The 2012 Hoya's men's basketball team had two excellent leaders in Henry Sims and Jason Clark. All the way from the China brawl to their third round fall to North Carolina State, they were exemplary in their execution to duty as senior leaders and team captains.

Mr. Sims stood tall in the paint attacking the rim, dishing assist , and scoring mid-range jumpers all while setting the offensive rhythm day in and day out. On the defensive side, he showed toughness in the low post by changing opponents shots, clogging up the lanes and snagging rebounds which eliminated all second effort shots. Mr. Clark did just about everything that JT3 asked of him, in many ways Mr. Clark also set the offensive tone for the Hoya's. At 6'2 Jason Clark attacked the rim in transition, shot the 3 from the outside, rebounded on both the offensive and defensive side of the court, was 75% from the FT and created 1.8 turnovers per game. For his efforts he was selected to the 2012 All-BIG EAST First Team, the 2012 All-District 2 Second Team, and was also the recipient of the BIG EAST Sportsmanship Award.

Pretty big shoes to fill as they should be after four years on the Hilltop and playing for JT3. So right about this time every year we ask ourselves, who will fill the void left by the departing senior class? Who will step up and be the Chris Wright or Roy Hibbert of old? Will it be a guard that leads the 2012-2013 team or a forward? Will the team turn to each other as they did this past year or will they turn in disarray?

Will Hollis stay another year and add to his NBA resume? Will he lead this talent packed team to another NCAA tournament appearance, or will Starks and Lubick stand up as floor generals? This talented team needs a leader to set this team at its will, but who will it be? Who will push the tempo in practice, who will be the floor general during conference play and guide the Hoya's to the championship that has eluded them for the past five years? Big East Champions have made it to the Final Four for the past several years and our trip to the Final Four is long over due.................

Wow, what a strenuous week and a half it has been. So much emotion condensed into such a small period of time. The success of earning a three seed, the apprehension about our opponent, the anger at the "experts" who were so quick to discard us, the elation at shutting those critics up, the heartbreak of a season ending before it should have, the optimism for the future. Most of us have felt just about every one of these feelings in the last several days, and it's exhausting. When it's all said and done, we're just tired and need a good nap, but the frustration remains. What do we have to do, right? What can we possibly do to return to the glory of 1984 or 2007? When we lose to teams like Cincinnati in the BET or VCU in the tourney the way we lost, it seems uncertain that it ever could happen. It seems that there is a hex on this University, does it not? It's a familiar feeling to us now, falling short, but we move on to the next season, sometimes with nothing but the hope that things get better. This is a feeling I've become used to over my entire life when dealing with sports, so I'm usually the first one to accept defeat. After the jump, I'll explain to you why being a Hoya has changed my perspective.

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I have thought a lot about the loss yesterday and I've read some things and heard some things about how the program has a trend of losing in the tournament and how there is clearly something fatally wrong with the program because of it. This upset me and I wrote a rambling, stream-of-consciousness rant reacting to that talk.

I am an unabashed Georgetown homer and an ardent supporter of John Thompson III. I think he is absolutely the right person to lead Georgetown’s program and 4 straight tournament exits to double-digit seeds has done nothing to change my mind on that. I’m saying that up front here to point out my obvious bias as I dig in against the wave of folks (both in the national media and among the Georgetown fan base) that are building narratives about Georgetown’s lack of success in recent NCAA tournaments and using that as an indictment of everything that JTIII has built at Georgetown.

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Good evening fellow Hoyas. As a frequent reader who is a) mostly a lurker around here b) hasn't seen much live Hoya basketball in the last 6 years living in Cincinnati and c) needs therapy after sitting through today's game, I thought I'd share some observations from the game today. To preface this post, I haven't been home since the game until now, so I haven't read the gamethread, JGD's summary or any other post mortem - I'll do that right after typing this, but really wanted to through my as yet-unbiased opinions out there. This could be embarrassing if y'all saw this much differently than I did, but here goes nothing..

More quasi-incoherence after the jump...

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Rules of gravity do not apply to me

Hold onto your butts, Day Two of our Columbian Exposition is around the corner, and this time we're taking it back to where much of the magic first started. So come nurse your St. Patty's hangover with yet another Guinness, go easy on the car bombs, and we'll see you soon.

Where: Irish Channel, 500 H St. NW

When: Tip-off is 12:15pm

Why: Don't pretend like you don't know why.

Preview of Sunday's Game: #3 Georgetown v. #11 N.C. State, 12:15pm, NCAA Tournament - (Don't Call it the) Third Round

For the first time in four years, the Georgetown University Fighting Bulldogs won a game in the NCAA Tournament. And now we can all breathe a sigh of relief.

There's no time to reflect on yesterday's win, but suffice it to say that our zone was effective, and it was refreshing to see our two seniors, especially Jason, step up and make plays. We shut down Kerron Johnson, and even though we allowed the Bruins to hit ten threes, nothing came easy for them. It was a satisfying and much-needed victory.

But in the immortal words of Hank Sims, "we didn't just come here to win one game."

More GTM after The Jump....

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http://www.diddukewin.com/ SUCK IT DUKE! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

This is a filler

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Rules of gravity do not apply to me

The tension around this lunch blog this week has been unbearable. In less than 24 hours, we will either be a national laughing stock AGAIN, or a very relieved bunch of Casualties looking forward to the next banana skin on Sunday. Either way, for those of you in DC and surrounding parts, you need to be among the Casual nation imbibing appropriate quantities of adult beverages.

The Iron Horse has kindly agreed to open an hour early for us tomorrow, and so the upstairs floor will be open for business and Hoya viewing from 3pm onward. So bug out of the office as quickly as you can, and let's make this agony a shared experience.

Where: Iron Horse Taproom, 507 7th St NW (Upstairs)

When: Doors open at 3pm; tip-off is scheduled for 3:10pm (unless the earlier game goes long)

Why: We've been building up to tomorrow for a year. Something has to give - either the Hoya first round hoo-doo, or our collective sanity. Come and find out!

Rankings:

The rankings are meaningless. Let's get right to it.

Preview of Friday's Game: #3 Georgetown v. #14 Belmont, 3:10pm, NCAA Tournament - (Don't Call it the) Second Round

Ever since we lost that terrible, terrible game to VCU last year, and that terrible, terrible game to Ohio the year before that, and that terrible, terrible game to Davidson two years earlier, we've all been waiting for this game. JTIII and your 2011-12 Hoyas deserve credit for exceeding expectations this season and finishing near the top of the conference, but let's be honest, this weekend is the one that will, rightly or wrongly, determine the legacy of this year's team.

In some respects, Belmont resembles last year's VCU team. The Bruins have a fair number of experienced juniors and seniors, they like to press and run, and they shoot a relatively high number of threes. Unlike VCU, which entered the 2011 Tourney with an "us against the world" mentality because no one thought they deserved an at-large bid, Belmont enters the 2012 Tourney as the darling of the sports-writing commentariat. Which leads me to my first observation.

More GTM / Six Observations after The Jump....

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This post is sponsored by TiqIQ

Following an exciting season which resulted in an impressive 23-8 record, the Georgetown Hoyas earned the #3 seed in this year’s NCAA tournament. The Hoyas will take on the 14th seeded Belmont Bruins in Session 1 on Friday 3/16 at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus, OH. With a win, the Hoyas will play the winner of the #6 San Diego State/#11 North Carolina State in 3rd round action. For deals on Lower Level Tickets, check out inventory from Primesport, the NCAA’s Tournament’s official ticket exchange.

If you're looking for something less expensive, there are still plenty of listings under $100 for session 1 and 3, most of which are in the upper levels. See sessions 1 & 3, here, courtesy of TiqIQ:

Avg Price/Get-In Price: Session 1: Avg $89/Get-in $35
Session 3: Avg $171/Get-in $86