Cashing In

Your "Bad Beat" for Friday is on:

Niagara (total of 141) at Canisius.

The game was tied at 62 with 2:18 to play after Rob Garrison's layup. That's when the offense stopped and killed the over players, yes the "offense stopping killed the over players!"

Nobody would muster even a single point in the final two plus minutes and this thing went into overtime still tied up at 62.

Things did not really heat up in the extra session at all as the game was only 65-64 Niagara with 2:53 to go. The under was still a possibility thanks to literally 5 points in the last 5 minutes.

But then the Purple Eagles ran ahead 70-64 leading to the fouling game and the 73-70 final resulting in a very very very lucky over.



Your winners for Saturday are on:

4* SMU (plus 8) vs. Memphis.

3* Georgetown (plus 1) vs. Duke.

2* Iowa (plus 14) at Michigan.

A 2-0 sweep on Friday for 5* with the Hornets and Spurs!

I can't say that I really truly like the SMU Mustangs but they are a much improved program and the aura of Memphis is certainly not what it used to be. The days of Derrick Rose and Chris Douglas-Roberts are long gone, shoot the days of John Calipari are now long gone as young Josh Pastner is in charge.

The Tigers are still pretty talented and good I am not denying that but these guys are no longer invincible as they are in much tighter games this season and going on the road like this to Southern Methodist is not going to be a walk in the park.

The Mustangs are clearly well inferior but at home will bring some game. These guys will treat this game as thee game and in the end will have a shot to not only cover but give Memphis their second conference loss.



Duke is very very good but I'm not at all sold on them being great. Jon Scheyer is certainly a player for sure and there is more talent including Nolan Smith and Kyle Singler along with the Plumlee boys but the Blue Devils are in the nation's capital today and basically have no answer for Greg Monroe.

Coach K's team has struggled at times defending bigs and Monroe is the big of all bigs. I can see him completely control the boards and shut Duke down if they can't make their long three's.

This will be a very competitive game as the Devils won't get blown out but the Hoyas at home are warriors and will squeak this thing out in the end.



In the beginning of the season this Iowa Hawkeye team was horrendous. Todd Lickliter lost all of his talent to transferring and others issues and the cupboard was extremely bare. But things have been a lot better of late and right now the Hawkeyes are not the same dismal garbage they appeared to be.

Iowa was just leading Evan Turner and Ohio State at the half in a cover and before that won going away against an improved Indiana squad. If you look a little further back the Hawks covered a 21 or so point number by only losing by single digits at Michigan State in a moral type victory.

These guys are clamping down a bit with the defense and playing tighter than expected low scoring games.

Michigan in Ann Arbor with Manny Harris and Deshawn Simms have some potential to be pretty good. But John Beilein's team is still far from anything better than good anywhere and I can see 62-54.