Pitt 76, UConn 68

Yeah, this is late, but it's been a busy couple of days for reasons that have nothing to do with hoops. Trying to find a job and all that stuff, you know...

Anyway, my primary conclusion from Monday night's big game was one I've drawn before: Pitt is for real. I mean, as a Final Four and a national title contender. That UConn team was on fire. And yes, they're without Jerome Dyson. And yes, that had an obvious effect. But Pitt went in with a clear plan for stopping (or at least hassling) Hasheen Thabeet, which nobody had done in weeks, and it worked.

It worked because DeJaun Blair is an animal -- not tall enough but certainly tough, strong and mean enough to play Thabeet and make his night miserable. His clear mission throughout the first half was to be in between Thabeet and the basket -- not even necessarily to do anything while there, but just be in between the player and the hoop. And it worked.

Thabeet is a thug, as we've discussed here before, and a bully. And most teams don't have anybody who can or will stand up to him. Pitt is an obvious exception, and once they got into Thabeet's head and disrupted his game, they were in good shape. UConn had to move the ball outside, and without Dyson they didn't have enough scoring to put the game away. Kemba Walker is a great player, and will be better, but basically the Huskies had been running their offense through Thabeet (for good reason) for so long, they didn't know what to do when they couldn't anymore.

Let's make one thing clear, though. In spite of all of that, this was no Pitt rout. UConn went into the final minutes looking as if they'd pull the thing out in spite of the rough start. The Huskies remain one of the best, if not the best team in the nation, and should be considered a favorite come March even without Dyson.

All last night showed us is that that's true about the Pitt Panthers too.

UConn 63, Syracuse 49

Yeah, nothing cheers a guy up like watching the Cuse get manhandled. Not that it'll make me feel any better Saturday afternoon, while I watch the Hoyas get manhandled BY the Cuse, but for one night it was fun.

After the game, Jim Calhoun called Hasheen Thabeet "the most dominant force in America right now." I assume he meant "in college basketball in America," thus exempting forces such as LeBron James, Barack Obama and American Idol, and I therefore agree with him. When Thabeet is as motivated as he apparently is right now, there's just not another team in the country with anybody who can play him.

Some bad news for the red-hot Huskies today, though, as Jerome Dyson is evidently out for the season with a torn knee ligament. My first reaction is to say they'll just slot the hyper-athletic Kemba Walker in there and not miss a beat, but Walker's been such a vital jolt of energy off the bench, you wonder if that translates into a starting role.

With Walker, A.J. Price, the terrifying Jeff Adrien and so many other talented players around Thabeet, I have to imagine UConn will still be fine, and a candidate for the national title. But they were starting to look as if they might run away and hide from everybody, and now you have to wonder how such a major injury will affect them.

Tonight's only conference game is Louisville at Notre Dame. The Irish have lost seven in a row and are grasping furiously for a ripcord. Can't imagine they find it tonight against T-Will and the Cards.

Back tomorrow with a recap of Louisville, if it's interesting enough, and maybe a preview of Saturday's Syracuse-Georgetown matchup, if I feel masochistic enough.

UConn 89, Villanova 83

So the other night, while watching the DePaul-South Florida game (yes, I was the only one watching -- call me with any questions about the game), I learned something about this year's Big East tournament. I'd already known that all 16 teams would be in it, but it hadn't occurred to me how, exactly, they were going to make that work.

Evidently, the top four seeds will all receive two byes, advancing straight to the quarterfinal round, which begins Thursday of that week. So, if you're one of the top four, you'll only have to win three games in three days to win the conference tournament.

The No. 5 through No. 8 seeds will each receive one bye and won't play until Wednesday. So those teams, if they want to win the conference tournament, will have to win four games in four days -- something that's only been done twice, last year by Pitt and a few years back when Gerry McNamara and Syracuse did it.

The No. 9 through 16 teams will begin play Tuesday and will have to win five games in five days to be conference champs. If that sounds freaking impossible, there's a good reason.

Now, why does this matter? Because that means somebody from the top nine will be in that Tuesday group. At least one of these nine teams:

Louisville
Marquette
UConn
Pitt
Syracuse
Georgetown
Notre Dame
West Virginia
Villanova

If you believe (as I do) that any of the nine teams in that list could conceivably win the conference tournament if all else were equal, this is jarring. It means that at least one of the Big East's "Power Nine" will be all but eliminated from contention for the title before the tournament begins.

If Villanova is that team, they will have some regrets.

They'll regret not making one of those tip-in chances in the final seconds of the Louisville game go in the net. And I believe they'll look back on last night's game at UConn and think they could have won that too.

Villanova is a nightmare to play against. They hassle everything. All through the second half, as it kept looking at if Connecticut was about to pull away, the Wildcats got a hand on every pass, a hand in the face of every shooter, a steal off every dribble that wasn't perfect. They created chance after chance after chance...

...and missed them all. I mean, this was hard to watch. They'd get the steal, block or some other kind of turnover, then they'd take it down the other end and miss a layup. Or miss a dunk. Or make the inconceivably bad decision to try and drive the lane and dunk on Hasheem Thabeet, whose large hand ended that quest emphatically.

(Quick note on Thabeet, by the way. This guy should be better, especially on offense. It looks as if all he wants to do is block shots. Now, he's excellent at blocking shots -- a total game-changer on defense. But he's an uninterested rebounder and a sometimes invisible offensive player. Jay Bilas kept saying that nobody else in the country has a comparable player, and he's right. The dude is 7-foot-3. But that doesn't help you score if you don't care about offense.)

Anyway, Villanova was way game. A.J. Price hitting 700 three-pointers in the first half didn't bother them. Jeff Adrien asserting his I'm-stronger-than-you-are-and-will-own-the-second-half act didn't bother them. The only thing that seemed to upset them was when they got the ball within a few feet of the rim. Why would that be so scary?

Nice escape win for UConn, which is rolling, but I call this a big-time missed chance for Villanova -- and one they might regret come March.

*Red-Hot Redbirds Roll Rutgers: Yes, of course I kept an eye on the Louisville-Rutgers game. Yes, I took note that it was tied at 7-7. Yes, I was impressed that Louisville then scored the next 21 points, enabling its mascot to take a 90-minute nap and its coaching staff to start drawing up plays for Sunday's game at Syracuse.

Look, I still think Louisville has shown some weaknesses this season, and that they could be vulnerable. But right now, they are ON FIRE, as good and as locked-in as any team in the conference and super-confident. If this keeps up, and builds on itself, they'll have a real good chance to take that No. 1 seed into Madison Square Garden in early March.