Rivalry Week Tip Off

Tonight kicked off college basketball’s Rivalry Week with two battles between four top 14 teams. Without further adieu, let’s see the final scores.

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(5) Villanova 82

(4) West Virginia 75

West Virginia simply lost a fundamental battle

Scottie Reynolds spoiled a Mountaineers' comeback with 19 points in the second half.

tonight against Villanova.  They were outrebounded 37-27 and had an overall horrific shooting night from behind the arc.  The Mountaineers shot 27 treys and only hit 7 for a pitiful 25.9%.  West Virginia also struggled from the charity stripe (18-32 for a staggering 56.3%). WVU got down early and, even though they never fell flat on their face, they just could not get over the hump to officially make a comeback.  Villanova was led by 21 points from their superstar senior Scottie Reynolds, who put up 19 of his 21 in the second half. Corey fisher chipped in with 17 points, Pena grabbed 9 boards and had 10 points.

(14) Kansas 80

(1) Texas 68

Kansas continued their hot streak in Austin tonight by defeating the ever slipping Texas Longhorns.  Marcus Morris led the Jayhawks with 18PTS/8RBS/4ASTS. Sherron Collins and freshmen Xavier Henry both put up 15 points. The Texas side wasn’t as pretty, J’Covan Brown scored 28 points on 9-19 shooting, Damion James did his thing (as usual) with 24PTS/10RBS/5BLKS but the Longhorns couldn’t control the tempo of the game and gave up 17 turnovers which ultimately led to their demise.  The rest of the team (besides James and Brown) scored just 16 points and accounted for 11 turnovers.  Just five Longhorns scored, and that is not the balance you want if you’re looking to beat a number one team.

Other scores:

Loyola (IL) 47 v (15)Butler 62

Robert Morris 53 v (25)Pittsburgh 77

Any questions? Feel free to contact me at Tyler@PeteProse.com.