NEWS AND NOTES:
-South Dakota State picked up a nice road win at Kansas State. I don’t want to get too carried away with calling this a big upset because K State is…well…terrible, and South Dakota State is expected to at least do decently well in the Summit League, but it’s still a nice win for any UTR team when they’re able to beat a power conference team on the road. South Dakota State tried to give it away by missing key freethrows and coming up empty on key possessions in the final minute, but K State couldn’t capitalize and after a defensive stop on the last play of the game SD State got the big win.
-North Florida did get a somewhat surprising 71-63 win at Cal Baptist, which was unexpected (at least to me) because we were kind of thinking the Ospreys at the bottom of the ASun. It could be they are much better than we thought. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time we were wrong about a team.
-Other than that, it was a very chalky and unexciting night full of buy game blowouts.
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HIGHILIGHTED GAMES:
-NORTH DAKOTA STATE AT SAINT MARY’S. North Dakota State is the preseason favorites to win the Summit League and they will really be challenged tonight against a Saint Mary’s team that’s expected to do well in the WCC and who won their season opener, but who is also trying to adjust to the post-Randy Bennett Era. This will be a test for the Gaels and this is the kind of game they need to be able to win if they’re an NCAA Tournament caliber team.
OTHER NOTABLE GAMES:
–UMES @ High Point – High Point will have little trouble getting to 2-0
–Fairleigh Dickinson @ Butler – I’m not all that big on Butler this year, but I think they’ll win this one and improve to 2-0
–Northern Kentucky @ South Dakota – both teams 1-0, this is the first road game for NKU (Note from Stalica – it’s the first true road game for the Norse, but keep in mind they did beat UTEP at the nearby Sanford Pentagon two days earlier)
–SELA @ Auburn – likely a buy game blowout
–Radford @ California – Cal should get to 2-0
-Queens @ LMU – Queens looked impressive in their season opener against Winthrop in the Field of 68 Tip Off and if they can follow that up with a true road win tonight that is a very solid start to the season
-Milwaukee @ Santa Clara – Santa Clara should cruise to 2-0
