1. Head coach Anthony Grant questioned the team mentality of his Alabama squad after a 56-52 loss to Mississippi State on Saturday. “There’s a point in time when winning needs to take a priority over any individual things,” Grant said, “and I don’t think we understand that all the time.” If the Tide’s head man had questions over teamwork on Saturday, then he’s really going to ponder his club’s commitment following a 69-59 loss to Vanderbilt. Alabama trailed by as many as 23 in the second half, were outrebounded by 10, and shot just 33% as a team from the field. Rather than a lack of teamwork, maybe it’s a lack of shooting ability that has done the Crimson Tide in this season. Alabama is last in the SEC in made three-point field goals with under three per game.
2. Forward Reginald Buckner was a huge factor in Mississippi’s first win over rival Mississippi State since January 31, 2009. Buckner pulled down 15 rebounds, blocked three shots, and scored a career-high 19 points. That’s a lot of production from the junior who averages 8.7 rebounds and just 6.8 points per game. “I thought he was tremendous,” Rebels coach Andy Kennedy said. “Obviously the difference in the game.” And not just any game — a much needed win for the up and down Rebels. “It was a statement game,” Buckner said. “We’re back in it. We’re back in the race.” Which race exactly is yet to be determined.
3. Mississippi State point guard Dee Bost is an emotionally driven player who can trash talk with the best of them, but usually backs up his talk with positive play on the court. Bost made plenty of noise before the game, but came up short in the Bulldogs loss on Wednesday night. Ole Miss coach Andy Kennedy set out to frustrate Bost by defending him with the length of 6’10” forward Terrance Henry. And it worked. Bost was four of 15 from the field for 15 points, but scored a flurry of eight points in the final 42 seconds of the game after the final outcome was already decided. “We thought the length would bother him, which it did a little bit,” Kennedy said. Bost has been the key to Mississippi State’s five-game winning streak against Ole Miss prior to this loss. In the 69-64 win in Oxford last season, Bost came up huge for the Bulldogs with 25 points, six rebounds, and eight assists.
4. Kentucky forward Terrence Jones credits a new attitude for his recent 13-point, nine-rebound performance against Arkansas. “I’m just not thinking as much,” Jones said. “Just being less conscious about my hand. Worrying about messing up because I wasn’t playing like I was as a freshman. Just thinking too much about every little play.” Jones refuses to use his finger injury as an excuse for his poor play, which is appropriate considering his struggles started well before the December 17th setback. The 6’8″ power forward has yet to record a double-double this season, despite reaching that mark thirteen times as a freshman.
5. Billy Donovan is looking to his bench to fill the void left by the ankle injury of center Patric Young. “Pat is obviously a big part of our team,” Florida forward Erik Murphy said. “He’s going through a little bit of an injury, and we have got to pick up the slack, step up. All of us collectively as a group need to.” Young is expected to play on Saturday against LSU, but how much and how effective he is remains to be seen. If Young is unable to play significant minutes, Donovan could turn to freshman Cody Larson. “I’m gaining more and more confidence and trust in Cody,” Donovan said. “I’ve put him in now the last several games, and he’s given us some good minutes.” Young was limited to just 13 minutes in the Gators’ last game against South Carolina.

Evan Jacoby is an RTC contributor and correspondent. You can find him @evanjacoby on Twitter. Night Line will run on weeknights during the season, highlighting a major storyline development from that day’s slate of games.

The popularity of Alabama’s basketball team might pale in comparison to that of its National Championship football squad, but the boys on the hardwood win its games in a similar fashion: defense, defense, and more defense. So the fact that Vanderbilt showed up in Tuscaloosa on Thursday night with the more physical defensive effort was impressive, especially considering how poor the Commodores struggled on the defensive end just a few weeks ago. Kevin Stallings’ team allowed just 59 points in the road win, and Vanderbilt (14-4, 4-0 SEC) is a much tougher team now with physical force Festus Ezeli back in the lineup. This group is a changed bunch from the team that lost to Indiana State at home in December, and the Commodores must be taken seriously now as a team with the formula to make a run in March.

With Ezeli Back, Vanderbilt is a Much Tougher Team Defensively (Getty Images/G. Halverson)

Vanderbilt entered this season a preseason Top 10 team, bringing back all five starters and three NBA prospects in Jeffery Taylor, John Jenkins, and Ezeli. Jenkins has held up his end of the bargain, leading the conference in scoring at 19.8 points per game. He’s arguably the best shooter in college basketball, currently leading the nation in three-point field goals (67) at a 45.3% rate (third in the SEC). Taylor has done his part, too, displaying his all-around game to the tune of 16.9 points, 5.6 rebounds, 2.0 assists, and 1.4 steals per game on 53.6% field goal shooting and the ability to hit from deep (45.3% on 3.5 attempts per game). But Ezeli missed six games due to an NCAA violation-related suspension, and another three recovering from knee surgery, and the Commodores struggled without him. While he doesn’t provide the statistical production of his fellow team leaders, Ezeli is their only true interior threat and most impactful defender. Take away those two aspects, and Vanderbilt barely looked like an above-average team for the first 10 games of this season.

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Brendon Mulvihill is an RTC contributor. You can find him @themulv on Twitter. See bottom of the post for the Official RTC Star System.

More great conference action tonight as one team looks to prevent history from repeating and repeating and repeating.

Festus Ezeli has Vanderbilt back on track

Vanderbilt at Alabama – 7:00PM EST on ESPN2 HD (****)

• Vanderbilt is a different team with Festus Ezeli on the court. The Commodores are 5-3 without Ezeli and 8-1 with him. While the schedule was also more difficult when he was injured, his impact on both the offense and defense is undeniable. Keep a close eye on how he manages the interior against Alabama’s JaMychal Green.  Green lit up the Commodores for 23 points last year in a losing effort. Vanderbilt has certainly torn through its first three SEC opponents this year, shooting 47% from three and almost 55% from two. Alabama and its top-five defense will present very difficult obstacle for Kevin Stallings’ team particularly on the Crimson Tide’s home court. A key factor in this game will be Vanderbilt’s ability to get second chance points on missed shots. Alabama’s field goal defense is so strong, especially against the three, that the Commodores can easily go one and done and shoot themselves out of this game.
• Alabama is only allowing teams to shoot 25.7% from three-point land. With Vanderbilt’s bread and butter being the long ball, this sets up for very interesting situation on the perimeter when Alabama is on defense.  Give the edge to Alabama as they have only allowed two opponents to shoot over 50% eFG so far this season. The Commodores shoot 42% of their field goal attempts from downtown. Look to see how Vanderbilt adjusts their offense against such tough perimeter defense.
• This game sets up as another offense versus defense match-up. However, the key may actually be on the offensive boards. Neither team is particularly fantastic on the defensive glass and offensive rebounding is a key factor in the offensive efficiency of both teams.  The team with more second chance points should win this game.

The SEC Full Court Press is a quick hitting review of my thoughts and observations from the last week, as well as a look ahead.

The Week That Was (01.09.12 – 01.15.12)

• Florida’s Kenny Boynton seemed to prefer a high degree of difficulty on his way to 15 points against Georgia. He was 1-6 (16.6%) from two point field goals on Saturday, but 4-7 (57.1%) from three-point range.
• Now that his time playing football for Steve Spurrier is over, South Carolina point guard Bruce Ellington has excelled on the hardwood. This week he averaged 18.5 points and three assists per game against Vanderbilt and Florida. Coming into these two games, Ellington had only scored in double figures twice all season.
• Vanderbilt got to the free throw line 44 times (making 30) against Georgia, showing improvement in its aggressiveness and ability to establish a presence in the low post.
• Three-point shooting continues to be an issue for Alabama. The Crimson Tide were 1-9 (11.1%) in a loss in Starkville against Mississippi State.
• Arnett Moultrie continues to rack up video game type numbers with 25 points and 13 rebounds against Bama. At one point, Moultrie scored 14 straight points for the Bulldogs.
• While I still think Moultrie is the SEC Player of the Year, Kentucky’s Michael Kidd-Gilchrist has made a fairly significant case for most valuable player. He finished with 17 points and 12 rebounds against Tennessee, but came up big in the clutch when Kentucky needed him most.
• Speaking of Kentucky, the Cats have as many conference road wins already this season (two) as they had on the road throughout the entire SEC slate last season.
• Who says John Calipari-coached teams can’t shoot free throws? Since the beginning of SEC play, the Cats are shooting 75% from the charity stripe. And they’ve been there 69 times in the first three conference games.
• For all my NCAA Tournament bubble talk last week, I now believe the SEC will end up as a five-bid league. LSU, Ole Miss and Arkansas looked as though they could wind up on the bubble, but all three are far too inconsistent to make a serious run.

Beat the Press

• The team I was most impressed with this week was the Mississippi State Bulldogs.  After struggling last week in a fast paced affair with Arkansas, Mississippi State got two important wins this week. First, the Bulldogs won 62-58 over the Tennessee Volunteers and then outlasted Alabama for a 56-52 win. The offense wasn’t clicking for the Bulldogs on either night, shooting under 45 percent from the field in both, but they found a way to win. This week will be even more telling as Mississippi State hits the road for contests against in-state rival Ole Miss and then on to Nashville for a tough game at Vanderbilt.

Anthony Davis needs one block to tie the single season blocks record at Kentucky

• This week, not only did Anthony Davis beat the press, but he swatted it into fifth row of the stands. Davis was key down the stretch in Kentucky’s victory over Tennessee as the freshman center showcased some offensive moves in the post. He finished with 18 points, eight rebounds and four blocks against the Vols, averaging 16 points, seven rebounds, four blocks, 2.5 steals and two assists on the week. Davis handles the ball on the perimeter often for the Cats, but had zero turnovers in either game.  With his eight blocks this week, Davis is now two blocks away from setting the single season blocks record (one block to tie) at Kentucky.

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Brian Otskey is the Big East correspondent for RTC and a regular contributor. You can find him @botskey on Twitter. See bottom of the post for the Official RTC Star System.

A couple of Mountain West battles highlight Saturday’s action but the big one is late Sunday afternoon in the Big Ten.

#14 Connecticut @ Notre Dame – 11:00 AM EST Saturday on ESPN2 (***)

• Led by Andre Drummond’s 20/11 on 9-11 FG, Connecticut got back on track by defeating West Virginia on Monday night. To win on the road, the Huskies will need quality efforts from most of their roster. That starts with Shabazz Napier protecting the basketball. Jim Calhoun’s sophomore point guard sets the tone for this team, good or bad. Napier (and UConn as a whole) has struggled with turnovers, especially in Big East play. On the road against a team looking to make its mark in the middle of the conference, the Huskies have to do a better job handing the ball if they are to win this one. The more possessions UConn can earn by using its strong rebounding advantage while minimizing turnovers, the more opportunities there will be for talented players such as Drummond, Jeremy Lamb (25 points vs. WVU) and Ryan Boatright to score.
  

  Can Napier Step Up To Lead The Huskies?

• Believe it or not, Notre Dame actually has an outside shot at the NCAA Tournament. 37 at-large bids have to come from somewhere and the Fighting Irish are on the bubble according to ESPN’s Joe Lunardi. This will be a tall order for Notre Dame, even at home. The Irish have won 29 consecutive home games but that will be tested mightily against the Huskies. The emergence of Jack Cooley in the paint could be the biggest reason why Notre Dame has a chance to upset UConn. Cooley has averaged 16.5 PPG and 9.7 RPG over his last eight games, the latest Notre Dame big man to develop nicely under Mike Brey. However, Cooley will likely have a more difficult time against Connecticut’s stifling interior defense. The Huskies have always owned the paint under Calhoun and this year is no different. Notre Dame has to make outside shots in order to win because it can’t count on Cooley alone inside. Jerian Grant has turned into a consistent scorer but the Irish need a third option. Brey had hoped Scott Martin would be that guy but he has really struggled. However, Martin is impacting the game in other ways, rebounding well even when the shots aren’t falling. Notre Dame must try to get to the foul line as well. UConn historically doesn’t foul often so this could be difficult even at home.
• If Drummond plays like he did against West Virginia, the Huskies will be a strong favorite. UConn must rebound aggressively to counteract any turnover problems it may have. The Irish have struggled shooting the three ball this year and Connecticut ranks second in interior defense. If those statistics hold true, Notre Dame will have an incredibly difficult time scoring. The good news for the Irish? They have been the best team defending the triple in Big East play (20.9%). For UConn, it’s simple. Protect the ball, rebound, and defend the paint. If the Huskies do that, they will snap ND’s 29-game home winning streak. Easier said than done, of course.

1. Forward Murphy Holloway picked up right where he left off for the Ole Miss Rebels.  Ole Miss was on a downward spiral losing four of its last five games, but Holloway’s 19 points and 14 rebounds propelled the Rebels over Arkansas on Wednesday. “Sometimes you wonder, ‘Boy, you’ve lost four out of five. What’s wrong?'” Ole Miss coach Andy Kennedy said. “He wasn’t playing. That’s what’s wrong. Good players make good coaches. With him back we dominate the glass, it’s the reason we win the game.” Holloway helped the Rebels control the rebounding advantage by a margin of 22.
2. Transfer guard Mike Rosario is finally healthy, but he is still learning to adjust to a new role within the Florida offense. Rosario scored seven straight points for the Gators against Georgia on Wednesday, but coach Billy Donovan is still expecting to see some improvement from his top bench player. “Getting those seven points in the first half, that helps your team,” Donovan said. “It’s interesting because I feel like people look at us as being this great scoring team. When you talk about scoring — guys that can put the ball in their hands, guys that can score — we’re a really, really good shooting team, but what we’ve got to do is we’ve got to understand we have to utilize our shooting.” One of Donovan’s greatest challenges with this Florida backcourt will be quality shot selection. Rosario went 3-9 against the Bulldogs. There is no doubt Rosario can score, but can he eliminate mistakes and bad shots and still accumulate points?
3. John Calipari wasn’t so sure his Kentucky Wildcats were going to pull off the win on Wednesday night over Auburn. “They wanted it worse than we did,” Calipari said. “They played with a desire that we didn’t have. I’m telling you, if we don’t understand going in we’ve got to go and just from start to finish play like a team that’s on a mission, then we’re going to lose games. Because every team is going to give us their best shot.” The Wildcats certainly didn’t give their best effort. Kentucky shot just 40.4% on the night, and were outrebounded 35-29 by the Tigers. The Cats were 2-6 on the road in the SEC last year, and they hit Thompson Boling Arena on Saturday for a showdown with the defensive minded Tennessee Volunteers.
4. Rebounding played a major factor in Auburn’s near upset of Kentucky. The Tigers outrebounded the Cats 31-14 in the first 30 minutes of the game, but something clicked with the Wildcats in the last 10 minutes as they snagged 15 of the 19 available rebounds. UK scored 21 points in the last half of the second half as Auburn only managed to score six down the stretch. Kentucky was awakened just in time to win the game, but the Cats gave Calipari quite a scare. “At one point I looked at the staff and said, ‘this has nothing to do with X’s and O’s, boys. We could be going down,'” Calipari said. Whatever the reasoning for the Cats’ resurgence in the second half, UK couldn’t afford a collapse to Auburn, so kudos to the Cats for winning on the road despite their poor play.
5. Alabama forward JaMychal Green started for the first time in five games after suffering from a shoulder injury earlier in the year. Green played 27 minutes against LSU, grabbing three rebounds and scoring nine points on 4-9 shooting. Through shuffling the lineup around in Green’s absence, coach Anthony Grant may have found the right combination of players going forward. The Birmingham News says that the combination of Green, Tony Mitchell, Trevor Releford, Trevor Lacey, and Levi Randolph should be the lineup that Grant sticks with moving forward. This was the first time this combination had started together.

With last night’s unique, electric, and egalitarian college football championship game behind us we figured it was time to pull out our RTC BCS Poll. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the concept, we are applying the BCS formula to college basketball to see what the results would be if college basketball had a BCS system instead of actually deciding a champion on the court. We have done this each of the past three years. Here are the results from 2009, 2010, and 2011. The posts are from various points in the season (either midway through the year or potentially at the end of the regular season) This year we are going to try to expand it out a little further and track the changes essentially from the start of conference play.

The rules are essentially the same as the BCS and as in previous years (with a few upgrades):

1. We are following the BCS Football guidelines as closely as possible, but we replaced the Notre Dame rule with the Duke rule since they both have sketchy TV contracts (Notre Dame with NBC and Duke with ESPN).
2. The AP and ESPN/USA Today polls are used as the human polls and RPI, Sagarin, Pomeroy, Massey, Colley, and LRMC as the computer polls. The human poll scores are calculated as a fraction (in decimal form) of the percentage of possible votes (1625 in the AP and 775 in the ESPN/USA Today respectively). Like the BCS we remove the highest and lowest computer rankings from a team’s overall computer ranking. The highest and lowest rankings are noted with green and red boxes. In the even that there were multiple similar highest or lowest scores we picked the first one in chart.
3. We used the traditional BCS calculations for determining each team’s score weighing the two human polls and the combined computer poll average as 1/3 of a team’s total score each.

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Zach Hayes is an editor, contributor and bracketologist for Rush the Court.

If there’s one thing I’m reminded of every January, it’s that winning on the road in conference play is incredibly difficult.

Ask Missouri, who came into their road game at Kansas State riding an undefeated record and lost by 16. Or consult Connecticut, who had a nightmarish week in New Jersey, succumbing to both Seton Hall and Rutgers. Florida would have a clue, as they were manhandled by rebuilding Tennessee. The same applies to Duke and Georgetown, two more top ten teams that lost on the road during this past week.

Needless to say, the rankings will experience a dramatic shakeup every Monday during a season where our perceptions are constantly in flux. After watching countless hours of hoops over the last two months, here’s how I see the top of the pack:

Fab Melo's rapid improvement has been a big reason for Syracuse's ascent

1. Syracuse (17-0, 4-0): There’s no debate over the best team in the Big East. With Syracuse’s first road game against a ranked team not coming until February 13, it’s looking more and more like a race for the league’s silver medal. The five players that Jim Boeheim shuffles off his bench – notably superb sixth man Dion Waiters, who could be their most talented player — could challenge for an NCAA Tournament bid by themselves. Their patented 2-3 zone is nearly impenetrable and Syracuse is second in block percentage and first in steal percentage, generating countless transition opportunities where they excel in the open court. No team has more depth or is currently playing at a higher level.

2. Kentucky (15-1, 1-0):  The Wildcats are not only sensational at this stage in the season, but with three freshmen and two sophomores among their top six players, they have the most room to grow of any team from now until March. This might be John Calipari’s best defensive team, buoyed by the shot-blocking artistry of center Anthony Davis, the primary reason why Kentucky ranks first in the nation in opponents two-point percentage (37%). The keys for the Wildcats over the next two months will be snapping preseason All-American Terrence Jones out of his perplexing funk and minimizing freshman point guard Marquis Teague’s turnover woes.   Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, who plays with an unquenchable energy and can guard four positions, has been the best overall freshman in the country on both ends of the floor.

3. North Carolina (14-2, 1-0): Roy Williams’ team has an inside track at a number one seed due to a watered-down ACC aside from Duke. The common perception of the Tar Heels is one of a potent offensive arsenal and a soft defense, but Carolina ranks 12^th in defensive efficiency and puts the opposing team on the free throw line less than any other team in the country. Harrison Barnes is one of the nation’s top scorers, averaging 17.6 points per game on 49% shooting, many of those open looks courtesy of the nation’s top distributor in Kendall Marshall. What separates this year’s Heels from last year’s 33% three-point shooting team is the health of Reggie Bullock and addition of freshman P.J. Hairston as pinpoint outside gunners.

4. Ohio State (15-2, 3-1): There’s no shame in the Buckeyes two losses at Kansas (without star center Jared Sullinger) and at Indiana by four points. In Sullinger, point guard Aaron Craft and wing William Buford, the Buckeyes boast the best player at each respective position in their conference. Ohio State ranks first in defensive efficiency largely due to the perimeter wizardry of Craft, rank sixth in two-point field goal percentage at a robust 55 percent and are the most proficient defensive rebounding team in the country. One major flaw could be a lack of outside shooting; with no high-volume Buckeye shooting higher than 37 percent from deep, opposing Big Ten defenses may pack the post in an attempt to limit Sullinger and force Ohio State to beat them from beyond the arc.

5. Indiana (14-1, 2-1): Tom Crean’s rebuilding project is one year ahead of schedule. The most dramatic change has been on the defensive end where the Hoosiers have gone from tenth to fifth in the conference in defensive efficiency led by tremendous defenders Victor Oladipo and Will Sheehey. Couple that with a 46% team mark from three, Cody Zeller’s efficient post scoring (66% from inside the arc) and Christian Watford’s emergence as an all-Big Ten wing, and it’s no surprise Indiana has pulled off dramatic wins over Kentucky, Ohio State and Michigan at a rejuvenated Assembly Hall. The questions that lie ahead: can Indiana win on the road in conference play, and when those threes inevitably rim out, will they be smart enough to consistently feed Zeller in the post?

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The familiarity amongst teams once conference play begins creates an atmosphere that is truly hard to predict. The SEC experienced some ups and downs as some teams didn’t play as expected while others rose to the occasion. The first week of SEC play was nothing if not unpredictable, and it’s only the beginning of what is to come.

The Week That Was:

• The Ole Miss Rebels haven’t shot at least 45% from the field and at least 30% from three-point range since a December 17 loss to Southern Miss.
• Meanwhile, the LSU Tigers, which beat the Rebels 81-55, have won eight of their last nine games.
• Kentucky’s Anthony Davis is closing in on the single season blocks record for the school. He has 74 so far this season, just 10 away from the all-time best mark of 84 set by Andre Riddick in 1993-94 and Melvin Turpin in 1982-83.
• Mississippi State allowed Arkansas to shoot 56.5% from the field on Saturday. Previously, the Bulldogs hadn’t allowed an opponent to shoot above 50% all season.
• The Razorbacks’ Julysses Nobles came up with a huge game on Saturday. The junior guard had 24 points and seven assists in by far his best game of the season.
• Coming off an 18-point loss to Memphis, the Tennessee defense held Florida to 56 points on 35.7% shooting. Both the point total and the shooting percentage were season lows for the Gators.
• Billy Donovan won’t want to pack his bags and leave Gainesville again this season. The Gators are 0-4 on the road this year, losing at Ohio State, Syracuse, Rutgers and Tennessee.
• Was that a Terrence Jones sighting? The Kentucky power forward had his best game in over a month with a 20-point performance on 8-9 shooting against South Carolina.
• Auburn mustered up 35 points in its game against Vanderbilt. The ‘Dores scored 38 in the first half.
• After accomplishing Auburn’s first ever triple-double this week, Kenny Gabriel tallied just two points, three rebounds and one block against the Commodores. It might be safe to say that Gabriel won’t secure the Tigers’ second triple-double in history while he’s playing against SEC competition.

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The first week of 2012 was quite the week in the college basketball world as 15 Top 25 teams fell, and seven of these losses came to teams ranked outside of the Top 25. Needless to say, the contenders are beginning to separate themselves from those who were pretenders for much of the non-conference. The top five teams remained identical from the prior week, but there was a good deal of movement throughout the rest of the poll. Syracuse picked up seven of the eight first place votes with Kentucky nabbing the other. The Quick ‘n Dirty analysis after the jump…

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