Jayhawks’s win, Cardinals’ loss highlights college basketball action

The Rebels improved to 17-2 on the season and a perfect 6-0 in the Southeastern Conference, which ties them for first place with Florida. Ole Miss has climbed to 23rd in the standings and avoided being another ranked team to be upset on Saturday as No. 3 Syracuse, No. 5 Louisville and No. 11 Kansas State lost earlier in the day.

Ole Miss trailed 33-31 at half before outscoring Auburn, 32-28 in the second half to earn the two-point win.

In a college basketball season where no team has pulled away from the pack, being No. 1 has been more of a curse than a blessing, as Louisville has found out this week.

The Cardinals have now lost two consecutive Big East games since reaching that top spot. After falling to Syracuse on Saturday, an unranked Villanova team shocked them in Philadelphia on Tuesday, winning 73-64.

No. 11 Kansas State succeeded in making its game against No. 3 Kansas a grueling, half-court defensive battle, but the Jayhawks proved they could win with their defense on Tuesday, leaving Manhattan with an 59-55 victory.

Neither team had lost in Big 12 play, which is going through a bit of a down stretch outside of the Sunflower State. As a result, Kansas went a long way toward clinching its ninth consecutive conference title, as Kansas State will likely need to defeat them at the Allen Fieldhouse to make it a race again.

Their decisive win over No. 1 Duke was two weeks ago was supposed to usher in a new era for NC State, but the Wolfpack, despite a lineup filled with future NBA players, remain as inconsistent as ever.

On Tuesday, NC State lost, 86-84, to a 10-8 Wake Forest team that shouldn’t have been able to stay with them, even at home. C.J. Leslie had several chances at the line in the last minute but wasn’t able to convert, giving Demon Deacons fans a rare chance to celebrate and rush the court in the Jeff Bzdelik era.

It wasn’t pretty, but Michigan State will take it. The Spartans went into one of the toughest arenas in the Big Ten and escaped with a 51-47 win over Wisconsin.

Neither team could get anything going offensively. Michigan State won with a 38% field goal percentage while Wisconsin finished with a brutal 29 percent mark from the field.