Remember last year? When Frank Haith’s Tulsa Golden Hurricane (that is not a euphemism it’s just what Tulsa named its athletic teams) won all those games in a row and we said, “Wow, Tulsa might play in the NIT!” and then there was a pandemic and we never found out if Tulsa would get to play in the NIT?
Well, they’re back.
“They” being the Golden Hurricane. The pandemic never left.
Last night, Tulsa stifled Houston up in Oklahoma, grabbing a marquee win at home to announce themselves as, well, kinda close to the NIT.
We’ll take it.
Other notes for today:
- Alabama, Mississippi, and Northwestern all strengthened their NIT cases last night, with Alabama pounding Mississippi and Northwestern comfortably losing at Iowa.
- Virginia Tech, Miami, LSU, and Texas A&M did not help their cause, with Virginia Tech escaping Miami and LSU pummeling A&M.
- USC showed Andy Enfield’s cards, and they were not NIT-worthy. Hard to take the Trojans seriously when they’re beating teams as good as Santa Clara by 23.
- Keep an eye on Purdue. The Boilermakers aren’t out of this. Matt Painter scares us. Do we scare him?
- Dangerous road game today for SMU, who visits Temple. By “dangerous road game,” we mean, “This is a great opportunity for SMU to lose to a mediocre team on the road and build a better NIT case.”
- Can Missouri afford a win over Tennessee? We may soon find out.
- A road loss by Arkansas may be just what the trainer ordered for Mr. Musselman. The Pigs go to Auburn.
- Seton Hall visits Xavier, and we wait with bated breath to see the latest twist in the Pirates’ grand plan. Lot of swords in this one.
- Penn State’s got a don’t-win game at Indiana.
- Georgia Tech hosts UNC and I, for one, am excited about the prospect of another locker room piñata. Did Josh Pastner fly with the last one? What are the rules about piñatas and planes?
- In NIT bubble action, Butler goes to Providence, Mississippi State visits Georgia, and St. Bonaventure travels to Rhode Island. All extraordinarily consequential games we will not remember two days from now.
- VCU, like SMU, has a chance at a course correction in Philadelphia, visiting St. Joe’s. With it being a home game for the Hawks, the Hawk itself will be able to flap in person, rather than on Instagram Live.
- NC State hosts Boston College, and we’d advise the Wolf Pack to, as Mitch McConnell put it that one time in a way that made me vaguely uncomfortable, keep their powder dry.
- Two intriguing A-10 games beyond the two we’ve already mentioned: Davidson hosts Richmond, Saint Louis hosts Duquesne. I believe each is a collaborative opportunity in the NIT sense, but I may turn out mistaken. I often turn out mistaken.
- Virginia goes to Notre Dame. Remember when Virginia was on the NIT radar last year? *ominous music grows* That was fun.
- Finally, we get the Nashville edition of this year’s Belmont/Murray State home-and-home, a home-and-home that traditionally dictates which team wants to lose in the OVC tournament and get an auto-bid to hang out with us.
Godspeed.
