Official 2011-12 College Basketball Thread

[Radii]

7pm tonight on ESPN for the Carrier Classic between Michigan State and UNC, cannot wait!

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by Radii

7pm tonight on ESPN for the Carrier Classic between Michigan State and UNC, cannot wait!

I am looking forward to watching this as well.

Duke's season tips off at 9pm. Can't wait!

[cartman]

I'm heading to the Texas-Boston game on Sunday. Have no idea how the Horns are gonna look. J'Covan Brown is gonna have to score a lot of points this season.

[Matthean]

UNC finally showing its talent, but State looks like they will be a much better rebounding team this year.

[Lathum]

UCLA, wow.

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Lathum

UCLA, wow.

teehee. Awesome.

[MrBug708]

The Wears are actually our best players. I don't know if that's good or bad at this point

[Matthean]

Via Facebook....

Him: I agree. What better way to watch MSU choke then to watch them choke on National TV!

Me: In order to choke one at least needs to be favored. MSU did all right considering they are rebuilding and UNC is stacked this year.

Him: UNC? Stacked? Seriously? You must not be a college basketball fan?

Me: They return 7 players from last year and are the number one team in the country. They have 62 of the number one votes in the AP poll. The rest of the country has 3. They have 30 of the number one votes in the ESPN poll, and the rest of the country has 1. Maybe somehow that doesn't define a stacked team(it does), but an unranked team getting beat by 12 to the widely agreed upon number one team in the country certainly isn't choking.

Waiting on the response.

[jbergey22]

Originally Posted by Matthean

Via Facebook....









Waiting on the response.

People like that arent worth your time. He says you must not be a college basketball fan while telling you NC isnt stacked...LOL

Vegas had NC as 9 point favs. I friend of mine asked me if he should take NC but I told him no. I learned a long time ago to not bet against Izzo as a dog. NC is completely loaded though so that person you were having the conversation with was a complete fool.

[cartman]

Just got back from the Texas-Boston U game. The Horns are very raw. But they seem to have bought into the defense first philosophy. They were swarming on defense. J'Covan Brown had a big night with 28, and one of the newcomers, Julien Lewis scored 18.

The glaring weak spot was on the boards. They are gonna have a hard time against teams with big front lines.

[dave731]

Cal was having some issues with George Washington early but I think it is more Cal beating themselves than anything else. Looks like the ship is being righted for them.

I did get to go see the Wofford/Emory and Henry game tonight...(yea, I know). Wofford is in a rebuilding year but they have a freshman, Karl Cochran, that I really like. I think Coach Young will go to him pretty regularly off the bench and may end up working him into the starting lineup at some point. They open conference play against Davidson on Dec. 1 and I'm going to try and get to that one as well.

[Wolfpack]

State wins a pair over the weekend to start out. Not too surprising considering it was UNC-Asheville and Morehead State. Well...maybe a little surprising. State, especially under Lowe, was prone to awful games against lower-level competition that would require some hard effort late to secure the win (or sometimes, the upset happened). State fans, including yours truly, have been burned too much in years gone by to think too highly of these outcomes (at least one internet poster posted a Lucy-with-the-football image), but there is a feeling of optimism that really hasn't been felt in quite some time.

[tarcone]

1st time in years Im excited about Iowa. They are in the last season of their Lickliter players. McCaffery says the team can go 11 deep, which is great. He is implementing more of his press and run and gun offense. Next season we have the 16th ranked class coming according to ESPN. Things are looking up in Iowa City.

[britrock88]

Matchups like Texas/Boston U and Cal/GWU grind my gourd... can't you schools find games with less expensive/resource-consuming travel involved?

[wade moore]

Well HiFi, the first game of our in-season home and home is tonight .

W&M has struggled mightily with the myriad of injuries to our front court. We have another front court player since the LAST time I talked about injuries that is out.

I don't know much about Liberty this year, but if you've got anything in the way of a front court, you'll probably be in good shape. I'll be at the game and let you know how they look .

[cartman]

Originally Posted by britrock88

Matchups like Texas/Boston U and Cal/GWU grind my gourd... can't you schools find games with less expensive/resource-consuming travel involved?

The Texas-Boston U game was part of the nine team "TicketCity Legends Classic" tourney, so that took care of at least part of the travel costs. The next game in the series for Texas is against Rhode Island on Tuesday. Strange part is that the tip-off is at 3pm. Not sure why they scheduled a mid-day game during the week.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by cartman

The Texas-Boston U game was part of the nine team "TicketCity Legends Classic" tourney, so that took care of at least part of the travel costs. The next game in the series for Texas is against Rhode Island on Tuesday. Strange part is that the tip-off is at 3pm. Not sure why they scheduled a mid-day game during the week.

The ESPN college basketball 24 hour marathon has been held for several years now. The Texas game is part of that marathon.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Really neat addition by the NCAA for the basketball stat geeks. The NCAA has scanned in all the old end-of-season stat sheets for teams going back to the 1947-1948 season. They're in PDF format and most are either handwritten or typed. Just select the team and 'Basketball' in the query box at the following link.......

http://web1.ncaa.org/stats/StatsSrv/careersearch

[dawgfan]

Reeves Nelson quitting UCLA...?

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/spor...es-nelson.html

[cartman]

Originally Posted by HiFiRevival

Tuesday is that weird all day college hoops thing ESPN does now to kick off the season.

I had completely blanked on that. I always thought they did that on a Fri/Sat or Sat/Sun. But looking at the history, it has been on a Tuesday.

[SirFozzie]

Game-by-game preview of the College Hoops Tip-Off Marathon - ESPN

All 21 games in 25 hours ESPN is showing starting at midnight tonight

[DeToxRox]

Watching Michigan's freshman PG Trey Burke, I cannot help but be reminded of Kalin Lucas. It's not quite a total resemblance but man do I ever see it.

[BishopMVP]

Won't really know until the Thanksgiving tournament at Atlantis, but UMass is looking like an NIT team and a contender for 3rd in the A-10 as long as 5'6 So. PG Chaz Williams (transfer from Hofstra) stays healthy. 19/9 in his first game, 20/10 tonight, and while we've had a solid collection of athletes the past couple years we've really been missing that PG that can push the ball effectively in transition or beat guys 1v1 in halfcourt sets.

[EagleFan]

Forgot about the 24 hours of college basketball day. Guess I don't really need sleep. Not even a huge basketball fan but I love the atmosphere of these games (which is magnified exponentially when March Madness arrives).

[EagleFan]

Either Gonzaga is really good or Washington State sucks... or both.

At least that's how it looks so far.

[dawgfan]

Originally Posted by EagleFan

Either Gonzaga is really good or Washington State sucks... or both.

At least that's how it looks so far.

WSU lost (by far) their two best players, so this is expected to be a rebuilding year for them.

[dave731]

Originally Posted by HiFiRevival

Best game of the entire 21 game mess might be Belmont-Memphis at noon. That Belmont squad should scare every major team they face.

I hate I am going to miss that one as I will be at work...Kansas/Kentucky should be pretty good as well though I expect my Jayhawks to lose.

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by dave731

I hate I am going to miss that one as I will be at work...Kansas/Kentucky should be pretty good as well though I expect my Jayhawks to lose.

Yeah- I'm not even sure what to expect from us this year. The team is just not that deep.

SI

[Thomkal]

And the big sigh of relief you heard coming from the Myrtle Beach area yesterday was due to the NCAA finally giving its ruling on the violation with the men's basketball program. Coastal reported it back in July 2010 and it took them this long to figure out that one player wore an illegal t-shirt to his signing day ceremony. Meanwhile Coastal was forced to suspend its leading scorer in case there was more to it in than that for the rest of the season in February of this year, causing Coastal (along with other stuff going on) to completely collapse when they were on their way to a Big South title and potentially a good seed in the NCAA's.

It really took the NCAA this long to rule on a illegal t-shirt? Granted the stupid player involved lied to them about it which was just incredibly stupid and probably led to him leaving the program instead of facing the music. And they had to check the whole program out I suppose, but an illegal t-shirt reported back in July 2010 leads to this long of an investigation? ridiculous.

So at least the big weight hanging over the program is lifted and they will need it as LSU comes to town. This game was supposed to be the opening of the new arena Coastal is building, but of course its not ready yet, so LSU will have to play in tiny Kimbel Arena, holding about 1,000 people. Coastal played at LSU last season and shocked many with a upset win in overtime. Both leading scorers are gone from the team that did that and there were lots of questions about how good/bad Coastal would be this season. They beat up on two Division III teams to start this season so this will be the first real test for the new lineup.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Pretty good game between WVU and Kent St. WVU sloppy on the offensive end.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Hoo boy. WVU-Kent State all tied up. Like watching a boxing match. So glad to have college basketball back on the radar.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by dawgfan

Reeves Nelson quitting UCLA...?

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/spor...es-nelson.html

Just suspended indefinitely. But we all know that's likely going to end up permanent.

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

And the big sigh of relief you heard coming from the Myrtle Beach area yesterday was due to the NCAA finally giving its ruling on the violation with the men's basketball program. Coastal reported it back in July 2010 and it took them this long to figure out that one player wore an illegal t-shirt to his signing day ceremony. Meanwhile Coastal was forced to suspend its leading scorer in case there was more to it in than that for the rest of the season in February of this year, causing Coastal (along with other stuff going on) to completely collapse when they were on their way to a Big South title and potentially a good seed in the NCAA's.

It really took the NCAA this long to rule on a illegal t-shirt? Granted the stupid player involved lied to them about it which was just incredibly stupid and probably led to him leaving the program instead of facing the music. And they had to check the whole program out I suppose, but an illegal t-shirt reported back in July 2010 leads to this long of an investigation? ridiculous.

So at least the big weight hanging over the program is lifted and they will need it as LSU comes to town. This game was supposed to be the opening of the new arena Coastal is building, but of course its not ready yet, so LSU will have to play in tiny Kimbel Arena, holding about 1,000 people. Coastal played at LSU last season and shocked many with a upset win in overtime. Both leading scorers are gone from the team that did that and there were lots of questions about how good/bad Coastal would be this season. They beat up on two Division III teams to start this season so this will be the first real test for the new lineup.

I expect similarly proportional penalties for Ohio State and Miami. I think that means Miami will hear back in August of 2084 and will receive 137 death penalties

SI

[whomario]

one of those idiot stickers almost injured a memphis player ...

Fun start to that game (Belmont-Memphis), although Belmont plays incredibly "naive", trying bad layups against way superior athletes for instance.

[Kodos]

Indiana is looking better this season. Victor Oladipo is quite an athlete and is attacking the basket regularly. Cody Zeller is looking good. Lots of shot blocks, rebounds, steals. IU needs to work at getting the ball to him on offense more. Lots of energy on display from the team as a whole. I think this is the year IU finally gets back into the top half of the Big Ten. And things get brighter next year when the second-rated recruiting class shows up on campus. Having a real point guard (Yogi) on the team will be a very nice change of pace.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

Hoo boy. WVU-Kent State all tied up. Like watching a boxing match. So glad to have college basketball back on the radar.

7 Freshman (not including 4th year freshman Truck Bryant) is going to make this a frustrating team to watch at times. Today was one of those times.

Next year's team should be very, very good though.

[sterlingice]

Get this game going already! It's already almost 10 and I don't think I will be able to stay up and watch all night

SI

[Thomkal]

LSU may never play Coastal Carolina again, because for the second year in a row, Coastal has upset them! Score this time was 71-63. Led by 10 at the half then hung on for the win. The main reason for the win was Coastal's domination on the bounds, outrebounding LSU 53-34.

I'm very surprised with this win given what they have been through and who they lost coming into this season. Too bad the new Arena wasn't ready to open yet for this given the result. Next big game for them will be on Tuesday when they play at Clemson.

[sterlingice]

Ok, I'm going to have to go to sleep now but we're not looking bad at the half. It's a sloppy, early season game but KU has looked like the better team. They're not as talented, I don't think but UK has that really young and sloppy look. They have more room to grow as the season progresses while I don't see a ton of young guys that are going to improve a lot with Kansas.

SI

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

LSU may never play Coastal Carolina again, because for the second year in a row, Coastal has upset them! Score this time was 71-63. Led by 10 at the half then hung on for the win. The main reason for the win was Coastal's domination on the bounds, outrebounding LSU 53-34.

I'm very surprised with this win given what they have been through and who they lost coming into this season. Too bad the new Arena wasn't ready to open yet for this given the result. Next big game for them will be on Tuesday when they play at Clemson.

Yeah, Mizzou fans were doing some scoreboard watching tonight. Saw that South Carolina lost to Elon(!) and Vandy struggled against Bucknell. Toss in a Florida loss at OSU and it was a pretty rough night for SEC teams.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by sterlingice

Ok, I'm going to have to go to sleep now but we're not looking bad at the half. It's a sloppy, early season game but KU has looked like the better team. They're not as talented, I don't think but UK has that really young and sloppy look. They have more room to grow as the season progresses while I don't see a ton of young guys that are going to improve a lot with Kansas.

SI

Yeah, Bill Self is going to need to work a little magic this year. Robinson and Taylor are obviously talented, but some pretty rough pieces surrounding those two players. Good part about basketball is that you can make a successful team around a couple of core players.

[dave731]

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

Yeah, Bill Self is going to need to work a little magic this year. Robinson and Taylor are obviously talented, but some pretty rough pieces surrounding those two players. Good part about basketball is that you can make a successful team around a couple of core players.

This thing is getting away from Kansas here...need a run!

And I think I despise this Kentucky team more than the John Wall team...

[MrBug708]

UCLA = Bad