Holy Hoops Batman!

This college basketball season just got a whole lot crazier last night. I’m not talking mildly funny crazy, like that wacky aunt who steals sips of schnapps from her too big purse with the kitten print on it. This is certifiable grade A crazy. The street value of this stuff is through the roof. Let us delve into the madness:

Wake Forest 82 UNC 69/N Carolina State 88 Duke 74 In case you haven’t been reading the headlines, this is the first time since 2003 that both North Carolina and Duke have lost on the same day. It was the Wolfpack’s first victory over the Blue Devils at home since 2004. That streak may have gotten under their collars. North Carolina State didn’t feel like an upset team in this contest. They dominated the whole way. Once they broke out to a double-digit lead, they didn’t let the Blue Devils come any closer than 8 points behind. Don’t think that Kyle Singler and Jon Scheyer were absent in this one, either. They scored 22 and 21 points respectively. The team picked to finish last in the ACC was the better team last night. The North Carolina loss ranks a little lower on the crazy scale, just because I don’t know that many people were still buying the no. 23 ranking the Tar Heels were selling. But the fact that North Carolina got absolutely dominated on their home floor dials it back up a few notches. Throw in the factoid that this is the largest loss for UNC in the Roy Williams era, and you have one sad stretch of Tobacco Road this morning.

UTEP 72 Memphis 67 UTEP put the skids on Memphis’s 64 game win streak. Everyone was predicting it would happen at some point this year, but nobody knew quite when. The suspense is officially over. This one had to be extra salty for the Tigers, because if they could have won they would have set the NCAA record for consecutive conference wins. UTEP’s junior guard, Randy Culpepper, grew up in the Memphis area. After the game, he said one of his goals at UTEP was to beat Memphis. When you can make it the goal of opposing teams just to beat you, just once, you’ve done something amazing. But it had to end sometime.

Kansas 81 Baylor 75/MSU 70 Iowa 63 These were the upsets that came close, just not nearly close enough. Give credit to Matt Gattens of Iowa and LaceDarius Dunn of Baylor for giving their teams a nasty edge last night. Gattens led Iowa in scoring with 17 points in a furious effort. Dunn did what Dunn does and put up 27 points and grabbed 9 boards. You better believe that Kansas is taking a deep sigh of relief over not having to play at Baylor this season.