With college football basically over, college basketball is taking over. On Saturday, there were a lot of great matchups to watch in the league. Like all season, there have been many upsets today including a couple of ranked teams. Four ranked teams went down on Saturday on a big day in college basketball.
College Basketball: Ranked Teams Go Down On Saturday
#18 Florida State over #7 Louisville
Another top ten team went down this season and this time it was number seven Louisville losing to #17 Florida State 78-65. Starter Trent Forest for FSU had a good game. He put up 20 points off of 9 of 11 shooting and had two steals. Florida State had a great game off the bench from M.J. Walker who was their leading scorer with 23 points with three blocks and five threes made. Louisville had a huge game from Jordan Nwora but that’s it. Nwora had 32 points and ten rebounds while the next leading scorer had 10 points. Lousiville had 16 turnovers on Saturday which is not the recipe to success.
They have now lost their last three matchups against ranked opponents. Their first was a 70-57 loss to number 22 Texas Tech, a 78-70 loss to number 17 Kentucky, and now this latest loss. The Cardinals are close to being the team they want and need to be but losses like this will not help them at all. Their next game is against unranked Miami.
#21 Penn State over #23 Iowa
This game was one of the best not only on Saturday but of the whole season so far. Number 21 Penn State beat number 23 Iowa State 89-86. Penn State had four players with over 15 points, including Izaiah Brockington, who had 23 points off the bench. Iowa had two players who had over 20 points as Joe Wieskamp had 23 while Luka Garza had 34 points and both had a double-double. It came down to who had the better bench and that was Penn State. It was a very close game and a very good one. Iowa turns right around and plays at Nebraska on Tuesday while Penn State goes to Rutgers.
#3 Kansas beat #16 West Virginia
This isn’t really a shocker as one team had to lose and it was number 16 West Virginia. It was a very close game throughout as WVU even had a lead after the first half but couldn’t stop the Kansas attack. Udoka Azubuike had another good performance as he had 17 points with 11 rebounds. Kansas has gone down as a number one but they still look very strong. West Virginia is still a very good team and they head to Oklahoma State who is 9-4 on the season.
Marquette upsets #10 Villanova
Marquette is having a very good season and Villanova would have their hands full on the road. Villanova couldn’t get it going until late but it was too late as Marquette had a 46-29 halftime lead. Marquette’s Markus Howard struggled from the floor as he went 7 of 20 but hit 12 free throws as he scored 29 points and had eight rebounds. Whenever Villanova tried to make a comeback, Marquette would just put their foot on the gas again. No Wildcats player had 15 points. They have a tough turnaround as they play on the road against Creighton on Tuesday.
Georgia upsets #9 Memphis
The biggest upset of the day is Georgia over number nine Memphis 65-62. The Tigers took a big hit after the NCAA ruled James Wiseman ineligible at the beginning of the season. They have to get over that and they did after only having one loss coming into the game against Georgia. Memphis still has a lot of talent like Precious Achiuwa who had 20 points and 15 rebounds. They had enough scoring but the turnovers are what killed them. This is Georgia’s first top ten win since 2011 when they knocked off number 10 Kentucky. The Tigers will kick-off conference play when they take on a very tough one loss Wichita State team on the road.
One Crazy Season
College basketball has been nothing short of crazy this season and there is still a lot of basketball to play. Multiple number one teams have gone down as well as multiple top ten teams. Even power five teams that aren’t ranked have had trouble and has gone down a lot this season. With all of this going on, one would think it’s March Madness but the madness has begun as soon as the season started. Maybe things will get back on track but for right now, it’s a fun and crazy ride.
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