re: Arkansas basketball about to land 3rd 5* of the 2022 class.

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I know it's a homer take, but I believe Duke wins the natty this year. We played our guts out and they just bulldozed us anyway. It could have been closer with better execution on our part, but 9 times out of 10 that Duke team beats us.

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Don't think it is at all. Since the 2nd half tipped against Michigan State they've been playing at an absolute elite level. They've both shown toughness (Texas Tech after getting punched in the mouth early) and an absolutely sky high offensive ceiling (2nd half TT, whole Arkansas game). I thought Arkansas played a fantastic first half on both ends of the floor and they were down 12 frickin points. They battled for 10 minutes in the 2nd half but eventually the weight of Duke's shot making just kind of wore them down and bad shots and miscues started coming in bunches.

That UNC game will just be an absolute mental strainer, though. The amount of monumental, historical things attached to that game would make even the most mentally tough players have a little bit of pause. Will be really interesting to see how that game plays out.

We lost by nine. We lost last year's Elite Eight by nine to the eventual NC. Wouldn't that just be poetic?

But last year, I'm pretty sure Baylor's nine point victory against us was actually the closest anyone played them all tournament. That's not true with Duke.