City of Basketball Love

Stephen Pianovich (@SPianovich)
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So maybe you have tickets to the East Regional games this weekend and are bummed Villanova is playing 600 miles away. Maybe you’re just a hoops addict who is watching the games at home and your favorite team is out of it.

Whatever the case may be, four teams – all of whom have either a national following, recent success or both – will battle it out for a spot in the Final Four this weekend at the Wells Fargo Center. Can’t figure out who to cheer for? This guide is here to help out with a reason to root for and root against Notre Dame, Wisconsin, North Carolina and Indiana.

Notre Dame

Reason to root for the Irish: They have local connections.

Notre Dame has the most Philly flavor among the four squads in town. Steve Vasturia, who has developed into one of the best shooters in the nation, went to St. Joe’s Prep and grew up cheering on Allen Iverson at 76ers games. His teammate, Matt Farrell hails from Pt. Pleasant Beach, N.J., and spoke of the east coast giving him his toughness on Thursday. The Irish also have assistant coach Martin Ingelsby on their bench. Ingelsby is from Berwyn, Pa. and had a successful basketball career at Archbishop Carroll before playing at Notre Dame.

Reason to root against the Irish: Chris Christie is a huge Notre Dame fan.

Philly fans will not want to side with the New Jersey governor, not after his multiple – and unfortunately unforgettable – celebrations in Jerry Jones’ private suite at Cowboys games.

Christie is longtime friends with Notre Dame coach Mike Brey, and his daughter is one of the team’s managers, so at least his love of the Irish makes some sense. But still, factor in his 31 percent approval rating among New Jersey residents and it’s hard for most south Jersey or Philly residents to be on his side.

Wisconsin

Reason to root for the Badgers: They’re the biggest underdog here.

Yes, Wisconsin has been to the past two Final Fours but they’re the lowest seed (7) and probably have the best story of any team in Philly for the weekend. Also, the “they win all the time” card could be played against all four teams, so it doesn’t work. A little more than two months ago, Wisconsin was 9-9, the team’s head coach to start the season had retired and it looked like if it was getting back to a Final Four, it’d be in the NIT. But the Badgers have won 13 of their last 16 and Bronson Koenig hit one of the best shots of the NCAA Tournament to beat Xavier.

Reason to root against the Badgers: Their bus clogged up Center City traffic.

Driving in Center City is no fun to begin with, and it’s no help when a giant coach bus is jammed on 17th and Market, which apparently was the case yesterday afternoon. Maybe the Badgers should take a page out of Temple’s book and just take the subway to their game.

North Carolina

Reason to root for the Tar Heels: They have a lot of star power.

As you’d expect with a team like North Carolina, they have a few of the most-talked-about players in college basketball. The Tar Heels leading scorer, Brice Johnson, is a double-double machine averaging 16.8 points and 10.5 rebounds per game. They also have point guard Marcus Paige, and despite his numbers being down and some injuries, he can still be one of the most electric players in college basketball. On the sideline, Roy Williams is the only head coach of the four to ever win a national title.

Reason to root against the Tar Heels: You want everyone else’s bracket to go up in flames.

You might be like a lot of people – 22.3 percent, according to ESPN – who picked Michigan State to win it all and lost your bracket pool and maybe some money on the second day of the tournament. Or maybe you thought Duke would repeat or Kentucky would make a run. Either way, you didn’t pick North Carolina and a lot of people did (14.6 percent). An Indiana upset on Friday would wreck quite a few more brackets, giving those in March misery some needed company.

Indiana

Reason to root for the Hoosiers: Tom Crean respects the hell out of Philadelphia basketball.

Indiana’s coach takes his fair share of lumps here on the World Wide Web, but he’s taken Indiana to a regular season Big Ten title and now a Sweet 16. He also isn’t joking about how much he respects Philly and its hoops. Here’s just part of the long answer he gave when he was asked about Philadelphia as a basketball city on Thursday:

“I wish we could take (players) and tour the Spectrum. We should go take a picture outside in the lot there. We had a great day today. We went and practiced at the Palestra. And they understand how big that is to me. That's a bucket-list deal for me for us to be able to get in there. And that was fantastic.

"But they know the history. And they see the pictures, because the Sports Illustrated cover of Isaiah Thomas hangs in our locker room in a full-sized poster. And they know the history. And they're basketball fans, so they understand that Philadelphia has got great basketball -- it's one of the great basketball cities in the world let alone the United States, and not just because of the history but because of the way people keep honoring the tradition by the great teams that are here and by the fact that so many really good players and coaches keep coming out of this area.”

Reason to root against Indiana: You really like chairs.

Chairs are great. I’m sitting in one right now. And honestly, it’s not even that great of a chair, but I still love it. This is way better than standing. So it’s tough to cheer for a program which had its most famous coach treat these valued pieces of everyday life so rudely. (Also, you should root against the Hoosiers if you don’t like stripes)