It was finally a great night to be an ACC bubble team. Pittsburgh beat Virginia on the road and Syracuse beat North Carolina at the Carrier Dome. Neither Syracuse nor Pittsburgh are in the current field but that win is going to help them get closer to the field as we head to the stretch run of the regular season. In other games Marquette won their 8th in a row with a win over Butler, Iowa State beat Cincinnati, Dayton had a late run to beat Duquesne. Illinois destroyed Michigan, Providence got back into the tournament field with a win against St. John’s, and New Mexico beat Nevada.
There were some teams who didn’t fare as well on the Bubble yesterday. Texas A&M lost on the road to Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt had one win in the SEC and that is a bad loss. Indiana State after just getting ranked lost at home to Illinois State. The path to the at large for the Sycamores just got murkier. Ole Miss needs to get good wins and they missed an opportunity last night when they got beat by double digits in Rupp Arena. Wisconsin finally ended their four-game losing streak with a win over Ohio State, BYU took care of UCF in Provo, Baylor beat Oklahoma, and Creighton hammered Georgetown in Omaha. The most surprising result of the night was San Diego State holding Colorado State to 11 points in the second half and erasing a 14-point deficit to win by 16 at Viejas.
Yesterday I went 20-5 in my picks that gives me a 98 day total of 2,847-1,162 overall. Wednesday schedules are usually packed but on Valentines Day this year there is not much to get excited about in the College Basketball world. Get through today and get to tomorrow as the schedule for Thursday is loaded and will continue to be throughout the weekend. Picks for day 99 February 14, 2024, are below.
Boston University over Army
UNC Asheville over Presbyterian
Michigan State over Penn State
Youngstown State over Robert Morris
Notre Dame over Georgia Tech
Clemson over Miami
South Florida over Tulsa
High Point over South Carolina Upstate
Gardner-Webb over Charleston Southern
Eastern Kentucky over Chicago State
Seton Hall over Xavier
Colgate over Holy Cross
Navy over American
Richmond over UMass
Fordham over Saint Bonaventure
Lafayette over Loyola MD
Furman over VMI
Mercer over Wofford
UNC Greensboro over The Citadel
Chattanooga over ETSU
Green Bay over Northern Kentucky
Detroit Mercy over IUPUI
Cleveland State over Milwaukee
Fort Wayne over Oakland
Queens over North Florida
Kennesaw State over Jacksonville
Belmont over Southern Illinois
Northern Iowa over Valpo
Murray State over Missouri State
Bradley over Illinois-Chicago
Loyola Chicago over Saint Joseph’s
Auburn over South Carolina
Maryland over Iowa
UConn over DePaul
Tennessee over Arkansas
Arizona State over Oregon State
Samford over Western Carolina
Utah State over Wyoming
Fresno State over UNLV
Three games stand out to me today. Auburn and South Carolina are a battle of two top-15 teams. Those two teams are safely on the field, but they are playing for seeding in the SEC and it is going to be a great game. Michigan State and Penn State are another one. The Spartans just got a signature win to solidify their NCAA tournament resume, but they have a hard time winning on the road. Can they beat a tough Penn State team? Penn State has been tough at home and is playing much better lately. It will not be an easy matchup for Michigan State.
The last one is going to seem weird but Detroit Mercy and IUPUI. The Titans are 0-26 on the season but are favored by six points at home tonight against a bad IUPUI team. Can the Titans finally get their first win of the year?