College Hoops Today

Serving College Basketball 365 Days a Year

The Breakfast Buffet: Purdue’s freshman guards have a tall task at Maryland, Houston, UCLA’s bench

Here’s today’s installment of “The Breakfast Buffet”, a daily column that can be found here every single morning getting you caught up to date on everything that’s happened from the day/night before and everything that’s going to happen in the next 24 hours.

Mangia!

Things To Sample

Purdue’s freshman guards have a tall task at Maryland
Braden Smith and Fletcher Loyer have been terrific all season long, but noticeably struggled in Sunday’s loss at Northwestern, combining to shoot just 2-13 from the field. The duo also only had five assists to just five turnovers against the Wildcats. Things won’t get any easier tonight in College Park. In addition to playing on the road in one of the Big Ten’s most intense atmospheres, Smith and Loyer will have to trade blows with Maryland’s Jahmir Young, who quietly continues to separate himself as one of the best players in this conference. In his last five games, Young is averaging 17.4 points, 3.8 assists, and 3.8 rebounds.

Houston’s caliber of opponent will improve down the stretch of the regular season
After tonight’s game against SMU (9-17) in Dallas, the Cougars will play three of their final five regular season games against Memphis and Tulane, who are in second and third place in the American Athletic Conference standings. No one is questioning how good Houston (23-2) is, but the facts are the facts: The Cougars have not played a team that is even in the NCAA Tournament picture since it won at Virginia on Dec. 17th. It will be good for this team to sharpen its knife a bit prior to the beginning of the postseason.

UCLA’s bench is improving
The Bruins are averaging 11.6 points in reserve in the five games since freshman guard Amari Bailey returned to the lineup after a foot injury. In the seven games that Bailey was out, UCLA (21-4) only averaged 5.3 points off the bench. This is a critical element to this team’s long-term success. The Bruins boast one of the best sixth men in the country in David Singleton (10 points), but have had a hard time finding other consistent scoring options outside of their starting lineup. The evolution of guys like Dylan Andrews and Will McClendon are a major thing to watch for this team over the next month. UCLA will host Stanford (11-14) tonight at Pauley Pavilion.

On The Side

  • In its last two games, Kansas has 45 assists on 68 made field goals. Both of the results were double-digit road victories. That’s not an easy thing to accomplish in the Big 12.
  • Since losing defensive stalwart Mawot Mag to a season-ending knee injury, Rutgers is 0-3 and giving up an average of 72.3 points. It gave up an average of 62.4 points during its first 12 Big Ten games this season when Mag was in the lineup.
  • Pitt’s top five scorers — Jamarius Burton, Blake Hinson, Greg Elliott, Nelly Cummings, and Nike Sibande — are in their fifth season of college basketball.
  • Tim Miles deserves credit for the job that he’s doing at San Jose State (16-10). With two more wins, the Spartans will have the most regular season victories that they’ve had since the 1980-81 season.
  • Loyola Marymount’s Cam Shelton is averaging 30.3 points over his last three games. The Lions will go for a regular season sweep of Gonzaga (21-5) tonight in Los Angeles. Tip off is at 11 PM ET on CBS Sports Network.

Daily Specials

  • Purdue at Maryland
  • Houston at SMU
  • Utah at Arizona
  • Stanford at UCLA
  • Gonzaga at Loyola Marymount

Leftovers