Tonight’s feature conference is the WAC, and we focus on the Grand Canyon Antelopes and what a great season they’re having, especially this past week where they managed wins against San Diego State and Liberty. We look at their chances of landing inside the bubble and not even needing to win the WAC Tournament to make the NCAAs. The Lopes are certainly the team to beat in that league.
From there we run through the other 21 UTR leagues and discuss the strength of the Missouri Valley and how good Indiana State and Drake have looked so far, along with Bradley still potentially being a dangerous team. UNC Wilmington is a team to watch and may be in position to get inside the bubble if they can blow through the CAA. McNeese has a big game coming up against Michigan, and after that may be favored to win all their remaining games and end up with a massively bloated record. UNC Greensboro is another team that may be able to play their way inside the bubble out of the SoCon, and Princeton still looks really strong out of the Ivy League despite the loss. We discuss all that, and more! And, as we do every week, we close with this week’s UTR Top Ten.
And for all you radio lovers, below is an audio only version of the show…
-It has been a very slow week so far. There was so little activity the last two days that we really didn’t even bother with a write-up. Today, we at least have a smattering of games that are worth paying attention to. We will also be recording Under the Radar tonight so be on the lookout for that.
-APPALACHIAN STATE AT QUEENS. James Madison has made most of the noise out of the Sun Belt, but Appalachian State looks to be just as good. One of the things App State has yet to do is win a true road game, and Queens is not an easy place to go and win despite the fact that they are a transitional program. In fact Queens has yet to lose at home, and Appalachian State has yet to win on the road, so this would be a nice win for them if they can pull it off.
-CREIGHTON VS UNLV (Jack Jones Classic, Henderson, NV). It may perhaps be a somewhat pro-UNLV crowd with the game being in Nevada, but it’s still one that Creighton should be able to win without having to sweat too much.
-WEBER STATE AT NEVADA. Both teams have shown they can play at a high level at times, and Nevada is starting to build at least a fairly decent profile at 7-1 overall, but six of those wins have come at home and Weber State has struggled with consistency so far. This would be a good win for either team, but whoever pulls it off will still have work to do.
-UTAH STATE AT SANTA CLARA. I really like what this Utah State team has been able to do so far, but this could be a bit of a tough road test for them. They’re 9-1 on the year, but just one of those wins was in a true road game, and Santa Clara isn’t the easiest place to go. This would definitely help Utah State’s resume if they’re able to pull it off.
-Bryn Athyn (nonD1) @ Princeton -Florida International @ Florida Atlantic – it’s a rivalry game, but it’s also a huge mismatch -Murray State @ Mississippi State – Mississippi State is a good team but their resume can’t afford another home buy-game loss -Chicago State @ Northwestern – perhaps a more compelling game than DePaul vs. Northwestern? -Tennessee State @ Liberty – Liberty is a good team, but they may be running out of strikes if they want any shot at landing inside the bubble -UNC Asheville @ Auburn – a likely Big South frontrunner against an Auburn team that I think is better than what they’ve gotten credit for -Southern Miss @ McNeese – a pretty solid UTR match-up -Denver @ BYU (Front Range v BeeHive Challange) -Seattle U @ San Francisco
Posted inDaily Rundown, News and Notes|Comments Off on News, Notes, and Highlighted Games: Wednesday, Dec 13th
Chad, David, and Jon Teitel run through all the major conferences and take a look back at a busy week. Arizona is the top ranked team in the nation and showed they were deserving of it with their blowout win over Wisconsin. In the Big 12, Houston, Kansas, Baylor, and Oklahoma are all high in the rankings and continuing to build up their resumes. Marquette, Creighton, and UConn have all managed big wins and are all ranked in the top ten out of the Big East. Ole Miss remains unbeaten, and Kentucky is starting to bounce back out of the SEC. We discuss all that, and more!
And for all your radio lovers, below is an audio only version of the show…
Before you look at the bracket, I want to make sure everyone knows what they are looking at. These are NOT my guesses is to what the actual Selection Committee’s Final bracket will look like on Selection Sunday in March. It is also not an attempt to guess what the actual Selection Committee would do if they were picking the field today. These are simply my own picks, and this is a CHECKPOINT based on CURRENT MERIT, and not a ranking of how good I think the teams actually are. I’m only really asking myself one question. How hard is it to win the games that this team has won?? That’s really it.
For instance, I personally think Auburn is really good, but I have them seeded kind of poorly. The reason is that at this point in time, they just haven’t won any games that really jump of the page.
If the season were a 40-minute game, we’d be about at the under-12 media timeout in the 1st half. There is a long way to go and I’m not trying to guess the future. Metaphorically speaking, I’m just trying to show what I think the score is at the under-12 1st half timeout.
Some notes and comments are listed below…
-Conference Champions are notated with an (*)
-Any teams that needed to move seedlines in order to meet bracketing rules have their original seed indicated in (parenthesis)
OTHERS CONSIDERED: Mississippi State, Florida, Duke, Liberty, NC State, Boston College, Saint John’s, Butler, Duquesne, Pittsburgh, Oregon, Nebraska, Xavier, Cincinnati, San Francisco, Iowa, Saint Bonaventure, Southern Illinois, Texas Tech, Indiana, Texas, TCU, Washington State
COMMENTS FROM DAVID:
-What impresses me most is notable wins away from home. The #1 seeds have all done that and I think they’ve started to set themselves apart. Purdue did lose the one true road game that they’ve played, but they’ve beaten so many good teams on neutral sites that it’s impossible to not give them credit for that and recognize that they are one of the best teams in the nation.
-A team like Duke, who was the last team in, has not done a damn thing away from home yet, and has even lost to a Georgia Tech team that is unlikely to make the NIT. I do think Duke is good, and I certainly think they will end up in the NCAA Tournament with a good seed, but this is a checkpoint and not a forecast.
-I really like what teams like Saint Joseph’s and Princeton have done. They’ve played a lot of games that aren’t necessarily against ranked teams, but that were away from home and hard to win and they’ve won the vast majority of them. Joe’s does have the one ugly loss to TAMU-Commerce, and that alone could warrant not being seeded anywhere near where I have them, but I think all their good wins have offset that.
-James Madison is unbeaten and a lot of people will probably try and say they deserve a much better seed than where I have them. While that may be true, in the current state of things that win against Michigan State isn’t quite as valuable as it appeared it would be at the time.
-The earlier in the year it is, the harder this is to do! At least if you’re trying to only measure merit.
Posted inBracketology, News and Notes|Comments Off on SELECTION MONDAY!! Hoops HD Bracket Projections (From the Puppet) – Dec 11th
-We will be recording this week’s Hoops HD Report, so keep an eye out for that and give it a watch or a listen. We will also be posting our latest Bracket Projections later today.
-The game of the day, and perhaps one of the more exciting games of the entire weekend, was Saint Joseph’s 74-70 win over Princeton. It was a well played and exciting game between two teams that both look like top 40 caliber teams and that should end up inside the bubble come March. It was the first loss of the season for Princeton, and even though it was a missed opportunity at a big road win, Princeton’s resume still looks pretty solid. As for Saint Joe’s, they improve to 8-2 on the year and have started to build a really nice resume of their own. It’s a shame this game didn’t get more attention because it was two really good teams with quite a bit of importance in regards to the NCAA Tournament.
-When Miami FL was blown out by Kentucky earlier this year we just thought it was an amazing performance by Kentucky (which it was, but still). Miami FL was blown out again yesterday, this time by Colorado 90-63. While it was an impressive performance by the Buffs, and while the Buffs are also really good, it does start to raise questions about how good Miami actually is. Having said that, other than those two blowouts, the Canes have won all their other games.
-Memphis picked up a really impressive road win as they knocked off a very good Texas A&M rteam 81-75 and were in control for pretty much all 40 minutes. Memphis is putting together quite an impressive profile in the first month of the season and is definitely a team to keep an eye on.
-After a bit of a sluggish start, Long Beach State is now 5-1 in their last six games and they picked up a big one at USC yesterday 84-79 in overtime. I don’t know if this is quite enough to declare Beach a team that can make a run at the bubble, but considering how well they’ve been playing and in looking at their remaining opponents it looks to me that they could really finish with a bloated record. As for USC, I still think they have a ton of potential, but I suppose it’s a good thing for them that they don’t play in the Big West. They’re now just 1-2 against Big West teams with both losses coming at home.
-Ole Miss barely escaped against UCF 70-68, but the Rebels remain unbeaten on the season and pick up their second road win. When I say they barely escaped, you have to go back and watch exactly how this game ended. UCF cut it to 2 in the final seconds of play, then stole the inbounds pass and put in what appeared to be a game tying basket, but the clock expired just a millisecond before they were able to get it off.
-Boston College is now 8-3 on the year after beating Saint John’s 86-80 in the Brooklyn Showcase. BC may not quite be a tournament team, but they’ve improved substantially and should be able to make at least a little bit of noise in the ACC.
-Michigan State continues to not look good. They fell at Nebraska yesterday 77-70, which as an isolated incident is forgivable because Lincoln is not the easiest place to win on the road, but Michigan State is now just 4-5 on the year with absolutely nothing of note on their resume. They have the talent to turn it around, but they’ve shown no signs of it yet.
NOTABLE GAMES (None that are really “Highlightable”):
-HOWARD AT PENN. A MEAC frontrunner against a Penn team that has made some noise this year.
-YALE AT QUINNIPIAC. In in-state battle between a Yale team that we thought would be really good and a Quinnipiac team that’s off to a better-than-exopected 7-2 start.
-MISSISSIPPI VALLY STATE AT GONZAGA. Zags should easily bounce back after the loss to Washington.
HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel will spend the upcoming months covering several Georgetown basketball home games, with (hopefully) a very special reward coming in March. In his free time, he traveled to Philly on Saturday and prepared this photo essay about the Kentucky-Penn game.
After attending 5 Georgetown games during November, I figured that I would shake things up a bit by heading up to Philly to see my beloved Penn Quakers host the 2nd-winningest college basketball program ever: the Kentucky Wildcats. Coach John Calipari has several players on his roster who grew up in/around the City of Brotherly Shove so he was kind enough to schedule a game back East so that all of the family/friends could come cheer on their loved ones in person. Based on the amount of blue in the stands, Big Blue Nation proved that they will also show up to cheer on their team wherever they play:
My expectations were very low going into the game but after Penn’s amazing win vs. 1 set of Wildcats last month (a 76-72 win over Villanova on 11/13) I decided to put my mascot theory to the test. I do not know how many college games are played at the Wells Fargo Center but I had to talk to literally TEN different employees before I found the media room: boo. On the plus side, I got to sit in the front row behind the basket: yay! The pregame meal consisted of a soft pretzel: what else!?
With Coach Cliff Ellis’ retirement from Coastal Carolina last Wednesday, Calipari is now the winningest active D-1 coach in the country with 790 (and counting):
In celebrity sighting news, current 76ers star/former Kentucky G Tyrese Maxey was in the house to check out his college coach:
Let’s tip it off:
Kentucky FR PF Aaron Bradshaw grew up 80 miles away from Philly in Roselle, NJ. He missed all of November with foot injury but looked as strong as an ox in the 1st half as he dominated the paint with layup after put-back after alley-oop. Kentucky is projected to end up with as many as 5 1st round picks next June and 7 guys in the top-38…and in just his 2nd game of the year Bradshaw demonstrated why he might very well be the 1st Wildcat off the board:
Another of the talented Wildcat super-frosh is G Rob Dillingham, who looked good during the 1st 20 minutes with a pair of shots from behind the arc and a lovely STL/layup. I can only hope that the fans eventually learn the proper cheer after he makes a big play: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZjAmpG8fNk
Penn only trailed 23-21 after 14 minutes before Kentucky went on 16-2 run to SEEMINGLY put things out of reach at 39-23…but then it turned into the Clark Slajchert Show. Penn’s SR PG had a backdoor layup, a baby hook in the lane, then wrapped things up with a scoop just before the buzzer to keep it close as the Quakers cut the deficit to 39-29 at halftime:
During the intermission I looked up to see 76ers F Marcus Morris, who proved that some people are indeed capable of pulling off the “sunglasses indoors” look:
I also noticed Kentucky FR Reed Sheppard’s parents sitting about 10 rows behind the Wildcats bench. His father Jeff was named tourney MOP when he led Kentucky to the 1998 NCAA title, and his mother Stacey also played basketball in Lexington:
Penn hung around for several minutes in the 2nd half thanks to some young guards of their own. FR Tyler Perkins missed a ton of shots in the 1st half but drilled a trio of trifectas in the 2nd half:
His backcourt mate FR Sam Brown missed the 1st 4 games of the season due to an ankle injury but has quickly become 1 of the best 3-PT shooters in the nation, as his 4 threes on Saturday put him at 20-41 in his past 7 games:
The elder statesman of the Wildcats is SR G Antonio Reeves, who made a couple of baseline runners, a lefty tip-in, and a corner 3 to help his team withstand Penn’s 3-PT barrage:
Kentucky had a huge advantage in bench scoring all night (by an incredible mark of 40-5!) due in large part to Bradshaw, who kept beating up the smaller Quakers inside and finishing with a sensational stat line in just his 2nd career game (17 PTS/11 REB/3 BLK/0 TO) as the Wildcats cruised to an 81-66 victory.
In the postgame press conference I asked Penn coach Steve Donahue what it was like to face the winningest active D-1 coach in the country. He joked that Calipari would have to get in line since “I got my ass kicked in the past by Mike Krzyzewski/Jim Boeheim”. He admires Calipari for caring about the right things: he remembers facing him in the 2010 Sweet 16 when Donahue was Cornell’s coach and Calipari’s attention to detail (in a 62-45 win) really opened his eyes:
The very last question of the afternoon was directed to Calipari about taking Ellis’ place atop the active D-1 wins list…only it was not asked by me but by some mother-Quaker who stole my thunder! He joked that holding the record just means that he is old, then spent a couple of minutes praising Ellis, who he just talked to on Friday night:
That is a wrap from Philly, check back in a couple of weeks when I return to DC but head to the western part of the district to see how GW is looking this year!
