The final full Saturday of regular-season college hoops action set up to be a banner day on paper. In practice, however, there were a whole lot of really good teams that got caught looking ahead to the postseason. On the precipice of conference postseason play for all the major conferences, three top-10 teams took losses on the day and five unranked teams toppled ranked teams in a lopsided, can’t-explain-it kind of day.
And that was all before 6 p.m. ET.
No. 2 Alabama was the highest-ranked team to stumble on the day with a 67-61 road loss to No. 24 Texas A&M. The Crimson Tide trailed by double digits at halftime and never recovered in a flat showing just days after clinching the outright SEC regular-season title.
No. 3 Kansas found itself in a similar boat in a 75-59 loss to No. 9 Texas. Kansas officially clinched the outright Big 12 regular-season title with Texas’ loss to TCU earlier in the week and trailed almost the entire game in an impressive start-to-finish showing for the Longhorns. The underwhelming performance for KU resulted in a failed attempt to solidify its resume as the possible No. 1 overall seed.
There were plenty of others who delivered duds and dandies across the college basketball landscape, so let’s break it down winners and losers style below — starting with Kentucky.
Winner: Antonio Reeves leads Kentucky to big road win
Without the services of lead guards Cason Wallace and Sahvir Wheeler, Kentucky stole a huge win on the road over Arkansas in Fayetteville behind a career-high 37-point explosion from sharpshooter Antonio Reeves. Reeves had a respectable 15 points in the opening 20 minutes before going nuclear with 22 in the second half, finishing the game 12-of-17 shooting and a perfect 11 of 11 from the free throw line. Kentucky’s spot in the NCAA Tournament was never in doubt )it is a projected 7-seed according to CBS Sports Bracketology Expert Jerry Palm), but the win helped UK secure the 3-seed and the important double-bye in the SEC Tournament.
Loser: Kansas gets blown out in finale
Having already clinched the Big 12 regular-season championship earlier in the week thanks to Texas, Kansas laid an egg on the road in Austin while suffering a 75-59 beatdown by the Longhorns. The game was meaningless for KU in terms of Big 12 Tournament implications — it already had the title and locked up the 1-seed, whereas Texas was playing for seeding — but it was an alarming letdown for a Jayhawks team that has looked almost immortal the last month.
It’s not the first time Kansas has underwhelmed in a big way this season, either. There is no doubt Kansas still has the goods to potentially repeat as champs, but a 16-point road loss to Texas is its third double-digit loss this season. Maybe it’s not cause for panic, maybe it is, but worth mentioning: of KU’s five losses, three of them — to Texas, to Iowa State and to TCU — were by an average of 18 points. When KU has it rolling, it can beat any team. When Kansas doesn’t have it, though, it is liable to get run out the gym — as it did on Saturday.
Loser: Alabama showing some flaws
The No. 2 Crimson Tide lost while shooting just 7 of 36 from 3-point range. Alabama is still going to be the No. 1 seed in the SEC Tournament and remains in good shape in regards to securing a No. 1 seed for the NCAA Tournament. But the Crimson Tide haven’t quite been the same over the past four games since revelations came to light about Brandon Miller’s connection to the murder investigation involving ex-teammate Darius Miles. Amid a wave of criticism for the program’s handling of the situation, Alabama needed overtime to beat lowly South Carolina and then squeaked out home wins over Arkansas and Auburn, both of whom it defeated by larger margins on the road earlier in the season. Alabama’s resume is rock solid, but Saturday’s performance was the latest sign that this team is not operating at peak efficiency entering the postseason.
Loser: Providence gets blasted
No. 20 Providence is officially limping into the postseason after losing 82-58 at home to Seton Hall — the program’s worst home loss since 2004. The Friars entered as 8-point favorites but let the Pirates shoot 62.5% from the floor. Dre Davis led Seton Hall with a career-high 24 points on 9-of-10 shooting, and the Pirates shot a season-best 55.6% from 3-point range. Providence made just 4 of 23 attempts from deep and has now lost three of its last four games following a 12-4 start to league play.
Winner: Princeton rallies for Ivy League title
Princeton trailed Penn by 19 in the first half and was down by nine with under five minutes to play but managed to rally for a 77-69 overtime victory to clinch at least a share of the Ivy League regular-season title. It’s the program’s 29th league title and second straight. Four players reached double figures for the Tigers, who closed the game on a 22-5 run.
Winner: Auburn gets big bubble win
CBS Sports Bracketology Expert Jerry Palm wrote that Auburn “desperately” needed to beat Tennessee. Well, the Tigers did just that, squeaking out a 79-70 win over the No. 12 Volunteers to close the regular season with a marquee win. Entering the day, Auburn’s only Quad 1 victory was a November win over Northwestern on a neutral floor. Beating Tennessee gives the Tigers much-needed juice entering the SEC Tournament and helps lessen the sting of a gut-wrenching overtime loss at No. 2 Alabama from earlier this week.
Loser: Baylor falls flat in regular-season finale
With Big 12 Tournament seeding on the line and the ever-important NCAA Tournament jockeying looming large, No. 7 Baylor laid a stinker in what I think was the most disappointing showing of the season for the Bears in a 73-58 home win to Iowa State. Iowa State had lost four straight entering Saturday, entering full meltdown mode, before going on the road and handing Baylor its biggest home loss since Feb. 13, 2016 when it lost at home to Texas Tech by 18 points.
“It was one of those games where every time we got something going, we couldn’t sustain it,” said Baylor coach Scott Drew. “The only good news is hopefully everyone had a bad game at once and got it out of their system, to get us refocused and reset for the conference tournament.”
Winner: West Virginia shores up resume
West Virginia entered Saturday’s game against No. 11 Kansas State on the bubble, according to Palm, as a projected No. 11 seed in the NCAA Tournament. The Mountaineers took care of business in impressive fashion, shooting 50.8% from the floor and forcing 20 turnovers in an 89-81 win. Emmitt Matthews Jr., Kedrian Johnson and Erik Stevenson each reached 20 points for WVU, which rallied nicely from an 0-5 start in Big 12 play to close the regular season with a 7-11 league mark.