News, Notes, and Highlighted Games: Tuesday, Dec 5th

Posted on December 5, 2017 by David Griggs

NEWS AND NOTES

-For the latest Hoops HD Report – CLICK HERE

-For Chad Sherwood’s UTR Game of the Day between SC State and Presby, which is SC State’s first game since that huge scare over the weekend – CLICK HERE

-Florida State went into Florida and trounced the Gators.  They led the whole way and then blew it open late in the second half.  Because of how well they had played, we all thought of Florida as a solid top ten team.  It’s rare that top ten teams lose at home.  If the Gators do end up having the kind of season that many of us were expecting after the PK-80, this could end up being one of the singular most impressive wins of the year by any team.  It was a great night for the Noles, who we weren’t all that excited about prior to last night, but are suddenly unbeaten with a huge win on their resume.

-A quick UTR note, congrats to Lipscomb who after losing 13 straight (or something like that) to rival Belmont swept this year’s Battle of the Boulevard last night with a rather decisive win over the Bruins.  Lipsomb isn’t likely good enough to be considered for an at-large bid unless they win out or do something crazy, but they are a very solid team that should finish at or near the top of the ASun, which would mean getting home court advantage during the tournament.  One of their losses was a road loss to Alabama in a game where they were without all their starters, so this is a potentially dangerous team.

 

HIGHLIGHTED GAMES

-MICHIGAN STATE AT RUTGERS (Big Ten).  Michigan State has a solid profile and they shouldn’t have too much trouble adding a conference road win to it tonight.

-VILLANOVA VS GONZAGA (Jimmy V Class, MSG, New York).  This is a fantastic early season match-up that would be on par with the kinds of games the #1 seeded teams are able to win.  Gonzaga’s only loss was a double overtime thriller to Florida, and while Nova’s schedule hasn’t been quite as tough to date they have absolutely blown through it.  The game probably means a little more to Gonzaga if for no other reason than Nova will have more chances for these types of wins when they get into conference play, but both teams are likely protected seed caliber teams, and depending on how the season goes they could end up on the #2 or #1 lines.

-VIRGINIA AT WEST VIRGINIA.  This is a huge test for a Virginia team that’s been tested, but not playing on the road in Morgantown level tested.  West Virginia is looking for their first really big signature win against a ranked team, and Virginia is looking for the kind of win that could help solidify them as a protected seeded caliber team.  The contrasting styles also make this a very interesting match-up.

-VERMONT AT MARQUETTE.  We like this Vermont team, but they’re coming off a loss at Bucknell that they really needed to pick up.  As far as them being a team that can land inside the bubble, I can’t help but get the feeling that they really need this win in order to make that happen.

-TEXAS AT VCU.  It will be an emotional day for VCU fans as their former coach comes to town.  I really like this Texas team and even though they don’t have any big wins on their profile just yet, they’ve shown they can play at a high level and that the big wins will likely be there at the end.  Picking up this one on the road would certainly help things.

-SOUTH DAKOTA STATE AT WICHITA STATE.  South Dakota State has looked really impressive at times, but they are probably swinging way over their heads as they take on a Wichita State team that just won at Baylor, is ranked #6 in the nation, and has shown no signs that they are overrated.

-NEVADA AT TEXAS TECH.  This is a great matchup between two teams that are off to fantastic starts and have already picked up some notable wins.  It’s not the showcase that we’re gonna see in MSG, but it’s a game I’m looking forward to just as much.

-COLORADO STATE AT ARKANSAS.  Can Arkansas bounce back after getting thrashed by Houston?  I still like the Razorbacks, but they need to get this one to restore some momentum.

-TEXAS A&M VS ARIZONA (Phoenix, AZ).  Arizona had a nice bounce back with what looked to be a really good win against UNLV.  They could REALLY bounce back if they’re able to knock off a TAMU team that has four big wins away from home already and has shown every sign that they’re a top ten team.

-MINNESOTA AT NEBRASKA (Big Ten).  Minney is off to a really good start and can add a conference road win to their profile tonight.

-SMU AT TCU.  I don’t think I’ve ever said this about this rivalry before, but it has NCAA implications for both teams!!  TCU is in the rankings, and SMU certainly has potential.  Picking up this win on the road would be their signature win up to this point.

-SYRACUSE VS UCONN (Jimmy V Classic, MSG).  This is a nostalgic rivalry when you think of how these teams battled as members of the Big East.  Now, neither team is in the Big East and neither team appears to be particularly good either.  Having said that, UConn is 6-2 despite needing overtime to beat both Columbia and Monmouth, and Syracuse has looked good on their home court against some pretty good UTR teams.  If either team is going to do anything, you get the sense that they need to win this game to establish some momentum and make a statement that they were good enough to not lose this game.

-UTAH AT BUTLER.  Both teams have looked decent, but neither have looked great yet.  Having said that, both have potential and this will be a really good OOC win for multiple reasons for whoever picks it up.

-CAL STATE BAKERSFIELD AT FRESNO STATE.  We’ll highlight this one because I like what Fresno has done so far, and I like CSU Bakersfield’s program even though they’re kind of at the bottom of their talent cycle at the moment.

-SAINT JOHN’S VS GRAND CANYON.  The Johnnies are a quite 7-1.  If they can get this road win, they’ll be a much noisier 8-1.  GCU probably isn’t a tournament team, but they’re solid enough to where they aren’t the easiest team to beat on the road.  This game isn’t on campus, but it will still be a very pro GCU crowd.

 

BUY GAMES

-Ball State @ Notre Dame
-Boston U @ Miami FL
-Winthrop @ Georgia
-Samford @ Memphis
-North Dakota @ Creighton
-SC Upstate @ Kansas State
-Saint Francis U (STFU) @ Duke
-Miami OH @ Missouri
-Oral Roberts @ UNLV

Posted in Daily Rundown, News and Notes | Comments Off on News, Notes, and Highlighted Games: Tuesday, Dec 5th

Under the Radar Game of the Day: South Carolina State at Presbyterian

Posted on December 5, 2017 by Chad

South Carolina State at Presbyterian, 7:00 PM Eastern, bigsouthsports.com

The game of basketball is about which team can outscore their opponent and notch the victory.  If a team gets enough victories, it may get a chance to compete in the national tournament with a shot at wining the championship.  The biggest concerns during most games is how to defend your opponent, how to best run your offense, and how to maximize the output from your team’s players.  It is a fun game to play, a fun game to watch, and a game which I and all of us here at HoopsHD love and respect dearly.

There are times, however, when the game takes a back seat.  There are a lot of things in this world that are way more important than a game, and we all got a shocking reminder of that this past weekend when South Carolina State was in action at North Carolina State.  Ty Solomon, a four year starter at point guard for the Bulldogs, suddenly collapsed during a timeout and needed to be resuscitated on the sideline.  The quick reaction and help from the training staffs and first responders most likely saved this young man’s life.  He was taken to the hospital directly from the court and is now recovering.  This was one of the scariest on-court moments we have ever seen, and we are all just thankful that Ty is ok now.

Ty’s team is back in action again tonight at Presbyterian in our Under the Radar Game of the Day.  South Carolina State enters this game at 1-7 overall and 0-7 against D1 competition, while Presbyterian has won three straight games to improve to 4-5 on the year.  However, tonight is a night when we will take a moment to reflect on the things that are more important than this game.  And then we will go ahead and watch the games . . . because just maybe we can get another finish like this one from last week for the Presbyterian Blue Hose:

Posted in Under the Radar | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

The Hoops HD Report: December 4th

Posted on December 4, 2017 by David Griggs

The panel reviews yet another busy week in college basketball.  We start by looking at the Mountain West where Nevada has cracked the rankings and where UNLV, San Diego State, Wyoming, and even Fresno State are off to better than expected starts.  From there we look at the struggles of the Pac Twelve where seemingly everyone other than Arizona State is underperforming.  We then run through the rest of the multi-bid leagues and discuss the ACC’s dominance over the Big Ten, Louisville’s struggles, the crazy post-game antics of the Xavier vs Cincinnati game, and Texas A&M’s hot start.  All that, a look at this week’s upcoming action, and much more.

 

And for all you radio lovers, below is an mp3 version of the show…

Posted in Hoops HD Report, News and Notes, Podcasts, Videocasts | 1 Comment

Basketball, blogging, and Teitel: HoopsHD at the BB&T Classic (Part 1 of 2)

Posted on December 4, 2017 by Jon Teitel

It is December in DC so that can only mean 3 things: holiday parties, stories about the Redskins that include the phrase “mathematically eliminated”, and the BB&T Classic in Chinatown. This year we got 1 competitive match-up (Temple-GW) and…1 battle of an undefeated team vs. a winless team (Coppin State-Georgetown). Sadly, no Hill Country BBQ on this year’s pregame menu (just lukewarm pizza) but a nice long 2-hour break between the 2 games that allowed everyone to catch their breath. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel spent all day at the Capital One Arena…and lived to tell about it.  Today we cover Temple-GW in Part 1, and check back later this week for Part 2 about Coppin State-Georgetown.

When Hoops HD sits right behind the basket, we sit RIGHT behind the basket:

They might not know exactly who I am…but I have been called worse, and perhaps there is some truth to the rumor that we are merging with a medical insurance website!:

Pregame intros were nice:

  

Cheerleaders as well…even if there not were a lot of fans around to lead in cheers:

  

Temple-GW was a classic tale-of-2-halves game with the Colonials building a 40-25 lead by halftime. 1 team lived by the 3 in the 1st half (GW: 6-10 3PM) and 1 died by it (Temple: 1-7). Time was really flying because somehow neither team made a single FT before halftime! Obi Enechionyia barely kept the Owls in it through the 1st 20 minutes with a pretty finger roll, baseline fadeaway jumper, and a jumper that bounced once on the rim before dropping in. GW used a balanced attack featuring several different scorers: Arnaldo Toro/Jair Bolden each made a pair of threes, and Patrick Steeves banked in a leaner at the buzzer to give his team what seemed like a stranglehold at the break.

The 2nd half was a completely different story thanks to Coach Fran Dunphy instructing his team to play more full court defense and his stars finally playing to their potential.  The Temple coaching staff is so fascinating: they have the best coach in Penn history (Dunphy), my former college neighbor (assistant coach Shawn Trice), and the 2001 NBA 6th Man of the Year (assistant coach Aaron McKie):

Shizz Alston made a pair of threes and extended his consecutive made FT streak to 46 (3 shy of Lynn Greer’s school record), while Quinton Rose had his own person dunk contest as he got to the rim on 3 separate occasions for sensational slams. The X-factor was Alani Moore II, the 5’10” sophomore who returned to his hometown of DC and almost won the game all by himself. With his team down by double-digits late in the game, Moore made a corner 3, then stole the inbounds pass and found Rose for another 3 to cap a 10-0 run in just 75 seconds, but it would not be enough. GW’s 2nd half star was SR Yuta Watanabe, who made a pair of threes and had a huge BLK at the rim to deny Rose with 41 seconds left. However, we also witnessed the coming-out party for FR G Justin Mazzulla: the younger brother of Joe (the former West Virginia PG Joe who played 145 games and went to the 2010 Final 4 under Bob Huggins) did a little of everything including an acrobatic layup off the glass, grabbing a loose ball and then converting a layup, and even taking a charge on the 6’10” Enechionya with under 3 minutes to play.

Temple had a couple of chances to tie it at the end but kept missing 3-PT shots as GW escaped with a 71-67 victory. Temple’s defense was dragging a bit in the 1st half but the Colonials are not going to lose many games when they shoot 27-45 from the field. It might not be as cool as the Miami football turnover chain, but Jair Bolden received the “Ghost Belt” due to all of his hustle plays (oh how it shines!):

I asked him at the postgame press conference what he was going to do with the belt, and he said that the winner just hangs it in his locker so that everyone else can be jealous. Unbelievably, the Owls have still not played a home game this season, so I asked Rose/Coach Dunphy if they were excited to finally play in front of their home fans this Wednesday…but they did not take the bait. Rose said he wished he could have returned home with a win, and Coach Dunphy said that his team was excited to play at Madison Square Garden last week and today in DC.

  

Posted in CBB | Tagged , | Comments Off on Basketball, blogging, and Teitel: HoopsHD at the BB&T Classic (Part 1 of 2)

November Reset, and Bracket Projections: Monday, Dec 4th

Posted on December 4, 2017 by David Griggs

For Chad Sherwood’s UTR Game of the Day – CLICK HERE

NOVEMBER (and a couple of December Days) RESET

-If you’re new to the party, let’s get you caught up on some of what you may have missed.

-Duke is the overall #1 team, and they’ve certainly done the most to earn it.  I rarely say that about Duke, so if I’m saying it then it must be true.  Their profile includes wins over Michigan State, Texas, and Florida, all of which came away from home.

-The best game of the year in terms of excitement and how well played it was is probably the Gonzaga vs Florida game in the PK-80.  The thing about it is that it wasn’t over until about 2am, so many people in the east probably went to bed.  It was a double overtime thriller that was played at a very high level.

-By my count, we’ve had five match-ups between top ten teams already.  I for one think this is a fantastic thing for the sport.  It’s good for the teams to test themselves and give themselves chances at big wins, and it’s great for the fans too, who want to see high level basketball.

-The number of quadruple overtime games (which is something we do track) is at 2.  We are ahead of last year’s pace!

-In looking Under the Radar, Northern Iowa and Western Kentucky appear to be the two best teams.  Northern Iowa has managed wins against SMU, NC State, and UNLV and their only losses were to Villanova and North Carolina.  Western Kentucky knocked off a Purdue team that’s red hot right now, as well as SMU.  Strangely enough the two teams were in the Battle 4 Atlantis, but did not meet.

-The biggest upset of the year, and perhaps in many years, was Grambling winning at Georgia Tech this past Friday night.

-The disappointment of the year is probably Arizona.  They started off ranked #2, but then failed to win a single game in the Battle 4 Atlantis.  They did pick up a nice win at UNLV this past week so they may be getting things turned around, but they still don’t look like a top 25 team, much less the #2 overall team.

-Virginia is once again ranked higher at the beginning of December than they were to start the season.

-Iowa stinks.

Pittsburgh REALLY stinks

-As far as the surprises of the year, I think I have two.  Washington State won the Wooden Tradition and beat San Diego State and Saint Mary’s along the way.  They did lose rather convincingly to UC Davis in their most recent game, but the fact that they are 6-1 and have two wins against pretty good teams is astounding for what I thought would be a team that would fall outside the RPI top 250.

The other surprise to me is their conference mates in Arizona State.  They are unbeaten on the season, and they blew a pretty good Xavier team off the floor along the way.  If you were to make a list of teams who have blowout wins against ranked teams away from home, it would be a very short list.  This ASU team has looked legit so far.

 

BRACKET PROJECTIONS FOR DECEMBER 4TH. 

-There are some notes on the bracket below, but the biggest note of all is for you to understand what you are looking at.  It is a CHECKPOINT based on CURRENT MERIT, and even CURRENT RPI numbers.  I know those things are not reliable.  I put this together as much of an exercise as I do anything else, and I figure if I’m doing it, then why not post it?  There are teams that are not even in the field (Louisville) that I believe to be better than multiple teams that are high in the bracket, but so far all they’ve done is win home buy games, and since I’m doing this based entirely on what teams have done so far, they’re not in it.

-The bracket reflects all games played through SUNDAY, DECEMBER 3RD

OTHERS CONSIDERED: Saint Bonaventure, Syracuse, Penn State, Georgia, Maryland, Ohio State, Auburn, Iowa State, Middle Tennessee, SMU, Michigan, UCLA, Wyoming, Utah, UCF, La Salle, Saint John’s, Saint Mary’s, Louisville, Louisiana Tech, Valparaiso

TEAMS THAT I THINK ARE UNDERRATED: Kentucky, Oklahoma, Virginia Tech, West Virginia, and USC to name a few.  They don’t have the big wins yet, but I think they have shown they are capable of picking them up and will do so once they et more opportunities

TEAMS THAT I THINK WILL DROP BEFORE MARCH: Western Kentucky, Northern Iowa, Temple, Clemson.  Temple is #1 in both the RPI and the SOS right now.  If they finish the season like that they’ll get a #1 seed.  Unfortunately for them I don’t foresee that happening.

 

NOTES FROM OTHERS AT HOOPS HD (They insist it’s too early, but I’ll open it up for criticism anyway, especially since they love to criticize me and point out any and all mistakes

-coming soon….maybe

Posted in Bracketology, News and Notes | Comments Off on November Reset, and Bracket Projections: Monday, Dec 4th

Under the Radar Game of the Day: Penn at Howard (and other highlighted games)

Posted on December 4, 2017 by Chad

Penn at Howard, 7:00 PM Eastern, hubison.com

Tonight, HoopsHD is dispatching our own Jon Teitel live and in-person to the Under the Radar Game of the Day as the Penn Quakers come to Washington DC to take on the Howard Bison.  The Bison enter tonight’s game at 1-7 (0-7 against D1 competition), though all 7 losses did come away from home.  In fact, tonight’s game will be their first contest at home against a Division I foe.  Charles Williams led the team with 23 points in their win against Central Pennsylvania, while RJ Cole just missed a double-double with 20 points and 9 assists.  Both players and their teammates will have a lot tougher battle tonight against the Quakers.

Head coach Steve Donahue’s Penn Quakers enter tonight at 5-4 on the season, having just fallen to Villanova last time out by 28 points.  Their other three losses were all respectable as well, at Fairfield, on a neutral court to Towson and in double overtime to La Salle.  They also won one of the more exciting games of the entire season so far, 101-96 in 4 overtimes at Monmouth.  Freshman Eddie Scott ended up being huge for the Quakers coming off the bench in that win, as he ended up with 21 points and 13 rebounds.  With Harvard struggling early and Yale dealing with injuries, Penn has a real good chance to be the favorites to win the Ivy League by the time we reach conference play.  A win tonight on the road will help to further prove just how good this team may be.

One final note, don’t forget to check out our HoopsHD Report that we will be recording tonight..if he gets back from the game in time, we may be able to get a live report on this one from Jon Teitel!

 

OTHER HIGHLIGHTED GAMES

-We had two really exciting finishes yesterday evening with Maryland getting it done in overtime at Illinois (and not without a little bit of controversy), and Mississippi State staying unbeaten on the year with a steal and last second shot win at home against Dayton.  Louisville also came up short in a close game against Seton Hall.  It was a good road win for the Pirates, and Louisville is still looking for their first win that isn’t a buy game win.

-MICHIGAN AT OHIO STATE (Big Ten).  The basketball version of this bitter rivalry.  This is actually a big game on paper for both teams.  It’s also important because both teams could really use some positive momentum right about now.

-WISCONSIN AT PENN STATE (Big Ten).  I like what Penn State has done so far, and have been disappointed in Wiscy so far.  These two teams currently seem to be heading  in different directions.  Wisconsin needs to win a game like this to get things turned around.

-HIGH POINT AT CHARLESTON.  I will continue to highlight CofC because I think they have a ton of potential, but they pretty much need to win out in order to be solidly in the discussion for a bid.

-IOWA AT INDIANA (Big Ten).  Iowa ihas been awful this year, and Indiana, while not awful, hasn’t been good.

-MISSOURI STATE AT NORTH DAKOTA STATE.  Missouri State is off to a great start this year, and can pick up another good road win if they’re able to pull this off tonight.

-FLORIDA STATE AT FLORIDA.  This is a huge rivalry, but this year’s edition of it appears to be a mismatch.  Florida State can REALLY polish up their resume if they’re able to pull this off, but that will be easier said than done.

-Sam Houston State @ Baylor – buy game.
-UTSA @ Oklahoma – buy game
-Northern Illinois @ Iowa State – buy game
-Sacramento State @ Saint Mary’s – buy game

Posted in Under the Radar | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment