NEWS AND NOTES
-It was a busy Saturday. If Missouri wasn’t on your radar before yesterday, they better be on it now. They knocked off Illinois 81-78 in the annual Braggin’ Rights game, and remain unbeaten on the year. With wins over Oregon, Liberty, Wichita State, and now Illinois, their resume is as good as anyone’s. Cuonzo Martin is an early candidate for National Coach of the Year! The officiating in this game was awful, but the play was good!
-Tennessee improved to 2-0 after winning a seesaw battle against Cincinnati. Two things to say about this game are that the Vols still look like they’re shaking some rust off after being shut down, and despite the loss Cincinnati is looking better and better every time they play.
-Florida State beat rival Florida 83-71 to remain unbeaten, but that hardly seems important considering that Keyontae Johnson collapsed early on in the game as the teams were going into a media timeout. It was a very unsettling scene as he just suddenly dropped and face planted in the middle of the floor. He was taken to the hospital and his condition is listed as stable. The players on both teams were understandably shaken. It was just this past summer when former Florida State player Michael Ojo collapsed and died on the court during a practice with his professional team in Serbia, so to see a player collapse the way that Keyontate Johnson did was very frightening for everyone. The game did continue. It is worth noting that both teams wanted to continue to play so it wasn’t a situation where it was forced upon them. Florida State did win, but that hardly seems important. I’m just glad that Keyontae Johnson’s condition is stable and I hope that he is able to diagnose and treat whatever it was that caused him to collapse.
-Miami FL suffered their first loss of the season, and it was a bit of a shocker. It was a home buy game to Florida Gulf Coast, who when you look at them is suddenly 3-1 on the year and right along with Liberty is looking like a really good team out of the Atlantic Sun.
-Kentucky fell behind by 22 to Notre Dame and was able to overcome 21 of those points, but could not get all the way over the top. They missed what would have been a game winning shot at the buzzer and the Irish held on to win. Kentucky is now 1-4 and still looks like they have quite a bit to figure out if they’re going to even make the NCAA Tournament.
-Syracuse blew out Boston College. Syracuse is now 4-1 on the season with the only loss being close and on the road against Rutgers. I think it is safe to say that we underestimated Syracuse. The overall resume may not be there yet, but they look like an NCAA Tournament team.
-Memphis could not get it done against an Auburn team that has looked pitiful all seaosn long. Perhaps we overestimated Memphis.
-Oklahoma State got a scare at Wichita State, but did pick up the road win and remains unbeaten on the year. They are appealing their postseason ban. We will see how it goes.
-South Dakota State, an under the radar team that we thought could land inside the bubble, got blasted by in-state rival South Dakota. The final score was 91-78, but the game really wasn’t as close as that. The Yotes actually had a 20pt lead late in the second half.
HIGHLIGHTED GAMES
-UMASS AT NORTHEASTERN. A rematch from earlier in the week as UMass tries to improve to 2-0 and pick up a road win.
-RHODE ISLAND AT WESTERN KENTUCKY. Rhody is off to a modest 3-3 start and needs to put meet on their resume between now and the end if they want to be inside the bubble. WKU is a UTR team that’s had some big wins already and appears to be good enough to land inside the bubble as well. In short, this is a resume building opportunity for two teams that need to continue to build their resumes.
-RICHMOND AT WEST VIRGINIA. A lot of the sparkle of Richmond’s win at Kentucky has faded, but if they can somehow manage to pull off a win at WVU today the resume will certainly get its sparkle back! WVU is high in the rankings and has looked like a protected seed so far.
-LOYOLA CHICAGO AT UIC. Loyola Chicago is a team that we think will be a Missouri Valley frontrunner, but they haven’t had that many opportunities to play yet. UIC is off to a good 3-1 start and is looking to keep that going against their crosstown foes.
-PENN STATE AT MICHIGAN (Big Ten). Penn State is coming off a very impressive win over Virginia Tech, and has another good one over VCU as well, so they’ve been a bit of a surprise this year and look to keep it rolling against a 5-0 Michigan team who is good, but who also hasn’t really been tested yet.
-OHIO U AT MARSHALL. A really good game today that probably won’t get the attention it deserves. Both are really solid UTR teams who we could end up seeing in the NCAA Tournament.
-WINTHROP AT SOUTH CAROLINA STATE. This is another winnable road game for Winthrop, which would improve them to 4-0.
-SAN FRANCISCO AT CALIFORNIA. San Francisco is looking to build on their 5-2 record, which includes a big win against Virginia. This is a winnable road game for them against another Bay Area foe!
-ARIZONA STATE AT GRAND CANYON. This one should be fun. The two schools are neighbors. Arizona State is in the Top 25 and GCU comes in undefeated and looking for some recognition of their own.
-MERCER AT GEORGIA SOUTHERN. A win gets Mercer to 6-0 and gives them their second road win of the season.
-SAINT JOHN’S AT GEORGETOWN (Big East). Georgetown put up a big fight against Villanova earlier this week and although they appear to be better than expected they probably aren’t going to end up inside the bubble. The Johnnies are off to a decent 5-2 start but still need to add some meet to the resume.
-STANFORD AT USC (Pac 12). Both of these teams have looked like tournament teams so far, so this should be a fun conference match-up. USC is, once again, better than the preseason projections and Stanford is looking for another statement win to improve their profile.
BUY GAMES (or games that might as well be)
-Oakland @ Michigan State
-North Alabama @ Indiana
-Northern Illinois @ Iowa
-Mississippi Valley State @ Vanderbilt
-Cleveland State @ Ohio State
-Portland State @ Washington State
