Until Friday night, road wins were tough to come by in the early going of Big Ten play. 16 games had been played, and the only time the road team came out on top was when Michigan State won at Northwestern a week before Christmas. Then on Friday night, road teams went two-for-two, with one being a surprise and one not so much. The former was a bigger one in the big picture.
It wasn’t too surprising that Rutgers beat Nebraska 79-62 in Lincoln, even without injured guard Geo Baker. The Cornhuskers are rebuilding and one of just two teams in the conference (along with Northwestern) with no clear path to the NCAA Tournament other than a shocking run in the Big Ten Tournament, as they are the only two teams in the well-balanced conference outside the top 55 in NET. Baker due to a left thumb injury sustained in practice, but Rutgers shot 54 percent from the field and dominated Nebraska on the glass by a 48-31 margin while holding them under 32 percent from the field.
Though reports say Baker is out indefinitely, the Scarlet Knights likely will have him back sooner rather than later, as head coach Steve Pikiell said he found out Baker couldn’t go “at the last minute”. In his place, sophomore Caleb McConnell made all eight of his shots and scored 20 points to lead the way, while Myles Johnson had 18 points and 14 rebounds.
The surprise came in Columbus, where Wisconsin now looks like a different team as they won their fourth straight, this one a 61-57 win over host Ohio State. The Badgers had to rally after a 13-2 Ohio State run early in the second half gave the Buckeyes the lead and momentum.
Ohio State was without Kyle Young, who had an appendectomy on Sunday after the Buckeyes’ loss to West Virginia in Cleveland, and that certainly hurt them. Kaleb Wesson gave them everything he had with 22 points and 13 rebounds, but Young is their second-leading rebounder and a glue guy. In his absence, no other Buckeye had more than five rebounds and the Badgers out-rebounded them 34-32 on the night after the Buckeyes came into the game with a significantly better rebounding margin than the Badgers.
Wisconsin has been a bit streaky this season, having twice won four in a row and also endured a three-game losing streak. But the big development is that they now have a solid NCAA Tournament resume, something they lacked when they were 5-5. Yes, they beat Marquette and then beat Indiana in an early Big Ten game, but both were at home and the jury is still out on the Hoosiers to a degree. Now, they have wins at Tennessee and Ohio State, and that should offset a loss to New Mexico in the Legends Classic that may become worse if the Lobos go into a slide with two key players potentially out for a while if not the season (although the fact that the Lobos had them for that game helps Wisconsin). Their other losses don’t look questionable – the next worst loss is probably the night before to a solid Richmond team that should make some noise in the Atlantic 10 or to Rutgers, which was in Piscataway.
Ohio State has now lost two in a row, but neither is a bad loss, and not having Young certainly impacted them. The Buckeyes look like a team that will be fine and still contend, but this is one more piece of evidence of how little separation there really is in college basketball this season. It didn’t look like it beforehand, but now, Big Ten teams will hardly be safe at home.
Side Dishes
Seton Hall scored a convincing 78-62 win over Georgetown in Newark to go to 2-0 in Big East play and send the Hoyas to 0-2. The Pirates took control in the first half and kept it going in the second by holding Georgetown below 36 percent from the field including 3-17 from long range. It was a well-balanced effort with four players in double figures, and none bigger than emerging big man Romaro Gill as he had 17 points, eight rebounds and four blocked shots while Quincy McKnight had a near-triple-double with 14 points, six rebounds and ten assists without a turnover on the night while also doing his usual job defensively. Gill has blocked four shots in each of their two Big East games thus far and won the big man battle over the more highly-regarded Omer Yurtseven, who had nine points on just 3-14 shooting.
At first glance, this result isn’t a shocker since Iona is having a down year, but the Gaels blew a 16-point lead with about six minutes left and lost at home to St. Peter’s 75-74 on a buzzer-beating layup by Peacock Daryl Banks III. The freshman, who finished with a game-high 25 points, drove the length of the floor after rebounding the missed front end of a one-and-one. The Peacocks finished the game on a 21-4 run.
Other results of note: Houston kept rolling by knocking off UCF 78-63 in their American Athletic Conference opener behind 20 points and 16 rebounds from Nate Hinton; Wright State went to 3-0 by coasting over host Oakland 96-69; Detroit Mercy knocked off Northern Kentucky 66-58; and Tulsa dominated Temple 70-44, holding the Owls below 28 percent from the field.
After a scare a couple of days earlier, UTEP head coach Rodney Terry was released from a hospital on Friday and may coach next Thursday, according to a statement from the school. The second-year head coach had a severe allergic reaction to a medication he was taking while the team was on the road ahead of their game at Florida International. He will not coach on Saturday when the Miners play at Florida Atlantic, giving way once again to assistant Kenton Paulino.
North Carolina has dealt with plenty of injuries this season, and now the Tar Heels will be without Anthony Harris for the remainder of the season after he suffered a torn ACL in his right knee on Monday night against Yale. The freshman suffered a torn ACL in his left knee over a year earlier and had done a lot to rehab from that injury, including having to sit the first eight games of this season.
Wake Forest will be without Sharone Wright Jr. and Michael Wynn for Saturday’s game at Pittsburgh, as the sophomore reserves were suspended for “failing to uphold the standards of Wake Forest basketball” according to a statement from the school. The Demon Deacons are already 0-2 in ACC play.
Tonight’s Menu
From today on out, every Saturday until conference tournaments will be packed with games, mostly conference games from here on out. It will be the busiest day of the week, and today is no exception.
- The ACC starts with a pair right off the bat as Wake Forest goes to Pittsburgh and NC State goes to Clemson (noon), then Louisville hosts Florida State and arch rivals meet as Virginia hosts Virginia Tech (2 p.m.), Notre Dame heads to Syracuse (4 p.m), Georgia Tech goes to North Carolina (6 p.m.) and Miami hosts Duke (8 p.m.)
- A full slate of Big 12 action starts with Texas Tech hosting Oklahoma State (noon), then Oklahoma hosts Kansas State (2 p.m.), Kansas hosts West Virginia (4 p.m.), TCU hosts Iowa State (6 p.m.) and Baylor hosts Texas (8 p.m.)
- Three Big East games are on tap, and all early on, starting with Creighton at Butler (noon), then Villanova is at Marquette and DePaul hosts Providence (2 p.m.)
- Two games are on tap in the Big Ten as Indiana goes to Maryland (noon), then Iowa visits Penn State (2 p.m.)
- A full slate of CAA games features two 3-0 teams meeting as William & Mary visits Northeastern (4 p.m.)
- Arch rivals meet in the first Ivy League game of the year as Penn hosts Princeton (7 p.m.)
- The MAC slate features a good one as Eastern Michigan hosts Akron (noon)
- The headline matchupa in the Missouri Valley are Bradley visiting Northern Iowa and Missouri State visiting Loyola-Chicago (8 p.m.)
- Mountain West play features Nevada hosting Boise State (6 p.m.), then the big one later as San Diego State takes their 14-0 mark into Utah State (10 p.m.)
- In the Pac-12, Oregon tries to bounce back from a loss at Colorado as they head to Utah (5 p.m.), while arch rivals meet as Arizona hosts Arizona State (9:30 p.m.)
- The SEC slate starts with a dandy as Tennessee hosts LSU (noon), then Kentucky hosts Missouri (2 p.m.), Mississippi State hosts Auburn (4:30 p.m.), Florida hosts Alabama (6 p.m.) and Arkansas hosts Texas A&M (7 p.m.)
- The Southern Conference is going to be great to watch once again, including matchups featuring the top four teams as East Tennessee State goes to Furman (4 p.m.) and Wofford hosts UNC Greensboro (7 p.m.)
- A good Sun Belt game to watch is Georgia Southern visiting Appalachian State (4 p.m.)
- In non-conference action, Memphis hosts Georgia in a game most thought would feature the top two NBA prospects (1 p.m.), while UC Irvine visits Harvard (2 p.m.), Ole Miss visits Wichita State (4 p.m.) and Vanderbilt hosts SMU (9 p.m.)
