BehindClosedDores

The Ramblings and Ruminations of a Vanderbilt Undergraduate from Franklin, TN

Monday, March 9, 2009

On to Tampa

Just thought I would drop in for a quick update.

In case you hadn't heard, the Vanderbilt Commodores are officially HOT going in to the SEC Tournament. Normally Vanderbilt losing to Arkansas is right up there with death and taxes as one of those things you can count on, but apparently someone forgot to tell our freshmen...whoops.

I have followed the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament very closely for the past 5 years or so, and I honestly cannot remember feeling like more teams have a legitimate shot at cutting the nets down in Tampa than I do this year. Obviously you can't rule out LSU, but dropping the final two games of the season after clinching the SEC regular season title doesn't exactly scream "we have momentum" and if we learned anything from Twister II: Atlanta 2K8 (that would be last year's SEC tourney where a tornado hit the Georgia Dome and almost ripped the dang roof off) and Jawja's improbable run to the SECT title it's that momentum is everything. Tennessee looked to be heating up at just the right time after knocking off South Cack in Columbia to win the SEC East, but after the emotionally flat effort against Bama on Sunday it's becoming increasingly difficult to predict which Big Orange Circus will show up. Auburn has an outside chance to make it to Sunday, but in all likelihood will have to go through Florida and Tennessee to get there.

Here are my picks, in order of least to most likely to cut the nets down in Tampa on Sunday.

12. Ole Miss
11. Georgia
10. Arkansas
9. Mississippi State
8. Alabama
7. Vanderbilt
6. Kentucky
5. South Carolina
4. Tennessee
3. Florida
2. Auburn
1. LSU

Also, my picks for SEC teams to make the field of 65
1. LSU-automatic bid
2. Tennessee
3. Florida
4. South Carolina


I can't wait to revisit these picks and laugh at how little I know about college basketball

Until then,

Go 'Dores!

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