NCAA Men's Tournament Capsules: Bracketed brothers make tournament a family affair

With one son playing on the East Coast and the other playing out West, Nate Dahlman came up with a game plan to keep the madness out of his March.

He won’t attend either game.

Eartha Rigsby, on the other hand, has a different dilemma. Her sons are key players for Vermont and Syracuse, who happen to face each other Friday in the first round of the NCAA tournament. The way she sees it, her only choice is to sit proudly in the stands and cheer for, well, everyone.

"Everything is a blessing," Rigsby said. "There are no losers here."

The NCAA selection committee has long had a knack for tucking intriguing coaching matchups and long-festering feuds inside the brackets. This year, though, it’s all about the strange twists and turns of family.

Rigsby’s sons, Kris and Maurice Joseph, will suit up for the Orange and Catamounts, who play in Buffalo, N.Y., in a 1 vs. 16 matchup.

Dalhman’s sons, Isaiah and Noah, play for Michigan State and Wofford — two teams that couldn’t be farther apart when they take the court Friday. Michigan State plays in Spokane, Wash., and Wofford is in Jacksonville, Fla.

Their father, meanwhile, will be in Minneapolis coaching his two daughters, Hannah and Rebekah, when Braham Area High plays Pipestone in the semifinals of the Class 2A girls state tournament.

"Being a coach, my main focus is taking care of the high school team here," Dahlman said. "That’s our journey. I’m part of that, as are the girls. The boys are on their journey. I’m rooting for them, of course. But if I don’t get to be part of that, that’s OK."

Dahlman has three decades of teaching under his belt in the town of Braham, population 1,655 (The Homemade Pie Capital of Minnesota). He describes his town as a one-grocery-store stopover that happens to produce a lot of good basketball players.

Braham’s Josh Vaughan was a star on the North Dakota State team that made an inspiring run to the tournament last year. There are the Dahlman boys — Isaiah highly recruited and Noah less so, but still leading Wofford at 16.8 points a game. Then, there are the Dahlman girls. Hannah, a junior, could play at a smaller Division I or Division II school while Rebekah, a freshman, is already drawing interest from the Big Ten and elsewhere.

"What’s the secret?" Nate Dahlman said. "We work hard. We practice hard. There’s not a lot to do except come to the gym and play basketball. It’s sort of a Minnesota version of Hoosiers. The kids come to the gym. They all grew up with it since kindergarten."

He says his family lives a simple life. They got rid of the TV when it broke a few years ago and, viola, suddenly found themselves playing games, interacting, talking to each other more. There are two other boys, Jonah and Zachariah. Raising six kids on a teacher’s salary doesn’t leave lots of room for discretionary spending, and so, the trips to see the boys play are infrequent.

Earlier this season, though, Michigan State coach Tom Izzo put Wofford on the schedule as a way of holding a little family reunion. The Dahlmans piled in the car, drove 12-13 hours to East Lansing and watched the Spartans win 72-60. Isaiah got the start and scored two points in 12 minutes. Noah started, too, and had 19 points in 26 minutes.

Dad has a sense of what Rigsby and her family can expect when her sons meet in Buffalo.

"They hugged each other at center court, they got announced at the same time," Dahlman said of his boys’ game. "There were tears coming down my face. It was very, very special. It’s hard to explain that. You really can’t put it into words."

Rigsby, who lives in Montreal where, she promises, there’s every bit as much youth basketball going on as hockey, said she’s been walking around with a smile on her face since the pairings were announced Sunday night.

Almost as soon as that happened, Kris, the younger brother at Syracuse, called Maurice, the older brother at Vermont.

"We were both pretty much going crazy on the phone. No words, just screaming. I don’t know how we communicated," Kris Joseph said.

They have not faced each other in a real game with real referees since Kris was 8. Maurice’s team won that day. Not surprisingly, Maurice beat up on Kris pretty bad in driveways and playgrounds for years afterward, as well. Every younger brother knows that pain.

"I’ve got all types of permanent bruises on my body because of him," Kris said.

Then, Kris started growing, and things evened out. He enrolled at Syracuse, where he has averaged 11.3 points and more than five rebounds in his sophomore year. He’s this season’s Big East sixth man of the year.

Maurice, meanwhile, started his college career at Michigan State but was looking for a change of scenery and a place where he could play more. So, he sat out a year, then went to Vermont, where he’s the second-leading scorer (14.5), and will find himself in a strange position against his younger brother: Playing the role of underdog.

"Maurice was more driven for the love of the game than Kristopher was at a young age," their mother said. "But Kristopher developed into a strong competitor. As the younger brother, you want to do everything your older brother is doing."

Nothing like doing it together, in the case of the Joseph boys.

Or doing it apart, in the case of the Dahlmans.

Nate and his daughters will be on the bus Friday at around the time Noah’s game — Wofford vs. Wisconsin — reaches full swing. They’ll be on the court at about the time Isaiah’s game — Michigan State vs. New Mexico State — tips off.

Winners and losers?

"You’re probably asking the wrong guy," Dahlman said. "Whatever happens, happens. One thing we know is that the sun always comes up again, no matter what."

Commentary: NCAA tourney teams get grades; summer school next?

Some six years after the NCAA warned members to get serious about graduating student-athletes or lose scholarships and face a postseason ban, here’s the list of Division I schools that have been sent to sit in the corner at tournament time: Centenary.

If Education Secretary Arne Duncan had his way, the list wouldn’t have ended with one school. It would have had an even dozen names on it, including luminaries such as Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisville and Maryland.

Duncan, a White House insider and basketball-playing buddy of President Barack Obama, is too politically savvy to believe his proposal is going anywhere. But that didn’t stop him from asking the question.

"One out of five men’s teams in the NCAA tournament has graduated less than 40 percent of their players in recent years. If you can’t manage to graduate two out of five players," Duncan said, "how serious are the institution and the coach about their players’ academic success?"

NCAA spokesman Bob Williams began answering him Thursday by reiterating that the organization feels Duncan’s pain. It just doesn’t like the way he did the math.

According to the NCAA’s calculations, seven of the dozen schools on Duncan’s list would have been OK and five would have been on probation.

"We feel like we’ve got a better measurement of what’s happening right now," Williams said.

He’s right. Duncan’s 40 percent figure is based on a measure called the Graduation Success Rate (GSR). It tracked the progress of ballplayers from four entering freshman classes during a six-year period beginning in 1999.

But when the NCAA metes out justice, it uses the Academic Progress Rate (APR), which measures how a school is performing over the last four years. Programs are graded each year on how many athletes are academically eligible and making progress toward a degree. Failing grades for consecutive years opens up a school to sanctions.

What’s wrong, no matter which measurement you use, is that the NCAA and the university presidents who control it aren’t doing enough. Besides banning Centenary from this year’s tournament, the NCAA has taken scholarships away from Georgia Tech, Tennessee and New Mexico State. That’s it.

"These aren’t NBA teams, they’re college teams. Let’s not forget that," said Richard Lapchick, director of the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida. "The universities they’re attached to are supposed to educate everybody who walks through their doors."

It was Lapchick’s research, in part, that spurred Duncan’s proposal earlier this week, particularly the disparities between graduation rates for black and white players. And Duncan comes by his concerns honestly.

He learned the game at playgrounds on Chicago’s tough South Side, then played college ball at Harvard and professionally in Australia before returning to his hometown to run the school system. He knows firsthand what it did for him and any number of others, including Kansas senior point guard Sherron Collins.

"He’s a kid I’ve played with since he was a freshman in high school," Duncan told USA Today. "He’s a winner. I watched him mature, and I’ve seen what he’s accomplished."

To be fair, the NCAA push to boost athletes’ performance in the classroom has produced plenty of similar success stories. Lapchick noted that athletes are more than keeping up with the rest of the student body and that their grades have improved across the board. Even the troubling gap between white and black students is narrowing.

What bothers him still is why there isn’t more pressure brought to bear. Few of the kids who dazzle the nation during the next few weeks will matriculate to the NBA. For too many, a college scholarship is their one and only chance they’ll get to cash in on their skills.

"Obviously, our problems with education are a lot bigger than just the universities. Some of the kids they’re getting, especially from some urban high school districts, don’t arrive ready to compete with regular students. But that’s what education is about," Lapchick said. "The point, ultimately, should be to graduate these kids."

The average student now takes 5 1/2 years to graduate from college. Recognizing that, a number of schools are effectively guaranteeing student-athletes a fifth year on scholarship.

If the NCAA wants to demonstrate its seriousness, making that practice mandatory — simply adding a few lines to an already overcrowded rulebook — would be a good place to start.

Jim Litke is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at jlitke@ap.org.

Notebook: Syracuse C Onuaku ruled out of tournament opener

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim didn’t hesitate: Orange center Arinze Onuaku won’t play Friday night against Vermont in the first round of the NCAA tournament.

"He’s still very sore," Boeheim said Thursday. "He’s getting better. He’s being treated. He’s still got pain when he puts pressure on his leg, so we’ve been practicing and playing and thinking that he would not be able to play tomorrow night. Beyond that, we still don’t know."

Onuaku crashed to the floor with an injured right quadriceps last week in the waning minutes against Georgetown in the quarterfinals of the Big East tournament.

"The hardest thing is this is my senior year, this is my team," said Onuaku, the school’s career leader in field-goal percentage (64.9) who averages 10.7 points and 5.2 rebounds. "To not be on the floor with them is tough."

Onuaku said he is without pain and the swelling has gone down. It was apparent when he walked courtside during the team shootaround at HSBC Arena, laughing and joking with assistant coach Rob Murphy after signing some autographs.

"His presence is going to carry us," said forward Wes Johnson, the Big East player of the year. "Him being on the sideline and being the leader is going to help us. If we keep winning, he’ll eventually get back."

STAYING POWER: DePaul, Seton Hall and Iowa are already hiring, and a few other schools are sure to be in the market for a new coach in the coming weeks, too.

One guy they can forget about calling? Oakland coach Greg Kampe.

In a profession where a five-year stop is practically a lifetime, Kampe is in his 26th season at the school in Rochester, Mich., a suburb of Detroit. Only four other active coaches have longer tenures.

"It really comes back down to the grass is always greener on the other side," Kampe said Thursday in Milwaukee, where his 14th-seeded Golden Grizzlies were preparing to play third-seeded Pittsburgh in the first round of the NCAA tournament.

"I come from Defiance, Ohio — little town. My dad put fertilizer on his yard and he tried to make it as green as he could make it," Kampe said. "This is my job; not to chase other jobs, but to do my job as best I can. And I really view that my job is to make Oakland a special place."

Kampe would be an attractive candidate to many schools. He’s won 58 percent of his games (445-322) at Oakland, which moved to Division I in 1999, and has eight 20-win seasons. Oakland’s 26 wins this season are a school record.

This is their second appearance in the NCAA tournament; they won the opening-round game in 2005 before losing to top-seeded North Carolina.

"When I’m done with this thing, I hope that people think it’s a special place that kids want to go there," the 54-year-old coach said. "And we won a lot of games and we won them in the right way with good people and with good kids."

BIG RED JOKE: Those Cornell guys are smart. Funny, too.

Guard Louis Dale, center Jeff Foote and forward Jon Jaques were hamming it up before their news conference Thursday and agreed that whoever took the first question would give an answer so far off base that everyone in the room would question their Ivy League schooling.

It worked.

The opening question was about balancing education and basketball, and the response?

"Well, we had a tremendous ride in. The police escort was fun. I think we’re a very good team, a very capable team. It’s really anybody’s game," Foote said.

The trio smiled through their little prank as they received some puzzled looks from the audience. Dale didn’t let the joke linger, though. He jumped in just as Foote finished and got the session back on course.

"I’ll just cover for Jeff real quick," he said. "I think we find a way to balance it out pretty well, just time management, focusing on that."

PHILLY PRIDE: A proud tradition of Philadelphia-reared college coaches is well represented in Jacksonville, Fla., where Temple’s Fran Dunphy, Cornell’s Steve Donahue and Wisconsin’s Bo Ryan are leading three of the eight teams.

"What we should probably tell the audience is anybody from Philly that sits in the stands thinks they’re a coach," Ryan said. "Have you ever met anybody from the area that didn’t think they could coach?"

Dunphy and Donahue, close friends who worked together at Penn before winding up at their current schools, said it’s difficult to avoid falling in love with college basketball while growing up in a city that’s produced so many successful coaches.

"I feel great pride that I’m in that group. You can’t give me a better compliment than to say I’m a Philadelphia guy who came from Philadelphia and coached the way they coach, whatever that is," Donahue said.

BIG SKY TOURNAMENT: There’s a large subset of coaches with University of Montana connections in the first round of the NCAA tournament:

— The Grizzlies, coached by former player Wayne Tinkle, play New Mexico.

— Old Dominion, led by former Montana coach Blaine Taylor, beat Notre Dame.

— California, led by former Grizzlies coach Mike Montgomery, meets Louisville.

— Utah State, led by former Montana coach Stew Morrill, plays Texas A&M.

In addition, former Montana coach Jud Heathcote won a national title at Michigan State, and his protege, Tom Izzo, has led the Spartans into the tournament. Michigan State and Utah State are both playing in Spokane, where Heathcote now lives.

"Jud Heathcote is the godfather of what has been going through Montana," Morrill said. "I heard from all those guys this weekend, including Jud, who calls and gives me grief."

Morrill is taking another path down memory lane in Spokane. He played for two years at Gonzaga, and was an assistant coach there, but doesn’t expect any transfer of loyalty.

"I’m too old, they don’t remember me," Morrill said of the Bulldog fans.

EMBARRASSING NICKNAME: Utah State guard Pooh Williams got a little embarrassed when asked about his unusual name. The product of Federal Way, Wash., is formally known as Earnest, but even his mother doesn’t call him that.

"I had caramel skin color and was real, real fat," Williams said, when pressed for an explanation on Thursday. "She used to call me her pooh bear and it stuck with me and a lot of guys teased me about it."

Williams has averaged 8.8 points for the Aggies this season.

-- John Kekis

Big East takes beating in NCAA opener

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The Big East was a Big Bust on the first day of the NCAA tournament.

Third-seeded Georgetown? Gone. Six seeds Notre Dame and Marquette? Maybe next year.

The No. 2 seed Villanova Wildcats were the only Big East team to advance on Thursday and they needed overtime to get past mid-major Robert Morris.

Georgetown and Villanova put on a pair of uninspired showings in Providence, R.I. — the Big East’s headquarters.

Even President Barack Obama was letdown by the power conference.

Through the first 12 games of the NCAA tournament Thursday, Obama has correctly predicted all but three results in his bracket. All three losses were by teams in the Big East: Georgetown, Notre Dame and Marquette.

The deepest — perhaps most talented — conference in basketball was smacked around by teams from the Mid-American Conference, Colonial Athletic Association, and the Pac-10.

"It doesn’t surprise me, it doesn’t," Ohio coach John Groce said. "There’s just a lot of good teams out there, a lot of good players, a lot of good coaches."

Groce led his 14th-seeded Bobcats to the biggest upset of the day when they handled the Hoyas from start-to-finish in a 97-83 win. They led by as many as 19 points against a maddening Georgetown team that had defeated two NCAA tournament No. 1 seeds this year in Syracuse and Duke.

The Hoyas said all the right things after the game about how every team in the tournament is a threat to win. Still, Georgetown had to be stunned it was heading home while a team they likely had no knowledge of on Selection Sunday was still playing. All the national TV appearances and recruiting perks of playing in the Big East were left meaningless.

"They just had all the answers," Georgetown coach John Thompson said.

There was disappointment all around the Big East.

— Quincy Pondexter drove for a tiebreaking bank shot with 1.7 seconds left to lift 11th-seeded Washington past Marquette.

— Old Dominion held on for a 51-50 victory over Notre Dame for its first NCAA tournament win since 1995.

The Wildcats survived a scare against Northeast Conference champion Robert Morris. Karon Abraham scored 23 points for the Colonials which appeared on the brink of becoming only the fifth No. 15 seed to beat a No. 2 and the first since 2001.

"I think sometimes if you get into a game like that and get embarrassed with a team like that or them outplaying you, that’s going to lose the game for you," Villanova coach Jay Wright said. "If you allow your ego to get involved in a game like that, you’re going to get beat."

It’s not over yet for the conference that placed two teams (Villanova, Connecticut) in last year’s Final Four. No. 1 seed Syracuse, No. 2 seed West Virginia, No. 3 Pittsburgh and No. 9 Louisville can salvage a successful start on Friday.

The Big East is still the only conference to place three teams in the Final Four.

-- Dan Gelston

Big East a bummer for President Obama’s bracket

NEW YORK — The Big East was a big letdown for President Barack Obama.

Obama correctly predicted 12 of the 16 winners on the first day of the NCAA tournament Thursday. Three of the losses were by teams in the Big East: Georgetown, Notre Dame and Marquette, while the other team crossed out on Obama’s bracket was Texas.

Obama had Georgetown reaching the round of eight — like many other pool prognosticators — after filling out a bracket for ESPN for the second straight year. The Hoyas, the No. 3 seed in the Midwest Regional, were stunned by 14th-seeded Ohio 97-83.

Two of the sixth-seeded Big East teams fell to No. 11 seeds. Notre Dame lost to Old Dominion in the South Regional, and Marquette was edged by Washington in the East Regional. Obama had Marquette reaching the round of 16 in his bracket.

He nearly went 0 for 4 with Big East teams as No. 2 seed Villanova survived a big-time scare from No. 15 seed Robert Morris in a 73-70 overtime victory.

Texas, the No. 8 seed in the East, lost to ninth-seeded Wake Forest 81-80 in overtime.

Obama’s West Regional was flawless after Kansas State, Butler, Murray State and BYU won. The First Fan also has his Final Four in tact: Kansas, Kansas State, Kentucky and Villanova.

Last year, Obama correctly picked North Carolina to win the national championship. His bracket ranked 903,125th overall, just above the 80th percentile in the ESPN’s online contest.

Spokane Notebook: Aggies, Pooh and Just-In'Love in Spokane

SPOKANE, Wash. — There's a large subset of coaches with University of Montana connections in the first round of the NCAA tournament:

Elsewhere

Ex-Seton Hall player pleads not guilty in robbery

NEWARK, N.J. — A former Seton Hall basketball player has pleaded not guilty to charges of robbing eight people at gunpoint earlier this week.

Robert Mitchell, who played in 31 games this season for the Pirates, appeared in court in Newark via video conference Thursday. He’s held on $650,000 bail.

His attorney entered the not-guilty plea.

The 23-year-old Brooklyn resident is accused of robbing eight people in a house in South Orange on Monday. Police say Mitchell took credit cards, cell phones, cameras and about $300 cash.

Mitchell had been scheduled to graduate in May. He was kicked off the team Sunday by coach Bobby Gonzalez, who has since been fired. Seton Hall did not give a reason for Mitchell’s dismissal.