E.J. Liddell Receives Threats after Ohio State Loss

E.J. Liddell

When Ohio State entered the 2021 NCAA tournament, many thought they had a chance to go all the way. This team had a successful regular season, sometimes looking like one of the country’s best teams. Although they had a fair share of losses in the regular season, they competed in what was considered the toughest conference all season long.

Just a few days after selection Sunday, Ohio State found their season over as they lost to Oral Roberts in overtime. Many believed that they had a pretty favorable draw, but they could never get going against the 15th seed. They were lucky to get to overtime in the first place, but losing in a tough one was particularly devastating.

EJ Liddell Receives Threats
E.J. Liddell Receives Threats

After the loss, there was a lot of backlash. In particular, Ohio State’s EJ Liddell came out and discussed some of the threats and hateful messages he received after the loss. Despite having a great season and playing fairly well in the game, he took a lot of the negativity due to how things ended up.

Passionate fans crossing the line with E.J. Liddell Threats

This is not the first time that passionate fans for a particular … Read more at FryingPanSports

Browns free agent signings and NCAA Brackets onNews, Notes & Rumors on live tonight at 6 EST!

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Samantha Bunten of NBC Sports, former NFL scout Kelron Sykes and I will discuss the additions the Browns have made this off season. Then at 6:30 David Kay basketball guru of Walterfootball.com joins me to talk about the Brackets and who will win. The last guest tonight will be Knicks beat writer for Metro New York Tony Williams to discuss the hiring of Phil Jackson by the team.

Please join us on or https://fryingpansports.com/radio-show/.

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NOTE: Check out the live News, Notes and Rumors show on Monday, Thursday and Friday at 6 PM Eastern on or https://fryingpansports.com/radio-show/. On Monday Samantha Bunten of NBC Sports and I discuss the results of the weekend. Thursday shows alternate between NFL Draft and basketball. On Friday Tony Williams Giants beat writer for Metro New York joins Samantha and me to preview the upcoming games.

 

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He edits https://fryingpansports.com. He has also published several novels on and a non-fiction work at http://www.merriam-press.com/. Follow him on twitter @NNRonDSN Read more at FryingPanSports

96 Teams in the NCAA Tournament is the worst idea since the BcS selection process.

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In the NBA, they play 82 games to determine which 14 teams don’t make the playoffs. Anyone that thinks that the regular season of the NBA is great basketball has to have their vision and sanity checked. For the most part only the last 10 minutes of regular season games between contenders show a level of intensity that is “must see” TV.

Now the NCAA is considering expanding the tournament to 96 teams. The top 32 team would get first round byes. What?????

First of all, this tournament is the ONLY thing that the NCAA does that they haven’t screwed up. It is great just the way it is. Putting all those teams into the tournament is like a high school championship where every school gets to play even if they lost every game. That is just plain dumb.

If the RPI was used to pick the 96 teams this year, #96 would have been Arizona with a 16-15 record. Why in the world would you want a just above 500 team into the playoffs? It doesn’t make sense. In addition, it makes the regular season almost meaningless.

Second, if you have to expand the tournament, give the top 2 … Read more at FryingPanSports

My thoughts on the final weekend of the NCAA Tournament

Fryingpan Sports

My thoughts on the final weekend of the NCAA Tournament

By Bill Smith

The Big East teams fail to make the Championship game.

North Carolina was just too deep and too talented for Villanova. NC point guard Ty Lawson and forward Tylor Hansbrough. Hansbrough came back for his senior year to try to win a Championship. He and Lawson were all that NC needed to get to the finals.

The biggest surprise of the day was the win by Michigan State over Connecticut. The defense of MSU stopped UConn’s powerful offense. Points off turnovers were the difference. UConn had the greatest margin on foul shots taken vs opponent foul shots in the country. While the Detroit fans were clearly supporting the Spartans, the officials did their best to even the odds for UConn.

Despite the failure to make the final game, the Big East had an outstanding season.

Just because the top teams failed to advance to the Championship game, don’t discount the year that the BE had. They were the top conference all season long with significant wins up and down the league standings.

The officiating was, to be kind, inconsistent.

A foul like beauty is in … Read more at FryingPanSports

Saturday Niblets from around the net for 03/28/09

Fryingpan Sports

Saturday Niblets from around the net for 03/28/09

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By Bill Smith

Best comment of the last 2 weeks:

Acai Burn’s comment on Don’t get too excited about a 3 team deal involving Jay Cutler and the Browns.

The Browns have two serviceable quarterbacks on the team at this time and to make a move at the qb position when they have other needs is a waste.

The problem is that in a three way deal, there is no way to compensate the Browns for the loss of Quinn. The Broncos will demand more than Quinn in return for Cutler. The question I posed boils down to where will the draft choice(s) for the Browns come from to compensate them for giving up Quinn?

Updates on previous columns:

Thoughts about the first 2 rounds of the NCAA Tournament. – CBS has done a little better job limiting the switches in games. The officials must be reading my site. There have been very few visits to the scoring table replay TV since I commented on the issue. The top seeded teams are still in control of the bracket although Xavier gave Pittsburgh a tough game on Thursday night. … Read more at FryingPanSports

Thoughts about the first 2 rounds of the NCAA Tournament.

Fryingpan Sports

Thoughts about the first 2 rounds of the NCAA Tournament.

By Bill Smith

College basketball has been hurt by the lack of upper class stars.

The quality of play has degraded over the last few year. Part of that is due to a lack of upper class stars from big schools. One of the reasons that small school teams are competitive with much bigger schools is that small school players tend to be more experienced and older.

College basketball suffers from a lack of fundamentals.

If you follow College BB, you must have noticed the explosion of unforced turnovers and the poor shooting percentage in mid range shots and at the free throw line. This is a lack of fundamentals. Players in todays game are much more athletic and rely on that quality to make up for poor technique.

Many players can not even dribble at full speed, let alone pull up and hit a 12 foot shot consistently. College coaches just don’t have the time to work on fundamentals the way they would like due to restrictions on practice time. As more and more players leave after 1 year, that will only get worse.

The players experience … Read more at FryingPanSports