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Historical starting fives for each Sweet 16 team

WASHINGTON — You can have your arguments about who will survive the second weekend of March Madness. Can NC State continue its run? Is Tom Izzo a robot built to work only in March? Can anybody beat Kentucky? Please?

But before we get to all that, imagine what the best starting five in each school’s history might look like. Surely, your view will be skewed by the generation of players you connected with the most. We tried to eliminate the inherent bias and cobble together the best starting five from each school in regards to their college careers.

This means that professional stats don’t matter. There were great college players who, for whatever reason, never became stars in the NBA or ABA. When there were close calls, we tended to skew more modern, because a 6-foot-11 center would probably be more productive in a cross-generational game than a 6-foot-6 one.

The results were somewhat surprising. Not every team you might expect to be strong is a powerhouse. You probably slept on a couple of schools that actually field terrific teams. Flip through the slides and check out each starting five, and let us know whether there’s anyone who absolutely deserved to be in ahead of the names we picked.

Note: All numbers are college career averages.

Basketball around the Beltway: Tall task ahead for a Hoyas giant

WASHINGTON -- Past met present for Georgetown University when the school introduced Hoyas great Patrick Ewing as its head men's basketball coach, with an eye toward the future.  It happened on Wednesday in front of a room packed with media, boosters, fans, students, alumni and a pep band that did not know "Vehicle" by the Ides of March. But Ewing's name alone was music enough to everyone's ears at the John Thompson Jr. Athletic Center in D.C. Ewing even replicated his famous scene from when he committed to play at the Big East school in 1981, holding a Georgetown pennant above his head.
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