Rush The Court

Welcome to the first day of RTC’s coverage of the Big East Tournament, live from Madison Square Garden. Today, we will be bringing you a live-blog as UConn starts its foray through the Big East Tournament in an attempt to move themselves back into bubble consideration. The Huskies have been a tough team to peg. They beat then No. 1 Texas without head coach Jim Calhoun only to lose five of their next six, including an ugly loss at home to Cincinnati that seemingly knocked them out of any and all tournament talk. But a fire was lit under this club after the loss to Cincy, and the Huskies went on to win their next three games, which included Ws at Villanova and at home against West Virginia, to put themselves right back into the mix. So how did they follow that up? With losses in three straight to take themselves off what is one of the weakest bubbles in recent memory. What’s worse is that Jim Calhoun benched his three seniors — Gavin Edwards, Jerome Dyson, and Stanley Robinson — at the end of the South Florida game for what seemed like apathy on the part of the Husky “leaders.” Calhoun has not yet announced who will be starting today. St. John’s is not a bad basketball team. They have some athletes, they have some size, and they have one of the most underrated players in the Big East in DJ Kennedy. UConn will have their work cut out for them if they want to climb into the NCAA tournament conversation again.  Join us this afternoon for the action.

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Rob Dauster of Ballin is a Habit is the RTC correspondent for the Big East Conference.

Season in Review

The Big East regular season ended on Saturday, and I think it is safe to say that the league had a bit of an unpredictable season. Don’t believe me? Show me a season preview that had Syracuse winning the league, Pitt getting a double-bye, UConn playing on Tuesday, and with South Florida and Notre Dame finishing above UConn and Cincinnati.  See? Unpredictable.

But what does that mean? Was the Big East better from top to bottom than it was last year? Did teams like Marquette, USF, and Notre Dame benefit from a down year?   The one thing that is for sure is that the top of the Big East is nowhere near the top of last year’s Big East. Five Sweet 16 teams and three No. 1 seeds is a pretty phenomenal feat. But last year the conference only sent seven teams to the tournament, and there is a very good chance that number will be surpassed this season.

The way the Big East bubble is shaping up right now, five teams are in – Syracuse, Villanova, West Virginia, Pitt and Georgetown. Louisville and Marquette should be ok, but a loss on Wednesday and things could get dicey depending on how the rest of the bubble plays out. If Notre Dame happens to lose their first Big East Tournament game (to either Seton Hall or Rutgers), then the Irish could be in trouble as they will likely be right on the cut line.  That gives us eight that are reasonably safe.

It is possible, however, for the Big East to get two more teams in. If today was Selection Sunday, then Seton Hall may actually be in the tournament. While they have 11 losses, the average RPI of the team’s that have beaten the Pirates is 26 and they have not lost to a team with an RPI below 64. Add into that mix that the Pirates have wins over Louisville, Notre Dame, Pitt, at Cornell and an RPI of 53. Its not a great profile, but its a very weak bubble this year. That could be enough.  The other team that still has a shot of an at-large bid is UConn, simply because the Huskies have more good wins than most of the bubble teams. That said, they also have 14 losses. UConn will likely need to make it to the Big East semis for any kind of real shot at a bid.

The Big East Conference released their all-conference teams today, and there isn’t much there that I disagree with. (Note: there are six players on the first team because one of those six will win POY; POY, COY, and ROY will be announced on Tuesday between Big East Tournament sessions)

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The St. John’s Red Storm host the Villanova Wildcats on Saturday in New York City’s Madison Square Garden. The #4 ranked Wildcats travel to NYC for the 102^nd meeting of the two programs, in a rivalry that predates the Big East Conference and numbers more games than any of Villanova’s Big 5 rivalries.  The Red Storm will be led by a brace of juniors who joined the program in 2007 and have logged three Big East seasons together.  Justin Burrell may be the most recognized name in the junior class, but DJ Kennedy and Sean Evans have paired to provide St. John’s with an athletic and physical set  of guard/forwards, while off guard Paris Horne has evolved from a set shooter to a solid perimeter defender. The Wildcats are led by a quintet of upperclassmen, starting with Wooden Award nominee senior Scottie Reynolds and his classmate Reggie Redding. The juniors are led by “the two Coreys”, Fisher and Stokes who have developed along with their classmate and low post player Antonio Pena. Both squads are deep and talented.  St. John’s leads the series 58-43, but Villanova has won five straight, going back to 2004. Will Villanova extend their winning streak, or will St. John’s get back on the winning track? Join us Saturday at noon on RTC Live.

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Back for another day of BGTD. We have a light early schedule today with only a couple interesting early games. I’ll be updating this post throughout the early part of the day so keep on checking back and feel free to add your own thoughts in the comments.

St. John’s at #1 Pittsburgh, Noon
- Been a struggle so far for the #1 team in the country. The Red Storm have been on fire from the field while the Panthers have struggled to find their range from the FT line (7/15). The Red Storm have been getting a big game out of D.J. Kennedy, who has 9 points at the half. The only reason the Panthers are in this game has been dominating the glass and a big start from DeJuan Blair, who has been beastly in the first half. It will be fun seeing Blair go head-to-head against the other big men in the Big East.
- Rough start for Sam Young with 5 points on 2/11 FG although he just got a nice assist to Gilbert Brown to put Pitt up by 5 with 1:20 left and then a nasty dunk off a feed from Levance Fields.
- Pitt up 41-36 at half after heating up a little at the end of the half and St. John’s missing a couple shots in a row.
- Interesting fact: Both Kennedy and Blair played at Schenley HS (Pittsburgh) on a team that won the Pennsylvania (PIAA) Class AAAA Championship. Does anybody know if Schenley is a regional powerhouse or just a fluke getting 2 D-1 scholarship guys on the same team?
- Weird setup for the seating at Petersen Events Center. It almost looks like they have luxury boxes behind the benches. Hard to see on TV. Does anybody who has been inside the arena have a little more info on this?
- Pitt is up 58-42 with 13:01 left.
- Wow. That’s a brutal schedule for Pittsburgh for the rest of January (5 straight games against ranked teams after a game against USF).
- Looks like Pitt has opened up a big lead and should be able to cruise the rest of the way. I’m going to switch my focus to the other 2 game below unless something interesting happens in this game.
- Pitt is putting on a clinic now. 85-61 with 2:36 left. Time to call this game.

#18 Xavier at Fordham, 1 PM

- Xavier up 35-22 with 4:34 left in the first half.
- Pretty dominant performance so far. They are shooting 60% from the field compared to Fordham’s 28%.
- I guess this is why people ranked Xavier above Butler in the BlogPoll a few weeks back even after Butler beat them. (Butler barely beat a bad Detroit team at home yesterday).
- Not getting this one on TV so if anybody is actually watching this one and wants to fill us in. Feel free because it’s hard to say something insightful by looking at constantly refreshing box scores.
- Fordham starts the 2nd half on an 13-4 run to cut the lead to 6 with 16:42 left making my above comment look really bad.
- Make that an 18-4 run to cut it to 49-48 with 15:25 left. How is the #18 team in the nation letting this happen against a 2-11 team?
- Xavier finally brought their team out after halftime. Now they’re up by 15 with 9:10 left. If I just saw the box score tomorrow morning, I would have assumed that Xavier rolled in this game.
- Xavier is up by 23 now with 4:07 left. Looks like another “routine” victory.
- Nice balanced effort from Xavier with 6 guys in double figures.

Wisconsin at #14 Purdue, 1:30 PM

- This should be a good game. Wisconsin has played well this year winning their first 3 games in the Big Ten including a big win at Michigan earlier this year.
- The game is being played on Keady Court. Is it too much to ask for a logo with a horrible combover?
- Speaking of the court. It looks like another of the raised courts (benches are below the floor). How many other schools have something like this? Does it have something to do with the colors? The only other one I can think of is at Vanderbilt.
- Looks like Robbie Hummel is healthy as he just hit a 3 after missing some time. He is coming off the bench, but I don’t think that will last long.
- Looks like a football game is breaking out here. Bodies hitting the floor.
- Nasty putback dunk by JaJuan Johnson. I guess the Big Ten does have some athletes.
- The Badgers have played pretty poorly, but is still in the game at half, 32-26 off an 8-0 run to end the half. If Purdue wants to make a run in March, they need to start putting teams away.
- Big first half by Johnson with 14 points on 6-of-7 from the field.
- Wisconsin keeps hanging around, but they haven’t been able to challenge Purdue for the lead. Each time they come close, they fail to convert.
- Tough foul on E’Twaun Moore there. Could have went either way.
- I have no idea what Bill Raftery was trying to say there. Something about Hummel’s 3-pointer, church, and marriage.
- Purdue is opening up a nice working margin here.
- Wisconsin would be right in this game if they could finish near the basket. They must have missed a dozen shots within 5 feet so far today with 7 min left in the game.
- Nice victory for Purdue (first win in the Big Ten after 2 losses). They won a game they should win without ever being in too much trouble. Great game from JaJuan Johnson with 20 points and 10 rebounds.