NCAA Basketball takeaways: ACC title race, SEC bad night and Big East drama
By Joey Loose
2. Who will be the final unbeaten team?
Utah State lost on Monday and Mississippi State fell on Tuesday, which means there are only three unbeaten teams left in the nation. Which one is going to be the last one left undefeated?
We just talked about them, but Connecticut looks powerful this season. They already have double-digit wins in their first thirteen games, a slate that includes Alabama, Florida, Iowa State, and Oregon. They’ve taken care of business and seen the play of big men Adama Sanogo and newcomers Tristen Newton and Donovan Clingan really take off. It’s hard to imagine the Huskies as an underdog during Big East play, though anything can certainly happen during those road trips; they did just struggle against Georgetown on Tuesday night at home.
Perhaps the team with the most impressive resume has been Purdue, whose first eleven wins includes double-digit victories over Duke, Gonzaga, and West Virginia. The play of Zach Edey has been undeniably impressive, and Matt Painter has surrounded his star with all kinds of talent, both young and experienced. The issue for the Boilermakers is that the Big Ten is a difficult league; the Boilermakers needed overtime to escape Lincoln and Nebraska last week. It’s hard to imagine Purdue as the final unbeaten unless these other two teams slip up before one of those tough road trips.
The final and most unexpected unbeaten remaining in New Mexico, this year’s darling in the Mountain West. The Lobos still rank only 69th in KenPom and have a pretty low strength of schedule, but they do have road wins at Saint Mary’s and SMU and beat solid Iona and San Francisco teams the last week. Second-year head coach Richard Pitino has this program playing very solid basketball and they’ll enter MWC play with that unbeaten mark, currently at 12-0. Perhaps their road trip to San Diego State on January 14th is the biggest challenge left on this regular season schedule for Morris Udeze, Jamal Mashburn Jr. and the rest of this lineup.