1. Duke is just fine without Rasheed Sulaimon. – There were plenty of Duke faithful who were worried about the team moving forward without it’s best on-ball defender and capable scorer off the bench. Those worries were eased last week, as the Blue Devils followed up their huge 69-63 win over No. 2 Virginia with a win over Georgia Tech and a 90-60 annihilation of No.10 Duke, who edged Mike Krzyzewki’s team 77-73 on Jan. 28th in what would end up being Sulaimon’s last game with the team before becoming the first player ever dismissed by Coach K in his 35 seasons at the school. Sulaimon’s attitude had taken an obvious and public turn for the worse when he was moved out of the starting lineup after starting 50 games in his first two seasons, and it seems that the lack of distractions he provided has helped Duke to move forward with a greater focus.
2. VCU is struggling without Briante Weber. – Rams head coach Chaka Smart was as curious as anyone to see how his team would respond after losing their top defensive player for the year with a knee injury during a Jan.31st loss to Richmond. As it turns out, not very well. Weber was not only the top defensive player on the team, he was 12 steals away from becoming the all-time NCAA leader. Weber’s absence has caused the Rams to reduce the time they spend playing their signature zone, and the results have been obvious. JeQuan Lewis, who replaced Weber in the starting lineup, has provided some marginally better offensive output, but at the expense of the team’s defensive play. Weber’s absence was apparent in VCU’s mediocre win over a bad George Mason team, but it was felt even more so in the buzzer-beating loss to St. Bonaventure on Saturday.
3. D’Angelo Russell is playing himself up the draft boards. – The freshman guard out of Ohio State was already one of the top-performing players in the country, and has been projected as a first-round pick should he decide to leave the Buckeyes at the end of the season. With the way he’s playing now, there might not be an option. Already the top-scorer among freshman (and among my top-five Naismith candidates,) Russell has continued to step up his play after his 33-point outburst against Northwestern back on Jan. 22nd. In OSU’s two games last week, Russell averaged 21.5 points, 9.0 rebounds, 8.0 assists, and 1.5 steals, highlighted by his triple-double outing against Rutgers that saw him dish out 11 assists and 11 rebounds while scoring 23 points on 61 percent shooting. Many draft experts now have him as a top-five pick for the upcoming NBA draft in July, and he’s showing no signs of slowing down.
4. The NCAA is finally addressing the game’s slow pace. – Aside from losing top players early to the NBA draft, the steady decline in scoring has been college basketball’s major issue in recent years. It is commonplace for teams to resort to passing the ball around the perimeter for most of the 35 seconds of the shot clock before even making an attempt to score. Realizing that they are losing their audience, the NCAA announced last week that they will be experimenting with a 30-second shot clock during this year’s NIT. The NCAA has tested out changes to rules before during preseason tournaments, but opted to utilize a bigger stage for a more realistic opportunity to evaluate the results. Officials will examine the effect on the games and take the data to the men’s basketball rules committee for review in May. Good move on the NCAA’s part.
5. Marcus Posley loves game winners. – Few players had a more epic week than Marcus Posley of the St. Bonaventure last week. The Bonnies found themselves down 61-60 to Davidson on Wednesday night with six seconds left after Wildcats guard Peyton Aldridge hit a huge three. Posley took a pass off the inbounds and drove the length of the court, hitting a tough runner in the lane and giving the Bonnies a huge conference win in the process.
On Saturday against No. 18 VCU he did it again, dribbling down the clock before making a drive through two defenders on the way to his game-winning layup.
The junior guard is averaging 17.1 points per game on 40 percent shooting this season.
