Practice Not Perfect Plan at Final Four

So, which Williams were you pulling for?

Roy, Gary, Venus or Serena?

It was a big week for Williams versus Williams. First, there were the top-10 tennis sisters, Venus and Serena, teeing it up on a hard court in Key Biscayne, Fla. A few days later, it was Roy and Gary, brothers in Final Four frustration, wiping flop sweat from their brows on the hardwood in Atlanta.

Say this much for college basketball: When its marquee matches a Williams against a Williams, you can be reasonably assured both competitors are doing whatever they can not to lose.

In fact, Roy, who lost Saturday night to Gary, was probably guilty of trying too hard to win. Again. With Roy’s Kansas Jayhawks trailing Gary’s Maryland Terrapins by 19 points late in the second half of their NCAA semifinal, CBS’ Jim Nantz and Billy Packer began discussing Roy’s ongoing search for the right way to prepare a team to go 2-0 at the Final Four.

Nantz: “I think Coach has really grappled with exactly how [his team is] supposed to handle all of this.”

Packer: “You know what the problem is, Jim. [It’s] when you think so much about that. There is no formula. You’ve seen everything. Hey, Al McGuire’s Final Four here, he never was even around his team. You say, ‘Oh, that’s the formula that works.’

“I just think you have to do what you’re comfortable with. Eventually that night will come, if it’s in the cards for you to win a national championship.”

So Roy went out again, 97-88, leaving him 0 for 3 in trips to the Final Four in 14 seasons.

And in the same arena a few hours earlier, Indiana’s Mike Davis reached the national title game in his first trip to the Final Four in his second season as Hoosier coach.

College basketball in March may be mad, but no one ever said it was fair.

Besides, if you take a closer look at Roy Williams’ latest stopover at the Final Four, you will find him to be a very lucky man.

He didn’t have to sit through four hours on “Final Four Friday” listening to Dick Vitale narrate practice. Yes, for those scoring at home, the decision-makers at ESPN have lost it. Reduced to a wallflower while watching CBS run off with the Big Dance, ESPN, so desperate for a piece of anything stamped with the Final Four brand, devoted four hours of its ESPN2 broadcasting schedule Friday to bring you--live!--the pre-semifinal practice sessions of Indiana, Oklahoma, Kansas and Maryland.

“The Terps! The Terps! Here they come! The Terps are here!” Vitale shrieked as Maryland’s players jogged onto the floor of the Georgia Dome for their hour’s worth of free throws and layup drills.

Four hours of players in colored practice bibs.

Four hours of players with hands on their hips.

Four hours of Vitale unfettered but not unplugged, with not only the proper credential but also express instructions to fill it up, to keep it coming, to go end to end, coast to coast.

My MVP for Final Four Friday?

My remote control.

Maybe it was a cruel experiment: Turn Vitale loose for four straight hours, just to see what happens, to see--longshot hope here--that he might eventually run out of things to say.

For the record, Vitale couldn’t talk basketball for four straight hours. But Vitale on baseball? Well why hadn’t anyone thought of that before?

Oklahoma’s practice was starting to drag a little, so Vitale and Digger Phelps started talking about the upcoming Devil Ray- Tiger season opener--don’t ask--before Vitale caught a glimpse of a graphic plugging ESPN2’s telecast of the Angel-Indian opener.

“I know one thing!” Vitale shrieked. “The Indians made a major mistake getting rid of Alomar! Didn’t sign Juan Gonzalez! Burba’s gone to Texas! Are you KIDDING ME?!?”

Vitale then informed us all, “I love baseball,” yet another reason why football has overtaken the grand old game as the national pastime.

Tired of baseball talk, Vitale and crew sent it over to sideline reporter Andy Katz, who collared Jim Harrick for a discussion about great moments in the history of Final Four Friday. Three days before Harrick’s UCLA Bruins won the title in 1995, Oklahoma State’s Bryant Reeves brought down the backboard with a monstrous dunk during a practice session at the Kingdome.

Katz asked Harrick for his personal recollection of that one shining moment. Harrick said he had only seen clips of it.

Thank goodness, then, for Final Four Saturday, which featured actual games to televise and talk about. Did those four practice sessions yield anything of educational importance? Well, you’ll notice very few CBS and ESPN talking heads had any clue about this one: Indiana 73, Oklahoma 64.

Big upset, that one. Surpassed only by Nantz breaking away from CBS’ pro-Bob Knight policy by noting that, “Bob Knight had a huge hand in a lot of these kids coming to Indiana and they, according to Indiana officials, have not heard from him on this run to the Final Four. Not a congratulatory call or anything. And I find that regrettable.”

Knight must have been too busy. He had four hours of basketball practice to watch.