College Basketball: Faults at the Top

San Antonio may very will wind up covered in blue when the NCAA tournament concludes this season. Memphis, UCLA, North Carolina, Duke, and Kansas—four of the nation's top five teams—have the color in common. However, blue might actually be a more accurate description of the way some of these teams will feel as March concludes. None of the nation's top teams are without faults.

In fact, the top two—Duke and Memphis—have such glaring weaknesses that it would be hard to say they are really even favorites to be cutting down the nets in San Antonio.

You would think that championship caliber basketball teams don't miss 20 free throws in one single game, but Memphis did against UTEP earlier this season. You would think championship caliber teams would be able to easily put away an opponent when holding a double digit lead in the game's final minutes, but, if the Memphis Tigers are indeed a true championship caliber basketball team, you would be wrong.

No Memphis lead is safe thanks to the opportunity their dreadful free throw shooting provieds opponents. This will certainly be the case in March. Inevitably, their pourous free throw shooting will catch up to them. As good as the Tigers are on the defensive end, from beyong the arc, and on the boards, it's their inability to execute one of the most fundamental aspects of basketball that will be their undoing.

Take their most recent tilt with Houston for example. The Tigers won by nine points, a margin that should have been much larger. However, when you go to the free throw line 32 times and miss 13 of those shots, you're leaving a lot of points at the door for your opponent to take advantage of.

Thus far, nobody has been able to fully walk through the numerous doors left open by the Tigers, but you've got to think it's coming. By the time we hit March and some of the nation's top teams (which are not found in Conference USA, by the way) are playing at their best, somebody will be ready to capitalize on the Tigers' major shortcomings.

Only one Tiger is shooting above 70 percent from the charity stripe. Memphis can't even put a couple of reliable guys on the floor late in games to keep the ball in their hands and help ice away basketball games.

John Calipari will face quite a few major decisions late in games about which five guys to put on the floor. Leading rebounder Joey Dorsey shoots below 40 percent from the line. Can you afford to have that kind of liability out there? At the same time, don't you want your best rebounder on the court at the close of games to prevent opponents from getting multiple shots per possession?

The Tigers leading scorer, Chris Douglas-Roberts, and primary ball handler, Derrick Rose, both shoot below 70 percent as well. Factor in that Rose is a freshman and you've got to wonder how the Tigers are going to handle late game situations. 

You're currently logged into Facebook

Do you want to share your Bleacher Report activity on Facebook?