The first of four college basketball champions was crowned on Wednesday when Santa Clara won the College Insider.com Tournament title with a 76-69 victory over Iona. These two schools had met only one pervious time, back in the Tournament of Roses at Portland, Oregon in 1960. Santa Clara won that meeting as well, 68-47. The Broncos became the third winner of the CIT, following Old Dominion in 2009 and Missouri St in 2010... Read more

The 2011 Final 4 from Houston will not have a single No. 1 seed participating for just the third time since seeding began back in 1979. The other years were 1980 and 2006 with both of those Final 4s being held at Indianapolis (funny how that kind of stuff happens). Louisville (a No. 2 seed) beat an eighth-seeded UCLA in the 1980 title game with Iowa (5-seed) and Purdue (6-seed) joining them in Indianapolis that year.... Read more

Sixteen ‘sweet’ teams remain and 15 games from now, on April 4 from Reliant Stadium in Houston, the 2011 national champions will be crowned. The selection committee ranked the entire field from 1 to 68 with the last four at-large teams selected and the four lowest-ranked automatic qualifiers playing what was called the "First Four". The winners from the group of at-large teams saw Clemson get a No. 12 seed and VCU a No... Read more

Ohio State held a slight edge over Kansas in last week’s coaches’ poll (17 first-place votes to 14) but extended that margin in Monday’s new poll, getting 25 first-place votes to Kansas’ six (I guess some of them saw OSU’s 93-65 destruction of Wisconsin on Sunday). Ohio State owned a much bigger lead in the AP poll last week (45-14 in first-place votes with BYU getting five and Duke one). Ohio State extended its lead... Read more

Four of the nation’s top-five teams won this week. No. 1 Ohio St crushed Penn St 82-61 in Happy Valley on Tuesday, earning the Buckeyes at least a share of the Big 10 regular season title. It marks the fourth time Ohio State has earned at least a share of the Big 10 title since Thad Matta took over as head coach for the 2004-05 season, the most by any Big 10 school during that span. Also note that Ohio State’s win was... Read more

Ohio State was No. 2 in last week’s AP poll and No. 3 (behind Kansas) in the coaches’ poll but on Monday, the Buckeyes found themselves atop both polls. No. 1 Duke lost 64-60 at Va Tech Saturday night, so a change at the top was expected. Ohio St was a solid No. 1 in the AP, getting 45 first-place votes to Kansas’ 14 (No. 3 BYU got five and No. 4 Duke, one) while the schools almost split the first-place votes in the coaches... Read more

The BracketBusters started back in 2003 with the intention of helping out the little guy. The theory being that mid-major schools would get an opportunity to face a quality opponent with a chance of hopefully improving its at-large status. However, in practice, the fact remains that there are very few at-large bids awaiting mid-major schools, so while the premise sounds good, few if any schools over the years have helped... Read more

The week opened with the nation’s No. 1 team, Ohio State, as its lone unbeaten at 24-0 and Centenary (Summit League) as the lone winless team at 0-25. The Buckeyes’ lone game this week is at Wisconsin (No. 13 in the AP and No. 14 in the coaches’ poll) on Saturday, which has won 16 straight home games as well as 34 of its last 35 at the Kohl Center. Coastal Carolina entered the week with the nation’s second-longest active... Read more

Duke, last year’s national champs, opened No. 1 in both major polls and remained there while stretching its winning streak to 25 games until losing 66-61 at Florida State on January 12. When the polls came out on January 17, Ohio State was the nation’s new No.1 team. The latest polls were released February 7 and the Buckeyes remain atop the two major polls for the fourth straight week, unanimously in the coaches’ poll... Read more

The eyes of the sporting world all descend on Indianapolis this weekend for college basketball's Final 4. Then again, maybe not. More than just a few pair of eyes will be paying attention to Sunday night's game at Fenway, where the Yanks and Red Sox open the 2010 MLB season with CC Sabathia squaring off against Josh Beckett. MLB's traditional Opening Day is set for Monday (April 5) with a 13-game schedule beginning... Read more