Four top-10 teams played at home on Thursday night as significant favorites and all four emerged with victories as the regular season ends and we turned our attention to the key projections for the NCAA and Selection Tournament on Sunday.
No. 2 Michigan left no doubt with a rivalry win that tastes even sweeter, as beating Michigan State also comes with winning the Big Ten championship of the regular season. After falling to Illinois without Ayo in his second loss of the season, Michigan needed a solid recovery and this more than served the purpose of centralizing the Wolverines before the end of the season. Following is the game back with the Spartans, which will serve as your own challenge to maintain that level of competition with a clear goal achieved.
No. 3 Baylor also did a great job of continuing his recovery with an 81-70 victory over Cade Cunningham and No. 17 in Oklahoma State. The Bears followed their first loss of the season with a win in overtime in West Virginia and now a second consecutive win in the ranking against the Cowboys. Number 6, West Virginia, had its own recovery point also hosting the TCU, and jumped on the Horned Frogs early with a 14-point lead in the interval he defended on his way to a 76-67 victory. The 12 great emotions did not stop there, with the Kansas number 13 also getting a scare against UTEP, but more about that later.
No. 5 Iowa left no doubt about hosting Nebraska, with Jordan Bohannon going deep and the bank had a lot of run in the second half of a 102-64 victory. Luka Garza had just 14 points, but played just 24 minutes in the game, making it a big win for Iowa due to the postseason grind ahead and also a night of under-average goals for a candidate for National Player of the Year.
Winner: First Big Ten championship for Juwan Howard
In just his second year as head coach of his alma mater, Howard positioned Michigan to secure first place in the ranking and enter the NCAA tournament with the expectation of a long stay in Indiana. Michigan beat Michigan State 69-50 to win the regular season Big Ten championship, with Franz Wagner and Hunter Dickinson leading. Given the initial returns, it is easy to extrapolate the small sample size and assume that this is the first of several Big Ten crowns of the regular season for Howard, especially given the combination of veterans, transfers and young talent, all geared up here in the 2021 Wolverines. We spent much of the season watching the sport through the Gonzaga-Baylor prism, but Michigan has come back from a break at COVID-19 with just one misstep so far and remains among the top choices to win the national championship.
The discussion about the National Player of the Year started with Luka Garza since before the season, but when voters decide this and other praise in the coming weeks, it will be interesting to see how Jared Butler fares against his peers at the top of the sport. He leads Baylor on the ground and at the biggest moments of the season, like the one we saw against West Virginia, and was the team leader on Thursday night with 22 points remaining with five assists, three rebounds and three steals. The time that Baylor spent on break created a lull for college basketball audiences (and many award voters) to spend time watching Butler and the Bears take care of business as efficiently as they did during most of the early 20s season. -1 . Butler fought in defeat in Kansas, but is playing at an All-American level for the season as a whole and it will be interesting to see if he, as a star player in this national championship contender, gets some late push for the sport’s highest honors.
Loser: Everyone, potentially (due to Cade Cunningham’s injury)
Oklahoma State coach Mike Boynton had no update on Cunningham’s injury or status after the Cowboys’ defeat at Waco. Cunningham was the elite, again, carrying weight in the attack and leading with 24 points from 10 of 19 shots in 39 minutes of action. In the final moments of the game, he stepped on Davion Mitchell de Baylor’s feet and cautiously walked off the court when he finished. Boynton’s comments included a reference to the overall picture with Cunningham, being a potential No. 1 choice in the NBA’s 2021 Draft.
“I’m always concerned primarily about his future,” said Boynton, via 247Sports. “As much as winning and representing is, my commitment to these children always comes first. I want to make sure that he is well. If he is well, he will continue to work with us, if it is something more serious than seems right. now, let’s plan and evaluate how we feel as we move forward. ”
Cunningham is an electric talent and Oklahoma State has been one of the hottest teams in the country for almost a month, and as the Cowboys’ NCAA Tournament’s eligibility and restraint became clearer, the buzz was growing for its role in March Madness. The hope is that the ankle injury will be mild, but Boynton’s comments indicate resistance to the risk of further injuries.
Winner: Pat Kelsey
Winthrop is 22-1 this season, ranked 105th at KenPom and on Sunday will play for a spot in the NCAA Tournament thanks to the 82-61 victory against Longwood on Thursday night in the Big South semifinals. Before that 21-point win, the Eagles beat Tubby Smith’s High Point team by 29 and now all the Eagles need to do is beat Campbell in the championship game to have his chance against an opponent from the main conference. On the way to the night, Jerry Palm had Winthrop as a 13-seed in his last Bracketology, and you can bet that a 23-1 team will receive some attention as a potential Cinderella from that spot on the bracket. Kelsey took Winthrop to the NCAA Tournament for the last time in 2017, dropping to No. 4-seed Butler in the first round.
Loser: Jayhawks narrowly avoids the defeat of Quad 3
Perhaps Kansas number 13 should have learned a lesson from North Carolina and avoided adding a non-conference game at the end of the season that could do nothing to help its resumption. But last Thursday, the day after Tar Heels suffered a Quad 3 defeat at home to Marquette, the Jayhawks announced that they would choose a Quad 3 game with UTEP. The bill on that decision came in an almost catastrophic way when the Jayhawks won a 67-62 victory over a team of Miners who led 34-20 at halftime. UTEP (12-11) extended his lead to 48-33 at the start of the second half before Kansas finally woke up for a late rally to avoid his first loss outside Quad 1. David McCormack scored 16 of his 18 points in the second half to help KU to avoid disaster.
The Texas veteran lost his first clash against rival Oklahoma, but made up for his absence in a one-point loss on January 26 as the biggest difference to the Longhorns in a 69-65 revenge victory on Thursday night. . Sims led the team on points (16) and rebounds (12) by adding three blocks and avoiding problems on the way to an impressive 8 in 10 display on the field. When it comes to the team’s fortunes in the postseason, Texas will be defined by its guard game, but the Sims’ performance proved to be the difference in this clash against another major opponent from the 12 biggest.