Last Night in College Basketball: March is Here With Upset After Upset

Men’s college basketball, women’s college basketball – there’s no shortage of college ball, every night. Don’t worry, we’re here to help you figure out what you missed but shouldn’t have. Here are all the best moments from last night in college basketball. UCLA picks up another top-10 win UCLA has had a weird season, starting out the year as a top-5 favorite in the Big Ten, going 8-3 in non-conference games and then getting pushed around quite a bit during conference play. Something has shifted of late, however. The Bruins defeated then-No. 10 Illinois in overtime on Feb. 21, downed USC by 19 points and, on Tuesday, defeated No. 9 Nebraska by 20 points, 72-52. It’s not that UCLA has been perfect — there was a loss to Minnesota mixed in there, too — but two top-10 wins to push the Bruins’ conference record to 12-7 and move it into double-bye territory for the Big Ten tournament is huge. And seemed unlikely not all that long ago. UCLA led throughout, and continued to pile on as the game went. It was up 37-24 after the first half, and then played a 35-28 second half. The Bruins’ largest lead was 21, and they finished up 20. UCLA didn’t have any massive offensive performances that keyed its victory, didn’t dominate in the paint or take advantage of a gaudy turnover total or opportunities for free throws. It just kept Nebraska down with its defense, limiting the Huskers to 39% shooting overall and just 5 of 24 from deep — that’s a problem for Nebraska, which has a very 3-based offense: it’s 23rd in the nation in 3-pointers made and 21st in attempts. While it only hits 35.2% of those, volume has solved for that, but Nebraska shot just 21% from beyond the arc on Wednesday. Sophomore guard Trent Perry led UCLA’s offense, with 20 points, 7 rebounds and 4 assists in his 38 minutes, but the most notable thing was how well the Bruins controlled the ball. They made just 8 turnovers while logging 17 assists — it wasn’t a flashy offensive performance, but it was disciplined and organized, and Nebraska could not keep up with it. A huge win for UCLA not just because of Big Ten seeding, but it helps move the Bruins just that much further away from the bubble and into sure thing territory for March Madness. Again, that wasn’t a given just a few weeks ago, but it’s amazing what a pair of top-10 wins can do for your Wins Above Bubble rating. ASU upsets No. 14 Kansas Given it’s March and we’re on the cusp of Power 5 conference tournaments and March Madness itself, you would think we would all have a handle on what Kansas is about at this point. This is a team that has played ranked opponents like UConn hard even without star freshman Darryn Peterson, even beating some of them, including then-undefeated Arizona. It defeated Iowa State by 21 points, handled BYU well before the Richie Saunders injury, snuck by Texas Tech and downed Houston. However! Kansas has also lost to UCF and West Virginia. Cincinnati upset the Jayhawks, 84-68. Arizona got revenge by crushing them, 84-61, despite Peterson being in the lineup and playing well that time. And now, unranked Arizona State upset No. 14 Kansas 70-60. The Jayhawks could be national champions; they could also lose in the round of 64. Peterson had yet another rough shooting night, going just 3-for-18 from the field and 2-for-11 from 3, cracking double-digits thanks to picking up multiple trips to the stripe. He still had 10 rebounds, 4 assists and 5 steals, but at some point there is reason to wonder about his shot selection: over his last 10 games, Peterson is shooting 39% over his last 10 games, and not just because of 3s, as he’s hitting just 41.4% of his 2-pointers, as well. Another way to put it: Peterson is averaging a GameScore of 10.8 over that stretch, and as John Hollinger’s metric is based on a scoring scale to make it easy to digest, 10 is considered an average performance. For further comparison, Peterson shot 50.4% over his first nine games, and 59.4% from 2 while averaging 22.2 points per game. “Why isn’t this more about what Arizona State did well?” That’s kind of the problem here. The Sun Devils shot 32%. They were outrebounded 55-43. They had a single-point advantage on points off turnovers, and gave up a ton of fast-break points. However, Arizona State led the entirety of the game and even built up a 20-point lead at the half, and continued to draw fouls from Kansas, enough to make 24 free throws on 80% shooting: that, more than anything, led to a win here. But the discipline that allowed Arizona State to make up for its poor shooting while not giving Kansas an out on its own does matter, and it’s why the Sun Devils were victorious. Now. Arizona State is on the wrong side of the bubble, but a W over Kansas could be a help there, so long as it’s followed by Big 12 tournament victories. Still, nothing is guaranteed for the Sun Devils, either. Texas Tech goes down Sure, just a couple of days ago all the talk was about how impressive Texas Tech had remained despite losing JT Toppin to an ACL tear. But this is the Big 12, and the only constant is the chaos: on Tuesday night, the No. 10 Red Raiders fell to unranked TCU 73-65 to reinforce that point. Texas Tech has been great without Toppin, yes, but losing your leading scorer has downstream effects. Here, sophomore guard Christian Anderson had an off night, going 4-for-11 from the field and scoring 11 points when he averages 19.1. Senior guard Donovan Atwell and freshman guard Jaylen Petty helped make up for that with 19 and 17 points, respectively, but there was still an overall lack of scoring a void where Toppin’s rebounds should be, as well. With TCU having no such troubles — junior forward Xavier Edwards had a 20-point, 12-rebound double-double, sophomore forward David Punch had another 10 boards, while sophomore forward Micah Robinson and senior guard Jayden Pierre added another 29 combined points on 12-for-20 shooting — Toppin’s absence and Anderson’s off night were all the more keenly felt. This isn’t to say that Texas Tech is doomed without him. It’s just that the margins are thinner than they were with him, and Anderson et al can’t afford an off night in a hotly contested Big 12, and after that, NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament. With TCU hovering on the right side of the bubble — but not by much — before this matchup, the win made it that much more likely that the Horned Frogs are playing in March Madness, too. Miami (OH) does it again Don’t worry, not every ranked team disappointed on Tuesday. There is the always reliable Miami (OH) to turn to in times of need. The No. 19 RedHawks continued their undefeated season with a 74-72 win over Toledo, becoming just the 15th team in Division I men’s basketball to ever reach a 30-0 record in the process. With just 24 seconds remaining, Toledo shrank Miami (OH)’s lead to just 2 points thanks to a layup from freshman guard Will James Jr. That would be the final points the Rockets would score, however, as on their final possession Leroy Blyden Jr. turned the ball over to sophomore guard Luke Skaljac, securing the RedHawks’ dub. Four Miami (OH) starters scored between 11 and 19 points, while the team shot 12-for-32 from 3 and 50% overall. The RedHawks lead throughout, and while its largest lead of 13 was eventually cut to a single bucket by the end, the defense held and didn’t relinquish the win. There have been a lot of close wins for Miami (OH) this year, yes, but the RedHawks have pulled it out every single time. That’s not nothing. This win also set a conference record, as the RedHawks are the first team in Mid-American history to win 17 conference games in a row. It’s worth pointing out, too, that while the MAC isn’t a power conference and is less competitive than they are, Miami still came into this game already 32nd in Wins Above Bubble and nearly top-50 in the NCAA Evaluation Tool. This is a tournament-caliber team, even if the undefeated record is maybe overstating things a bit. Rice sets program record win streak Rice won its 22nd-straight game on Tuesday, defeating Charlotte 63-56. That’s a new program record for the Owls, who are also 17-0 in American Conference play, four games up on second-place East Carolina with one regular-season game left to go. It also marked the 100th-career win for coach Lindsay Edmonds, who took over the program in 2021. The Owls had built up a 16-point lead in this road game, but that was whittled down, especially in the fourth quarter when Charlotte outscored Rice 16-12. The Owls were able to hang on thanks to strong games from senior center Shelby Hayes, who had an 11-point, 13-rebound double-double with 2 assists and a block, and a 23-point performance from senior guard Dominique Ennis: while Rice as a whole struggled to shoot, finishing at 39%, Ennis sank 10 of 15 and added 3 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals, to boot. Rice remains the lone American Conference team to lock in a seed for the upcoming tournament, though Memphis, Wichita State and UAB have already been eliminated from contention. The other nine spots are up for grabs, but after the Owls play UTSA on Saturday to end the regular season, Rice will get to sit and wait out most of the tournament thanks to a bye to the semifinals. Manley scores 32 in Sun Belt tourney The first round of the Sun Belt tournament kicked off on Tuesday, and we already have an early upset. Bottom-seed Louisiana took on 11-seed Georgia State in the 14-team tourney opening round, and won thanks to a huge performance from junior guard Mikaylah Manley. A transfer from Southern Mississippi who scored 13.4 points per game this season, Manley scored a career-best 32 points in 40 minutes, with 9 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 steals. It was the top performance by any D-I women’s players on Tuesday by GameScore (25.5), and she also led them all in actual scoring, too. The Ragin’ Cajuns needed every one of those points, too, they beat Georgia State 71-66. Manley didn’t shoot particularly well in terms of accuracy — she was 9-for-23 from the field — but the volume and an 11-for-12 performance from the stripe made up for that. Plus, it’s not like her teammates were doing much better: the team as a whole shot 38%, but that was still better than what Georgia State managed. Tanner lifts Vandy in OT Vanderbilt escaped being upset by Ole Miss, 89-86, first by coming back in the second half and bringing the game to overtime with a pair of free throws with 26 seconds left in the game. Once in overtime was where the real magic happened, though, because it’s there that sophomore guard Tyler Tanner elevated his game. Tanner was already the game’s leading scorer when OT began, with 24 points. In overtime, though, he dropped another 10 of the 13 Vandy scored, matching Ole Miss’ output on his own. Overall, Tanner shot 11-for-19 with 3 triples and 9-for-12 from the line, while adding 5 rebounds, 7 assists and 5 steals. Just a huge night for Division I’s leading scorer on Tuesday. It also made up for an overall lackluster offensive effort from the Commodores; non-Tanner shooters were just 18-for-56, 32%, and 6-for-26 from 3. Tanner led in points, assists and steals while finishing tied for second in rebounds. As said: a huge night. BYU goes down again Freshman forward AJ Dybantsa scored 23 points. Sophomore guard Robert Wright III added 21. Freshman guard Aleksej Kostic contributed 14 off the bench. That should have most of the makings of a win, but the problem is that BYU didn’t get nearly anything from the other seven players that played minutes against Cincinnati in a 90-68 defeat. BYU is no longer ranked — the Cougars have now lost four of five games since senior Richie Saunders had his season ended by a torn ACL — and the main issue is that there just isn’t enough Dybantsa and Wright to go around. They have to do almost everything on offense now, and there is only so much energy to go around for the defensive side of things, too. Dybantsa also has to be a higher volume shooter without as many weapons for opposing defenses to cover on the court: he might have led with 23 points, but he also shot just 33% and hit a single trey. BYU will still make it to March Madness, but its chances of sticking around very long in that tournament seem to go down with every defeat. This was a promising team, but it was already not a given that it would take down the elite opposition even with Saunders; its problems have only gotten worse since losing him. As for Cincinnati, every starter scored between 12 and 18 points, with senior forward Baba Miller picking up a double-double (15 points, 12 rebounds) and sophomore center Moustapha Thiam just missing one (16/9). The bench didn’t add much, but the Bearcats also didn’t ask it to: all but one starter played at least 32 minutes, and the team as a whole shot 50%. Cincinnati is still on the wrong side of the bubble, with a WAB score of -0.82, but a strong Big 12 tournament could get the Bearcats where they need to be for March.