Notre Dame Continues To Impress

Oregon 92, Alabama 69
Before I get to the game that inspired this post's title, I want to get to one last game from last night. I know that this one was on past the bedtime of most, as it started at midnight eastern time, but it still had some important implications for both teams. One thing I've always liked about Oregon is how all of their parts are so interchangeable. It doesn't matter which guys they put on the floor, because they're going to hustle and they're going to run it down your throat. They didn't even get a big performance out of their most recognizable star, Tajuan Porter (12 points on 13 shots from the field). Obviously the way that they're getting rocked by UNC (as I type this) isn't all too encouraging. And that bad loss to Oakland is a problem. But the Pac-10, outside of UCLA at the top, is absolutely wide open this season. The conference is down, and Oregon has the chance to win 10 or 11 games there and earn a Tournament trip. As for Alabama, I talked before the season started about how important a healthy Ronald Steele was going to be. And he may be healthy, but if so then he's very afraid of re-injuring himself. Steele just seems terrified of putting stress on his bad leg, and he never seemed willing to push himself in this one. He consistently settled for long jump shots, and his 3-for-11 shooting was the result. Alabama has the advantage of being in a down SEC, and a very down SEC West. The conference wins will be there if they can play better. But they're going to need the 2006 Ronald Steele back. Right now he's an absolute shell of his past self.

#8 Notre Dame 81, #7 Texas 80
Doesn't it always seem like the Maui Invite has great games like this? It was a very gutty performance out of Notre Dame, as they hung in as their shots weren't falling, and while Texas was blowing them away on the boards. You do have to wonder, however, how long Luke Harangody, Kyle McAlarney and Tory Jackson (64 of their 81 points, 22 of their 33 rebounds, and 12 of their 17 assists) can carry this team. One of these days, two of those three will go cold, and it's going to be a long day. Or what if one of them gets injured? The Big East is just so ultra competitive that I just see way too small of a margin of error for these guys. That said, they're a really good team that is unquestionably one of the top teams in the country. At this point, they're in the 1 seed discussion. They've got to be after a win like this. For Texas, it's easy to get discouraged after this loss follows right on the heels of a big Kansas win. They're suddenly aware that the Big 12 isn't going to be the cakewalk that they thought it might be. But that said, they can take solace in the fact that they played poorly and still only lost by one point to a very elite team on top of its game. A.J. Abrams is arguably the best three-pointer shooter on this side of Stephen Curry, and he was only 5-for-16 here. He'll generally shoot a lot better than that, and Texas will be fine. They're still the prohibitive favorites in the Big 12.

#18 Florida 86, Washington 84
It was very important for Florida to hang on to the win here, as you never want to go home after an 0-2 performance at a preseason tournament. The defense obviously wasn't what it could have been, but Washington was also just shooting out of their minds. The Huskies shot 60% from the field, led by 5-for-5 three-point shooting out of Justin Dentmon. But Florida has a lot of scorers, and they hung in there and pulled out the important win. For the Gators, it's now time to relax a little bit. The out-of-conference schedule is pretty easy the rest of the way, and even the generally easy SEC schedule is somewhat back-loaded. In other words, Florida should win a whole lot of games over the next two months. The Washington Huskies, on the other hand, are reeling right now. They're 2-3, and know that even a great performance wasn't enough to beat a good-but-not-great Gators team. If Washington intends to make a run at an at-large bid, I'd really like to see them go undefeated until the Pac-10 season starts. The only real tests are at home, and none of them are too intimidating: Oklahoma State and Portland State probably being the two toughest. Washington needs to prove that they can take care of business and take advantage of a weakened Pac-10.

Nebraska 71, Saint Louis 57
Nebraska shot out of their minds (59% from the field) and earned a very nice early season win. The Cornhuskers obviously haven't had too many big basketball seasons lately, but you have to like the solid way that they've started the season. At the moment, they're 4-0 with wins over two solid mid-majors (at TCU, and here against Saint Louis). Nebraska has two more big tests before the Big 12 season starts, with Creighton coming to town this weekend, and then a game at Arizona State on December 7th. But to me, the real test is whether Nebraska can win the games that they're supposed to win. They usually get some good wins each season, but what kills them are the bad losses. If Nebraska can take care of business and win the rest of their out-of-conference games (excluding the Creighton and Arizona State games, neither of which would be bad losses), then you have got to consider them a legitimate at-large threat. That would put them, at worst, 11-2 heading into Big 12 play. Also, while the Big 12 should be fairly strong this year, Nebraska got a bit lucky with their Big 12 schedule (in my opinion). There's no reason they can't win 20 games this season. For Saint Louis, they really suffered again from the fact that they don't have a go-to guy offensively. When they need a basket, they just don't have that guy. I don't know who the leader is on this team. They still have that Boston College win in their pocket, but they're going to need to show a little bit more consistency before we can take them too seriously as at-large contenders.