Eric Moyer is the RTC correspondent for the Atlantic Sun Conference and Southern Conference and a contributor to the RTC SEC Microsite. You can find him on Twitter @EricDMoyer.

Reader’s Take

Looking Back

• Tickets Punched: The conference’s two newest programs, USC Upstate and FGCU, secured the first General Shale Brick A-Sun Championships berths recently. Eight of the 10 schools will earn spots for the event, set to begin on Wednesday, February 29. For the third straight year, Mercer will serve as host.
• High Scoring Defeats: Stetson’s grasp on the eighth and final qualifying position became more tenuous as the Hatters dropped a pair of high-scoring affairs to Lipscomb (99-91) and Belmont (106-93). The Hatters have lost six games this season when scoring at least 80 points. Only one other school in the country has suffered even five such defeats (VMI).

The Talented Torrey Craig Of USC Upstate Was More Than Deserving Of The RTC Atlantic Sun Player of the Year Honor

End-of-Year Awards

Since this edition is the last “Checking In On” for the A-Sun before the end of the season, no time seemed more appropriate than now to dole out some hardware (hardware not included).

• Coach of the Year: Bob Hoffman, Mercer – In the preseason, Belmont dominated the top of the polls, garnering a combined 36 of the 39 first-place votes between the coaches and media. Hoffman’s Bears reached 20 wins for just the seventh time in 106 years and did it without the star power of someone like past standouts such as James Florence, Danny Emerson or Brian Mills. Six players average between 8.1 and 11.0 points per game this season.
• Defensive Player of the Year: Isiah Brown, ETSU – Brown moved into the top 10 in A-Sun history in blocks and top 20 in rebounds. He also surpassed the 100-steal mark for his career.
• Game of the Year: While Mercer scored the only win against a BCS school (at Georgia Tech) and ETSU’s Jarvis Jones buried a game-winning 3-pointer at the buzzer at Charlotte, the winner goes to USC Upstate taking down Belmont for the first time in program history. The Spartans rallied from 16 points down in the first half and only took the lead on a game-winning bucket by Torrey Craig with two seconds left. That win started a three-game win streak for USC Upstate against Belmont, Lipscomb and ETSU, a streak not seen in the league in six years.
• Freshman of the Year: Brett Comer, FGCU – After teaming with Austin Rivers in high school, Comer fit right in at FGCU by averaging 9.1 points and a league-leading 5.5 assists. He is on pace to be one the few freshmen in the country to record both 100 rebounds and 100 assists.
• All-Conference Team: Torrey Craig, USC Upstate (17.2 PPG, 7.8 RPG, 1.3 SPG); Jake Gollon, Mercer (10.6 PPG, 5.7 APG, 83.3 FG Pct) Kerron Johnson, Belmont (13.9 PPG, 5.4 APG, 52.5 FG Pct); Adam Pegg, Stetson (14.7 PPG, 5.5 RPG, 50.4 FG Pct); Adam Sollazzo, ETSU (15.2 PPG, 5.5 RPG, 4.5 APG)
• Player of the Year – Torrey Craig, USC Upstate. Craig reaps the benefits of the balance attacks featured at Mercer and Belmont to earn the league’s top individual honor. Of course pacing the league in scoring and ranking second in rebounding didn’t hurt his candidacy.

Bob Hoffman (coach), Isiah Brown (defensive), and Brett Comer (freshman) also earned RTC honors for their impressive regular season campaigns

Power Rankings

1. Mercer (20-7, Previous Ranking: 2): The Bears won the highly-anticipated showdown with USC Upstate on Feb. 4, then survived a tight road contest an in-state rival Kennesaw State to reach 20 victories for the seventh time in school history and for the first time since 2002-03. The regular-season title, top seed in the A-Sun Championship and the league’s automatic NIT bid could be at stake when the Bears welcome Belmont in the regular-season finale.
2. Belmont (20-7, Previous Ranking: 3): In improving to 12-2 in A-Sun play, the Bruins extended their streak of seasons with at least 12 league victories to nine-in-a-row. No other school can boast such an active streak, however, Kansas needs to win just one of its final five Big 12 contests to join the Bruins at eight.
3. USC Upstate (17-10, Previous Ranking: 1): The Feb. 4 loss to Mercer likely ended the Spartans’ dreams of an A-Sun regular-season crown. However, they are in a strong position to post the biggest turnaround in the nation. The Spartans have 12 more victories than a season ago, matching Manhattan for the biggest win improvement from 2010-11.
4. FGCU (13-13, Previous Ranking: 4): The Eagles held steady in the #4 position thanks to scoring their largest victory against a league foe not named USC Upstate, a 21-point win against Lipscomb on Monday.
5. ETSU (13-12, Previous Ranking: 6): The Bucs’ offensive woes in losses reared their ugly heads again in recent losses at Mercer an at home against Jacksonville. In the two losses, the Bucs shot only 31.8 percent from floor (22.2 percent from 3-point arc). ETSU needs only one win or a Jacksonville loss to clinch its spot in the A-Sun Championship.
6. North Florida (13-15, Previous Ranking: 7): After winning four of five to return to the .500 level, the offensive fire power left the Ospreys on their road trip to ETSU and USC Upstate. They were outscored by 20.0 points per game. The sputter came after shooting nearly 56 percent in wins against Stetson and FGCU. Like the Bucs, the Ospreys need only a win or a Dolphin loss to return to the A-Sun Championship.
   

   Lipscomb Released Jordan Burgason Due To A Violation Of Team Rules (AP)

7. Lipscomb (12-14, Previous Ranking: 5): The Bisons suffered a major setback last week when the school kicked out Player of the Year contender and the nation’s top 3-point shooter, Jordan Burgason, citing a violation of team rules. In the team’s first game without him, the Bisons came within one point of matching the all-time NCAA Division I record for points in an overtime session when they scored 24 in besting Stetson on Saturday.
8. Jacksonville (6-20, Previous Ranking: 9): One considered dead in the water, the Dolphins have re-entered the picture for making an sixth straight appearance in the A-Sun Championship. They have closed to within one game of Stetson by scoring big recent victories against the Hatters and at ETSU. The Dolphins close with three home games and could use their recent stingy defense (60.8 PPG) to claim that eighth spot.
9. Stetson (8-18, Previous Ranking: 8): Despite increasing their scoring in league games by more than 10 points per game on last season, the Hatters, once a sure bet to return to the A-Sun Championship now hold only a one-game lead on Jacksonville and face road games at FGCU, USC Upstate and ETSU to close out the regular season. As an add on to the Hatters’ bad luck when scoring at least 80 points, the rest of the country is 1407-197 when scoring at least 80 points (87.7 win percentage); the Hatters are 0-6.
10. Kennesaw State (3-24, Previous Ranking: 10): The Owls’ modest streak of qualifying for the A-Sun Championship in consecutive years officially ended as the Owls fell to 0-14 in league play. No A-Sun school has gone winless in league games since Campbell in 2004-05.

Looking Ahead

Here are a couple of games in the coming days for fans to keep an eye out for:

• Monday, February 20: USC Upstate at Belmont: The only A-Sun school to beat Belmont besides Lipscomb since the start of last season came on Jan. 21 at USC Upstate. The Spartans rallied from 16 down at the half to score their first-ever victory against the perennial heavyweight. Torrey Craig hit the game-winning shot with two seconds left, part of a 22-point effort. The Spartans will attempt to become just the fifth team to sweep the Bruins in the last seven years.
  

  Justin Cecil and Mercer Have A Huge Game Looming Against Belmont (mercer athletics)

• Friday, February 24: North Florida at Jacksonville: With Belmont leaving for the OVC next season, the “SunTrust River City Rumble” becomes the conference’s lone crosstown rival. The Dolphins have controlled the series until very recently. Beginning at last year’s A-Sun Championship where the Ospreys broke an 11-game losing streak to the Dolphins, UNF has won the last two meetings. Jacksonville will need to keep winning to pass Stetson for the eighth spot in the upcoming A-Sun Championship.
• Saturday, February 25: Belmont at Mercer: This game could loom monumental of both teams postseason aspirations. With two weeks to play, the Bears and Bruins own identical 12-2 marks in league play with Belmont owning the head-to-head tiebreaker thanks to a 82-78 home victory on Dec. 3. Despite all the advantages that come to the top seeds, the loser can take solace in the fact that the top seed has won only two of the last 10 A-Sun Tournament titles.

1. The SEC announced the 2012 Allstate® SEC Basketball Legends. The 12-man class will be honored at the SEC Men’s Basketball Tournament March 8-11 at the New Orleans Arena. The 2012 class includes Jack Kubiszyn (Alabama), Nolan Richardson (Arkansas), Chris Morris (Auburn), Mike Miller (Florida),  Willie Anderson (Georgia), Adrian “Odie” Smith (Kentucky), Jack Waters (Ole Miss), Chuck Evans (Mississippi State), Henry Martin (South Carolina), Gene Tormohlen (Tennessee), and Drew Maddux (Vanderbilt). Each SEC Basketball Legend will be recognized at halftime of his institution’s first game at the tournament.
2. While Vanderbilt was throttling Ole Miss, 102-76, on Thursday, much of the drama came outside the lines. In the game, the Rebels received three technical fouls, one because of some fans throwing ice on the floor for a second time. Andy Kennedy and Terrance Henry also received technical fouls by the end of the night. After the game, teammates Reginald Buckner and Jelan Kendrick had to be separated by the coaching staff after an argument. “When you played like we played there’s a lot of frustration to go around,” Kennedy said. “I’m sure some of that got misguided.” Hugh Kellenberger of the Jackson Clarion-Ledger filed this video regarding the altercation.
3. In that win, Jeffery Taylor scored 28 points as he continued his ascension up the Vanderbilt scoring chart. At Taylor’s current average, Vanderbilt would need to make the SEC Tournament championship game, and the NCAA championship game for him to pass Foster.  The Tennessean’s Mike Organ spoke to Taylor and his teammates about his chances of taking down Shan Foster of the school’s all-time leading scorer. “I’ve always been among the top scorers on the team, but we’ve always had good scorers and we’ve always had a balanced team,” Taylor said. “But where I am on the (all-time) scoring list is nothing that I’ve ever really had that great an interest in.” Organ writes that “at Taylor’s current average, Vanderbilt would need to make the SEC Tournament championship game, and the NCAA championship game for him to pass Foster.
4. As Auburn basketball is starting to see a uptick under Tony Barbee, the story of Tigers’ walk-on starting point guard Josh Wallace has picked up steam. Evan Woodbery writes how Wallace, the owner of a 4.45 GPA in high school, can balance his book studies with his playbook studies. “Engineering is a pretty tough major, and I guess to balance that and play a sport is pretty demanding on both ends,” Wallace said with a shrug. “So I guess people want talk about it a lot.”
5. Jack Blankenship, the subject of the “SEC basketball photo of the year” has seen the popularity of the picture grow to the point where ESPN’s Dave Wilsonwrote about Blankenship’s sudden stardom. “I thought it’d be cool to find a way to get a picture of myself and bring it to the games and hold it up,” Blankenship said. “It’s been amazing. I’ve always wanted to be famous.”

1. Arkansas remained one of three power conference schools (joining Boston College and Utah) to not own a road victory in Division I after being clubbed by Tennessee in Knoxville on Wednesday night. Among the 74 current power conference coaches, none of them owns a worse road record over the past two seasons than Mike Anderson. Anderson at Missouri went only 2-7 last year and this year’s Razorbacks are 0-8 so that porous road record could easily be reason #1 why they are likely NIT-bound and not returning the NCAAs for a fourth straight year, matching the program’s longest drought since the 1970s.
2. Anderson and Tennessee head coach Cuonzo Martin, the SEC’s two first-year coaches, met for the first time on Wednesday night. Knoxville News Sentinel‘s Mike Strange writes that  the schools that hired these two coaches, both leaving schools in Missouri (and in Martin’s case at least a rumored candidate to replace Anderson), are satisfied with their respective choices.
3. South Carolina’s Malik Cooke and Georgia head coach Mark Fox already knew each other quite well when the two schools met on Wednesday. Cooke played for Fox at Nevada for two years so of course when the Gamecocks and Bulldogs met for the first of two times this season Cooke took advantage of his chance to beat his former coach for the first time in three tries. He hit the game-winning shot with 20 seconds left. “He’s just a winner,” Fox said. “I hate to see the ball in his hands.” “I respect him a lot,” Cooke said about Fox, “but I was just trying to get a win for South Carolina because we really needed one.”
4. Kentucky opened up its practice to the public on Wednesday, allowing students, faculty, staff and a national television audience in on the top-ranked Wildcats’ preparation as they seek to become the first team since 2003 to finish the Southeastern Conference undefeated.”I want the students into it, I want the players alert and focused through the week,” head coach John Calipari said. “Our practices are pretty consistent in how we go about it, then it turns into … `Why don’t we call ESPN?’ Then it was like, ‘I bet it rates higher than games.’ It’s Kentucky. That’s the Kentucky Effect.”
5. Sports Illustrated‘s Zac Ellis found former Tennessee Athletic Director Mike Hamilton and his new career path he has charted for himself since resigning in June. Hamilton began work in October as the president of U.S. Operations for Blood:Water Mission, “a non-profit organization based in Nashville that addresses Africa’s clean water and HIV/AIDS crises, two of the leading causes of orphanage in sub-Saharan Africa.” Hamilton has three adopted children from Africa, one of whom, five-month-old Kalu,  is HIV-positive. There are certainly worse things he could be doing with his time.

1. The Florida Gators suffered a tough home loss to Tennessee on Saturday, but that loss could have long-lasting ramifications. Sophomore forward Will Yeguete left the game with a concussion. Head coach Billy Donovan labeled Yeguete as doubtful for Florida’s next game Tuesday at Alabama. “He failed a concussion test when he went in (the locker room),” Donovan said. “A lot of it is going to be how well he responds. He’s definitely not going to practice (today), not going to practice Monday. The doctors have told me that he can’t play, but (doubtful) would be my guess.”
2. Tennessee’s win was witnessed by a prominent future Volunteer. Derek Reese, one of Tennessee’s signees for 2012, traveled to Gainesville from his hometown of Orlando. “I was expecting the game to be closer; that was a real good win, real important,” Reese said. “I think it’s a result of Coach Martin’s mentality. He’s tough-minded and he’s going to make you play hard and get the most out of you, and that’s how the successful teams do it in sports. That’s what I was looking for in a college coach.”
3. Following Alabama’s short-handed road loss at LSU last week, Crimson Tide head coach Anthony Grant spoke of his decision to suspend JaMychal Green, Trevor Releford and Andrew Steele on Friday night. He said he received information about something that happened before the trip: “I’m very disappointed in terms of some of the choices that we as individuals made,” Grant said. “But you’re dealing with young men. I was a college student at one point. Can’t say that I did all the things right all the time.”
4. Two Crimson Tide freshmen from Huntsville — Trevor Lacey and Levi Randolph — saw increased playing time against LSU as part of the suspensions. Bill Bryant of the Huntsville Times wrote how the relationship between the two, who finished 1-2 in Alabama’s Mr. Basketball each of the previous two years, was formed and how their learning curves were accelerated with the suspensions.
5. With ESPN in Nashville for College Gameday this weekend, several of the network’s analysts offered up some lofty comparisons to Kentucky’s Anthony Davis. “He’s special in how he affects the game,” Dick Vitale said of Davis. “He’s the only player I’ve seen going back to Patrick Ewing that affects the game without scoring a point.” “He is the best big guy college basketball has seen in a while, several years,” Jay Bilas wrote. “I liken him to a more skilled Marcus Camby. He is a game changer defensively that can block shots around the rim and block perimeter jump shots.”

Eric Moyer is the RTC correspondent for the Southern Conference and Atlantic Sun Conference and a contributor to the RTC SEC Microsite. You can find him on Twitter @EricDMoyer. See bottom of the post for the Official RTC Star System.

#1 Kentucky @ Vanderbilt  – 9:00 PM EST Saturday on ESPN (*****)

• ESPN’s College Gameday descends on Nashville, Tenn., for the first time ever for this SEC clash between the Wildcats and Commodores.
• Vanderbilt has won four straight games at home against #1 teams. The Commodores defeated Tennessee on Feb. 26, 2008; Florida on Feb. 17, 2007; Kentucky on Jan. 13, 1993 and North Carolina on Dec. 5, 1987. All-time, Vanderbilt has four wins against top-ranked Kentucky squads (Mar. 3, 1951; Jan. 6, 1959, Jan. 6, 1964 and the 1993 game).
• The Commodores have won five of their last six against the Wildcats in Memorial Gym.
• Youth meets experience on the interior when freshman sensation Anthony Davis squares off with Festus Ezeli. Davis has been breaking block records throughout the year and Ezeli set the Vanderbilt all-time record last month.

Tennessee @ #8 Florida – 4:00 PM EST Saturday on SEC Network (***)

• The 12-12 Volunteers meet the 19-5 Gators looking to sweep the season series for the third time in the last five seasons (2007-08 and 2008-09) and continue their recent control of the series (winning 11 of the last 17).
• When Florida came to Knoxville, Tenn., in early January, the Volunteers held the Gators to a season-low 56 points. In league games, Tennessee has held its opponents to an SEC-leading 60.2 points per game.
• Jarnell Stokes sat on the UT bench when the teams met in January as he had not yet been cleared to play. In seven games he has averaged close to nine points and eight rebounds per game. However, he strained his right wrist on Tuesday and did not play against South Carolina on Wednesday.
• Florida will don its Nike Hyper Elite Platinum uniforms, designed by Nike as a way to honor its recent national championship programs.
• The Gators have made 10 or more 3-pointers in 16 games this year, the most such games in a season under Donovan. Florida had seasons with 15 (1998-99, 2008-09).
• Erving Walker needs eight assists to set the Florida all-time record. Ronnie Montgomery dished out 503 assists from 1985-88.

Plenty of SEC games slated for Saturday:

• South Carolina @ Arkansas (1:30 PM on SEC Network) –  After stubbing their toe at Auburn and at Georgia, the Razorbacks return home where they sport a 16-1 record. Conversely, the Gamecocks are just 1-6 on the road and have lost four straight overall.
• Georgia @ #20 Mississippi State (4 PM Saturday on SEC Network/ESPN3.com) – In the battle of Bulldogs, the Bulldogs (Athens version) scored their biggest margin of victory this season with a 22-point win against the Razorbacks on Arkansas. The Bulldogs (Starkville) face their second Thursday-Saturday turnaround this season and enter off a 10-point win vs rival Ole Miss.
• Auburn @ Ole Miss (7 PM on FSN) – The Tigers and Rebels meet for the second time in less than a month. The Rebels suffered a one-point overtime loss to the Tigers on Jan. 14, their lone loss to a team outside the RPI top 100. Their last four losses are by a combined 17 points. Auburn has lost five of seven since scoring that win against Ole Miss.
• Alabama @ LSU (7 PM on ESPN2) – After a four-game slide that followed Alabama’s 69-53 win at home against LSU on Jan. 11, the Crimson Tide has responded with three straight wins. Conversely, the first Alabama-LSU matchup starting the Tigers on their current 2-6 slide.

***** – quit your job and divorce your wife if that’s what it takes to watch this game live
**** – best watched live, but if you must, tivo and watch it tonight as soon as you get home
*** – set your tivo but make sure you watch it later
** – set your tivo but we’ll forgive you if it stays in the queue until 2014
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game

Eric Moyer is the RTC correspondent for the Southern Conference and Atlantic Sun Conference and a contributor to the RTC SEC Microsite. You can follow him on Twitter @EricDMoyer.

Reader’s Take

Looking Back

• Taking a Break: On Monday, College of Charleston head coach Bobby Cremins said he was physically exhausted and was advised by his doctors to take “drastic changes or risk jeopardizing his long-term health.” In his absence, Mark Byington has gone 3-2.
• Hot ‘Dogs: Samford earned its first-ever win against Davidson, a 77-74 decision on Jan 28, handing the Wildcats their lone SoCon loss of the season … After earning their first ever win against Davidson, the Bulldogs beat Wofford on Saturday for the first time since 1982.
• Going Streaking: UNC Greensboro extended its win streak to seven straight before losing to Furman on Saturday. The streak marked the Spartans’ longest since stringing together eight consecutive wins during the 1995-96 season.

From the Notebook

• On Saturday, The Citadel head coach Chuck Driesell started Marshall Harris III, Lawrence Miller and Jordan Robertson in their contest against Elon. They became the first three freshmen to start for the Dogs since Jan. 14, 2008.
• Davidson has used the same starting lineup (Jake Cohen, De’Mon Brooks, J.P. Kuhlman, Nik Cochran and Tom Droney) in every game.
• Since being inserted into the starting lineup eight games ago, Elon’s Jack Isenbarger has averaged 20.5 PPG, 4.9 RPG, 4.4 RPG while shooting 48.5 percent from the floor.
• The Citadel’s Mike Groselle has 12 double-doubles this season, tying The Citadel’s single-season record. His 20 career double-doubles are three shy of tying the Bulldogs’ all-time mark.

B.M.O.C.

• Andrew Lawrence, College of Charleston: The junior guard from London averaged 28 points in two games last week. He played all 50 minutes in a double overtime contest at Elon in which he scored 32 points, dished out eight assists and shot 10-of-16 from the floor. He followed that performance with a 24-point, seven-assist night in a win at Appalachian State. Combined, he shot 63 percent (17-for-27) from the floor, 64.7 percent on 3-point tries (11-for-17) and missed only one free throw in 12 attempts.

Bob McKillop and Davidson Sit Atop Our Latest Power Rankings (AP)

Power Rankings

1. Davidson (19-5, Previous Ranking: 1): Despite a three-point loss at Samford, the Wildcats remain atop the power poll as they own a three-game lead in the standings. They pace the SoCon in scoring, scoring margin, rebound margin, free-throw percentage and both offensive and defensive rebounding percentage.
2. Georgia Southern (12-12, Previous Ranking: 6): Sophomore Jelani Hewitt is averaging 16.2 points per game over last five games and made the game-winning 3-pointer against Chattanooga on Jan. 28. In his first 19 games, he averaged 9.4 points per game. Read the rest of this entry »

1. In their first game without Tony Mitchell, Alabama handled Auburn, winning the first round of basketball version of the Iron Bowl. On CapstoneReport.com, one writer praises the move by head coach Anthony Grant: “Mitchell is the Tide’s second leading scorer and second on the team in rebounds. But Mitchell leads the team and possibly the SEC in several other undesirable categories: Like pouting when something doesn’t go his way; Playing soft defense, if he plays it at all; Flailing around on the floor like a soccer player after receiving just a bump or scratch; And in making a jackass of himself in front of thousands of onlookers.”
2. Shuan Smith’s recovery from major hip surgery at Mississippi State has head coach Rick Stansbury looking to give Smith more quality minutes over the final two months of the season. “There’s no reason he can’t (give five to eight minutes a game) against everybody,” Stansbury said Monday in the Commercial Dispatch. “If he hadn’t been hurt, I think we’d be way beyond that point, but just because of his situation that’s where we’re at right now.”
3. Even before Kentucky throttled Florida on Tuesday, Mike Miller of NBCSports.com wrote about the ever-improving Wildcats. He writes “the ‘Cats are outscoring opponents by an average of .28 points per possession, meaning they basically beat everyone by about 18 points…It starts with the defense. Kentucky has the game’s most intimidating shot-blocker (Anthony Davis, with apologies to Fab Melo), its most versatile defender (freshman Michael Kidd-Gilchrist), a bruiser who does a little of everything (Terrence Jones) and guys who can fill roles as needed (everyone needs a Darius Miller).”
4. Already moving on to Saturday’s showdown in Nashvillle, David Boclair writes about the contrasting philosophies between Kentucky and Vanderbilt. “Vanderbilt, after all, has put together its most promising team in decades with patience and persistence. Players have stayed in the program, so the current roster includes five scholarship seniors (one of them in his fifth year) and a junior…Kentucky, conversely, likes to rely on one-and-done superstars. Under current coach John Calipari, one of the sport’s legendary programs has made great use of players such as John Wall, Brandon Knight, DeMarcus Cousins and Eric Bledsoe, who show up, play one season and promptly jump to the NBA.”
5. A FoxSportsTennessee.com stories analyzes how turnovers have put the  Commodores in a difficult spot following back-to-back losses. “We didn’t do a very good job of attacking their press, and it was disruptive,” coach Kevin Stallings said of Vandy’s play against the Gators. “We did a poor job with our spacing and our ball-handling, and it caused problems.” Home games vs LSU, and of course Kentucky, could put Vanderbilt back on track to locking up a first-round bye in next month’s SEC Championship.

1. Alabama head coach Anthony Grant suspended junior forward Tony Mitchell indefinitely on Monday due to “conduct detrimental to the team.” Grant said that the decision came after “an accumulation” of incidents. On Saturday, Mitchell came off the bench for the first time this season but still played 31 minutes in a double-overtime win over Ole Miss. The Crimson Tide face rival Auburn on Tuesday and Tiger head coach Tony Barbee said the suspension “doesn’t mean a thing.”
2. More than a few column inches have been dedicated to Kentucky’s SEC schedule, starting with the lack of a Thursday-Saturday scenario and finishing with the Wildcats’ first nine league games featuring only one RPI top 50 opponent (home vs Alabama). Starting with tonight’s top-10 showdown with Florida, Kentucky will face six top-50 foes and #51 (Ole Miss) in its last seven games. “I’m going to talk to them today about making sure we are humble,” head coach John Calipari said in his weekly teleconference. “Let’s understand why we’ve been winning and let’s understand where we have to take this.”
3. The best SEC freshman not residing in Lexington, Florida’s Bradley Beal, has proved repeatedly to be the real deal and he again showed why in the Gators second half rally against Vanderbilt on Saturday. He scored five straight points and 14 of his 16 in the last 12 minutes of the game. In addition to his scoring, Beal ranks as the top rebounding guard in the conference and he credits Billy Donovan for making him work on his dedication to rebounding, “It’s always in my mind, because I always get on myself because I’m like, ‘Dang, I need to rebound or coach is going to get on me,’” Beal said. “Coach has always been hectic on me about going to rebound, going to rebound. I’ve just been trying to take that into my mentality and try my best to rebound.”
4. In his weekly teleconference, Mississippi State head coach Rick Stansbury offered up some positive news on freshman DeVille Smith who had missed the Bulldogs’ last four games and was hospitalized for headaches, dizziness and memory loss for the second time this season. Stansbury said Smith returned to school on Monday, but was not ready to project when Smith might return to the team.  “Right now I’m not even concerned about the basketball part of it,” he said. “That’s not even a concern, when he’ll play. I have no idea when that’ll happen. We’ll just have to wait and see.”
5. By virtue of a loss at LSU, CBSSports.com special contributor Jerry Palm placed Arkansas as one of his “Weekend Losers” as the Razorbacks fell to 0-6 on the road. Arkansas has only one more road game against a top-100 opponent, its season finale at Mississippi State, but they can get off the schneid on Wednesday in Athens against Georiga.

Eric Moyer is the RTC correspondent for the Southern Conference and Atlantic Sun Conference and a contributor to the RTC SEC Microsite. You can find him on Twitter @EricDMoyer. See bottom of the post for the Official RTC Star System.

Vanderbilt @ #11 Florida – 1:00 PM EST Saturday on CBS (****)

• The best of a so-so weekend in the SEC lost a little bit of luster after Vanderbilt lost at Arkansas on Tuesday. As it still stands, the winner moves into second place in conference standings. Vanderbilt would tie Florida at 6-2 with a win, conversely the Gators could take a two-game lead on the Commodores with the home victory.
• Saturday represents the first of two meetings between the Gators and Commodores. Each of the previous three seasons have resulted in season sweeps. The Gators won twice in 2008-09; Vanderbilt took both meetings in 2009-10 while Florida won both regular-season meetings and eliminated the Commodores in an SEC Championship semifinal contest as season ago.
• This contest features the reigning SEC Player of the Week (Jeffery Taylor) and Freshman of the Week (Bradley Beal) and four of the top seven scorers in the conference. Additionally, the Gators and Commodores rank first and second, respectively, in three-pointers made and in three-point percentage.
• The Gators are one of two SEC schools undefeated at home (Kentucky) and Vanderbilt has the second-best road record in the conference at 4-2. Could the experienced-laden Commodores steal a key SEC road win after letting one get away on Tuesday? In their six losses, Commodore opponents have shot almost 39% from the three-point arc as compared to 31.5% in their 16 wins.

Ole Miss @ Alabama – 8:00 PM EST Saturday on ESPN2 (***)

• A pair of teams squarely on the NCAA bubble square off in Tuscaloosa. Both teams enter fresh as neither has played since Saturday. Alabama ended a three-game slide by beating Arkansas. Ole Miss owns a pair of quality conference wins (Arkansas, Mississippi State) but an overtime loss at Auburn will remains a stain on the résumé.
• The Crimson Tide have dominated the Rebels at home, winning 70 of the 80 contests.
• The Tide’s defense remains one of the top in the nation by allowing a scant 57.9 points per game this season,the ninth-best average in the nation and the best in the SEC. Only seven Alabama opponents have even reached the 60-point mark this season and four have failed to score 50 points. The Crimson Tide has held their opponents  to just a 37.3% field goal percentage, the sixth lowest in the country. Ole Miss more than holds its own at the defensive end, holding opponents to 39.4% shooting and the Rebels are 11-2 when holding their opposition to less than 40% shooting.
• History says Alabama is the right choice in this game. In addition to their home dominance, the Crimson Tide are 27-2 in their last 29 games at Coleman Coliseum.

Read the rest of this entry »