NCAA Top 25 Recap: A rough week for Sparty

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As you might have heard, it was a tough week for the Michigan State Spartans. After suffering a mass shooting event earlier in the week, their game against Minnesota was rightfully postponed. For the record, I honestly feel like their game on Saturday against Michigan should have been postponed as well.

It wasn't though and Michigan State fell to Michigan by something like twelve points. If you watched the game, you would actually know that it was actually a much closer game than that. MSU just kind of fell apart at the end. Going into halftime they were up and at one point they had a pretty impressive lead.

I know there were extenuating circumstances here, but my frustration with Michigan State has just about reached a boiling point. As I have said before, I am out of excuses. At this point, I am afraid that U of M is going to make it to the tournament and we will be stuck at home watching. How embarrassing is that?

I don't even know what to say at this point. They had the game in their hands. It was theirs to lose, and they did.

Meanwhile, my nieces varsity team has started the playoffs. With the regular season gone, my niece no longer has to spread her time across the junior varsity and varsity squads. That also means she is probably going to get less playing time in the post season since the varsity coach hasn't utilized her as much as the JV coach.

They had their first game of the playoffs on Saturday and it was a beat down. My nieces team pretty much owned the game the whole time. In fact, they were up by nearly 40 points at one part of the game.

Given that fact, my niece was actually able to get some time on the court in the playoff game. They have their next game this week on Wednesday. I am looking forward to seeing how that goes. I can tell my niece has already started to turn the corner and her mind is shifting into softball mode. She just needs to hold on a little longer!

If you remember my post from last Friday, there were no games played that evening. However, there were 17 games played by top 25 teams on Saturday. I actually got to watch a couple of the games and they were quite exciting.

You can tell that teams are really starting to turn the corner into tournament mode. There are only about four games left for most teams before they move into their conference tournaments. Those are going to be a big step in determining who will make it to the big dance. You can have a mediocre season but do well in your conference tournament and it could be a happy March for you!

#7 Virginia had a close call against Notre Dame just edging past the Fighting Irish 57 to 55.

How about that #10 Tennessee vs. Kentucky game. The Wildcats were on fire upsetting the Volunteers 66 to 54. I watched most of that game and I have to say that Kentucky was on fire. The home crowd was into it and they were just relentless. It was a pretty great game.

Oklahoma took #6 Texas into overtime but fell just short of the upset 85 to 83. There has been a lot of talk about the Big 12 this year and how good they are. I think we are going to see quite a few Big 12 schools in the tournament for sure.

Alabama continues to hold the #1 spot and they put an absolute beat down on Georgia 108 to 59.

Pretty crazy to think that the upset over Tennessee was the only upset of the day on Saturday, but like I said, we are getting to the point where the rubber meets the road. Teams are going to be giving it everything they got to get to the big dance and get that favorable seed.

There were three top 25 games on Sunday and none of them were upsets. Houston continues to hold the #2 spot, but I think I need to take a closer look at them before I get started on my bracket this year. I think they have been in the top 5 or 10 the past three years and I am not sure they have advanced very far in the tournament.

I'm not saying the AAC is a weak conference, but they haven't been what they usually are these past couple of years. Strength of schedule is going to definitely play into things here.

Check back Friday for more college hoops action!

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All pictures/screenshots taken by myself or @mrsbozz unless otherwise sourced