Some Great College Hoops

Duke 70, Florida State 57. The Devils had a great first twelve minutes, enjoying a 16-0 run and jumping out to a 30-13 lead against the Seminoles. But people that have followed this rivalry knew that Florida State, who has played Duke exceedingly tough recently, would make a run. And they did. The lead was 12 at the half, and then Florida State stormed all the way back with great defense, tremendous toughness, and heart to actually take the lead at 54-53 with under 5 to play. And this is when playing Pitt a month ago in the Garden came in handy. It seems that Duke got out toughed in New York City, and it was happening again last night. But Duke is growing and getting better. And they punched back. Hard. Duke closed the game on a 16-2 run to win a game that was truly much closer than the score would indicate. The late game heroics were led by Freshman Kyle Single, who hit a monster, monster three to give Duke the lead again. And then Greg Paulus, who has been simply terrible for the first 35 minutes, just took over down the stretch with a steal, two lay-ups, and one sucker punch to the chin (he is getting more under the skin of his opponents than ever, like Bobby Hurley used to do). John Scheyer was sensational all night long, not only scoring but also doing a lot of little things to help his team. And Gerald Henderson played a consistently solid game. I would rather see Henderson play consistently than make a spectacular play of two and then disappear. The Devils move to 2-0 in the conference and did not lose any ground to....

North Carolina 83, Georgia Tech 82. For the second time in three ACC contests, North Carolina got away with their life, winning by a point when Georgia Tech missed two shots at the win on the game's final possession. Does not matter how good you are (unless you play in a crappy conference like Conference USA, Memphis), it is not easy to go on the road and win in conference play (KU will likely have its hands full with a Missouri team that lost last night to Iowa State this weekend. Just watch). Bottom line is that championship teams find a way to win these games, and UNC has done just that twice in a row. Tyler Hansbrough is so tough that, even if you do not like him cause you are a Duke fan, you have to admire this kid's game, and most specifically, his competitiveness and toughness. He is just a fantastic college player. And anyone that thinks he will not be a good pro because he is not tall enough is dead wrong. This kid will be drafted later than he should, and some team will be very, very happy they got him. UNC will be a very tough out in the ACC and, more importantly, in March.

In the Missouri Valley Conference, who thought the huge match-up this weekend would not involve Southern Illinios. Or Creighton. Or Bradley. No, instead the joint will be jumping in Des Moines on Saturday when the Redbirds of Illinois St (6-0 in the conference) come calling on the Drake Bulldogs (6-0 in MVC play). Drake was able to win on the road last night against always tough Bradley, despite playing without the leading scorer ion the conference, guard Josh Young. I guess Dr. Tom Davis' son actually learned how to coach from the old man.

Villanova looked like it was going to lose to the mighty Depaul Blue Demons for the second time in about two weeks but used a 15-0 second half spurt to salvage a regular season split with the boys from Chicago. Villanova is not looking great right now, and we need Rudofker to give us some insight on this squad as the head into the heart of conference play.

Back Friday with some discussion on the NFL Championship games this weekend.