mvc – Rush The Court

What’s Trending: Let’s Dance…

Matt Eisenberg — Mon, 09 Mar 2020 19:55:00 +0000

What’s Trending is a column examining the week that was in college basketball social media. Matthew Eisenberg (@matteise) is your weekly host.

After a January 18 loss at Boise State, Utah State’s record fell to 14-6 (3-4 Mountain West) with a NET Ranking of 83rd and any bubble hope seemingly out of reach. After a stretch of winning 11 of its next 13 games, however, Utah State found itself playing for a Mountain West title over the weekend against San Diego State. After a tightly fought second half, the Aggies had possession with the score tied and the clock winding down…

Ten Questions to Consider: Teams Battle For Positioning As Others Fight for a Chance to Dance

Matt Eisenberg — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 15:01:53 +0000

This weekend will send the first few teams dancing as conference tournaments are already underway in several leagues. Elsewhere, the power conferences enter their regular season finales with conference titles on the line. Here are 10 questions I have for just some of what will take place on the hardwood this weekend:

Which Big East front-runner will gain the edge for a Big East Tourney run? (Seton Hall @ Creighton, Saturday, 2:30 PM EDT, Fox) With a win in Omaha, Seton Hall would guarantee itself a Big East title and the top seed in the upcoming Big East tournament. The #1 [...]

Ten Questions to Consider: Christmas Weekend

Matt Eisenberg — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 19:31:07 +0000

Other than the eight teams participating in the Diamond Head Classic, there will be a three-day break from action beginning on Sunday. Here are 10 things to watch while binging to basketball and Christmas carols on Friday and Saturday.

Texas Is a Tough Team to Figure Out (USA Today Images)

How concerned should Texas be with its offense? Texas currently ranks among the bottom 20 nationally in both three-point and free-throw percentage, is 141st in adjusted offensive efficiency, and only one Big 12 team since the 2006-07 season has finished conference play with both a winning record and offense outside the [...]

The Mid-Major Disadvantage: The Power of the Power Conferences

Shane McNichol — Thu, 25 Feb 2016 22:01:26 +0000

For the first time in recent memory, Gonzaga is in jeopardy of missing the NCAA Tournament. Throughout a season in which the Zags began in the top 10, they have experienced a variety of miscues (home losses) and misfortunes (Przemek Karnowski’s injury) that have resulted in a spot squarely on the bubble. Their ups and downs this year will lead the upcoming HBO documentary following Mark Few’s team around this month to look less like Ballers and more like Game of Thrones (For those without a friend’s HBO Go password, find some new friends.)

Kyle Wiltjer’s Team Has Not [...]

Evansville’s Mockevicius Rebounding At Historic Pace

Greg Mitchell — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 16:01:11 +0000

The most humble college basketball player in the country might be a Lithuanian based in southern Indiana. Egidijus Mockevicius has grabbed 20 rebounds in back-to-back games, including a 23 point, 20 rebound effort on Tuesday night against Loyola Chicago. How was he able to do this? Luck, he says. “The ball was just bouncing into my hands. It’s just the luck,” the senior big man told CBSSports Network after the game. The numbers would disagree. Mockevicius is grabbing defensive rebounds at a historic pace, currently leading the country with a 40.2 defensive rebounding percentage. This type of production is simply never seen, anywhere. This ferociousness on the defensive backboards [...]

Shock Therapy: Finding a Cure to Wichita State’s Ills

Chris Stone — Wed, 23 Dec 2015 20:45:07 +0000

It’s been a rough first month of the season for Wichita State, as the preseason top-10 Shockers have struggled mightily in non-conference play. After ankle and hamstring injuries to point guard Fred VanVleet and five losses in their first 11 games, the Shockers aren’t even receiving any votes. VanVleet was absent for three of those defeats and Gregg Marshall‘s group managed to pick up two nice non-conference wins over UNLV and Utah once he returned, but their loss on the road to Seton Hall last weekend raised continued concerns about the Shockers’ postseason hopes. Wichita State has just one game to go before Missouri Valley play begins, so Marshall will [...]

O26 Never-Too-Early Top Five (and More)

Tommy Lemoine — Wed, 15 Apr 2015 19:15:13 +0000

Don’t look now, but college basketball season is only seven months away! Okay, so that may seem a bit far off, but it’s never too early to gin up a little excitement for the sport we love. Let’s examine a few O26 teams that are sure to make some noise in 2015-16.

Top Five

Wichita State will be right back at it in 2015-16. (Getty Images Sport)

Wichita State. Fred VanVleet is back. Ron Baker is back. As is Gregg Marshall, much wealthier after a sizable pay raise. With one of the country’s top backcourts and most sought-after coaches rejoining the [...]

Bracket Prep: Coastal Carolina, Northern Iowa & North Florida

Tommy Lemoine — Mon, 09 Mar 2015 17:45:20 +0000

As we move through Championship Week, we’ll continue to bring you short reviews of each of the automatic qualifiers to help you fill out your bracket next week. Here’s what you need to know about the most recent bid winners:

Coastal Carolina

Coastal Carolina is going dancing for the second-straight season. (Jeff Blake-USA TODAY Sports)

Big South Champion (22-10, 11-5) RPI/Pomeroy/Sagarin = #144/#147/#151 Adjusted Scoring Margin = +2.4 Likely NCAA Seed: #16

Strength: Coastal does not have great size but it does have an excellent guard quartet which accounts for two-thirds of the team’s scoring. Josh Cameron, Warren Gillis, Elijah Wilson and Shivaughn Wiggins – a Mount [...]

Wichita State’s Pursuit of Perfection Continues Friday in Arch Madness

Adam Stillman — Thu, 06 Mar 2014 22:01:33 +0000

The Wichita State Shockers are looking to make some more history. After finishing the regular season undefeated at 31-0, becoming the first team to accomplish the feat since Saint Joseph’s in 2004, the Shockers look to become the first team to enter the NCAA Tournament unbeaten since UNLV pulled off the trick in 1991. Will Wichita State succeed in its pursuit of perfection? Based on its dominance of Missouri Valley Conference foes this season, you’d have to think the odds are in the Shockers’ favor to run through Arch Madness. Only three league opponents stayed within single figures of Wichita State [...]

Wichita State in Great Position to Finish the Regular Season Unbeaten

Adam Stillman — Thu, 06 Feb 2014 20:01:22 +0000

The biggest hurdle has been cleared. An undefeated regular season for fourth-ranked Wichita State (24-0, 11-0 MVC) now looks like a strong possibility after the Shockers traveled Wednesday night to Terre Haute and left with a hard-fought 65-58 victory against Indiana State. The Shockers entered the game with a 38.5 percent chance of going unbeaten, according to Ken Pomeroy’s projections. Now, after completing the season sweep of the only other legitimate challenger in the Missouri Valley Conference, the Shockers’ chances at perfection jumped all the way up to 55.6 percent. A win at Northern Iowa on Saturday would boost that number [...]

The RTC Podblast: Episode 13.5

rtmsf — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 20:25:10 +0000

Welcome to this week’s RTC Podblast, hosted by Shane Connolly (@sconnolly114). It was a week of big rivalry games from Michigan-Michigan State to Duke-North Carolina to Kentucky-Florida and UConn-Syracuse. We hit on a few of these during this week’s podblast, while also finding some time to discuss the MVC and Creighton and looking ahead to what can only be described as a fairly miserable lineup of games over the weekend. Oh well, there’s always next week… this week’s outline is below.

0:00-7:45 – Sparty Establishes Itself as the State’s Best Team 7:45-10:20 – Syracuse Drops Last Big East Game vs UConn 10:20-12:45 – Creighton Struggling [...]

Night Line: Clarity Proves Ever Elusive in Wacky Missouri Valley Conference

BHayes — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 07:58:00 +0000

Bennet Hayes is a regular contributor for RTC. You can find him @HoopsTraveler on Twitter. Night Line runs on weeknights during the season, highlighting a major storyline development from that day’s games.

Back in January, there was a time where we thought we actually knew what was going on in the Missouri Valley Conference. We were confident that Creighton was a top-10 team and that Wichita State was nearly as good as the Shockers of a year ago. Surely Illinois State had been exposed as a fraud, a once trendy sleeper pick to win the league before losing their first six [...]

Who Won the Week? Hurricanes, Orange, and Not Doug McD…

rtmsf — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 22:15:34 +0000

Who Won the Week? is a regular column that will outline and discuss three winners and losers from the previous week. The author of this column is Kenny Ocker (@KennyOcker), an Oregon-based sportswriter best known for his willingness to drive (or bike!) anywhere to watch a basketball game.

WINNER: Miami (FL)

Miami Fans RTC’d the Blue Devils Wednesday Night (credit: WaPo)

Jim Larranaga’s Hurricanes, by extension the subject of an NCAA inquiry regarding the alleged payment of former player DeQuan Jones, had one of the best weeks on and off the court of any school this season. First, the NCAA botched its [...]

Jake Odum the Key to Scrappy Indiana State This Season

WCarey — Sun, 30 Dec 2012 22:53:17 +0000

Walker Carey is an RTC correspondent. He filed this report after Sunday afternoon’s game between Illinois State and Indiana State.

Creighton’s Doug McDermott and Illinois State’s Jackie Carmichael have deservedly received the acclaim of being the two best players in this year’s Missouri Valley Conference, but Indiana State guard Jake Odum is quietly emerging as one of the league’s best as well. The junior, who is a local product out of South Vigo High School in Terre Haute, Indiana, provides the senior-less Sycamores with a calming presence who can also effectively score and distribute the basketball.

Odum

So far this this [...]

Night Line: Unbeaten Season Ends, But Gregg Marshall is Building Something Special In Wichita

BHayes — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 07:44:38 +0000

Bennet Hayes (@hoopstraveler) is is an RTC correspondent and Night Line columnist. He filed this report after Thursday night’s Wichita State – Tennessee game in Knoxville.

The 2011-12 college basketball season was a breakout year for the Wichita State Shockers. Sure, college basketball enthusiasts had taken note of an NIT title run in 2011, but Gregg Marshall’s bunch didn’t truly enter the national consciousness until that 27-5 season a year ago which included a 17-1 stretch to open the calendar year. They became a trendy March sleeper pick pre-Tournament, but ultimately met the fate that so many five seeds before them [...]