College Basketball Roundup: Big Battles Edition

Dec 2, 2022 - 7:05 PM

Greetings, BBN!

In this roundup we’ll look at this week’s action, which mostly involved the matchups in the ACC/Big Ten challenge and the Big East/Big 12 Challenge, preview this weekend’s Baylor-Gonzaga and Kentucky-Michigan games, and talk about whatever else is cool in hoops including but not limited to hot seats, sock puppets, Jay Bilas, English tea, bluejays, or how many horses can fit in Rupp Arena.

Let’s get rolling.

This Week

Kentucky prevails in rock fight with Bellarmine, Louisville drops to historic 0-7

Yuck, what an ugly game at Rupp Tuesday against Bellarmine for the ‘Cats, scoring just 21 in the first half and still being tied at 32 with 13 to go. Still, they won by 19, and have had all week to fix things up and fly to London for this Sunday’s showdown with some Wolverines.

Louisville, as we know, had no such luck against Bellarmine several weeks ago, and is still regretting it after falling to 0-7 Tuesday night against Maryland in another rout. Entering this year, no team from the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, or SEC had ever started 0-7 in a season.

Welp. Now Louisville and the Pac-12’s Cal have both done it and might be continuing it for a while.

Former #1 UNC on 3-game losing streak, Marquette smashes Baylor

Could UNC go from #1 to unranked in two weeks? It’s very well possible, though they certainly aren’t falling apart—dropping extremely close ones to Iowa State and Alabama and losing on the road at Assembly Hall can happen to anybody. Still, they better be ready for Sunday’s road trip to 7-1 Virginia Tech or last year’s runner-ups might be 5-4! One team nobody saw coming this season is the Marquette Golden Eagles, who just clobbered the Baylor Bears by 26 Tuesday night to give their NCAA Tournament resume a big signature victory early on.

Best of the rest:

• Virginia survives Michigan on road by two to stay unbeaten
• Texas takes down Creighton as the Lone Star State continues to dominate college hoops

This Weekend

Kentucky vs Michigan in London

Care for some college basketball with your tea, or tea with your college basketball? The choice is up to you this Sunday at 1 as the ‘Cats play the other Michigan after losing to Tom Izzo’s Spartans a couple of weeks ago. They learned a lot in that loss and the Gonzaga road trip, getting pushed around and beat up against NCAA Tournament powerhouses. Now it’s time to go get a W in England.

Gonzaga vs Baylor in South Dakota

Two of the biggest non-blue blood brands in basketball face off against each other in a game that’ll leave one national title contender 5-3 after wild Novembers for both schools. It’ll be a game both coaches will give everything they’ve got to win and headline Friday night hoops.

Fast Breaks

Total unbeaten teams remaining

15 teams have yet to take a loss this season as the calendar turns to December, ranging from Houston and Texas and Virginia to Southern Miss, UNLV, and New Mexico. We’ve reached the point also where more unbeaten vs unbeaten matchups this year will be extremely rare if not impossible soon.

Louisville vs Florida State on December 10th will get a lot more buzz than usual if their losing ways continue

I’ve never seen a conference matchup between teams off to worse starts than Louisville and Florida State, which might be wildly entertaining.