FORMER PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON OFFERS HIS NCAA TOURNAMENT PICKS ON SIRIUS XM RADIO
42nd President of the United States talks college basketball on today’s edition of ‘60/20 Sports’ hosted by James Carville and Luke Russert
Audio will be posted after the show at www.sirius.com/sports
NEW YORK – March 20, 2009 – Former U.S. President Bill Clinton will be a guest today on 60/20 Sports, the weekly SIRIUS XM Radio sports talk show hosted by James Carville and Luke Russert, where he will share his predictions for this year’s NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament.
60/20 Sports airs nationwide every Friday from 11:00 am to 12:00 pm ET exclusively on SIRIUS XM Sports Nation, SIRIUS channel 122 and XM channel 143.
The show replays Saturday at 5:00 am ET and Sunday at 8:00 am ET.
In the interview – recorded yesterday – Clinton, an ardent college basketball fan, and Carville, the noted political strategist and commentator, discuss which teams they think have the best chance of playing deep into the bracket and tender their picks for the Final Four and National Championship.
Asked who he is picking for the Final Four, Clinton was firm on three of the four regional champs but wavered on who would come out of the West region.
Host, James Carville: “Who have you got in the Final Four?”
Bill Clinton: “Louisville, Memphis, Pittsburgh and North Carolina. Or Louisville [vs.] Connecticut. I can’t tell. Memphis may have a good enough defense but they’re skinny so UConn can probably match up against them and I think they’ll get by.”
Clinton went on to predict a Louisville-North Carolina final with the Cardinals emerging from a tight contest as National Champions.
“Louisville was so good to us the last go ‘round I kind of think Louisville will win,” said Clinton. “But North Carolina I still believe, you know, they sort of show up sometimes and sometimes they don’t. If the
ir point guard (Ty Lawson) is healthy they’re going to be hard to beat just because they’ve got great athletes. But I must say I was really impressed with Louisville at the end of the year. They were better than I thought they were and to win the Big East [Conference regular season] and then win the Big East Tournament, you know, I think they’re good.”
“If those two teams get in the final,” continued Clinton, “Basketball doesn’t have a loser because Roy Williams is a great coach and Carolina, I still think they’ve got the best athletes if the point guard stays healthy. But Louisville has a way of playing, their defense is so great that if they can just make even two-thirds of their free throws all the way home I just think they’re going to be hard to beat. Defense, it seems to me tends to win National Championships and their defense is just so good that’s why I’m picking them. But I think it’s tight as a tick.”
This is Clinton’s fourth pre-tournament appearance on 60/20 Sports and the former Commander in Chief discussed various other teams and topics from the college basketball landscape, including Syracuse’s thrilling six-overtime win over Connecticut in the Big East Conference Tournament.
Clinton: “I got home from an event I did and watched the last three minutes of the game and I said, ‘Well, I’m going to go to bed after this overtime,’ and I had to stay up for another hour and 15 minutes! [Jim] Boeheim’s a great coach and those kids play with so much heart.”
The program will also include a live interview with Phoenix Suns star guard/forward Grant Hill, who led the Duke University Blue Devils to back-to-back National Championships in 1991 and 1992.
The concept for 60/20 Sports was born in 2006 from the high octane sports debates between the then 60-year-old Carville and then 20-year-old Russert during Washington Nationals baseball games. The two life-long sports fans took their discussions to the airwaves in 2006 and can currently be heard every Friday at 11:00 am ET on SIRIUS XM Sports Nation (SIRIUS channel 122, XM Channel 143) discussing the headline news from the world of sports and interviewing a variety of athletes, coaches, sports executives and fans.
Just wanted to get that out there.
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