Princeton at Yale, 8:00 PM Eastern, espn3
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Gonzaga. Vermont. Princeton. Entering play tonight, only three Division I teams remain undefeated within their conferences. The Zags have three games left before the WCC tournament, with the toughest test probably being a home game against BYU. Vermont has two games left before the conference tournament, both of which are at home, though against the second and third best teams in the America East (Stony Brook and Albany). Princeton’s road to finishing undefeated is the longest, with six regular season games left plus the Ivy League tournament. The next four of those are all on the road, and probably the toughest of that group is tonight’s Under the Radar Game of the Day. Tonight, the Tigers travel to New Haven, Connecticut to take on the Yale Bulldogs.
Princeton enters play today at 8-0 in the Ivy and 15-6 overall. They Tigers’ win streak is now at 11 straight, one of the longest in the nation. Steven Cook led the way last weekend in a two point home win over Columbia (a game that Princeton let the Lions charge back into late after building a big lead) with 19 points and 8 rebounds. Myles Stevens was the star player with 19 points in the Tigers’ earlier home win over Yale. Also, you can never overlook Spencer Weisz, who had scored 20+ points in 3 of his last 4 games before Columbia held him to a season low 4 last time out.
Yale currently sits at 14-7 overall and 6-2 in the Ivy League, tied with Harvard for second place. The Bulldogs fell at home to Harvard last time out despite 20 points off the bench for Alex Copeland and a double-double from Sam Downey. Copeland was also Yale’s leading scorer in the first matchup with Princeton, scoring 21 points (as a starter in that game). Yale certainly has the ability to knock off the Tigers tonight, and in fact are predicted by kenpom.com to win the game by 2. If, however, Princeton is able to secure this win and a win tomorrow at Brown, they will have taken a huge step towards having that perfect conference season.
OTHER HIGHLIGHTED GAMES
-KENT STATE AT AKRON (MAC). There are a lot of good rivalries in the MAC, but this is probably the best one. Akron’s chances of getting into the NCAA Tournament without winning the automatic bid are probably below fifty percent, but they are definitely above zero. If they win out they’ll get a serious look, and may even get selected.
-VALPARAISO AT OAKLAND (Horizon League). Valpo probably has even less of a chance of getting an at-large bid without the automatic bid than Akron does, but they do have a chance. They’re also playing on the home court of one of the few teams that beat them tonight, so if they pick this one up it’ll be one of their better wins of the season on their resume.
-VCU AT RICHMOND (Atlantic Ten). Richmond is too far outside the bubble to reach it, but they have done well in A10 play, and this is a rivalry game, so it should be fun. VCU has a challenging stretch of games coming up that will either solidify them as a tournament team, or land them in the NIT.
-CALIFORNIA AT STANFORD (Pac Twelve). This is a rivalry game between a Stanford team that’s struggled, but that has shown signs of life at home, and a Cal team that could really use a road win.