Patrick Marshall of Bluejay Basketball is the RTC correspondent for the Missouri Valley and Big 12 Conferences.

Current Records and My Standings (Conference Standings) (Last Week)

1. Kansas (24-5)(13-1) (3)
2. Oklahoma (26-3)(12-2) (1)
3. Missouri (24-5) (11-3) (2)
4. Oklahoma St. (19-9) (8-6) (6)
5. Texas A&M (21-9) (7-7) (8)
6. Texas (19-9) (8-6) (5)
7. Kansas St. (20-9) (8-6)(4)
8. Nebraska (16-11) (6-8) (7)
9. Baylor (17-11) (5-9) (9)
10. Iowa St. (14-15) (3-11) (11)
11. Texas Tech (13-16) (3-11)(10)
12. Colorado (8-18) (1-13) (12)

There has been a lot of movement this week in the Big 12. With Blake Griffin out the Sooners looked vulnerable. Bill Self appears to be doing one heck of a coaching job this season as Kansas sits atop the Big 12 with wins over Oklahoma and Missouri this past week. As we head into the last week of the regular season, let’s sort of see where all the Big 12 teams are at this point.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ryan Pravato of College Fast Break is the RTC correspondent for the Summit League.

NDSU 22-6 (15-2)

Everybody’s favorite to be the league rep in the Big Dance.  Now the only question is what seed they will be pegged. Many bracketologists (I use that term oh so liberally) have the Bison as a 14th seed, some a 15th, no one else to my knowledge has them as anything different. With such a dynamite record, is a 13th seed really that much to ask?  Back on the 21st the Bison tangoed with the Wisconsin-Milwaukee Panthers in a scintillating BracketBuster match up for the ages. Check that, the only BracketBuster game anybody gave a flying squirrel about was Butler versus Davidson, and that game stunk. Do these one bid league teams really need to play an out of conference game during, uh, the conference season? I don’t think so. Plus, some of the BracketBuster match ups were a total waste of time, definitely not all created with equality in mind.  But back to the task on hand, NDSU senior guard Mike Nelson tied a season high with 22 points. Senior point guard Ben Woodside was two rebounds short of a triple-double. NDSU concludes the regular season at 2nd place Oral Roberts on Feb.28th .

Update- NDSU clinched at least a share of the regular season title with a road victory over Centenary on Thursday (Feb. 26). Woodside and Winkleman combined for 66 points.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ray Floriani of College Chalktalk is the RTC correspondent for the MAAC and NEC Conferences.

SOUTH ORANGE, NJ – The MAAC regular season winds up on Sunday. The conference tournament will begin the latter part of next week in Albany and there is no drama or speculation on the top two seeds, even with Siena visiting Niagara this evening.

We are taking the tempo free look at the MAAC. Only conference games are figured and the EM (efficiency margin) is the vital difference between offensive and defensive points per possession.

Read the rest of this entry »

JC of HBCUSportsBlog is the RTC correspondent for the SWAC and MEAC Conferences. With the end of the regular season imminent, both conference wrap-ups are below this week.

SWAC Wrap-Up

And so it is nearly finished. A final act for the SWAC conference that is low on team talent, but with a few programs that have a legitimate shot of scoring more than 29 points against the number one seed in the national tournament.

Alabama State paces the conference, and is poised to eclipse 19 wins for the second-consecutive season. On their heels is Jackson State, with just two conference losses on the year and one courtesy of Alabama State.

Read the rest of this entry »

Damon Lewis, a reporter and play-by-play announcer for the Horizon League Network, is RTC’s Horizon League correspondent.

Butler: 14-3; 24-4
Green Bay: 13-4; 22-8
Cleveland State: 12-5; 21-9
Wright State: 11-6; 17-12
Milwaukee: 10-7; 15-13
Youngstown State: 7-10; 11-17
UIC: 6-11; 14-14
Loyola: 6-11; 14-16
Valparaiso: 4-13; 8-21
Detroit: 2-15; 7-21

With the final day of the regular season taking place on Saturday, we’re going to utilize the “bullet point” method this week. There are only a few items of importance that will be sorted out on Saturday…all of that having to do with seeding for the Horizon League Tournament, which gets underway on Tuesday, March 3rd. I’ll be providing a preview of the HL Tourney in the coming days…in which we’ll discuss the match-ups and recap the post-season awards. No more stalling…here we go! Read the rest of this entry »

Michael Hurley is the RTC correspondent for the Pac-10 Conference.

News & Notes

• Lute Olson compiled a 43-6 record against Arizona State. Since he took a leave of absence last year, Arizona is 0-4 against the Sun Devils.
• Against ASU, Jordan Hill, Chase Budinger, and Nic Wise all logged 40 minutes. For the year the three are each averaging over 35 minutes a game. They are the only team in the Pac-10 with three players averaging over 35 minutes a game. Come Pac-10 tournament time these three horses have to be tiring.
• Oregon State swept the season series against Cal for the first time since the 1994-95 season.
• Jerome Randle has 59 three-pointers this season putting him 9 shy of the school season record 68 set by Ryan Drew in 1990. With four games left and Randle averaging over two a game he stands a fighting chance at overtaking Drew.
• Washington State’s win at UCLA last week was only their second win in their 53 games at Pauley Pavilion.
• The battle for coach of the year in the Pac-10 has four solid candidates. With the jobs Mike Montgomery, Russ Pennell, Craig Robinson, and Lorenzo Romar have done, there is an excess of candidates to choose from.
• Pennell is the front-runner right now in my mind. He turned this Arizona team around and has them at 8-6 in the Pac-10 and 18-9 overall. He was the second choice for interim coach in late October. Last year he did color commentary for Arizona State radio network.
• Jon Brockman is the only mid-season candidate for the Naismith trophy from the Pac-10.

Player of the week: Taylor Rochestie
Rochestie scored 24.5 points a game for Washington State this week. Rochestie also averaged five rebounds and four assists a game. Rochestie scored 33 points in WSU’s upset of UCLA. He shot 5-for-7 from three-point range and a perfect 10-for-10 from the free throw stripe.

Honorable Mention: Darren Collison and Rihards Kuksiks
Collison scored 18.5 points and averaged 6.5 assists for UCLA this past week. Collison went a perfect 7-for-7 from the line in the two games. Kuksiks scored 17 points in Arizona State’s win this week. Kuksiks scored 15 of those on five three-pointers.

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s Down to the Wire

Inching closer to Tournament Time!  All but two teams have just two games remaining on their SBC schedule which will conclude tonight and this weekend.  Thankfully, the West has experienced some much needed separation except for the bottom of the pack who will be in a dog fight to avoid a first round road game.  In the East, the Toppers, having won against Troy in last weeks game of the week, are now seriously poised to nab the number one overall seed and possibly the whole enchilada given the next story.  Which is…

Read the rest of this entry »

Kevin McCarthy of Parsing the WAC and Sam Wasson of bleedCrimson.net are the RTC correspondents for the WAC. 

Current Standings:

1. Utah State (12-1, 25-3)
2. Nevada (8-4, 16-10)
3. New Mexico State (8-5, 15-12)
4. Boise State (7-5, 17-9)
5. Idaho (6-6, 13-13)
6. Hawai’i (5-8, 13-13)
7. San Jose State (4-8, 11-14)
8. Louisiana Tech (4-9, 12-16)
9. Fresno State (2-10, 11-17)

The race for the league title and the automatic bid to the NIT should be decided on Thursday night. Utah State hosts Hawai’i with a chance to wrap up the regular season title, their second in the past two seasons. For Utah State however, they’re looking to make their first NCAA tournament appearance since the 2005-06 season, that year they received an at-large bid after finishing second in the regular season and losing to Nevada in the title game of the conference tournament. The UtAgs, despite a record of 25-3 don’t want to leave anything to chance as they still feel the sting of finishing 25-3, being ranked 21st but not receiving an at large bid after losing in the Big West semifinal to Cal State-Northridge 63-62.

As for the rest of the league, the race for second place is on as Nevada (8-4), New Mexico State (8-5), Boise State (7-5) and Idaho (6-6) can all finish as high as 2nd.

And not to be left out, the bottom four teams, Hawai’i (5-8), San Jose State (4-8), Louisiana Tech (4-9) and Fresno State (2-10) are all playing to stay out of the league’s 8/9-seed play-in game (with the winner having to face likely 1-seed Utah State) in the quarterfinal round.

Read the rest of this entry »

Josh & Mike from Big Ten Geeks are the RTC correspondents for the Big Ten Conference.

Looking Back
As Lester Bangs told William Miller, “you’ll meet them all again on their long journey to the middle.” He could just as well have been talking to most of the Big Ten this season, as we now see 5 conference teams bunched up with 7 or 8 losses, all fighting for their NCAA Tournament lives. Penn State got a big boost from their ugly 38-33 victory at Illinois, then lost a winnable game at Ohio State to rejoin the masses. Penn State now has a 3-2 record against the top of the conference (Michigan State, Purdue, and Illinois), with a home game still remaining against the Illini. This ability to hang with the best of the conference is their sole basis for an at-large bid – their best non-conference win was at Georgia Tech (currently 1-12 in the ACC), so the Nittany Lions figure to need at least 10 Big Ten wins to even be considered.

Speaking of Illinois, they shook off the Penn State loss to get a nice road victory at Ohio State, putting them back on track for at least third place in the conference. Mike Davis continued his superb sophomore season, dropping floater after floater over Ohio State’s shot-blockers. Davis shot 11 for 14 from the field to finish with 22 points to go along with 8 rebounds and continues to lead the Big Ten in Defensive Rebound %.

Read the rest of this entry »

College Chalktalk is the RTC correspondent for the Atlantic 10 Conference.

By CCT Staff | February 4, 2009

PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Lavoy Allen (So.), Temple

Allen had perhaps his best week as a collegiate player, averaging 19.5 points and 14.5 rebounds over a two game span. The 6-foot-9 sophomore was sensational from the floor, shooting a sparkling 74% (14-of-19) during the stretch. In his most impressive game of the season, Allen shot 8-of-8 from the floor, scoring 20 points and grabbing 18 rebounds in a win over St. Bonaventure yesterday. The two double-doubles this week were the ninth and tenth of the season for Allen, as he helped lead the Owls to two victories.

HONORABLE MENTION: Kevin Anderson, (So.) Richmond; Ahmad Nivins (Sr.) Saint Joseph’s; Damian Saunders (So.), Duquesne

(Note: College Chalktalk’s week runs from the previous Monday through Sunday, given the release of ‘This Week in the A-10″ each Monday morning.)

Read the rest of this entry »