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UPDATE (12:45 PM, EST) – Baylor-Gonzaga has been postponed after a couple of positive COVID-19 tests with the Gonzaga travel party.

NEWS AND NOTES

-The craziest game (or at least finish) of the day was between Marquette and Wisconsin.  It was close all throughout, there were several lead changes in the final minute, and Marquette picked up the win after missing what would have been a game winning freethrow, but getting the tip-in on the rebound.  Marquette improves to 3-1 and (for now) owns claim to the highest ranked win!  Wisconsin was ranked 4th and no one ranked ahead of them has been beaten!  That will change today when Baylor and Gonzaga play each other, but at least they get to hold claim to it for a little while!

-Oregon bounced back after a sluggish first game to get a nice win over a Seton Hall team, that’s off to kind of a sluggish start themselves.  The Hall has now fallen to 1-3.

-South Dakota State picked up a really nice road win at Bradley.  They’ve got a lot of work to do if they want to end up inside the bubble, but if they dominate their conference like should and can pick up a couple more notable wins they should be in the discussion.

HIGHLIGHTED GAMES

-BAYLOR VS GONZAGA (Indianapolis, IN).  Not only are these the top two ranked teams, both have already beaten highly ranked teams!  Both are proven in addition to being ranked high!  It wouldn’t shock me at all if both of these teams ended up on the #1 line.  It’s a hugely exciting early season game between two teams that have a lot of weapons.  It will be really fun watching them go at each other.

-FURMAN AT CHARLESTON.  Furman really hasn’t been tested yet, and perhaps won’t be today either, but this is still probably their toughest game of the season so far, and it’s a chance for them to pick up a road win and improve to 4-0.

-EASTERN WASHINGTON AT ARIZONA.  Eastern Washington did not look good in their first game, but they’re still probably the Big Sky frontrunner and are potentially dangerous if Arizona overlooks them.

-SMU AT DAYTON.  I’m looking forward to this one.  Both teams are unbeaten and I feel that both are potential/likely tournament teams, so this is a big early season game for both of them.

-WASHINGTON STATE AT COLORADO (Pac 12).  Both teams are unbeaten, and up until now Wazzu has actually looked a lot better than expected.  If they can pick this one up on the road then they will really have our attention.

-NEW MEXICO STATE AT SANTA CLARA.  This is the first div1 opponent for New Mexico State, and it won’t be easy.  Santa Clara is 4-0 and I still think they can be a bit of a dark horse in the WCC this year.

-SOUTH CAROLINA AT HOUSTON.  South Carolina hasn’t gotten off to the best start, but I still think they have a ton of potential.  That being said, this is one of the better teams they will face all season.  Houston is ranked 10th in the country, and I think they’ll finish the season ranked in the top ten.

-BYU AT UTAH STATE.  Bee Hive!!!!  BYU did have a somewhat surprising blowout loss to USC, but that’s their only loss of the season and they still look like a really strong team.  Utah State is just 1-2, but a win in a rivalry game like this could really energize things for them.

-UIC AT BALL STATE.  A win for UIC gets them to 4-0 as well as gives them their second road win.

-NORTHERN KENTUCKY AT CHATTANOOGA.  Both teams 2-0

-GEORGIA SOUTHERN AT USC UPSTATE.  Georgia Southern can improve to 3-0.

-RICE AT HOUSTON BAPTIST.  Rice can improve to 4-0 and pick up their second road win.

BUY GAMES (and games that might as well be)

-Columbia International (nondiv1) @ Mercer
-Mount Saint Mary’s @ VCU
-Radford @ East Carolina
-North Dakota State @ Kansas
-Fairleigh Dickinson @ Providence
-Chicago State @ Northwestern
-Lipscomb @ Arkansas
-Samford @ Belmont – Belmont is unbeaten
-Northern Illinois @ Pittsburgh
-Rider @ Syracuse
-Oakland @ Oklahoma State
-Arkansas Pine Bluff @ Saint Louis

NEWS AND NOTES

-Winthrop picked up another nice win against Little Rock yesterday to improve to 2-0.  We thought Winthrop would be good by Big South standards, but with two wins against two really good UTR teams, I’m starting to wonder if they’re good enough to play their way inside the bubble.

-UConn picked up a really nice win against a USC team that looks to be good.  Neither of these teams received a whole lot of love from the preseason polls (at least not by top 25 standards), but it wouldn’t shock me at all if we saw both of these teams in the rankings by the end of the year.

HIGHLIGHTED GAMES

-KENT STATE AT VIRGINIA.  Kent State comes in at 1-0 and could make quite a bit of noise in the MAC this year, but they’re probably swinging way over their heads today against a very good Virginia team.

-GEORGIA STATE AT CHARLOTTE.  This would be the second road win for Georgia State and improve them to 3-1 overall if they’re able to pull it off.

-WISCONSIN AT MARQUETTE.  This is always a fun rivalry.  It will have an interesting feel being played without any fans, though.  Wisky is ranked in the top five, so one has to conclude that they are in the hunt for a #1 seed.

-SOUTH DAKOTA STATE AT BRADLEY.  South Dakota State is a solid team, but their margin for error is thin if they want to land inside the bubble, so games like this are big.  Bradley’s only loss on the season was a close one at Xavier, so they have quite a bit of potential as well.

-SETON HALL VS OREGON (Omaha, NE).  This is another good early season match-up between two likely tournament teams, both of whom could use a good early season win right about now.

-SAN FRANCISCO AT CAL POLY.  A win for the Dons gets them to 4-2 on the year, as well as gives them their second road win.

-JACKSONVILLE AT GEORGIA – Both teams unbeaten.

BUY GAMES

-Saint Peter’s @ Maryland – SPC is a potential MAAC frontrunner
-Detroit @ Michigan State
-Kennesaw State @ Creighton
-Bellarmine @ Duke – Welcome do D! Bellarmine!!
-Valparaiso @ Purdue
-Central Arkansas @ Memphis
-Stetson @ Miami FL
-Troy @ Texas Tech
-North Dakota @ Minnesota

NEWS AND NOTES

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-We saw back to back top 10 (well, top 11) match-ups last night and neither game disappointed.  Gonzaga and West Virginia seesawed back and forth with the Zags finally getting control in the final minutes of the game and picking up yet another big time early season win.  There was a scary moment when Jalen Suggs suffered an injury and had to leave the game, and at the time no one was sure how serious it was.  Fortunately…not very.  He was able to reenter the game in the second half and all vital signs are positive.

-Baylor pulled away from Illinois in the second half and picked up what is so far, the biggest win of the year in regards to the rankings.  Illinois was ranked 5th, and no one ranked higher than that has lost a game yet.  The Bears are for real, and they will face Gonzaga this weekend.  We are lacking fans, but we don’t seem to be lacking quality early season match-ups!

-Texas got a big win over North Carolina, which was their third notable win of the season, and it allowed them to take home some hardware.  Texas may finally be having the season that we’ve been waiting for under Shaka Smart.

-Missouri knocked off Oregon in Omaha last night in a game that was somewhat surprising.  We weren’t expecting much out of Mizzou at all, and on the flip side were expecting quite a bit out of Oregon.  But, one early season game can entirely change the view that you have of any given team, and I guess that’s what happened with Mizzou yesterday.

-Penn State remains unbeaten after hitting a three at the buzzer to knock off VCU.  It had been a really rough offseason for the Nittany Lions and we were kind of expecting a long and frustrating year, but it’s been anything but that out of the gate.

-Duquesne picked up their first win of the year against (what we think) is a pretty good UNC Greensboro team.  I do think they’ll be able to make some noise in the A10 this year.  UNCG still has a good team, but they’re off to a bit of sluggish 1-2 start.

-South Dakota State had a nice bounce back win at Iowa State, which is something they kind of needed if they want to end up inside the bubble this March, which we still think they are good enough to do.

-Rhode Island got an impressive win against a Seton Hall team that had been playing well going into yesterdays game.  We need to keep paying attention to the Rams this year as well.

-San Francisco has been somewhat inconsistent this year.  At times they’ve looked fantastic and at other times you can’t believe it’s the same team.  Last night they looked fantastic and totally blew Nevada off the court.

-Indiana picked up a really nice neutral floor win against a pretty good Stanford team.  Stanford had played really well in their first two games, so it was a little surprising to see them struggle so much yesterday.

-Florida got a big scare from Army, but held on for the win.  This Army team has been fun to watch this season and I think will make quite a bit of noise once they get into Patriot League play.

-BYU bounced back from their blowout loss to USC and handed Saint John’s their first loss of the season yesterday.

HIGHLIGHTED GAMES

-WINTHROP VS LITTLE ROCK (Louisville, KY).  These are two really good UTR teams.  Winthrop already managed a big win against UNC Greensboro in their first game and have the chance to pick up another one today against a Little Rock team that will be one of the frontrunners in the Sun Belt.

-WASHINGTON AT UTAH (Pac 12).  It’s the season opener for Utah, which is just another odd situation that we’ve seen this year with a team playing a conference opponent in its first game.  Washington was not expected to do much this year, and so far they are living up to that.

-UCONN VS USC (Mohegan Sun).  Both teams are unbeaten, and both have looked good.  USC is coming off a very impressive blowout win against BYU and can keep that momentum going if they’re able to pick up another big early season win today.

-SEATTLE AT UCLA.  This is a buy game, but with Seattle coming in at 3-1 and UCLA having struggled in their first two games we will go ahead and highlight it.

-FLORIDA VS BOSTON COLLEGE (Mohegan Sun).  The Gators really struggled in their opener against a pretty good Army team yesterday and will face another test today against a BC team that’s just 1-2, but that has played well against some pretty good teams and could use an early quality win of their own.

-ARIZONA STATE AT CALIFORNIA (Pac 12).  Arizona State has looked pretty good early on and should be able to pick up their conference opener on the road tonight.

BUY GAMES (or games that will look that way on the team sheets)

-UMass Lowell vs NC State (Mohegan Sun)
-Saint Francis U @ Liberty
-Western Illinois @ Iowa
-Washburn (nondiv1) @ Kansas
-VMI @ Virginia Tech
-Niagara @ Syracuse
-Omaha @ Drake – a win for Drake gets them to 3-0
-UTSA @ Oklahoma
-Northwestern State @ TCU
-Saint Katherine (nondiv1) @ Pepperdine
-Texas Southern @ Saint Mary’s