A is for Auburn. A team that won its first 17 games and 25 of its first 26 staggered a bit down the stretch, and its disappointing show in the Southeastern Conference tournament leaves some, including possibly coach Cliff Ellis, to wonder if these are paper Tigers after all.
B is for Baltimore. Our city will be well-represented in the tournament with George Washington's Shawnta Rogers (Lake Clifton), Michael King (Lake Clifton), Patrick Ngongba (Calvert Hall) and Sam Anyan (Calvert Hall); Temple's Mark Karcher (St. Frances); Miami's Johnny Hemsley (Southern-Balto.); Maryland's Juan Dixon (Calvert Hall) and Matt Hahn (Atholton); St. John's Marvis "Bootsy" Thornton (Dunbar); and Mount St. Mary's Aaron Herbert (Calvert Hall) and Konata Springer (Towson Catholic).
C is for Cincinnati. The Bearcats are the only team to have beaten Duke this season, and could get another chance if both make it to the East Regional final in East Rutherford, N.J.
D is for Duke. Mike Krzyzewski has seemingly assembled the makings of his second dynasty. After losing to Kentucky in last year's South Regional final, the Blue Devils are the biggest pre-tournament favorites since their predecessors won it all in 1992.
E is for Elton. Are you getting tired of all this Duke stuff? Better get used to it, since Elton Brand and his teammates will likely be around for the next three weeks. In Brand's case, it might be the last time around for the talented sophomore.
F is for free-throw shooting. Among teams in the tournament with a chance to win it all, Connecticut is shooting 73 percent as a team and Michigan State is at 72.7. The best free-throw shooters in the field are Siena (78.9), Evansville (77.2), Miami of Ohio (76.2) and Detroit (75.7). That could make for some early-round upsets.
G is for Gonzaga. The Bulldogs haven't been in the tournament since they put a mild scare into Maryland back in 1995. Led by hot-shooting guard Matt Santangelo, who scored 34 in his team's bid-clinching win, Gonzaga could give Minnesota all it can handle.
H is for Huskies. Not Washington, but Connecticut. This is Jim Calhoun's best chance to finally get the albatross off his neck and fans from Stamford to Storrs off his back for never having coached in the Final Four.
I for Indiana. The basketball-crazy state will again be the focal point of attention for the first two rounds. Not only are Indiana, Purdue, Valparaiso and Evansville in the field, but the RCA Dome -- it's still the Hoosier Dome to many -- will be a South Regional site.
J is for Jonesboro, the little town in Arkansas that has been transformed from the center of the tragedy that took place with the shooting of the schoolchildren last summer to the triumph of the hometown Arkansas State Indians and their championship in the Sun Belt tournament.
K is for Kentucky. The defending national champions go in with their confidence renewed by their third straight SEC tournament championship. But their chance of a fourth straight Final Four depends on the play of seniors Wayne Turner, Scott Pad- gett and Heshimu Evans.
L is for luck. Teams need a certain amount of it throughout the tournament. Georgia Tech had it in 1990, when the Yellow Jackets got some extra time on a malfunctioning clock. Duke had it in 1992, when Kentucky failed to guard the inbounds pass that was thrown to Christian Laettner.
M is for Mount St. Mary's, which delivered legendary coach Jim Phelan his 800th victory by beating Central Connecticut State in the Northeast Conference final. It is also for monumental, which is what it would be if the Mountaineers beat Michigan State in the first round.
N is for N'diaye. Pronounced "Jy," it is the last name of Auburn's junior center, Mamadou, and Delaware's junior center, Ndongo. Hopefully, they'll acquit themselves with more class than North Carolina's Makhtar did last year at the Final Four, when he falsely accused a Utah player of directing a racial slur at him.
O is for Odom. Not Dave, who's getting used to being snubbed and having to prepare Wake Forest for the NIT. In this case, it's for Lamar, the talented Rhode Island freshman who hit the winning three-pointer against Temple in the Atlantic 10 final to give the Rams new life.
P is for point guards. You need a good one to survive in this tournament. All four top seeds have one: William Avery at Duke, Mateen Cleaves at Michigan State, Khalid El-Amin at Connecticut and Doc Robinson at Auburn. But the best in the field might be Ohio State's Scoonie Penn and Utah's Andre Miller.
Q is for Quincy. Two years ago, as a relatively unknown sophomore, Quincy Lewis helped Minnesota beat UCLA in the West Regional final to secure a berth in the Final Four. Now the Gophers will be counting on the 6-foot-7 senior forward, the Big Ten's leading scorer this season, to help get them by Gonzaga in the opening round.
R is for run-and-gun. It's a style that has produced the last five national champions, starting with Arkansas in 1994 and ending with the second of Kentucky's two titles in a three-year stretch last year. The South Regional is filled with racehorse teams, led by Auburn and Maryland. But the Tigers and Terrapins could be slowed by the plodders from the Big 12 (Oklahoma State) and Big Ten (Indiana)
S is for Siena. The Saints are back in the tournament for the first time in 10 years, when they upset Stanford in the first round. This time they'd like to march into the second round with an upset of Arkansas in Denver.
T is for Terry. Arizona's Jason Terry was called the best sixth man in college basketball when he helped the Wildcats win the 1997 national championship as a sophomore. Now a senior, Terry might be the national Player of the Year.
U is for underdogs, of which there are many. The biggest has to be Florida A&M.; One of five tournament first-timers in the field and the only team with a losing record, too bad the 12-18 Rattlers (a 45-point underdog to Duke) can't bring their marching band to Charlotte.
V is for Valparaiso. Or Viskovic. The Crusaders and their talented 6-11 center, Zoran Viskovic, could be a first-round threat to Maryland's prolonged survival. But Valpo was last year's Cinderella, and in these kind of stories, the shoe usually fits only once.
W is for Winthrop: The Eagles were a dismal 7-20 last season before coach Gregg Marshall came over from Marshall University, junior point guard Tyson Waterman returned from a one-year hiatus at Winston-Salem State and the Eagles went 21-7, winning the Big South tournament for their first NCAA tournament bid.
X is for X-factor. Coaches will talk about it in their pre- and post-game news conferences. Sure it's a stretch, but Xavier didn't make it. The Musketeers were, uh, X-ed out, losing early in the Atlantic 10 tournament.
Y is for Yegor Mescheriakov, the 6-8 forward who teams with Shawnta Rogers to give George Washington a potent inside-outside offensive threat. The senior from Belarus averages 17.4 points and a team-best 6.8 rebounds.
Z is for zzzzz. The regular season was fairly uneventful, and there were few memorable games during the conference tournaments. It doesn't bode well for anybody upsetting Duke between now and March 29. The prediction here is the Blue Devils in six relatively easy games.
Pub Date: 3/11/99