Category: College Basketball (Page 114 of 153)

Wake Forest made 27 of 38 fouls shots and made 45% of their 3 point shots to upset #2 Duke 86-73. In the game five Blue Devil players fouled out. Rumor after the game was that Coach K was having the three oficials investigated. I don’t know about being investigated, but I bet they won’t have any Duke games the rest of the way.

Speaking of officials, after Siena lost to Loyola (MD) this weekend Coach Fran McCafrey was asked about the officiating. When he declined to answer his wife chimed in from the back of the media room with “the headline should read, ‘We got screwed.'” Now that’s sticking up for your man. I wonder if she can be reprimanded?

With Memphis’ come from behind win at UAB and Oral Roberts three point loss at IUPUI over the weekend, there remains only three undefeated teams left in conference play. While Memphis is still undefeated overall, both Cornell and Davidson have run the table in their respective leagues.

Coach Steve Donhue has taken the Big Red to the top of the Ivy League and threatens to win the league with a perfect record. They are 8-0 and 16-5 overall with a two game lead over Brown. Just in case you are wondering, it has been close to two decades since a team other than Princeton or Penn has won the Ivy. Penn is currently in fourth while Princeton is sixth. My how the mighty have fallen.

Davidson is 17-0 and 19-6 overall after this weekend’s victory. After a brutal pre conference schedule they have rolled through the Southern Conference and look like a sure bet for the NCAA tourney evern without winning the conference tournament.

Memphis is poised to do what UNLV did by running the table in the regular season and advancing to the Final Four. Coach John Calipari’s team came back from a 7 point deficit with less than a minute to play to keep their record intact.

Over in the Big 12, Kansas, Kansas State, Texas and Texas A & M continue to battle it out. Kansas State made a statement with a 37 point win over Missouri on Saturday. Michael Beasley was unstoppable. He scored 40 points and grabbed 17 rebounds in leading the Wildcats.

More trouble for Missouri, guards Stefon Hannah and Jason Horton have been charged with fighting during a bar dispute earlier this month. Coach Mike Anderson did not hesitate to remove both from the squad. One can only hope that he gets things squared away in Columbia.

Indiana President McRobbie has announced an internal investigation into the allegations submitted by the NCAA last week. The NCAA has deemed five violations by Coach Kelvin Sampson to be “major.” Now Indiana is doing another investigation. What a joke? You can smell this dog and pony show from 10 miles away. All Indiana is doing is trying to find out how to cover their backside if they fire Coach Sampson. Talk about hypocrisy. But then again it is always about money.

I am not defending Coach Sampson if he is guilty of the charges, however, let’s be serious. Making a couple extra phone calls is not like giving a kid cash or some other type of extra benefit. Every program in the country has broken rules. Some have been reported. While others go untraceable.

As far as I am concerned, let him coach out the year and then let the chips fall where they may. This is the same school that got rid of Bob Knight because they didn’t want to put up with his boorish behavior and more importantly, he was no longer winning championships.

In the end just follow the money trail.

One thing Thad Matta knows how to do is win. He collected his 200 win as a head coach and is currently the winningest coach in Ohio State history. He is on track to record his 8th straight 20 win season and 13th overall when you throw in five years as an assistant.

He has the Buckeyes poised to make another run with his third different core group of players in three years. Losing three players drafted in the first round of the NBA draft last year would cripple most programs, but Matta has found a way to mix a group of talented freshman (Koufos, Turner, Diebler) with some outstanding upperclassmen (Butler and Lighty).

Currently, three games out of first place theyt have three of the four top teams coming to Columbus to close the season. You better not count the Buckeyes out yet….

Speaking of Koufos, he had a double double against Northwestern and is clearly one of the best freshman big men in the country. Butler became the all-time assist leader for the Buckeyes last night breaking Kelvin Ransey record. Senior and freshman leading the way…

Not only did Coach Kelvin Sampson and his Indiana Hoosiers lose to Wisconsin last night, but the NCAA has come out with their report and he could lose his job. Brian Butch banked in a three point shot to give the Badgers a two point lead with just under 10 seconds and a three point attempt by Jemarcus Ellis bounced off the rim as time expired. One might think that was the most important thing to happen to the Hoosiers last night, however, think again.

A program that Bob Knight came in and cleaned up in the late 60’s has been free of NCAA scrutiny since then is now under a dark cloud due to Sampson’s excessive phone use. After commiting the same violations at Oklahoma prior to his hiring at Indiana, he has now commited the same violation.

The catch this time is that the NCAA has alleged that he provided false information during the investigation. If this is true he could be done at Indiana. Right now however, the university is not in position to jump the gun. If you will remember a couple of years ago when Ohio State jumped the gun in firing Coach Jim O’Brien it came back to cost them millions. O’Brien won his court case and was awarded over $2 million because Ohio State did not follow due process. I don’t believe Indiana wants to do the same thing with Sampson.

This could stretch on until the summer in which case both parties could be severely damaged. It doesn’t look good for Sampson at the moment. But then again the NCAA has a habit of jumping to conclusions. Ask Jerry Tarkanian who sued the NCAA and won over $2 million for their vendetta against him.

In America you are innocent until proven guilty. Also, I love the fact that the NCAA is going after phone violations when there are a lot of more serious problems being overlooked.