Boston College. Closest the Eagles have come: Three-time regional runners-up, in 1967, '82 and '94. The '82 team helped break open the bracket by stunning No. 1 seed DePaul before falling to sixth-seeded Phi Slama Jama in the regional final. Where they rank on the underachiever scale: High. Not much excuse for a school from a good basketball city that has been at it as long as the Eagles not to stumble into at least one Final Four.
He also listed Clemson, Miami, VT as the other ACC underachievers, but what's relevant to me is how correctly he has nailed our situation at BC. We should be a lot like Villanova: after all, we're both private Catholic schools with long histories in big conferences. The differences are that the Wildcats win regularly, get top-line recruits, captivate the major metropolitan area in which they are located, and go deep into the dance. BC does not.
So BC has made the tournament x out of the past y years. How many championships? Final Fours? Elite Eights? Getting into the tournament every now and then (which BC is most assuredly not even going to do this year) and maybe winning a game is pretty much the most we can hope for. Is simply making the big dance good enough around here? You know and I know that the Eagles are capable of so much more. They'll never be a basketball factory like Kentucky, Kansas, or North Carolina, but they don't have to be to win.
And then there's this year, which is underachievement at its finest. Virtually everyone on a veteran team is having a down year. Lovely.
No comments:
Post a Comment