By Aidan Joly
The Champions Classic doubleheader on Tuesday night followed by a Final Four-caliber twofer on Wednesday night highlighted the best back-to-back nights of hoops we have had so far this season.
When it comes to Tuesday night, Michigan State may have had the most impressive night. The Spartans kicked off the evening with a commanding 83-66 win over Kentucky in a game that didn’t even feel that close.
Michigan State outclassed Kentucky in every sense of the word. It shot better, rebounded better, played better defense and had better nights from its stars.
Jaxon Kohler was most impressive for MSU. He went for a game-high 20 points on 8-12 from the field and made both of his three-point attempts. Point guard Jeremy Fears dished out an incredible 13 assists in a clinic on passing.
On defense, it limited preseason SEC player of the year Otega Oweh to just 12 points on 4-12 from the field, giving him fits all night. It limited Denzel Aberdeen to 1-12 from the field. As a whole the Wildcats shot just 35% from the field and 23% from three, compared to the Spartans shooting an even 50% from the field as well as 50% from behind the arc. The Spartans won the rebounding battle 37-24.
The Spartans now have wins over two ranked SEC teams, Kentucky and Arkansas. It’s crazy to think of a Michigan State team as underrated, but that is certainly how it feels with this Spartans squad.
In the second game of the night, it was the Cameron Boozer show in a 78-66 Duke win against Kansas.
The freshman played like a player who was not in just his fifth game of college basketball, racking up 18 points and 10 rebounds, and dished out five assists.
The event is the type of event that can bring out the best and the worst in a player, especially so a freshman. If you remember one year ago, Cooper Flagg had 26 points in the Champions Classic against Kentucky, but had two critical turnovers in the final 12 seconds of the game as Duke lost. That’s not to say Flagg was not an incredible player for the Blue Devils last year – he was – but guys with little collegiate experience tend to struggle in those big moments. Boozer did not.
Moving on to Wednesday: Does Arizona deserve to be the No. 1 team in the country?
The Wildcats certainly looked the part in a 71-67 win in a true road game against UConn. It got key buckets when it needed to down the stretch and absolutely dominated on the glass, 39-19
Man oh man, does Koa Peat look like the real deal. The freshman scored 18 points on 7-14 from the field and grabbed 12 rebounds. While he did struggle in Arizona’s game against UCLA on Nov. 14, he has been awesome when it has mattered most. In Arizona’s other notable game, the season opener against Florida, he had 30 points as the Wildcats knocked off the defending national champions.
He might be having the most impressive start of the season for a freshman anywhere in the country. He has looked the part and stood tall for all of Arizona’s games, practically willing them to a 5-0 start that has included wins over three ranked teams. Arizona will continue to play against ranked teams, playing Auburn on Dec. 6 and then on the road against Alabama on Dec. 13.
Can it be the No. 1 team in the country at some point this year? It surely has that chance.
As for the last game of the something of a quadruple-header: Alabama went to a quasi-road game in Chicago and wore down Illinois, ending with a 90-86 win.
It was an Alabama performance that we have come to expect from these Nate Oats coached teams. It used its pace and a barrage of threes to absolutely wear down and exhaust a team. The Illini did better than most in terms of keeping up but at the end of the day came up a couple buckets short. The Tide shot 45.5% from the field and made just over 36% of its threes, hitting 13 of them for the night.
Those threes were evenly distributed – Labaron Philon hit three of them as part of a 24-point night to lead the Tide. Taylor Bol Bowen, Aden Holloway and Amari Allen had two each as Allen had nine points and 11 rebounds in 28 minutes off the bench. Bol Bowen had 12 points and Holloway had 11.
So far this season Alabama has the fourth-quickest offense in the country, second among high-major teams and has a top-10 offensive efficiency margin in the nation per KenPom. That comes after it had the fastest-paced offense in the entire country last season.
It was also a good bounce-back performance after dropping a game to Purdue six days before. The Tide do have a win against St. John’s.
Oats is another guy who is seriously challenging his team in the non-conference. Alabama will start on Monday in the Players Era Invitational, kicking it off against Gonzaga, then seeing UNLV on Tuesday before a third TBD opponent to finish off the event. As previously mentioned, Alabama vs. Arizona is on Dec. 13.
It will certainly be a team that is battle-tested heading into SEC play.
AJ Hoops 