There are no striking changes in the standings this week, so let me just say that it was nice to hear so many people criticize the Cousy Award for omitting Jordan Taylor from its list of ten finalists. Yay, assist-to-turnover ratio! (I’m actually not that big of a fan.) But also, for scoring 30 points […]

I wanted the premise of this piece to be that people were thinking the Spartans could really use Korie Lucious about now. It turns out almost nobody is making that case. However, there’s still the notion that for tourney purposes, Michigan State must now be judged without Lucious, which in this case is unfair. Tom […]

There’s now a little separation for the top two in the race for the kPOY. Sullinger and Fredette are 1 and 2 for the second consecutive week but there’s some space between them and 3rd place. This week, for each player, I’d like to highlight the number of his made shots that have been assisted […]

Last season, if you’ll recall, I asked a question regarding the tournament selection process: Let’s say you were given the following task: From a list of 320 college basketball teams, pick the 34 best. Not the most deserving, not the most difficult to play against, not the ones with the best athletes or the cutest […]

Jared Sullinger takes back first place after a week in which his team made a case as the best in the nation while he poured in 27 and 16 at Illinois. Sullinger didn’t post huge numbers in last night’s rout of Purdue (which isn’t considered in the standings below), going for 17 and 7 in […]

A few conference games have been played and the elusive dream of going unbeaten in conference play has ended for most. By my count there are 23 teams undefeated in conference (although this includes Princeton and Penn who have not yet played a conference game). Last season, only Butler could achieve this task. With Belmont’s […]

Within approximately 24 hours both The Sporting News’ Mike DeCourcy and CBS’s Seth Davis expressed a similar sentiment via twitter to oddly identical questions. @mikevukkdka What is biggest thing that will keep Pitt from the Final 4?”—Can they generate scoring chances to beat elite D, shot clock? – @tsnmike Not scoring enough, fast enough RT […]

The kPOY continues to gain traction in the nation’s basketball psyche, as evidenced by a link on Wikipedia to an entry yet to be created. Now, I just need a real trophy. (Maybe a pizza trophy?) In other news, we have a new leader. However, since the race from first through fifth is so tight, […]

I’ve been working on another project this week. So I present these without comment. More chit-chat next week! (Standings through Sunday’s games.) 1. Jared Sullinger, Ohio St. (Rating of .503, last week: 1st) 2. JaJuan Johnson, Purdue (.499, LW: 4th) 3. Jon Leuer, Wisconsin (.491, LW: 5th) 4. Nolan Smith, Duke (.486, LW: 7th) 5. […]