Last Night in College Basketball: Potential Final Four Preview, So Many Upsets

Men’s college basketball, women’s college basketball – there’s no shortage of college ball, every night. Don’t worry, we’re here to help you figure out what you missed but shouldn’t have. Here are all the best moments from the weekend in college basketball. A Final Four preview? What an incredible weekend of college basketball, and a potential preview for March Madness in more ways than one. On the men’s side, we got a look at a possible set of Final Four matchups, with the top four seeds all facing each other. But considering what else went down — upset after upset, for both men’s and women’s basketball — it’s also worth remembering that this weekend might have been the only time we’ll get to see Duke vs. Michigan and Arizona vs. Houston. Hey, with the way the Big 12 has been this season, even saying the Wildcats and Cougars will face off in their conference tourney seems presumptuous. The rankings played no part in which teams came out the winners, either. No. 3 Duke took on No. 1 Michigan, and would win, 68-63. No. 4 Arizona bested No. 2 Houston, 73-66. Close games on both accounts, but close is no comfort in March. Luckily for the Wolverines and Cougars, it’s still February. With a margin of victory of just 5 points, the reason one team won over the other is either glaringly obvious or even comes down to a single play. For Michigan, the issue was the paint. Duke won the rebound battle handily, with 41 to the Wolverines’ 28; Duke had 13 offensive boards to Michigan’s 8, which helps explain at least part of the disparity in paint points, as well, with the Blue Devils scoring 34 to Michigan’s 24. With the teams otherwise even from deep and the free throw line, it was that performance in the paint that separated the two. Star freshman forward Cameron Boozer was at the forefront with an 18-point, 10-rebound double-double (as well as 7 assists and 2 blocks), but freshman guard Nikolas Khamenia had 9 rebounds off the bench in 24 minutes, as well: senior forward Yaxel Lendeborg led all Wolverines in both points (21) and rebounds (7). With Khamenia scoring 6 in addition to outrebounding every Michigan player, you could say he was the difference as much as anything else. [Men’s College Basketball Top 25: Duke, Michigan Lead The Way] For Houston, the paint was also a problem, but the Cougars had no real shortage of issues against Arizona. While the Wildcats’ size underneath has regularly been an issue for opponents, Houston actually outrebounded Arizona, 39-37, finishing one up in both offensive and defensive boards. However, the Wildcats outscored the Cougars 38-20 in the paint because Houston struggled to score just in general: it shot 36% for the day even though it hit 31% of its 3s, and turning the ball over more than twice as much as Arizona didn’t help matters at all, either. Arizona had that massive paint advantage, and scored 16 points off of turnovers to Houston’s 3: the final scores might have been separated by just 7 points, but Arizona led for 91% of the game for a reason, and quickly put up its largest lead of the day — 10 — after Houston tied late, because the Cougars’ shooting went completely cold. What’s most impressive — and most encouraging — for the Wildcats here is that they did it without Koa Peat once again. He is suffering from an undisclosed “lower leg injury,” and sat out again like he did against BYU — Arizona won both games, with senior guard Anthony Dell’Orso once again stepping up from the bench. He scored 22 points, just like he did against BYU, this time in 34 minutes and with 3 rebounds and 4 steals to go with them. Those 22 points also led all scorers. Arizona now has sole possession of first in the Big 12 and a little more cushion for a double-bye, as Houston has lost two in a row and the other two teams trailing directly behind — Kansas and Iowa State — both lost this weekend as well. So many (men’s) upsets No. 8 Kansas didn’t just lose, and it wasn’t just upset. The Jayhawks dropped a game to unranked Cincinnati — their first unranked home defeat of the year — and by the final score of 84-68. And yes, this was despite freshman guard Darryn Peterson playing 32 minutes: he scored 17 points on 7-for-17 shooting with 4 rebounds, 1 assist and a steal. Sophomore forward Flory Bidunga was the real highlight of the day for the Jayhawks, leading with 18 points on 8-for-10 shooting, while securing a double-double with a game-high 12 boards, 3 assists and a steal and block each. That wasn’t nearly enough against the Bearcats, however, as they shot 48% on the day — and 12-for-31 from 3 — while winning the rebound battle 40-29. Scoring 15 points off of turnovers compared to Kansas’ 3, beating the Jayhawks on the boards and watching Peterson go 1-for-7 from deep and drive down the team shooting percentage on 3s to 22% in the process meant a Cincinnati W. The Bearcats got a career-high 28 points out of sophomore center Moustapha Thiam, who also had 7 rebounds, 8 assists and 2 steals, and his performance was a huge part of why Cincinnati ran away with it in the second half. Also throwing chaos into the Big 12 picture was No. 23 BYU, which recently lost one of its best players in senior Richie Saunders to an ACL injury. While the Cougars lost to Arizona last week, they upset No. 6 Iowa State on Saturday, 79-69. Freshman forward AJ Dybantsa had a game-high 29 points and nearly had a triple-double, too: he had a game-high 10 rebounds, tied with freshman forward and teammate Khadim Mboup who grabbed his in 17 minutes off the bench, but Dybantsa also had 9 assists. Scorer, facilitator, rebounder — he’s going to have to excel at all three to get BYU deep into March, and against Iowa State, that’s exactly what he did. BYU isn’t in any danger of stumbling into a double-bye for the conference tourney, but it kept pace with UCF and is tied for sixth in the Big 12, putting it in position for a single bye with four games left on the schedule — including one against UCF, and another facing off against No. 13 Texas Tech, as well as the Cincinnati team that just beat Kansas. UCLA took down No. 10 Illinois, because the Big Ten hasn’t been enough of a mess. The Bruins are now 10-6 with four games left, not quite in position to fight for a double-bye in the conference tournament but at least in a strong spot to secure the single-round variety, and even stronger because both Iowa and Ohio State — the teams directly trailing it — lost. What’s absurd is how UCLA won — it never should have happened at all, but Illinois’ defense is often as bad as its offense is good. And Illinois ranks first in KenPom’s Offensive Rating, so that inversion explains why the Fighting Illini sent three men past halfcourt to defend an inbounds with 4.9 seconds left in overtime, then got caught by the most obvious screen in the world before forgetting to attempt to divert a game-winning layup by UCLA senior guard Donovan Dent even a little bit. If this sounds like hyperbole, that’s only because you have not seen the play in question. Overall, Illinois is a better defensive team than that — it’s 30th in Defensive Rating, after all. There have been times this season, however, where rating goes out the window and is replaced by lapses like the above. And this one cost Illinois big time. Not to take anything away from UCLA, of course — not only did it spring this trap on Illinois to win, but the Bruins pushed the Fighting Illini to this point in the first place. Last of the major men’s upsets came by way of Tennessee, which took down No. 19 Vanderbilt, 69-65. The Volunteers stayed in this one because they dominated in the paint, scoring 40 points to Vandy’s 22, and while the Commodores had more than twice as many 3s — 9 to 4 — they still couldn’t shake their unranked opponent. Tennessee took the lead, 66-65, after a Nate Ament jumper. The freshman forward shot just 3-for-13 on the day, but that shot was huge, as Vandy would not score again, and Tennessee being in the lead meant that the Dores had to keep fouling to get the ball back after missing with a layup to answer. Tennessee would sink 3 of those free throws, putting the game out of reach, but none of them ended up being necessary in the end since Vandy couldn’t hit another bucket. So many (women’s) upsets The women’s game was also loaded with upsets over the weekend. No. 20 Texas Tech ended up losing to Colorado, 75-68, as the two went back-and-forth from quarter to quarter. The Lady Raiders were up 23-19, but then Colorado bested them in the second, 21-14. Texas Tech seemed like it had adjusted during the half, busting out a 22-13 third, but then the Buffaloes put on a dominant fourth quarter in which they scored 22 and held Texas Tech to 9 points. Texas Tech had just 18 rebounds in the entire game, and to be fair some of that was because it shot 58%. However, Colorado missed far more often, and the Lady Raiders didn’t get their share of those rebounds, with the Buffs picking up 17 offensive boards to Texas Tech’s 15 defensive ones. Those second chances added up, and the impact was felt even more when Colorado ended up scoring 31 points off turnovers to Texas Tech’s 18, despite both teams having 19 forced turnovers. Virginia isn’t ranked, but it’s still a really good basketball team that came into play on Sunday 37th in the NCAA Evaluation Tool. Even then, though, beating No. 8 Louisville was a shock, given the Cardinals have been on an upward trajectory. The Cavaliers dominated defensively, however, limiting Louisville to 36% shooting. Still, it has to be pointed out that the Cardinals lost sophomore guard and top scorer Tajiianna Roberts after just four minutes in the first quarter, to a leg injury — in a 74-72 loss, it’s easy to say that’s what caused the loss. Still, Louisville got 34 points from its bench, so the fill-ins did what they could to help. And yet! If Roberts had a better shooting day than those players did… well, it’s not hard to dream of another bucket, you know? That being said, Virginia is legit and a tourney team, and injuries happen. The Cavaliers earned this one by limiting Louisville’s offense, and that’s something to remember come March — this won’t be the last Louisville-level team Virginia has to face if it’s to make it deep into March Madness. Coming out of nowhere on the upset front was Clemson over No. 9 Duke — the Blue Devils had won 17 games in a row, and while Clemson, like Virginia, is legit, the way things worked out was still a real surprise. Duke was up 20-8 after the first quarter, but almost immediately let Clemson back in the game with a 15-9 second. While the Blue Devils mostly course corrected in the third by limiting the Tigers to 7 points, they also scored just 10 of their own. Clemson had a huge fourth quarter, outscoring Duke 23-11 to not only tie, but take the lead with 3.1 seconds left on the clock, on a 3-pointer by junior guard Hannah Kohn… the first, and only, points of the day for the bench player who is averaging 5.0 per game this season. She was left alone at the top of the arc, and executed a catch-and-shoot to perfection before Duke’s defense could stop what it had allowed to happen. Offensively, Clemson was a mess, shooting 32% for the day, but went 6-for-13 in the fourth quarter while hitting 9 of its 11 free throws for the day — credit to the Tigers’ defense for limiting Duke’s opportunities to shoot, as well. Another ranked loss that is bound to shake up the poll. The most significant upset of the weekend for women’s basketball, though, was thanks to No. 13 Iowa defeating No. 6 Michigan. The Wolverines have been ranked high all year, but they have a couple of glaring issues that have been spotlighted in this space again and again: they sometimes get overly sloppy in a way that makes them vulnerable, and they do not always shoot effectively enough to make up for that. Against Iowa, Michigan had 24 turnovers and shot 31%. Iowa converted those turnovers into 21 points — 15 more than Michigan got on Iowa’s — and while the Hawkeyes were similarly ineffective from deep, they were a menace in the paint, dropping 40 of their 62 points there. Michigan scored 44 points total, and just once in the last three-plus minutes of play. Sophomore guard Olivia Olson shot 6-for-16, for 13 points. The bench provided just 6 points on 2-for-13 shooting in 46 minutes, and Syla Swords played all 40 minutes while shooting just 3-for-11. Michigan is wildly talented, but it has to tighten up before the tourney, whether you’re referencing the Big Ten’s or the NCAA’s. Credit to sophomore Ava Heiden for once again putting Iowa on her back, though — the center scored a game-high 24 points on 11-for-17 shooting and logged a double-double with 10 rebounds, 2 steals and 2 blocks, while senior forward Hannah Stuelke had her own double-double with 11 points, 12 boards and 7 assists. Iowa, by the way, is now tied with Michigan for second in the Big Ten, at 13-3. Miles logs her fifth triple-double of the season Hey, here’s a fun stat. Just 13 Division I women’s basketball players have ever had five triple-doubles in their careers, and on the men’s side it’s even fewer at eight. TCU fifth-year guard and likely WNBA lottery pick Olivia Miles? She has five triple-doubles this season. Miles picked up her fifth of the year and 11th of her career — the third-most in D-I women’s basketball history — with 26 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists against Iowa State. Miles scored or assisted on 63% of the Horned Frogs’ points, which would be impressive out of context but is even more so when you see that they beat the Cyclones by the narrow score of 80-73. She also scored 15 of those 26 points in the final 5:21 of the game, which helped bring TCU from down 13 to winning by 7. Miles scored the 2,000th career point of her career in this game, making her the third D-I player of the century to have at least that many points as well as 800 rebounds and assists each. It wasn’t just Miles, though: fellow transfer and senior forward Marta Suarez, who might very well be a WNBA pick, too, had a double-double with 19 points and 10 boards. Oddly enough, the only real blemish in the game came from Miles, who shot 1-for-7 from deep and brought down TCU’s shooting percentage on 3s — she went just 2-for-14 to start before the fourth-quarter eruption. The starters played most of the game, the bench provided some points and boards in their minutes and Iowa State was held to 39% shooting, with even junior center Audi Crooks — who leads the Big 12 in shooting percentage — limited to an 8-for-17 performance. TCU remains all alone atop the Big 12 standings, at 13-3, and has to close out the year against Cincinnati and fellow ranked team, Baylor. Iowa State is in a tie for seventh in the conference at 9-7, not out of any mix just yet, and especially not now that dynamo junior forward Addy Brown has finally returned to action after missing most of two months. Brown hasn’t found her shot again yet, but she does have 14 rebounds, 6 assists a steal and 2 blocks in two games and 45 minutes since coming back — Iowa State will need every bit of her it can get if it’s to make it to March and somewhere meaningful within it.