Fictional Hooper Bracket: The Final Four

We got an all-blueblood Final Four. I know we enjoyed Saint Peter’s, but as happy as I am for Shaheen Holloway’s new contract — of course this is yet another example of a college coach capitalizing off of his hard-playing talent for a much better job, but the Peacocks pull their home bleachers out of a wall — Saturday is better because they’re all gone. Duke vs. North Carolina in the semis in Mike Krzyzewski’s last strut, Peacocks, your gift basket is to the left.

While our tournament also had its share of surprises, a dog was voted into the regional finals, the voters united to do the right thing in the end, even if it meant that the least entertaining basketball character in the history of pictures that move and talk, made the Final Four. In one matchup, Hoosier’s Jimmy Chitwood will be going up against White Men Can’t Jump’s Sidney Deane, and the other features Billy Hoyle, of the same movie, against a star athlete with a name that was inspired by the silky handle and jump shot of Earl the Pearl Monroe aka Black Jesus — or as the film notes just Jesus — He Got Game’s Jesus Shuttlesworth.

It was time for Uncle Drew and his sweatpants, Jackie Moon and his shady promotions, Air Bud and his gross dog slobber, and the human construction crane, Neon Boudeaux, to leave the final rounds to the legends. The best are here, and it’s time for the Kumate to get real. It’s time for you, the good people who consume our content, to keep making your voices heard on the polls @Deadspin. In the Sweet 16, each matchup was voted on well over 1,000 times. Keep this up, and we’ll mail all of you some of those left over, Set it, and Forget its that have been collecting dust on a shipping container since 2003.

*DISCLAIMER: Deadspin has no authority to offer you those delightful cookers, even if we had the slightest clue where they were.

Finally Billy Ho gets tested. It’s not Raymond coming around that corner after the failed liquor store robbery, or the Duane Martin basketball character who wasn’t recruited by John Thompson. Billy Ho is about to see what it’s like to play against a true phenom in Jesus Shuttlesworth. He wouldn’t have been allowed on the Venice courts with Billy and Sidney Deane, because within two seconds of looking at Shuttlesworth they would have known that the only way to defeat him would require a trip to Raymond’s car. How many 6-foot-5 people do you know who walk this earth as smoothly as Shuttlesworth? He moves through life like a hooper who couldn’t turn it off if he tried, unlike his opponent who relies on not resembling a basketball player in any way.

Billy Ho had better amp up that trash-talk, if he’s going to have any chance against a player that might one day hit more 3-pointers than anyone in the history of the NBA. He’s gonna need even more verbal fury than he had for Martin at the 2-on-2 tournament to get through this. That’s all he’s got on Shuttlesworth. For the first time, this No. 1 overall seed has met an opponent equal in stature. Sure Boudeaux could fit Billy in his cereal bowl, but only one of those characters was a star, and the other was coached by Nick Nolte.

This is the kind of matchup that always brings America to the television set. In one corner, we have the brash, silver-tongued hustler from the courts of Venice — Sidney Deane. And in the other, we have the neat, gritty, intelligent, best teammate you could ever ask for, oozing with the clutch gene, from Hickory, Ind., — Jimmy Chitwood.

As much as Deane is loved, he’s going to find himself in some unfamiliar territory as the heel in this matchup. He’ll need to lean into being a heel the way “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and The Rock did, by being so creatively awful to their opposition that the fans ended up loving them more than any other wrestler. Deane needs to have enough ammunition for Chitwood, the team, and especially the coach. He may be able to blow past Chitwood on the court, but what he doesn’t have is that All-American tale that pulls at the heartstrings. Sure he puts in enough hours across multiple professions to work two full-time jobs, is a great father to his son, and a supportive husband to his wife. His main goal in life is to take care of them and get them out of the “Ain’t No Vista Of No” View apartments.

Admirable, but Deane is up against Jimmy Chitwood, baby. The man ran around in copper tighty whities and still got buckets. That’s back when players were in this for the love of the game, not because they could potentially use their talent to change the economic trajectory of their entire family. Nope, Chitwood wants to leave Hickory, but he’s gotta come back and win his community the title. Also, he made it clear that the only person he would play for is the hardass coach, who is only at the school because he physically struck a player at a much better job. Chitwood tells the community of Hickory that if they want him on the team, Coach Dale must be allowed to bark at them everyday, because that’s how all championships are won.

Quite the culture clash we have here. South L.A., vs. Southern Indiana, playground balling vs. metronome-like high school basketball, and domination vs. droningly effective wins. I think I covered all the differences, right?