Weekend Winners & Losers
By Bruce Marshall
It was a bumpy week in college hoops, with many of the Top 25 teams biting the dust. But that’s just part of the narrative that now turns its attention to the looming NCAA Tournament as the calendar turns to February. And a look at the past week’s winners and losers highlights a few Big Dance regulars who are going to have their work cut out for them if they want to get a call from the Selection Committee.
BUTLER: Loser...The Bulldogs have fallen into fourth place in the Horizon League and their return to the Big Dance can no longer be considered a fait accompli. A puzzling pair of losses to modest Wisconsin-Milwaukee got the alarm bells ringing in Indianapolis, and defeats vs. Wright State and over the weekend in overtime at Valpo continued the worrying trend. A viable third scoring option after G Shelvin Mack and F Matt Howard, the main holdovers from last year’s surprising NCAA finalists, has yet to emerge, as Butler continues to miss the unique dimension provided by F Gordon Hayward over the past couple of seasons. Opponents have been able to take 6-11 soph C Andrew Smith (who’s hitting 65% from the floor but shooting the ball less than 5 times pg) too easily out of the Butler offensive flow, and expected contributions from some highly-regarded freshman have yet to materialize. There’s still time for Butler to regroup, and its tough pre-league schedule will continue to boost the Bulldogs’ RPI, but it seems more and more likely that the only way Butler can be assured of returning to the Big Dance will be by winning the Horizon Tourney.
GONZAGA: Loser...Like Butler, the Zags are hardly assured of an invitation to what would be their 13th straight Big Dance appearance. Gonzaga at least got back into the win column with an 86-53 win over WCC punching bag San Diego on Saturday, but the Zags’ losing streak had previously reached three in a row with a showdown loss vs. Saint Mary’s on Thursday night. Inconsistencies at the PG position in the wake of Matt Bouldin’s graduation continue to hamper the Zags, as juco Marquise Carter has been a major disappointment as Bouldin’s likely successor. And speaking of inconsistencies, soph swingman Elias Harris continues to see his production swing wildly from one game to the next. Defensive issues are also a concern, allowing a succession on WCC foes to hit better than 50% from the floor. The loss to the Gaels last Thursday also marked the Zags’ first 3-game losing streak in conference play since 1997. Wins over Marquette, Baylor, Xavier, and Oklahoma State in pre-league play won’t hurt on Selection Sunday, but those sorts are all NCAA "bubble" teams at best. Like Butler in the Horizon, Gonzaga might just have to win the WCC Tourney to get back to the Big Dance.
MICHIGAN STATE: Loser...Okay, the Spartans scored an overtime win over Indiana on Sunday. But these aren’t Bob Knight’s (or even Mike Davis’) Hoosiers we’re talking about this season. And the red flags were out in East Lansing with a preceding 3-game losing streak that included a humbling home loss to unfancied underdog Michigan at the Breslin Center. While we and most other "bracketologists" are somewhat compelled to give MSU the benefit of the doubt and pencil the Spartans into the Big Dance based on past achievements, the fact is that Tom Izzo’s current MSU edition lost most of its meaningful non-league games (vs. UConn, Duke, Syracuse, and Texas), four of its five Big Ten wins have been by 4 points or fewer, and to this point has been one of the nation’s major disappointments. The suspension of junior G Korie Lucious is the latest worrisome development in East Lansing, with Izzo now asking more from sr. G Kalin Lucas, who played 43 of the 45 minutes on Sunday vs. Indiana. Izzo is hoping that help in the post might be forthcoming from wide-bodied, 283-lb. soph Derrick Nix, who scored 9 points vs. the Hoosiers, but we think the Spartans are no longer a sure bet to get back to the Big Dance.
KANSAS STATE: Loser...Like Butler, Gonzaga, and Michigan State, we don’t feel compelled to pencil K-State into our Big Dance field any longer, either. At some point, the Wildcats are going to have to put together a win streak, and Saturday’s lopsided 90-66 loss at rival Kansas might have marked the low-water mark for HC Frank Martin’s team this season. K-State is now just one game out of the Big XII basement, and we’re to the point we have to wonder if the Wildcats can recover at all. The two seniors who were supposed to be the linchpins of this year’s team, G Jacob Pullen & F Curtis Kelly, have hardly lived up their advance billing. Suspension issues aside, neither has been producing on the floor, where Pullen has hit on only 41 of 107 shots from the floor in Big XII action, while the enigmatic Kelly played only 10 minutes in the first half vs. the Jayhawks while being benched for the entirety of the final 20 minutes at Phog Allen Fieldhouse. Regional sources suspect Pullen has not been as effective this season without backcourt sidekick Denis Clemente, whose graduation has forced Pullen into an uncomfortable PG role. K-State also ranks last in both FG and FT shooting percentage in the Big XII, hardly the sort of indicator that would suggest a turnaround is imminent.
WASHINGTON STATE: Winner...With the Cougs badly in need of a signature win to revive their NCAA at-large hopes, Sunday night’s visit by the arch-rival U-Dub Huskies in a hoops version of the "Apple Cup" was likely to be Wazzu’s most-important game of the regular season. And the Cougs stepped up nicely, winning 87-80 behind swingman Klay Thompson’s 25 points. The win was a complete one for HC Ken Bone’s crew, as the Cougs forced 23 Husky TOs and limited U-Dub to converting only 11 of 31 three-point shots. With PG Reggie Moore (who scored 18 vs. the Huskies) back in action after a recent suspension, Bone is able to use juco G Faisal Aden off the bench, from where he continues to deliver a needed spark, scoring 15 in a reserve role vs. Washington. How the Cougs fare on the road, however, will go a long way in determining their eventual NCAA fate; they’ve dropped three of their first four as a Pac-10 visitor, and still have five more to go on the conference trail.
CLEMSON: Winner...We have long wondered how HC Brad Brownell would fare if given more material than he had to work with in past successful stops at UNC-Wilmington and Wright State. Well, we’re getting our answer this season, as Brownell has steered Clemson into contending position in the ACC thanks to a pair of impressive wins last week over NC State and Florida State. The Tigers, in an adjustment phase early in the season as they were adapting to Brownell’s motion offense, have been using defense to excel lately, holding the Wolfpack and Noles to a combined 94 points in the two wins last week. Seniors G Dermontez Stitt (13.6 ppg) and 6-8 workhorse Jerai Grant (12.6 ppg) have handled the bulk of the scoring duties in the absence of last year’s top scorer Trevor Booker, now with the NBA Wizards. Although Brownell couldn’t end the Tigers’ ;long losing streak at North Carolina (Clemson now 0-55 at Chapel Hill after losing tot he Tar Hells on Jan. 18), the Tigers now look a good bet to get back to their fourth straight NCAA Tourney as long as they can win a couple of games on the ACC road, where they’ve lost their first three.
GEORGE MASON: Winner...We’ve seen HC Jim Larranaga’s team do this before. And now the Patriots are officially on another midseason hot streak, with their win streak now at 7 straight following yet another impressive triumph at William & Mary on Saturday. That 85-69 win over the Tribe marked the sixth time in the current 7-game upswing that the Patriots had won a game by a double-digit margin. Larranaga’s backcourt is finally in synch, with sr. G Cam Long (hitting better than 50% from the floor) emerging alongside Hofstra’s Charles Jenkins as perhaps the top backcourt performer in the CAA. Getting sr. G Isaiah Tate to accept his sixth-man role has been another important development, while 6-9 C Mike Morrison’s ability to act as an effective clean-up presence in the post has allowed Fs Ryan Pearson (14 ppg) & Luke Hancock (12.2 ppg) to do their preferred wandering out to the perimeter on the attack end. CAA observers are suggesting that this is probably Larranaga’s best team since the Final Four team of five years ago, as the Patriots and Virginia Commonwealth begin to position themselves in potentially-favorable positions on the NCAA "bubble" as Selection Sunday looms.
ST. JOHN’S: Winner...This was the sort of performance St. John’s fans were dreaming about, but didn’t really expect, when Steve Lavin was hired as head coach last spring. We’re talking about Sunday’s 93-78 win at Madison Square Garden over Duke that rekindled memories of the Lou Carnesecca glory days when Chris Mullin and Walter Berry were the featured performers. In a stretch of eight consecutive games, the Red Storm faced opponents ranked n the Top 25, winning three of those, although none are likely to come in as handy with the Selection Committee as the win over the Blue Devils. Lavin has had no trouble getting his troops to adapt to his uptempo offensive philosophy, with sr. G Dwight Hardy (who scored 26 vs. Duke) especially appreciative after having to play in a more-controlled tempo under Lavin predecessor Norm Roberts. Now, the Red Storm gets into a more favorable portion of its schedule, with six of its next nine Big East foes being unranked. Much attention is likely to be paid to the upcoming Feb. 5 game against Lavs’ former employer UCLA, and a win there will give the Red Storm another potential valuable chip to be cashed on Selection Sunday.
SANTA CLARA: Winner...A month ago, most WCC observers would have said that Broncos’ HC Kerry Keating was sitting on one of the hottest seats in the conference, and unlikely to return for a fifth season in 2011-12 if SCU didn’t pout things together, and fast. Well, a few weeks can make a big difference, and Keating is now feeling a lot better about his future as the Broncos have emerged as a surprise conference contender with four straight wins, including a rousing 85-71 win over Gonzaga on Jan. 20 thanks to 36 points from high-octane soph G Kevin Foster. But what got the attention of regional insiders was a subsequent 72-59 win over contending Portland, as SCU showed no signs of letdown after its first home win over the Zags since 2000. And last weekend’s sweep of L.A.-area conference foes Pepperdine and Loyola-Marymount on the road has put the Broncos into second place (along with USF) behind Saint Mary’s in the conference, and a game ahead of struggling Gonzaga. Sources believed the key to the Broncos would be for other scoring sources to help relieve the burden on the explosive Foster, and several have stepped to the fore lately, including a pair of imports, bruising 6-7 Aussie Ben Dowdell (who scored 22 vs. the Pilots in that Jan. 22 win) and 6-9 Canadian Marc Trasolini, who has scored in double figures in 8 of his last 9 games. Moreover, the emergence of true frosh G Evan Roquemore (14.5 pg in the wins last weekend in the L.A. area) from Las Vegas has prevented opponents from committing too many resources on the perimeter to slowing Foster. WCC observers like the balance on the Broncos, who get a chance to avenge an earlier defeat vs. nearby Jesuit rival USF on Saturday.