You may have noticed that ESPN is running their "Best Case / Worst Case" series for the various college basketball conferences right now. Yesterday, it was the BIG EAST's turn at the plate. I'm not about to engage in a systematic breakdown of the entire thing, primarily because I think it's one of the sillier, fence-straddling exercises I've ever seen: by my count, the "Best Case Scenario" for most of the teams involves some variation of: "Hey, everything breaks right, their newcomers play well, and nobody gets hurt, they could be looking at a top four finish in the conference," while the worst case goes roughly along these lines: "They can't replace Guy Who Graduated, and New Guy doesn't fit in, and they slink to the bottom of the conference."
So, in an effort to make this exercise in silliness even sillier, I present Marquette's REAL Best Case / Worst Case Scenario:
BEST CASE SCENARIO
- Marquette comes out the gates like an eagle on greenies, laying waste to the non-conference competition in the first two months of the season. MU embarrasses Duke in the championship of the CBE Classic, and Coach K interrupts Coach Buzz's post-game presser to ask for his autograph, and later declines to offer J.P. Tokoto a scholarship, explaining that Marquette is the ONLY place for an elite-level guard.
- In December, Marquette beats UW-Madison by 35, Coach Buzz empties the bench for the entire second half -- except for Vander, who plays all 40 minutes and scores 48 points on 23-for-23 shooting. Also: Bo Ryan suffers an attack of acute rodent-ia after the game and has to be carried to the locker room, where Todd Rosiak confronts him with evidence that none of the Badgers has attended a single session of the Advanced Agricultural Journalism class in which they're all enrolled. Bo resigns in shame, and choppers out of the Bradley Center parking lot, Nixon-style.
- Jamail Jones actually turns out to be the player you'd get if you put Chuck Person, Landon Donovan, Ahman Green, and Jamiroquai in a blender.
- Dwyane Wade buys the restaurant inside Turner's, has the place up and running before the season tips off, installs Mr. McCarter as a puppet dictator, and shows up to run the bar for the grand re-opening, where he buys me a brandy Old Fashioned and mashes up the cherry and orange in the bottom of the glass, just the way I like it.
- Just for good measure: Marquette wins every conference game, every conference tourney game, and makes a run to the Final Four, so Smarmy Tom Crean's banner isn't the most recent FF banner hanging in the rafters of the Bradley Center.
- In a stunning upset, Jae Crowder secures the Republican nomination for Wisconsin's Senate seat, then blanks Senator Russ Feingold, 21-0, in a one-on-one "lightning debate" at The Al.
- DJO becomes my friend on Facebook.
- The Big East has to split the newcomer of the year award between Vander, Jones, Crowder, and Reggie Smith.
- Soft Pretzel With Cheese spells Chris Otule's name correctly.
WORST CASE SCENARIO
- Marquette loses to all the hyphenated UW schools. In a related item: I have to buy season tickets to UWM games just to get the UWM-Marquette ticket.
- Vander quits at midseason and joins his buddy Jeronne Maymon at Tennessee.
- Marquette loses to DePaul. Again.
- Chris Otule breaks again.
- The always impeccably attired Jay Wright steals my wife.
- Indiana is good.
That's my list. What's yours?