Pitt Takes Care Of UConn

#6 Pittsburgh 78, #4 UConn 63
It's rare to have a team as overrated in the polls this late in the season as UConn is. Coming into this game both Sagarin and Pomeroy rated them as close to the 40th best team in the nation, and I had them as a 7 seed in the Tournament. If you're wondering why a 10-0 team that beat Michigan State and Kentucky was only the 30-40th best team in the country, it's because you always should discount a little bit what happens at these early season tropical tournaments, and UConn won those two games on back-to-back days in Maui when Kemba Walker was playing out of his mind. Since returning to the contiguous 48 states UConn has had victories that include New Hampshire by 7 and Coppin State by 12. And people forget that in their first game in Maui they barely escaped Wichita State by 4 points. The key to beating UConn is making Kemba Walker inefficient and keeping them Alex Oriakhi from creating second chance points. Walker did get 31 points in this game, but it came inefficiently (10-for-27 from the field), and Pitt won the boards. UConn had four more offensive rebounds, but they had a lot of long offensive rebounds from their guards. In the paint, Pitt's frontline outmuscled UConn (Gary McGhee most of all). Pitt's offense could use improvement, but they shoot well from the mid-range, so they'll score against just about anybody. In my opinion, Pitt is the narrow favorite in the Big East, with Georgetown and Syracuse as their top contenders. They will head to Georgetown on January 9th, and get Syracuse at home on January 17th. UConn shouldn't have too much trouble with South Florida on Friday evening, but then they have a tough game at Notre Dame on January 4th.

Richmond 69, Seton Hall 61
The bad news continues to roll in for Seton Hall. Star Jeremy Hazell, already out because of a broken left wrist, was shot at home over Christmas weekend. The injuries aren't supposed to be too serious, but it's looking more and more like Hazell will try to just take a redshirt for the season. I do think Kevin Willard is a good coach who can recruit well, but obviously he's having trouble with this older squad handed to him in his first year at Seton Hall. He might need a year or two to clean house and bring in his guys - right now they just don't look at all like a Tournament team. Seton Hall is now 6-6, and will begin Big East play at home against USF, which is about as easy as it will get from here on out. They have to play Syracuse (twice), Georgetown, Pitt and Louisville (three of those five games will be on the road) before the month of January ends. As for Richmond, they have quietly plowed through their schedule, and are arguably the second best team in the Atlantic Ten with wins over Purdue and Seton Hall. They have two mediocre losses (Iona and Georgia Tech), but it's possible that both of those will turn into RPI Top 100 losses, which will really help their at-large chances. They play at home tomorrow against Wake Forest, where they should be heavily favored and would be very damaged with an upset loss. They open A-10 play against Charlotte on January 5th.

Penn State 69, Indiana 60
Indiana's season started strong - they actually looked like a bubble team for a while. But things have fallen apart quickly with three consecutive losses to Northern Iowa, Colorado and Penn State. To not take care of business at home against the worst team (in my opinion) in the Big Ten after those two bad losses is really bad. The problem for Indiana all season has been defense, particularly in the paint where they're small. Tom Crean historically likes to go guard heavy and hasn't ever really focused much on big men, but his Indiana teams have been even worse in this regard than his Marquette teams. Indiana's entire frontcourt (starters plus bench) combined to score 5 points and had 9 rebounds in this game. I just don't see how Indiana is going to guard the elite frontcourt players that all of the top six Big Ten teams (Ohio State, Michigan State, Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin) bring to the table. Indiana is going to need to get to at least 11-7 in Big Ten play to make the Tournament, and they are going to have to recover quickly with Ohio State next (Friday evening), then road games at Minnesota (January 4th) and Northwestern (January 9th). They also head to Wisconsin and Michigan State before January ends.