NCAA Basketball: Colgate, Ohio among mid-major upset candidates
4. Creighton vs Brown
TV schedule: Friday, Nov. 19 – 3:15 PM ET, ESPN3
Arena: Virgin Islands Sports & Fitness Center – St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands
The reasoning behind the upset potential in this game is quite simple: Brown is coming off of a game in which they almost beat North Carolina in Chapel Hill and Creighton is coming off of two unimpressive wins over bad teams. This game will also be played on a neutral site in the opening round of the U.S. Virgin Islands Paradise Jam. No home court for Creighton.
Brown was picked to finish fifth in the Ivy League but looked much better than that against UNC this past Friday. The Bears led 50-47 at halftime and were only down three with under a minute to go.
Head Coach Mike Martin has a deep squad, with 10 players averaging double-digit minutes and four players averaging double-digit points so far this season. Those scorers are led by sophomore guard Dan Friday (15.0 ppg, .523 eFG) and freshman forward Nana Owusu-Anane (15.0 ppg, .579). Both Friday and Owusu-Anane scored 20+ in the close loss to UNC.
Creighton opened the season against an Arkansas Pine-Bluff team that is currently ranked 356th in KenPom (out of 358 DI teams). They trailed by two points with 15 minutes left in the second half—far from a promising result. The Bluejays followed that up with a seven-point win in which they scored only 51 points on a Kennesaw State team that was picked to finish next to last in the Atlantic Sun this season.
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Brown and the Ivy League as a whole have been quite impressive to start the season. Creighton has not. This game has potential upset written all over it.