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NEWS AND NOTES
-Ohio State suffered their first loss of the season as they fell to Purdue. Ohio State, while good, has a bit of a flimsy resume at the moment with no wins that really jump out at you, whereas Purdue is now 5-2 with a win against…well…Ohio State!
-Duke’s win at Notre Dame was by far their best of the year. That’s not saying much since their only other wins are buy games, but they actually looked better than they have all season long. More importantly than the conference road win on paper is that they appear to be improving as a team on the court.
-Pitt has won five straight since dropping their season opener. They knocked off (a short handed) Miami FL team last night for their first ACC win. I’m not ready to say that they’re a solid tournament caliber team yet, but I am willing to say they don’t stink nearly as much as I thought on the first day of the season.
-Mercer suffered their first loss of the season as they fell on the road to Georgia State. Mercer and Georgia State are two good UTR teams who’s only losses are to each other.
-Marshall is another really strong UTR team that had a bit of a surprising loss yesterday. They fell at home to Toledo. They trailed for most of the game, but rallied late and came back to force overtime. They appeared to have all the momentum, but then fell flat in OT and ended up with their first loss of the season.
-Cincinnati fell at home to South Florida. The Bearcats are young and wildly inconsistent, and while they’ve shown some promise, yesterday’s loss certainly does not help them.
-Oklahoma State went down for the first time this year in a home loss to TCU, which was a bit of a shocker. Both these teams have looked better than what we thought they’d look like coming into the year. TCU improves to 6-2 on the year with some decent wins on thier resume.
-SMU handed East Carolina their first loss. The game was close for about 30 mins, but then SMU pulled away. They aren’t getting a whole lot of national attention, but I really like this SMU team.
-Arizona State lost at home to UTEP, and nothing against UTEP who now improves to 3-2, but Arizona State just has not looked good in the last week or so.
HIGHLIGHTED GAMES
-KANSAS AT TEXAS TECH (Big 12). Texas Tech was actually our preseason pick to win the Big 12, and while we expect to see a lot of improvement between now and the end, they haven’t really looked the part so far. Of course, our opinions of them would change in a big way if they could knock off Kansas tonight. It should be a good one between two probable protected seeds.
-CREIGHTON AT SAINT JOHN’S (Big East). Creighton has lost a couple of close games to Kansas and Marquette this past week and is looking to get that nasty taste out of their mouths. This won’t be a cakewalk by any means as the Johnnies have shown quite a bit of life themselves this year, but it is a winnable road game.
-NC STATE AT SAINT LOUIS. Neither team has a loss, and SLU has a pretty good win against LSU under their belts, but so far they’ve both had limited chances against quality opponents, so it’s good that we get to see them play each other tonight.
-SAN FRANCISCO AT OREGON. San Fran is a wildly inconsistent team. They have beaten ranked teams and lost to mid-level UTR teams within a 24 hour span. They seem to be swinging a little bit over their heads tonight, but they’re still a fun team to watch and the Ducks better not overlook them.
-SETON HALL AT MARQUETTE. Marquette has two huge wins under their belts against Wisconsin and Creighton. They have a couple of losses as well, but neither one are damaging and they appear to have a very solid team. Seton Hall has sputtered a little bit out of the gate, but they’ve won three straight and can really pick up some momentum if they’re able to win tonight.
BUY GAMES (or games that might as well be)
-Le Tourneau @ New Mexico
-Delaware State @ Coastal Carolina