Last Night in College Basketball: Surging Minnesota Takes Down No. 10 Iowa

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. Minnesota is rolling The Minnesota Golden Gophers are now winners of five-straight games and have moved into a tie with Michigan State for fifth in the Big Ten standings. The latest victim of this run was the No. 10 Iowa Hawkeyes, whose ranked status did not save them from the Gophers. Those who pay attention to the NCAA Evaluation Tool — or our weekly coverage of the NET rankings — are already aware that the poll is completely whiffing on Minnesota: it hasn’t been ranked once this season, but after the dub against Iowa it sits 9th in NET. In the five-game win streak, the Gophers defeated Oregon — no slouch itself — then trounced Wisconsin, took care of business against Penn State, beat Purdue by 33 points and now took down a top-10 team while dropping 91 points on it. That last one is bound to get Minnesota noticed by voters in next week’s poll, but pride yourself on being ahead of the curve if you caught on to what’s up before that happens. This was a W on the road, too, but that’s been normal for Minnesota of late. The wins against Oregon and Penn State were also away games, and the Gophers are 5-3 on the road for the season, too. It took a little time for Minnesota to get going, but this is a dangerous basketball team now, and right as the end of the season nears, too. As for the Iowa game itself, Minnesota was led by junior guard Grace Grocholski, who scored a team-high 21 points in 38 minutes on 50% shooting while pulling down 5 rebounds with 3 assists. Grocholski certainly didn’t do it alone, though: five Minnesota players scored at least 10 points, while two others just missed with 9 and 8 each. Senior guard Amaya Battle had 14 boards to go with her dozen points, while senior forward Finau Tonga made the most of her 18 minutes off the bench with 10 points, 7 rebounds and an assist and block each. Iowa scored 85 points, so no surprise that it had some standout performances, too — most notably sophomore center Ava Heiden’s 24 points on 9-for-13 shooting with 4 rebounds, 2 assists as well as a steal and block. Senior forward Hannah Stuelke fell a rebound short of a double-double, and the team as a whole shot 48%. The Hawkeyes couldn’t capitalize on Minnesota turning the ball over more often, however, and were actually outscored 16-7 on points off of turnovers despite losing the ball less often — between that and Minnesota hitting a couple more 3s, Iowa was upset. Now, Minnesota isn’t going to shoot 71% on 3s every game by any means, but it made Iowa pay for the mistakes it did make, and more than kept up with the Hawkeyes offensively. The Golden Gophers have the 15th-best offense in Division I women’s basketball, per Offensive Rating, and are 12th in Defense with the 8th-best Net Rating. They can beat you in different ways, and on Thursday, they took Iowa down via shootout. Michigan hit the century mark and then some Michigan has been on another great run since righting itself post-Wisconsin loss. The Wolverines have now won seven games in a row since their lone defeat, a stretch that includes wins against ranked Nebraska and Michigan State squads, and now also Michigan’s first 100-point game since Dec. 29, when it dropped 112 on McNeese State. The Wolverines got pretty close to that again on Thursday with their third-highest scoring total of the year, 110 points. Penn State was the unfortunate team on the other end of that barrage, and the Nittany Lions managed a quiet 69 points for themselves. Michigan shot 61% as a team and sank 15 of 29 3-pointers, with nearly half of those coming out of the hands of Nimari Burnett. The senior guard scored a game-high 31 points on 11-for-16 shooting that included a 7-for-10 showing from beyond the arc, and he had 5 boards and a pair of steals to go with all that scoring, too. The Wolverines went easy on their starters, letting the bench handle the minutes and much of the work, and they responded. In a combined 98 minutes, Michigan’s bench scored 43 points with 11 rebounds, 14 assists and a block. The second-half defense wasn’t quite as good as Michigan is capable of, but there was also little reason to fully bear down given the Wolverines were already up by 32 points at halftime. Michigan remains in first place in the Big Ten, tied with No. 5 Illinois at 11-1. The Wolverines’ schedule hasn’t been easy all year — they have played the fourth-toughest schedule in Division I to this point — and it’s not going to get any easier in the coming weeks. Before a showdown with the Fighting Illini at the end of the month, Michigan will also play No. 12 Purdue and No. 4 Duke, and the season will close out against No. 10 Michigan State, too. Vanderbilt survived Kentucky Vanderbilt might have stumbled for a bit there, but that was expected — being undefeated all season is a rarity, and it happening in this year’s loaded SEC seemed an impossible task from the start. The Commodores have recovered from back-to-back losses to ranked South Carolina and Ole Miss squads, though, with dubs against Florida and now No. 16 Kentucky following. Now, Vanderbilt just squeaked by the Wildcats, 84-83, but Kentucky is not just No. 16 in the poll but also 16th in NET and in Net Rating. That’s a legitimately good basketball team, and one playing at home — winning at all is what matters in those cases. That Vanderbilt’s 8th-ranked position in NET didn’t dip after a single-point win should serve as a reminder of that if words alone don’t suffice. Sophomore guard Mikayla Blakes can take much of the credit here, as the second-leading scorer in the nation made a push for the scoring title with a 37-point performance — Blakes is now at 25.6 points per game, just 0.3 behind Iowa State junior center Audi Crooks. Blakes shot 13-for-25 from the field and 6-for-9 from 3, with 2 rebounds, 4 assists and 4 steals. Kentucky got its own standout performances — both senior forward Teonni Key and junior center Clara Strack posted double-doubles, with Key getting 27 points and 12 rebounds while Strack had 14 and 15 (and with 7 assists, too). But the Wildcats simply turned the ball over way too often, and the Dores made them pay. Kentucky had 20 turnovers compared to Vandy’s 6, and the Commodores converted those into 25 points. It’s pretty safe to say that if Kentucky had held onto the ball even a little bit more effectively, Vandy would have suffered another L. The Wildcats did not, though, and that’s part of the game — Vanderbilt did a better job of protecting the ball on its possessions and attacked Kentucky effectively enough so that it could not do the same. And for that, Vanderbilt kept ahead of Texas while gaining some ground on LSU in the SEC standings. Two 40-point games! Mikayla Blakes didn’t lead Thursday’s scorers across Division I despite such a good game because, somehow, there were two 40-point games: one in men’s ball and one in women’s. Senior guard Sincere Parker dropped 40 for Memphis against UAB in a 90-80 win, but the performance is even more impressive with a little more context. Parker came off the bench and scored those 40 points in just 26 minutes. He shot 14-for-20 from the field, 6-for-8 from 3 and sank all six of his free-throw attempts, too. Somehow he had time for 6 rebounds, 2 assists and a steal in between all of that shooting, too. Those 40 points are a career-best for Parker, who has been an efficient scorer off the bench for his entire college career. Just maybe ever quite as efficient or successful as against UAB on Thursday, is all. On the women’s side was someone a little more used to scoring points in bunches, who was somehow even more efficient with her shot. Fairfield’s Meghan Andersen scored the 1,000th point of her career earlier this season at the start of her junior year, and now the forward has dropped 40 points in a single game, too. That wasn’t just a personal milestone, but it’s also a program record. She did it on 15-for-20 shooting from the field against Marist while going 8-for-10 from beyond the arc, and hit both of her free throws, as well. Andersen also had 8 rebounds with an assist and steal, and did all of this in 25 minutes. Why not more than 25 minutes? Mostly because Fairfield ended up winning 109-48 by shooting 54% overall and sinking 19 3-pointers as a team on 51% shooting. Take a breather, Meghan, you earned it. Fairfield, by the way, leads the nation in made 3s with 280, 22 more than the next-highest team, Richmond, and is third in attempts. It’s not just volume, but also that the Stags hit from deep: Fairfield is shooting 38.3% from beyond the arc as a team, 7th-best in the country. A career-first for Isaac UC Irvine’s Tama Isaac has had a double-double before, but it wasn’t against a Division I opponent. On Thursday he logged his first such game against Cal State Bakersfield with 14 points and 13 assists, the latter of which led all of Division I basketball for the night, on both the men’s and women’s sides. The freshman guard has had a pretty solid run over his last four games after a bit of a dip in performance when conference play got going, as he has averaged 12 points with 3.0 rebounds, 6.3 assists and 2.0 steals over his last four games while seeing his minutes increase to 31.5. The Anteaters moved to 9-2 in Big West play with the 78-62 win that did not feel quite as close as that score suggests: the Roadrunners shot just 35% overall, but had their score buoyed by UC Irvine’s inability to avoid fouling them combined with Cal State Bakersfield’s inability to miss a shot from the stripe. It went 15-for-16 on free throws, helping to make up for 19 turnovers and the 20 points the Anteaters converted off of them. At least a little bit, anyway. Ohio State handles Washington We got a ranked-ranked Big Ten matchup on Thursday, and it did not disappoint. No. 9 Ohio State took on No. 24 Washington, and the Buckeyes came away with a 70-60 road win, which also marked the 500th victory of coach Kevin McGuff’s career. Rising star Jaloni Cambridge was the standout for Ohio State, as the sophomore guard scored a game-high 26 points on 12-for-21 shooting with 7 rebounds, 2 assists and a steal, too. While she was matched by Washington’s junior guard Sayvia Sellers, who had 26 points of her own, it was Ohio State’s other players that made the difference. Senior guard Chance Gray had 12 points, 4 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals, for one, but it was 6-foot-6 center Elsa Lemmila who made the biggest difference. Not just a pun, that, as the sophomore used her size to block a Division I-leading 5 shots while pulling down 9 rebounds. Lemmila also scored 13 points and added a pair of assists and steals each. While Washington outscored Ohio State in the second quarter, otherwise, the Buckeyes were in control. Ohio State is now 10-2 in Big Ten play, alone in third place with Iowa’s loss and a game back of Michigan. Washington, meanwhile, is 7-5 and in seventh, still hanging around the middle of the single-bye seeding for the conference tournament next month. A record rebounding performance Stanford had a couple of notable scoring performances on Thursday against Pittsburgh, with junior guard Chloe Cardy and junior forward Courtney Ogden both turning in 10-for-18 performances that resulted in 26 and 23 points, respectively. They weren’t the stars of an 86-65 rout of the Panthers, however, as freshman Lara Somfai stole that show. The 6-foot-3 forward, who was born in Hungary before moving to Australia and then ended up in the United States and attended IMG Academy, scored 15 points in 40 minutes, but also had 3 blocks, 2 steals, 8 assists and a Division I-leading 23 rebounds. She nearly had a triple-double there, but had to settle for “just” a double-double with a whole lot of other numbers supporting it. Those 23 boards didn’t just lead men’s and women’s ball on Thursday, but also set an ACC freshman record and stand as the most boards by a freshman this season. (Remember, North Texas’ Megan Nestor might be in her first season of Division I ball, but she’s a senior, so her three games with more than 23 boards don’t count here.) Tennessee repelled Georgia in OT Things have been a bit rough for Tennessee lately. The Lady Vols were upset by Mississippi State before being defeated by UConn by 30 points, the worst loss they have suffered in the rivalry in terms of margin of defeat. The Lady Vols were able to get back on track last night, though, as they defeated Georgia in overtime, 82-77. Georgia might not be ranked, but the Bulldogs are 34th in NET and in Net Rating, and this was a home game for them — that’s a good basketball team, and one that could defeat Tennessee or just about anyone on the right night. The Lady Vols were in control throughout much of the game, but couldn’t quite put the Bulldogs away because of this, and Georgia winning the fourth quarter also put it in position to force overtime. There, Tennessee regained control of things, outscoring Georgia 14-9 and erasing the fourth quarter that put them in OT in the first place in the process. There isn’t much the Lady Vols did wrong here, given they were competitive in the paint, outrebounded Georgia and didn’t post an ungodly number of turnovers. Georgia just wouldn’t go away and then hit 21 of 25 free throws — including three from Dani Carnegie with seconds left in regulation to force OT to begin with — but Tennessee ended up on top in the end. Next up for the Lady Vols? No. 3 South Carolina. Tennessee is going to have to be at its best to come away with a W there. The Gamecocks won their Thursday matchup 88-45 over the same Mississippi State team that upset Tennessee last week, by the way. LSU loses to Texas Because the SEC wasn’t already showcasing enough of its high-quality teams on Thursday, the marquee matchup for the conference will close things out here. No. 5 LSU took on No. 4 Texas in one of the great tests for both this season, and it was the defensive-minded Longhorns that came out ahead of the offense-heavy Tigers, 77-64. The game was relatively close for much of it, but Texas closed out each half with big quarters and sank 17 of 20 free throws compared to the Tigers’ 9-for-14. With LSU unable to get going from deep – the Tigers shot 5-for-13, or 38%, from 3 – it became difficult to close the gap with Texas. Rori Harmon needs a shout out here. The senior guard played 33 minutes, scoring 11 points with 5 assists and 6 steals, all of which matter as far as the historical record goes: Harmon scored her 1,500th career point on Thursday, and she tied the Texas steals record, making her both the program’s steals and assists leader. That’s a pretty good career right there. The Longhorns are fourth in the SEC, half-a-game up on LSU, which matters since the top four teams receive a first-round bye in what will be a bloodbath of a conference tournament in March. A record 10 SEC teams were in the poll just last week, and this time around, there are still nine hanging around. Every little edge is going to matter, as the slim margins of this particular matchup have already reminded both teams.