By Aidan Joly
This weekend was the biggest weekend of the season so far for college football, but college basketball still managed to grab some headlines with some upsets and some other big games.
Here’s what happened over the weekend.
Down goes No. 1
Purdue fell to Northwestern in overtime 92-88 in Evanston, marking the second consecutive season Northwestern has taken down the Boilermakers as the No. 1 team in the country.
Purdue needed a perfect pass from Camden Heide to Zach Edey right at the end of regulation to even get the game to overtime.
Northwestern won the game with the turnover battle. The Wildcats had just three turnovers the entire 45 minutes to Purdue’s 17, four of them coming in OT. You got that right – Purdue had more turnovers in the five-minute extra period than Northwestern did the whole game. Boo Buie was fantastic for Northwestern, putting up 31 points on 10-20 from the field.
For Purdue, the loss is not overly concerning, but it will be something to monitor. The win is a huge one for Northwestern as it kicks off Big Ten play with this win, one that probably moves them up a seed line come March.
Very concerned about Villanova, less about Duke, even less about Kentucky
Three surprising results came on Saturday.
First, Villanova lost to Drexel 57-55. I wrote last week that Villanova had redeemed itself by performing very well in the Bahamas, but they come back to the U.S. and promptly lose to St. Joseph’s and Drexel, finishing in last place in the Big 5 Classic, going 0-3 in that tournament. It also drops Kyle Neptune’s squad to 6-3 on the season and dropped out of the top 25 on Monday.
Villanova simply needs more out of Mark Armstrong, who finished with zero points against Drexel in a total no-show effort. He only had five points against St. Joe’s. A jump out of him was expected, it hasn’t happened so far.
After Villanova finished at .500 even last season, this is a very concerning start to the season. In 43 games as Villanova’s coach, Neptune has six losses to sub-100 KenPom teams. The seat isn’t hot for Neptune yet, but it’s certainly getting warmer.
A team I’m slightly less concerned about, but have some questions about, is Duke. The Blue Devils fell to Georgia Tech on the road 72-68. The loss dropped them to 5-3 and are now 1-2 away from Cameron Indoor Stadium, the other loss coming to Arkansas earlier in the week.
The Blue Devils are now No. 22 in the country. Jeremy Roach and Kyle Filipowski seem to be the only ones showing up in big games, they need a third piece to really do well. Duke’s next two games (home vs Charlotte, home vs Hofstra) should both be relatively easy wins, but the real chance for Duke to redeem itself comes on a neutral floor against Baylor on Dec. 20. That game should be very, very telling. But if they find a way to lose one of the next two, some real alarm bells will go off.
Now, of this group, the team I’m least concerned about is Kentucky. The Wildcats did have an alarming loss to UNC Wilmington on Saturday, falling 80-73. The loss dropped them to 6-2 on the season, but the loss feels like more of a fluke. The other loss came to Kansas, which was not concerning at all.
For Kentucky, it’s a “forget this game happened and move on.”
Kansas beats UConn in great one
As busy of a weekend as it was, it’s easy to forget this game happened all the way back on Friday night.
Kansas picked up a 69-65 win against UConn at Allen Fieldhouse. It was one of those games where Kansas dominated the first seven or so minutes and the final five or so minutes, but otherwise it was all UConn. Tristen Newton was great for the Huskies, scoring 31 points on 10-18 shooting and 6-9 from three. He could really separate himself as one of the best players in the Big East. Kevin McCullar and KJ Adams were both very good for the Jayhawks, scoring 21 and 18 points respectively.
It’s interesting to make this more about the team that lost, but UConn was also without freshman Stephon Castle. Watching the tape, UConn doesn’t need to be ashamed for this loss. All things considered, it played well in a tough environment.
Wisconsin stuns Marquette in Madison
It was a stunner in Madison on Saturday afternoon with Wisconsin beating No. 3 Marquette 75-64. The Badgers took control early, leading by as many as 16 in the first half and not looking back.
Wisconsin is a team with a ton of experience and minutes continuity and it showed against the Golden Eagles. Max Klesmit finished with 21 points, while Steven Crowl had 16 on 5-6 from the field. Wisconsin is coming off a pretty mediocre season and maybe the Badgers are showing some improvement early on. They sit at 6-2 now.
Between this result and Northwestern, maybe just maybe, the gap in the Big Ten between Purdue and everyone else isn’t as large as we thought.
Is Clemson for real?
The Clemson Tigers are 7-0. To find the last time Clemson started a season at that mark, you have to go all the way back to the 2008-09 season, when it started 16-0 under Oliver Purnell.
Clemson went 2-0 this week, knocking off Alabama on the road to end the Crimson Tide’s 19-game home winning streak and then beat Pittsburgh 79-70 on the road to open up ACC play. According to theclemsoninsider, the win against Alabama was just the second time in program history that Clemson knocked off a ranked opponent on the road. That’s impressive stuff.
On Monday, the Tigers debuted in the top 25, checking in at No. 24. This feels like the best Clemson team in years and may shape up to be one of the best teams in the ACC. PJ Hall has been terrific, averaging 21.4 PPG so far this year, while Joe Girard III looks like one of the most underrated transfer portal pickups in the country after he has started the season at 14.7 PPG while shooting 46% from three.
Clemson will take on rival South Carolina on Wednesday before taking on fellow undefeated squad TCU on a neutral floor in Toronto on Saturday.
Officiating blunder
The aforementioned TCU got some help staying undefeated on Saturday. It beat Georgetown 84-83 on a buzzer-beater from Emanuel Miller.
One problem though. Miller very clearly stepped on the out of bounds line with the ball just before the shot, which should have resulted in a turnover and a sure Georgetown win.
It was a toughhhh no-call and it’s not a reviewable play. I’m not sure what the answer is and I’m not advocating for monitor reviews, but this feels like something that should be changed to be reviewable. Does it mean giving coaches challenges? Does it involve making that type of play reviewable? It’s a very slippery slope.
The officials in this sport are already drained, traveling and working a game nearly every day for some of the game’s top officials. All three of the officials worked a game the day before, according to KenPom: Kipp Kissinger and Mike Roberts were both on the Houston-Xavier game in Cincinnati, and Ray Natili worked the UConn-Kansas game. A lot of this is that it can be too much on officials.
For example, let’s take a look at Ron Groover’s absurd schedule, just from the last week-plus:
- Fri, Nov. 24: Arizona St vs Vanderbilt (Las Vegas)
- Sat, Nov. 25: Incarnate Word at UTSA
- Sun, Nov. 26: Wyoming at Texas
- Mon, Nov. 27: Houston Christian at TCU
- Tue, Nov. 28: LSU at Syracuse
- Wed, Nov. 29: Tennessee at North Carolina
- Thu, Nov. 30: Creighton at Oklahoma State
- Fri, Dec. 1: George Washington at South Carolina
- Sat, Dec 2: day off
- Sun, Dec. 3: Louisville at Virginia Tech
College basketball does have an officiating problem and part of the problem it seems is that referees are on the road daily and are surely exhausted, even by this point in the year. Scenarios like that shouldn’t happen. But unfortunately, they do.
AJ Hoops 