As often happens, we’ve had a few nights this college basketball season with a lot of surprises. We’ve had some wild nights. Tuesday night was decidedly not one of those nights, as it was a night where most of the favorites rolled. As such, Wake Forest’s 71-67 win over NC State stands out just a little more.
Let’s take nothing away from Wake Forest, but also realize that NC State has a nice record run up largely against bad opponents. They have wins over Vanderbilt (after Darius Garland suffered his season-ending injury) and Auburn, but otherwise have whiffed against NCAA Tournament-caliber teams like Wisconsin and North Carolina, losing close ones on the road. This game was in Winston-Salem, so in theory the Demon Deacons had one thing on their side.
Wake Forest had a 15-point lead at the half and quickly grew it to 22 points at 51-29 just over two minutes in. At that point, many wondered what was up with NC State. The Wolfpack responded by scoring the next 15 points to get right back in it, and tied it at 58 with under eight minutes to go. But they appeared to run out of gas, as the Demon Deacons led the rest of the way.
The result is a welcome change from the first three games of ACC play, each of which Wake Forest lost by double digits. Non-conference play was no picnic beforehand, as it included losses to Houston Baptist and Gardner-Webb, along with a Richmond team that is down and a blowout at the hands of Saint Joseph’s, who is off to a disappointing start in Atlantic 10 play. Worse still, Duke was the only one of those first three teams that you would look at and think the Demon Deacons would have little chance against, though the losses to Georgia Tech and Miami both came on the road.
Not much was expected of Wake Forest this year, and it’s a sign of how tough the job has become. There has been speculation about Danny Manning’s job status. The challenge for this team is far from over, but getting a win like Tuesday night’s helps, and it stood out a little more on a night without many results like it.
Side Dishes
Among the favorites who won big were Tennessee, who blew out Arkansas 106-87; TCU, who routed West Virginia 98-67 to drop the Mountaineers to 0-5 in the Big 12; Kentucky, who handled Georgia 69-49 in Athens; Purdue, who ran away from Rutgers 89-54 as they outscored the Scarlet Knights 49-24 in the second half; and Virginia, who handled arch-rival Virginia Tech 81-59 starting with a first half in which they were white-hot shooting the ball. If Virginia shoots the way they did in the first half more often, they will be just about impossible to beat given the way they defend.
One favorite who won, albeit not in quite as lopsided a fashion, was Marquette, who pulled out a 74-71 win at Georgetown. The win would be good all by itself, as Georgetown is clearly better, but it’s made more impressive by the Golden Eagles star guard Markus Howard playing just three minutes due to back tightness. In his place was Sam Hauser, who scored a career-high 31 points and grabbed eight rebounds.
Then there was the heavier favorite who, quite simply, survived. Nevada led for much of the game, and for a lot of the second half by more than one possession, but Boise State rallied late and took a 71-69 lead with less than two minutes to play. After the teams traded misses, Cody Martin hit his first three-pointer in a month with less than five seconds left to give Nevada a 72-71 win. Boise State had a rough non-conference but had started Mountain West play 3-0 before losing this one.
Providence got their first Big East win, and it was much-needed as they took advantage of 22 Seton Hall turnovers to knock off the Pirates 72-63. The Friars got a gift from the Big East schedulers with three of their first four at home, but they end up 1-3 as they now hit the road for four of the next five and six of the next eight games.
Loyola-Chicago has pulled into a tie atop the Missouri Valley Conference, as they took care of Valparaiso 71-54 behind five players who scored 11 or 12 points. The Ramblers are tied with the Crusaders at 4-1 in Valley play.
Also of note: North Carolina beat Notre Dame 75-69 despite a big game from John Mooney (16 points, 19 rebounds), Mississippi State edged Florida 71-68 in Starkville, LSU went to Ole Miss and picked up a nice 83-69 win, and Saint Joseph’s got their first Atlantic 10 by handing Davidson their first conference loss, holding on for a 61-60 win.
Tonight’s Menu
A busy night of action has a few odd start times clearly dictated by TV along the way.
- The first game of the night is in the Atlantic 10, where St. Bonaventure goes to Rhode Island (6 p.m.), then VCU hosts Dayton (8 p.m.)
- Another early one is in the Big East, where St. John’s hosts Creighton (6:30 p.m.), then DePaul hosts Butler (8:30 p.m.)
- In Big 12 action, Oklahoma hosts Kansas State (7 p.m.), then Iowa State travels to Texas Tech (9 p.m.)
- In the SEC, Texas A&M already knocked off Alabama, and will now try to knock off Auburn in College Station (7 p.m.), while South Carolina takes their 3-0 SEC mark into Vanderbilt (7 p.m.) and Alabama goes to Missouri (9 p.m.) later on.
- There’s a showdown in Texas in the American Athletic Conference as SMU hosts Houston (9 p.m.), then UCF tries to stay undefeated as they travel to winless Wichita State with an unusual late tip out there (10 p.m.)
- The last game of the night is in the Mountain West with Air Force hosting UNLV (11 p.m.)
