Sunday, March 12, 2000
Bearcats: We deserve No. 1 seed
Pairings will come this evening
BY MIKE DeCOURCY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The NCAA men's basketball committee will emerge from hiding sometime today and reveal the bracket for the 2000 NCAA Tournament, and with that will make a loud statement regarding its impressions of the other Cincinnati Bearcats.
With All-America center Kenyon Martin out because of a broken leg, the Bearcats are considered to be in jeopardy of being seeded lower than No.1 in the tournament. The only people who know for certain, though, are the committee members so tightly sequestered that even family members need a special phone code to get calls through.
“I think about it when people tell me about it,” said UC coach Bob Huggins. “But I learned a long time ago, you don't have any control over what the committee does.
“I personally think it's a travesty if they don't give these kids their due. How can you be ranked first in the country the majority of the year ... Look around the country. Look at everybody who's lost.”
The Bearcats (28-3) have a pretty good idea why they dropped their Conference USA tournament game on Thurs day. They're not sure how to explain what happened to Ohio State, Syracuse, Kentucky, Florida and Tennessee in their league tournament defeats.
“They have all their best players,” said UC power forward Jermaine Tate. “We lost the best player in the country. They lost, and they didn't lose any players. I think in the long run, we should still get a No.1 seed.”
The importance of the seed is enhanced for UC, because a lighter draw could mean more time to implement the changes made necessary by Martin's absence.
They believe they earned the right to be seeded at the top of the bracket by holding the No.1 ranking for more weeks than any other team and earning more victories than any team ranked in the top 10 of wire-service polls.
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