Last Night in College Basketball: UConn is Finally Looking Dominant

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. UConn finally handling the Big East with ease UConn ranks No. 3 in the poll this week, as well as third in FOX Sports analyst Casey Jacobsen’s rankings. The Huskies finally broke their extended streak of coming in 8th in the NCAA Evaluation Tool, moving up to 7th in NET, thanks to a huge win over Creighton that saw Connecticut beat a Big East team by more than a few points. That last point is important, as there had just been too many close wins of late to consider UConn any kind of lock for a deep run in March, considering that the Big East is weaker in 2025-2026 than in most years. The Huskies keep on winning — their one loss remains against No. 1 undefeated Arizona — but an overtime win against Providence, beating Seton Hall 69-64, topping Georgetown by just 2 points, letting Villanova take them to OT, another close W against Providence… well, none of that engenders confidence, no matter UConn’s rankings. The good news for Huskies fans is that UConn seems to be coming out of whatever funk was causing them to play down to the competition for basically a month straight. Connecticut crushed Creighton, 85-58, and on Tuesday followed that up with a similarly dominant win over Xavier, which the Huskies won 92-60. No one player starred for UConn — junior guard Silas Demary Jr. led with 17 points — five players reached double-digits in scoring and two others fell a single point shy of joining them while the team as a whole shot 57%. Now, this does not mean everything is fixed and there is no cause for concern when it comes to UConn taking on other possible top seeds in March, but the further away the team gets from the idea of “could be easily upset in the Big East tournament,” the better. The first real test in a while — one meant to be a test — is the next game on the schedule, against No. 22 St. John’s. While the Red Storm struggled earlier in the season, they have bounced back in a big way as a post-roster refresh squad started to gel. Whatever the outcome — against a ranked conference opponent, on the road — it will say a lot about UConn’s overall chances this season. Miami (OH) does it again Miami (OH) is ranked No. 23. It now also has a 23-0 record after taking down Buffalo on Tuesday, which is not only very noticeably an undefeated one, but also represents the longest-ever win streak in Mid-American Conference history. It was not an easy victory, but the RedHawks already have a few games like that behind them in this streak. Miami (OH) would win, 73-71, and it was that close despite a significant disparity in shooting percentage — 55% for the RedHawks, 42% for the Bulls — due to free throws. Buffalo was fouled just two more times than Miami (OH), but the when and where of the fouls the RedHawks committed mattered, as the Bulls went to the line 18 times and sank 14 of them, or, 12 more attempts and 11 more makes than the RedHawks had. Miami (OH) dominated in the paint, however, 48 to 28, and that focus on high-percentage shots ended up allowing the RedHawks to survive the significant free throw advantage. Still, they let Buffalo hang around long enough for a last-second 3-point attempt out of the hands of junior guard Ryan Sabol to be a potential game-winner. The contested 24-footer didn’t find the mark, though, and Miami (OH) came away the winner for the 23rd time this season. Sophomore guard Luke Skaljac led the way for the RedHawks with 19 points on 9-for-15 shooting, and added 4 rebounds, 3 assists and 5 steals to those figures. The Bulls got 18 from sophomore guard Daniel Freitag and a game-high 22 from senior guard Angelo Brizzi, and both teams’ starters played fairly equally, but the RedHawks got a little more out of their bench — 16 points to 9 — and that made as much of a difference as anything. A 24-rebound performance The Charleston Cougars are 18-3 overall and now 10-0 in Coastal Athletic Association play following a win over Campbell — their 11th-straight victory. While twin sisters and junior guards Taryn and Taylor Barbot did a lot of the heavy lifting on the scoring end, combining for 32 of the Cougars’ 61 points, neither was the star of the W. That would instead be junior forward Grace Ezebilo, who scored 8 points with 2 assists, 3 steals and a block, and oh, 24 of the Cougars’ 41 rebounds. Those 24 boards represent a program record for the College of Charleston, and are also a career-high for Ezebilo, who is in her first year of Division I ball. Before transferring to Charleston, Ezebilo played for Tyler Junior College, where she averaged 12.8 rebounds per game as a sophomore. She’s not quite at that figure in D-I ball, but Ezebilo is pretty close: enough so that, at 11.8 per game, she’s leading the CAA by 3.5 boards a night and is sixth in all of Division I women’s basketball. It’s pretty easy to point to her performance this year as a significant part of why Charleston — already 14-4 in conference play last year — is in position to be both the regular season champ and maybe find itself in the NCAA Women’s Tournament in March, as well. Boise State wins key conference game in OT Boise State ranks 59th in NET, but you wouldn’t know that from its conference performance. Entering play on Tuesday, the Broncos were just 5-6 against Mountain West competition, with UNLV and Fresno State a little too close for comfort at 5-5 and 4-6 despite both of them being considerably further behind in NET. Tuesday presented a must-win game, then, as far as these things go in the regular season: Boise State was facing off against an 8-3 Nevada squad that was the Broncos’ equal in NET — the two were one after the other in the rankings — but had a firm hold on the fifth spot in the Mountain West standings. Meaningful because just the first five teams get a bye to the quarterfinals. The Broncos and Wolf Pack couldn’t settle things in regulation, as Nevada senior guard Tayshawn Comer hit a 10-foot floater as time expired to send things to overtime at 79 all. While the Wolf Pack got nothing from the bench — 3 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists and a steal in a combined 58 minutes — the starters did plenty of heavy lifting to force things to this point. Comer had 24 points, with sophomore forward Elijah Price adding 17 on 6-for-11 shooting with 9 rebounds. But it was senior guard Corey Camper Jr. that caused the most trouble for Boise State, as he scored a game-high 35 points on 14-for-22 shooting while grabbing 4 boards, dishing out 2 assists and stealing the ball 3 times. Boise State got a combined 48 points out of seniors Javan Buchanan and Dylan Andrews, however, and its own bench added 23 points and 15 rebounds in 66 minutes. The Broncos also outlasted Nevada in OT, and would win 91-87 as Andrews picked up 8 of his 25 points in the extra period — the senior guard also scored the 1,000th point of his career amid all this chaos. Now, Boise State is 6-6 and still in sixth in the Mountain West, but has narrowed the gap between it and Nevada to two games. The two won’t face off again in the regular season, but Boise State did what it had to do in direct competition; the rest depends on how the Broncos handle their remaining eight games. Tulsa keeps pace with W Tulsa is in for a bit of an uphill climb to the top of the American Conference, but that’s also where it probably needs to be in order to make it to March Madness. While a team like Rice might sneak in with an at-large bid — if one is even available — owing to its bubble-team status in NET, Tulsa ranks 133rd. A conference championship is the only way. Getting there will be a lot easier with a bye, and the Golden Hurricane are now tied for the better bye — the one that skips a team to the semifinals — after defeating Wichita State to improve to 8-2 in conference play. [Get to Know a Mid-Major: The American Conference] Tulsa downed the Shockers, 75-65, on the strength of a huge night from senior forward Hannah Riddick. She tied her career-high with 27 points that also led all scorers, and did so on 10-for-12 shooting while adding 6 rebounds, 2 assists and a steal and block each. She also shot 6-for-7 from the line, which was a team-wide deal against Wichita State: Tulsa sank 18 of its 21 free-throw attempts, which proved to be a huge advantage since the Shockers went to the line just 11 times themselves. Rice remains atop the conference at 9-0, but Tulsa doesn’t need to finish with a better record than them to get the better bye. So long as the Golden Hurricane can keep pace with East Carolina, the team they are currently tied with, then destiny will be in their own hands come the regular season finale: Tulsa wraps up its season at home against East Carolina, and can secure second place there. Saint Louis wins 16th-straight No. 19 Saint Louis lost on Nov. 28 to Stanford, to drop its record to 6-1. Since then? Nothing but wins for the Billikens. They are now 22-1 and 10-0 in conference play after defeating Davidson on Tuesday, 91-82. And Saint Louis isn’t just a product of a mid-major conference dominating lesser competition, either: the Atlantic 10 leaders rank 16th in NET, and 24th in KenPom. While the win against Davidson was by “just” 11 points, the Wildcats are nearly a top-100 team, and this W came on the road, too, which made up for not beating them by more as far as NET’s calculations are concerned. Sophomore forward Brady Dunlap was the star, as he came off the bench and scored a game-high 22 points in 22 minutes, hitting 6-for-6 from 3 while grabbing 5 boards. Saint Louis, as a team, shot 51%, and were able to withstand Davidson hitting 10 3s of its own — and 16 of 21 free throws — thanks to that high-percentage shooting. Saint Louis is comfortably atop the A-10 at 10-0, with George Mason and its 8-1 record in second, followed by VCU in third at 8-2. All three are tourney-caliber teams, and all three might get there, too, given the A-10 sent four teams last March, but the preferable way is as conference champion. The way things are going, that very well could be Saint Louis. 30 3-point shots?! You read that right. Thirty of ‘em, from one person. Specifically, Aysia Hinton, who managed as much despite coming off the bench for North Carolina Central on Tuesday. The Eagles were in competition against a Division III school to sneak another game into the schedule amid conference play, and ended up defeating William Peace, 103-51. That part isn’t surprising. What is a shock, even with it being a D-I school against a D-III one, is that Hinton not only took 30 3s, but that she sank a dozen of them. Your brain now has to try to make the seemingly disparate ideas of “a player missed 18 3-pointers, she shot 40% on 3s” work. Good luck. Hinton, a junior guard, had 6 3-pointers and 18 points at halftime, at which point it became clear that both the scoring record for North Carolina Central and the 3-point record were both hers if she shot enough. And she shot, a lot. Every single one of Hinton’s 30 shots was a 3-point attempt, and she made 12 of them. That gave her 36 points — the program record — as well as the Eagles’ 3-point record. She is averaging 6.6 3-point attempts a game right now, and averages 2.3 makes per, as well — she almost never takes shots from inside the arc, since the guard averages 7.2 attempts a game. At 34.1%, Hinton is leading the MEAC in 3-point shooting percentage, and yet, North Carolina Central loves to play her off the bench: in 19 games this season, she’s started just one of them, and averages 20 minutes per night. A potent weapon if you can deploy it off the bench, that’s for sure, and one that now holds multiple program records.