The Memphis Tigers haven’t been to the national championship since 1973; the UCLA Bruins, on the other hand, have been to the title game three times now (in the last three years). How big was this game for Memphis? Huge.

Leading the Tigers was Derrick Rose, who scored 28 points; Chris-Douglas Roberts scored 25 points; and Joey Dorsey picked up 15 rebounds, keeping UCLA center Kevin Love to 12 points and 9 rebounds.

“He’s a great player,” Dorsey said of Love. “I was just trying to make it hard for him to score, and just trying to dominate the glass so they wouldn’t get second shots on the offensive end.”

The loss was a bitter pill for Bruins’ coach Ben Howland to swallow. Thinking that UCLA had a stronger D, Howland must now explain to his players how it is that even with a superstar like Kevin Love on your team, it ain’t over ’til it’s over. And for this UCLA squad, it is over…until next year.

“It’s disappointing,” coach Howland said, “and there’s a lot of sad kids in that locker room right now.”

This just in: The North Carolina Tar Heels are pretty good at basketball. They’re so good, they’re getting 8-5 odds to come out of the Final Four and win the NCAA men’s national championship.

That’s quite a compliment. There are no slouches among the three other teams in Saturday’s semifinal; UNC’s competition is the Kansas Jayhawks (3-1 to win the title), the Memphis Tigers (27-10) and the UCLA Bruins (16-5). All No. 1 seeds, just like North Carolina. Are the Bruins only half as good as the Tar Heels?

North Carolina has been convincingly dominant over four straight opponents. None of the other teams can claim that. But four games is also a very small sample size, and all four of these clubs have put together a tremendous season up to now. Finding that balance between long- and short-term performance analysis is part of the art of handicapping, just like any other investment.

We’ve had some more movement – just a little – on the March Madness odds front. Here’s Friday’s slate with the betting lines at press time.

Midwest
No. 12 Villanova at No. 1 Kansas (–12)
No. 10 Davidson at No. 3 Wisconsin (–5)

South
No. 5 Michigan State at No. 1 Memphis (–4.5)
No. 3 Stanford at No. 2 Texas (–2)

The difference is with the Texas Longhorns, who have lost some steam after reaching –2.5 on Wednesday. This line has been difficult for the books to pin down; it might be anywhere in the vicinity by the time you read this. Stanford is playing in the Pac-10 shadow of UCLA, but the novelty factor of twins Brook and Robin Lopez has earned the Cardinal some extra eyeballs.

There are strong under trends for both teams if the pointspread doesn’t agree with you. The total for Stanford-Texas is 134 (under –105).

Thursday’s first-round action was all about the chalk. Thirteen of the 16 matchups went to the favorites, and there were no serious upsets of note – although Belmont made it very, very interesting against Duke.

Kansas State was a 3-point dog versus USC, but anyone who puts even a modicum of faith into statistical analysis saw Michael Beasley and the Wildcats winning that one. They’ll be a big handful for the Wisconsin Badgers to deal with in the second round.

UCLA’s massive 70-29 victory over Mississippi Valley State (-31.5) also deserves some praise. That was without Luc Richard Mbah a Moute, who wasn’t needed and thus buys some extra time for his sprained left ankle to heal. This is the value of getting a No. 1 seed in the Tournament.

Speaking of which, Kansas (-21) also covered in an 85-61 pasting of Portland State. Rock, chalk, Jayhawk. They get UNLV on Saturday in Omaha.

The North Carolina Tar Heels have done just about everything you could ask a college basketball team to do. They wrapped up the regular season with just two losses. They got revenge for one of those defeats by beating Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium in the season finale. And they regained the No. 1 spot in the polls heading into the ACC conference tournament.

All great from a basketball standpoint, but here’s what matters to handicappers: 20-8 ATS. That’s the third most profitable record in the nation. Still, we’ve seen this movie before. The Heels were ACC champions last year and a huge moneymaker at 19-12 ATS before March Madness, where they coughed up a big lead and lost to Georgetown in the Elite Eight.

This year’s team can also be beaten, as Duke and Maryland have already shown. North Carolina is ranked 23rd overall in defensive efficiency. Can the Tar Heels protect their Achilles’ heel this time?