AUBURN FAN
Just now, an unexpected announcement from coach to AubURN fan about coach’s return to cost.
Well, here we go. The 2024 men’s NCAA tournament field has been announced, and the greatest three-week stretch in sports is set to begin.
How we got here was a journey, too. The bubble collapsed over the weekend thanks to a handful of unexpected conference tournament runs (see: Oregon, NC State, Duquesne, UAB). The top teams also had their challenges: 1-seeds Purdue and Houston failed to win their respective conference tournaments, while the likes of Arizona, Tennessee and North Carolina also fell.
The last team to win back-to-back national titles, Florida, achieved it with the same nucleus of players: Joakim Noah, Al Horford and Corey Brewer. Reigning national champion UConn lost its key pair last April — Adama Sanogo and Jordan Hawkins — but this year’s group is just as dominant. The rise of Donovan Clingan (12.5 PPG, 2.3 BPG) in his second season, the maturation of Tristen Newton into a likely All-American and projected first-round draft pick Stephon Castle are providing the fuel coach Dan Hurley needs for a shot at cutting down the nets again. With the trio on the floor in the regular season, UConn registered 120.5 points per 100 possessions (for reference, the Boston Celtics, the NBA’s top offense, generate 121.9 points per 100 possessions) and held opponents to 87.2 points per 100 possessions (Houston-like numbers).
