[Real Badman]

Best Case: With their young stars growing up on national TV, the Wildcats return to the summit and win their eighth national title. Freshman Brandon Knight[/url] plays like the best NBA-prospect guard with two healthy big toes. Terrance Jones continues to be an all-court matchup problem and rebounding fool, but now takes better shots. Doron Lamb [url=http://sports.espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/player/profile?playerId=51543]makes every open 3. Junior Darius Miller continues the late-season blossoming that made him SEC tournament MVP. Kentucky mows down Princeton, West Virginia, Ohio State, North Carolina, Duke and Kansas to win the title, cutting a wide swath through its blue-blood competition for the greatest program of all-time. John Calipari snips the nets at last, and 2,000 Kentucky families name their newborn sons Cal. To complete the rapture, Louisville loses its first game to Morehead State and Rick Pitino gets ejected. In response to rumors of interest from the New York Knicks, Kentucky gives Calipari an $8 million-a-year contract and a half-share in the Rachel Alexandra-Curlin foal and starts construction on a new 30,000-seat arena.

Worst Case: In a crushing case of déjà vu, Joe Mazzulla keys another West Virginia upset of the Wildcats -- this time in the round of 32 -- and extends Kentucky's longest-ever Final Four drought to 13 years. Bob Huggins runs his record to 9-1 against Calipari, who verbally bombs Terrence Jones again in a late-game situation. Big Blue fans who spent all week dissecting the presumptive Kentucky-Ohio State matchup have their daydreams pre-empted by the reality of Mazzulla evicting the Wildcats once more. Every key underclassman goes pro and so does Calipari, who is hired in New York to replace Mike D'Antoni after the Knicks bomb in the playoffs. Meanwhile, Louisville reaches the Final Four with no first-round draft picks.