[The Poet]

Well, Joe, that Austin Peay/Murray State game is finally over, and I'm sorry to say your Racers came up juuuust short, losing 66-64. The fell behind by 10 at the half, but made a game of it . . . as we both figured they would.

Some other early finals:

West Virginia 65 - Georgetown 59 = I told you that the Hoyas should prevail, if they could manage to shoot. They did shoot pretty well, at .500 from the field and better than .900 from the line. But they turned the ball over 18 times, as opposed to WVA's 13. That still doesn't fully explain this loss, yet I'm gonna grap aholt of any excuse. A great win for the Mountaineers, who really needed one.

North Carolina 62 - Virginia 56 = Unlike the Hoyas though, the Tar Heels shot like crap. With .370 from the field and a "meh" .700 from the stripe, they should consider themselves fortunate that some of those FTs came late to give them the narrow victory . . . since this one was a LOT closer than the 6-point edge indicates.

Syracuse 61 - Seton Hall 56 = The Orange keep rolling, but this one's not all that juicy. True, the Pirates have lost a few close ones to good squads, but in their prior two they were duly spanked by Cincy and Louisville. There is no good reason the supposedly # 4 team in the land should edge them like this, so I must class this as one of those "bad" wins for the 'Cuse.


I'm gonna do my lunch now, and come back with my Sunday picks. Later, dudes.