19 things you need to know about the 2015 Final Four

Duke was looking for a team nickname just after the end of World War I. During the Great War, the Chasseurs Alpins, nicknamed “les Diables Bleus,” were internationally famous French soldiers. But, as you’d expect from the French Army, their success didn’t last long and once the U.S. got in the war, les Diables Blue were relegated to raising money for the war effort. After the war and Duke’s lifting of a ban on college football, there was a two-year battle about the name, much of it about how the Methodists would react to “Blue Devils,” for obvious reasons. The first post-war football team at Duke played without a name. As the stalemate dragged, a newspaper editor started referring to the team as the Blue Devils and the rest is history. But, seriously, did you know Duke’s nickname came from the French Army? New rule: Anytime Duke loses a game, we say les Diables Bleus surrendered it.

2. This is one of the best Final Four fields in 20 years.

This Final Four includes the teams with the second-most F4 appearances (Kentucky), the fourth-most (Duke), the eighth-most (MSU) and a team tied for No. 22. That seemed unbelievably impressive, so I went back and looked through recent Final Fours to confirm that this year was special, maybe historically so, only to surprisingly find two other Final Fours in past seven years in which the participants had a higher cumulative total. The 2015 field has 46 appearances, while the teams in the 2008 and 2012 Final Fours had a combined 48 appearances.
No other year is better than 2015 though, mostly because there have been more opportunities to make Final Fours in 2015 than there was in 1995. For instance, the 1993 Final Four featured North Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas and Michigan, which today adds up to a total of 56 appearances. But when you account for all the Final Fours those teams have made since then, the cumulative number of Final Fours made in 1993 drops to 37.

So even though 1993 didn’t have as a high number, it’s almost certainly a more impressive field than the impressive 2015 field. But make no mistake, this is a wonderful Final Four in terms of intrigue, with Duke going for its fifth title under Coach K, Tom Izzo’s semi-Cinderella run and Wisconsin bidding for its first title in 74 years. Oh yeah, there’s something intriguing about Kentucky too, but it’s slipped my mind.
3. The University of Kentucky was founded in 1865, the same year as the of the Civil War, when Kentucky University merged with Transylvania University.

If John Calipari had been around, he probably would have successfully recruited Dracula from Transylvania U and won a number of titles, only to have them all rescinded after Kentucky played a day game and Dracula did his thing.

4. I made dueling anagrams for each of the Final Four matchups (e.g. “Duke Michigan State” and “Kentucky Wisconsin.”). Then I picked a winner.

 

Magic Hates Duke, Tin > UK Cynics knew it, son!
A hatred of Duke and tin from one of the five most famous basketball players in history, versus a boast about Kentucky losing? Gotta go with Magic’s hate of Duke and No. 50 on the Periodic Table.

5. Michigan State wins the battle of the macscots.

 

Remember, the Blue Devils were named after a product of France, so —- pffffffft. Badgers scare people like a newborn puppy, which leads us with a Spartans vs. Wildcats final. And as a proud Spartan (on my mom’s side), there’s no way some wildcats could down those shirtless guys in 300 or modern-day Spartans armed with the liquid courage of a few shots of ouzo.

6. Ashley Judd is a Kentucky fan.

(AP)

I know! I had no idea either until I found something about it on the Internet. You’d think CBS and other networks would let viewers know this important fact and sometimes show Judd on TV if she ever attends games.

7. Speaking of Ms. Judd, she earned a Masters degree from Harvard in 2010.

This is a Harvard grad. (AP)

Judd, who, if you didn’t catch sarcasm above is shown approximately 5,000 times during UK games, got her Masters in public administration at Harvard. That must explain why she and Morgan Freeman used to always survive those thrillers they were in.

8. Duke was originally named Trinity College until the school moved to Durham and was named after the prime benefactor: The Duke family.

Randolph and Mortimer Duke.

“The family would later become the inspiration for Trading Places,” is something I would say if that were in any way true.

9. Wisconsin stole its famous fight song ‘On Wisconsin’ from a guy who wrote the tune for the University of Minnesota.

 William Purdy composed the music and his roommate and fraternity brother Carl Beck penned the words back around 1909. Purdy planned on submitting the song to the University of Minnesota in hopes of a $100 prize, but Beck convinced him to send it to Wisconsin instead, a school where he’d once studied. Purdy agreed and the song quickly became a historic marching band hit, with John Phillips Sousa, the famed conductor and writer of American military marches, saying  it ” and “the most stirring, enthusiastic college melody I have ever heard.”

10. Duke is the highest-ranked Final Four university, according to U.S. News.

And just in case you ever forgot that, the from Houston Sunday night in a move that reeked of the “look at us, we value education first!” Yeah, because those tests couldn’t have waited ’til morning and Jahlil Okafor really cares about his exams when he’ll be going pro in approximately two minutes.

11. Despite the pedigree and/or size of each school, their lists of famous alums is … lacking.

Kentucky — Ashley Judd (in case you had forgotten), Mitch McConnell.
Duke — Ken Jeong, Richard Nixon and every single person calling or analyzing college basketball for ESPN or CBS. Okay, I guess Nixon is a big one.
Wisconsin — Joyce Carol Oats, Boz Scaggs, Butch Vig, Eudora Welty, the guy who produced Perfect Strangers, Frank Lloyd Wright, Stephen Ambrose, Greta Van Susteren.
Of course, if we had counted sports stars, the lists would have been much longer, but Wisconsin wins in a blowout. If the battle of famous alums were a basketball game, the Badgers win 78-39 over Kentucky, then blowout Duke in the final, 66-40. But forget brilliant writers such as Oates, Welty and Ambrose or music geniuses Boz Saggs and Butch Vig; Wisconsin was winning anyway strictly based on Thomas Miller, the producer of Perfect Strangers.

12. Every team in the Final Four has won a title.

Kentucky leads with eight, Duke has four, Michigan State checks in with two and, as mentioned before, Wisconsin earned its lone title in 1941. All together, there are 15 combined title banners hanging in the rafters of each team’s arena. This is not a rarity, though. Five of the last 10 Final Fours consisted of teams that had each won a title.

13. Two Final Four teams are tied for the lead in most former players in NBA.

Duke’s Kyrie Irving should be fighting for an NBA title later this spring. (AP)

Not surprisingly, it’s Duke and Kentucky that lead the list of former players in the NBA with 18. (The totals are from the start of the 2014-15 NBA season and are  Michigan State comes in as a respectable 11th place with seven former players in the pros. But for as good as Wisconsin’s non-sports alums are, their recent basketball alums leave much to be desired.
The Badgers are tied for 29th place with three current players. That puts them behind Georgia Tech, Wake Forest, USC and New Mexico, and tied with Creighton, Nevada, Vanderbilt and Wichita State, among others. The good news: Frank Kaminsky will make it four Badgers in the NBA next year, assuming Devin Harris, Jon Leuer and Greg Stiemsma (who are averaging 8.8, 4.7 and 0.9 points per game, respectively) hang around on a roster. This is a good stat for all those who say, a statement that’s clearly ridiculous but compelling nonetheless.

14. Kentucky and Duke are the only schools to have also played in this year’s women’s tournament.

$20 says Duke wasn’t called for a foul in this scrum for a rebound. (AP)

Duke, a No. 4 seed, lost in the Sweet 16 in a way-too-early ACC rematch with Maryland. And to those in Big Blue Nation who says the ‘Cats are unbeatable, second-seeded Kentucky was upset by a No. 7 seed in the second round of the tournament. Michigan State, who Kentucky could play in the final, is, gasp, a No. 7 seed.

15. If jerseys determined the winner of the Final Four, Kentucky would be champions.

Duke’s modern-classical jerseys would beat Michigan State’s sea of green, even if those jerseys looked awesome when Magic Johnson wore them. On the other side of the bracket, in a blowout of West Virginian proportions, Kentucky hammers Wisconsin. That means we get the final everyone wants in the real tournament: Duke vs. Kentucky. Here’s a comparison:

(Both pics via AP)

This is a tough one as the jerseys are essentially the same thanks to Nike. But Kentucky gets the edge due to the boldness of its block letters, better numerals and, most importantly, colored-in names on the back of their jerseys, while Duke stuck with the unreadable block lettering that no one TV can read.

Then again, if both teams meet in the final and Duke wears their blue road jerseys, maybe this debate is reopened for discussion.

16. Who hasn’t the meanest on-court face?

John Calipari vs. Bo Ryan

(AP)

Mike Krzyzewski vs. Tom Izzo. Advantage Krzyzewski.
Coach K often has the look of a petulant child who didn’t get what he wanted for Christmas. Izzo is frequently unhappy and sometimes has the look of someone who doesn’t have time to deal with incompetent refs and players who can’t shoot free throws:  But whenever he gets down, I imagine him reciting an uplifting passage from the Bard and calms down.“H to the izz-O, V to the izz-A/Fo’ sheezy my neezy keep my arms so freezy/Can’t leave rap [college basketball] alone the game needs me.” 
In the finals, we have an upset, with Bo Ryan over Coach K. The Duke coach yells from a position of entitlement and on a gold-encrusted soapbox that Nike probably made for him, whereas Bo has more of an angry blue-collar face that might actually scare you.

17. Combine all the mascots together and it looks an evil bear version of Billy Idol, with horns.

Billy Idol is also wearing a cape, a mask and an oversized T-shirt where the W definitely stands for “White Wedding.” Also, how great is this mash-up? I emailed our graphics mastermind Rubie Edmondson in the morning with a ridiculous request to make a composite of the four mascots. Not only does she do it, not only does she do it quickly, but she does it perfectly. Rubie’s the one who designe

18. If you double the combine final rankings of the three No. 1 seeds (9), they still don’t reach the final ranking of “lowly” Michigan State (22).

Kentucky obviously finished No. 1 in the Wisconsin was No. 3, behind Villanova because 32-2 in a sad conference is more impressive than 31-3 in a good conference. Duke was No. 5 after falling three spots following an ACC tournament semifinals loss to a top 10 Notre Dame team. (Lesson: Everyone places far too much value on conference tournaments.) And then there’s Michigan State, who was unranked going into the Big Ten tournament, but rose eight spots to No. 22 after making a run to the finals, losing in OT to Wisconsin.

19. The end: A list of how long its been since each team was in this position.