Final Four 2015: Biggest Storylines to Watch

The 2015 NCAA men's Final Four might produce some of the best games of the entire college basketball season, but it's definitely going to deliver some incredible storylines no matter the outcome.

The collection of programs and coaches is perhaps the best that has ever been assembled at the national semifinals. Even the worst remaining team has been to seven of the past 17 Final Fours and boasts one of the greatest coaches of this generation.

And then you have the players. In all likelihood, the Wooden Award winner and first runner-up will be playing on Saturday night, and there will be as many as nine first-round draft picks in action.

However, whether Kentucky goes undefeated or fails to do so will inevitably be the most discussed thing this weekend.

Might as well get started there.

Will Kentucky Go Undefeated?

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As you may have heard once or twice over the past couple of months, Kentucky is trying to become the first undefeated national champion since the 1976 Indiana Hoosiers.

What you may not have heard is that it's anything other than a foregone conclusion.

That's because one of the best-kept secrets of this season is that Kentucky didn't play a particularly daunting schedule.

Sure, compared to what Wichita State faced in 2013-14, Kentucky ran the gauntlet and back again. Games against Kansas, North Carolina and Louisville in advance of 21 games against the SEC are considerably more challenging than the games those Shockers had against Saint Louis, Tennessee, Alabama and BYU.

However, the Wildcats only went up against one team during the regular season that earned better than a No. 4 seed in the tournament, and that was the game against an atypically young Kansas team less than a week after the season began.

Truth be told, Notre Dame in the Elite Eight was unequivocally the most difficult team Kentucky faced this season, and this Saturday's game against Wisconsin is going to be even tougher.

To finish the job, Kentucky would need to go through Wisconsin and probably Duke—arguably the two best teams in the country not named "Kentucky." Because of those two games alone, no one would ever be able to say that the 40-0 Wildcats didn't earn their stripes.

We bring up the level of difficulty of the first 38 games to provide contrast to the challenge that lies ahead. Kentucky can and should finish the job, but we're not nearly "Bet 150 bones to win 100 bones" confident, and those are the listed odds for Kentucky to win it all according to OddsShark.

Is This Tom Izzo's Best Coaching Job Ever?

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Let's take a brief trip down memory lane to one month ago.

Michigan State was 19-10 with no RPI Top 30 wins, no RPI Top 125 nonconference wins and bad losses to Texas Southern, Nebraska and Minnesota. Plain and simple, the Spartans were a bubble team.

But Tom Izzo was still sculpting his masterpiece.

Matt Costello and Gavin Schilling evolved from guys who didn't belong on the court for 15 minutes per game to guys who could play 30 minutes without being liabilities. Denzel Valentine went from a turnover-prone point forward who sometimes excelled in various categories to a reliable ball-handler who stuffs the box score on a nightly basis.

Travis Trice struggled to find his stroke at points throughout the season, but he has been a three-point assassin when his team has needed him in the tournament.

Add it all up, and the Spartans—who in mid-February really began to embrace the defensive, slow-tempo nature of this season—have been playing significantly better basketball than they were a few months ago, and that's a testament to an excellent coaching job by Izzo.

With all due respect to this year's roster, this is unquestionably the least talented of Izzo's seven Final Four teams. Just look at this year's mock drafts. DraftExpress has Branden Dawson at No. 96 on its list of the top 100 prospects. He's the only Spartan on the list. Meanwhile, Duke, Kentucky and Wisconsin each have at least three players ranked in the top 30.

That fact is not lost on Izzo either, as before his team's win over Louisville in the Elite Eight, he told Paul Schwartz of the New York Post, “I think, to be blunt about it, [making the Final Four] would be one of the greatest things we’ve done at Michigan State.’’

In years past, Izzo had first-round picks such as Mateen Cleaves, Morris Peterson, Jason Richardson and Zach Randolph, but there's not a player on this roster who is ready for the NBA. What he has been able to do after losing Gary Harris, Adreian Payne, Keith Appling and even Kenny Kaminski from last year's roster is nothing short of incredible.

Can Wisconsin Get Redemption?

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Frank Kaminsky and Sam Dekker came back to school for one reason: to win the national championship that Aaron Harrison stole from them one year ago.

It's just perfect that the Badgers get another shot at Kentucky in the national semifinals.

Most of us never get a chance to face our demons. I still have nightmares about free throws, line drives and penalty kicks that I missed more than a decade ago while playing meaningless games for a high school that not one of you has ever heard of. I couldn't even imagine the pain of being continuously reminded of a blown opportunity at a national championship.

Wisconsin gets a chance to not only exorcise those demons but also inject some of its own into the team on a quest for perfection.

Everything about Wisconsin's season has been about this game. If the Badgers could trade in their Big Ten titles and Kaminsky's likely Wooden Award for a national championship, they would do it without a moment's hesitation.

They may be goofy, fun-loving guys 99 percent of the time, but you better believe they'll be seriously focused on the task that awaits them on Saturday night.

They have only been thinking about it every day for the past year.

Who Will Win the Wooden Award and Most Outstanding Player?

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It's not very often that the best player in the country plays for the team that wins the national championship. In the past 38 seasons since the inception of the Wooden Award, it has only happened six times—and in five of those six seasons, the Wooden Award winner was also named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player.

It has only happened twice in the past 19 years—Anthony Davis for Kentucky in 2012 and Shane Battier for Duke in 2001.

But there's a pretty good chance it could happen again this year.

Duke's Jahlil Okafor, Kentucky's Willie Cauley-Stein and Wisconsin's Frank Kaminsky were named three of the four finalists for the Naismith Trophy on March 19 and are among the 10 remaining candidates for the Wooden Award, as well.

Unfortunately, voting for the Wooden Award ended on March 23, so we could be headed for an awkward situation where either Kaminsky or Okafor destroys the other in the national championship game only for the loser to be named the Wooden Award winner.

Regardless, what an unbelievable collection of talent we'll have on display for the final three games of the season. In addition to the aforementioned Wooden Award candidates, there's Duke's Justise Winslow and Tyus Jones, Wisconsin's Sam Dekker and Kentucky's entire roster.

According to Gary Bedore of KUSports.com, there were more than 60 NBA executives and scouts on hand for the Champions Classic back in November. If there aren't at least 150 in the stands on Saturday night, it just might be the biggest surprise of the tournament.

Best Coaching Quartet Ever?

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Throughout the years, the Final Four has produced more than its fair share of incredible groups of head coaches.

Three seasons ago, John Calipari, Rick Pitino, Bill Self and Thad Matta blessed us with their presence. Three years before that, it was Jim Calhoun, Roy Williams, Tom Izzo and Jay Wright. And who can forget the star-studded cast of Izzo, Gary Williams, Mike Krzyzewski and Lute Olson in 2001?

But you probably have to go back to 1991 to find a quartet of coaches that really stacks up against this year's. Roy Williams was just getting started back then, but he, Krzyzewski, Dean Smith and Jerry Tarkanian have all won at least 750 games in their respective careers. We'll probably never again witness a collection of legendary coaches in the national semifinals quite like that one.

We'll merely have to settle for the best assemblage of coaches in more than 20 years.

Krzyzewski (1,016 wins), Calipari (635), Izzo (495) and Bo Ryan (386) have combined for 2,532 wins. They have a combined career winning percentage of 75.2 percent and have now been to 27 Final Fours.

ESPN ranked all four of them in the top seven among best active head coaches back in July.

Regardless of which team is cutting down the nets on Monday night, we will spend the next few days talking about where that coach ranks on the list of the all-time greats.

Will Big Ten Finally Win Another Title?

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Once upon a time, the Big Ten won basketball championships on the regular. From 1976 to 1989, the Big Ten won five out of 14 national titles.

In the 25 years since then, the conference has won precisely one national championship—and the 2000 Michigan State Spartans should be thankful that Cincinnati's Kenyon Martin broke his leg before the tournament and that Florida, North Carolina and Wisconsin knocked the other three No. 1 seeds out before the Elite Eight.

It hasn't been for lack of opportunity, either. Since 1990, the Big Ten has been represented in the Final Four 20 times. This year actually marks the fifth time during the past quarter century that the Big Ten has two teams in the Final Four, giving the conference "dual representation" more often than any other conference.

But the other leagues have been the ones cutting down all the nets. The ACC has eight titles in the past 25 years. The SEC has six, and the Big East has five.

It almost seems like a cruel joke that the Big Ten has been so successful for the first 20 weeks of each season yet so snake-bitten with all the marbles on the line. Both Michigan State and Wisconsin will be looking to break that curse, but it's going to be an uphill battle with most expecting Duke and Kentucky to be in the title game.

Will Anyone Be Able to Score?

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Forget about the unstoppable force; what happens when an immovable object meets an immovable object?

Defense has been the name of the game this season, and three of these four teams have been defending as well as any squad in the tournament. And the one that hasn't (Wisconsin) is the one that is renowned for being such an efficient defense for the past decade-plus.

Through four games, Kentucky has held its opponents to 53.0 points per game. Duke isn't far behind at 53.5. Michigan State has allowed 61.3 points per game—including an overtime contest against Louisville. And Wisconsin is the oddball, letting its offense do the talking while giving up 71.8 points per game.

To be fair, much of that is due to the paths these teams have taken.

Duke's played against a No. 16 seed (Robert Morris), a No. 8 seed that struggled to score all year long (San Diego State) and two games in NRG Stadium in Houston where jump shots go to die. Kentucky's path was pretty similar, going through a No. 16 seed (Hampton) and two teams that didn't shoot well at all this season (Cincinnati and West Virginia) before that riveting game against Notre Dame.

Even Michigan State had a low-scoring path as a No. 7 seed, going through Georgia, Virginia, Oklahoma and Louisville—not one of which was exactly known for lighting up the scoreboard this season.

Wisconsin had it rough, facing three consecutive opponents (Oregon, North Carolina and Arizona) that rank in the top 20 nationally in adjusted offensive efficiency.

But the fact remains that these teams—particularly Duke and Kentucky—have been shutting down opponents for the past couple of weeks.

Will that trend continue? Better yet, would it actually be good for the future of college hoops if we get a couple of brutally low-scoring games between elite teams, resulting in significant rule changes this summer?

Will Duke vs. Kentucky Come to Fruition?

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Duke and Kentucky haven't exactly gone out of their way to schedule games against one another in recent years. Duke's 75-68 win in the 2012 Champions Classic was the only time since 2001 that the blue bloods have squared off.

Yet, for the past several months, everyone has wanted to see the game between the two teams that produced the most memorable moment in NCAA tournament history.

Put it this way: When ESPN announced back in November that it would be releasing the I Hate Christian Laettner documentary this March, it wasn't hoping for Duke vs. Wisconsin, or Kentucky vs. Michigan State in the national championship.

For so many reasons, a Duke vs. Kentucky title game might be the most-watched game in the history of college basketball.

Per Jason McIntyre of the Big Lead: 

"Based on the ratings for the 1st weekend of the tournament—the most-watched game was Wichita State vs Kansas, followed by Kentucky vs Cincinnati—and the selection committee putting Duke on the other half of the tournament, I still wouldn’t be surprised if Kentucky vs. Duke approached the 25-30 million viewers figure. "

First off, the Blue Devils and Wildcats have two of the biggest—if not the two biggest—fanbases in the entire nation. It is almost required that you either love or hate each of these programs, so there should be millions tuning in just to root for the lesser of two evils.

Second, there's Kentucky's quest for perfection. If you're not watching the game solely because you either love or hate one of these teams with every fiber of your being, you're watching so you can bear witness to history—whether it's Kentucky becoming the first team to go 40-0 or the first team to go 39-1.

But the real reason we want to see this game is "The Shot." We see the replay at least 100 times every March, and we would see it at least 100 times in the 48 hours leading up to this showdown. These two teams produced a once-in-a-generation moment 23 years ago, and we're greedily hopeful they can do it again.

Kerry Miller covers college basketball for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @kerrancejames.