Also, Max Homa did not hit a person.
He hit a tree. Yeah.
He was very clear about that. On the record.

Although I wish he had hit the person. Yeah.
I wish, because the person was standing right in front of him when he was trying to hit a shot. That's Darwinism.
He said afterwards, he's like, yeah, I asked him to move. And then they just kept on inching closer.
The post-match press conference with Max was so funny because they asked him about that situation. And he had this, like, smile on his face.
And he kept holding himself back. and if I'm running it through the Maxoma Truth Translator,

he wanted to say so badly like i wish that it hit the guy like it's his fault for being there yes he should not have been there that's his problem not my problem you should ask him about that yeah um but the video made it look like it just whopped him in the head and i was so i was hoping that he got hit in the head but you know not enough to cause a serious injury, just enough to teach him a lesson.

Yeah.

Yeah, I agree.

So Max did not hit a person.

I thought he killed the guy.

Yeah, I mean, there's no way that hits him in the head.

It doesn't seriously injure him. Yeah, there's a person.

Like, it hits the thing, and then you hear somebody scream like half a second later.

Yeah.

That would have been...

I kind of wish that it happened.

Yeah.

For me.

Okay, PFT or who's back?

My who's back of the week is the Titanic. Oh.
So I think we pitched this on the show to Damon John. Okay.
From Shark Tank like five years ago. But it's been my dream to one day recreate the Titanic.
And by that I mean build the exact same ship again, have it leave from the same port on the same day of the year, have it sail the exact same route as the original Titanic, and have the exact same number of lifeboats on it. Have tickets cost the same that they did back in the day.
The three richest guys in the world on there. Yeah, adjusted for inflation, and then just see if you can make it.
I guarantee you that would sell out. People like Thrill Seekers out there.
There's a bunch of Titanic freaks out there. We saw it with the sub that imploded.
People get legit obsessed with the Titanic. I would love to have it be like stowage class where it costs like $5 for a ticket.
You sell a thousand of those. And then you have other suites up top that cost $250,000 where rich people get to go.
Just recreate it 100%. But there's an Australian billionaire named Clive Palmer, and he is planning on building the exact replica of the Titanic, and he wants to set sail in 2027.
I hope he does it at the same time of year. Do it.
Just run the whole thing back. See what can happen.
Well, there's no ice caps anymore, right? Maybe by then. We fucked up that iceberg.
Yeah, we did. The iceberg is not existing.
Well, warming. Titanic, kind of a little bit of a bitch-made boat when you think about it.
Obviously, because it got destroyed, but have you ever seen the pictures of the Titanic versus a modern-day cruise? It's not as big as it is. That shit and bezos probably has a boat yeah definitely titanic was mid at best yeah so they should make this a bigger boat yeah that's what i'm saying like if you remake the titanic everyone's gonna look at me like that's it that's it though because in our heads we're like biggest boat ever for that for that one day like on the same day of the journey that the Titanic hit the iceberg, they should just have the captain blindfolded.
It's like we're going straight ahead. Yeah.
Can you imagine what a thrill that would be to be on that boat? I want this thing to sink so bad. It would rock.
Especially a billionaire named Clive. It would rock so hard if it sank.
I'm rooting for it to sink. He might be building this just to blow it up and be like, it sunk.
Yeah. This might be a Michael Bay movie.
Yeah. Okay.
My Who's Back Week, I have two. One is, I should have said this during the brackets, but this is the funniest time of the year in terms of non-sports fans versus sports fans because I think in NFL season, if you aren't a football fan, I think most non-football fans at least respect it.
Like, we know that's big. Like, we know the NFL's big.

The NFL's king.

There are people who just, like, will never watch a college basketball game just out of principle.

And I saw this one guy tweet, you're a sick individual if you've been watching college

basketball all week.

It's like, no, this is the best.

But it's always a funny divide because you have people who, like, obviously not listeners

to this show, but you have people who are just like, this is just another just another week for them while we are just going to go to war yeah yeah i love it yeah it is it's really strange um but you know what i mean i get i get it i get into whatever big sport is happening at that time that's how my calendar is right of course but you know what i mean like when you meet someone who doesn't watch the nfl they're like oh yeah well i know i watch super bowl yeah and rostein but you meet people who don't watch college basketball where they're like, oh, yeah, well, I watch Super Bowl. Yeah.
John Rothstein.

But.

You meet people who don't watch college basketball, they're like, what is going on?

But I feel like during bracket week.

Yeah.

That kind of transcends.

Office.

Yeah, you're right.

You're right.

The office is going on.

But conference championship week, you're right.

There's a lot of people out there that like March.

Like college basketball does not start until the bracket.

Right.

It's more about conference championship week.

They don't understand like, wait, you've been watching basketball every day for the last five days.

It's the exact opposite of Joe Lenardi's schedule.

All right.

Thank you. start until the bracket it's more about conference championship week they don't understand like wait you've been watching basketball every day for the last five days it's the exact opposite of joe linardi's schedule all right so that that was my segue because my other who's back is joe linardi who's now no longer back because it's golf season joe linardi i thought i liked this guy have we had him on i don't think so i think you know what he reached out to us maybe maybe year two of part of my take and i think we were going to put him on the show, but he was like, the thing is I'm actually swamped until the third week of March so I can come on the third week of March.
And then we were like, wait a second, what the fuck are we going to talk to Jill Linardi about during the NCAA tournament? Right. Like his job is done by then.
He doesn't even – I don't think he watches the NCAA tournament. He was also getting community noted because he was putting in like wins.
He had Virginia winning against NC State. They didn't.
Yeah. In Illinois losing to Nebraska.
They didn't. But Joe Linardi on Friday night after making Virginia the winner tweeted, danger time for UVA and good night for me.
Joe Linardi has to work three weeks a year. And he said good night at 1057 during conference championship week on Friday night when there was like six games left.
Yep. What is up with this guy? I think, I think he hates brackets.
Yeah. Because he also said, I think Joe Linardi is trapped in his own personal hell.
Like the one thing that he has to do all day, every day he hates doing, which is watching college basketball college basketball right and he was the first to do it and everyone respects him and ESPN employs him but like a million people do brackets now shout out bracket matrix that compiles it all he had you know a couple hours before uh the brackets came out he said two hours actually two days until golf season he's just so excited to be done with this stuff and then he also said this this is grumpy time for him right now it was like right before the brackets come out he's as grumpy as it gets what is up with this guy does he not bro you gotta love what you do yeah it's like if hank's job was to read all the time that's what he's treating this like i was shocked and he he might not even watch the games this week. I don't know.
His job is done. Like, Joe Lunardi's usefulness runs out at exactly this time.
Yeah, it's over. And Max was here on Friday night.
We were just like, what do you mean good night? I was furious. What do you mean good night? Your job is to watch the games and decide the bracket for us.
You are going to sleep. We had Max Max, when he tweeted that, I think you and I both stayed up for another five hours.

Yeah, I mean, the Arlington game was unbelievable.

It went forever, and it was incredible.

But, yeah, New Mexico and Colorado hadn't even tipped off yet, and they were both bubble teams.

Good night. How are you supposed to make a judgment on who should be in and who should be out

if you won't even watch the games on championship weekend? Careful, Max. Crazy.
Careful italian you don't we were literally you don't want to come across like a cbs we were just screaming what do you mean good night you can't go to sleep this is your job it's five days a year that he has to stay up that late yeah what he needs to realize is that with one snap of the fingers that freak steve kornacki could step into his job and do it better. I've always been a Jerry Palm guy myself.
That fucking piece he has on his head just rocks. He just goes out there with authority.
You're like, dude, what are you wearing? I like Charlie Cream. I'm on the Cream team.
Okay. Yeah.
Yeah. So let's normalize other guys.
Yeah. I think, so I was thinking about the upcoming college football season.
I think Blake, his line is going to be,'s going to be a bracketologist for football because nobody's doing that yet. Yeah, I'm going to be the first.
Yeah. That's as long as the Lenardi's not doing it.
No, he hates his job. Good night.
You don't fucking say good night to us at 1057 on Friday night of conference championship week. What do you mean? Good night.
Yeah, well, it, it was midnight on the East Coast. This was after he had put Virginia as a win.
Yeah, that's tough. Tough night for him.
Real tough. Okay, Jake is still taping with Titus.
We can ask him who's back when he gets back here. Let's get to John Rothstein, talk a little more college basketball.
Also got to talk some tweets with John Rothstein because he's had a bunch recently that have had to say huh ever had one of those days when it's just too cold to keep working nah neither has ariot ariot work jackets and boots are packed with all the cold stopping waterproof protection you need to get the job done under any conditions so you can take any job out there and always deliver check out ariot in your local workwear retailer or visit Ariat.com slash work to get 10% off your first order when you sign up for email. And whether whatever in Ariat work here.
All protein bars generally taste the same, but not one bars. One made protein bars are actually delicious with Reese's and Hershey's.
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You can find him on CBS Sports. You can hear his podcast, College Hoops, today.
It is a tradition unlike any other. We have John Rothstein to break down his region's talk brackets.
But before we do that, John, how are you feeling after Shaka Smart just outed you for being a serial texter to him on national television for people who missed John asked him about Tyler Kolick and whether he'd be playing and Shaka said, should I answer this now or should I wait till you text me every single morning? How are you feeling? You know, Hey, look, I hope that cat, everybody who meets me and I think probably most people feel this. I feel I'm one of the most relentless people that they've met in the history of their life.
Look, nothing was given to me. Nothing obviously was put in front of me and said, okay, take this.
This is yours. So the only way I know how to live life is to go through every life each and every day like I've accomplished nothing.
And the way in life to accomplish everything is to wake up each and every day believing that you accomplished nothing. Oh.
every day is a gift. Wait, so every day you wake up and you're like, I have not texted Shaka Smart ever in my life.
Essentially. No, I was following up with him this past week, obviously, about Colick's injury news.
And we spoke before the Big East tournament. He said, there's no news right now.
I'll let you know if that changes and so on and so forth. But I can never go through life feeling like I could have done more in my vocation and in my effort.
So what I mean by that is, you know, I believe it was Salvador Dali who said, have no fear of perfection. You'll never reach it.
We're getting deep and philosophical here on the first question, but why not? We're close. Yeah, I like that.
I think the way you have to look at it is I could never live with myself like, well, I could have done X, Y or Z to be better. And I didn't do that.
So now I look at things and I say, you know what? I have to always make sure that I'm stretching things out as much as I can, giving my best effort. And if the chips don't fall in your favor, the chips don't fall in your favor.
You're never going to be able to be on top of everything, but you can never not give your best effort in life. As you know from one of our favorite movies that we share together, one of most Celeste Stallone's most underrated movies over the top, the world meets nobody halfway.
Yes. And you do not.
You live that. You live that mantra.
and sometimes to your personal life's detriment because I was made aware of this tweet of yours

a couple of hours ago. I wanted to follow up, make sure that you're doing okay personally, because I believe this was Friday.
You tweeted, problems at home. Been so dialed in that my wife took our six-month-old girl with her to a work trip on the West Coast.
I hope they come back, but if they don't, dying on your sword is worth it when yukon st john's is 24 hours away at msg remember life is about choices so are you single is this the is this the like lookout ladies john rostein ready to get back at it no but the truth of the matter is this my wife you know i've got a really busy stretch as you guys know i was doing tv tonight i had to do my own podcast i'm on with you guys i have more tv in the morning then i'm flying out to dayton for the first four and then i'm going to another site from there but she was like all right i get it that this is march every month is march for me because i have a job too and i have my own career and she's like you know what i'm putting the baby to sleep and i'm sleeping in a different room tonight because i don't want to hear about these brackets i'll watch the game socially but that's that's it. And I go, that's fine.
So March season drives a rift, I think, you know, in the house a little bit. Like people don't understand that like, it's a really big deal that Duquesne hasn't been to the tournament since 77, which is the same year that Star Wars first did theaters.
But I have learned this and you guys tell me if I'm wrong. Nobody is perfect.
Not even my wife, who I love to pieces. But at the end of the day, you are who you are in life.
And at this point, you guys know me well enough. I'm not changing.
So if I, for years, have felt that the most underrated rivalry was St. John's-UConn, and it was untapped because St.
John's, who didn't make the NCAA tournament, hasn't won an NCAA tournament game since 2000, when Mike Jarvis led St. John's over Northern Arizona and Tucson when Northern Arizona had a very dangerous center named Dan McClintock.
I am not going to back down on the fact that I was still waiting to see if St. John's could get the Friday night, the Big East tournament to play UConn, who again has become a team that is operating on a Calhoun level under Dan Hurley.
Yes. No, hey, listen, we have busy seasons, football season.
We have a lot of stuff that pulls us in a different direction, so we understand. I wanted to follow up on one other.
We had your back on the other tweet where you said you lost a friend because you didn't go to their engagement party. I don't know if you heard what we said on our show, but we said engagement parties are bullshit.
A guy should never be like, I can't believe you didn't come to my engagement party. That's point John Rothstein.
You made the right choice. But also, and you guys know this, when you do what we do, you don't say no to work.
You don't say no that you didn't know when you have opportunities because especially, and you guys know this, when you're starting out, if you say no, you may never get another opportunity. So this guy, who again was a pseudo friend, I would say, when I went to college, he was friendly, like, hey, do you want to go to a Knick game or whatever? Kind of friendly.
But then when I started having more opportunities in my career, he was like, hey, my brother really wants to get into talk radio. Can we come by and see the station? And it's like a friend of convenience, and you get

invited to the wedding, and you're happy that

your pseudo-friend is having success,

but you're not going to say, no,

I'm going to come to your engagement party

instead of going to a Final Four

when Butler was playing VCU and UConn

was playing Kentucky, and Shabazz Napier

and Jeremy Lamb were freshmen at UConn.

Right, and that friend's name? Jonathan Bosco.

Yeah.

Look where it ended up. Who's Jonathan Bosco? You can put it together with a last name.
Okay, fair enough. That's all you, BFP.
I'm not going down that rabbit hole. Yeah, we had your back.
All right, so let's get into it. Let's dive into it.
I know you always like to put names on the bracket, on the region, so we're just going to hand it to you. You drive.
We'll insert ourselves here and there with questions. But let's rip it off.
All right. Well, let's start now in the top left right now, which is the East region.
UConn is the one seed. And I look at the makeup of the coaches in this region as having such fiery personalities.
Dan Hurley is your one seed. P.J.
Altsaberberger's the two. He looks like he could step in an octagon and fight Ken Shamrock right now.
Brad Underwood at three is a coach who keeps a treadmill in the gym at practice. And if a player isn't playing well, he makes sure they get on and obviously hits the treadmill.
Duquesne is Pittsburgh tough at 11. Auburn, one of the toughest teams in the country, one of the hardest playing players in the country in KD Johnson.
San Diego State is also a very hard playing time, a hard playing team at the five seed. I see ruthless, hard nose, competitive teams in this region.
And I see the region of gladiators led by the coach of the one seed, in my opinion, the favorite in the NCAA tournament, Dan Hurley. And Dan Hurley, probably in his own mind, feels like he's a little bit like Russell Crowe in gladiator in this NCAA tournament.
Brother to a famous point guard, son of a famous father. And even though he won a national championship last year, he will have his vengeance in this tournament of the next.
Okay. I like that.
that I like that the gladiator region so um can you tell us what just missed for this region because or how quickly do you come up with the names and was there anything you were workshopping because I'd love to see the drafts I'd love to see what was like ah this was so close but you know Iowa State doesn't really fit this or BYU doesn't really make sense here. So was there a name that you were toying with before you came up with Gladiator? Well, I was looking up and down, obviously, this region, and I was just saying, oh, my God, like, you know, Iowa State is so tough and Dan Hurley is such a personality, and, you know, we have Bruce Perl, who's such a personality and so fiery, and then you have, obviously, you know, the Brad Underwood stuff.
heley such a personality and you know we have Bruce Pearl who's such a personality and so fiery and then you have obviously you know the Brad Underwood stuff he's such a personality and Duquesne and Pittsburgh and it's such a story for them to get there for the first time since

77 I almost went with the region of chutzpah oh okay I like this I need the I know I need whatever

cut you know is on the drawing or the in the drafts for each one of these regions I like that

so it was almost the region of chutzpah but I went with the region of gladiators because I think

Thank you. I need whatever is on the drawing or in the drafts for each one of these regions.
I like that. So it was almost the region of chutzpah, but I went with the region of gladiators because I think you have the Dan Hurley element of, again, even though he won a national title, brother to a famous point guard, son of a famous coach, and even though he won a national title, he will seek his vengeance in this tournament or the next.
Yeah, I also think in your flow chart, it really helps if it can line up with a movie that would fit right in at like 2 p.m. on a Saturday afternoon, airing on TNT.
It came out at least 20 years or more. Yes.
Gladiator came out in 2000. Yeah.
That's 20 years or more. That's right.
Yeah. All right.
Who do you have coming out of this region? I've got UConn, guys. I mean, UConn is going to be playing, and I've been talking about this for weeks, in situations where UConn is not going to have to get on a plane to go to a Final Four.
Stores to Brooklyn, win two games there, back to Stores, win two games in Boston. But I will say this.
If Auburn can find its way to Boston there in the Sweet 16, I think UConn against Auburn in that Sweet 16 in Boston has a chance to be one of the best games of the entire tournament. I don't know if you remember this, Cat or PFC.
They played a couple of years ago in the first round of the battle for Atlantis, and it was one of the best games that we had that season. I think it was Thanksgiving Eve.
I was at the park in Brooklyn with my kid. I think I had two kids.
I was with my son, and it was like, what, two overtimes? And I had a lot of money on that game. Was it two overtimes? That was, I think, two overtimes.
Yes, it was definitely an overtime. I remember it well.
That was a great game. So there's a lot of conference champions in this bracket.
Do you put any stock into them fading out of the tournament? There's two sides to that. You know, I mean, we look at what happened, obviously, with Purdue in the past.
We've seen it work both ways. It's obviously great momentum for some teams.
UConn in 2011 won five in five days with Kemba Walker and then won six games in the NCAA tournament. I think there's some of that.
I also think that, you know, you look at the bottom of this region, you've got, I think, you know, the 2-3 seed is massive. I mean, Iowa State on Sunday, I had forecasted as my fourth number one seed, and Illinois is a team that I felt for about a month could be a dark horse Final Four team.
So I'm looking at the scenario at the bottom of that region as being a dynamite, dynamite region here. So who did you have dropping out if you had Iowa State as number one? I had North Carolina dropping out.
Huh? Okay. Okay.
I saw a lot of people online said that. I'm not saying this, but I saw a lot of people online saying that you were a moron for that.
Would you like to defend yourself against those people? I don't look at my mentions't looked at my mentions since 2017 that's smart that's very smart what about uh the people that say duquesne was uh lazily seated because it seems like the committee basically said whoever wins vcu duquesne right who the 11th seed vcu would make more sense as 11th seed oh shit we already filled out our whole bracket we'll just put in duquesne when they clearly are the weakest of the 11 seed vcu would make more sense as 11 seed oh shit we already filled out our whole bracket we'll just put in duquesne when they clearly are the weakest of the 11 seeds resume wise and actually a lot of 12 seeds have better resumes well look at this right now for a sec guys the 11 seeds duquesne bid stealer out of the 810 new mexico we learned later was a bid stealer out of the mountain west i thought new New Mexico should have been in regardless. NC State, bid stealer out of the ACC.
And Oregon, the 11th seed in the Midwest, bottom right, was a bid stealer. So it almost feels like the 11th seed slots all just went to the bid stealers.
Yeah. Interesting.
That might be what happened. Okay.
So, well, if you haven't read your notifications or your mentions in 2017, did you ever think that maybe there's like a young John Rothstein out there that wakes up every day and tweets at you and is trying to interact with you in the same way you're dealing with coaches and they're just pounding their head against the wall? They're just trying to make a name for themselves, John. I have an email.
He can reach out to you guys or Hank or Jake, and I'll get in touch with him. Okay.
Anything to help younger people achieve their passion, like we've been fortunate enough to do. Okay, so any upsets coming out of this in the first two rounds? I've got Duquesne beating BYU.
That's a little bit of an upset, and it's not an upset I'm going to take here, but I mean, in terms of the seed, but I think considering how poorly Florida Atlantic played losing the Temple, I think a lot of people are going to fade Florida Atlantic. I think Northwestern, you guys know this being in Chicago, is severely, severely limited after losing Ty Berry to a season-ending injury.
And Northwestern has also been without Matthew Nicholson, who has been a stalwart inside for them during this two-year run he has been out for a number of a number of games I'm going to take Florida Atlantic to beat Northwestern I've talked obviously for a long time about Auburn because I love Auburn and I don't really love the matchup for Yale but James Jones has a good ball ball club at Yale. I think Auburn is too deep for that, but my upset in this region is Duquesne beating BYU in an 11-6.
I think we have to remember this, and you guys get this. BYU, for the most part, was a team that was recruited to play in the West Coast Conference, and now you have a team in Duquesne who just won the Atlantic 10.
There is not the conference gap that there probably would be in your normal 6-11 when you have a bid stealer. So I'm taking Duquesne right there, but I've got UConn, Auburn, Illinois, Iowa State in my Sweet 16, the region of Gladiators, and I've got UConn over Illinois in the Elite Eight.
Okay. Okay.
All right, next region, wherever you want to go. Bottom left, we'll stay on the left side of the bracket.
Okay. Alright, next region.
Wherever you want to go. Bottom left will stay on the left side of the bracket.
The West region, which has played in Los Angeles, and because it's played in Los Angeles, it should fittingly be called the region of drama. Now, why is it the region of drama? Well, let's look right now who the one seed is.
North Carolina. Obviously, two years ago, played for a national championship, lost to Kansas, had the dramatic season last year where it missed the NCAA tournament.
Now it has done a complete 180. But who is the two seed? Arizona.
And that means if the seeds hold in Southern California, and it's a one-two, we would have Caleb Love going up against his former team for the right to go to the Final Four. That is the region of drama.
Now, you look at the other characteristics of this region. You've got drama with New Mexico, a team that had to play well at the Mountain West Tournament after losing the Air Force in, obviously, a very, very brutal loss a couple of weeks ago.
You also have drama with St. Mary's.
Randy Bennett's club starts 8-6. Then it goes, he rips the WCC like a chainsaw through butter.
It gets a 5-seed. It wins the WCC regular season and also tournament titles.
St. Mary's has not been to the second weekend of the NCAA tournament since 2010 with Omar Samhan, Mickey McConnell, Matthew Della Vadova when they beat Richmond and Villanova back-to-back in Providence.
And then you've got Tom Izzo in this region as well, who, again, is always a great quote, always opinionated. He's a very dramatic guy.
But the big headline for the region of drama is the potential North Carolina, Arizona, Caleb Love against the Tar Heels matchup in the Elite Eight in the West region, therefore the region of drama. How much longer do you think Izzo's going to stick around? Oh, I don't see him not coaching.
I don't think Tom Izzo could not coach. I think Izzo in some ways enjoys the adversity more than the actual success because the adversity then forces you to have the truly brutal practice the next day and getting back the respectability.
So what missed the cut in this region? What were we thinking about when we saw it? This region, as soon as I saw that it was being played in Los Angeles and as soon as I saw there was a chance that Arizona could play North Carolina in the Elite Eight, I said, hands down, this is the region of drama. There's nothing else to talk about.
It's so dramatic. And again, life is not obviously a movie, but this would feel like a movie if we have Caleb Love against North Carolina going up against R.J.
Davis and Baycott, guys he went to the national championship game with two years ago. Yeah, so hold on.
That feels kind of like the selection committee screwed up by just like, oh, we'll just put Duquesne in at the 11th seed. When you found out that it was going to be L.A., what, like, when did they announce the sites? Like a year ago? Was that always going to be the drama? In L.A.? Yeah.
No, but the matchup, the potential matchup, you know. I want to just make sure.
I want to make I want to make sure you're not you know we're not like you could maybe tell us what the regions are next year based on where they're being played I'm not there yet right now I'm taking it one day one year at a time so if we're looking at this like a movie who's the good guy though is Caleb love the good guy or is it his teammates and then Caleb love walks out the door on him Caleb love is I think has gotten a gotten a bad rap. I think Caleb Love is perceived to be the bad guy, but he's not.
I went to Arizona and, you know, spent some time with him the preseason. Wonderful guy.
He's had a great year. You know, Pac-12 player of the year.
Played like an All-American. I just think that it would be compelling, compelling theater if that's the case.
I mean, look, both of these teams got to go through really good teams to get to that point. I'll say this, guys.
I'm looking at North Carolina. Now, the game will be played in Charlotte, but whoever North Carolina gets, Mississippi State or Michigan State in that round of 32 game, that is a bear of a game to get to the Sweet 16.
Now, I think America is going to be taking Michigan State in this game because of Tom Izzo. That's what people from the periphery do.
I am going with Mississippi State. I am going with Chris Janz, the dentist, who will give you a root canal without the Novocaine when he gets the chance.
Guys, let's look at Chris Janz here in the NCAA tournament. New Mexico State, he beat UConn two years ago.
Last year, got Mississippi State to the NCAA tournament. Lost on the last possession in the first quarter pit.
Now he's back. The dentist doing work, Cat.
I like it. You sound like a very good dentist though.
It sounds like just a torturer. Yeah, I like it.
All right. Really good defensive coach, PFC.
Yeah, although their defense hasn't been as good as it was last year. Fair enough.
i mean i guess you know he took took some tweaks out but again a little bit better offensively the guy you want to keep an eye on for mississippi state a guy who i think could be a real star as again people who are coming from the periphery is josh hubbard 510 freshman from mississippi state believe he scored over 4 000 points in high school oh okay all right All right. Hey, it's Rhea from Chicks in the Office.
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Houston obviously didn't play well against Iowa State in the Big 12 tournament title game. Tremendous four-guard sets, tremendous guard play, tremendous firepower.
You know about Nebraska with Fred Hoiberg. We love Kese Tomonaga, another player I think could captivate the country in spurts with his ability to shoot.
Nebraska, by the way, has never won an NCAA tournament game, so that's on the line for them. They go against Texas A&M who has that dynamite backcourt for Buzz Williams with Wade Taylor the fourth and Tyrese Radford, and they can really, really score.
That's a dynamite first-round game, and guys, I'm going to be at that game doing sidelines in Memphis. We got then Wisconsin, the best offensive team of the Greyguard era with A.J.
Storr against James Madison. That's going to be a trendy 12-5.
And then you got Duke against Vermont. Duke is Duke.
I know Cat doesn't want to hear that. We've got Kentucky, the best scoring team of the Calipari era.
And then if you look at the bottom right in the region of firepower you've got Florida you know again they lost their center Micah Handlogged into a an injury on Sunday a leg injury against Auburn but they're going to probably go in against the winner of Colorado Boise State Colorado a potent offensive team and then Marquette's the two Chaka Smart as you, saying on CBS Sports Network that they're planning on Tyler Kohler coming back. There is major, major firepower in that region.
I have loved Florida's ability to score the ball throughout, obviously, this season. They're a little bit different now up front without hand-logged in, but you look at the offensive capabilities of the teams in this region, it is exquisite.

Yeah.

I mean, PFT and I obviously were going up against each other in the first round.

Then you got Jake and Hank going up against each other.

This is going to be a fun region.

Yeah, can you give us a pick for JMU-Wisconsin?

I know you said people on the periphery, people on the outside,

trendy 12-5 pick for JMU. Does that mean that you're going Wisconsin?

I'm going to take Wisconsin.

I like Wisconsin to play Duke in a rematch of the 2015 national title game at the Barclays Center. I've got Houston, and then obviously I think A&M beats Nebraska.
I love the way A&M is playing, even though they lost a little early. Nebraska, again, never won an NCAA tournament game.
I'll take Texas Tech over NC State, Kentucky over Oakland. I got Florida playing Marquette.
I would take Florida over Marquette. That's a little bit, you know, I'm going to break it open a little bit there.
Then I'm going to have Kentucky, Florida in the Sweet 16 and SEC game. I'm going to take Wisconsin to beat Duke.
Oh. And then I'm going to take Houston to play Wisconsin, and I've got Houston beating Kentucky in the Elite Eight in the region of Firepower.
Okay. How about this? If JMU beats Wisconsin, can JMU get a John Rothsteinism? Can you come up with something for Harrisonburg? Well, I can't force Rothsteinisms.
Yeah, come on. Rothsteinisms are things that can't be forced.
Yeah, but if they beat Wisconsin, if they shock the world, if these JMU Dukes beat the Badgers. I don't have a Rothsteinism for Kansas, Kentucky, Gonzaga.
I mean, they've done a little bit more than JMU. Yeah, so far.
What was your last Rothsteinism that you came up with? I'd have to go back and look at things in the lab, but one of the things that got a lot of play today was the Keithith dan brought one because nobody for a long time cared about duquesne yeah when keith dan brought to the duquesne job i called it mission impossible and then the duquesne duquesne like account you know tweeted today mission accomplished oh because duquesne hadn't been to the hat duquesne hasn't been to the tournament since 77 so mission impossible got accomplished but yeah you know I don't just come up with them and throw it out. Everybody is like, oh, I want a tagline, I want a tagline.
It's like, it's not that easy. No, what about just hand those out? Harrisonburg, more than just meth.
What about that? You like that one? That means no. I think that would be good.
Harrisonburg, the Las Vegas of Central Virginia. That's not what I've heard about Harrisonburg.
Oh, my friend, you have not spent time at Finnegan's Cove when they get the Sigs inside and the Jell-O shots going. Fair enough.
I have a feeling that you might have had enough for me during your tenure there. How long was it? Four years.
Exactly four years. Thanks, Sean.
That was a really mean question. Yeah.
I just wanted to check. All right.
So what about the last one, Midwest? Well, the Midwest region is the region of tension. Okay.
Now, why is it the region of tension? Well, your one seed is Purdue. Your two seed is Tennessee, who has not been past the Sweet 16 under Rick Barnes.
Your fourth seed is Kansas, who, did not have both Kevin McCullough and Hunter Dickinson available for the Big 12 tournament. There's a lot of tension in this region right now.
And I also think, you know, when you look at the one seeds, guys, I think the path for Purdue, and I know you have to obviously take this with a grain of salt because nothing is easy for Purdue in March. I think the path for Purdue is very favorable to at least get to the Elite Eight.
The first two games are at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis. You're going to play the winner of Utah State and TCU second.
And then if you win there, your five and your four are are Gonzaga which is the most vulnerable Gonzaga team we've had since 2016 then you have Kansas we've discussed without McCuller without Dickinson potentially in the big well they didn't play in the big 12 tournament but they're obviously very wounded I mean it's not a great Kansas team even if those two players play I'd be shocked if Purdue doesn't get to the Eight. I know that's saying a lot considering the way things have gone in the NCAA tournament.
And then the bottoms, I'm looking at Creighton being an underrated team. I think they lost early in the Big East tournament.
That changed things. And then also, if Texas wins and Tennessee wins, we could have a game in the round of 32, Rick Barnes against his old school and against his former assistant

Rodney Terry.

Okay, so what was...

Was there anything else that we were going to name

this region?

When I saw Purdue

and Tennessee together, it was

either the region of tension or the region of pressure,

but I thought tension was better.

So which of these teams is best equipped to handle tension? Well, if history tells you anything, it might not be any of them, but I would say Creighton. Ooh.
I think Creighton's the dark horse in this region. I'm going to say Creighton to get to the Elite Eight and lose to Purdue.
I think that Purdue will exercise the demon, much like Virginia in 2019 after losing to UMBC and get to a Final Four. Okay.
All right, so your Final Four, and then maybe give us your national champion. I am going to go with UConn out of the region of Gladiators.
I'm going to go with Arizona out of the region of Drama. I'm going to go with Houston out of the region of Firepower, and then Purdue out of the region of Tension.
And I like UConn over Purdue, clinging against E.D., a battle of the titans in the title game. And UConn, led by Dan Hurley, as we said, brother to a famous point guard, son of a famous coach, getting his vengeance in this tournament or the next, becoming the first back-to-back national champion since Florida in 2006 and 2007.
Okay. All right.
Do you have any comment about the Big East getting fucked over? Well, the thing is this, and Murphy's Law sometimes happens with the NCAA tournament in terms of the bubble situation. The Big East started championship week with seven teams in play for the NCAA tournament.
Now, the thing was, the Big East all season long had a number of teams in play, but so many teams were tied up with the bubble. So there were only three teams all year long that separated themselves.
And we had a Murphy's Law type situation for bubble teams. Now, what do I mean by that? If Florida Atlantic won the AAC tournament, we would have seen one bid open up because they are an at-large team.
If Dayton won the A-10 tournament, we would have seen an at-large bid open up because Dayton was already projected as an at-large team. So that's two bids right there.
And then if NC State didn't win the ACC tournament, we would have seen that large bid open up. And then if Oregon didn't win the Pac-12 tournament, we would have seen that large bid open up.
That's four. And then we found out tonight if New Mexico didn't win the Mountain West tournament, we would have seen that large bid open up.
That's five bids in five spots for other teams where the Big East surely would have been represented. I thought that St.
John's would have been a little bit closer to the cut line. They weren't among the first four out for the selection committee from what we saw earlier tonight.
But obviously, you have three Big East teams in Creighton, Marquette, and UConn

that are all good enough to go to a Final

Four, but the Big East right now

with its lowest number of teams in the NCAA

tournament since 1993.

It's crazy. And now, if

all five of those hadn't opened

up, would Villanova

have been one of the last four out then?

Probably

would have. The first four out or the last four out? No the last four out then probably would the first four out of the last four out no last four out like it would have been first four out so there would have been the eighth eighth team out like where would they have bumped up if we had had no no bubbles burst like could could we have had at least last four out I think so okay all right so they would maybe Yeah, so they were like, if they were like, if the committee had just said, you know what, this is an awesome year, let's do 78 teams, would Villanova have been in? Potentially.
Potentially. Let's do a little thought experiment, though.
If St. John's had gotten in, what seed would they have been? They would have been in Dayton in the first four.
First four, instead. Yeah.
Virginia was the team. When I did, I do a bracket projection every day during championship week.
So when I did my bracket projection today, I did not have Virginia in the field. Now, what we learned, and I talked to Bubba Cunningham about this, who obviously is a part of the committee, is that the committee really valued teams who didn't have any bad losses.
Now, if you look at the metrics for both Virginia and Colorado, not too many impressive wins. Virginia beat Florida, won at Clemson.
Colorado beat Washington State twice. But they didn't have any quad three or four losses.
So the committee really took that into consideration. Now, Texas A&M had a weird resume, had five quad three losses, but Texas A&M beat Iowa State, who's a two-seed, beat Tennessee, who's a two-seed, beat Kentucky twice, who's a three-seed, and also beat Todd Golden in Florida, who's a seven-seed.
Okay. John, what does...
We haven't had you on since you had the birth of your child. What does fatherhood look like for John Rossi? How's it going? I appreciate you asking.
Every day is a bye game. That's the best way I can say it.
It feels like you're down eight at the under 12 timeout every single day. You know, you know, there is nothing in the world like, you know, being a father and, you know, having obviously a child and the way it makes you feel complete as a family but you also feel like you know you're in a bye game against matt langle and colgate and they're drilling threes and there's nothing that you can do yeah yeah no that's a great way to put it i often say the same thing uh what so what's your schedule you're going to dayton do you know where you're going after dayton yeah i'm gonna be in date.
I actually have some TV to do tomorrow morning. I'm going to do CBS this morning or CBS mornings tomorrow morning.
And then I'm flying to Dayton. We're going to do the first four Tuesday, Wednesday.
Then after the games, I'm going to be going to Memphis for the Friday Sunday. So Friday Sunday is going to be Houston, Longwood, Nebraska, A&M, and then Clemson, New Mexico, Baylor, Colgate.
And then I'll be back in studio on CBS Sports Network for the Sweet 16 and the Elite Eight, and then we'll be at the Final Four in Phoenix. Are you going to go take a dip in the Bass Pro Shop Pyramid in their tank that they got there? What's the Bass Pro Shop Pyramid? Oh, my friend.
It's the most magical place on earth. No, I mean, I'm pretty singularly focused until April 9th.
I was going to ask you, what's your take on Justin Fields being traded to the Steelers? What position does he play? He's a quarterback. For what team? Well, he was on the Bears, now he's on the Steelers.
Okay, yeah, I mean, I really haven't followed the Steelers since, like, Neil O'Donnell. Oh okay all right what about uh did you watch the super bowl uh we had a party yeah and what'd you think um mahomes played right yep and they play uh andy reed was the coach yeah who was the other team that played against taylor swift no uh the 49ers right and that's not jeff garcia is it nope nope not anymore no yeah close um was it brock purdy yes yeah yes yeah okay yeah um i was kind of just socializing because like i you know the college basketball game was over i think i worked the seat in all villanova game that day and i just kind of was just talking to people i didn't really have an interest in the game i would like you to to maybe you have the you're relentless.
We started this interview saying you're relentless. I have a longstanding thought that there should be a college basketball game after the Super Bowl on Super Bowl Sunday.
Everyone's looking for something to bet after they lose their Super Bowl bets. Can we get that into someone's head and be like, hey, let's schedule a game.
Let's play a game. thing we should do and you tell me because you know you say you're always looking for you know stuff like that you know for additional ways to you know obviously have sports yeah yeah i think that and you know i'm all about standalone games in college basketball i think you know a certain league should play a five o'clock game on like a Friday afternoon.
Yeah. Happy, like a happy hour thing.
And I also think you did that like certain leagues, maybe not the highest profile leagues should play 10 a.m. games on Sunday on Saturday morning.
So it's a standalone game and then not have any, not have any tension and get things going quicker. I like that.
We also came up with an idea that you should pitch to people. Because this one has legs.
PFT and I don't think that they should expand the tournament. No.
No. We should not expand the tournament under any circumstances.
And it aggravates me. Not you guys.
But that people think that it's a good idea. Jeff Goldblum said in The Lost World.
The sequel to Jurassic Park. That taking dinosaurs off this island was the worst idea in the long sad history of bad ideas, expanding the tournament might be worse.
Okay, so not an expansion of the tournament, but if on Selection Sunday we have the eight teams that would be potentially on the bubble, in the bubble, in the tournament, so Boise State, Colorado, Virginia, Colorado State, all we're in. Oklahoma, Seton Hall, Indiana State, and Pitt.
We have them all in the same location. The minute we have the bracket, we have those eight teams play to see who gets the last four spots.
Well, I think that's a good idea. It's expanding the tournament, but yeah.
I have also said this. I love, you know, where we're at right now with the amount of teams in the ncaa tournament i feel that if you're an automatic qualifier and you win your league you should be in the round of 64 and i have said that you know repeatedly so i would like it and i love you know i've worked you know the first four in dayton it's great if the last eight at large teams someday could be the teams in.
Yeah, I agree with that. So if you're looking at it right now, let's look at, you know the matchups in Dayton.
The last eight at-large teams, the 11 seeds were not obviously were not at-large teams. They were automatic qualifiers.
So the last eight at-large teams were Nevada and then, let's see. boise state colorado well boise state colorado and then virginia colorado state but also so that's four nevada is five drake was an aq so if you had nevada michigan state a&m and then tcu or northwestern in day Dayton and then you let obviously the 16s play in the round of 64 I think that would be an incredible way if we could ever do that to really draw people in I like that and not to say that people aren't obviously excited or whatever and look the first four is great we had Fairleigh Dickinson last year who wound up beating Purdue and Fairleigh Dickinson was a treat to watch.

But I feel if you are a mid-major

team that wins your league,

you deserve to be in the round of 64

and those last eight at-larges should

start off the tournament in Dayton.

And the first four is great

because usually a team makes a run. I mean, we had

UCLA go all the way to the final four.

10 out of the last 11

years, a team in the first four has won a game in the ncaa tournament so yeah who's that team going to be this year i think the team to watch in the first four let's see that's a great question also do you have it do you have a name for the first four you should give a name to that the first four yeah i would say the team most likely to win an ncaa

tournament game this year of the first four is the boise state colorado winner i love florida that's a really really tough round of 64 game because colorado if you think about it guys kj simpson potent player i think if colorado was better he would have been an all-american candidate potent player cody williams is a projected lottery pick tristan da silva is going to play basketball professionally.

Also, Eddie Lampkin, if you remember guys is on the tcu team who almost beat arizona two years ago when they had ben mather and he went for 20 and 14 florida is going to have its hands full with either colorado state or boise boise playing in a third straight ncaa tournament under leon rice and another another storyline here, guys, which I wrote about for my daily newsletter tomorrow, one of the big takeaways is the Mountain West got no respect. Four double-digit seeds out of the Mountain West.
I mean, Nevada, the two teams in the first four, and then also New Mexico as 10s and 11 seeds. I mean, as a wise man once said, it wasn't personal.
It was strictly business. But they did get respect to the fact they got six teams in.
And the Big East got three. No question, and that should be celebrated.
But the Mountain West, like I felt like all week after day, if the Mountain West gets six teams in, that's great. You should celebrate it.
The Mountain West has something to prove in this NCAA tournament. You were slighted.
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Visit www.nobowlproject.com slash barstool for 30% off your entire order that's www.nobullproject.com backslash barstool for 30% off last question for you john we haven't talked to you in a while how was Europe? Europe was incredible. Really?

Europe was incredible really better you're better than vcu you're uh i mean when shaka was there and it was briante weber at the top of the press i mean it was tough really tough to kind of take that over anything else just because i mean you know you had the band you had the havoc you had the pressure there's a clip if you guys can find it it was in 2013 briante weber stripped alex barlow on butler and threw down a ridiculous jam and just punched the air and like it made you like seriously like want to find a picket fence to start doing push-ups on because it was so crazy but europe was was great. I think we stayed.

I think the trip was long, Kat.

We were there for 18 days.

We had a couple of friends get married about three hours outside of Paris.

So we went to Paris first.

We hung out with them for a little bit.

It was incredible.

The bread, the scene.

Paris is an incredible city.

We then went to three stops in Italy. You were right about the food, both of you, in terms of it being incredible.
I mean, I have it too. We talk about bucket list items.
The show Searching for Italy with Stan Tucci, to me, is one of my favorite shows because I'm such a food fan. Like, that to me would be, I think, a tremendous guess for you guys to have Stan Tucci on part of my take.
Because this guy's housing food throughout Italy and he doesn't gain any weight. We went to Portofino.
We went to Rome. We went to the Amalfi Coast.
There's now direct flights from the Amalfi Coast to New York. Then we went to Greece last.
Nice. Are you willing to take back your statement, don't waste calories on pizza outside the Eastern Time Zone? in terms of the united states but p but pizza in italy you can do that i can do that i leaned into the italy trip but i but the bread but the bread in france was the thing that really blew my mind yes the bread for the bread and friends and the thing is this i you know you guys know how much i love food but in france you like you can be content with a beer and a great loaf of bread and like some butter.
Yes. So content.
So Paris, France, the Seagull Center. You got to pick one.
The A-10, I mean, aside from a rare thing like this year, they've kind of become a one-bid league, so I'd probably take Paris over the Seagull Center. Wow.
Wow, you've changed. John Rothstein sold out.
Damn. Okay.
Sorry to tell you that. I don't think it's really anything to do with Paris It's just an indictment on the Atlantic 10 It never should have went from 16 to 18 league games It went from 16 to 18 league games guys After the 14th season Think about this for a sec In 2013 the Atlantic 10 had 5 teams in the NCAA tournament 5 and then after that season Temple left, Xavier and Butler Xavier and Butler left.
And the next year, with the same crop of teams, pretty much what it has now, the league had six teams in the NCAA tournament. Then after that year, all of a sudden, the 8th end thought it was a power conference.
It went from 16 to 18. League's never been the same since.
You need that non-conference scheduling flexibility. It's the same flexibility that the WCC had that allowed Randy Bennett to schedule Colorado State and New Mexico, two wins, obviously, that helped St.
Mary's get in the position it's in right now, which is to be a 5C in the NCAA tournament. I do have one last question for you.
So we were just talking before you came on about Long Beach, Long Beach State and Dan Monson. Wild story.
Is there any chance that he gets his job back if they win in the first round? It's as awkward of a situation as I've seen. You know, that would be incredible.
I think he made a comment about that. It's like he said, it's like your girlfriend coming back and trying to get back together after you get famous.
If somebody asked him if, like, you know, he would get his job back. You know, It's as bizarre a scenario as I've seen in 20 years doing this,

but there is a tie-in to that first-round matchup.

Do you guys know it?

What is it, Gonzaga?

Dan Munson was the head coach of Gonzaga when Gonzaga went to the Elite 8 in 99,

lost to UConn, Coach Calhoun's first Final Four,

and he's playing Tommy Lloyd, a longtime Gonzaga assistant.

I love the fact that he pulled a Hank. They were like, hey, you're fired, and he was like Tommy Lloyd, a longtime Gonzaga assistant.
I love the fact

that he pulled a Hank. They were like, hey, you're fired.

And he was like, yeah, can I just keep showing up for work?

Okay, cool. The boys are playing for him.

Love it. They're playing for him, man.

Yeah. All right.
Well, John, thank you

as always. You're the best.

Best time of year. And we'll be tuning in.

We'll be watching you in Dayton on

Tuesday and Wednesday. Always great

being with you guys. Love you dearly.
We sleep in May. Absolutely.
Bye, John. Thanks, John.
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Oh, by the way, I should have mentioned during bracket talk, we are running a bracket at Stella Blue Coffee. All you got to do is buy anything on StellaBlueCoffee.com and you will get a link to join the bracket.
Fill it out. If you win the bracket, you get a trip to Chicago HQ with two friends and you get to spend the day us, hanging out, playing ball, whatever you want to do.
Also, the other, I think, places 2 through 11 will get a signed Stellar Blue custom basketball. So you're filling out brackets.
You got to drink coffee anyway. We have mugs.
We have hats, everything, StellarBlueCoffee.com. Just go buy anything between now and Thursday when the games tip, and you will get that link, and you can join the bracket.
Justin Fields. Justin Fields traded to Pittsburgh Steelers for a sixth-rounder that could be a fourth-rounder.
Depending on playing time. Depending on playing time.
So I'm going to give my, I think, actually a very balanced take that people probably are not going to like because it's been a very polarizing subject and I I have a take that's I'm gonna give you my honest take uh that's balanced and I feel is just how I feel uh the Bears failed Justin Fields it sucks that this is the way it ended uh they set him up in a really bad spot in the fact that they drafted him with a coach that was already on the hot seat. They were planning on sitting him that first year, and then remember they decided, hey, let's start him against the Browns, one of the best pass rushes in the game, and this will be fun.
And he got sacked like nine times and threw for 27 yards, and we were off and running.

Year two, the team was actively tanking.

They had one of the worst defenses I've ever seen.

They had 10-game stretch at the end of the season

where they let up 25 or more points.

And six out of 10 of those games, they let up 30 or more points.

And then year three this year, they were basically like,

be so good, Justin Fields, that we will keep you. Go out and do it with an OC that doesn't really know how to use you.
Could Justin Fields have played better? Yes. But I also think he was set up to fail, and I'm really sad about that because I like Justin Fields as a guy.
And I think if you listen to anyone in that locker room, they love him as a leader. It sucks that a guy that was so exciting and I had so much hope for was failed by the organization.
So I thought that they had to trade him. And I'm happy that he was traded just because Caleb Williams is the future and you couldn't have done the Justin Fields, Caleb Williams thing at the same time.
And if you had kept him, maybe you could have gotten more from him when quarterbacks get injured, but that would have been a disaster for Caleb Williams. You would have basically done to Caleb Williams what you did Justin Fields and set him up for failure so at least they're learning from these mistakes also shout out Ryan Poles and the Bears they did say they were going to do right by Justin Fields and by all accounts they did because they had a few different suitors and I think like Patriots fans are like why didn't we get Justin Fields Eagles fans like why don't we get Justin Fields think Justin Fields was like, I want to go to a place where I can play.
Yeah. So when you look at what Ryan Poles did, I think you can definitely say that the Bears did not get everything they could have gotten for Justin Fields.
So a legitimate criticism of Ryan Poles would be to say, your job is to do what's best for your team, the Chicago Bears. and in this case, it looks like he wanted to keep his word to Justin Fields and do right by him more than he wanted to maximize trade value for Justin Fields.
So you might say that he made a mistake doing that, but I also think that this is, in his mind at least, like a long-term play for becoming known as a GM that will do something nice for a player as a way to thank them for what they've done in that city. So it could, I guess, make Chicago slightly more attractive.
If it's between the Bears and a team that's in a situation like the Bears and you have a history that's been built up of doing right by your players, that could nudge a free agent or two over the edge. And Ryan Poles is probably admitting the bears failed him and it wasn't ryan poles failure like let's be honest because it was remember justin fields wasn't drafted by ryan poles ryan poles shows up in year two of justin fields he inherits justin fields ryan poles job is to basically completely strip this thing down and build it back up which he has been doing doing an incredible job of.
Unfortunately, Justin Fields wasn't in that plan, other than Justin Fields playing so well in year three that they had to have him. And then the contract part is a big part of this, because everyone, I think, was saying all you got was a six, maybe a fourth.
The Steelers have to decide whether they want to pick up the fifth-year option in like three months yeah so I think a big part of this was that Fields his value ended up being so low because GMs don't want to have to make a hard decision before he plays a snap you have to decide if you want to keep him which is extremely relatable right like I oh I'm going to trade like a third round pick for this guy and it's just going to make me have to make a big decision soon no my big decision is trading for the guy i don't want to have to double down on right doing work right so that's a i i understand that um if you're russell wilson i saw he reacted when he say like this qb room is about to be lit justin yeah i hope justin fields beats him out i think he's better than russell wilson right now i think he i think he might be like for the future he he definitely is uh and then kenny pickett is out of pittsburgh too yeah so kenny did not react well apparently to the russ signing um i guess reading the writing on the wall it just seems like russ is now anointed as the guy yeah they've just they told russ no justin feels is i think they said justin feels is going to be the starter did they no i think shefter said something no i think he said the opposite i think he said is going to be the starter. Yeah, yeah.
So, like, Kenny wanted out because I think they told Kenny, like, this is our guy for the next season. Yeah, yeah.
Or he's the presumptive starter. Yeah.
And so Kenny's like, no, I got to get out of here. Oh, wait, breaking moves.
Breaking moves. Villanova gets a one seed in the NIT.
Let's go, Max. Max.
Yeah, it's big. VCU is a tough draw, though.
You know what? You know what, Max? People forget that the NIT was the original national championship tournament. It's a very prestigious tournament.
Win that, Max. Win it.
Yeah, I'm sure the boys are going to be fired up. Got to be.
Very fired up. Okay.
That was our Villanova talk. Yeah.
Kenny, I mean, he was an Eagles fan growing up. I hope he has a long career.
We like Kenny. And now he's in a good, like, everyone seems to be going to stable places.
Like, it was unstable for Kenny in Pittsburgh. Now it's stable in Philadelphia.
He's not the starter, but he knows his role. Justin Fields was unstable in Chicago.
We failed him. Now he's going to a stable organization in Pittsburgh, which I think he's going to end up like, I think he'll probably win the job.
I know they said Russ is the starter, but once you watch Justin Fields versus Russ, it's going to be apparent. George Pickens is not going to like Russell Wilson.
No. He's not going to like him at all.
So I had one last thing about the Justin Fields thing and this is where because it was very tumultuous the last two months on Bears Twitter and Bears you know seeing people on the street. There's Justin Fields camp.
There's the Caleb Williams camp. I've been in the Caleb Williams camp just out of the logic of you.
Ryan Poles set this whole thing up to be to get that one pick and to get a franchise quarterback on a rookie deal when you've already invested in some other parts of your roster, and that's the window. Ryan Poles is doing – he's correcting everything that was wrong for Justin Fields because, like I said, Justin Fields stepped into a disaster situation with no defense.
They obviously got D.J. Moore later, but very little offensive talent to throw to.
Ryan Poles is now doing the reverse, where I think that Caleb Williams might be set up better than any number one pick ever. And I know that sounds crazy.
This is still the Bears. But remember, it's not often that you get a number one pick as a 7-10 team.
The defense is good. He has a legitimate number one.
He now has a legitimate number two in Keenan Allen. He a top 10 tight end and Cole and Cole Komet he's got a running game like this is finally outside of the coach maybe being on the hot seat this is finally you've set up your your future franchise quarterback to walk into a situation that he can succeed in and that is why every Bears fan should be very happy that Ryan Poles is the GM and that he made this move to trade Justin Fields and we turn the page and we go to the next one now everyone's telling me Caleb Williams gonna be a bust I get it he sucks nail paint whatever I don't care I think he's really good and he's set up in a perfect way yeah like Andrew Luck Andrew Luck went to a two-win Colts team Trevor Lawrence went to a terrible team wasn't that the oh they the Peyton got hurt that year? Yeah, Peyton got hurt that year.
Did they even win two wins? Did they have two wins? I don't even know. We can probably look up and see what the best record was for any team.
Yeah. That's pick number one.
All these teams, like Bryce Young, has gone into the worst situation. Like, you can go Trevor Lawrence was in a bad situation.
All these number one picks, Baker Mayfield, they haven't been put on teams that are 7 and 10 that have pieces around them that are legitimate. And, oh, I forgot to mention, we also have the ninth pick.
So that's another thing that's going to help Caleb Williams, whether it be a pass catcher or defensive player. I don't know.
I just think that Ryan Poles has set this up where it now is the question is if Caleb Williams is great, the Bears will have a definite window to win a lot of football. It's a very funny thing that we do to first overall picks.
We're like, congratulations, you're going to the shittiest team. Hope you're good enough to overcome how bad this team is.
Right. Will you be? Baker, will you be good enough to overcome the Browns' inning of it all or not?

Urban Meyer is going to kick half your roster, Trevor.

I hope you're good enough to overcome him ditching your team after Thursday night games and fingering co-ed's buttholes.

Right.

Good luck.

No offense to you guys, but would you not say that the Bears are in a better situation

for a QB taken in the first round than the commanders in the Patriots right this second? I think our ownership is strong. I think the ownership in Decent is strong.
Our ownership's about to be dead, but yeah. Shout out Virginia.
She's still kicking. He's set up better than a number one pick has probably ever been since.
I think they should build around Tyson Bajan. Yeah, there's got to be at least a few out there.
Yeah, there's got to be some Tyson Bajan heads out there. He's I mean that was an arm wrestler I'm excited about this I I've if you go through Ryan Poles and what he has done he gets so much heat for Chase Claypool which was a mistake but he also cut bait on that mistake which was you know some GMs are stubborn like that everything else he has done Montez Sweat DJ Moore you know getting the Carolina number one these things beef beefing up the defense not going crazy on free agency keep getting in a good cap spot I he's been great and so why wouldn't you trust him and why wouldn't you trust his evaluation of Caleb Williams and I'm very very excited for the future of the Bears and again sad Justin Fields but I think we have a very very bright future so you shouldn't be it was it was tumultuous it was people were at each other's necks yeah this is it's one of the great controversies of all time it's something that you'll be doing a post-mortem on for the next probably six years well Chicago we we don't deal well with quarterback controversies Josh McCown was at a strong camp to start over Jay Cutler listen I'm still obsessed with the Kirk Cousins RG RG3 debate from 10 years ago.
You have not yet begun to see the end of this fight. We also had Tyreek Hill in the news again.
Another Tyreek Hill headline. Dolphins Tyreek Hill bullied wife, smashed face with unlit cigar, police report says.
So I'm glad that they clarified that it was unlit because the first time I saw this headline, it just read that he smashed a cigar into her face.

Yeah.

Which is bad, but it's way worse if the cigar is lit.

Yeah.

This was an unlit cigar.

Also, the term bullying your wife.

What does that even mean?

I don't know.

I don't know what bullying means anymore.

He really is mad libs every single time he's in the news.

He's mad libs.

Yeah.

Tyreek Hill bullied wife. Smashed face with unlit cigar.
Unlit cigar. Hank, do you want to tell me that I was wrong and you were right about Justin Fields? You wanted him.
I do want him. I think he's going to be good.
Okay. I think the Steelers are going to be good.
I still think he could be the guy. I'm not giving up on that.
Yeah, I think the Steelers are set up. I both quarterbacks are forgotten about but i think both could be good yeah you'll be fun not funny i don't wish this but like something happens caleb williams maybe like has a minor injury yes i'm knocking on wood and then you trade back for justin fields get him back in town he knows the system a lot of people would like that yeah yeah a lot of people be pumped by that seems like from from what I've seen from Chicago people they're mad people are mad because they they I think there's a feeling that Justin Fields was failed by the organization which I agree with I think you can't be mad when you're given the circumstances of you have a decision you have to make on a fifth year and you have the roster set up perfectly right now to insert a rookie contract qb like it makes so much sense if you want to win a super bowl you got to do it with this rookie contract and everything else you got around him i just it's a no-brainer in my mind also shout out ryan poles for doing that when the entire city was drunk off their mind so that you know like people probably woke up on sunday like what happened oh there were definitely definitely some riots that happened like i would have loved to have been in a bar as the the word of the trade trickled out just watch the instant reaction from the crowd but definitely some blacked out dudes who just like they were told yeah but they didn't find out till sunday morning yeah they forgot about they woke up like what or they woke up they're like oh shit i had a crazy dream yeah we traded justin fields for a six pick i think people are also upset hank to your point that like people are mad people are mad because it is a fleecing because they were told yeah they were told that the compensation was going to be what sam darnold's who started that rumor who shefter was shefter the one who said it was a one there was someone else no no Schefter said on our pod that the formula is out there for what Justin Fields is going to cost and that's what Sam Darnold got yeah which was a second or a third or something like that yeah so people's expectations were were too high the market wasn't that strong so that's why people actually like the Sam Howell trade the Seahawks gave up more for Sam Howell than the Steelers did for Justin Fields.
Yeah. I mean, I at one point was, oh, it was Mel.
Mel said that it was going to be the eighth overall from the Falcons. Fuck you, Mel.
He fucked us. Who the hell is Mel? I remember when that happened.
I was like, this is awesome. Maybe it's true.
But in the last three weeks or so, I had come to grips, and I even said it on Waddle and Sylvia. I was like, a fourth would be a dream.
And it could still be a fourth, but that felt like it was settling there, and I had come to grips with it. Yeah, now you've got to root for a Russell Wilson meltdown.
Yeah. Yeah, I'm rooting for Justin Fields.
So we turned the page. It's better for the Bears franchise going forward to to go with Caleb Williams Caleb Williams is going to be so polarizing god people are going to hate him so much not even not even Bears fans I'm saying like outside they already hate him Max just tweeted I'm getting so fired up for the NIT we can watch him live tweet because he's not searching for Sidney Sweeney right now on the computer here he's just cruising Twitter okay Jake just, Jake just walked back in.
We've got to get his thoughts from him. Also, Pug just walked in as well.
Pug, quick before we get to Jake's thoughts, Seton Hall, give it to us. Seton Hall, give it to him.
Seton Hall got screwed. Three teams out of the Big East is just blasphemy.
I'm sad. NIT is here.
Pug. Okay.
Good take. Good right good take pug so put that on a quote card jake yes go off so much to break down uh if you want to watch back on the mark titus show we just broke we just filled out an entire bracket okay i'm not changing it wait jake what's your favorite storyline because we did jake storyline prediction yeah my favorite storyline is well is, well, obviously the number one is Purdue's redemption.

Okay.

Can they do what Virginia did

and win it all after losing to a 16?

Another one is an Elite Eight matchup I have

between UNC and Arizona.

Arizona would be playing for the right

to go to the Final Four in their home state.

It's in Phoenix.

And also Caleb Love, one of their best players,

a former North Carolina Tar Heel. You can see them battling for the elite eight okay that's another one um and then yukon the the best chance for someone to repeat since the florida gators in 0607 this is it so okay what about the part of my take bowl i mean that goes i'm saying from a big picture he's talking about national media yes who don't listen this podcast, who are listening to this podcast right now.
Exactly. Yeah.
But, yeah, the part of my take thing, we had our live bracket show, and when it said Wisconsin, James Madison, I was like, wow, that's crazy, but we kind of saw it coming. And then Duke-Vermont right afterwards all in the same pod.
Congratulations to us because one of our teams are going to the Sweet 16. Yeah, so we predicted it vermont's going to go to the sweet 16 and you're going to be like i'm actually rooting for you guys because i only called vermont for two years and like i'm rooting for them but i'm not rooting for them but then you're going to definitely root for them and you're going to be like oh i feel so bad for you and then you're going to tweet like cat amounts yeah it's going to just trigger all of us i know it is but i do have i will say I have jam you over UVM okay oh okay yeah all right so fuck you so you have you have Vermont pulling off the first round up but you've always had an anti-wisconsin well I was I said on crazy I like no I listen Jake is a college basketball expert I've always said respect is he an expert he's an expert he's an expert it sucks every.
I really think that you know ball. Who's in your final four last year? Who's in the championship? Who's in your final four last year? I don't know who my final four was, but two years in a row, my national champion has been eliminated on day one.
Two years ago. Did you intentionally pick someone that plays on Friday this year? Nope, I wasn't scared of it.
Because if it happens again, it would be equally as funny. Two years ago, I had Kentucky.
They lost to St. Peter's on Thursday.
Last year, I had Arizona. They lost to Princeton on Friday.
This year, I have a team playing on Thursday. Wait, do the Final Four first.
Don't just give us the national champion. Auburn.
North Carolina. Houston.
Purdue. Purdue.
So So three ones and then Auburn staying hot. Dickie V, the Dickie V bracket, three ones.
Is that what Dickie V does? He always does three ones and like a two. I know Auburn's not a two.
Yeah, they're what, a four? They're a four. And then I have North Carolina versus Purdue.
So you have the storyline of North Carolina winning it in the same stadium that they won it last time in 2017. You're such a storyline slut.
I know I am. And then you have Purdue.
You see the storyline, you just open up your mouth. You have Auburn beating UConn? You glaze.
I have Auburn beating UConn because the last few years, the number one overall seed's lost in the Sweet 16. I feel like everyone always has the number one overall seed going to the Final Four.
All right. What upset do you have? Big upset first round.
First round, I have no threes losing, but I have Charleston over Alabama and Vermont over Duke. And deep runs, I have Drake in the Elite Eight, and I have Florida in the Elite Eight.
I don't hate the Drake call. Drake's really hot.
I think Illinois and Iowa. Well, his dick is.
Yeah. Did you see that video, Jake? I did, yes.
Oh, you did? You saw Drake's cock. Wow.
Sure. I did not think that he would have.
Is there a chance that Drake can play against South Carolina? That'd be awesome. Yeah.
Drake beats the cocks again. Oh.
National championship. Yeah.
But yeah, the top left region, the east, you have all the conference tournament champions, the top four seeds, UConn, Auburn, Iowa State, Illinois. And I had a note.
I had a reminder for myself. I rarely set reminders for myself.
Last year, after the first weekend, I said, do not take more than one or two conference tournament champions going deep because everyone on the recency bias. So that's why I have Uconn uh iowa state and illinois all not making the elite eight wow um yeah so that was that and i north carolina winning the championship jake why do you think they fucked over the big east i honestly don't know because in recent years they always threw over the smaller schools and they let everyone from the mountain west in yeah all six those teams, Big Cat? Which one? Mountain West team? No, I've never heard of them.
No, what did Frank say? Hold on, I've got to find Frank. He had a great tweet about the Mountain West.
I kind of see what Frank's saying about the broadcast rights. Yeah.
Mountain West. The CBS broadcasts the Mountain West.
The tournament's on Turner. And the Big East is Fox.
But, yeah. So, the biggest takeaways are I have three onesies in the Final Four.
However, I have Drake and Florida in the Elite Eight. Okay.
What about you guys? I have a pretty chalk fund. I did two ones, two twos.
Yeah. I feel like I really mixed it up there.
You'll like mine, Jake. I went storylines.
Oh, Frank said, shh. So, John Fanta said the Big East just announced that this year's entire conference tournament was a sellout.

19,812 came to all five sessions.

Frank said, shh, don't tell the committee they're busy watching Mountain West boar ball.

Fucking got him.

Yeah.

You'll love my Final Four because it's the storyline.

It is UConn, UNC, Marquette, Creighton.

Three out of four of the Big East. All three Big East teams get to the final four and show the selection committee was very stupid.
I love that. Also, I forgot what I was going to say.
Okay. I also have Jamie going to the Sweet 16, Jake.
I think that's a sharp pick on your part. Yeah.
I mean, the bottom right, the Midwest, it's all the teams that choke in the tournament. So one of them has to break through, right? Purdue and Tennessee, they always have like Final Four realistic expectations.
Creighton too. Yeah, Kansas is there.
No, but that's what I'm saying. Like, of course, Kansas or Gonzaga is going to end up winning the region.
Yeah. Because you can't really trust any other team.
Yeah, although they kind of stink. But I have Purdue.
Oh, I remember what I was going to say. Congratulations to the Howard Wagner winner on beating UNC because that would be my trend of my champion being out day one.
Oh, yeah. So you should take Howard Wagner winner Moneyline.
All right, Jay, give us your first four. We actually didn't break down any of the first four.
I have, because everyone despises Virginia, I have them not only beating Colorado State, I have them beating Texas and going to the round of 32. Yeah, they're going to make us watch more of them.
Oh, that's going to be such a great narrative game. Which one? Because if Virginia loses, like Virginia never should have been in.
If Colorado State loses, it'd be like, Mount West sucks and he should be in. We just basically get to decide what we want from that game.
Yeah. But you can listen to the Mark Titus show from my full bracket, but those are the big takeaways.
Okay. All right.
Well, good show, boys. We will have Mark Titus on on Wednesday to get deeper into brackets.
Best time of year. Let's do numbers.
12. 18.
40, but I feel like. Three.
I'll go one for Villanova. Once he'd Nova, 20.
99 put. If it's 60, that's going to be bad.
Yeah. Oh, Shane, thanks for Keenan Allen, by the way.
Thanks for Keenan Allen. You want to say anything about that? Appreciate it.
Shane was very upset at me. Yeah.
You want to say something, Shane? What were you saying? Thanks for Keenan Allen. Fuck you.
Okay. 23.

MJ, North Carolina, my national champion.

Oh, there it is.

Love you guys.

Fuck. I'll be coming for your love, okay?

I'll be coming for your love, okay?