Bevo's Daily Round Up 3.12.09

Rick Barnes asks why. Why do we play a conference tournament?

For starters, Rick Barnes gave off the feeling that he would rather be preparing his team for the NCAA Tournament instead of a largely meaningless league tournament.

“You’d like to win a Big 12 championship because it’s a championship,” Barnes said. “It’s something else, I guess, you can brag about. But I’d give all that up to do well in the NCAA Tournament.”

Barnes also talks openly about the NCAA tournament and CBS.

If Barnes had his way, the Longhorns would still be in the conference schedule this week.

"I would rather not play the conference tournament and play a round-robin schedule, to be honest with you," Barnes said before Texas practiced Tuesday at the Ford Center.

Actually, Barnes was just warming up before turning his thoughts to the NCAA Tournament and various proposals for expanding the field.

"It amazes me when everybody keeps talking about expanding the NCAA Tournament - and they have their theories - but the theory they never talk about is that it's owned by CBS," Barnes said.

"CBS ain't going to change it. They like it exactly the way it is. I don't understand why the people keep talking about it because when you pay $6 billion, believe me, whether the NCAA wants to admit it, it's owned by CBS.

"They like the three-week format, they like the Cinderella teams coming in early. They just want them gone by the round of 16."

The Texas baseball team is No. 1. Remember the last time we were in the top spot?

Football

Crimson and Cream has who is and isn't back this spring. And they provide a pretty picture, although beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

ESPN's Tim Griffin looks at the home-field advantage.

Byron J. Gajewski's model found that the Big 12 team with the biggest home-field advantage was Nebraska. The Cornhuskers were determined to have a home-field advantage of 9.89 points before every kickoff.

And Baylor, the only team without a bowl berth in Big 12 history, was determined to have the smallest home-field advantage at Floyd Casey Stadium.

"Home-field advantage isn't created equal," Gajewski told the Chronicle of Higher Education.

It's an interesting concept, but I've got to be thinking that Gajewski might have missed a team. I think he badly underrated Oklahoma, a team which clearly has had the biggest home-field advantage in the conference in recent years.

Texas Tech has a new special teams coach. Mike Leach found the best in Eric Russell.

“We studied all the teams and figured out, who had the best special teams in America last year? Louisiana Tech did,’’ Leach said. “So we asked, who coaches their special teams? Is this a lucky year for him, or was he always good? At Louisiana Tech, he was. And he totally ruled at special teams at North Texas.’’

Trying to find a controversy where one does not exist? Drew Sharp, USA Today, does not want the NCAA basketball tournament to turn into the BCS.

 

March Madness isn't without its fair measure of maddening BCS-like political controversy.

It heightens the drama knowing that there will be some hurt feelings Sunday night when the only call comes from the NIT.

Rancor soon replaces the disappointment and in the days before the NCAA tournament's tip-off, there will be cries from coaches and administrators of being wronged and demands that a more equitable method of fielding the tournament be created.

Sound familiar?

The BCS... nothing changes. The Fiesta, Orange, Rose and Sugar bowls agreed to deals that deals will keep the national championship at those sites through the 2013 college football season.

Dr. Saturday looks at the dinosaur in college football.

In case you need some football players, check the cheerleading squad. Ohio State did.

The Sooners should be happy. This is No.1 or No.2 spot they didn't make. But they have to be up there, somewhere...