As Duke fails to make the Final Four with all their supreme talent, that should tell you that Arizona Basketball will have their time soon enough.
This was the year for Duke to win, well with all that talent and all right? Wrong! As the team ladened with three, Top-10 picks lost before the Final Four, that should tell fans, that the Arizona Basketball team will have their time soon enough!
Call me a homer, a fan boy, I don’t care, but I feel at this point I’m beginning to sound more and more like a broken record.
Arizona Wildcats
Yes, I’m just as frustrated as anybody that the Wildcats have been Final Four-less since 2001, and even more frustrated that we have been agonizingly close multiple times now.
While making a Final Four and even winning takes an immense amount of skill as well as the right blend of players, it does take quite a bit of luck as well. Need I remind you, that even as good as the 1996-97 National Championship was, it wasn’t even Arizona’s best team on paper!
We can all site the immense talent head coach Sean Miller has had over the years, and the fact he has come up empty-handed, but here’s the truth, even the “most talented” teams don’t always win, case in point with Duke this year having three, Top-10 draft picks and coming up short.
Sure, Coach Mike Krzyzewski has been to plenty of Final Fours, and has won numerous titles, but he’s also been coaching at the division one level for 44 years. Miller has been around just 15.
Let’s look at a couple other examples… Mark Few has made just one Final Four in 20 years at Gonzaga, former Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan didn’t make a Final Four until later in his career, and we all remember the Cinderella story of then No. 11 Loyola-Chicago making the Final Four last year.
Literally any team can get hot and make a run, that’s why it’s called March Madness. Among Lute’s tremendous success, he’s also had numerous, first-round exits, nine to be exact. Most of those with some immensely talented teams.
Unfortunately, unlucky things happen, and as we all saw with Duke, arguably the best team on paper, failed to make the Final Four. Heck many even had the Blue Devils possibly winning it all.
Last year, Arizona had three, NBA-level players, including the consensus No. 1 overall pick, and it didn’t work out.
In Millers’ second year with the Wildcats, that certainly wasn’t one of Arizona’s “best teams”, but they were a bounce away from getting to a Final Four.
So again, while it does take talent to win, a lot is also dependent upon match-ups, getting hot at the right time and quite a bit of luck and timing as well.
Arizona’s and Millers’ time is coming, just be patient… although that’s easier said than done. Nothing still changes the fact he’s one of the better coaches in college basketball, and his bright future is still ahead of him.
At Zona Zealots, I stand with coach Miller and still await for the day for us to finally break through and get there! Duke losing today just helps me cope in the meantime! Bear Down, Arizona!