Happy New Year everybody! And a happy second half of the college basketball season to you as well. Nearly every game played on New Year's Eve had major bracket implications, so it was hard to narrow down the most important games. We saw two Big Ten bubble teams duking it out, a couple of Big East powers throwing down, and a major upset of one of the American Athletic Conference teams.
@Illinois 83, Indiana 80 (OT): Between Ohio State, Wisconsin, Michigan State, and Iowa, the Big Ten probably has the best Top 4 of any conference. So wins will be difficult for the teams in the middle of the conference who want to try to get an at-large bid. A 0.500 record may not be good enough, but in this Big Ten, 10-8 should suffice. Winning outside of the Top 4 is very important, and Illinois, despite its sloppy play, held serve at home on Tuesday over Indiana. Coming into this game, Illinois was in the better position, with wins over Missouri and UNLV and losses only to Georgia Tech and Oregon (Indiana has two additional losses and no good wins). And while a win at home should have been expected here for the Illini, this game simply served to show the pecking order at the middle of the Big Ten. We'll see throughout the season if Illinois can hang with Michigan and Minnesota or if Illinois is simply a solid #7 Big Ten team. It should be noted that, at this point, it seems unlikely that both teams make the Big Dance.
Villanova 76, @Butler 73: Villanova's tough loss at Syracuse, where it blew a big first-half lead and didn't get too close it the second half, could have been a turning point for the previously undefeated Wildcats. But Nova did not let the loss define it, and the Wildcats came out swinging when it traveled to Butler on Tuesday. Butler is still a team searching for a good win, and like Illinois and Indiana, good wins will be hard to come by in the American conference. For Villanova, on the other hand, it should have retained a #2 seed in next week's Bracket Brief with this win. All Villanova needs to do at this point is win most of its Big East games, especially including the ones that it is expected to win.
@Houston 75, Connecticut 71: Disasterous loss for UConn. There really isn't another way to put it. UConn should have won easily. It is even hard to say where they go from here. UConn is a deeply flawed team with a difficult upcoming schedule. UConn could overcome the strength of schedule and sneak in, but smart money may say that UConn is going to lose and lose a ton in the second half.
Here's a list of the rest of Tuesday's important actions.
@Xavier 70, St. John's 60
@Princeton 73, Kent State 68
Ohio State 78, @Purdue 69 - decent road win for still undefeated Buckeyes
Duke 86, Elon 48 (in Greensboro, NC)
@Pittsburgh 58, Albany 46
Richmond 70, Northeastern 66
@St. Joseph's 71, Binghamton 44
@Maryland 70, North Carolina Central 56 - Terps get much needed win heading into ACC play
Seton Hall 81, @Providence 80 (OT) - Friars will now need some major Big East upsets
@Syracuse 70, Eastern Michigan 48
@Kansas State 72, George Washington 55 - GW's RPI masks issues, A-10 will be a struggle
Michigan State 79, @Penn State 63 - Spartans impressively hold PSU to 16 second-half points
Louisville 90, @Central Florida 65
@North Carolina 84, UNC Wilmington 51
@Georgetown 61, DePaul 54
@Iowa State 99, Northern Illinois 63
Memphis 88, @South Florida 73
@Iowa 67, Nebraska 57
@Creighton 67, Marquette 49
New Year's Day is set aside for college basketball, but a few interesting games found their way onto the Wednesday slate for college basketball:
Winthrop at Dayton
UNLV at Fresno State
Loyola IL at Indiana St.
Boston College at Harvard
SMU at Cincinnati
Utah State at Air Force
Evansville at Drake
San Diego State at Colorado State
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