NCAA Saturday: Classic in the Carrier Dome & No. 1 Arizona falls

Orr often attends Texas Tech games and the program’s athletic department spokesman said they’ve never had problems with him “crossing the line” previously. Texas Tech has not released a statement on the incident.

Oklahoma State players were not made available to media following their loss and the program has not released a statement on Smart. Cowboys head coach Travis Ford spoke with media during his post-game press conference but did not comment on the incident, stating he was unable to see what occurred and wanted to “make sure” he saw what happened before discussing it.

The last couple of weeks have not been kind to the Hoosiers, but Tom Crean’s boys were finally able to get over the hump with a big win over the Wolverines. The loss was Michigan’s first in conference play and the team’s first loss overall since mid-December.

Virginia is putting together a pretty solid résumé for the NCAA Tournament; the win over Pittsburgh is easily one of the team’s more impressive wins of the season.

No. 12 Louisville 87 Central Florida 70

The Cardinals bounced back from a tough home loss to Cincinnati earlier in the week with a convincing win over Central Florida. Louisville is now alone in second in the AAC at 7-2.

If you weren’t watching Big Sky basketball on Saturday night, you missed quite a finish.

Weber State trailed Sacramento State, 71-70 with 15 seconds left when Sacramento State was called for a questionable foul. Hornets coach Brian Katz protested the call and was quickly given a technical, resulting in a total of four foul shots for Weber State.

It was only fitting that one of the most anticipated games of the season would come down to the final possession. in overtime.

With the win, Syracuse improved to 21-0, while Duke fell to 17-4.

No. 25 Texas provided the latest twist in what’s been a wild season in the Big 12 with a convincing 81-69 win over No. 6 Kansas in Austin on Saturday.

The Longhorns built a double-digit lead late in the first half and never gave it up, ballooning the lead to 20 early in the second half.

Baylor’s season spiraled out of control long ago, but the Bears gave fans a glimpse of hope on Saturday with a 76-70 upset win over No. 8 Oklahoma State at Gallagher-Iba Arena.

The loss was the third in four games for the Cowboys, who have suddenly gone from a Big 12 favorite to a .500 team at 4-4 in the conference.

Note to the Kansas guards: you might want to stop the ball in transition. Otherwise, things like that happen.

In this play, he decides to take a heat check from way behind the NBA line because why not.

Jamal Crawford would be proud of that 4-point play.

In AAU ball, a play like that would have cleared out the gym.

In college, all Randle can do is shake his head and laugh about it later. At the highest levels of the game, everyone gets dunked on. It just doesn’t usually look like that.

I don’t mean to be hyperbolic, but that type of play is what drives coaches to drink.

Fortunately for both Smith and Thad Matta’s sanity, the Buckeyes got a stop on the final possession, winning 59-58.

via LandGrant33

However, ironically enough, the best potential “zonebuster” when Duke takes on Syracuse on Saturday will actually be on Jim Boeheim’s Orange. Sophomore Trevor Cooney shoots 40 percent from deep, and isn’t shy about hoisting 3’s. He has taken 142 in conference play this season, tops in the ACC. That’s almost half (46 percent) of total threes by the entire Syracuse team.

Ken Pomeroy has noted that a team has very little impact on how well an opponent can shoot the ball from deep (there is the Boeheim exception). What a team can control is how many threes an opponent shoots. Duke opponents have attempted the fewest threes of anybody in the ACC, and it isn’t even a particularly close margin. Blue Devil opponents have shot 85 threes all season long. Next-closest is Boston College at 108 followed by Clemson at 117.

With a 69-66 win at the Yum! Center, Cincinnati moved to 9-0 in conference play, putting them 2.5 games ahead of Louisville and Memphis in the conference race. With both the Tigers and the Cardinals still set to come to their building, the Bearcats are in the driver’s seat for the first conference championship in the history of The American.

Mick Cronin’s team hasn’t gotten a whole ton of press this season, but he has big and athletic players at every position, and his team plays a brand of physical, intense defense that wears on opponents over the course of 40 minutes. Cincinnati isn’t trying to out-skill you and win a finesse game; they are trying to beat you up, give you a wedgie and take your lunch money.

If you haven’t seen Cincinnati play this season, they have athletes at every position and they are not trying to lay the ball in.

No. 1 Arizona narrowly escaped Stanford on Wednesday with its perfect record intact, thanks to a defensive effort that held the Cardinal to just four points in the final ten minutes of play. The Wildcats combine elite individual defenders with an ability to take care of the ball, riding a balanced attack to a school-record 21-0 start.

Ken Pomeroy rates Arizona as his No. 2 overall defense, trailing only Saint Louis. The Wildcats are fourth in the country in overall scoring defense, allowing just 56.7 points per game. Opposing teams are shooting just 37.2 percent from the field against Arizona, also good for fourth in the nation.

Cincinnati is one of the nation’s surprises, and Louisville is the defending National Champion. The Bearcats are 8-0 in the AAC, and the Cardinals are 6-1. Louisville is 13th in the nation in points per game; Cincinnati is fifth in scoring defense. They are both led by senior guards who could make an argument for conference player of the year.

Something has to give on Thursday.

Arizona barely escaped Stanford with its perfect record intact, holding off the Cardinal, 60-57.

Johnson was the driving force for Arizona, scoring 16 points. The Wildcats’ leading scorer also sank the game-deciding three-pointer in the final minute, his third on the day.

In the aftermath of LSU’s 87-82 upset of Kentucky, most of the coverage will focus on all the things John Calipari’s boys did wrong. Just as important, though, were all the things LSU did right. The Wildcats have holes that can be exposed, but their opponents still need the horses to do it. Most teams in the SEC don’t have them. LSU does.

O’Bryant is from Mississippi, Martin is from Louisiana and Mickey is from Dallas, an indication of what makes LSU such a dangerous program. After six years at North Texas, which he built from nothing into an elite mid-major, Jones now has access to two of the most fertile recruiting areas in the country. If he can get one or two Top 100 guys out of the Dallas/Fort Worth area and build a fence around Louisiana, Jones and LSU will have a top 10-15 program every year.

The Tar Heels have already endured a rough season on the court, sitting 10th in the ACC standings with a 12-7, 2-4 mark. North Carolina is looking for its first conference road win of the season.

• Bracketology: Arizona and Syracuse lead the way

We didn’t watch the State of the Union tonight. HEY, WE’RE NOT BAD CITIZENS: WE HAVE A JOB WRITING ABOUT SPORTS AND WE WERE WORKING TONIGHT. So we were watching Michigan State-Iowa on ESPN, a foul-filled affair that ended up going into overtime.

Also interested in watching that: a certain person who had quite a large stake in the State of the Union:

Baseball players wear caps in the field, batting helmets at the plate. Football players wear helmets. Hockey players wear helmets. But basketball players are beautifully unencumbered, leading to a variety of beautiful follicular personal expressions.

Before tonight, if you had asked me who had the best hair in college basketball, I would have said Isaac Fotu of Hawaii.

He’s just going to take the ball to the front of the rim and dunk on your head. Thank you very much.