Charleston beat Baylor in Waco yesterday. 3-2 on the year, with a win against BC and two competitive losses to St. Johns and Auburn.
I'll admit I haven't followed Cal basketball as closely in recent years, but we're looking good at 6-0 against some mediocre competition. We have some better competition coming our way in the form of Creighton, Wisconsin and UNLV. We have 2 senior guards in former Pac-10 frosh of the year Allen Crabbe, and senior PG Justin Cobbe. I don't really pay attention until conference games start, but with UCLA not looking as good as advertised, Cal looks like they can be top 3 or 4 in the Pac, and hopefully Tournament bound. We'll see how things go.
Kansas is beating up on Oregon State, which was to be expected.
But Ben McClemore just made an amazing leaping jump for a steal and followed it with an even more impressive dunk that started way out from the basket, allowing him to somehow weave in midair around set post player. Pretty amazing for a redshirt freshman, who already has 15 with 8 minutes left in the 1st half.
NCAA lost a great one yesterday.
Majerus lived his life to help others
We were pretty lucky to have him in St. Louis the last few years.
Ugh.
Yeah, Withey is in the process of putting together a historic year. He actually gets more blocks against better teams, because they actually have bigs that try to score inside. The real key is the % of blocks in which KU keeps the ball. It was something Cole Aldrich had worked on pretty hard, because swatting the ball out of bounds just gives your opponent another shot.
But Withey grew up playing volleyball in San Diego, so he already had a long history with directing his swats.
Wit the way McLemore is playing, this may end up being Bill Self's best team by the time March rolls around. Part of it is that Withey has really become dominant offensively, too. McLemore can score from anywhere, and Relaford can shut down anyone. But they have a lot of new pieces and young players, so they are nowhere near as good as they will be.
I hope McLemore sticks around for his sophomore year, but that loks doubtful already.
Also the NCAA is doing stuff for the 75th March Madness this year, so here's a list of 75 all-time tournament players, teams, and moments.
"Hampton's 58-57 win against Iowa State." Ugh, I was afraid that would be on the list.
Can't wait to watch Indiana and Butler play tomorrow at the fieldhouse in Indianapolis. Butler has been a darling the last few years but many here in the Hoosier state believe that the Bulldogs were just a 'nice story' while the team from Bloomington got's it house back in order. Should be a fun game.
Can't wait to watch Indiana and Butler play tomorrow at the fieldhouse in Indianapolis. Butler has been a darling the last few years but many here in the Hoosier state believe that the Bulldogs were just a 'nice story' while the team from Bloomington got's it house back in order. Should be a fun game.
So that didn't go quite as planned. It was a hell of an ending. When Indiana erased a 5 point deficit to force OT, O figured it was in the bad for the Hoosiers.
I expect Belmont to give Kansas just as much fight this evening.
So that didn't go quite as planned.
No it didn't. Great game all around, congrats to the Bulldogs. Hoosiers better work on their free throws. The grueling Big 10 season awaits.
Too bad the 2nd game, Purdue vs. Notre Dame, is a snoozer.
Well, Cal is who we thought they were. After starting 6-0 against some mediocre opponents, Cal played 3 ranked teams and lost all 3. We took UNLV to the wire, but lost huge against Wisconsin, and just got beat by Creighton.
I'm starting to feel like the Jayhawks have flipped a switch. Belmont was supposed to present solid challenge to Kansas, as Pomeroy has them ranked even higher than Butler (#33-#44). And Kansas just blew them out of the water from the get-go, dominating them for the entre 40 minutes.
They take on another tough mid-major Tuesday night when Richmond comes to town. The real test of how good the team is will come next Saturday when they travel to Ohio St.
But right now, the Jayhawks are strong everywhere, and McLemore has superstar written all over his performances so far. Another freshman, Perry Ellis, who was supposed to be the best of the bunch, is now starting to come along, and could return to the starting line-up before long. And another, Andrew White III, has started to make a good case for more minutes.
My belief is that this team will stay on this hot streak long enough to get to #1 or #2 in the country.
Today is certainly the big day for Kansas. How they handle Ohio State on the road will say a lot about how good they really are. They've been on a crazy good streak.
Rock Chalk Jayhawks! Great game!
Ugh... Cal may not have been a tournament team, but a loss at home to Harvard definitely ruins our RPI. We'll need a pretty good Pac-12 record and probably make some noise in the Pac-12 tournament to get us in this year.
The more I think about it, the more I'm realizing that today's Minnesota-Michigan State game is a huge game for the history of the program. The state of Minnesota has number 1, 10 and 29 on ESPN's 2014 recruiting rankings. All three are being heavily recruited by both schools (and many others). All three of those recruits and some other highly recruited players are going to be at the game. Winning isn't going to secure any commitments for Minnesota but losing sure as hell could lose some. So, given all that, I'm sure they're going to lose.
This is actually the first time I can remember that the Gophers are going to be favored against MSU. The last time would have either been in the mid-'90s during the years that don't officially exist anymore or in the late-'70s.
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