David Ely is an RTC Contributor

Introduction

March is here. Need we say more? Those three little words should be enough to put an extra skip in your step this morning and the rest of the week. March is the month when it’s not only socially acceptable to call in sick from work to watch sports — it’s encouraged. The way this season’s gone, the Tournament should be beyond epic, possibly even exceeding last year’s chaotic first two rounds. And if more male cheerleaders are involved, that’s OK by us. It’s March and we’re in a good mood.

What We Learned

Baring an epic collapse during the final two weeks of the regular season, BYU should get a #1 seed when the NCAA Tournaments brackets are released March 13. And none of this “in the discussion” talk. The Jimmer Fredettes (er, Cougars) are definitely one of the top four teams in the nation after their 13-point shakedown of San Diego State at hostile Viejas Arena on Saturday afternoon, a place where the Aztecs hadn’t lost a game all year. After San Diego State took a brief 2-0 lead, the Cougars led the rest of the way in an eye-opening performance that proved two important things: BYU can play some D, and it doesn’t always have to be all Jimmer, all the time. The Cougars held Kawhi Leonard to 17 points on 6-14 shooting, blocking his shot twice and harassing the Aztec big man whenever the he set up in the paint. BYU also had three players other than Fredette score in double figures. Charles Abouo led the way with 18 points, while Noah Hartsock finished with 15 and Jackson Emery added 13. The knock on the Cougars was always that they relied too much on Fredette. While it’s still a justified criticism (Fredette has the fifth highest usage rate in the nation), BYU gave teams reason to think twice about doubling Fredette, especially on the perimeter.

Will This One Do It for the Hokies?

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Earlier this month the Basketball Hall of Fame announced its list of ten finalists for the Bob Cousy Award, given annually to the nation’s top point guard, and created a minor controversy when it left off Wisconsin star Jordan Taylor. At the time, the ten finalists appeared to be deserving although some might question Jimmer Fredette‘s passing ability/frequency and Demetri McCamey‘s play recently:

• Norris Cole, Cleveland State
• Corey Fisher, Villanova
• Jimmer Fredette, BYU
• DJ Gay, San Diego State
• Brandon Knight, Kentucky
• Demetri McCamey, Illinois
• Mickey McConnell, St. Mary’s
• Nolan Smith, Duke
• Isaiah Thomas, Washington
• Kemba Walker, UConn

The Cousy Award committee eventually came to its senses on Taylor

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1. Bruce Pearl returned to the sidelines last night in a game against Kentucky in Lexington, having served his eight-game SEC suspension.  Gary Parrish believes that the Big Orange head coach will be nailed with a full one-year suspension by the NCAA when it finally metes out its punishment for lying to the governing body (among other things).  This would be a reasonable punishment considering the NCAA simply cannot let one of its star head coaches get over on it like that.  Still, Tony Jones as the interim coach would be a good replacement (he was 5-3 with two close OT losses while Pearl was out), giving him a chance to move on to another top coaching job the following year while keeping a fair amount of continuity within the UT basketball program.
2. Luke Winn uses more graphs than you can shake a frosh at in comparing the offensive progress of nine of the best collegiate rookies in the country this year.  You should read the whole thing, but here’s a synopsis:  Steadily rising – Jared Sullinger, Perry Jones, Harrison Barnes, Will Barton; Marginally Rising – Tristan Thompson, Cory Joseph, Brandon Knight; Decreasing: Terrence Jones, Joe Jackson.
3. And articles like these are why NC State continues to be the laughingstock of ACC basketball.  Not only does the author lose all credibility when he states that Herb Sendek is on the hot seat at Arizona State this season — the same Sendek who won 22, 25 and 21 games in Tempe the last three seasons — but he fails to understand that the key difference between the first five seasons of Sidney Lowe vs. Sendek is that the latter clearly was building toward something.  Lowe only appears to be building toward a stigma of perpetual ACC bottom-dweller.  The other significant fact that he fails to recognize is that the ACC has been a pathetic shell of its former self the last five years — if there was ever an opportunity for a non-Duke/non-UNC team to step into the top tier, it’s been during this period.
4. Georgia Tech’s Brian Oliver will miss up to three weeks with a broken left thumb that will require surgery.  The 6’6 sophomore guard is the team’s third-leading scorer and fourth-leading rebounder for a team that is going nowhere in the ACC and nationally, but the expectation is that he will be back in time for the postseason.
5. Pete Thamel at the NYT gives casual fans just tuning into college basketball a primer as to what the season has been so far.  His argument is that the lack of stars — from the injured Kyrie Irving to the gone-pro Wesley Johnson and Greg Monroe, has led to a wide-open season of parity.  We agree with the last part of the statement — the field is wide open this year.  But wasn’t it wide open last year as well?  Duke wasn’t an extremely popular pick to win it all, but they did anyway.  The two other teams considered most likely to do so — Kansas and Kentucky — never even got to Indianapolis.  As for the lack of star power, well, again, this happens just about every year — guys like Johnson and Monroe go league, while the next generation of stars, the Fredettes and Sullingers, take their place.  This wasn’t Thamel’s best work.

***** – 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 2013
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game

Brian Otskey is an RTC contributor.

An intriguing non-conference game, Bruce Pearl’s return and an ACC bubble battle headline tonight’s schedule. All rankings from RTC and all times Eastern.

Xavier @ Georgia – 7 pm on ESPNU (***)

Mack Is Still An Underrated Coach, In Our Opinion

These teams last met in the first round of the 2008 NCAA Tournament, the year Dennis Felton’s Georgia team made an incredible run through the SEC Tournament to steal the automatic bid. Xavier has won eight of nine games coming into tonight’s matchup while Georgia has won two straight after starting 3-4 in SEC play.

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David Ely is an RTC Contributor.

Introduction

You know how ESPN loves doing college basketball marathons? The network put on 24 straight hours of hoops at the beginning of the season, and then ESPN aired four-straight games on MLK Day for your viewing pleasure. Well, why stop with those two days? Monday would have been the perfect day to sit on your coach all afternoon and watch some roundball. TWTW can’t think of a better way to nurse your Super Bowl hangover. Make it happen, ESPN. 

What We Learned

North Carolina’s 20-point loss at Georgia Tech over MLK Weekend might have been the best thing to happen to the Tar Heels this season. Since that embarrassing loss, the ’Heels have ripped off five straight wins in ACC play, outscoring opponents by at least 20 points in the last three. A lot of people will choose to single out Kendall Marshall’s insertion into the starting lineup as the turning point of the season, but it’s been Harrison Barnes’ improved play that’s catapulted UNC into the ranks of NCAA dark horse. Barnes has scored at least 17 points in three consecutive games for the first time in his career, and it’s no coincidence that UNC cruised in all three games. The Tar Heels already boast one of the better post duos with Tyler Zeller and John Henson, now they have the electric scorer they’ve missed since the 2009 title season. 

Is It Too Late For the Wildcats? (AP/N. Majamdar)

Baylor, Butler and Kansas State all went on the road Saturday and came away with mega wins as they attempt to remain in the discussion for NCAA Tournament bids. Baylor landed the most impressive W, riding Perry Jones III to an overtime win at Texas A&M. Butler got a boost with its 12-point win at Horizon League leader Cleveland State, and Kansas State avoided a crippling loss when it eked past Iowa State. It remains to be seen what these wins will do for them in the long run, though, as all three are firmly entrenched on the bubble. The Wildcats have the best RPI of the bunch, checking in at #31, and according to Joe Lunardi’s latest Bracketology, they appear to be in the best standing with the selection committee as an 11 seed, compared to Baylor (the last team in) and Butler (NIT bound). But anyone who feels secure in trusting Frank Martin’s team hasn’t watched any hoops this year.

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1. The Mountain West has received a lot of attention this year due to the excellent play of top ten teams San Diego State and BYU and, of course, the NPOY candidacy of the Cougars’ Jimmer Fredette.  Yesterday the attention on the league was of a different sort, though, as Wyoming, dead last in the league standings at 1-8, fired head coach Heath Schroyer after three-plus seasons at the helm.  This move comes after the Cowboys lost its seventh consecutive game on Saturday, a three-point home loss to Colorado State.  Schroyer was 49-68 during his tenure in Laramie, with his best season coming in 2008-09 as Wyoming went 19-14 (7-9 MWC) and made the NIT.
2. Ugh.  Oklahoma State forward Darrell Williams was charged with three counts of rape and one of sexual battery on Monday stemming from an incident in December where he allegedly assaulted two women at a party.  The junior college transfer has given head coach Travis Ford a solid season, averaging 7/7 in twelve starts and around 21 minutes per game, but according to the coach, he will be held out of the lineup and practice until his legal issues are resolved.  His preliminary hearing is scheduled for the first week in March, which probably means that Williams’ season is effectively over.  OSU has been playing better of late, beating Missouri and Oklahoma to get back to the middle of the Big 12 pack, but any further push will be that much more difficult without the sometime-starter available to bang bodies down low.
3. Dan Wiederer delves further into the phenomenon known as Kendall Marshall going for a record sixteen assists in UNC’s destruction of Florida State over the weekend.   We didn’t know, for example, that Marshall has a tendency to pull a Bill Russell during halftime of games, but we do now and we’re quite sure that Roy Williams will provide the rookie with his own four-year supply of barf bags if he keeps dropping double-figure dimes the rest of the season.
4. A new Monday meant another version of Seth Davis’ Hoop Thoughts.  In this week’s edition, he deplores the fly-by-night departure of Larry Drew II from the program (blaming Drew’s mother more than his famous father), St. John’s as the most interesting bubble team at this point, and a Kyrie Irving update that you haven’t seen anywhere else.
5. The ten final candidates for the Bob Cousy Award given to the nation’s top point guard were announced on Monday, and there were a couple of surprising omissions.  The complete list is below, but as Mike Miller at Beyond the Arc points out, there’s really no legitimate excuse for leaving out Xavier’s Tu Holloway and Wisconsin’s Jordan Taylor.  Both players have been outstanding for their respective teams, and outside of the NPOY candidates Fredette, Smith and Walker, arguably better than any of the other names on this list.

• Norris Cole, Cleveland State
• Corey Fisher, Villanova
• Jimmer Fredette, BYU
• D.J. Gay, San Diego State
• Brandon Knight, Kentucky
• Demetri McCamey, Illinois
• Mickey McConnell, St. Mary’s
• Nolan Smith, Duke
• Isaiah Thomas, Washington
• Kemba Walker, UConn

Jesse Baumgartner is an RTC contributor. In this weekly piece he’ll review the five things he loved and hated about the previous seven days of college basketball. This week, Jesse goes nuts (as did most people) on the whole Larry Drew II situation and claims Brandon Knight isn’t a real point guard (God help us), and then takes his place in the long line of Wild Bill fans.

The Five Things I Loved This Week

I LOVED…..“Wild Bill” from the Utah State student section. Apparently I missed this guy last year, but you sure can’t miss him when you’re an opposing player at the free throw line. You get a couple options, too, when you’re playing the Aggies. Wild Bill could choose to expose his rather robust cleavage, or he might switch things up and don an elephant costume – like he did this last week against Nevada. Of course there’s also the Winnie the Pooh outfit, too. Personally I’m waiting for the first free-throw line victim that just starts cracking up. You know they want to, so I’d just let it loose for a few seconds so you could concentrate on the freebie.

How Can One Not Love This?

I LOVED…..three things that came out of Larry Drew II’s decision to quit on UNC (don’t worry, I rant about it in the HATE section, too). First off, UNC looked dynamite without him on Sunday against Florida State and showed again that the team is bigger than the decisions of one disgruntled player. Then there was Roy Williams, who said in the wake of Drew’s decision that “Z (7-footer Tyler Zeller) thinks that he can” be a factor at the point. And finally, check out Tar Heel swing man Dexter Strickland’s hilarious Tweet after realizing he’ll be the back-up point guard: “I gotta get on my Deron Williams swag for Sunday…lol @KButter5 (PG Kendall Marshall) I got u son!”

I LOVED…..some innovative expression from the Pac-10. This time it was Arizona point guard Lamont “MoMo” Jones, who went off for 27 points and hit multiple clutch shots in a dramatic 3OT-road win against Cal. “I’ve played like this my whole life,” said Jones. “To other people it might be something new, but to me it’s just another day in the life of MoMo Jones.” Players take note. If you want to be quoted, nothing does it faster than referring to yourself in the third person. Gets ‘em every time.

I LOVED…..that for all the talk of a weak SEC and a strong, dynamic Kentucky, the Wildcats are now 4-4 in conference play after taking a spill against Florida this weekend. Once again, that which we take for granted in college basketball comes back to bite us in the…whatever you call it. I stand by a statement I made after watching UK in Maui at the start of the season – Brandon Knight must become an actual point guard. Point guards don’t have assist-turnover ratios of 83-75. This UK team can make a run, but they need Knight to perhaps limit his scoring a bit (which is tough, since he’s a stud in that department) and get his teammates better looks on a consistent basis.

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***** – 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 2013
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game

Brian Otskey is an RTC contributor.

On paper, this isn’t the best weekend of games. However, this is college basketball where anything can happen. You just never know what could happen and it may end up being a thrilling couple of days, anyway. All rankings from RTC and all times Eastern.

West Virginia @ #12 Villanova – 12 pm Saturday on ESPN (****)

Yet another big game in the Big East features two teams tied for third place at 6-3 in league play. The winner will tie second place Notre Dame, just a game and a half behind first place Pittsburgh. West Virginia has won seven of nine games and rebounding has been a big reason why. The Mountaineers have not been out-rebounded by an opponent since a New Year’s Day game at Marquette, plus their defense has been solid. West Virginia has scored only 58 PPG over their last four games (three of them without leading scorer Casey Mitchell) but has held opponents to an average of 50 PPG over the same stretch, culminating in holding Seton Hall to 44 points on Wednesday. Bob Huggins’ team is #5 nationally in offensive rebounding percentage but will have to bring their A-game on the glass against Villanova. The Wildcats rank 20^th in keeping opponents off the offensive boards and were led by the interior duo of Antonio Pena and Mouphtaou Yarou in their most recent win over Marquette. They combined for 32/15 and have been huge factors this season as Jay Wright isn’t counting exclusively on his guards to win games anymore. Although West Virginia has rebounded the ball extremely well of late, they still rank only #291 in opponent’s offensive rebounding percentage, allowing teams to grab 35.6% of their misses. Villanova will likely miss a lot of long range shots against West Virginia’s #2 ranked three point defense (allowing 27%) so offensive rebounding will be important for both teams, especially the Wildcats, in this game. Coach Huggins used 6’7 John Flowers on Seton Hall’s Jeremy Hazell in their last game and he successfully shut down the Pirates’ gunner. Might we see the same thing on Villanova’s Corey Stokes? It’s a good possibility, though Flowers may be needed inside more often to double Pena and Yarou. Flowers leads the Big East in blocked shots and needs to have another good defensive game against a Villanova team that can score in bunches. The Wildcats score 25.6% of their points from the foul line and attempted 33 free throws against Marquette. Villanova is very difficult to beat when they get to the stripe because they shoot 78% and get there so often. Dribble penetration from Corey Fisher and Maalik Wayns leads to good looks inside and plenty of free throw opportunities. West Virginia has to do a good job defending the dribble drive and Kevin Jones will be a key player in doing so. Jones is a taller player who, along with Flowers, will form the second line of defense if the Wildcat guards are able to get into the lane. Jones is also a warrior on the glass, going for 13/12 in his last game. With the status of Casey Mitchell still uncertain, West Virginia will have to stick to typical “Huggy-ball” more than ever, and that’s physical defense and great rebounding. Villanova is 16-0 when they score at least 70 points but only 2-4 when they fail to do so. With the way West Virginia is rebounding and playing defense right now, it’s very possible that this game could be in the 50’s or 60’s. We’re going to go with the upset and take the Mountaineers on the road in this game.

#10 Kentucky @ Florida – 9 pm Saturday on ESPN (****)

With a win on Saturday night, Florida can really create some separation between themselves and Kentucky. With a win against the Wildcats, Florida will hold a two and a half game lead over UK and remain ahead of Tennessee, a team they beat on the road already. Quite simply, a win here puts Florida in a commanding position in the SEC East. Of course, that won’t be so easy against the nation’s fourth ranked team in eFG% defense. The Gators have won 9 of 11 games but Kentucky will be their toughest test since a meeting with Ohio State back in November. The Wildcats are coming off a loss at Ole Miss earlier this week, a game in which they committed 18 turnovers and didn’t defend the three point line well at all. Freshman point guard Brandon Knight had six of those turnovers and needs to do a better job tonight. Young teams can’t turn it over and expect to win on the road no matter how talented they are and Kentucky is finding out the hard way. With a 2-4 record in true road games, the Wildcats need to grow up quick if they want to play deep into March. Knight needs to create shots for himself and others, taking advantage of UK’s 40% shooting from deep. With Doron Lamb shooting the ball very well recently, Kentucky has plenty of threats to win this game. A key battle in this game will be at the forward spot as Kentucky’s freshman Terrence Jones goes up against Florida senior Chandler Parsons. Jones averages 18/9 and had 22/12 at Ole Miss while Parsons has been on an absolute tear on the glass of late. Controlling the boards will be critically important in a game that could be all about pace. The Gators would like to slow the game down and work in the half court while the Wildcats are comfortable at a quicker pace. To keep the tempo in their favor, Florida has to win the rebounding battle and make shots. The Gators are #10 in offensive rebounding percentage but the matchup between Jones and Parsons, as well as Vernon Macklin and Josh Harrellson at the center position, will likely determine who controls the glass in this game. If Harrellson can shut down Macklin (Festus Ezeli of Vanderbilt did a good job of this in the last game), the onus will be on Parsons to carry the Gators yet again. With Erving Walker hitting only 7 of his last 33 threes (21%), Florida will work the ball inside even more than they already do. The Gators get 56.8% of their points from two point range but will face the #4 interior defense in the country. Kentucky allows opponents to shoot only 41% from two point range while Florida is making 50.5% of their two point shots. This should be a physical game and whoever controls the interior will likely come out on top. Despite their road woes, we think John Calipari’s team will be ready to play tonight and hand the Gators their fourth home loss, disappointing the big crowd sure to be at the O-Dome for ESPN Game Day.

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The Lede.  It’s snow-and-ice-pocalypse across a major swath of the midwest and east tonight, but that doesn’t stop us from delivering this evening’s news and analysis from the comforts of our couch.  Tonight games from Boston to Boulder and everywhere in between were moved, postponed or played in front of sparse crowds of people avoiding the weather.  No matter where you sit, whether in the frigid zones getting decked by the snow or the warmer climes elsewhere, there was some pretty good basketball going on around the nation tonight.  Let’s keep everybody out there safe tomorrow trying to dig out of it, though.

Are Harrison Barnes & UNC Turning the Corner? (A. Hunger/NO)

Your Watercooler Moment.  Is Carolina Back? After winning eight of nine games coming into tonight’s contest at Boston College, UNC had already re-established itself back in the national rankings (#23 AP; #24 RTC) but there was a still-tenuous feeling among many about whether Roy Williams’ team was actually legitimate or not.  After all, the Heels’ best win in that streak was at home against Virginia Tech and there is still that lingering image of a craptacular performance at Georgia Tech a couple of Sundays ago.  Delving into the Heels’ resume, though, shows that their other losses really aren’t all that bad — a two-point loss to Texas (playing as well as anyone right now) in addition to Ls to Illinois, Minnesota and Vanderbilt.  These are all forgivable losses especially for a young team, but the question on everyone’s mind is whether a performance like tonight where the Heels ripped a solid BC team by 32 points is the start of something special?  We’re not quite ready to go there yet, but the recent offensive emergence of Harrison Barnes (career highs of 25 pts vs. NC State over the weekend and 26 pts tonight) gives Carolina a dimension on the wing that they haven’t had.  In those two games, Barnes has already hit nearly a quarter of his entire number of threes made for the season, and the transition of Kendall Marshall to the starting lineup in place of Larry Drew over the last four games has been an effective one.  Neither Marshall nor Drew are the type of players in the mold of Ty Lawson or Raymond Felton who will push the Carolina attack into overdrive en route to a national title, but Marshall in particular has shown a propensity for distributing the ball (his assist rate is through the roof per minute played), and for the first time all season we are now convinced that UNC is indeed the #2 team in the ACC behind Duke.  The key takeaway with tonight’s win is that Roy Williams’ team is getting better — they’re not going to the Final Four and they may not even be Sweet Sixteen-worthy this season, but in a watered-down ACC, they should have enough to at least get back to the NCAA Tournament and quite possibly win a first round game.  With presumably everyone back next season, Carolina fans could once again have the building blocks to get back onto their typical Final Four every-other-year track.

Tonight’s Quick Hits…

• The Big Ten Mucky Muck.  Two Big Ten games tonight proved that home teams are pretty good in this league most of the time and that it’s looking more and more like there will be a five-team race for second place in the league behind Ohio State.  Purdue dropped its fourth road game in a row to go 7-3 in the conference, and as we all know, Madison isn’t a good place to come out of a road losing streak.  Meanwhile, Illinois broke its two-game tailspin (and four of five) with a strong defensive performance in front of about twenty fans versus Penn State.  With the results of these two games tonight, OSU now has a three-game lead on Purdue, but the Boilermakers and the next five teams (Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan State, Minnesota, Penn State) are all within two games of each other.  It’s going to be a wild second half of the season to see how that league shakes out in the middle.
• KU’s Odd Luck in Lubbock.  Strangely, Bill Self had never won a game in Lubbock prior to tonight’s destruction of the Red Raiders, 88-66.  In games in 2005, 2007 and 2009, KU went to Texas Tech with a top ten ranking and came away with losses in all three visits.  Tonight’s game was a completely different story, as Kansas ran out to a huge halftime lead and never looked back.  The Jayhawks put five players in double figures, including the Morris twins’ combined 29/16, but the most notable performance of the evening came from Thomas Robinson, who had his second consecutive great 17/9 night, well above his season averages of 9/6.  This is wonderful to see.
• Brandon Knight, Meet the Hand (of Reggie Buckner).  One of the best blocks we’ve seen all season long sent the Ole Miss home crowd into a frenzy.  Welcome to D1, rookie.  Oh, and Chris Warren hit a 25-foot three to win the game.  That too.

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***** – 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 2013
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game

Brian Otskey is an RTC contributor

This weekend brings us yet another great slate of games with plenty of ranked teams heading out on the road to face unranked opponents. How many will go down this time? All rankings from RTC and all times eastern.

#21 Georgetown @ #6 Villanova – 12 pm Saturday on ESPN (****)

Despite their win at the Carrier Dome over Syracuse last week, Villanova has lost two of its last three games and now welcomes their rival Georgetown Hoyas to the Wells Fargo Center. The Hoyas have won three straight over the New York-area schools to climb back to 4-4 in Big East play. Georgetown has won four true road games but none of those wins were against teams the caliber of Villanova.

If Freeman and the Hoyas Plan On Finishing Strong, Tonight's a Good Night To Start

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