Tuesday morning college basketball contemplations

My Final Four prediction right now: Kansas, Kentucky, West Virginia and Utah State. Now they just need to all be in opposite brackets. . . .

OK then. Iowa State Athletic Director Jamie Pollard gave coach Greg McDermott the vote of confidence Monday, which is much better received in March than in January. So McDermott gets a fifth season as ISU's coach after a fourth-straight losing season, barring a stunning run in this week's Big 12 tourney.

I wonder two things: What if Kansas State had blown out Iowa State Saturday instead of the Cyclones' shocking (and most impressive) win in Manhattan? What if Pollard hadn't been the one who hired McDermott?

I wonder the second thing more. Ever notice how ADs give coaches longer leashes when they hired the coaches instead of their predecessors? Pollard jettisoned Wayne Morgan, who was in place as coach when Pollard got the ISU job.

The last coach of an Iowa D-I men's program to win a game in the NCAA tournament? Morgan, in 2005.

Steve Alford, hired by Bob Bowlsby, found his golden parachute in New Mexico. That was when Gary Barta was the AD at Iowa. We'll always wonder if Barta suggested to Alford that he might consider jumping rather than wait to get pushed out of the plane a year later. Maybe Alford didn't need the suggestion. It shouldn't matter to him, anyway. He's doing pretty well for himself these days.

Barta's hire, Todd Lickliter, is winding up a third-consecutive year of big losing. You can't blame an AD for rooting extra-hard for his own hire. But can anyone remember the last time the Hawkeyes were so bad in back-to-back games, not to mention back-to-back seasons?

We know Iowa doesn't have winning Big Ten talent, but a 35-point loss to a Minnesota team that some in Gopherland feel has underachieved?

On the other hand, current Northern Iowa AD Troy Dannen didn't hire Ben Jacobson to be his men's basketball coach, but Dannen doesn't seem to have any qualms about how that program is being run. . . .

The next commentator or pundit who says School X "punched its ticket" into the NCAA tournament needs to have something of his own punched. I heard it twice in a 10-second span in one telecast on Monday.

It's a tired, tired cliche, just like "The Big Dance" is a tired, tired term.

Besides, who punches tickets anymore? What, are these teams traveling via passenger trains? You get your code scanned sometimes, yes.

Monday night, St. Mary's scanned its code into the NCAAs. So did Siena and Wofford and Old Dominion. (UNI beat Siena and Old Dominion this year, by the way.)

This scanned-code thing, this will be the rage by the end of the NCAA tourney's first week this year. . . .

About the Big Ten: If Northwestern beats Indiana in the first round of the Big Ten tourney, the Wildcats will have 20 wins. That would be despite losing to Penn State (twice), Iowa and Indiana, accounting for four of the 11 league victories for those three teams.

Ohio State's Evan Turner led Big Ten conference play in scoring, rebounding and steals, but was just second in assists. Sad. . . .

I'm not really sold on West Virginia going to the Final Four. Utah State, however, is so there.