Final Four Schedule Set For Saturday With VCU-Butler At 6:09 ET Followed By Kentucky-UConn

The 2011 NCAA Tournament will conclude next weekend, as the Final Four begins on Saturday and concludes with Monday’s NCAA championship game. Mid-majors VCU and Butler will play in the first game of the Final Four schedule Saturday at 6:09 p.m., with established powers Kentucky and Connecticut following them at 8:49 p.m. The games will be broadcast on CBS.

Reliant Stadium in Houston will be the venue for the Final Four. Normally the home of the Houston Texans, Reliant Stadium has never hosted a Final Four game. The stadium will hold 76,000 people for the games, making this the largest venue in Final Four history.

Three games remain in the 2011 NCAA Tournament, with the Final Four beginning next weekend in Houston. Upstarts VCU and Butler face off for a chance at an established power, as UConn and Kentucky are set to make up the other end of the bracket.

Kentucky shot well against UNC early on, then made enough big shots down the stretch to hang on for their first Final Four trip since the Tubby Smith era. This is Butler’s second-straight Final Four, VCU’s first-ever, and UConn’s third in the past eight years.

The No. 11 VCU Rams, champions of the 2011 NCAA Tournament’s Southwest region, will advance to face No. 8 Butler after topping No. 1 Kansas in one of March Madness’ all-time great upsets. VCU stormed out to a huge early lead before Kansas started to close in the second half, but held on to win, 71-61.

VCU vs. Butler will be a battle of Cinderallas the likes of which have been unseen since Cinderella II: The Clone Wars. Though it’s hard to think of either of these teams as underdogs at this point, with Butler making its second-straight Final four and VCU having already taken down five tournament favorites in a row just to make it this far.

Butler and UConn have booked tickets to the 2011 Final Four, but we still have two more games to go to fill out the rest of the bracket ahead of the April 2 NCAA Tournament National Semifinals. On Sunday, four teams hit the floor in the final two games of the Elite Eight with the chance to realize a dream and make it to the Final Four on the line.

It’s Cinderella versus the last No. 1 seed standing in the first matchup as Kansas takes on VCU at 2 p.m. in San Antonio. In the late matchup, at 4:55 p.m., it’s all about talent as Kentucky and North Carolina hit the floor. Between the two teams, there’s a plethora of NBA talent and each coach employs a style pleasing to the eye.

Here’s the complete Elite Eight 2011 schedule:

Southeast Region final, New Orleans:

No. 2 Florida vs. No. 8 Butler at 4:20 p.m. ET

The full Sweet 16 bracket schedule is here, and below are the locations for the games, and which teams are playing where:

West Region, Honda Center, Anaheim, California

San Diego State vs. UConn

Duke vs. Arizona

Shortly after Florida State finished dismantling Notre Dame in the 2011 NCAA Tournament on Sunday night, the game times and announcer pairings for the Sweet 16 matchups were announced. It’s a two network show this time around as TNT and truTV have been dropped from the TV rotation, leaving just CBS and TBS to broadcast the bracket’s next eight games spread between Thursday and Friday. Sweet 16 games will begin at 7:15 p.m. on both days, with the second set of games scheduled to tip-off at around 9:45 p.m.

The four announcer pairings are no surprise as CBS’ three typical teams will be joined by Marv Albert, Steve Kerr and Craig Sager. Gus Johnson is headed to New Orleans to call Florida vs. BYU and Wisconsin vs. Butler, but there’s a problem. Reggie Miller will be making the trip along with Johnson and Len Elmore, leaving many Gus fans in an uproar.

Especially once you recall the many gangly caucasians participating in Butler-Wisconsin! March Madness. Can’t miss it.

If the scheduling folks still want to try and deliver staggered game start times, we can expect action to begin early in the evening. Here are the four matchups you can look forward to seeing on Thursday night: