Morning News: ACC/Big Ten Challenge Tips Off; Also, Boise State Beats Utah

Marshall Plumlee and Caris LeVert were two of the breakout players from last night

#10 Duke 79, #22 Michigan 69 In one sense, this game was exactly what we all expected. With Nik Stauskas nowhere near 100% and with an atrocious start to the night shooting, the Wolverines easily could have rolled over and lost by 25 or 30 points. But they hung tough, and got a really nice performance from Caris LeVert (24 points) en route to only losing by 10. LeVert might be the most improved player in the Big Ten. He's been fantastic this season.

For Duke, there are two stories. First, their defense came along from New York. After a horrible start to the season defensively, the Blue Devils cleaned a lot of those issues up during the NIT, and they looked very strong here again. A significant reason was the other story of the game: Marshall Plumlee! Plumlee only had 2 points and 3 rebounds, but that doesn't begin to describe his physical presence on both ends of the floor (he's huge, and a bundle of energy). After basically not playing this entire season, it's interesting to see how Coach K has adjusted his lineup to deal with his big man deficiencies. Will this be a consistent strategy going forward or was this just a one-game adjustment to deal with Michigan's bigs? We'll find out over the next few weeks.

Early Hot Shooting Leads Minnesota Over Florida State The Seminoles defense was being roundly criticized on social media during their 71-61 loss to Minnesota, but I don't really think that's fair. The Gophers hit 50% of their threes in the first half, and 3P% defense is mostly luck. The Gophers were held to only 29.7% shooting on twos, with Florida State piling on 9 blocks. But without a great offense, Florida State is always going to be vulnerable to teams that happen to get hot behind the arc.

The Gophers are always a perplexing team, but they absolutely needed this win after being shut out in Maui. Assuming that they avoid any terrible losses between now and the start of the Big Ten season, a 9-9 conference record should be enough for that at-large bid, unless they completely fail to collect a big scalp or two.

Meanwhile, the Seminoles fall to 1-3 against Pomeroy Top 100 opponents. They're a good team, but they might not be consistent enough offensively to earn an at-large bid. They have an interesting pair of games coming up against Charlotte and UMass in a couple of weeks. Wins there would put them in a really nice position for an at-large bid heading into ACC play, while a loss or two could make it difficult for the Seminoles to put together an at-large quality won/loss record (with just one more loss they'll need to go 10-8 in ACC play to get to 18-12 overall).

Boise State Begins To Grab National Attention Boise State was a team I really liked preseason, and I currently have them sitting as an 8 seed in my latest bracket projection. And they came into this game 6-0, but without a win over anybody but a cupcake. That latter fact changed as Boise State moved to 7-0 with a 69-67 win over Utah. Boise State doesn't have any stars (their primary playmaker is Derrick Marks, but nobody would confuse Marks with a star basketball player), but their team offense is quietly very efficient. The question is going to be how well that efficiency carries over to better opponents. They looked good against Utah, but jump into the deep end next week at Kentucky. I'll be more interested in their following game, at home against St. Mary's. If Boise State is going to be a Tournament team, that's the type of game you want to see them win.

Meanwhile, Utah is clearly significantly improved this season. Larry Krystkowiak has got several guys who can get to the basket this season, which was something he really didn't have last season. It will probably be another season before they can seriously contend for an at-large bid, but don't be shocked if they find a way to get to 9-9 in Pac-12 play this season.

Iowa Holds Off Notre Dame This game wasn't supposed to be so close, but neither team played a whole lot of defense in Iowa's 98-93 win over Notre Dame (the two teams combined for 1.34 PPP). The best news for Iowa is that they got a much more balanced offensive performance than they'd seen most of the season, getting 20 points (and 7 rebounds and 7 assists) from Aaron White, along with 17 from Jarrod Uthoff. In the scoring explosion, Roy Devyn Marble had a relatively quiet 17 points.

The Irish will be happy with how good they looked offensively (20 assists to only 7 turnovers), though offense isn't what is going to hold them back this season. Defense is the concern. The Irish are now allowing 1.02 PPP, which might not be good enough for an at-large bid. That will have to improve as the season goes along.

Syracuse Crushes Indiana, Like We All Expected Indiana looked completely lost against the Syracuse zone during their embarrassing 61-50 loss in the NCAA Tournament last season. It was their only offensive performance below 0.80 PPP all season long. Well, that team actually had a bunch of good shooters... this year's team has one. All signs pointed to another offensive apocalypse for the Hoosiers, and they delivered, scoring only 0.90 PPP in a 69-52 loss to the Orange. The story for the Syracuse offense continues to be Tyler Ennis and Trevor Cooney. It's hard to believe that Cooney's hot shooting will hold up for an entire season, but that duo has certainly looked really good so far this season.