13 Feb25 - Meteor Sightings

Volume XVII, No. 17 - 13 Feb257 - [] Top 25 Ballot

Meteor Sightings

Until now, we haven't had any truly special performances in the biggest games. Indiana has so mnay weapons that 19p9r5s from fVictor Oladipo (in the Hoosiers' 72-@68 top-ranked/BIG 10-showdown win at Michigan State) had ESPN's Dick Vitale drawing comparisons to Michael Jordan.

    
Until now. tOtto Porter Jr. delivered a truly special performance (33p8r5s) in front of the largest on-campus crowd ever for college basketball (35,012), single-handedly leading Georgetown to a 57-@46 win over Syracuse in their final BIG EAST showdown at the Carrier Dome.

    
Not to be outdone, bKendall Williams nailed 10-for-13 three-pointers in a 46p5r explosion, lifting New Mexico to a come-from-behind road win at Colorado State, 57-@46, with first place in the MOUNTAIN WEST on the line.

    
Kansas survived in double-overtime at Oklahoma State, 69-@67(2OT). St. Louis handled VCU, @76-62, and completed the sweep of Butler with a road win, 75-@71.

    
IU carved out a gap lead in the BIG 10. Georgetown stands alone atop the BIG EAST. New Mexico is two-games up in MWC. Kansas reduced a three-way tie down to two (along with Kansas State) in the BIG 12. St. Louis is alone on top of the overstuffed ATLANTIC 10.

Ohio State has been surviving on defense and a one-man-team offense from bDeshaun Thomas. That was plenty good enough to dispatch Minnesota, @71-45 (as the Buckeyes held the Golden Gophers to 29% shooting). But when pAaron Craft steps up and becomes a true scoring threat (21p6a, including several beautiful drives the basket in traffic, in their @68-60 win over Michigan), OhSt is something more than just splashworthy.

    
Miami(Florida) has been playing not to lose for a couple of weeks now and it ran out of save-the-day comebacks in a flat loss at Wake Forest, 65-@80 Missouri pulled Florida back to the pack with a @63-60 home win, but it was (bad) business as usual on the road -- they're 1-7 so far -- at Rupp Arena as it fell to Kentucky, 83-@90(OT). UNLV held off Colorado State, @61-59, to hang in tied for third in the MWC (with San Diego State). Marquette gave up its share of the BIG EAST lead with a disappointing 56-@60 loss at Villanova. Notre Dame began the week still hung over from 5 OT, starting 0-for-12 for a total of 1 point 11 minutes into the game at Pittsburgh, but coach Mike Brey finally got his tema to sober up as the Irish rallied on the road to win 61-@52 and then continued the roll with a @62-41 drubbing of suddenly slumping Cincinnati.

Temple beat La Salle, @82-74, to claim a share of this year's BIG 5 title. It's the third in four years for the Owls; but it's the first since 1998 for the Explorers.

    
Some thoroughbreds have clinched their regular season titles. Unbeaten Gonzaga cruised home to reclaim the WEST COAST title (for the twelfth time in thirteen years). Likewise, unbeaten Memphis repeated in CONFERENCE USA, outracing second-place Southern Mississippi, @89-73. (The Tigers look to be this year's only Anti-Spoiler team -- sure to get an at-large NCAA bid even if it doesn't win its otherwise 1BC conference tournament -- yet another consequence, by the way, of Butler's and VCU's jump to the ATLANTIC 10 as those two teams would have easily dominated the HORIZON and lowly COLONIAL this year -- instead, they've spoiled the NCAA pool automatically by moving and leaving us with no better alternatives than Valparaiso and, ugh, Northeastern ... or worse.)

    
Three-peats are the order of the day for Long Beach State[BIG WEST], who cruised home, and Bucknell (and cMike Muscala), who got payback with a road win at Lehigh, 61-@55. Repeaters Stony Brook[AMERICA EAST] and Davidson[SOUTHERN] had gap leads to boot. Middle Tennessee dumped second-place South Alabama, @85-50, to take the SUN BELT. All of the opposition fell away while Mercer kept winning, taking the ATLANTIC-SUN title. Northeastern edged James Madison, @66-64, to take the COLONIAL (but so many of its wins have been by squeak margins that it's not much of a favorite to win the conference tournament even with a gap title).

Without Butler and VCU, the BRACKETBUSTERS event had fewer top-notch matchups. By far the highest profile was St. Mary's' @74-66 home win over Creighton, as pMatthew Dellavedova(19p5a6r5to;5/10 3s) more than matched Doug McDermott(22p). South Dakota State's pNate Wolters(18p5a) was looking good with a halftime lead on the road at Murray State, but he was ineffective in the second half after taking a hard fall on a drive to the baseket, and pIsaiah Canaan(22p5a;5/10 3s) took over in the MSU's @73-62 comeback win over SDSt. Belmont kept Ohio University in its season-long funk with a solid @81-62 win over last year's (intact) Sweet 16 squad. Akron easily handled North Dakota State, @68-53. Davidson outlasted Montana, @93-87(OT), (thanks to 28p from Jake Cohen, despite 28p7a11r from xKareem Jamar). Wichita State had no trouble with Detroit, @94-79, (despite 29p from Ray McCallum Jr.). Charleston Southern fell at Rider, 54-@61. Stephen F. Austin had the best road win, 68-@60, at Long Beach State.

    
Overall, the WAC (5-1), METRO ATLANIC (7-3) and MISSOUR VALLEY (7-3) rolled while the BIG SOUTH (4-8) and SOUTHLAND (2-8)
tanked.

- -

All ACC teams are pretenders until they can conquer Duke in Cameron -- first-place Miami(Florida) can prove much to many with a road win (Saturday). Michigan tries to pay back the embarrassment when it hosts Michigan State (Sunday). Syracuse has a tough week just trying to hold onto second place in the BIG EAST (at Marquette, Monday; vs Louisville, Saturday). It ain't BRACKETBUSTERS (and it ain't for first place), but instigators VCU and Butler finally meet in Richmond (Saturday). UCLA hosts Arizona with first place in the PAC-12 at stake (Saturday). Creighton can tie things up again in the MISSOURI VALLEY in its home showdown with Wichita State (Saturday). Only bad things can happen for Memphis when it travels out=of-conference to Xavier (Tuesday).

    
Ohio U's last chance to stay in the MID-AMERICAN race comes in its home showdown with Akron (Wednesday).

    
It's down to the wire in the NORTHEAST as Robert Morris visits Bryant (Thursday) and Quinnipiac visits Long Island (Saturday). The SOUTHLANDS final showdown comes when Stephen F. Austin hosts Northwestern State (Saturday). It's Princeton's big chance to tie things up in the IVY LEAGUE when Harvad comes to Jadwin Gym (Friday). The SWAC title should be decided when Texas Southern hosts Southern (Thursday).

-- Ron

Key games this week:

Monday:

Kansas-@IowaSt, Syracuse-@Marquette, @CConnecticutSt-Quinnipiac(CT)(CT_6),

Tuesday:

Indiana-@Minnesota, emphis-@Xavier,

Wednesday:

Georgetown-@Connecticut, @NewMexico-SanDiegoSt, @UCLA-ArizonaSt, @OhioU-Akron(OH), @Elon-Davidson(NC), @MorganSt-CoppinSt(BaltimoreMD),

Thursday:

Gonzaga-@BYU, Duke-@Virginia, @Niagara-Rider, @Bryant-RobertMorris, @FLGulfCoast-Mercer, @TexasSo-Southern,

Friday:

@Iona-LoyolaMD, @Princeton-Harvard,

Saturday:

MiamiFL-@Duke, @Florida-Alabama,
@Syracuse-Louisville, KansasSt-@Baylor, Arizona-@UCLA, NotreDame-@Marquette, ColoradoSt-@BoiseSt,
WichitaSt-@Creighton, Memphis-@UCF, @Cincinnati-Connecticut, @Oklahoma-IowaSt, @VCU-Butler, @California-Colorado, @Arkansas-Kentucky, @GreenBay-Valparaiso, @Xavier-Massachusetts, @Denver-NewMexicoSt, @LongIsland-Quinnipiac, @Stetson-Mercer, @StephenFAustin-NorthwesternSt, @CharlestonSo-CoCarolina(SC), @NCCentral-SavannahSt,

Sunday:

MichiganSt-@Michigan(MI), @Pittsburgh-Villanova, @StonyBrook-Albany(NY),

Monday week:

@Louisville-Cincinnati.

---

Top 25 - 13 Feb25 - [] Column

1. Indiana (24-3)
   
2. Georgetown (21-4)
   
3. New Mexico (23-4)
   
4. Kansas (23-4)
   
5. Gonzaga (26-2) WCCu+2
   
6. Miami(Florida) (22-4)
   
7. Duke (24-3)
   
8. Michigan State (21-6)
   
9. Michigan (22-4)
   
10. Florida (22-4)
    
11. Ohio State (19-7)
    
12. Syracuse (22-5)
    
13. Wisconsin (18-8)
    
14. Louisville (22-5)
    
15. St. Louis (21-5)
    
16. Kansas State (21-5)
    
17. Arizona (23-4)
    
18. Oklahoma State (20-6)
    
19. Notre Dame (22-6)
    
20. UNLV (20-7)
    
21. Colorado State (19-6)
    
22. Marquette (19-7)
    
23. Wichita State (24-3) (vBB)
    
24. Memphis (24-3) C-USAu+3
    
25. St. Mary's (23-5) (vBB)
    

Honorable Mention:

Wake Forest (12-14), Missouri (19-8), Villanova (18-10), California (18-9),

Temple (19-8)/La Salle(19-7) .5BIG 5,

Long Beach State (15-10) BIG W+3,

Middle Tennessee (25-4) SUN B+4,

Stony Brook (20-6) AMER E+2,

Bucknell (22-5) PAT+2,

Davidson (20-7) SOCON+3 (vBB),

Mercer (17-9) A-SUN+2,

Northeastern (18-10) COLON+2,

Murray State (18-7) (vBB),
Belmont (20-6) (vBB),
Akron (21-4) (vBB),
Rider (16-13) (vBB),
Stephen F. Austin (19-3) (@BB).