College Basketball’s Crazy First Weekend of February
This past weekend was not just any ordinary weekend in college basketball. In 161 games played, stats of all sorts were produced in just a span of two days.
This all took place within a period of 48 hours during the first weekend of February in 2014.
This past weekend 18 games needed overtime to determine a winner, while 35 games were decided by just 3 points or less.
Eleven of the Top 25 teams in the AP poll lost over the weekend. Starting from the top, No. 1 Arizona was defeated by California. Newly named No. 1 Syracuse and No. 3 Wichita State remain unbeaten; with one surviving overtime against Duke and one rallying from a deficit of 15 points to win.
Duke had 89 points, but still lost, while Virginia managed just 48 points in a victory.
Texas, in the Big 12, won for the four straight game, versus a team ranked in the top 25. The Longhorns beat Kansas thanks to holding freshman sensation Andrew Wiggins to only seven points, just three days prior to that game he scored 29, his career high.
Utah this season has lost 7 games by a total of just 26 points.
Evansville led Wichita State by 15 points but could not send the Shockers to their first defeat. Six times this season Wichita State has rallied from 10 points or more down to win.
Both Baylor and Georgetown entered the weekend with losing streaks of five games, both exited the weekend having defeated a team in the Top 10.
The Texas A&M hoops team was held to just 36 points by the Florida Gators. The Johnny Manziel football Aggies scored more than 36 points on 11 occasions this past season. The win moved Florida to 19-2, the Gators won the national championship the last two seasons they started with that record.
No. 1 ranked Arizona lost their game with California on a Golden Bears basket with only 0.9 seconds remaining in the game.
Weber State lost to Sacramento State 78-75. The game was decided by two 3-point baskets over the final second of play. Weber hit theirs to tie the score with only 0.7 left. Dylan Garrity then heaved a shot 75 feet at the buzzer to win it for Sacramento State.
A new career 3-point record was set by Travis Bader of Oakland who hit his 461st over the weekend.
St. Johns started their Big East schedule with five straight losses and now has won four of their past five.
San Diego State is now 8-0 in conference play in the Mountain West, its best conference start in 93 years.
Michigan started Sunday undefeated for seven weeks, but lost to Indiana whose Yogi Ferrell hit 7 of his 8 three-pointers. Ferrell missed 12 of this previous 15 from three-point territory in his previous three games at home.
Syracuse is No. 1 and Virginia No. 2 in the ACC. Duke is in third. In the six plus decades of the ACC, both North Carolina and Duke have never finished lower than third.
This was just one Saturday and Sunday of NCAA men’s basketball but with the number and stats to fill an entire statistician’s notebook.
