Saturday College Hoops Thoughts

The season just got a whole lot more interesting as #1 Duke fell to unranked Georgetown, #2 Florida fell to unranked Tennessee, #9 Pitt fell to unranked St. John's and #13 Wisconsin was upset, at home, by Division 1 provisional school North Dakota State. All three were surprising upsets but the last one is really puzzling. How did North Dakota State, an AVERAGE provisional team, defeat what was considered perhaps the best team in the Big Ten? This one has to be up there with Chaminade upsetting #1 Virginia back in the early '80's.

Penn State played a hard fought game against Ohio State but just couldn't come out on top losing 75-64, a much closer game than the Big Ten opener in Columbus. The loss drops Penn State to 2-3 in the Big Ten but this team is improving. Ever since that blowout loss to Ohio State, Penn State has defeated Northwester on the road, lost a close one to Iowa, defeated Purdue and then lost this one Ohio State. The Lions now have a tough four game stretch that includes Wisconsin (A), Michigan State (A), Michigan (H) and Illinois (A). If Penn State can manage to win just one of those games, it would be big for the program. Obviously, Michigan looks like the best chance for a victory out of that group but who knows what could happen in Madison after North Dakota State's upset. The Badgers are either going to overcome it or allow it to destroy them.