Michigan Holds Off Creighton

I hope everybody had a Happy Turkey Day. I certainly ate my share of food with my family. I also watched a heck of a lot of sports, mostly college ball, although a bit of football as well. There were a lot of good games today, and so let's get to a few of the early games first:

#16 Michigan 83, Creighton 76, OT
Michigan didn't look good here, but showed a lot of poise in overcoming a late deficit to hold off a good Creighton squad. Manny Harris was a beast, going for 20 points, 11 assists and 9 rebounds, and the rest of the starting lineup all looked good. But guys like DeShawn Sims, Zach Novak and Laval Lucas-Perry are all established quality Big Ten players. The question I have is where the depth is. Michigan basically went with a six man rotation here. They're going to have to get more production out of the young players on their bench or they're going to wear out during the brutal Big Ten season. As for Creighton, they need to look at the positives from this game: they played terribly and still took a Top 20 team to overtime. P'Allen Stinnett fouled out with only 7 points on 10 shots from the field, which is one of the worst games I've ever seen him have. Creighton now gets a great chance tomorrow (or today, depending on what time zone you live in) to beat another potential bubble team in Xavier. They've got to get at least one win out of their three games in Orlando or they'll really have an uphill battle to get into the at-large discussion later this season.

Marquette 71, Xavier 61
Speaking of Xavier, it's hard to draw too many conclusions from this game because of how poor these two teams played. There were a lot of turnovers and a lot of ugly, forced shot attempts. Xavier's star sophomore, Jordan Crawford, came into this game averaging over 21 points per game this season, and promptly shot 4-for-20 from the field here. Other than Lazar Hayward for Marquette and Jason Love for Xavier, I wasn't impressed with anybody. But this is a key win for a Marquette team that is trying to prove that they're actually a legitimate middle-of-the-pack Big East team this season. It's hard to argue with a 5-0 start, although Xavier is the first good team they've beaten. We'll get a better idea of where they stand when they play Michigan in about 12 hours (noon eastern time). As for Xavier, they don't necessarily have the same degree of urgency as the team they're playing next (Creighton) because their conference is better. There will be plenty of chances for building a resume and building up the computer numbers in the Atlantic 10. But I still feel like they've got to have the win over Creighton, because their final opponent in the Old Spice Classic could potentially be Iona, which would not be a resume-building win. You don't want to leave a tournament like this without a single resume-building win.

Texas A&M 69, Clemson 60
You saw in this game why Clemson misses Terrence Oglesby, and his ability to hit clutch threes and to stretch the floor. It kept feeling like they were in a position to make a run to even up the game, but they didn't have anybody on the floor who could hit a three. The team as a whole went 3-for-18 from behind the arc (not that the 34% from the field or 61% from the line was much to brag about either). Also, while Trevor Booker is still a beast, his numbers are down from last season and he hasn't even had to play ACC opponents yet. It's clear that he's struggling with all of the hands in his face - something he wasn't used to when opponents had to stretch their defenses out to keep tabs on Oglesby. One thing that Clemson needs to do is to advance the development of Noel Johnson, who has the ability to be an offensive spark, and to open things up underneath for Booker. Although considering how many great starts have turned into terrible finishes the last few seasons, maybe it's a good sign that Clemson is starting off the year slow. Maybe this means they'll finish strong late in the ACC season for once? I'm not sure if it works that way. Anyway, Texas A&M has a couple of returning players that all Big 12 fans know and respect (like Donald Sloan), but I was impressed with the emergence of B.J. Holmes, who was deep on the bench last season, but absolutely torched Clemson's backcourt, getting to the line for 12 free throws, hitting 11 of them and scoring 20 (leading all scorers for both teams). This goes down as a very nice win for the Aggies, but they get a chance to really make a splash this afternoon against West Virginia. A win over West Virginia would give A&M the best start of any Big 12 team other than Kansas or Texas.