This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jay Gonzalez sound Fox Sports
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c R two, SAG and iHeartRadio Station. Hey, good ufternoon. Everybody.
Welcome to Eye on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm
Steve Rivera. He's Jenkins oh Us with us again today, is said Jay,
I want to test your trust level today, Steve. All I can
say is the sun came up today. I did it. I thought the
same thing and I'm thinking, but produce a lot of two sonans. Well,
it's like it's always that way, isn't it. I'm going to get
it. You don't expect to lose to Washington State. You don't expect to
lose Washington State at home. You don't expect to lose Washington State when you're
playing for first place in the league. You don't expect to lose Washington State
when you're acting umberform in the country and they're looking at a number one seat.
But they did. They found a way. Sure, they found many
ways to Yeah, you know so many things right, so many things you
could count to about four or five different things, maybe even more why they
lost the game. And it's funny because you heard the press conference right how
they were kind of breaking down in every possession almost mattered. Uh, and
it kind of did. But it doesn't work that way in games. As
Tommy pointed out. But the bumbled free throw or lay up or whatever Love
had the thing about, they don't talk about. He came back on the
next position hit a three pointer, so he covered the difference. He covered
it, So forget that. I mean there's a lot of the foul in
the corner, follow in the corner that that's the one that sticks out because
it happened at the end. You can't do that. Can do that it
ultimately cost him the game because if it makes the free makes that shot and
there's no free throw, you know you're going down and you're taking the last
shot. You know the game possible, win it right, right, A
lot of a lot of So So I text you, I texted you.
I don't know if you saw my text, because then you talked about the
airport team. I thinking you I saw your text, But then that's why
you respond why I responded, I took it off. I took it off
the other thread. That other person wasn't interesting. I don't want you to
change your theory, because that's how I wouldn't money for the football programs,
because because they don't look like a good team, but they play as well
as a team can play well. Isaac Jones is a beast that took over.
Yeah, he's he's a beast. And you know it's funny because when
he got his fourth foul. Uh, and look, I hate it when
coaches think that refs should ref differently during games. Right, he committed his
fourth foul and it was a foul, and Kyle Smith is yelling at the
ref. You took the best player out of the game. No, the
best player took himself out of the game by having four fouls. The ref
didn't do that. It was a call. It was a legit call.
You know, we watched the replace because we you know, we we have
the we have the telecast on an iPad there and it's behind. So was
that a yes, it was a foul, you know, and and so
but I hate it when the coach says and like, well, like Sean
Miller did the other day, falls in a row, Well, because you
committed five falls in a row. Right, the falls aren't even well,
they're not supposed to be even you call the files the foules. And he
said that, none of my point being that Isaac Jones is really damn good.
You know, they won this game. I shouldn't they won this game
with with with the kid, the price or the kid. Yeah, he
was fantastic too, even though he had a bad game, but he had
you know, he had five points. You know, he sat out,
He sat out a whole bunch of the game because he wasn't playing well.
And they won that game because but because Colin Boswell was was missing again.
Right, how much trust do you have in Kylon ball aswell? Not none,
not much right now, because he's just not playing well, Steve,
and I don't know what he hasn't both he's been in this rut, with
the exception of a handful of small handful of games, he's been in a
rut for weeks now. And and look, not not intending to put it
all on him. It's not other guys play well. Sure, guys got
to make free throws. Guy's gotta not fill three points shooters, Guys got
to make a layup, right, All those things. But you know he's
got to play better. They're they're going to be in big trouble. There's
no question this team is uh is it should be a better team because of
all the parts, even if one part is missing. Uh, there's too
much to ask for Caleb to show up and do his thing to And you
know you have kJ who is very good who can fill in a spot,
and Bradley was was Bradley I guess, But but Boswell needs to be better,
isn't that? But in that what we were saying way at the at
the at the beginning of the year that this is the team that has so
many pieces. One piece can be missing and they're still really good. Right
But for some reason, if that piece is they're not really good. No,
they need all the We've realized that we have to change that tune or
rewrite our story because everybody needs to be playing well. And the thing about
it is, and I've said this before, Jay, that first game against
Duke set expectations that were probably unrealistic. So you come home thinking that we're
going to be gangbusters. They play Alabama really well, Wisconsin really well,
We're gonna be great. They're gonna Purdue. They got to see a flaw
in the first flaw we saw, right, Kennedy fan the perimeter. But
I think that was the lofty expectations. This team is gonna be great,
and having talked to some national people, that's what they see. They're not
seeing what we're They're not seeing the pimples that we see, right, you
know, they're seeing the games. Wow, these guys look fantastic, but
they're not watching lest night's game. Stephen, Again, I remember, you
know, going into the conference season, we were thinking, are these no?
No, I wrote that to day. You wouldn't four games, six
games total? Never? Right? And here they are, and here they
are, and yet who's better than them to be a possible number one seed?
Exactly right? I don't know exactly. It seems like I as seem
that it hurt them, but it didn't hurt them. They're good enough.
And then the thing that I hate the most, and you were a coach,
all you have to do is play your best, play well, and
you're connat. Anybody doesn't work that way, Yeah, somebody goes in place
better better. No, And the thing about Washington State is, as we
say, you know, we talked about the old Airport team. They do
not look like a great team when they walk on the court. You know,
you look at their center for number forty five. Yes, we knew
Isaac Jones was good. We knew, we knew Rice was good. But
you know they got beat by bye by h twenty one. The guy hit
all the three pointers. Oh yeah, you know he beat He's the one
to beat him. He had twenty seven points and get three in the corner.
Well j Jacob Wells or something like that. Yeah, it was a
fantastic game if you had no no skin in the game. One of my
buddies turned to me says, I can see why you know you're not a
fan. You don't get hurt. I just want to go the story.
Yeah, because a lot of dealer was it was. The crowd last night
was electric. It was great. It was great for a nine o'clock round.
And they went home pissed. They were mad. They were mad.
They were throwing stuff on the court. They threw Yeah, they threw stuff
on the court. Comb man, But well, I don't know where that
came from. Promets, you know. But uh, you know again,
still so so plenty of basketball left you playing. You and you go play
and you let it play out. I turn. I sit between Troy and
Sheer. I turned and sure, you know he's a fan, he's he's
a big I said, Cheer. Tell me the truth. Now, what
level of trust you have or belief you have in this team? And be
realistic. I'm not he won't mind me say this, And he said,
uh, seven. I'm thinking, hmm, that's pretty good. I figured
eight in my mind because they're not great. Yeah, but they're okay and
things need to happen. But that's that's not a whole lot of faith in
a team that you really love. Yeah, because it's uh, you just
don't know, you know. I that was last night was completely unexpected to
me. Well, yeah, I said before the game, I said,
we're gonna win. Yeah, they're not gonna cover, but they're gonna win.
Yeah, Caleb Love, what do you think are you? What about
your trust? Well? Well, the thing I still haven't have trusting.
But part of it is that when Colein Boswell's not playing well, it's like
Caleb Loff feels he's got to do more. He doesn't put the ball,
he doesn't put the ball in Colin Boswell's hands as much as you would think
he should or needs to, he takes it. He takes it on himself
too. You know, play over that, you know, and he takes
some shots that you know that that drive down the lane you know where he
slipped and fell and you know, and that was that, you know,
the possession before I think with afterwards when Love was going to the basket,
bollow was wide open, wide open. All you had to do is slip
a pass. But there's several occasions where he was open on other drives as
well. That's my issue with love. That's my only issue with love.
Well. But but you know, Jane Jayden Bradley does that. You've all
talked about that, right, you know, like kJ Lewis goes into the
paint and once he goes into the paint sometimes no, no, yes,
he's going all the way with it. He's not. You know. Well,
then now you have three guys like that. That's too many guys to
be like that. I wanted to ask you guys, because it seems like
a trend a little bit late in games, say there's ten seconds left,
Arizona's down one or two as this, I don't know, do you think
Tommy has a good plan in place or is it more Caleb go go.
That's what makes it. That's what it appears to be. No, wait,
we've asked him that before, but it was one of the triple overtime
games. You have a thing, you know, he did say and it
didn't happen last night. Rethink about calling a timeout before, and he didn't
last night. Right, that's when the slip came or whatever, and he
and I thought, is he not going to call a timeout? And he
didn't and boom, to your point, apparently not. And it's like,
I think it's I think it's one of those field things where you know leuias
to do that. Yeah, sure, but it's a field thing where you
think, okay, is it you know, I'm guessing he goes through that
decision process every time, can I call him out here or not? And
if he's not calling time out, he's trusting that his guys are going to
do run their offense and do what they're sure to do and get a bucket.
And sometimes he thinks, you know, maybe we need to call time
out because of what they've been doing those defense I just think, you know,
it's a little bit because he has done that he has called time in
the pasture set up a play. So last year when we were at this
time, what it was the what was like the big mL of the team
coming into late February early March. Do you remember, I think I'll remind
blowing big leads, blowing they did to Washington State last year, blowing up.
What's the overriding theme this year? The last second failure that second because
they haven't had many, but they've lost all those games. I'll bet you
two to one that they lose in March on the last position. Game last
night felt like a game, a March game, didn't it come on?
Why would you not be I I'm willing to bet that because it's happened all
year and it trends that way. I caught the very beginning of David Kelly's
post, you know, the talk show app post came out after that,
and he counted up and I don't know if this is six number. They
counted up six, six opportunities to win a game on the last shot,
and they haven't failed. They've gone over six. Yeah, yeah, no,
I heard that too, And actually I think you have it on the
on the on the press conmence Brian asked him because it was four. He
counted four and he wrote about it. Four last second failures. It probably
all there were. There were two just in the three and in the Utah
two or three in the Utah game, two in the Utah alone. So
that's that's what my prediction would be. Because here's the theme. And and
remember at the beginning of year and I wrote this, and I can't remember
his phrase that Tommy wanted to avoid or have a lot of wiggle room.
He didn'tus wiggle room, but a lot of He wanted to beat the crap
out of teams, so just in case they failed late, they'd be Okay,
Well that's not the issue now, it's getting your tone is really for
the end. Yeah, they're not winning the close games that were the one
possession games at the end where there may be plays there. But again last
night, it seemed like whether the play broke down or or what. But
it seemed like Caleb was going to they basically said, let's make a play
right here. It's what it felt like. The slip and they slipped and
all that. And he had a mediocre game. He had a lot of
points, but he shot a lot. He took a lot of shots shots
and took him to make a three. And do you like that? I
trust him and takes your shots more than anybody else on the team. Sure,
when Boswell taking last night, Boswell took a couple where you just kind
of scratched your head as well, early, very early in the shots.
You know, they just they just didn't play as well they needed to play
to win the game. And that it's as simple as that. Tommy Persher
pretty much said that to your point, to your point though at the beginning,
you don't expect this to happen here. Yeah, that's it, and
that's the thing, and that's the thing that's stinking, and you don't expect
to get swept. I watched him say, but you know what, they
might be the conference champion. So if if you do get swept, if
I shouldn't State wins the conference championship, it's because they swept Arizona and they
were good enough to do that, right, you know. And so you
know, your hats off to those guys. And I think I think you
really have to, you know, take your hat off to those guys.
Okay, so let's go. We got about a minute and a half.
We've got a good show today, actually a very good show. We're not
at the casino. That's right, We're not at the casino. Don't come
to the casino. They have some internet issues over there, so we uh
so we had to just go ahead and come in and do the show.
Yeah. So here in the first hour and another about six seven week minutes,
we're gonna have Andy Bagnado. He and I spent some time with the
n Cuba people about twelve of us voting and balloting and all this for the
mock mock brocket for the upcoming tournament in Phoenix, and we'll get more into
that. You can ask the questions. And then in the second hour,
Jim liven Good, Yeah, Jim liven Good, I want to talk to
him about because he was the head of the committee back in the day.
Things have changed, but just how difficult it was. And then we could
talk about the ad STO right, yeah, because he's familiar with the new
idea are zones as it a read France. Liz, all right, we're
gonna put that baby, Okay, stick around, We'll we'll have all that
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to schedule your free evaluation today. Steve Rivera and Jake and Salez they have
their Eye on the ball on Tucson Sports Big Jet Fox Sports fourteen fifty streaming
live. I mean iHeartRadio. Wapp Hey, welcome back to I on the
Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera, he's Jacobsauce and
now on the phone, we have and the BEG Model, one of the
final four media consultants. I spent some time with them over the last couple
of days and we were part of a big cool thing drawing up the mock
bracket for this upcoming event. Andy, how are you? I'm doing good?
And Jay, the company you keep these days. I can't help it
and I can. You know, I keep trying to figure out what am
I doing with my life and I get to have any answer. He sold
and sold to the devil. Baby he seld and sold to the devil.
I'm telling you, Jay, I feel for you. But I'm glad I'm
here and you're there. That's all I'm gonna say. Yeah, for some
reason, I keep showing up. So why didn't you explain to the listener
that we have, what we went through, what we went through a couple
of days ago. Oh yeah, So it was. It was very cool,
and thank you Steve for coming up and making that tedious drive up here
for that. But as part of the ncaa sort of outreach for the upcoming
twenty twenty four Men's Final four in Glendale, UH, they are offering a
mock selection committee for the media. And you guys know, they've been doing
this for years in Indianapolis back when, back when I was a writer,
I never was able to get down there for a variety of reasons. So
even though I was just up the road in Chicago, and the whole idea
is to to sort of take the mystery out and some of the myth of
what goes on in the selection room, slection committee room on that week before
uh the selections are announced. And so they decided a good idea would be
to bring it to the local market of whichever city is hosting the final four.
And I'm really glad they did it. I thought we had a good
turnout. There were a few people who had to drop out of the last
minute, being media members. They had news come up. But I'd ask
you, Steve, I mean, what did did you get you? You
know, you're the guy who's been covering basketball literally your whole career. What
did you learn the other day? I mean, you know, it was
fascinating. I did have some questions for them, and and they're always there's
always a contrarian in the room, and Andy was one of those. And
I'll get to that later. But I was under the depression that I asked
Woodward, right, is that who's the warlock, David war Warlock? That
I thought for years that it was either the last ten games, if not
the last ten games, or the twelve games that you kind of based a
lot of the recency bias stuff. Well that's changed. It's the whole season.
So that Duke game means, Man, it matters, it doesn't.
You're not gonna forget that. So that was a surprise to me. And
I don't know if you felt this way any you know when we were voting
with our computers that I felt a little stress and who I was picking,
oh, one hundred percent of you, even though to be clear to everybody
listening or all three of you, the uh, the this isn't this bracket
doesn't go anywhere, right, So but yeah, I was I was thinking.
First thing is I didn't want to look like an idiot, right,
like somebody and David is very funny and he's a super professional. But I
didn't want somebody going who put the College of Charleston in here or something like
that. And you know, I went to Northwestern full disclosure, and I
think I might have told a couple of guys in the room, you know,
if you want your dinner served, you better have the cast in your
field. But because we did have a dinner, but but jokingly, but
yeah, I did. Oh, absolutely what I got a new respect for
And I've always had respect for what the committee goes through, just in terms
of the scrutiny and everything else. But really, you got to know what
you're doing here, and I think it's pretty clear that they do, you
know, I mean I think they do. Yeah. So, how close
to the process, to the actual process was this? I mean, is
that what? It was? Tronical? You guys are trying to create that,
right? It was identical. It was identical. So essentially, Jay,
all of the all of the steps that go into putting the bracket together,
the votes, the naming of you know, the number one seeds,
then the then you see the rest of the field, and then where do
they go? Like, you know, why why does my school get sent
to Providence when it's a bus ride to la Why don't we play there?
Right, all of those things came up just like they do in the real
process. Now, obviously we don't know yet who's going to win the conference
tournaments from the one did leagues, right, So I think the assumption Steve,
if I remember this right, I don't want to misquote it. But
wasn't it whoever's leading, didn't they sort of put them in? Yes?
Is that how? Yeah? The higher seeds the higher seeds, right,
and then you can you can you couldn't have played each other three times?
Uh oh, yeah, you know you can't play in conference whatever, you
can't play near this stadium whatever, or if you're in the same conference,
you can't play before a certain round, right right, right, all that,
and it was the travel well and then well travel but then your next
guest after me. Uh. He remembers an episode with the b YU rule,
right, which is that's not a rule, that's the wrong way to
put it, but the request that they don't play on Sundays for the reasons
that they stayed and so David went over all that. But I thought it
was fascinating when they're populating the bracket with the teams and this is all now
computerized. One of the eNCA officials in the room, LJ. Wright,
said that when he started the NCAA, there was no computer system. They
had Velcrow and they would put a team's name on the on you know,
say Pittsburgh in the three seed, and then oh wait, we can't do
that for this reason, so they pull it off the board and move them
to somewhere else as a three seed. And he said, we killed Forest,
right. Steve was at the line that we killed Forest with all the
printouts, because every time something would change, you know, Duke would lose
in a conference tournament or something, they'd have to print out an entirely new
team sheet. So no, it's it's it's it's totally uh computerized. It's
fascinating. And what we did we only did for three hours. We kind
of did a rush thing, but it was everything that was identical. They'd
take five days and one thing would let's the super second last night's game with
Washington State would happen late, right late in that Saturday night thing. They'd
have to throw a wrench into this and kind of change things. Right.
One of the guys I won't name names who was in the room, fought
fought for a fought or how thought that there was only should be the number
one overall seed and we're thinking, no, that's not gonna happen, right,
And then there's kind of a vote of that stuff. In fact,
you go ahead and say what you thought. So I had I think,
what did we do Steve? Was it was due number one overall, so
Houston over number one, Ukon number two, right right. So the way
it works, Jay, is that once you have the seed line, so
one, two, three, four, those are your top four seeds,
did they go down? It's called scrubbing, and so the the someone in
the committee can raise their hand and say, I make a motion to move
Yukon from two to one, okay, and so is there a second yes?
And then they take a vote and it's a majority rule. So if
a majority looked at it says yeah, Yukon should be two or should be
one, then they flip them and they do that all the way through to
sixty eight. So yeah, so what now we didn't do that. We
didn't do that because of time contract. But yeah, I just wanted to
see how it works. So I raised my hand and I think Rivera was
the folks that voted me down, but I'm not listening. My son in
law is a Yukon fan. But but I just wanted to see how it
worked, and it was pretty cool. So I mean, coming out of
this, did you just learn that this is a really complicated, detailed,
even tedious process. What would you say, Steve? Yeah, and it's
just struck. I said, I had no skin in the game, know
nothing, and I was stretched a little. It's odd. It was odd
because, like like Andy said, no one's seen my screen except for the
people taking Italian and they don't. They don't. It's not that they don't
care, they're not. They don't care about the votes and it's our votes.
And I'm thinking, how how could bias not be involved? One I
asked that question, right, and two I guess there's no wrong answer.
Yeah, well, yeah, I think, I think. And I used
to sit there on deadline as a reporter for the Chicago Tribune and in a
sense critique their work in real time. Right, So we get the bracket
and I'd sit there and my first thought would be, oh, my gosh,
look of Night in Indiana are playing one of his assistants in the second
round. If they both win, oh they must have set that up right.
Well, twenty years later, I know what a ludicrous statement that was,
because I can see how they really do get boxed into matchups because of
their principles, right, So yeah, you can't have conference teams played before
a certain point. You can't have what was it, Steve, If it's
a Thursday Saturday, they can't play. Or if it was a Friday Sunday,
you don't want to have tom played Thursday. So it's it's and then
there's the MILEX thing, which they didn't do. You used to do what
I was a reporter. They you would just the East Region. It would
all be East team means or the sub regionals. That's not the case anymore.
In one building, you could have a West region game right and the
game right depending on the distance. So I realized that some of the things
that I probably wrote back in the day, maybe more than some, were
like totally uh you know, and the conspiracy theories and all that stuff.
I mentioned that I make sure good fan fodder, but I don't think that's
really what's going on. Because I mentioned that because Tommy could play Gonzaga if
there and I'm thinking, you know, people are going to think about this
and this is no, we don't, we don't want to. I mean,
how how many did we how many times did we hear they need to
get a loot and and uh and Bobby Knight in the same brackets so they
can play each other and stuff like that, you know, right. It
was a lot of fun though. One of the things they talked about Maryland,
who was the tortoise in the hair? I can't remember who? Uh
gosh, who was? Who was it was with be like North Dakota State
or somebody Jack Rabbits or somebody somebody like that. And someone someone called the
NC doublea like that Sunday night and couldn't find him, called and harassed the
guy that we're talking about, the Warlock. It says, we know what
you're doing, we know what you're doing, and says, what are we
doing? You know? We didn't respond, and it was you put the
tortoise, Marilyn against these guys because it's the tortoise in the hair. Wow,
it got down to that. Yeah. See, And I think,
as you said Andy a minute ago, that that would be probably the more
telling thing than anything. How ludicrous. A lot of these theories and arguments
and assumptions and things like that have been you know, over the years,
and no matter how often the committee members come out and say, look,
we just put together the bracket that we you know, and we weren't looking
at somebody playing somebody during X round because their arrival or something, and and
you know, and nobody believes them. You know, I'm saying nobody,
but a lot of people don't believe that that's actually the case. They have,
you know, they have doubts that they really don't look at that.
Well, you know, it's funny you say that. Jay I was standing
there watching as the bracket was populated and the second round I think was it
Steve. As a writer, I would always want to go to where the
great games were going to be, right, so I would look on there
and I was fortunate at the Chicago Tribune, I was the lead writer for
many years on the tournament, and so I could basically pick my spot.
My first question was where was Arizona going to be? Because I didn't want
to be with Rivera on Press Rose. I good, No, many times
I saw the Cats over the years, but I would look at matchups and
say, oh my gosh, look what could be happening on Saturday in New
York or whatever. And the one that one that jumped out of media other
night and our mock was South Carolina versus North Carolina in Charlotte in the second
round. Yeah yeah, I mean can you imagine what that would look like
in the real world, right, I mean the former ACC team South Carolina
and North Carolina, the border rivalry in Charlotte. I mean amazing. And
this just happened, right, And nobody in the room was like, let's
do that. It just happened that way, right, But the assumption would
be that you did that on purpose, sure, for sure? Correct?
I would think, yeah, yeah, you're right. Well here's another thing,
and I think this is we can talk about this because it's a mock.
We had the West East blah blah blah. The East was loaded,
loaded, but it wasn't loaded because the teams are good. It was it
was the top three of the top four or four. We're all blue bloods,
were all blue bloods. This is this never happens well because the blue
bloods aren't taken issue. A bunch of mine aren't as good, right,
so they just hasn't been that good. Kentucky has been exactly North Carolina and
they were all in the same bracket at the least. It was like,
well, and don't you know, don't we always say, you know,
that the bracket comes out right, and one of the first things that that
starts getting talked about is which is the toughest bracket? Right, we went
through that too, go ahead and explain that. And well, that was
interesting because they the one of the I think, as I remember Dave exploded
it, they want to make sure that there we spend a certain range on
the six seeds, right, so the overall seeds, and you don't want
to have you know, one heavier than the other or you know, much
heavier. And like you said, they don't publish that, I think,
but it's if you're really dialed into where how how the seating goes, you
can some of the experts could figure it out right. In other words,
they could look at it and say, oh, the East is much better
than the than the west, or or you know, the West is very
weak this year or whatever. So one of the things that they want to
do for equity is to just make sure that those are as close as possible.
And that was another thing I think we saw Steve, is how that
is tough because you have all these other restrictions on you about you know,
the conference teams playing and another factors, and suddenly it becomes well, they
have you know, this team has to fly from who was it? There
was somebody in the southeast that had the fly to Spokane. I can't remember
who was. Steven Like, well, that's not going to go over all,
but that's where you're going, where you're going. That's how the that's
how the bracket shook out. Well, regarding this balance thing, ours,
ours had one one area where it was a little the number was too too
far, too too much, like he was saying, there's a number,
and they looked at it and tried to fix it, but it couldn't be
fixed. So either the the committee says, okay, we can do this
to this or they just have to leave it alone, right because it's not
possible. And what about the thought or not the thought andy the process?
About how many teams from a conference get in? Right, it's so often
you see that, Well, how did you know nine big you know,
big ten teams get in and only two PAC twelve teams get in. You
know, how does that happen? Well, because the big ten has cloud
and they got money and you know, and so did the a CEC and
whatever. You know, I explain sort of the conference affiliations if those even
come into play. Well, I thought of Steve on this one, but
I don't think they did in the play that they no, because it's all
voting. It's all voting. They have this massive numbers of teams that are
are good enough to be in the tournament, and then it's all the twelve
people voting for unless you're involved, unless you're a commissioner involved in the right,
you're not allowed. So we could have eleven voters, could have ten
voters, and it's the voting of the teams to get in. So it's
not it's it's just if you're good enough. And it's not eye test.
They said, do not it's not an eye testing. This is a is
a head to head analytics, YadA YadA. They have all those sheets on
the board. It's crazy, and you can call and we did this.
Numerous people in the room did this. There's the NCAA staff who are there,
the championship staff, and you can say, pull up Yukon and Purdue
and they put them up on the board and you can look at all of
the metrics for both teams had to head. And I think one very interesting
common which was from LJ. Wright was that if you are going to whatever
you're using as a as a metric that you believe is most important or two
top things or whatever, be consistent from your first vote until your last vote.
So let's just say your biggest metric is the predictive. You know,
the predictive metrics. Okay, that's so I'm going to judge the teams that
do that. If it's road wins, conference road wins, if it's a
bad losses, like I really hold bad losses against a team, but be
consistent. Don't don't judge one team against with that and then another team on
a different thing. And I thought that was fascinating too, because there are
so many ways to judge. Right, Oh, that it was a terrible
loss, I'm going to hold that against them, or a road it is
hard to win on the road, even though they lost them maybe not a
quality opponent on the road. So it's I just came away with. I
mean, the NCA Tournament to me is the greatest sporting event in this country,
and I came away with so much more respect, even though I had
a ton to begin with. For what the job facing the committee every year
is so real quick We got to go. Last night Arizona lost. We
all know that they were the there were a number one seed. Do you
think they we would be able to hang on to a number one seed after
last night? That is beyond my pay grade. I'm gonna defer that one
to the committee, right, So we'll see. I mean, it was
a big loss, so we'll see how it holds on in three weeks.
Andy, thanks a bunch, and this was fow. This was very fun.
Thank you. We'll catch up down the road and I'm looking forward to
seeing both of you here in Glendale in about a month and what like forty
five days or forty three I've lost track, so it will be there.
Yeah, thank you. You're buying a beer. Thank you as always.
Thank you. That was mister Andy McDonell. Was he in charge of this?
No, No, he's the pr agent for the n C double that's
coming in right. They handle like that's but he's participantly here, Yeah,
he participant right now. All right, that was very that was very informative
and fun. So we'll be right back. We'll take your costs five to
two zero four, one six forty. Let's not going to have some Tommy
Lloyd Klatz. You're an Arizona men's basketball fan. You know it's been successful
for nearly forty years. Now take a look back at the Ludolsen era in
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I mean, iHeartRadio WAFT. This is I on the Ball with Steve
Rivera and Jay Gonzalez on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. Hey, welcome back to
I on the Ball here Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve, he's Jake.
You've got Sid doing his work for us. We've got about eleven minutes.
We're going to try to reach George Montis, who's at the casino.
They start their big showtime cards of festivities, these internet issues for his for
yeah. Yeah, but what he's able to do, uh, because he's
a separate to the casino obviously use hot spots and things like that. Yeah,
but it's a big deal going down to the casino, you know.
I hope they hope they figure it out. They figure it out. Yeah,
Okay, we're just gonna touch basement. He'll be like our man on
the scene. That's where we're supposed to be today and we'll talk. We'll
talk to him just briefly about what's going on, because I know we have
some of the athletes here the next couple of days out there and uh,
and then we'll get to the get to the Tommy Lloyd clips. Uh.
So okay, so good. We're gonna try to reach him out now and
then uh, let's see what happens. Uh and we'll talk more if you
want to give us a quick call in the second hour, in the second
hour, and we can talk about what happened last night. Your thoughts on
on what, you know, craziness we saw there that was you know,
uh, that was a crazy game. I mean it just was, Yeah,
it was. It was a crazy game. Did you Was there a
point there where you thought the Arizona was gonna win the game? There was
a point and I think Tommy alluded to it in his in his press conference,
there was a time where you looked, I thought, Okay, this
is where they're gonna make the second half. Yeah, you're saying, Okay,
they're gonna make the run, they're gonna pull away, They're can get
up by ten big bus in there in there, and that they that that
that would try again that that would be this is it, this is where
we're gonna win the game. And then then the next thing, you know
why, Washington State was on a little run and they get the lead back
and Arizona just never, you know, never, uh, you know,
got it. You probably didn't read me today, right, you're too busy.
But but I've seen this game a number of times, especially against teams
like this that are kind of stilted, kind of herky jerky. They throw
defenses that you're not used to. It's just kind of like different. Arizona
has long been troubled by these type of teams. Yeah, they are,
they are, I mean they just you know, uh, but you know
what. The George was just good Georgia there, Yeah, this is George.
This is Stephen Jay. Your guys, are you not in the desert
right? Yeah? Not yet? How are things going over there? Oh
they're awesome, man, It's it's just been busy. We just opened the
doors at three o'clock and it's been a busy show so far. All right,
So what George mitis from showtime cards? You're at you're at You've got
a show set up over at the Casino Del Soul. Okay, so what
exactly are people coming over there for? What do you got? What are
they what are they doing? Who are they going to see? See?
It's exactly what you said, but a little more. It's called the Showtime
Sports Spectacular because it's not just a card show, your typical like you know
sports card show. You see, uh, you're seeing memorabilia. We're having
athletes, we're having voice actors, we're having meet and greets, we're doing
trade days with giveaways. So it's it's basically an entire experience for anybody that's
into sports, obviously the collector, but just a sports fan and general you
know. So basically we're connecting the average sports fan with the collectors and just
you know, really taking this mainstream basically because there's I talked to a lot
of dealers in there, and they're from all over Atlanta, Georgia, Alabama,
Oklahoma, Connecticut was the furthest one, but Santa Barbara, Orange count
like all over. So tell me tonight that you're going to be there all
night. Who's going to be in today, who's going to be in tomorrow?
And sad Sunday if you go Sunday. So tonight tonight is our big
one. It's Jacob Wilton. He's with Oakland Aids. You may have not
heard of him, or you may have. He was drafted at number six
overall in last year's draft. He's with the Oakland Aids. He's their number
one prospect right now. He's a shortstop, either short stop second baseman.
But he has a lot of games where he gets four for four, like
he's a hitting machine. Year comparing them to like Tony Gwynn or Jeters or
you know, which is so early. I hate when they do that,
but expectations. Yeah, he's coming in tonight at seven thirty and he's a
great young man. Okay, then tomorrow are you gonna have you a people,
No, not tomorrow. Tomorrow they play they have a game. That
know that that game yesterday. I'm sure you guys were talking about it.
Yeah, in fact, in fact, we blamed the loss on you,
as I recall it. Yes, said Jason, we needed them to win
this whole weekend, but it was that's a tough one. The stomach one
point like that. So they're gonna go visit you this weekend at all.
Yeah, they're gonna be there on Sunday. On Sunday, at one o'clock.
Uh, they're gonna be there, Umar bo Key, Shot Johnson is
aka Showtime and Paley Larson. Okay, so people want to get autographs,
go there, Go there, yep, come there. It's a meet and
greet and you can get your photo, sign some autographs, get a basketball
sign, get photos signed free, free, free, free to get in.
Uh No, there is an admission use code CATS all capital letters CATS
fifty and you'll get fifty percent off admission. Use that code. Kids are
always free. Sunday is Kids Day, so we're gonna have a lot of
events involving kids. Okay, super thanks man, all right, you guys
always appreciate it. Okay, thank you. Yeah, I might be headed
down there all right over because you're going you're going to play poker, maybe
play cards, played baseball cards. We got a time for a couple of
clips. Yeah. Let's let's uh, let let's go right at the top
with you know, just Tommy's first introductory remarks after the lost he never sounds
as bad as you want as you want to sound. And you know that's
a great point by you, because I think the same thing. He's like
Dictomy almost to her. No, it's the opposite. But he's not as
snarky. Yeah, he just never sounds as he never sounds as upset as
you want to get the early part because he says, hey guys, yeah,
hey guys, yeah, the very at the very beginning. So here
was his initial comments after the post game hard Fog game. I mean,
tip your hat to Washington State. Uh, you know, obviously we had
opportunities, but you know, they they've been really good in close games all
year, and you know they're a team on a roll right now, and
you know they were able to find a way. I mean, they made
a bunch of you know, kind of clutch, big time plays down the
stretch, and you know, and you know, obviously we still had opportunities
and you're up three, you get him to miss a three, it's a
loose ball. You got to come up with that ball, and then you
know they throw it to the corner and it's just you know, you have
a senior who's a really good player and a smart guy, key shot just
you know, probably got a little over zealous in his clothes out and you
know, ends up found a three point shooter and the and the kid just
was all net. You know. So, uh, you know, you
got to tip your hat to Washington State last night. It was a perfect
storm. It just was Yeah, because t shot bless his hard try to
try to block it, didn't miss it, missed it, found it flipped
him. Uh, the lamps that were missed, the slips, the falls
something. Do you believe in destiny to a degree? Have I asked you
that? To a degree? I believe in it? Last night was one
of those destiny games. Like what like last night was pre ordained to happen?
Yeah, yeah, well I can't tell you why. Yeah, but
yeah, too many weird things happened to make it happen. Yeah, and
they all happen, and they all, every one of them happened. Right.
We got another couple of minutes we're talking. We were talking about the
one possession games that that that Arizona has been in and there's one none of
them. Well I haven't they won one, but they haven't hit those last
baskets. And you know, he talked about this game, you know what
came down to the last possession. So here's what he had to say about
these one possession games. There's a lot of ways to win one possession games.
And you know when you're up three, you know there's there's too early
to file and they missed a shot. You know, you got to get
the rebound, and you got to get the rebound. You come down,
you're in the double bonus, and you know, you make one of two
free throws, the whole game changes. You know, you don't and they
go out and make a three and you foul it if lips on you,
I mean, it's that easy. So you know you do know, yeah,
I don't. You don't need to over complicate it more than that,
you know, So, Jay, one of those things was a battle missing
free throws again, right, yeah, And I've always been no, no,
and that's why I'm going to go with it. At some point though
specific to him and others, they may not have been that important in December
and January, but now the importance there are because you know everyone talks about
learning lessons and blah blah blah, at some point they become important. Well,
we were seeing that, you know, I mean, we were tracking
that. You know, when when when Larsen misses the free throw Keyshot misses
a couple Kai Kylin Baswa front rimmed one. I mean, like you know,
Caleb Love missed one, and you're going, what the hell is going
on? You know, And because we have you know, I have my
screen where I and er to the stats, but then we have three other
screen where we've got the stats that you see on the staff broadcast program.
Yeah, and we're watching we're they're ten for nineteen, you know that.
Whatever, And then we get to this they missed ten free throws and lost
by three. You know, you make one, you make five out of
ten, maybe you win the game. Not and and Tommy made the points.
If you make those free throws earlier in the game, that's not how
the game is gonna end. Right, Just because you missed two free throws,
if you make those two and you lost by one, doesn't mean you
would have won by one. But you know, you get down to the
end, maybe instead of being down up three, you're up five, you
know whatever. However it happens, and you know, we and it's just
kind of like we were sitting there going, this is gonna this is gonna
hurt, this is gonna cost them, and they're gonna need these, and
then still nothinking they were gonna lose, but then thinking they lost and and
we we tracked that the entire game, and you got you gotta make those
free throws. They wouldn't go away, they wouldn't go away. Yeah.
Yeah, Arizona I think was the largest. Well, it was no more
than a couple of possession I think I think Washington State went up by seven
one at one point, but it was gonna cut it right up, and
after that it was no more than the two possession games either on either side.
Who had pretty your uniforms last night? Those are ugly ass great exactly
exactly, I know. But it's not about the ugliness of the uniform it's
just that they wore those uniforms really well, and that's why they won.
That's what they want. I'm gonna I'm gonna say that the long sleeves that
that that the Rice kid was wearing, those are like you know, junior
high sleep. Yeah, our baggy. They were long. You know,
you don't see you don't see basketball players wearing long sleeves very often. You
see it more like a T shirt. But the kid's pretty good here,
you know. I actually I think he did not play very well last night.
No, he's in a long sleep. Another theory, all right,
let's take our break. We're coming back to the top of the hour with
breaking news and then Jim Living Goood coming up in the second hour, so
stick around.