Entering this past week, the Big Ten was riding high as one of the best conferences in college basketball. The previous No. 1 team in the country — Arizona — lost to No. 9 Kansas and No. 16 Texas Tech in a week, dropping the Wildcats to No. 4 in the AP Poll.
Michigan moved up one spot to take over the mantle as the top team in the country. And the Wolverines solidified their case at No. 1 after No. 3 Houston also dropped a conference game against No. 6 Iowa State on Monday.
After riding an 11-game winning streak into a showdown against No. 3 Duke at Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C., Michigan came up short against the Blue Devils on Saturday. The second loss for Michigan this season dropped the Wolverines to No. 3 in the AP Poll on Monday.
Michigan loses to Duke, still in the Big Ten driver's seat
A 68-63 loss to the now-No. 1 team in the land isn’t a result to scoff at, but Michigan had chances to win this game Saturday night.
With 8:42 left in the second half, Duke freshman forward Cameron Boozer committed his fourth foul of the game, sending him to the bench. Even though the Wolverines were down by seven points — which was cut down to five after sophomore forward Morez Johnson Jr. made both free throws — Michigan had a chance to swing the game back in its favor without Boozer on the court.
However, the Wolverines could capitalize on their opportunity.
After those free throws, Michigan wouldn’t score another point in 2:40. With Boozer off the floor for just under four minutes, the Wolverines totaled six points. Duke had four.
After Boozer entered the game with 4:47 left on the clock, the Wooden Award leader went on to record seven more points, two rebounds and a block. Duke forwards Maliq Brown and Patrick Ngongba took the physicality to Michigan’s frontcourt without Boozer on the floor. Contributing a pair of blocks and a steal.
The Wolverines were downed by their inability to hit a 3-pointer all night. Michigan finished the game 6-for-25 (24%) from range, going 3-for-13 (23.1%) in the first half and 3-for-12 (25%) in the second half.
Graduate forward Yaxel Lendenborg started the game off hot, finishing the first half with 16 points, four rebounds and two assists. Lendenborg was 6-for-9 from the field and 2-for-4 from 3-point range when the halftime buzzer sounded. The UAB transfer rattled off 10 points in just two minutes near the start of the game by pushing the pace in a transition-friendly Michigan offense.
But Lendenborg had to pick up a more defensive role after junior center Aday Mara picked up his third foul with 7:08 remaining in the first half. The change in mentality hurt Lendenborg as he compiled only five points in the latter 20 minutes.
In a gritty, defensive contest, Michigan confirmed the belief that the Wolverines are one of the best teams in the country. But Michigan’s frontcourt is beatable, and the backcourt’s unreliability will hurt the Wolverines during big moments in March. Junior guard Elliot Cadeau finished with eight points, and graduate guard Nimari Burnett had zero.
However, Michigan still runs the Big Ten. The Wolverines own a 15-1 conference record this season and showed their value against No. 8 Purdue on Tuesday by winning 91-80.
Michigan effectively shut down Purdue star Braden Smith, holding the senior guard to a 4-for-13 performance from the field. Smith did go on to finish with 20 points — by making 10 free throws — but Purdue senior forward Trey Kaufman-Renn outmatched the Wolverines.
Kaufman-Renn finished with 27 points and 12 rebounds (7 offensive), however, his effort was countered by six Michigan players finishing with double-digit points.
Cadeau led the Wolverines with 17 points, while Lendeborg, freshman guard Trey McKenney and sophomore guard L.J. Cason all finished with 13. As a team, Michigan knocked down 13 3-pointers and 52.6% of its shots from the field.
With four games left in the regular season for Michigan, the Wolverines will have to dust themselves off and make sure this result doesn’t snowball. Last time Michigan lost, the team rattled off 11 straight wins. If the Wolverines were able to win 11 straight again, it would set them up with a spot in the Final Four.
UCLA stuns Illinois, but the Bruins still have work to do
4.9 seconds on the clock, and 94 feet to go.
UCLA faced an uphill task if the Bruins wanted to upset No. 10 Illinois at Pauley Pavilion in Los Angeles.
Senior guard Donovan Dent received the inbounds pass. He slipped past the first defender, split two more defenders at the free throw line and went up and under to score a game-winning layup. As Bill Raftery would say: “Onions!”
The buzzer-beater pushed the Bruins past the Fighting Illinois 95-94 in overtime. UCLA was resilient all game, coming back from being down 23 points — which was the largest comeback to beat a top-10 opponent in AP poll history.
UCLA opened the game the same way as its previous two losses. The Bruins couldn’t find the bottom of the net and scored just 10 points with 9:27 remaining in the first half, while it felt like Illinois couldn’t miss.
However, after the 9:12 mark in the first half, after junior forward/center Xavier Booker broke the Bruins’ offensive drought that had lasted almost seven minutes with a turnaround jumper, UCLA knocked down 13 of its final 14 shots heading into the locker room.
Then, Illinois started to miss its shots in the second half. The Fighting Illini were shooting 54.5% and 52.6% from the field and beyond the arc, respectively. However, the Bruins held them to 29.6% shooting from the field and 16.7% from the 3-point line in the second half.
Dent finished the game with 14 points scored, while also racking up 15 assists in his 42 minutes on the court. Junior guard/forward Eric Dailey Jr. led UCLA with 20 points, going an efficient 8 for 13 from the field.
With four games left on their schedule, the Bruins need to keep the momentum from this win into the rest of the season. UCLA is projected as an 11-seed or one of the last four teams in. The Bruins have three opportunities to improve their 3-7 Quadrant 1 record: Nebraska, USC and Minnesota. UCLA also has a Quadrant 2 game at home against USC on Tuesday.
Bruce Thornton shines during a 1-1 week for Ohio State
29.5 points, 6.5 rebounds, 5.0 assists and shooting over 52% from the field.
Those were the stats Ohio State senior guard Bruce Thornton produced last week, as the Buckeyes split a pair of games against ranked opponents.
He started the week off by dropping a team-high 27 points on No. 24 Wisconsin on Tuesday. Thornton also led Ohio State in rebounds (9) and assists (8). His performance was helped by junior forward Devin Royal chipping in 25 points (10-17 on field goals) to push the Buckeyes to a crucial 86-69 win.
The victory was a Quadrant 2 win for Ohio State, but it was the Buckeyes' best win this season. Ohio State enters the last four games of its season with a pair of Quadrant 1 games and two Quadrant 2 contests remaining. The Buckeyes own a 0-9 record in Q1 games, but they don’t have a loss worse than Quadrant 2.
Thornton has been instrumental for an Ohio State program that hasn’t been to the NCAA Tournament since he’s been in Columbus, Ohio. The fourth-year Buckeye has averaged 20.4 points (5th-best in the Big Ten), 5.4 rebounds and 3.9 assists per game this season, while shooting 54.6% from the field and 38.6% from behind the arc.
Thornton has produced throughout his collegiate career, culminating in becoming the third 2,000-point scorer in Ohio State history. He also passed Jerry Lucas and William Buford to move into third on the Ohio State all-state scoring list.
And his ranking on the list got even higher on Sunday, as 32 points against No. 15 Michigan State moved Thornton into second place, surpassing Herb Williams. Thornton has now totaled 2,037 points in his Ohio State career, only 59 points behind Dennis Hopson at 2,096.
Even with Thornton’s strong performance on Sunday, the Buckeyes couldn’t overcome poor shooting from behind the arc, falling 66-60 to the Spartans. As a team, Ohio State combined to shoot an abysmal 4 for 22 on its 3-point attempts. Thornton was 2 for 8, but finished 10 for 14 on his 2-point shots.
The Buckeyes needed a signature win this season, but the health of the roster is a negative trend. Freshman forward Amare Bynum was unable to practice on Saturday, while Royal was. Yet by gametime, Bynum was in the starting lineup, and Royal was on the bench. Bynum started and played 28:58, but neither player scored a point for the Buckeyes, who were already without second-leading scorer John Mobley Jr. for a third game due to a hand injury.
Thornton will keep producing for Ohio State, but the Buckeyes need to turn spectacular Thornton performances into wins. That mentality needs to start with Iowa on Wednesday and No. 8 Purdue on Sunday. After those two matchups, their final two games lighten up, as Ohio State goes on the road to Penn State and finishes the season against Indiana at the Schottenstein Center.
After a loss to Iowa, Nebraska is trending in a downward direction
20-0
That’s the record Nebraska had when entering its matchup against then-No. 3 Michigan on Jan. 27. The Cornhuskers pulled out clutch wins over Illinois and Michigan State to continue their dominant win streak.
However, since that 75-72 loss to the Wolverines, Nebraska has dropped contests to Illinois, Purdue and more recently, Iowa. At the same time, the Cornhuskers have only picked up wins against Rutgers, Northwestern and Penn State, three teams near the bottom of the Big Ten standings.
The Cornhuskers have lived by the 3, but have started dying by the 3 more recently, especially against the Hawkeyes on Tuesday night. Nebraska produced 24 attempts from behind the arc, but only five went in the basket. In a low-scoring, defense-first matchup, the Cornhuskers were downed 57-52 inside Carver-Hawkeyes Arena in Iowa City, Iowa.
Nebraska’s rebounding struggles continued to persist against Iowa. After out-rebounding Northwestern 40-24 in their previous game, the Cornhuskers came down with only six rebounds in the first 20 minutes. Nebraska finished the game with 24 boards, giving up 37 total and 12 offensive rebounds to the Hawkeyes.
The second-chance opportunities helped Iowa overcome a 17-for-51 (33%) performance from the field. Nebraska’s defense limited Bennett Stirtz for most of the game, but a stretch of plays throughout the middle of the second half pushed the momentum towards the Hawkeyes. Stirtz finished with a game-high 25 points after shooting 8 for 22 from the floor.
Nebraska rebounded from the Iowa loss with a dominant 87-64 win over Penn State on Saturday, but that performance was expected against a now 11-17 team.
Junior forward Pryce Sandfort was a bright spot in both games. He finished Saturday’s game with a new career-high of 33 points. 20 of them came in the first half after he connected on 5 of 6 3-point attempts. The 6-foot-7 sharpshooter also broke the single-season 3-pointer record in his home state and against his former team in Iowa.
After rising all the way to the No. 1 seed line, Nebraska has fallen to a projected three seed in recent weeks. Without a marquee game on its schedule, the Cornhuskers could fall even further down the NCAA Tournament seeding.
Nebraska still has matchups against Maryland and at home against Iowa, plus a Los Angeles road trip against USC and UCLA sandwiched between those two games. The Cornhuskers have a proven team-identity — shooting 3-pointers — but that identity might come back to hurt Nebraska in March.
One Game to Watch Every Day This Week
Tuesday Feb. 24
USC @ UCLA, 11 p.m., FS1
Wednesday Feb. 25
Ohio State @ Iowa, 9 p.m., BTN
Thursday Feb. 26
No. 13 Michigan State @ No. 8 Purdue, 8 p.m., Peacock/NBCSN
Friday Feb. 27
No. 3 Michigan @ No. 10 Illinois, 8 p.m., FOX
Saturday Feb. 28
No. 12 Nebraska @ USC, 4 p.m., BTN
Sunday March 1
No. 13 Michigan State @ Indiana, 3:45 p.m., CBS
