Barclays College Game Follow-up
Although the majority of the focus on Monday was on the Grace vs. Berkeley Carroll games, there were two games after that were previously reported by by the Grace Gazette. The college games took place after the barclays game. The matchups were Penn State against Pitt and number 17 ranked Texas A&M against Oklahoma State. The initial projections by the Grace Gazette were Oklahoma state to win by 5 and Pitt to win by 6. Both of these projections were wrong, and the final scores had Oklahoma state losing by 18 and Pitt losing by 31.
Of course it would be smart to go over our predictions are see why they were off. The Texas A&M and Oklahoma State game. When the first article was written for the Gazette, it was before the preseason rankings were out, and little was known about Texas A&M’s young roster. The juniors on A&M clearly made significant developments over the summer and clearly stepped into their leadership roles as upperclassmen. Oklahoma State clearly felt the loss of Jawun Evans who currently plays for the Los Angeles Clippers D-League team.
In the Penn State Pitt game, it was clear that Pitt was missing Jamel Artis and Michael Young. Artis plays for the D-League affiliate of the Magic, and Young plays for the affiliate of the Washington Wizards. Pitts new additions were not able to step up in the absence of the two players allowing for Penn State’s guard’s to bully Pitt Shep Garner lead his Penn State team as they destroyed Pitt with a more experienced roster poised to be a sleeper in the Big Ten.
After seeing how both teams played in the games it is clear to see that both will be ready to make tournament runs this a coming March. Following the games Texas A&M has jumped ten rankings to the seventh best team in the country. If everything stays the way it is look for A&M to be a two or three seed in the tournament this March. On what to expect from the other teams, it seems as Oklahoma State will be in the NIT this year with a chance to win it all. Penn State is a likely eight or nine seed for the tournament and Pitt will be a definite bubble team.