Good afternoon, college hoops fans, and welcome to another version of Boom Goes The Dynamite.  What does that mean?  If there’s a game on my television, I’m watching it.  I’m even monitoring games on about five different online game-trackers.  John Stevens, here, holed-up in the RTC Midwestern Compound.  Normally you have to wait until Tuesday for me to force my opinions and exert my influence on you in my weekly column; on this particular Saturday, NVR1983 (the Zelig of college basketball fandom — the man can literally pop up anywhere in the country with a press pass and do a live broadcast and duck out before you’ve noticed he’s been there, and probably eaten half your food) is probably somewhere setting himself on press row for a game tonight, and RTMSF (the guru of RTC) is, from what I understand, probably laying under a big pink blanket watching Mad About You or Sex And The City DVDs with his wife at a spa somewhere.  Poor b—ard.

(Just kidding, Mrs. RTMSF…)

Anyway, where I am in the Midwest, it’s cold again, it’s grey, and it’s starting to snow.  Sounds like good basketball-watching weather (but what isn’t?).  I’ve got a television, I’ve got a cooler, and I’ve got a couch.  Let’s watch some hoops.  I invite you to join me. 

We’re getting a little bit of a delayed start because of a techincal difficulty on my end (long story — suffice to say, I am easily distracted and/or confused by things like shapes and colors), but now that we’re up and rolling, in a moment we’ll catch up on what’s happened so far in today’s games.  Welcome!

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

Looking Back
Wow! Northwestern scored a thrilling upset over Michigan State at the Breslin Center this past week  prevailing 70-63. While the Wildcats still face a (very) uphill battle to get to the NCAA Tournament, at least this win made the other teams in the conference take notice. Kevin Coble put on one of the finest performances we have seen all season pouring in 31 points on just 16 shots. He’s not a household name yet, but with a couple performances like that, he will be.

Illinois also separated itself from the pack a bit, scoring home wins over Ohio State and Wisconsin, two teams that now appear to be in free fall. Wisconsin has lost four straight games as of this writing (and tips off against Purdue in a couple of hours) [Ed. Note: Now 5 straight], and Ohio State now sits at 3-4 after dropping a home game against Michigan State. To be fair, that’s the only home loss for the Buckeyes in the conference season, who might go on a run once the schedule eases up a bit.

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

Looking Back
In a highly competitive Big Ten, Michigan State has now managed to achieve a bit of separation. It wasn’t easy – it took a closer-than-expected road win against Penn State and a comeback from a 9-point second half deficit against Illinois – but the Spartans remain the only squad without a conference defeat and are clearly the team to beat after Purdue‘s early stumbles.

Behind Michigan State, there are five teams with 2 conference losses, each with realistic tourney hopes. Minnesota got a huge victory at Wisconsin, a feat that will be difficult for other teams to match. The Gophers followed that up with a loss at Northwestern illustrating how tough it is to consistently win on the road in the Big Ten.

It appears that Ohio State‘s romps over Houston Baptist and Indiana have allowed the Buckeyes to right the ship – their defense, which had been MIA for several weeks, held Michigan to their 4th worst offensive efficiency of the season. The three teams that had better defensive games against Michigan? UCLA, Duke, and Illinois. An Ohio State squad playing defense like that can be a major factor in the Big Ten race.

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This’ll be  quick one today because our usual writer is busy inviting a bunch of dudes over to his pad for some game involving another collegiate sport tonight.  A sport that tends to have trouble deciding who the most worthy teams are for its championship just about every year.   Our opinion of that faux-championship game is below. 

When Does Utah Play in the Finals?

As for the rest of your evening, while you’re not watching Oklahoma and Florida throw balls all over the field en route to a 65-63 finish, enjoy a warm post-coital buffet of some college hoops.   There’s a surprisingly tasty slate on tap for tonight, with four games involving Top 25 teams.  

7pm

– Wright St. @ Butler on ???.  Wright St. appears to be coming out of the fog that enveloped its team during the first two months of the season, as they’ve won 8 of 9 games with the only loss coming at #4 Wake Forest.  Butler, on the other hand, continues to roll along, but the Bulldogs have had trouble with WSU, losing seven of their last ten against the Raiders including their last two when ranked.  The big question is whether this game’s total will outscore the BCS game’s. 

– Minnesota @ Iowa on ESPN2.  Iowa hasn’t gotten much publicity this season, but the Hawkeyes are 9-0 in their home arena, a place where Minnesota has lost seven of their last eight visits.  Minny’s only other true road test was a one-point win over Colorado St., so we’re a little skeptical about the validity of Tubby’s 13-1 record (best start since 1996-97).  Still, if Minnesota can get a road win in a place they traditionally don’t play well, it would go a long way toward establishing itself as one of the upper elite of Big Ten teams this year.

8:30pm

– Oregon @ Arizona on FSN Regional.   This is a battle between teams who were swept in their first Pac-10 tilts last weekend.  The difference is that at least Arizona was on the road in the Bay Area when they went 0-2.  Oregon plays defense like most teams enjoy suicide sprints; in other words, not at all.  Arizona should have a field day of open looks and easy layups for Chase Budinger, Jordan Hill and others to take advantage of.  They just need to make sure that Jamelle Horne is nowhere near the floor at the end of the game. 

10:30pm

– Oregon St. @ Arizona St. on FSN.  Arizona St. may be without the services of forward Jeff Pendergraph tonight, but that shouldn’t stop you from checking in on Herb Sendek’s team for a quick glance at possibly the most complete guard in America, James Harden (23/6/5 on 55%/44% shooting).  OSU is coming off of its first Pac-10 win in nearly two years vs. USC, but that was at home.  Still, OSU has been much more competitive this year. 

– Stanford @ Washington on FSN Regional.  UW is a team that hasn’t been talked about much this year, and why would we?  They’re 10-3, but they’ve lost to nearly every good team they’ve played (Portland, Kansas, Florida).  Stanford got its comeuppence last weekend when Arizona St. dominated them in Maples.  But the Cardinal did recover to beat Arizona, and UW had a nice win over its in-state rival Wazzu, so this could make for an interesting contest.  Both teams have low-grade NCAA aspirations, so they need to win these types of games. 

11pm

– Cal St. Fullerton @ Cal Poly on ESPNU.  The BCS game should be ending around 12:30am due to all the passing and timeouts, so turn this one on for the last five minutes to see CSF’s Josh Akognon play for the first time in your life.  His Titans (6-8 ) aren’t very good, so it’s unlikely you’ll see him in March – this might be your last opportunity to see this fantastic collegian while still in school. 

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

Looking Back

Conference play is underway, and it appears we’re going to be in for a wild one.  There were very few blowouts, and two of them involved Minnesota (dishing it out against Ohio State, and taking their lumps against Michigan State).  For the most part, the home teams held serve, but there were 3 road victories (2 of them belonging to the Spartans).  Even Indiana gave Iowa a scare in Carver-Hawkeye Arena.  It just isn’t safe to take a night off in this conference.

For our money, Michigan State looks like the early frontrunner.  Twelve or thirteen wins might be enough to win this thing, which can be boiled down to the two-step formula of winning at home, and going .500 on the road.  MSU stands at 2-0 with both wins being road wins.  That means they would need 9 home wins and 4 road victories to seal this up, and assuming they don’t falter at Indiana, they’re very close to winning all the road games they need to.

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With most conference schedules starting to get into full swing, I thought I would start doing Set Your Tivos daily with a weekend edition to cover the games on Saturday and Sunday.

7 PM
– #5 UConn at #22 West Virginia on ESPNU: Just another night in the Big East for the Huskies, who responded to last week’s  loss to Georgetown with a 80-49 beatdown over an exhausted Rutgers team. Tonight, Jim Calhoun’s Huskies go to Morgantown, WV to face Bob Huggins and the Mountaineers. Joe Alexander is gone, but Alex Ruoff and Da’Sean Butler have stepped up to fill the void. The Mountaineers have been impressive this season with wins over Ohio State (on the road), Iowa, Ole Miss (on the road), and Cleveland State. However, their lack of a solid interior presence could mean a big game for Hasheem Thabeet IF (big if) the Huskies decide to use him. If A.J. Price and the Huskies utilize Thabeet, they should roll in this one.

– Ohio State at #12 Michigan State on ESPN2 and ESPN360.com: The Spartans are finally starting to show the form that earned them an early-season #5 ranking. Honestly, outside of this being a league game, I don’t really expect this one to be close just based on the momentum these two teams have (along with the continued absence of David Lighty). Of course, since it’s a league game, I’ll probably be completely wrong. In either case, this game will be worth watching to see what kind of shape the Buckeyes are in. I don’t think they will be able to beat the Spartans in East Lansing if Raymar Morgan and Kalin Lucas are playing well, but it should be entertaining to watch.

9 PM
– #7 Texas at Arkansas on ESPN2 and ESPN360.com: A week ago I wouldn’t have even thought about watching this game and I think the Longhorns may have been just as disinterested. However, with the Razorbacks victory over Oklahoma on New Year’s Eve this game has suddenly become more interesting. I’m not quite sure what to make of the Razorbacks who lost to Missouri State back in November, but haven’t lost since before Thanksgiving. The key to the game will the play of Michael Washington, the Razorback center who played national POY favorite Blake Griffin to a virtual standstill on New Year’s Eve. It will be interesting to see the match-up at the 5 as Rick Barnes will likely counter with Connor Atchley, who has the outside game to take Washington away from the post. I’ll also be intrigued to see what Arkansas does to neutralize A.J. Abrams after Willie Warren went for 35 points against the Razorback guards.

– Alabama at #11 Clemson on Fox Sports South and ESPN Full Court: I’m interested in this game more to see if the Tigers are legit. It just seems like they always start the season off undefeated amassing a 15-0 record before falling apart and usually missing the NCAA tournament. However, this year they managed to win a few good out-of-conference games (Temple along with road wins at Illinois, Miami, and South Carolina). The Crimson Tide will need big games out of their backcourt of Alonzo Gee, Ronald Steele, and Senario Hillman if they want to pull off the upset. The Tigers will need to start winning games like this if they ever want to break into the ACC elite and compete with UNC, Duke, and Wake Forest for a league title.

– #14 Purdue at Penn State on The Big Ten Network: The Boilermakers will be looking to rebound after opening Big Ten playing with an OT loss to Illinois. Prior to that, the Boilermakers had been playing very well with a big win over Davidson. They will have to do it against the Nittany Lions who also are coming off a loss (at Wisconsin). The game will likely come down to how each team’s top 3 players play. The Boilermakers will be relying on E’Twaun Moore, Robbie Hummel, and JaJuan Johnson while the Nittany Lions will count on Talor Battle, Jamelle Cornley, and Stanley Pringle (possibly the only college basketball player in the nation who would be advised to stay out of the library).

I’ll be honest with you. This doesn’t even come close to Super Saturday from a couple weekends ago, but it’s certainly better than watching all the specials about how your retirement account fell apart this year or some mediocre college football teams play in a meaningless bowl games that nobody has ever heard of. It certainly should be enough to distract Big Ten fans away from their teams getting blown out in the bowl games. In any event it will get the rest of you ready for Dick Clark at midnight. . .

Noon ET
– #15 Michigan State at #21 Minnesota on the Big Ten Network: Both teams are riding high after impressive victories on Super Saturday. The Spartans (9-2) have rebounded from a slow start including a blowout loss to UNC (doesn’t seem that bad any more. . .ok losing by 35 in a virtual home game is really bad) to reel off 5 straight wins including a win against Texas on the 20th. Meanwhile, Minnesota (12-0) has been playing consistently good basketball–quality wins over Virginia and an overrated Louisville team–all year despite coming into the season with modest expectations from the media. While the Spartans are more of a known quantity with a number of marquee players, the Gophers are more of an unknown as their soft early season schedule (only Louisville was a RPI top 100) is the reason they are 12-0 yet only ranked #21 in the country. The key to this game will likely be Spartan sophomore PG Kalin Lucas who comes into the game boasting a better than 6.5:1 assist to turnover ratio. If he continues to play at that level, Tubby Smith will have a tough time matching Tom Izzo and the Spartans.

2 PM ET
– #3 Pittsburgh at Rutgers on ESPN Full Court and ESPN360.com: The Panthers are heavy favorites in this game, but we’ll be more interested in how the Scarlet Knights are performing in the middle of the toughest 3 game stretch in college basketball history (#1 UNC then #3 Pitt then current #2 UConn in the same week). Jamie Dixon should have his guys ready for this game after UConn’s loss to Georgetown a couple night earlier, but you never know with college kids particularly ones who probably went home for the holidays and spent time around people who praised them even more than what they normally hear at school. This is definitely an “upset alert” game, but we think the UConn loss should be enough to keep Levance Fields and the Panthers on their toes.

– Wisconsin at #24 Michigan on ESPN2 and ESPN360.com: At first glance this would appear to be a mismatch with the Badgers being unranked and the Wolverines receiving a lot of attention from the media this year, but this game should be very close. Most of you know about the Wolverines (10-2) with losses to Duke (avenged) and Maryland, but the Badgers (9-3) come in with a pretty strong resume too–a blowout loss against UConn along with 2 close losses to Marquette and Texas (by a combined 8 points). Despite their strong starts, both teams still have work to do if they want to guarantee themselves a ticket to the NCAA tournament. As usual the Badgers come in without a true superstar, but have a very balanced attack with 5 players averaging between 7.8 and 12.6 PPG. The Wolverines rely on their stars–Manny Harris (19.8 PPG, 7.8 RPG, and 5.1 APG) and DeShawn Sims (17.2 PPG and 9.2 RPG). I figure the Wolverine fans (and Manny Harris) should be enough to put their team over the top in the Big Ten opener.

4 PM ET
– Iowa at #23 Ohio State on the Big Ten Network: Unfortunately we don’t think we will be seeing Mr. Trillion (Mark Titus) make an on-court appearance because this also figures to be a close game. The Hawkeyes (10-3) haven’t been world-beaters, but they should put up a pretty good fight if Anthony Tucker can rebound from his recent suspension and play up to his early-season form. The Buckeyes looked absolutely awful in their last game a 76-48 loss to West Virginia, which dropped them 10 spots in the polls. If the Buckeyes expect to rebound and contend for a Big Ten title, which they have the potential to do, they will need freshman B.J. Mullens to start playing like the big-time recruit he was out of high school. At the very least, Thad Matta needs Mullens to start playing like the 7-footer that he reportedly is. Seriously, 4.0 RPG in 17.7 minutes per game against mediocre competition isn’t going to cut it for someone who has been hyped as a potential lottery pick. If Mullens can raise his game, he and Evan Turner should be enough to make them contenders for the Big Ten title.

6 PM ET
– UNLV at #18 Louisville on ESPN2 and ESPN360.com: I would use an “upset alert” on this one, but with the way Rick Pitino’s boys have been playing this year they haven’t played well enough for me to consider another loss an upset. Louisville has the talent to blow out UNLV, but to date they haven’t shown the ability to translate that talent into performance this season. UNLV certainly hasn’t been playing great this year, but their pressing defense has started to pay dividends recently with a big win over Arizona. Normally a team as talented as Louisville shouldn’t have trouble with a trapping defense of the level of UNLV’s (saw it on Christmas Eve on a replay of the Southern Utah game on Mountain TV–don’t ask), but it might just be enough pressure to rattle a team that appears to be as mentally weak as Louisville. My prediction: Let’s just say I have a strong suspicion that Rick will be giving another long speech after this one.

8 PM ET
– #17 Gonzaga at Utah on CBS College Sports: As much as I would like to make this a game about 2 teams (sorry Utah), this game is really all about Gonzaga. The Bulldogs, who were ranked 4th in the nation a couple weeks ago, have lost 3 of 4. We’re willing to let the loss to UConn go (we called it the “Game of the Year (to date)” at the time, but neither team has done much lately to help with that claim), but losses to Arizona and Portland State have basically knocked Gonzaga out of contention for a #1 seed this year. However, Mark Few still has a chance at a #2 seed and spot in the West Region if Jeremy Pargo, Matt Bouldin, and company can get back in gear.

10 PM ET

-#1 UNC at Nevada on ESPN2. This is a true road test for the Heels, but it looked better on paper a month ago than it probably will be tonight.  The Wolfpack, with Luke Babbit, Armon Johnson and Brandon Fields, appeared to be ready to compete for another WAC championship and an NCAA bid coming into the season, but they have been nothing short of a disappointment so far, losing to pretty much every good team they’ve played.  Still, there is talent here, and if UNC is looking ahead to hanging out in the seedy casinos afterwards, Nevada could use their homecourt advantage to make a game of this one.  It’s worth keeping an eye on as you lift your glass to toast the new year in the east.

Credit: www.squaremeal.co.uk

Josh & Mike of Big Ten Geeks are the RTC correspondents for the Big 10 Conference.

Looking Back

The ACC won its 10th consecutive Big 10/ACC Challenge last wmichigan st, kevin coble, northwestern, indiana, acc/big challengeeek by a 6-5 margin.  That’s actually a pretty decent result for the Big 10, as the ACC figures to be an elite conference this season.  Also, take into consideration that the ACC played 6 home games (compared to the Big Ten’s 4, or 5 if you consider Detroit to be a home venue for Michigan State), the ACC’s worst team last season, N.C. State, didn’t participate, and three of the Big Ten’s losses were by 5 points or less (to be fair, 3 of the ACC’s wins were by 5 points or less).

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News & Notes. It’s a light night here at RTC, so we’ll throw in some overdue links.

• TBL wonders why the media continues its enamoration with Tyler Hansbrough (and his alter-deity Tim Tebow).
• Here’s Vegas Watch’s ACC preview.
• Oklahoma St. starting center Ibrahimi Thomas has been dismissed from the team.
• Iowa freshman guard and leading scorer Anthony Tucker was suspended indefinitely.
• Dan Hanner’s 10 things to do as a college hoops fan.  We’re sitting at seven.
• Memphis’ Tyreke Evans celebrates his RTC honorable mention as FrOY through the first quarter of the season.

Tyreke Evans Celebrating RTC Honorable Mention

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Story of the Night. Is this the year, after nine straight emasculations at the hands of the ACC, that the Big 10 finally breaks through and wins the ACC/Big 10 Challenge?  Well, considering that going into the last day of the Challenge in 2007-08, the ACC led 5-1, the previous year 4-2, and in fact, the Big 10 has NEVER gone into the final day deadlocked, we consider this a moral victory.  Maybe they don’t, but we do.  Looking at tomorrow night, the ACC still has the upper hand (Wake is a mortal lock at home vs. Indiana, and Georgia Tech will be heavily favored at home vs. Penn St.), but if Michigan St. and Northwestern can protect their home court/field, (big ifs) then Michigan @ Maryland could be the tipping point game.  Maryland will be favored, but Michigan has proven that it can play with anyone this year, and you never know which Terp team will show up.  If only the Illini had held on at home tonight, Big 10 fans!!

This Is What Duke Does.  Duke 76, Purdue 60. The most hyped game of tonight’s Challenge, if not the actual best game, reminded us all of what Duke consistently does every year in November and December – beat all comers.  Those of us who were fooled by Duke’s completely shameful avoidance of true nonconference road contests forgot what Duke typically does when they play those ACC-mandated games away from home – win them.  Duke looked focused and ready to play from the tip, while Purdue was clearly over-focused, to the point of blowing wide open layups and showing an inability to make simple defensive switches.  The Purdue jitters excuse quickly morphed into one involving Duke’s superior defense, though, as Purdue stars Robbie Hummell and E’Twaun Moore were held to a pedestrian 25 pts (six below their average), but 20 of those points were in the last eleven minutes of regulation, when the game was largely out of reach.  The Devils held the Boilers to 37% from the field and a mere 2-13 from three.  Equally impressive, Duke dominated the boards 44-26, including eight extra possessions from offensive rebounds.  Kyle Singler led the way for Duke with a double-double (20/12), but Jon Scheyer (20 pts) and Nolan Smith (12 pts) contributed with timely threes, as Duke improved to 10-0 in the Challenge. Purdue Fan = not happy.

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