Upsets Continue: Jacksonville Over Florida

Jacksonville 71, #19 Florida 68, OT
I continue to talk about how many upsets we have this time of year. Elite teams are between the early season tournaments and the conference regular season, and they're more focused on exams and Christmas than they are about their lower tier opponents. But as much as I keep saying this, I continue to be shocked at just how bad the wave of upsets has been this year. Florida did physically dominate this game (an offensive rebounding percentage of 50%), but they were sloppy (17 turnovers) and couldn't hit a shot (35.6% from the field). Florida is still very much in a position to earn a high Tournament seed if they can win the SEC, and they were just two days off of a big win over Kansas State, but more likely they feel to me like a 5-7 seed team. To be fair, Jacksonville isn't as bad as people think they are. Jacksonville hasn't been relevant in the national college basketball scene in 40 years, but they did play in the NIT the past two seasons. They won the Atlantic Sun Conference outright in 2008-09, and they finished in a four-way tie atop the conference in 2009-10. I view Belmont as the favorite to take the conference this season, and I think Lipscomb is the most likely team to knock them off, but Jacksonville has to be a contender.

Arizona 72, NC State 62
I was impressed with Arizona's performance here. They were playing a true road game against an ACC team that has some blue chip raw talent, and their outside shots were not falling (4-for-16 behind the arc). So rather than continuing to jack up shots they took the ball to the basket, earning 30 free throws, which they hit at an 80% clip. Derrick Williams has been the offensive star for Arizona all season, but they got a nice game off the bench from Kevin Parrom (11 points on only 4 shots from the field - probably his best game in his short career at Arizona). The two big improvements for Arizona this year compared to last year are depth and maturity, and both were on display in this game. The Wildcats still aren't getting respect from the pollsters, but they're 10-2 with both losses coming to ranked teams. Both Sagarin & Pomeroy rate them as one of the 20 best teams in the nation. I don't think they're quite that good, but I certainly think they're a Tournament team. NC State, on the other hand, has not at all lived up to the preseason hype. They were overrated because of their highly rated freshman class - the reality is that only a handful of freshmen have a big impact on any given season, and unless you've got a Kyrie Irving or Jared Sullinger you're not going to be able to have a lot of success without a lot of production from returning players. NC State has improved over the past couple of weeks (CJ Leslie in particular), but they're still nowhere near a bubble team. At 6-4 without any quality wins the Wolfpack will likely have to go 10-6 in ACC play to make the Tournament.

Maine 74, Penn State 64
Speaking of upsets: another loss for a Penn State team that has really struggled this season. They're 7-4 with their best win coming over Duquesne, and this loss won't help either. And once again I don't blame Talor Battle, who continues to play great basketball (26 points on 7-for-13 shooting, along with 7 rebounds and only 2 turnovers). But he can't get any help at all from his teammates. In this game, all Nittany Lions players not named Talor Battle combined to shoot 19% on threes, 43% on twos and 56% at the line.... against Maine. Considering how frisky Iowa has been this season, Penn State really might be the worst team in the Big Ten. As for Maine, this is a nice win, but I don't see it leading to much. I still view the America East as a battle between Vermont and Boston University.