Here we are! National Championship game, Louisville Cardinals vs Michigan Woverines!
That was our dreams all along  in our website!

Both games were close nail biting games, but hard fought good semi final games.

Louisville could not do their usual running game, but their bench players rescued
them in 2nd half.  That proved Cardinals definitely are championship caliber team!

Michigan had tough time against Orange crush 2-3 zone defense, but their quickness
and out side shooingts especially by bench players in 1st half were the difference.

Both teams came this far, means Championship game will be anybody's game,
although Louisvilles are the favorite, I think!

Best luck to both teams!  KJ

Go!  Blue!

 

It seems that Louisville is generally considered as the favorite to win.
That's exactly what I don't want to hear.
I love to be in the side of the underdog.

Thinking that Louisville had to overcome Wichita State by a narrow escape,
and Michigan handled big Syracuse easily, the game will be for anyone.
Maybe, a lucky break or two might determine the champion.

Anyway, whoever wins, it is a lucky break for us.
I have not been in the "March Maddness" for years since I left Kentucky (16 years ago !!).
Now, I have it again.

Detroit Red Wings won.
Detroit Tigers beat NY Yankees two games in a row.
Wolverines won.
Now who do we have to play next? Cardinals? Louisville?
Who do you think will win, Wolverines or Cardinals?

Anyway I have to be prepared for a late bedtime on Monday night.
This is too much to bear for the old age.

Michigan Forces Syracuse Out of Comfort Zone, and Tournament

By GREG BISHOP
ATLANTA — Late in the second half Saturday, Coach John Beilein worked the Michigan sideline, his jacket off, his sleeves rolled up, his tie loosened. He crouched. He leaned. He clapped and shouted. It was part coaching, part pleading, part aerobics.
There Beilein stood, a handful of heart-thumping minutes from the national championship game, most every seat in the Georgia Dome filled. All it took was some 35 years in coaching, with stints at almost every level from high school to Division I. All those vans driven and uniforms washed and floors swept. All those games in small gyms surrounded by empty seats.
He did not stand still.
On Saturday, his Wolverines delivered Beilein to the doorstep of his first national championship, to the title game against Louisville on Monday night. This Michigan team brought to mind those from the Fab Five era, with a 61-56 victory launching the Wolverines into the final game of the college basketball season for the first time since 1993. Back when most of them were infants.
When the game ended, guard Trey Burke sauntered toward the Michigan supporters, as he thumped his chest and fans threw seat cushions on the court. As Burke made his way back to the locker room, the same locker room where the assistant coach Bacari Alexander squeezed an orange into juice before the game, Burke yelled to no one in particular, “We’re not done yet!”
Beilein walked in soon after. The room erupted.
Syracuse (30-10) had whittled a double-digit deficit to a point, 57-56, after forward James Southerland knocked down a 3-pointer, a rare basket on one of his worst shooting nights. Burke missed one of two free throws.
The Orange inbounded the ball with a chance to tie the game. They ran a play for Southerland, who was covered. Guard Brandon Triche took what Coach Jim Boeheim said later was his best and only option. He drove the right side of the lane.
Michigan forward Jordan Morgan slid in Triche’s path. Morgan would later say he felt he had position. Triche would say he felt that Morgan did not. The officials agreed with Morgan and called a charge.
“I probably should have made a better decision,” Triche said. “I probably should have pulled up.”
The Orange had one final opportunity to tie. Again, they called a play for Southerland. Again, Michigan smothered him. Again, a Syracuse player drove (guard Trevor Cooney in this instance), and again, a Syracuse player missed. Morgan slammed home an exclamation point at the other end.
That was the pretty play, the one destined for the highlights. But the charge taken was a sequence that best embodied the Wolverines on Saturday — average on offense; resourceful at the end; if not a defensive juggernaut, then a pesky defensive team.
“At the end of the day, it wasn’t offense,” Burke said. “It was defense that allowed us to advance.”
Early in the second half, Syracuse missed three consecutive shots from in close. Guard Michael Carter-Williams tried to throw the ball off an opponent and stepped out of bounds. Southerland clanged another jumper off the rim.
The sequence was indicative of the way the game unfolded, of Michigan’s defensive prowess and Syracuse’s offensive ineptitude. The Wolverines controlled the pace, sped the tempo, forced the Orange out of their comfort zone, in this case the 2-3 defense Syracuse made famous. Michigan was too athletic. Too fast. Too tough.
Mitch McGary always seemed to force his way into the thick of it. He presented Syracuse with a conundrum: how to defend a player with the bulk of a center, the size of a forward, the skills of a guard and the nimble feet of a ballerina. The answer for the Orange was not well, as it turned out.
In one second-half sequence, McGary tossed a no-look pass to forward Glenn Robinson III, who dunked the ball. On Michigan’s next possession, McGary received a feed from Burke and jammed home his own slam. The Michigan student section erupted in celebration. The band played. The cheerleaders danced with yellow Michigan cones over their heads.
McGary finished with 10 points, 12 rebounds, 6 assists and 2 blocks. C. J. Fair kept Syracuse in the game. He basically was the Orange offense, recording 22 points.
In this tournament, Syracuse’s zone resembled an octopus, the players the tentacles, their long wingspans spread across the court, their movement coordinated, suffocating. Syracuse held Montana, Indiana and Marquette to their lowest point totals of the season. Their tournament opponents connected on 15.4 percent of their 3-point shots.
The zone became the talk of the tournament and beyond. Even the White House got involved. In an interview on MSNBC, the deputy press secretary Josh Earnest compared Republican obstructionism to the Orange’s defense.
And yet Michigan appeared to present something of a challenge for the Orange. Ever since the first basketball team rolled out a zone defense, dribble penetration and marksmanship from long range have ranked among the most effective counter methods. With its skilled guards, an up-tempo offense and a post player in McGary adept at both scoring and passing, the Wolverines seemed to fit snugly into the role of zone buster.
Burke connected on only one field goal in the first half, an impossibly long 3-pointer that raised Michigan’s lead to 36-25, where it stood at halftime. But as a team, the Wolverines made eight 3-pointers, including two apiece from Spike Albrecht and Caris LeVert, a pair of freshmen absent any noticeable nerves.
McGary took care of the rest, his game decidedly old-school, versatile, efficient, as if he should have arrived here clad in Converse high tops. He often handled the ball in the middle of the zone, as he flung passes to open teammates. He muscled his way inside for baskets.
As Michigan celebrated, Syracuse answered questions. One about retirement set off Boeheim. He said he never indicated he would not return next season. He said never. Ever. He said he had never been more proud of a team than this one.
“Frankly, I’m tired of being asked that question,” Boeheim said. “Is it because I’m old?”
Not likely. Beilein, in the national title game in his fourth decade as a coach, was further proof of that.
■

PUBLISHED APRIL 6, 2013


http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/07/sports/ncaabasketball/michigan-holds-off-syracuse-to-advance-to-ncaa-title-game.html

Few Comments about Michigan-Syracuse game

1.Great teams

  Great teams always are able to utilize 'Plan B',when 'Plan A'
  won't work. Their bench powers were the ones in these cases
  last night for both winning teams.

2.Orange Zone buster

  Syracuse players' wing spans are so long like octapi, it is tough
  to attack them. Michigan stepped up their defense ends and force them
  to fail offensively and each time Michigan got rebounds out of these
  miscues,they had executed fast breaks efficiently using their quicknesses
  especially 1st half.

3.Mitch McGary

  Michigan is the yougest team out of 68 participating teams(3 freshmen
  as starters). Freshman starter by the name of Mitch McGary should be the
  tournament MVP in my book for U of M. He is equipped with rare combination
  of muscles,heart,and brain.

4.Coach B owed me one!

  Each time I went to the big game like WS and Stanley Cup Final etc,somehow
  my teams had failed.We were all set to go Atlanta to see 'Final Four' few
  days ago,but we could not go because of mainly unsureness of ticket availability
  and partly my jinx,ha,ha.  KJ

 

Congratulations, Wolverines and Cardinals! With envy and excitement,
we are looking forward to the final tomorrow.
Good luck, Dr. Hwang, for Wolverines!
Good luck, our WM for Cardinals!
With utmost respect from humbled Buckeyes.

The final game of the 2013 NCAA Tournament, the championship
between the Louisville Cardinals and Michigan Wolverines,
tips off at 9:23 p.m. ET on Monday night
and will air live on CBS. Coverage begins at 9 p.m. ET.