Big East

The first college basketball weekend of 2007 has delivered some interesting results. First off, how many people expected Hartford and Maryland-Baltimore County to be on top of America East after the first weekend of play? The Hawks, led by first-year head coach Dan Leibovitz, won a 62-60 thriller at Maine on opening night, then followed that win with an 80-75 double-OT home win over Boston University. The Hawks only have two seniors on the roster, so it would be understandable if people looked to their future instead of the present. Of course the two seniors, forwards Bo Taylor and Alex Zimnickas, are important contributors, but the Hawks also have some solid youngsters playing a part in their success. Freshman guard Joe Zeglinski is the team's second leading scorer, and sophomores Jaret Von Rosenberg, Michael Turner and Fabrice Tafo combined for 26 points off the bench in their win at Maine. A young team has its bumps in the road, but the future could be now for the Hawks.

I guess I need to start with the obligatory congratulations to Bob Knight for breaking the all-time wins record. ESPN has beat this story to death so I really don't have anything interesting to add. My only hope is that they won't keep televising Texas Tech games. This is a slightly above average team that has proven this week that they'd be middle of the pack in the Mountain West Conference. New Mexico was a few missed open lay ups and one or two bad JR Giddens shots away from winning today. Still, 880 wins is 880 wins so the man deserves respect.. at least for a day or so until he obnoxiously goes off on his team or the media or the refs and he loses my respect again..

Just about every conference had one team in action yesterday.. so I thought for a change that I'd run down the results conference by conference.. a little bit of fun for everyone.

America East.. Last year's tournament representative, Albany, had their 5-game winning streak snapped at Utah Valley State (discussed in yesterday's independents review). The Great Danes head into conference play with a 7-5 record, presumably the favorites along with 8-5 Vermont.

Atlantic 10.. Saint Louis picked up their 8th win in 9 home games, beating Ole Miss (the Billikens first win over a BCS team in almost 3 years.. Kansas State in January of 2004). The Bills face a poor Saint Bonaventure squad to start conference play, where they should improve to 11-3.

While it’s certainly nice to have a player who can be counted on to score 20 or so points in any particular game, it is just as important to have someone who can hold a player averaging 20 ppg significantly below the individual’s average.

Raphielle Johnson previews the 14 schools in the New York Metropolitan Area over the next weeks. Stop back each day as he moves from #14 up to #1.

ACC

Big 10

Big 12

Big East

Pac-10

SEC