Wednesday Recovery

Last night was one of those nights we get from time-to-time in college hoops where it feels like the opening weekend of the tournament. Let’s recap.

Blue Bloods Bonkers

Duke went into Louisville off a weekend win at Virginia. Realistically, splitting those games would have been great. Louisville has been far better than imagined. Coming off a loss to Florida State in overtime in a game they probably should have won, the Cards were motivated and jumped Duke. They lead by 9 at half and quickly stretched it to 23. They lead by 19 with 6:30 left and lost. They lead at that point 62-43 and lost 71-69. Classic Duke 28-7 run to win it. Once again, Zion Williamson was amazing, going 9-15 from the field with 12 boards. He was also a cool 8-9 from the line.

It was not much better for the other blue blood in the Commonwealth as LSU won a last second tip-in to win at Kentucky after trailing by 8 at half. Controversy surrounded the last play as it appeared LSU probably goaltended but it the refs also missed a goaltend by Kentucky as the original shot went up. LSU has a chance to win the SEC should Tennessee falter with the win last night. 

Big Ten

The top Big Ten contenders all were in action last night with Michigan State coming out the big winner after grinding out a win at the Hauser Center. The Badgers failed to reach 60 points for the 3rd consecutive game and that was after scoring 38 in the first half.

Maryland held serve at home and beat Purdue in relatively easy fashion. They trailed by 8 at half and out scored Purdue 40-18 in the second half. They did so by shooting 8-27 from 3, so they didn’t exactly shoot their way to a comeback. We should note that 18-point half. For a team 4th in offensive efficiency, that is an interesting half.

At the arena of sadness, Michigan lost at Penn State in a game they were effectively out of by halftime. John Beilein has enough of Big Ten officiating and was tossed at the half. More concerning for the Wolverines was giving up 75 to a mediocre Penn State team. If they don’t win the league, this game will haunt them.

Markus Howard 

Howard did Howard things again last night. He scored 36 points on 21 shots and only 4 3’s. Amazingly, he missed 2 free throws, going 8-10 from the stripe. In “rebounding margin” isn’t a thing, DePaul outrebounded the Golden Eagles by 11 and it didn’t matter at all. DePaul was also 7-13 from 3 and it didn’t matter. This is a fun Marquette team.