College Basketball in the Path of Totality

In this week's episode of The Wisconsin Sportscast, Mike Lucas and Tom Oates debrief the men’s and women’s NCAA championship games. Purdue and Iowa both lost to UConn and South Carolina respectively, but at least the Big Ten was represented in the finals of both tournaments. 

“I think what happened — if you want to draw parallels between the two —  is they both ran into a really good team,” says Oates, the former Wisconsin State Journal sports columnist. “South Carolina is deep and they are good. And the UConn men’s team is a complete team. They waltzed through this tournament two years in a row and that just doesn’t happen.”

Lucas notes that you can’t blame Big Ten stars Zach Edey and Caitlin Clark. They both scored 30 points (or more) in the finals.

“The Boilermakers had eight assists on 24 makes. All eight assists belong to one player, Brandon Smith. Nobody else had an assist in the game!” says Lucas, a Cap Times sports freelance writer and former radio color analyst for the Badgers. “I wish Clark would have had a little help in that title game. The South Carolina bench outscored Iowa by 37 points.”

Also on the podcast, the veteran journalists examine why the Milwaukee Bucks aren’t clicking this season. Finally, Lucas and Oates discuss the solar eclipse.

“I never heard that phrase before, the path of totality,” says Oates. “I’ve also heard it called the zone of totality.” 

“The zone of totality?” responds Lucas. “There’s no way that’s played in Wisconsin basketball.” 

The Wisconsin Sportscast with Lucas & Oates is a Cap Times podcast produced by Dylan Brogan. Find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

A weekly podcast with insights and analysis on the Wisconsin Badgers, Milwaukee Brewers, Green Bay Packers and Milwaukee Bucks from two of Wisconsin’s most experienced sports journalists. Mike Lucas is a veteran sports columnist for the Cap Times and was a Badgers radio color commentator for over 25 years. Tom Oates was a sports reporter and columnist for the Wisconsin State Journal for 40 years.