Morning Madness: Saturday, March 11

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Here's what you need to know in college hoops for Saturday, March 11. Get Morning Madness delivered to your inbox.

One more day until brackets. And what a day it should be.

Thirteen tickets handed out today

Notre Dame and Duke will meet in the ACC tournament final (9 ET, ESPN) where Duke has a chance to become the first team to claim the ACC tournament crown by winning four games in four days. Arizona takes on Oregon in the Pac-12 title bout (11 ET, ESPN), and if you're half as excited as Bill Walton about that, you're appropriately hyped. And don't look now, but Iowa State looks poised to make a deep tournament run -- the Cyclones will duke it out with West Virginia for the Big 12 crown (6 ET, ESPN).

Other league championship games on the docket: the America East, Big East, Big Sky, Big West, C-USA, MAC, MEAC, Mountain West, Southland, the SWAC and the WAC.

Let's rock and roll.

Full Saturday schedule

But wait! Friday had its moments, too

Duke throttled North Carolina in the second half, while Arizona outplayed UCLA from start to finish. Still, the story of conference championship week has to be Michigan, right? On Wednesday: The Wolverines’ plane skids off the runway -- nobody is injured, but a scary situation nonetheless. Thursday: Michigan wakes up at 6 a.m., arrives at the arena 80 minutes before game time, dons practice jerseys and still romps. Friday: The Wolverines upset Big Ten champion Purdue.

Now, resilience meets resilience when Michigan plays Minnesota on Saturday.

Full Friday scoreboard

Minnesota Golden Gophers: From rags to respectability

A year ago at the Big Ten Tournament, Minnesota showed up with five scholarship players and was routed by Illinois, finishing the season 8-23.

Fast-forward to 2017. Minnesota just dispatched Michigan State and now, that's no surprise. The Golden Gophers are one of the hottest teams around; ...

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