Come for the Sam Thompson GIF, stay for the subtle Drake humor.
Tuesday’s college hoops roundup: Duke and Missouri roll but see key players go down
A pair of top ten teams rolled at home over conference foes on Tuesday, but each had a key player go down with an injury to an area where they’ve been damaged before.
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Top 25 Scores
No. 1 Duke 68, Clemson 40
Duke got a career-high 27 points from Quinn Cook and held Clemson to 10 first half points, the lowest first half total by an ACC team since 1979. The bigger story, however, is the health of senior Blue Devil forward Ryan Kelly.
Kelly, who is averaging 13.5 points and 5.4 rebounds, injured his right foot while driving to the basket late in the game. He injured the same foot a season ago, and was forced to miss both the ACC and NCAA tournaments. Kelly will undergo tests to determine the severity of the injury on Wednesday.
No. 10 Missouri 84, Alabama 68
The story here is nearly identical for the Tigers, who pulled away from Alabama late but are holding their collective breath following senior forward Laurence Bowers going down with a knee injury with about six minutes left in the game. Bowers, who leads the team in scoring (16.8 ppg) and ranks second in rebounding (7.0 rpg), missed all of last season with a torn ACL. He’ll have an MRI tomorrow.
The lone bright spot for the Crimson Tide was Trevor Releford, who scored a personal best 26 points and went over 1,000 points for his career. Alabama (8-6, 0-1) has now lost six of eight.
No. 13 Creighton 91, Drake 61
Ethan Wragge hit six treys and scored 22 points in a game that was never in doubt. HYFR.
No. 14 Ohio State 74, Purdue 64
Even though his team has suddenly become inexplicably erratic, I’m not convinced DeShaun Thomas isn’t the best player in the country. He knocked down 8-of-13 shots, scored a game-high 22 points, and seemed to answer the bell every single time the Boilermaker fans started to get a little too into the game.
Also, Sam Thompson did this:
Pittsburgh 73, No. 19 Georgetown 45
This is certainly the double take score of the night, but it’s been time for everyone to fall back out of love with Georgetown for a few weeks now. They hung with Indiana on national television on a night where there were no other sports on and the Hoosiers were ranked No. 1, but if you’re capable of scoring less than 50 points four times in a month, well then you’re capable of losing at home by 28 to an average Pitt team. It was the worst home loss the Hoyas have suffered under John Thompson III, and this is the first time in the JT III era they’ve started Big East play 0-2.
Other Scores of Note
Connecticut 99, DePaul 78
Kevin Ollie gains his first Big East win in the manner in which so many other Big East wins have been gained over the past seven years. At one point during the first half, Connecticut was outrebounding DePaul 20-2. Also, the Blue Demons’ Brandon Young scored 35 points in this game, a Tuesday night high. Also known as the best high.
Missouri State 62, Illinois State 55
Two weeks ago Illinois State entered Missouri Valley play with legitimate at-large bid aspirations, while Missouri State had not defeated a Division-I opponent. Suddenly the Bears are 3-1 in the MVC while Jackie Carmichael and the Redbirds are an even more shocking 0-4.
Northeastern 63, Drexel 58 (OT)
Northeastern’s Quincy Ford hit a double clutch three at the buzzer to both force overtime and earn himself the No. 1 spot on SportsCenter’s Top Plays. The loss drops Drexel, arguably the most disappointing team in college basketball, to 5-10 overall and 1-2 in the CAA.
Baylor 82, Texas Tech 48
The Bears went on a 24-5 run over an eight minute stretch during the first half to effectively end Texas Tech’s dreams of running the table in the Big 12. I wasn’t being serious in that last sentence. Feel embarrassed, TCU.
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