Tuesday News and Notes

A shocker in the Big East last night- Leaving aside the idiotic court storming, this was a banner night for Georgetown. A 42-19 lead at the half after leading 15-11 with ten minutes gone, holding Villanova to .59 points per trip in the first half, and allowing no real hint of a comeback all added up to a 78-58 win over the best team in the conference. The win probability so favored the Wildcats that it didn't hit even until after than ten minute mark. This is the same Georgetown team that Xavier rolled by 17 and the same Villanova team that just crushed the Musketeers. It's quite a conference.

Speaking of comebacks and upsets- Last week saw some pretty extreme swings. Most notable has to be LSU coming back from down eight with 1:25 to play in overtime. Ken Pomeroy's week in review also touches on the three biggest upsets and two other improbably comebacks. The lesson, as always, is to watch college basketball incessantly.

The packline works perfectly!- In Virginia, anyway. This one is behind the ESPN paywall, but if you have a Magazine subscription you're in free. In short, Virginia suffocates teams on defense. Third in efficiency, fourth in effective field goal percentage, fourth in offensive rebound percentage, third in two point field goal percentage, 67th in three point percentage. All of that comes at the cost of forcing turnovers (314th) but it raises the question of why Xavier's execution of the same defense is so much worse.

Ohio State is not very good- Well, KenPom has them 22nd, just five spots ahead of Xavier, but Gary Parrish lays out the case for them being very overrated. I frankly think Gary is completely wrong here, but hating on OSU is never the wrong route to take.

And finally, the photos of the week- This is my favorite thing to click through from week to week. Both Buzz Williams and Brian Gregory appear here, both at the helms of teams that strive to be mediocre. We missed last week's installment, but you can find that here.