This past weekend will best be remembered as “upset weekend,”seeing how No. 1 Kentucky and No. 2 Ohio State were defeated on the road by Indiana and Kansas, respectively.
Let’s take a look and see how these upsets impacted this week’s power rankings.
Here are the Top 15 College Basketball Teams for the week of December 12th, 2011.
Sans Jared Sullinger, the Buckeyes were upended by the Kansas Jayhawks on Saturday, thanks in large part to 21 points from Kansas big man Thomas Robinson.
Would the Buckeyes have beaten Kansas had Sullinger played? Very likely. But yet the Buckeyes still gave the Jayhawks everything they could handle. Add in Kentucky’s loss to Indiana, and Ohio State is this week’s No. 1 team.
The Orangemen jump to this week’s No. 2 spot after Kentucky lost to then unranked Indiana on Saturday. Syracuse had wins this past week over Marshall and George Washington and do not play again until Saturday, when they travel to North Carolina State.
Thanks to an upset loss at Indiana on Saturday, the Wildcats fall to No. 3 in this week’s rankings after being in the top spot last week.
Even more worrisome than the loss on Saturday was the play of Terrence Jones. The sophomore had four points and only one rebound in 28 minutes of action.
After a dominating win against Evansville on Tuesday and a closer than expected win over Long Beach State on Saturday, the Tar Heels remain idle in the No. 4 spot this week.
The Blue Devils erased their ugly loss to Ohio State two weeks ago with dominating wins over Colorado State and Washington this past week. Duke will have plenty of time to catch their breath, seeing as they don’t play again until the 19th against N.C. Greensboro.
With two big wins over Fair. Dickinson and IUPUI, the Cardinals kept their undefeated record intact, moving up one spot to No. 6 in this week’s rankings. The Cardinals host Memphis next Saturday, in what should be one of the more intriguing games of the weekend.
Xavier kept their early season momentum going Saturday with a blowout victory over in-state rival Cincinnati. But the victory was overshadowed by the brawl that broke out at the end of the game, which saw Xavier’s Kenny Frease get decked by Cincinnati’s Yancy Gates.
So far the Gators have beaten the teams they were supposed to and have remained very competitive in their two losses against Ohio State and Syracuse.
In Friday’s win over Rider , Florida exhibited a brilliant inside-outside attack. The team’s usually stellar perimeter hit 14 three-pointers, and forward Patric Young scored 12 points and grabbed 10 rebounds.
The Gators host the Texas A & M Aggies next Saturday in a match-up between two top 25 squads.
If you asked the Kentuckys, Ohio States and North Carolinas of the world one team they wouldn’t want to face come tournament time, and it’s likely one of them would mention the Tigers, who are now 9-0 after wins over Navy and Villanova last week.
After losses to Duke and Kentucky earlier in the season, the Jayhawks were desperate for a victory over a ranked opponent. The desperation, for the time being, has subsided. Kansas upset Ohio State on Saturday, behind 21 points from Thomas Robinson.
After Baylor’s win over Northwestern last Sunday and their game against Bethune-Cookman on Wednesday, it will be 10 whole days in-between games for Perry Jones and the Bears.
The Huskies quietly had a good week, beating underrated Harvard, who was ranked No. 25 in the AP poll at the time, by 14 points. The Huskies have non-conference games against Holy Cross and Fairfield before starting their slate of Big East games on the 28th against South Florida.
It appears as though Marquette is one of those teams that are going to keep fans on the edge of their seats all season. The Golden Eagles pulled a victory from the jaws of defeat against the Washington Huskies Tuesday night, thanks to a three-pointer from Jae Crowder with just seconds remaining.
The Panthers exhibited their usual grit on the backboards in their Saturday win against Oklahoma State, outrebounding the Cowboys by 14. Pitt’s only loss this season came against Long Beach State in the middle of November.
With their dramatic upset victory over No. 1 ranked Kentucky on Saturday, thanks to Christian Watford’s three-pointer as time expired, the Indiana Hoosiers are now a perfect 9-0 on the season.
Joshua Sexton is a lifelong basketball fanatic, who watches as many games as possible. In addition, He has played and coached the game at the high school level. He has recently started writing about the game of basketball.
