NEWS AND NOTES
-For John Stalica’s UTR Game of the Day between Saint Francis U and Sacred Heart – CLICK HERE
-Villanova and Butler started off with a rain delay. The roof was leaking, and the game had to be stopped within the first few minutes. When it resumed, it did not disappoint, It was close all throughout, and after Nova hit a three in the final seconds to tie the game, Butler hit a three at the final buzzer to win the game. It was a big win for the Bulldogs who had gone through a patch of losing four out of six and who needed to shift the momentum back their way.
-Seton Hall bounced back from their home loss to Xavier over the weekend with a nice win at Georgetown. They are still in the Big East driver’s seat.
-Iowa showed up at Purdue (sort of), and got blown out of the arena. The game was basically over before the first media timeout, and it just kept getting worse. Purdue looks awful at times, but on the nights that they eat their spinach they look like they can beat anybody. The final score was 104-68.
-LSU fell at Vanderbilt. Vandy had lost 26 straight SEC games, so to say that this was a surprise is an understatement. As Joby Fortson put it, you don’t often see an 0-8 team beat an 8-0 team in conference play.
-Creighton fell on the road to a Providence team that continues to play like an NCAA Tournament caliber team, but that doesn’t have the overall resume to get them there due to a slow start to the season. The Friars actually really blew this one open in the final minutes of the game to win it going away.
-Duquesne won decisively at Saint Louis. This will probably be the last time we mention SLU for a while.
-Minnesota blew out Wisconsin at home. There are home court heroes, and then there is Minney. They are so good at home, but so bad everywhere else.
HIGHLIGHTED GAMES
-UCONN AT TULSA (American). Tulsa is the first place team despite having a really bad OOC slate, and although they are not yet inside our bubble they are certainly heading in that direction and have another winnable game at home tonight.
-CINCINNATI AT WICHITA STATE (American). Cincinnati has done a lot of work over the last couple of weeks, but they still have a lot of work to do. I think they are in a position to where a win tonight puts them at least on the bubble, and maybe even inside of it. They’ve won six of their last seven, and beating a ranked team on the road would help boost their resume. Wichita State has taken a bit of a step back, and a win tonight gets them back on the right track.
-CALIFORNIA AT COLORADO (Pac 12). To be fair to Cal, they are much better than they were a year ago, and they have managed some nice wins. But, they are still nowhere close to an NCAA Tournament caliber team. This is the kind of game that Colorado is expected to win at home.
-USC AT ARIZONA (Pac 12). Arizona helped themselves out last week with two big road wins, and faces a USC team tonight that’s trying to play their way safely inside the bubble. If the Trojans can pull off a win like this, it will be the headliner on their resume.
-TULANE AT HOUSTON (American). Houston is coming off a loss to Cincinnati, but is still in reasonably good shape and will remain that way so long as they can hold serve at home in games like this.
-STANFORD AT UTAH (Pac 12). Stanford is still hanging around the area of being inside the bubble, but not entirely safe. A road win like this would help, and a loss would probably actually hurt since Utah really isn’t anywhere near the bubble.
-BYU AT PORTLAND (West Coast). This is a winnable road game for a BYU team that appears to be inside the bubble and is trying to stay there.
-LMU AT GONZAGA (West Coast). Gonzaga continues to blow through the WCC, and that isn’t likely to change tonight.
-SAINT MARY’S AT SAN DIEGO (West Coast). It’s a road game, but it’s the kind of game that tournament caliber teams are expected to win, so SMC needs should be able to hold serve.
-UCLA AT ARIZONA STATE (Pac 12). UCLA has been playing better, so the Sun Devils don’t want to just overlook them. They’re outside the bubble, which means any home loss to a non-tournament team could be crushing.
-A couple of good UTR games tonight worth mentioning are William & Mary at Charleston, which has first place implications in the Colonial (which has been a really fun league to watch this year), and Murray State who goes to Belmont, which should be one of their toughest games of conference play so far.