Ranked Road Games Feb 4-8

They have no point guard

Syracuse has no point guard?  MCW leads the nation in assists so not only do they have a point guard, but they may have the best point guard in the nation. 

Was very surprised to see Syracuse dominate Notre Dame last night.  That was one awful shooting performance by Notre Dame; especially Knight who was simply terrible.  Good job by Syracuse to get their act together and play better.  Have to give props to Christmas, who IMO, for the first time stepped up his game and didn't allow Cooly to shove him around inside. Fair, again showed why he is the best player on the court. CONGRATS to Syracuse. Hopefully this will start a run of wins.

Syracuse has no point guard?  MCW leads the nation in assists so not only do they have a point guard, but they may have the best point guard in the nation.

There is a lot more to being a point guard than getting a lot of assists and give MCW credit; he does do that well.   That said, he is a very good player and will get better.  When he gets in there with a team that has a couple of trapping guards, you will then know Syracuse could use a couple of good ball handlers.  Syracuse would go from an excellent team to a great team with a couple of guards that can really handle the ball and play great pressing defense.  Just my opinion after watching almost every game played this year by Syracuse.  At the beginning of the year, I thought Syracuse was going to run the table in the Big East, however some of the players did not improve much over last year:  Christmas, Keita, and especially Cooney. Not too thrilled by Coleman's play as well.   Also, Trisch and MCW are not trapping anyone with regularity and get the ball taken away from them too often.....ball handling skills, kprobably because they are both too big and not quick enough.   Pleasant surprise is Grant and the loss of Southerland was big.  Hopefully he will be back soon. I like Syracuse; just don't think they are playing good ball at the moment. I could be wrong, but last night's game was more Notre Dame playing very poorly than Syracuse playing great.  We shall see about that very soon.     

"They have no point guard and seem to be out of sorts at the moment."

I think you got your teams mixed up; it's KANSAS that has no point guard. Syracuse has one of the best point guards in the nation. He just had a bad game against Pitt and Syracuse is woefully short of depth.

That's what Mike Brey does. He plays six, maybe seven guys. I've never understood it, he has some kids on his bench that can play. I think the lack of depth is why he can't win in the tournament.

If Illinois finishes the Big 10 6-12, I have a hard time seeing them in the tourney

I was saying that could happen if they beat Indiana this week. If you head into selection Sunday with wins over Indiana, Gonzaga, Ohio St and Butler, then you're likely to be selected, even with a mediocre finish and losses to Purdue and Northwestern (there will be teams with even worse losses making the field this year). Now if they don't get this big one and fall to 2-8 in coverence play they'll need to win one of 3 remaining tough road games (@Minnesota, @Michigan or @Ohio St). If they lose all 4 of those games (including IU at home) but win the other 5 (vs Purdue, @Northwestern, vs Penn St, vs Nebraska and @Iowa) I believe they still have a shot even, possibly as a "Last 4 in" but they would definitely be heading into slection Sunday as a "bubble team" at that point.

Illinois already has wins over Gonzaga, Butler and Ohio State, so their resume is pretty solid. They will be an interesting case come Selection Sunday. There are going to be some pi$$ed off mid-major fans with gaudy records against East Nobody U. that won't like a team with a losing conference record getting in over them, but that's the way it goes. I think a win over Indiana or Michigan (which I don't see happening) makes them a lock, barring multiple bad losses from here out.

--> Who did you BEAT and where?
--> Who did you lose to and where?

That's all that matters, not the records or the numbers.

Well said twocoach!

If they can beat IU or Michigan then probably, but the committee looks at how well you've played in the last 10 or so games as well. Without a major win over a top 10 team from here on out, I don't think 6-12 gets them in.

I think if they get to 7 they'll get in, and will be a lock if that includes a win vs Indiana or @Minnesota, @Michigan or @Ohio St.  I also think if they're able to win either the Indiana or Michigan game, they'll get in even if they only get to 6 B1G wins. If they get hot from 3, they can beat anyone! (Of coarse that's true of just about any team vs any other team, but at least Illinois has some decent 3 shooters and a decent PG, which the latter I can't really say of my Jayhawks as of late)

Good call to those that said Arkansas had some game for Florida. Not only did they have some game but they just hung a LOSS on them. Crazy year this year. No one can figure out how to win a road game!

Kansas is in a little trouble in the 1st half here 17-4 TCU with less than 5 minutes remaining in the first half

Most embarassing performance by a Kansas team in their 100+ year history. I have never seen a BAD college basketball team suck as bad as KU sucks tonight. Mind boggling.

I still think they get it together and win by about 10-15 pts.... I guess they thought they could show up and beat TCU since they are 0-8 in the Big 12.

It wasn't overconfidence, it was bad shooting and a huge pile of turnovers. Look like high schoolers, but starting to get it together a bit...

"12 games need to cut down to 8 for the poll, so let's toss the four worst RPI opponents TCU, Texas Tech, Arkansas and Providence. Don't worry, I'll still include Florida, Kansas, Kansas State and Ciincinnati in the carnage count if they lose. "

THREE of the four games I tossed ended up being upsets. Providence beats Cincinnati, Arkansas beats Florida and TCU beats Kansas. What in the heck is going on this year?
I am still waiting to wake up from a bad dream. I have never seen a Kansas team play so universally terrible. Every single starter was terrible tonight but McLemore, and he was only bad. TWO points in the first 14 minutes of the game. Mind boggling. Maybe NOW they will start paying attention to the coaching staff.

Illinois! I had a feeling!

Look at this ridiculousness!

LOSS #1 Indiana @ Illinois, Feb 7
LOSS #5 Florida @ Arkansas, Feb 5
LOSS #6 Kansas @ TCU, Feb 6
LOSS #11 Ohio State @ #2 Michigan, Feb 5
WIN #12 Louisville @ Rutgers, Feb 6
WIN #13 Kansas State @ Texas Tech, Feb 5
LOSS #15 Minnesota @ #10 Michigan State, Feb 6
LOSS #17 Cincinnati @ Providence, Feb 6
LOSS #20 Missouri @ Texas A&M, Feb 7
LOSS #22 Creighton @ Indiana State, Feb 6
WIN #23 Marquette @ South Florida, Feb 6
LOSS #24 Notre Dame @ #8 Syracuse, Feb 4

3-9 for ranked teams on the road. Good grief. What a mess. I guess it shows just hopw much value that the Slection committee should put on quality road wins. They are truly hard to get. We haven't even gotten to the weekend where there are 11 more games with ranked teams on the road. I will post that poll tomorrow. WOW!

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You could have thrown a dart at that list and been right.  That is amazing.