07 Feb26 - Finish Strong

Volume XI, No. 17 - 07 Feb 26 - [] Top 25 Ballot

Finish Strong

The two conference showdown games in the Big 10 and Big East were both decidedly defensive affairs. Ohio State edged Wisconsin, @49-48, on gMike Conley's driving layup with 4 seconds left. The win handed the Buckeyes the regular season title (thanks to an earlier UW loss at Michigan State). It's still not clear which team is really better -- the Badgers could have sealed the win seconds earlier but gKammron Taylor missed the front end of a one-and-one. We'll have to wait until Round Three in the Big 10 tournament final in Chicago. (If they both win out from here and do meet in that championship game, they'll likely both wind up with #1 seeds in the NCAA tournament.) In a battle with no more than a #2-seed on the line, Georgetown converted a couple of steals into layups to turn a 49-49 game with 5 minutes left into a @61-53 Hoya victory. GU is now alone in first place in the conference with one week left to play.

A couple of teams that seemed like locks for #1 seeds for most of the season haven't finished strong in the home stretch. Florida lost again, this time on the road at LSU (playing without "Big Baby" cGlen Davis). The Tigers used a mini-version of The Year After Rule -- (call it "The Week After Effect") -- as the supporting cast stepped up their activity and were a more effective team in the short-run with an open lane and no post player to feed and watch. The Gators couldn't hit from outside and kept waiting for a run that never came. They've already wrapped up the regular season title in the SEC, so they don't have anything to play for until the conference tournament (except that #1 NCAA seed). North Carolina's problem isn't motivational, it's more a case of the freshmen expecting teams to quit because "the game is over" like they did earlier in the season. UNC battled Maryland and seemed to have put it away with a 77-@70 late in the second half, but UMd responded and gained a @89-87 victory. The Terrapins are playing with the same kind of aggressive hunger that they showed at the start of the season. Meanwhile, the Tar Heels have fallen back into a three-way tie for the ACC lead with Virginia Tech and Virginia. (Can you believe that Round Two of VaTech-UVa still has first-place implications the second time around?)

Oregon and Michigan State seem to have turned on a switch that should see them through to the end of the season. The Ducks rebounded from their "slump" with two solid home wins, @64-59 over Washington State and @93-85 over Washington, as gAaron Brooks and gTajuan Porter scored 86 points between them in two games. (Nothing was ever terribly wrong with UofO in the first place, but the tough Pac-10 schedule broke their momentum for a bit.) Meanwhile, the Spartans knocked off Wisconsin @64-55 and Indiana @66-58 as gDrew Neitzel (28p and 17p) has made a late bid to challenge UW's fAlando Tucker for Big 10 Player of the Year. (First runner-up will have to do, though.)

The churning of teams in the SEC may wind up costing at-large bids from the lesser conferences. (For example, it now seems unlikely that the MVC will get more than 3 bids.) With everyone beating each other, they're all getting rating points that can't be matched by teams like Davidson/Appalachian State(SoCon), Akron(MAC), Wright State/Loyola-Illinois(Horizon), Gonzaga/Santa Clara(WCC), VCU/Old Dominion/Drexel(Colonial) or even Xavier/Massachusetts(Atlantic 10). Most likely, only one each of those teams will get an (automatic) bid into the NCAAs because it looks like all the at-larges are headed for the Big Boys. In the Mountain West, BYU, UNLV and Air Force are making their reputation off of beating each other. The problem is, there aren't many quality wins among them outside the conference. UNLV and USAF did beat Texas Tech (but that's a moving target as far as using it as a benchmark goes). BYU beat Oral Roberts -- big deal. They'll probably all three make the NCAA field, though, because of the overall strength of the conference.

It's tournament time in the lesser conferences. The usual problem is the danger of NCAA locks screwing up in their conference tournament and giving an automatic bid to a team that wouldn't have made it otherwise while they take away an at-large bid that could have gone to some other deserving team. #1 on that list this year is Memphis in lowly Conference USA (but they're undefeated inside the league and the tournament is at their place -- hopefully, that'll be enough; but we won't have to worry about them until next week). Butler goofed around, losing at home to Loyola(Illinois), and wound up losing the #1-seed (and the right to host the Horizon League tournament) to Wright State. WSU and LoyIL probably haven't done enough to get a bid on their own, but they've both proven already that they can deal with Butler head-to-head. Winthrop should have done enough to garner an at-large bid if they need it, but they won't: they just posted the first undefeated regular season ever in the Big South and they also are hosting the conference tournament. Gonzaga is normally a part of this conversation, but the 'Zags aren't in control of their league and have all kinds of problems on and off the court. More likely, they'll need to win the WCC tournament themselves to ensure an automatic bid. Vermont has handled Albany twice in America East league play, but it's hard to beat a good team three times. Holy Cross and Bucknell split in the regular season (and had to go to the official RPI this week to determine which team would be the top seed in the Patriot League tournament). Marist (and NCAA assist-leader pJared Jordan) won the regular season, but they're by no means head-and-shoulders above the likes of Niagara, Loyola(Maryland) and Siena. East Tennessee State won the Atlantic Sun with a cushion, but they split OT wins head-to-head with second-place Belmont. Oral Roberts dominated the Mid-Con, but it's a one-bid league (despite their preseason win at Kansas). South Alabama seems to be the class of the Sun Belt, but that's faint praise.

Davidson and Appalachian State both deserve bids, but even if they both make the Southern Conference final, they'd be one of the last teams to get in. The strong showing in BRACKETBUSTER probably helped the Colonial remain a two-bid league, but only two at most among VCU, Old Dominion, Hofstra and Drexel can make that final. The big "lesser" tournament this week is the MVC (Thursday thru Sunday). Southern Illinois, Creighton and Missouri State are all in with at-large bids, but the likes of Bradley (which leads the NCAAs in three-point shooting), Northern Iowa and Wichita State, for sure, will have to win the tournament to get in.

No ultimate showdowns left in regular season play, just decent matchups here and there. The lustre is off of UNC-Duke II (Sunday) as far as conference standings (but the Blue Devils are trending up while the Tar Heels are trending down). Pittsburgh at Marquette (Saturday) doesn't mean as much the second time around, either. Texas does have two big games this week: Wednesday (vs Texas A&M) and Saturday (at Kansas), but the Longhorns don't defend well enough to really beat those teams when it really matters.

-- Ron

Key games this week:

Monday:
Kansas@Oklahoma, Georgetown@Syracuse, Gonzaga@SanFrancisco, LongBeachSt@Pacific, @IdahoSt-Montana,

Tuesday:
Florida@Tennessee, @Pittsburgh-WVirginia, MichiganSt@Michigan, @AirForce-BYU, KansasSt@OklahomaSt,

Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday:
BIG SOUTH TOURNAMENT on-campus/@ Rock Hill SC
- (@Winthrop),

Tuesday, Friday-Saturday, Tuesday week:
HORIZON TOURNAMENT on-campus/@ Dayton OH
- (@WrightSt, Butler, LoyolaIL),

Wednesday:
TexasA&M@Texas, @Duke-Maryland, @Kentucky-Georgia, @Alabama-Mississippi, @Arkansas-MississippiSt, Villanova@Connecticut, @TexasA&MCC-StephenFAustin,

Wednesday-Saturday:
SOCON TOURNAMENT @ North Charleston SC
- (Davidson, AppalachianSt, ColofCharleston, UNCGreensboro),

Wednesday, Sunday, Friday week:
PATRIOT TOURNAMENT on-campus
- (HolyCross, Bucknell),

Wednesday, Sunday-Tuesday week:
SUN BELT TOURNAMENT on-campus/@ Lafayette LA
- (SAlabama, ArkansasSt, WeKentucky, LAMonroe, NTexas),

Thursday:
UCLA@WashingtonSt, NCarolina@GeorgiaTech, Nevada@UtahSt, USC@Washington, VirginiaTech@Virginia, Arizona@California, @FresnoSt-BoiseSt, @LongBeachSt-UCIrvine,

Thursday-Saturday:
A-SUN TOURNAMENT @ Johnson City TN
- (@ETennesseeSt, Belmont),

Thursday-Sunday:
MVC TOURNAMENT @ St. Louis MO
(SoIllinois, Creighton, MissouriSt-WichitaSt, Bradley-NoIowa),

Friday:
@Penn-Yale,

Friday-Monday week:
COLONIAL TOURNAMENT @ Richmond VA
- (@VCU, @OldDominion, Hofstra, Drexel, @GeoMason),
WCC TOURNAMENT @ Portland OR
- (SantaClara, Gonzaga),
MAAC TOURNAMENT @ Bridgeport CT
- (Marist, Niagara, LoyolaMD, Siena),

Friday-Sunday, Saturday week:
AMERICA EAST TOURNAMENT @ Boston MA/on-campus
- (Vermont, Albany, @BostonU),

Saturday:
UCLA@Washington, OhioSt@Michigan, @Wisconsin-MichiganSt, @Kansas-Texas, @Georgetown-Connecticut, Pittsburgh@Marquette, @Nevada-NewMexicoSt, @Vanderbilt-Arkansas, Tennessee@Georgia, @Stanford-Arizona, Syracuse@Villanova, Illinois@Iowa, @KansasSt-Oklahoma, @UtahSt-FresnoSt, @SamHoustonSt-TexasA&MCC,

Saturday-Tuesday week:
MID-CON TOURNAMENT @ Tulsa OK
- (@OralRoberts),

Sunday:
@Florida-Kentucky, @NCarolina-Duke, @VirginiaTech-Clemson, BostonCol@GeorgiaTech, Alabama@MississippiSt, Akron@KentSt.

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Top 25 - 07 Feb 26 - [] Column

1. UCLA (24-3)
2. Ohio State (26-3)
3. Wisconsin (26-4)
4. Florida (25-4)
5. North Carolina (24-5)
6. Texas A&M (24-4)
7. Kansas (24-4)
8. Georgetown (21-5)
9. Memphis (24-3)
10. Washington State (23-5)
11. Pittsburgh (24-5)
12. Nevada (25-2)
13. Maryland (22-7)
14. Duke (22-7)
15. Southern Illinois (24-5)
16. Oregon (22-7)
17. Michigan State (21-8)
18. Vanderbilt (18-9)
19. Tennessee (20-9)
20. Kentucky (17-9)
21. USC (20-8)
22. Texas (21-7)
23. Virginia Tech (19-8)
24. Butler (23-5)
25. Winthrop (21-4)

Honorable Mention:
- - LSU (15-13), Loyola(Illinois) (18-10), Notre Dame (21-6), Vermont (23-6), Marist (23-7), Delaware State (16-11), Mississippi Valley State (14-14).