Kentucky Wildcats @ Indiana Hoosiers: Talking Basketball With CrimsonCast

Scott of CrimsonCast.com and I have been doing an Indiana vs. Kentucky pre-game podcast now for three or four years running (and I honestly can't remember which it is). This is a chat I really look forward to every year, because Scott is simply one of the best college basketball fans around, and the Indiana Hoosiers are one of the few, and maybe the only, college basketball fan base that can actually compare with Kentucky in intensity and dedication to their program.

To me, some of the excitement has been leached out of the IU/UK series over the last half-decade due to the turmoil that has swirled around both teams. Back when this series ran as hot as the Ohio Valley in August, both teams were nationally ranked and there was always a lot of national and regional prestige on the line when these two got together. This is the first year in a long while in which that can be legitimately true -- if IU wins, they skyrocket back to national prominence at 9-0 after having beaten the battle-tested, #1 Wildcats. If UK wins, it solidly cements them at the top of the college basketball world, and as the team to beat (for now, anyway).

Follow me past the jump for more.

We all know, no matter what we may individually think of the Hoosiers, what a great basketball program IU has been over the years, and now that they are back playing the kind of basketball that the state of Indiana deserves, this year's podcast with CrimsonCast was a unique pleasure, because we didn't have to approach it from the position of one team being markedly inferior to the other. This year, there is no doubt whatever that the Hoosiers are competitive, and that whatever the outcome of this game, that IU program is back on the national map.

So enjoy the podcast, I think you'll find it interesting.