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Friday Random Basketball Thoughts

- The demise of Penn State continues as they went down to Indiana at home last night. The Nittany Lion fans over at Black Shoe Diaries are not happy to say the least, and question whether the team has quit on Ed DeChellis. As for Indiana, they are far from the pushover everyone expected them to be, and with a win over Iowa at home this weekend, the Hoosiers will be in the upper half of the Big Ten standings at 4-3, something no one thought possible before conference play started.

FBC expanded on my post from yesterday by breaking down just how bad some of the remaining teams on NU's schedule are. To give you an idea of the ineptitude of Chicago State, they recently lost by 21 points to Texas-Pan American. I have to question why that game is even on the schedule, wouldn't it be better to rest up that late in the season instead of playing a RPI-killing dumpster fire of a program? I can understand playing one or two teams like that early in the season, but it makes no sense to do in March.

- It seems to be a common theme to criticize students for storming the court after wins. It was probably a bit absurd for UCLA to do it after beating a mediocre Washington team, but I think it's fine in most cases. When a team pulls off a big upset at home over a top ranked opponent, court-storming is only natural. Which was why I was shocked to read a few Northwestern fans complain about the NU students doing it after beating #6 Purdue. All this nonsense about Purdue not really being a top 10 team because they came in on a 2 game losing streak is absurd. They were 14-2 coming into that game, and that included wins over top 10 teams West Virginia and Tennessee (before the Vols suspended 4 players). Yes, they fell out of the top 10 after losing 2 games last week. Teams fall in the rankings when they lose to unranked opponents, that's how the polls work. Stop being killjoys and take pleasure in the 'Cats biggest home win in over a decade. I recognize it's a minority of fans complaining, but I'm amazed that any fan would complain.