The Memphis Tigers Will Not Win the NCAA Tournament

I love the Memphis Tigers Men's College Basketball Team. But they aren't winning the championship. Not this season. Not next season, nor any season in the foreseeable future.

They have great players, including two of the best players in the nation that will be in this year's draft should they both elect to go on to the NBA. Chris Douglas-Roberts is the team's leading scorer, and he is one of the most athletic players in all of college basketball. He is 6'6" and can do anything you would ever ask a shooting guard to do at any level of basketball. And of course there is the phenom freshman PG Derrick Rose who is one of the best, if not the best, point guard in the nation. He has all of skills you want in an NBA player, but more importantly, he is a true point guard who is looking to pass first and score second, ala a Jason Kidd or Chris Paul.

But as good as those players, and as good as their Coach, John Calipari, can be, this team and basketball program is not built to win a national title.

A national basketball team is made up of many parts. While one of the most talented teams usually tends to win the NCAA Tournament, you have to remember, at the elite level, there is very little difference in the levels of talent between the players. Florida wasn't the absolute most talented team when they won the first of their two consecutive championships, but they won it despite that. They won it because they had the right formula. And they came back the next year to win it the championship when they were the most talented team, because they had the same formula from the year before.

First of all, the schedule makes the team. You can say what you want, but I don't care how good a team is. If they at some point they aren't tested day and day out with winners, than they aren't going to make it through the most difficult tournament in all of sports.