After last weekend's quartet of top-10 matchups, this Saturday was more about teams on both sides of the NCAA Tournament cut line needing to take advantage of opportunities to pad their resumes. Six top 10 teams faced unranked teams on the road, environments where highly ranked teams have consistently struggled all season. This group doesn't include the likes of Marquette, which was hosting a St. John's team that needed a win, or Kentucky, which was at home against a desperate Gonzaga team. Michigan State, Colorado, Cincinnati and Florida also needed a win to boost their NCAA tournament hopes. Who could close the deal and get a win?
With just one month left in the regular season, bubble teams are running out of time to get wins that will be important on Selection Sunday. Saturday provided some clarity, and as a result, ESPN's Myron Medcalf, Jeff Borzello and Joe Lunardi have some ideas.
Medical calf: Baylor's challenges at Allen Fieldhouse continue. The Bears are now 1-18 in their last 19 games at Kansas. And they've never had a better chance to steal a victory over Bill Self in a hostile venue. Not Kevin McCullar Jr. due to injury. Dajuan Harris Jr. injured his ankle late in the game. Instead of adding a signature win to boost their tournament standing, the Bears couldn't stop the short-handed Jayhawks.
The game also highlighted the superiority of the Big 12. Three of the four teams that joined the league this season (Houston, BYU and Cincinnati) are in the top 35 in KenPom. The fourth (UCF) has wins over Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. In total, ten teams in this conference are in the top 40 in the NET rankings.
In this league, a good team like Baylor (one of the most offensively efficient teams in the United States, first in the country in three-point shooting although poor on defense) could win a league title with a run down the stretch, or finish the season in the middle of the pack. Or worse. The competition is that tough.
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No. 13 Baylor misses two tying 3-pointers in final seconds against No. 4 Kansas
Baylor misses two open threes to tie the game as they fall 64-61 to Kansas.
Borzello: On the one hand, Kansas beating a top-15 team without McCullar, with Harris banged up late and with Hunter Dickinson sidelined by foul trouble and struggling for long stretches of the game is absolutely impressive. The Jayhawks scored 17 points off 21 turnovers and got a couple big shots from Nicolas Timberlake, which is a great sign going forward.
But not everything was positive. It was surprising that Baylor struggled to make perimeter shots, coughed them up 21 times and still had opportunities to send the game to overtime. And the way Kansas defended Baylor on the final two possessions, when Jayden Nunn and Ja'Kobe Walter hit open 3-pointers, won't make Bill Self happy.
Perhaps most concerning, however, was Harris' latest injury. He finished the game, but we'll have to stay tuned next week.
Impact of the Lunardi bracket: We call this a “status quo” game, where the result was essentially chalk. When that happens, especially this late in the season, there is very little movement from a single result. Kansas came into the game ranked second, eighth overall, and remains exactly that. Baylor entered as a fourth seed, No. 14 overall, and drops only to No. 15 (behind Duke) as a still-solid No. 3 seed.
Medical calf: After escaping a double-digit halftime deficit with a second-half run, Kentucky ended Saturday's loss with another curious call: what appeared to be a designed lob from Reed Sheppard to Adou Thiero, which was intercepted by Ben Gregg. However, that wasn't Kentucky's only missed opportunity in this game. There were missed defensive assignments and a key offensive rebound late in the game that Gonzaga took advantage of simply because Kentucky didn't play with a sense of urgency.
It just doesn't seem like John Calipari and his players are on the same page. Yes, the Wildcats, who are 2-4 in their last six games and haven't won a game against a top-30 KenPom team since Jan. 6 against Florida, are playing some of the worst defense among Power teams 5. But the disconnection goes beyond that. A team full of NBA prospects has been outplayed by opponents lacking that talent. The Wildcats are in free fall and it's unclear how they'll be able to stop it.
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Collin Murray-Boyles throws down big dunk against Vanderbilt Commodores
Collin Murray-Boyles throws down big dunk against Vanderbilt Commodores
Borzello: Gonzaga suddenly has life in the NCAA tournaments. The Zags' postseason hopes essentially hinged on Saturday's game, as they hadn't won in Quadrant 1 all season and this was one of their last chances to get one. They still need to take care of WCC business, and the end of the regular season at Saint Mary's is very important, but Mark Few's team now at least has a realistic chance to move forward.
How did Gonzaga do on Saturday? The Bulldogs went back to basics and simply dominated the paint. Graham Ike, Anton Watson, Braden Huff and Gregg combined for 66 points, and Ryan Nembhard stayed in attack mode in the pick-and-roll. The Zags have struggled from the perimeter all season, but they didn't try to beat Kentucky from 3-point range; instead, they found a weakness and continued to exploit it.
Impact of the Lunardi bracket: The knee-jerk reaction will be to immediately put Gonzaga in the projected NCAA field. Not so fast, say bracketologists. This win definitely gives life to the Zags as an at-large contender, but there's a lot more work to do considering how poor their profile was heading into Rupp Arena. We'll move the Bulldogs comfortably into “Next Four Out” territory, within range of the “First Four Out,” but we'll need to top the table in the WCC, including a win at Saint Mary's on March 2, to get some breathing room . in the conference tournament.
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Auburn Tigers vs Florida Gators: Game Highlights
Auburn Tigers vs Florida Gators: Game Highlights
quick hits
The young star from South Carolina
The Gamecocks emerged from a sloppy first half to beat Vanderbilt by double digits (75-60) and extend their winning streak to seven ahead of a tough showdown at Auburn. During that stretch, three different players led the Gamecocks in scoring. Lamont Paris always preaches about the value of South Carolina as a team; That's how he won this season.
But freshman Collin Murray-Boyles, who was out for the first month of the season with mononucleosis, has emerged as a young star. Against the Commodores he finished with 31 points (14 of 17), 7 rebounds, 2 assists, a steal and a block. He is just the third South Carolina player to score 30 points on 80% shooting in the last 25 seasons, according to ESPN Stats & Information. It was also the third consecutive game in which he was his team's top scorer. South Carolina is barely playing for its spot right now, but Murray-Boyles is developing into an excellent young talent who has raised SC's postseason ceiling…and his own. –Medcalf
Bubble hopes are still alive While the Zags who kept their at-large hopes alive received the most headlines, two other teams that entered Saturday needing a boost to their resume added big wins: Michigan State over Illinois and Florida over Auburn. The Spartans were on the right side of the bubble to start the day, but they had just lost in Minnesota and needed to bounce back. And Tom Izzo's seniors stepped up: AJ Hoggard (23 points), Malik Hall (22 points), Tyson Walker (19 points). Meanwhile, Florida beat Auburn by 16 in a game that wasn't all that close. The Gators led by as many as 29 points and didn't take a shot over the final nine minutes. They have now won five of six, including victories over Mississippi State, Kentucky and, now, the Tigers. –Borzello Big East makes moves My eye was largely on the Big East bubble heading into Saturday's game, and the games did not disappoint. Butler affirmed his overall status with a close victory over Providence, while the Friars, Xavier and St. John's all missed opportunities to advance or enter the projected NCAA field. The conference has another big bubble game on Sunday when Villanova hosts Seton Hall: the Wildcats are multiple wins away from returning to the field, while the “last team in” Pirates are just one loss away from folding. — Lunardi
