Ohio St

By this time next Sunday there will be more than 20 teams guaranteed inclusion in the 2011 NCAA Tournament and the first three tickets were punched on Saturday. UNC Asheville (Big South), Belmont (Atlantic Sun) and Morehead State (Ohio Valley) all won their conference tournament finals while Princeton (Ivy) missed out on a chance to join the fun with their loss at Harvard. Now the Tigers need to beat rival Penn at the Palestra to forge a tie atop the standings, forcing a one-game playoff with Harvard for the Ancient Eight's automatic bid.

Despite an overall record of 19-9 and an SEC record of 11-3 Alabama is still in need of wins to ensure their presence in the field of 68. Why? Further inspection of their schedule provides the reason, with a non-conference schedule that boasts some bad losses and the mixed fortune that comes with playing in the SEC West. On the line tonight is at least a share of the overall SEC title as the Crimson Tide visits Florida (22-6, 11-3) in their lone regular season meeting.

BYU (27-2)

Kansas (27-2)

Ohio St (27-2)

While Vanderbilt (20-6, 8-4) would need a lot of help to catch Florida atop the SEC East standings there's still the matter of sewing up a first round bye in next month's SEC Tournament, and they can move one step closer with a win over Tennessee (16-11, 6-6) Tuesday night. Tennessee won the first meeting between the two, with the Volunteers slumping at the time and needing a second-half revival of sorts (combined with some poor decisions from the Commodores) to pull off the comeback.

Many fans and pundits alike felt that Ohio State's trip to Madison would be the point where they'd suffer their first loss of the season. But after a first half that didn't do much to separate either team those prospects didn't look good as Thad Matta's group went on a 23-6 run to push their lead out to 15 points with 13:21 left in the game. Thankfully for the Badgers Jordan Taylor and company had other ideas, answering with a 30-8 run of their own and eventually going on to win 71-67 at the Kohl Center.

The day has arrived for those who pegged Saturday as the first loss for the undefeated Ohio State (24-0, 11-0) Buckeyes, who visit Wisconsin (18-5, 8-3) in a contest that will go a long way in determining the tenor of the Big Ten race from this point forward. That seems to be the forgotten aspect of this contest, with many choosing to focus on the question of whether or not Thad Matta's crew can go undefeated (personally, this is a silly question as it hasn't been done (tournament included) since 1976).

The lesson learned this weekend: almost anyone can be had. And that should make for an exciting month of March if results like the ones we saw become the norm. Twelve ranked teams went down on Saturday, but it should be noted that four of the losses came to opponents who were also ranked and eight of the twelve lost on the road. How does one narrow these results down: ask the simple question of which losers may be in some trouble at this point in the season. One such victim has to be Syracuse, who has now dropped four straight and has to play at Connecticut on Wednesday night.

If you were upset that the game between Florida and Georgia wouldn't end in time for the tip between Purdue and Ohio State that's understandable. Because by the time ESPN switched its coverage from Athens to Columbus the Buckeyes had just about ended the game, going on a 17-1 run following a Purdue basket to make the score 6-4 with 17:27 remaining.

No mistaking what the biggest game of the night is, especially when considering the conference title implications involved. Top-ranked Ohio State (20-0, 7-0) host #12 Purdue (17-3, 6-1) in a matchup of the top two teams in the Big Ten and a win over the Boilermakers would put Thad Matta's team on the fast track towards another conference championship. But this game also provides one of the best individual matchups of the season to date, one that will have the attention of both NBA scouts and college fans.