Saturday Shifts to College Hoops

For a college football fan like me, today is bittersweet. It’s the beginning of the bowl season, which means exotic (Fresno State vs. Wyoming!) and utterly mismatched (um, Fresno State vs. Wyoming) games to add a little spice to the holidays. But it’s the first weekend without the traditional times and games, the first weekend that college football irrevocably cedes its familiar noon and 3:30 slots to college basketball or the NBA or hockey or bull-riding. (Okay, it’s mostly college roundball.)Good news for today: There are decent pairings on the slate. The highest profile belongs to the one in which North Carolina travels to Texas to take on the Longhorns in the first-ever basketball game in the new Texas Stadium. The young Heels will have to handle the bulk of Dexter Pittman and the versatility of Damion James, or the reason for tuning in at halftime may be the cavernous arena alone.

The best team in the country is on display, too. Kansas hosts Michigan in a game that will see the Jayhawks get closer to full health; if their 32.6-point average margin of victory so far isn’t impressive enough, consider that they’re doing that with a freshman leading them in scoring and a few players still dealing with nagging injuries.

But the most interesting game may be the one taking place on the biggest stage. Gonzaga comes east for a rare game against Duke, and two teams that have struggled in the NCAA Tournament of late -- neither has made it past the Sweet Sixteen since 2004 -- get to test their mettle with a non-conference game. Gonzaga may be without Matt Bouldin, and Duke has more firepower with Jon Scheyer and Kyle Singler, but both teams scrap, and they should produce compelling basketball at Madison Square Garden.

Though there’s no better place for a big basketball game than MSG, it pains me to know that the hallowed grounds of gridiron tests are going to be deserted for the rest of the year. I’ll come to love the dunks, threes, and floor burns in time. But don’t think I won’t watch some of the St. Petersburg Bowl.

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