We’re back from a busy weekend and heading into a really light week, but that doesn’t mean our correspondents are taking a break!

ACC – Steve Moore  (READ MORE)

UNDER THE BIG TOP:  Much has already been written about the UNC-Texas shootout/circus at The-House-That-Jerry-Built.  The 103-90 Texas win proved that Roy Williams’ Tar Heels still have plenty to do on the defensive end, as UNC gave up 100 points in regulation for the first time in Williams’ tenure there.  Does this mean that UNC is not good enough to reach the Final Four?  Absolutely not.  If there’s any team that needs time to find its identity, it’s this one, considering all the new faces.  I may have bumped UNC out of the top spot this week (and I may think Roy Williams is a crybaby), but I still expect the Heels to rise back to the top of the ACC (notice how I’m already backing off my crazy Maryland prediction from earlier in the year). (…)

Missouri Valley – Patrick Marshall of White & Blue Review (READ MORE)

MVC-MWC Challenge winding down—The Valley continues to lead the challenge against the Mountain West Conference 4-3 heading into the final weekend of games.  Illinois State went on the road to defeat Utah and Creighton had a chance to close out the conference’s victory but lost a huge lead on New Mexico and left Albuquerque with a loss.  Now it is up to Drake and Northern Iowa this coming weekend to close out the first year of a several year agreement for each conference to play one another.  In the coming years all of the Challenge games will be played in a one-week time period instead of throughout the non-conference season.  (…)

Steve Moore is the RTC correspondent for the Atlantic Coast Conference.

ACC teams lost just three times in the last week – and all were interesting/entertaining games in their own right. Two losses were inevitable, thanks to a pair of conference games.  The other was Texas-sized, in more ways than one.

ACC POWER RANKINGS (record as of Sunday, Dec. 20)

1. Duke (9-1, 0-0)

PAST:  Let’s skip right over the gimme win over Gardner-Webb and move on to Saturday’s game with Gonzaga.  The Zags were bad, that much is true.  But some of Gonzaga’s 23.8% shooting percentage needs to be credited to a stifling Duke defense.  Gonzaga came in averaging almost 80 points, and were held to half that.  The win was enough to put Duke atop our rankings, but the Devils still need to show a little more – because Gonzaga was just that bad.

FUTURE: No games this week.

2. North Carolina (8-3, 0-0)

PAST:  The Tar Heels have been getting plenty of credit here for playing some real pre-conference foes, and that didn’t change on Saturday, when UNC faced No. 2 Texas in the monstrosity that is Cowboys Stadium.  There was also more than enough up-and-down, fast-paced hoops to keep any hoops fan happy, just not the “W” to keep Heels fans happy. More on this game later.

FUTURE:  UNC hosts Marshall on Tuesday.

3. Wake Forest (8-2, 1-0)

PAST:  The Deacons survived a classic trap trip to UNC Wilmington, then took care of North Carolina State at home on Sunday.  Wake freshman C.J. Harris continues to chip in for the Deacons, earning his third ACC Rookie of the Week honors with 10 points and four boards against N.C. State, and 11 points against UNC Wilmington.

FUTURE:  The Deacons complete their “N.C.” trifecta this week when they travel to Greensboro to face UNC-Greensboro.

4. Georgia Tech (8-2, 0-1)

PAST:  Tech dropped an overtime heartbreaker to Florida State, 66-59, that could come back to bite them come seeding time. Sure, the Seminoles are a solid team, but you can’t lose home conference games like that. Especially in your ACC opener.

FUTURE:  Tech hosts always-tough Kennesaw State on Tuesday.

5. Florida State (10-2, 1-0)

PAST:  The Seminoles jump up two spots this week after going 3-0 with wins over Georgia State, Auburn, and the most impressive of all:  AT Georgia Tech.  No, FSU doesn’t leap past the Yellow Jackets just yet (I still think Tech is the better overall team), but the Seminoles sure improved their tourney resume in a week that saw most everyone else take a cupcake break.

FUTURE:  The Cupcakes come now, however, for FSU, which faces Tennessee-Martin, Alabama A&M and Texas A&M-Corpus Christie in its next three games.

6. Clemson (10-2, 0-0)

PAST:  The Tigers slip a spot, despite two wins this week over East Carolina and the College of Charleston.  But they will have plenty of time to rise, especially if their defense continues to force an absurd 11.7 steals per game.

FUTURE:  Clemson has two more cupcakes before a Jan. 3 date at Duke.  The Tigers host Western Carolina on Tuesday.

7. Miami (12-1, 0-1)

PAST:  Four cupcake wins, including a 20-point road romp at Stetson, likely didn’t reduce the sting of that one-point loss to Boston College earlier this month.

FUTURE:  No games this week after Monday’s date with North Carolina A&T.

8. Virginia Tech (9-1)

PAST:  Easy win over Charleston Southern doesn’t really help or hurt the Hokies this week.  But junior Malcolm Delaney certainly is.  He continues to dominate the league scoring stats, averaging 22 PPG, which ranks just outside the top 10 in the nation.

FUTURE:  The golden Retrievers of UMBC come calling Tuesday night.

9. Maryland (6-3, 0-0)

PAST:  All that Hawaiian sun must have worn the Terrapins out after the Maui Invitational, because Maryland has played just three games in all of December and hasn’t played since a win on Dec. 12.

FUTURE:  Maryland hosts two gimmes this week in Winston-Salem State and Florida Atlantic.

10. N.C. State (8-2, 0-1)

PAST:  The home loss to Wake Forest was no real crime, especially since the Wolfpack hung around most of the night. But if they want to move up in the rankings, the Pack will have to score a little more.  They are averaging a league-worst 67.3 points – and that’s against the pre-conference cupcakes.

FUTURE:  N.C. State does play the only real interesting game of the week in the ACC, as it heads to Arizona on Wednesday.

11. Virginia (5-4, 0-0)

PAST:  After a game against UNC-Wilmington was snowed out, the Cavaliers had two full weeks between games going into Monday’s date with NJIT.

FUTURE:  Wednesday against Hampton (corrected).

12. Boston College (7-3, 1-0)

PAST:  The cruising win over Bryant wasn’t enough to get the Eagles out of the cellar.  Not with home losses to Harvard and Rhode Island on the resume.  Say it again:  Harvard and Rhode Island.

FUTURE:  BC hosts UMass Wednesday night, with the Minutemen coming off a solid win over Memphis on Saturday. Watch out for another in-state defeat.

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WEEK THAT WAS…

• UNDER THE BIG TOP:  Much has already been written about the UNC-Texas shootout/circus at The-House-That-Jerry-Built.  The 103-90 Texas win proved that Roy Williams’ Tar Heels still have plenty to do on the defensive end, as UNC gave up 100 points in regulation for the first time in Williams’ tenure there.  Does this mean that UNC is not good enough to reach the Final Four?  Absolutely not.  If there’s any team that needs time to find its identity, it’s this one, considering all the new faces.  I may have bumped UNC out of the top spot this week (and I may think Roy Williams is a crybaby), but I still expect the Heels to rise back to the top of the ACC (notice how I’m already backing off my crazy Maryland prediction from earlier in the year).
• ACC-TUAL LEAGUE GAMES!  Florida State’s dramatic overtime win over Georgia Tech was the first real key ACC game of the year, and the first real upset, as well (except for maybe BC over Miami).  Is it January yet?  I’m tired of seeing everyone beat up on UNC-Greensboro and Stetson.
• RAMBLING RANT OF THE WEEK:  If I was a Duke fan who, you know, actually lived anywhere near Tobacco Road, I’d be growing real tired of what seems like 55 “home” games each year at Madison Square Garden.  I know what it does for exposure, and mostly I know what it does for the wallet, but this is a team with one of the best – if not the best – homecourt advantage in the nation.  Why the heck do they need to play in New York so much?
• BONUS RAMBLING RANT OF THE WEEK (Jerry Jones Edition):  Like many college hoops fans, I am attracted to the game due to the atmosphere of a great college building. I haven’t attended a ton of raucous games, but I can tell you that the 2002 America East finaland games at the Palestra are among the top sporting events I’ve attended.  So it kills me to see so many key games in March played in sterile football stadiums with half a million seats.  I understand the money, and I know the Final Four has been in those buildings for years, but now we’re starting to see regional games, sub-regionals, and even regular season games played in huge buildings.  I’ll take a bandbox gym any day.

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WAITING IN THE TUNNEL…

GET YOUR SHOPPING DONE:  There really isn’t any must-see TV this week in the ACC.  Outside of N.C. State’s trip to Arizona on Wednesday night, you should have plenty of time to bake that doorstop of a fruitcake.  And just think, waiting for you just after New Year’s?  Another great season of ACC hoops. Enjoy, and Happy Holidays!

Over the weekend there was a lot of talk about questionable officiating, but it turns out that the most controversial officiating of the weekend may not have occurred in Indianapolis. Lost in the controversy of the awful Butler–Xavier finish was the supposedly awful officiating at the NC State–Wake Forest game. I say supposedly because I wasn’t even aware of the questionable officiating and our correspondent for RTC Live didn’t mention it except for commenting on the foul trouble for the two teams. It turns out that Wolfpack forward Tracy Smith, who fouled out with 5:28 to go played just 23 minutes in the 67-59 loss, was less than thrilled about the officiating. After the game Smith told anybody who would listen that the officials called too many “touch fouls” (undoubtedly only against NC State) and “favored Wake Forest all the way, but that’s ACC basketball” (not to nitpick, but ACC basketball is about favoring Duke and UNC). The result? Smith has been suspended for one game by NC State so he will not be available for the Wolfpack’s next game where they will travel to Arizona to take on the Wildcats. Given the way that the Pac-10 has played this year with the notable exception of USC trashing Tennessee this weekend we doubt that Sidney Lowe will miss Smith’s 17.6 PPG and 9.5 RPG. For his part, Smith apologized for his comments:

“I was caught up in the heat of the moment, but should not of made the comments I did. I want to apologize to my coaches, my teammates, and (Sunday) night’s officials for this situation.”

Interestingly, Smith’s statement does not say that the content of his comments were wrong just that he should not have said them. It should be worth while paying attention to how ACC officials treat Smith the rest of the season as the Tim Donaghys of the world may have found their latest edge in Vegas.

Patrick Marshall of White & Blue Review is the RTC correspondent for the Missouri Valley Conference.

Current Records and my standings (Last Week)

1. Missouri State  (10-0) (1)
2. Wichita State (10-1) (2)
3. Northern Iowa  (8-1) (3)
4. Southern Illinois (7-2) (5)
5. Illinois State (8-2)  (4)
6. Indiana State  (7-3) (7)
7. Evansville (6-3) (8)
8. Bradley  (5-5) (6)
9. Drake  (5-6)  (9)
10. Creighton  (4-6)  (10)

STORIES OF THE WEEK

• MVC-MWC Challenge winding down—The Valley continues to lead the challenge against the Mountain West Conference 4-3 heading into the final weekend of games.  Illinois State went on the road to defeat Utah and Creighton had a chance to close out the conference’s victory but lost a huge lead on New Mexico and left Albuquerque with a loss.  Now it is up to Drake and Northern Iowa this coming weekend to close out the first year of a several year agreement for each conference to play one another.  In the coming years all of the Challenge games will be played in a one-week time period instead of throughout the non-conference season.
• Wichita State takes down ranked team—Wichita invited a ranked Texas Tech team into Koch Arena, the first non-conference ranked team to visit since Kansas in the 1991-92 season, and sent them home with a loss.  That must be why teams like that don’t come back or want to play Wichita at home. 
• Missouri St.  heading to undefeated non-conference record—Missouri St. defeated St. Louis Saturday night and Rick Majerus is ready to anoint the Bears as the winners of the Valley for this season.  Well, they are still undefeated and could stay that way if they can steal a win in Arkansas Tuesday night.   Could this be Drake version 2.0?

TEAMS DOING WELL

• Missouri St (1-0 this week)—As mentioned above, Missouri St. is one of a few undefeated teams in the nation right now.  It is due to their defense.  The Bears finish out the non-conference slate in Fayetteville with a “lucky they still have a team”  Arkansas squad.   About the only thing wrong with Missouri State is Will Creekmore’s jersey.
•  Wichita St (1-0 this week)—Wichita continues to be on a roll.  Andy Katz asked whether Wichita would be undefeated if they had Clevin Hannah and he was able to play against Pitt at the CBE Classic.  Either way, the Shockers are the real deal this season.    They host North Dakota State this week to complete their non-conference slate.
•  Northern Iowa  (1-0 this week)—Head Coach Ben Jacobson went back home to North Dakota this past week, but brought his UNI team in to take a victory.  Northern Iowa is at about the same point as Wichita right now.  Coach Jacobson is pretty happy with his team now, but he wasn’t at the beginning of the season.  They host Wyoming this week as a part of the MVC/MWC Challenge. 
• Southern Illinois (2-0 this week) –You can tell the reputation of the Salukis has taken a hit when they went out to Vegas this week in an invitational but their games were overshadowed by the women’s matchups in the same tournament.   However in both games this weekend against San Diego and San Francisco, SIU pulled out one point wins to complete a solid non-conference slate until a late January game against Western Kentucky.  Southern Illinois is off for the holidays until conference play starts in a week and a half. 
• Evansville (2-0 this week)—Evansville is continuing to build themselves back up with two wins this week.  They took a blow with Kavon Lacey, one of their emerging team leaders, going out for the season with knee surgery.  However, they are really spreading the scoring around and starting to come together.  A big road test at Austin Peay this week will see how far they have actually come. 
• Indiana St. (1-0 this week)—The Sycamores escaped with a win in Toledo this week on a Jake Kelly basket with  six seconds left and they are now again without point guard Harry Marshall who has had a lot of discipline problems at Indiana State.  The Sycamores look like a solid team, but they don’t need these distractions.  A trip to IUPUI this week will test them.

TEAMS WITH WORK TO DO

• Drake (0-1 this week)—Drake lost to Iowa this week and they sort of have to feel bad that a key player for the Hawkeye team that beat them was then arrested later that evening for public intoxication.  However, Coach Phelps feels pretty good about the recent recruiting classes, but can they produce on the court?    San Diego State comes to town as the possible deciding game of the MVC/MWC Challenge.
• Bradley (0-2 this week)—This team is on the verge of collapse.  Not only is Dodie Dunson out for the year with a broken arm, but they also lost Dyricus Simms-Edwards to a foot injury for 3-6 weeks.  Bradley lost this week to Loyola on a crazy off-balance half court shot and then got absolutely blown out by Iowa State Sunday.    The Braves now sit in limbo with a three-game losing streak for nine days until conference season starts at Drake.
• Creighton (1-1 this week)—Many do not have a good read on this Creighton team this season.  They have been so close in so many games against tough competition, but lack the killer instinct to finish the games.  The latest collapse was in New Mexico this weekend.  Creighton was up 15 points at one point in the first half, shooting almost 75%, but then New Mexico finished the first half cutting into the lead and by the middle of the second half the Lobos made the adjustments needed and pulled out a come-from-behind win.   They get a snoozer in Houston Baptist this week with their only wins this season coming so far on their home court. 
• Illinois State (1-1 this week)—Illinois State has had enough chinks in their armor exposed to lose on the road to Ohio, but then came back to get a big win at Utah as part of the MVC/MWC Challenge.   The Redbirds need another player to step up to help Osiris Eldridge and that player might be Austin Hill.  The Redbirds get a snoozer of their own with Grambling State this week.

WEEK AHEAD AND GAMES TO WATCH

A light week due to the holidays and very few key games except for the conclusion of the MVC/MWC Challenge, but also the last week of non-conference action for the MVC.  Conference play will start after the Christmas holiday.

• 12/22, San Diego St. @ Drake—Drake is starting to turn things around, but this will be a tough game against the Aztecs that could decide the MVC/MWC Challenge. 
• 12/22, Missouri St. @ Arkansas—Although Arkansas has so many problems, this could be a nice road win for the Bears and a great close to their amazing non-conference season. 
• 12/23, Northern Iowa @ Wyoming—A key matchup in the MVC/MWC Challenge’s final games.  UNI is on a roll lately.

On Monday night, the University of Kentucky will welcome the Drexel Dragons into Rupp Arena for a 7:00 PM ET tilt that — no disrespect to Drexel, here, we’re just playing the percentages — could give UK its 12th win of the season against no losses, and could further the record for best start at UK for a first-year coach.  Previously held by (no surprises here) Adolph Rupp, who started the 1931 season with ten straight wins, John Calipari took that record for himself with the Wildcats’ win over Austin Peay on Saturday.

Just your typical Monday night, post-finals week, holiday season, non-conference game, eh?

Oh, yeah.  There’s this other thing.

As you likely know by now, a win over the Dragons on Monday evening will mark win #2,000 for the Kentucky program.  They’ll beat North Carolina to that finish line by eight wins, or about a month.

While acknowledging how impressive that number is and what it means to Kentucky fans, the players and coaches in Lexington are largely dismissing the occasion with a sort of wave of the hand, seeing it not so much as a finish line but a milepost on the way to another finish line located in Indianapolis in early April.  That makes sense, when you figure that Calipari himself will only be responsible of 12 of those 2,000 wins, and that even the three current Kentucky seniors — Ramon Harris, Perry Stevenson, and Mark Krebs — can lay claim to only 74 of them, a mere 4%.

Any wearer of the Kentucky uniform, past or present, should certainly feel a part of this achievement.  No doubt about that.  Calipari said it best, though, in a recent AP story about reaching 2,000 wins when he simply said, “It’s important to the Commonwealth.”

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1. Iowa starting point guard Anthony Tucker was charged with public intoxication on the night of his team’s win over Drake, 71-67, and he will be suspended from the team immediately.  This is his second such charge, as he pleaded guilty to the same charge one year ago in Iowa City.
2. According to Jim Calhoun, he and UConn are very close to signing a five-year extension to his current contract that will keep the acerbic coach in Storrs into his seventies.  Reportedly, Ken Kreyeske was his top negotiator in the discussions.
3. Ohio State’s Evan Turner is on the record stating that his return will be on January 9 against Minnesota, a full four weeks ahead of initial projections.  Let’s hope he’s right, because the more Turner plays, the better for college basketball.  But let’s also make sure that he’s healthy, and we’re sure Thad Matta will have a say-so in that respect.
4. This is a great story.  The NCAA granted Mike Gerrity’s waiver on Friday, making him eligible at USC immediately.  So what does he do?  Only drop 12/10 assts in the Trojans’ unreal (in margin) upset of top-ten Tennessee on Saturday evening, his first game in two years!
5. Rutgers lost big man Gregory Echinique to eye surgery over the weekend, but he is expected to make a full recovery.  He was averaging 13/8 in seven games for Fred Hill’s Scarlet Knights.

The Debacle in Hinkle.  #17 Butler 69, Xavier 68. The story over the weekend was the bizarre and (some say) unconscionable ending to the Butler-Xavier game on Saturday afternoon.  If you somehow missed it, check out our post on the subject from last night.  We pretty much agree that the referee crew followed the rules as they’re written, but that the rules as they’re written pretty much suck in a situation such as this.  RTC Live was there, and as our correspondent wrote at the time:

That would be one ballsy crew to take a full second OFF the clock against a visitor down by 1 point.  HUGE controversy WOW…. I have been doing bball for years and I cannot believe that they just did that?!?!?!?!?!”

Ballsy they were, but also correct by the letter of the law.  Unfortunately for Xavier and Chris Mack, the Musketeers were left holding the bag when a timing error led them to believe they’d have a final shot to win the game.  The NCAA needs to step up and immediately clarify this rule, including what kind of stopwatch can and cannot be used to estimate the time so that we’re not faced with an equally ridiculous ending on a much bigger stage later this year.

Jerry’s Joint.  #2 Texas 103, #10 UNC 90.  The featured game of the weekend at Jerry’s World known as the new-and-improved-to-a-ridiculous-degree Cowboys Stadium showed why many people are very high on Rick Barnes’ Texas team to cut down the nets in April.  UT put four players in the 20+ points column, including huge dub-dubs from seniors Damion James (25/15) and Dexter Pittman (23/15) to go along with Avery Bradley’s 20/4 assts/3 stls and J’Covan Brown’s 21/5/3 assts.  Showing the depth that Barnes now has at his disposal, much ballyhooed transfer Jai Lucas (recently eligible) only played six minutes and recorded zero points.  He’d start for most of the teams in the Top 25 from day one.  UNC’s Ed Davis was the only Carolina player who seemed comfortable with the waves of Texas players inside, as he blew up for 21/9/4 blks for one of his best performances of the year.  Texas will get another test on Tuesday of this week as Michigan State visits Austin, while UNC will head back home for a few easier games prior to the start of the ACC in early January.  We’re still worried about UNC’s point guard play, but we’d imagine that Texas is going to make a lot of pretty good teams look bad over the course of this season.  That team is loaded!

The JumboTron Dwarfs the Court (AP/Tony Gutierrez)

Gonz-awfulness.  #7 Duke 76, #15 Gonzaga 41.  In a game all too reminiscent of other early-season blowouts that Duke has administered on overrated teams, the Devils completely overwhelmed the Zags defensively to, as Mark Few put it after the game, “woodshed” his team on Saturday afternoon at MSG.  Duke’s defense held Gonzaga to a mere fifteen FGs for the game, 28% shooting, a single three-pointer and a quarter-century team low of 41 points.  Despite all the hype for the Duke bigs coming into the season, it’s been the backcourt play of Jon Scheyer and Nolan Smith, combining for 36 PPG, 7 RPG, and 10 APG that has truly driven this team to have the look as one of the best teams in America this year.  Scheyer’s ridiculous A:TO ratio of 5.8 to 1 actually went down after two TOs in this one, but his 20/5/8 assts more than made up for the miscue.  Smith added 24/3/3 assts, and we’re going to spare talking about the Gonzaga awfulness since not a single Zag got into double figures on the day.

Shot of the Weekend.  Cornell 91, Davidson 88 (OT). Ryan Wittman’s 30-footer at the buzzer in overtime gave the Big Red its eighth win of the year and a shot at a Big East team (St. John’s) on Monday night at Madison Square Garden.  Lost in the heroics and glee of Wittman’s shot was the fact that it wouldn’t have even been possible had Louis Dale not hit a driving layup with 0.7 seconds remaining in regulation.  Cornell’s only two losses this year were against Big East teams (Seton Hall and Syracuse), so this will likely be the Ivy League favorite’s best chance to get a huge win this season (Kansas at Allen Fieldhouse is not realistic).  We haven’t been able to locate a video of this shot yet, but if you see one, let us know.

SEC Sucktitude. A week ago, we were ready to start believing that the SEC is much-improved this year.  Then the SEC East craps itself on Saturday and Sunday.  We’re reserving judgment for now, which of course means we really think this league is terrible and deserves only one bid (ok, not really).

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In case you missed it, there was a bizarre ending to the Butler vs. Xavier game in Hinkle Fieldhouse today that allowed the home Bulldogs to get a huge win that will undoubtedly help them when it comes to NCAA Tournament seeding in March.  Down a single point with thirty-six seconds remaining, Butler came out of a broken play with a a wide-open layup for Gordon Hayward that included two offensive rebounds, a couple of near-steals for Xavier, a possible backcourt violation, a clock stoppage, a couple of scrums on the floor and a long break in the action as the refs tried to sort it all out.  This is the sequence of events as they happened in real time:

What ended up happening was something that we’ve never seen before in all our years of watching college basketball (or our correspondent’s, who was on-site at the game today).  If you stuck with the video all the way to the end, you know that the officials ultimately decided that the brief clock stoppage during the near-steal in the backcourt negated the final 1.2 seconds of the game, giving Butler the victory without an opportunity for Xavier to throw length-of-the-court and try to win the game.  We’ve probably seen time added to a game a hundred or more times, but we’re not sure we’ve ever seen time taken away to end a game.   Here’s the officials’ postgame explanation:

The game clock was erroneously stopped at 14.7 seconds. When we put (on) the stopwatch to see how long the clock had erroneously stopped, 1.3 seconds had elapsed.  The shot by the Butler player was released at 1.8 seconds. The ball went through the net at 1.2 seconds and the clock stopped correctly.  Because we lost 1.3 seconds, that time is deducted from the remaining 1.2 seconds, officially ending the game.

Xavier’s Chris Mack was apoplectic over this decision, and there’s a general sense around the twitterati that XU got homered at historic Hinkle today, but was the decision by the officials a fair and equitable one?  Should time ever be taken away from a close game?  And what does the NCAA rule say?  RTC is here to answer those questions.

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Contributing writer Kevin Chupka will periodically interview a rabid student fan about all things basketball on the court and in the stands… a view from the student section.

College basketball has its casual fans just like any other sport.  There is one group however that elevates it above all else by taking “fandom” to new heights.  A group tasked with truly being that sixth man on the court.  Sure the alumni can open up wallets full of cash from the real world and they can drink their fancy imported beer but the lifeblood of any great team inside the many arenas of division one college basketball are the students.  There are always exceptions (yours truly and Dick Vitale to name but two) but by and large students are the ones who live and breathe based on their team’s fortunes.  And so I sought to find some of those rabid fans.  The ones that paint their bare chests bright red or blue or orange.  The ones that lead the student section in chants that lift up their team and dash the dreams of the other.  In the weeks that follow we’ll get the dirt from inside the foxhole as we pick the brains of those who know their team best.

People like Michael Bleach, the beat writer for The Badger Herald, the paper of record at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  The senior journalism major has his finger on the pulse of the basketball Badgers; and while he and many in town were still streaming into Camp Randall Stadium to cheer on the gridiron Badgers, Michael was also looking closely at a basketball team that the mainstream media saw clawing for notoriety in a strong Big Ten conference.

In a column previewing the season Michael wrote: “the national media (AP Top 25) has determined the Badgers will finish behind Michigan State, Purdue, Michigan, Ohio State, Illinois and Minnesota. Michigan State and Purdue I will give you. As for the rest of the teams on that list, however, they haven’t invented a word strong enough for me to express my disbelief. I am colossally baffled.”  Baffled he told me because “The team has no holes in the starting five — with everyone on the floor able to shoot from beyond the arc — and it is a Bo Ryan team, so you know they will play strong defense. They have two strong subs coming off the bench in Jordan Taylor (sixth man of the year candidate) and Ryan Evans (typical athletic, defense, hustling guy).”

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Both Wake Forest and NC State enter ACC conference play as relative unknowns: sure, the Demon Deacons beat Gonzaga in Spokane, but what are we to make of their double-digit homecourt loss to William & Mary that same week? Similarly, NC State’s victory over Marquette on the road was noteworthy, but their less than impressive victory in their last game over Elon, one of the weakest teams in the nation, has Wolfpackers scratching their heads. Wake enters Sunday’s game at 7-2, riding on the back of Al-Farouq Aminu (15.9 ppg, 10.4 rpg). Ishmael Smith has increased his production for the Deacs, but the true compliment to Aminu this season has been freshman guard C.J. Harris’ shooting, bringing 12.4 ppg while shooting 53% from the floor. State will rely on Tracy Smith and his 18.3 ppg and 9.4 rpg to go toe-to-toe with Wake Forest’s Aminu. In the end though, offensive rebounds could be the factor in this matchup: neither team has shot the ball well this season, Wake is the tallest team in the nation and rebounds accordingly, while NC State has been below average on the defensive glass. Both Dino Gaudio and Sidney Lowe are under pressure from the fanbase to produce after underperforming last year. For both teams, a win in Winston-Salem would be a good place to start for proving they belong in the top half of the ACC.