NCAA Basketball 20-21 Catch-All

Whew yeah I meant to post Saturday night. Cards held on against Duke. And now Duke has 0 votes in the AP poll for the first time since Feb 1996, when Coach K was out with back surgery.

The #1 Cards (women) went down to the wire at Wake Forest Sunday but pulled it out by 2. 100% (13-13) from the FT line helped that effort. Dana Evans, leader for player of the year, hit the game winner.

Then the women had to play again today at 4pm. Held off Miami, who shot 45% from 3. Won by 3 but Miami made a meaningless basket at the buzzer so it wasn't on doubt.

And they play AGAIN on Thursday!

Meanwhile covid cancelled Louisville men's game that was scheduled vs Boston College on Saturday. So they now play Clemson tomorrow, who have just 3 or 4 in a row. And also now playing Georgia Tech on Monday.

Hey, UT looks like the Tennessee from earlier in the year with a 19 point win over Kansas. We even hit threes this game.

Lots of upsets today. GT over FSU. VT over UVA. Florida over West Virginia. Oklahoma over Alabama.

Pitt.... kinda self destructed in their game against Notre Dame. Technical fouls... And one play made Jeff capel so pissed he was all over him as he came out of the game, and the dude just went to the locker room.

Not a good look.

Tyrian wrote:

Lots of upsets today. GT over FSU. VT over UVA. Florida over West Virginia. Oklahoma over Alabama.

Indeed. Crazy day. Cards off so I just skipped around and watched a bit of everything.

GT is next, Monday afternoon at 2pm. Hopefully they used up their best stuff beating FSU and maybe will be out of gas with such an early game

I still can't believe VaTech put up 44 points in 2nd half vs Virginia.

Welp, I figured this was going to go this way. Clemson had lost too many recently, and we were on a streak. Definitely doomed.

Argh.

Tyrian wrote:

Welp, I figured this was going to go this way. Clemson had lost too many recently, and we were on a streak. Definitely doomed.

Argh.

They seem to be a completely different team at home.

Cards beat GaTech by 20 easily yesterday afternoon. Same GT that beat FSU on Saturday.

#1 Cards fell to NCSU women last night. Dana Evans was the best player on the floor with 29. But the next best 4 or 5 players were all Wolfpack yesterday. No help at all. Still 3 weeks at #1 was pretty fun.

And Louisville Syracuse not happening tonight. Apparently positive player test for Cards.

Ugh. I still don't know how UNC has somehow not had any positive tests crop up in the players or surrounding program staff. We've had games postponed, but always due to the other team needing to do so.

I hope whoever tested positive has no severe symptoms or repercussions.

[massive exhale]

Gah!

Another down to the final seconds game for Duke/UNC. Not the prettiest effort (though light years beyond whatever was going on at Clemson... Gross), but I'll take it!

Yeah that was... poorly officiated.

Duke started bringing pressure... which really meant fouling the sh*t out of UNC at every chance... once they got down 12. And the refs let a lot of it go to get the game close.

Bluedevils on the wrong side of the bubble. Good.

Stele wrote:

Yeah that was... poorly officiated.

Duke started bringing pressure... which really meant fouling the sh*t out of UNC at every chance... once they got down 12. And the refs let a lot of it go to get the game close.

Bluedevils on the wrong side of the bubble. Good.

I know that officiating is part of the game, and as a fan of one of the teams playing, I often can't trust my judgement. But yeah, there were some... questionable calls down the stretch.

Like I said tho... I'll take the W.

Now to see if Tennessee can remember how to basketball in the second half.

Tyrian wrote:

Now to see if Tennessee can remember how to basketball in the second half.

They did. Kentucky collapses again.

What a bad season for the wildcats.

Tyrian wrote:
Tyrian wrote:

Now to see if Tennessee can remember how to basketball in the second half.

They did. Kentucky collapses again.

What a bad season for the wildcats.

Still a pretty bad game for the Vols overall, but we were fighting the whistle in the first half. Just not playing consistently.

That Keon block from behind on the three to Fulkerson who handed it to Vescovi for the full court pass to Springer for the dunk on the other end was a thing of beauty, though.

MannishBoy wrote:

Still a pretty bad game for the Vols overall, but we were fighting the whistle in the first half. Just not playing consistently.

That Keon block from behind on the three to Fulkerson who handed it to Vescovi for the full court pass to Springer for the dunk on the other end was a thing of beauty, though.

The Vols played a much better second half than the first half. Kentucky stayed true to form in that they played well for ~25 min and then exploded in some fashion or another. These two things combined resulted in a Vols victory.

Multiple 12-0 runs for Tenn in 2nd half. Was fun to watch.

UK needs to win SEC tournament, if there is one, to have a chance at NCAA now.

Hell they can't even make NIT without being 500. Not sure there will be an NIT this year either? Haven't heard either way but the usual quick scheduling at campus sites and travel seems risky. And they can't do the whole thing at MSG.

UT is just so inconsistent on offense. Defense is strong, offense works until it doesn't. Then you lose to Ole Miss.

I hope that the bad games of Fulkerson and Pons causing the two freshmen to produce so well in the second half will teach them what they can mean to this team as we near the tourneys. Fulkerson scored 27 at Rupp last year, and I think 0 this year. Instead the Vols won on the backs of the freshman and consistent performance of JJJ.

Welp, there it is. Miami @ UNC postponed due to potential (pending tests) covid exposure for UNC players (possibly exposed while celebrating the Duke win... sheesh).

I knew it was a matter of time before college kids would end up college kid-ing, and now they may have cost themselves (and their teammates) several opportunities to win games. It just goes back to the whole "we probably shouldn't be playing college sports at all" thing.

Louisville last night said Coach Mack tested positive and is showing symptoms. They cancelled Wed game and have asst coach Gaudio planning to coach Saturday.

Duke falls to Notre Dame for their third consecutive loss. Kentucky drops a close one at home for their 13th loss of the season.

Michigan state barely survives Penn State at home.

Still no news as to whether UNC will resume playing or be forced to cancel upcoming contests.

Blue bloods all out of the poll now that Kansas dropped and UCLA dropped too.

Like 1 of the top 10 title teams (Villanova) and 1 of the top 10 Final Four teams (Ohio St) are ranked. And they're both down at 8th or 9th all-time.

This might finally be the year for Gonzaga.

EDIT: And this.

twitter wrote:

Each of the 10 schools with the most total AP Poll appearances all-time are not ranked in this week's AP Poll:

928 North Carolina
920 Kentucky
841 Duke
796 Kansas
699 UCLA
656 Louisville
560 Indiana
550 Arizona
550 Syracuse
476 Michigan State

I definitely think this may be Gonzaga's best shot at a title since 2017. Barring something amazing happening, it seems likely that Baylor and Gonzaga will meet for the title (assuming the tournament happens)

Argh. I loathe playing UVA. There is just something about that style that just absolutely stymies unc. So frustrating.

Tyrian wrote:

Argh. I loathe playing UVA. There is just something about that style that just absolutely stymies unc. So frustrating.

Yeah I'm kind of glad Louisville's game @UVA was canceled. We've yet to win down there since we joined the league and only beat them twice at home. And they've generally been one of our home+away matchups every season.

Stele wrote:
Tyrian wrote:

Argh. I loathe playing UVA. There is just something about that style that just absolutely stymies unc. So frustrating.

Yeah I'm kind of glad Louisville's game @UVA was canceled. We've yet to win down there since we joined the league and only beat them twice at home. And they've generally been one of our home+away matchups every season.

Man they are tough... checks schedule, yep tomorrow night, 7pm

Ego Man wrote:
Stele wrote:
Tyrian wrote:

Argh. I loathe playing UVA. There is just something about that style that just absolutely stymies unc. So frustrating.

Yeah I'm kind of glad Louisville's game @UVA was canceled. We've yet to win down there since we joined the league and only beat them twice at home. And they've generally been one of our home+away matchups every season.

Man they are tough... checks schedule, yep tomorrow night, 7pm

I think UNC has lost 7 in a row to them. Bennett's pack line always seems to bring out the WORST in our shooters. UNC was 1-13? 14? from 3 pt range last night, which is just absolutely awful. Lowest score for the season, fewest points scored in a half, and lowest shooting percentage. Just an ugly, ugly game. :/

And now our Tuesday match with VT has been postponed / cancelled due to Covid-19, so that's another ranked team matchup opportunity gone. Bubble is shrinking rapidly. :/

Looks like FSU showed up tonight. Got close a couple of times but fortunately we pulled it out.

That was fun to watch. I don't always enjoy teams getting their asses kicked, but when it's UVA, sure.

I never saw them get closer than 7 in the second half. Thought they might be making a bit of a run, but then FSU said enough of that crap!

Impressive win by the Seminoles.

I wish we had that kind of shooting touch against UVA!

In other news, we're now scheduled to play a game against Northeastern. I figured we might also try to schedule Northsouthington State and Western East Tech A&M School of Cuisine. Really go after those quad 7 wins.

How many games are we not going to have this year due to COVID. Looks like we have more cancellations coming up