The University of Texas released the non-conference schedule for the men’s basketball team yesterday, and the Longhorns once again have a top-flight list of opponents before Big 12 play. Use the drop-down menu at the top of the page to check out the full season schedule, or simply click this handy-dandy hyperlink.

Texas opens the season with the Coaches vs. Cancer tournament, which culminates in a pair of games at Madison Square Garden against two of the tournament’s other three regional hosts — Illinois, Maryland, and Pittsburgh. The Terrapins and Panthers were both NCAA tournament teams in 2010, and both advanced out of the first round. While the Illini did not make it into the Big Dance, hopes are high for their 2010-11 campaign, and ESPN’s Andy Katz even ranked them 15th in his first preseason poll.

The Longhorns also face a trio of perennial powers in this season’s non-conference slate. Texas first travels to Greensboro, North Carolina to tangle with the Tar Heels on December 18th. As we reported on Twitter last week, the two schools were in talks to move this year’s game to the Bahamas. With this year’s contest staying Stateside, it fulfills North Carolina’s “semi-home” game in the current contract and now leaves the two schools free to revisit the Nassau option in future seasons.

While the Tar Heels were sent reeling following their loss to the Longhorns last December, they seemed to put the pieces together in the post-season and surged to the NIT finals, where they lost to Dayton. With another year under the belts of the young and talented Carolina team — plus the addition of freshman stud Harrison Barnes — the Tar Heels are set for a solid 2010-11 campaign.

Just four days later, Texas heads to East Lansing for an on-campus match-up with Michigan State. The Spartans are coming off their second-straight Final Four, and return all of their key players outside of Raymar Morgan. Although the Longhorns escaped with a victory against MSU in Austin last December, they have historically had trouble with Tom Izzo‘s teams. A true road game against a preseason-Top 5 squad will certainly be a challenge for the Horns.

In early January, Texas hosts Connecticut at the Frank Erwin Center. Like the Tar Heels, the Huskies had an abnormally mediocre season last year. Unlike North Carolina, however, Connecticut managed to knock off the Horns in the midst of their struggles. The Huskies are bringing in a pair of 4-star guards and return Kemba Walker, so expect coach Jim Calhoun to have his team ready for another exciting match-up.

The Longhorns will also face two more major conference opponents in Southern Cal and Arkansas. Texas knocked off both of those teams in 2009-10, and are looking for another clean sweep this year. The Trojans are still embroiled in NCAA drama, as their school’s lawyers are fighting sanctions that were handed down earlier this month. Coach Kevin O’Neill certainly has his hands full rebuilding the program, but his squad matured nicely at the end of last season.

The Razorbacks, meanwhile, will be without star guard Courtney Fortson, who declared for the NBA draft and signed with an agent in April. Arkansas fans are lamenting the decision, as Fortson went unselected in Thursday night’s draft. They can take solace in the fact that sharpshooter Rotnei Clarke will still be on the court for Coach John Pelphrey, though.

In addition to the major names, the Longhorns filled the remainder of their non-conference slate with a slew of mid-major opponents. Navy and Louisiana Tech are Texas’ opening round opponents in the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic, while in-state foes Lamar, Rice, and Sam Houston State are all making trips to the Frank Erwin Center. North Florida and Coppin State round out the non-conference sked for the Horns with match-ups in December.

For the second time in the last three years, Rick Barnes has led his Texas Longhorns to a perfect 9-0 start. Texas has yet to truly be tested, winning those first nine games by an average margin of 32.7 points. That all changes today.

The Longhorns square off with the defending National Champions this afternoon in the first-ever basketball game held at the giant Cowboys Stadium in Arlington Texas. While both schools have cash incentives built into their contracts to reward them for drawing crowd as big as 75,000, most observers expect less than 40,000 in the seats. Regardless of how many basketball fans make their way into JerryWorld this afternoon, it will be a historic day.

Although the Tar Heels are fresh off another national title, Roy Williams’ team is still finding its way early in the season. North Carolina lost four starters from last year’s team, including Tyler Hansborough and point guard Ty Lawson. The new-look Tar Heels are incredibly young, boasting a highly talented five-man recruiting class, and have a very deep frontcourt that could be the best in the nation.

By the numbers

That excellent North Carolina frontcourt means that the Heels don’t push the ball up and down the floor quite as much as they used to. Of course, that’s not saying much when you consider just how fast last year’s UNC team played. This year, the “slower” style of Tar Heel basketball is still the 25th-quickest in the nation, with an average of over 74 possessions in each of their games.

When North Carolina isn’t scoring easy points in the transition game or on the secondary break, they love pounding the ball down low to their big men. Nearly 64% of their points come from within the arc, good enough for fourth nationally in that metric.

Oddly enough, their free-throw rate isn’t sky-high as a result. The FTR measures how often teams head to the line in relation to field goals they attempt per game. North Carolina’s FTR is just a tad over 38%, which actually places them just outside the top third of the country. By comparison, the Longhorns boast an FTR of 46 percent.

The number which could be most important in this afternoon’s game is the turnover margin. So far this year, North Carolina has actually turned the ball over more often than their opponent, albeit just barely. The Tar Heels have a negative 0.3 turnover differential per game this season, a number that stems largely from their massive early-season struggles with the ball. While the youngsters have settled down quite a bit in recent weeks, the quick tempo and inexperience can still lead to a fair share of miscues for the Heels.

Meet the Tar Heels

Without a doubt, the toughest match-up for Texas is big man Deon Thompson. The 6’9”, 245-pound senior is not only a beast in the paint, but is a handful off the dribble and can hit spot-up jumpers from anywhere on the floor. While he’s not going to shoot a ton of threes, Thompson has still proven that he has the perimeter shot in his arsenal. The threat of his jump shot keeps defenses honest, so when opponents play him tighter outside, Thompson uses an explosive first step to blow by them and get to the rim.

Thompson is also going to give Texas a lot to handle on the glass. He is averaging eight boards per game to go along with his team-leading 17 points per contest, and his offensive rebounding rate is actually 66th-best in the country according to stat guru Ken Pomeroy.

In the backcourt, Marcus Ginyard is the steady leader of the team. After missing nearly the entire championship season due to injury, the senior guard used a medical redshirt to return for one more season. Unfortunately, he is struggling with another foot injury and is listed as probable for today’s game.

Ginyard is best-known for his suffocating, lock-down defense, and is often found harassing the opposing ballhandlers well beyond the perimeter. He worked hard on his jump shot all off-season, and it’s already paying off. While North Carolina isn’t a team that takes a ton of three-pointers, Ginyard is one player opponents hate to see shooting from behind the arc. So far this year, he is hitting at a 44% clip from long range and is averaging over 10 points per game.

Although not a senior like Thompson and Ginyard, big man Ed Davis is also a huge contributor for the Heels. Just a sophomore, he still hasn’t even completely developed into his 6’10” frame, but is already dominating opponents down low. He fights for every single rebound, and currently leads the team with more than nine boards per game. Davis is also an intimidating presence on defense, swatting nearly three shots per contest.

In the backcourt, sophomore Larry Drew II has huge shoes to fill at the point guard position. Following the departure of Lawson to the NBA, the youngster who averaged just nine minutes and 1.4 points per game in 2008-09 was handed the keys to the offense. No pressure.

For the most part, Drew has responded very well. He’s averaging nine points per game and has improved dramatically over the first month of the season after struggling with turnovers in his first few games. Drew is very quick with the basketball and can weave in and out of traffic to reach the paint. But if teams think they can sag back to try to keep the speedster in front of them, they quickly discover how deadly accurate Drew is from long range. On the year, the guard has connected on 42.3% of his three-point attempts.

Swingman Will Graves is the fifth man in the starting rotation for Coach Williams. With so many other talented players on the floor, Graves isn’t asked to do too much, and his stats are rather pedestrian as a result. What he does provide to the team, though, is a heady player who can run the floor and attack defenders off the dribble from the perimeter. Don’t be surprised if Graves is the one coming up with a key bucket late in the game while Texas is focused on all of the other stars.

Off the bench, giant seven-footer Tyler Zeller provides quite the spark in the paint. Although he plays just 19 minutes a game, Zeller is still the third-highest scorer on the team with 9.2 points per game. Named “Mr. Basketball” for the state of Indiana in 2008, the tall, thin center can run the floor incredibly well for his size and fits perfectly into the up-tempo style of UNC. In the half-court game, he provides a huge target on the blocks and his solid turnaround jumper can make him seem unstoppable when he gets the ball down low.

Freshman John Henson started playing his high school ball at Round Rock, just a few hours south of JerryWorld. After transferring to a prep school in Florida, he chose North Carolina from a long list of suitors that included the Texas Longhorns. Henson is 6’10” and has an incredible wingspan, but still has the body of a freshman. He’s wiry and lacks the muscle to bang around down low with experienced college forwards and centers. But Henson is incredibly athletic and agile, so he’s able to pull those defenders out away from the basket and beat them off the dribble.

Dexter Strickland is another of the talented freshman on the Carolina roster, and has been blossoming as the backup point guard behind Drew II. Like the starting point, Strickland is ridiculously fast and can speed past the defense in transition and off the perimeter. But the youngster is still making his share of freshman mistakes, which have limited him to just over thirteen minutes per game. Strickland is hampered by a hamstring injury that has him listed as questionable for today’s game. If he does play, the Horns can’t afford to lose him on defense, as he’s showcased a very solid jump shot early in the year.

The excellent freshman class at Carolina also includes twin brothers Travis and David Wear from Mater Dei in California. The 6’10” freshmen can score inside, but they also are very impressive shooting the ball from the midrange and even beyond the perimeter. Defensively, they often seem uncomfortable if pulled too far outside the paint, but when they are able to camp out near the rim, their length is invaluable.

Keys to the game

This afternoon’s contest is an intriguing match-up of similar styles, with both teams able to run the floor or beat up their opponents in a half-court game with their solid frontcourts. Vegas thinks the Longhorns are six-point favorites on this semi-home court, but it wouldn’t be at all surprising to see this one finish even closer.

For Texas, the most important thing is to control the paint. In their loss to Syracuse, the Tar Heels were absolutely stymied by a 2-3 zone that kept them from scoring inside and forced them to take a ton of perimeter shots which mostly resulted in misses. Even against an over-matched North Carolina Central team, the Tar Heels seem perturbed by the zone and were content to wait around the perimeter when they couldn’t attack the paint. If the Longhorns can keep Carolina from getting looks inside, they will have a much better shot at the win.

Texas also needs to force mistakes by the young Tar Heels. North Carolina has turned it over at least 19 times in four of their games, so the quick hands of Dogus Balbay and Avery Bradley on defense could lead to turnovers and easy points for the Horns. There is no easier way to slow down a high-octane team than taking the ball away from them.

In addition, the Longhorn guards and swingmen have to make sure they don’t force things inside. With their stable of tall, lengthy defenders, the Tar Heels love it when opponents try to drive all the way to the rim, or take their time trying to make moves on the blocks. The typical result is a swatted shot that ends up somewhere in the 15th row. What Carolina’s defense is susceptible to is good ball movement and drive-and-dish attacks. If Texas can work the ball around and make the tall defenders react, they will earn many more open looks.

Finally, Texas must take advantage of the freebies. Neither of these teams is very good at shooting free throws, with the Heels making just 65% of their attempts and the Longhorns sinking an even-more embarrassing 61 percent. This game has all the makings of a nail-biter, so every single point is crucial. Leaving those points sitting at the line will certainly leave one of these teams saying “What if?” tomorrow morning.

Welcome to the first in our daily series recapping the previous night’s action around the country. As the season rolls on, this morning scoreboard check will include unranked Big 12 teams, as well. And as a catch-all disclaimer, it should be noted that on some mornings, sleep just seems more valuable than the scoreboard rundown.

#4 North Carolina 88, Florida International 72 – After all of the off-season controversy surrounding the alleged mix-up in scheduling this game, it appears that perhaps Isiah Thomas didn’t have that much to worry about. Thanks to a ridiculous 26 Tar Heel turnovers, the Golden Panthers were able to keep the game respectable for much of the night, never falling behind by more than 26 points.

For Carolina, the bright spot of the night was the defense. The Heels blocked eight shots and held the Panthers to 30% shooting in the first half. Ed Davis led the block party for Carolina, swatting away four shots to go with his double-double performance of 13 points and 11 rebounds. Deon Thompson led all scorers with twenty.

#12 California 75, Murray State 70 – The final score indicates a much closer game than what actually transpired out west, but it also makes way for concerns about the Bears’ killer instinct. Mike Montgomery’s squad built a lead as big as 18 points in the second half of this one, but the hot-shooting Racers hit 53% of their shots in the second stanza and refused to give up.

The backcourt combination of Jerome Randle and Patrick Christopher provided 31 points for the Bears, including Randle’s 10-of-11 shooting from the charity stripe. Cal lost the battle on the glass by a 30-29 count, and had a meager 1.25 assist-to-TO ratio.

#17 Ohio State 100, Alcorn State 60 – The least competitive game of the night also gave us the least information about a Top 25 team. With the Buckeyes cruising the whole way, Thad Matta was able to go deep on his bench, dishing out at least thirteen minutes to ten different Buckeyes.

Jon Diebler hit 6-of-9 treys in a 22-point performance, but the standout star of the night was Evan Turner. The junior from Chicago held down point guard duties and logged a triple-double with fourteen points, ten assists, and 17 rebounds.

If the dominating win wasn’t enough to get Buckeyes excited about the new season, big man Dallas Lauderdale is expected back for Thursday’s game against James Madison.

#25 Syracuse 75, Alabany 43 – It didn’t take long for Jim Boheim to get over the 800-win hump, reaching that milestone in the first game of the 2009-10 season. The Orange bounced back quickly from their embarrassing exhibition loss to Le Moyne, decimating the Danes with suffocating defense. Syracuse forced 32 turnovers, including 21 steals, and held their opponents to just 27% shooting from the floor. Former Iowa State Cyclone Wes Johnson had six of the Syracuse steals and added twelve points and eight rebounds.

Guard Andy Rautins had to leave the game with just over fourteen minutes left. After jumping to pass to big man Arinze Onuaku, he landed on an opponent’s foot and twisted his ankle. Rautins wore a walking boot the rest of the evening, and his status is still in doubt for Wednesday’s game against Robert Morris.

The college basketball season is now just fifteen minutes away. Here are your TV listings for the night:

Florida International at #4 North Carolina – 6 P.M. CST, ESPNU
The biggest story of the night will undoubtedly be the regular-season coaching debut of Isiah Thomas, although the new may have already started wearing off following a loss to the NAIA’s Northwood in an exhibition on Wednesday night. For the defending-champion Tar Heels, the key storyline in early November will be how the team moves forward following the loss of Tyler Hansborough, Wayne Ellington, and Ty Lawson. The return of Marcus Ginyard following last year’s foot injury will definitely provide senior leadership, something the Heels will likely need for their quintet of ESPN Top 100 recruits.

Alcorn State at #17 Ohio State – 6 P.M. CST, Big Ten Network
This is a guaranteed yawner from the opening rounds of the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic, but fans will get their first look at how the Buckeyes have matured following an offseason where nearly the entire team returned. The only key piece missing from last year’s squad is big man B.J. Mullens, who left for the NBA after just one season. Dallas Lauderdale will be expected to fill the void this year, although he will likely be missing this early season matchup as he recovers from a broken finger he suffered in preseason practices.

Albany at #25 Syracuse – 8 P.M. CST, ESPNU
Iowa State transfer Wesley Johnson lit up the scoreboard in Syracuse’s exhibition on Tuesday night, dropping in 17 second-half points en route to a 22-point performance. Unfortunately for the Orange, it came in an embarrassing loss to D-II school Le Moyne. To be fair, Syracuse was experimenting with man-to-man for much of the game, a drastic departure from Jim Boheim’s famously stingy zone D. But the result certainly raises eyebrows in a season where pundits are wondering if this young Syracuse team can handle the rigors of the Big East conference. A convincing win over the visiting Danes would help to wash away some of the bad taste that is already tainting this season.

Murray State at #12 California – 10 P.M. CST, ESPNU
In what is likely going to be a down year for the Pac-10 Conference, hopes are high for the talented and experienced Golden Bears. Cal returns four starters from last year’s team, including a pair of senior guards in Patrick Christopher and Jerome Randle. It’s a well-proven axiom that solid backcourt play leads to quality results in March, so many expect the Bears to be dancing into the second weekend. If you can’t stay up to watch this one, be sure to set the DVR and get your first look at the Best Team Nobody Knows.

Last week’s ballot was admittedly a tough one, with teams around the country refusing to play consistent basketball. As a result, we submitted rankings which we weren’t exactly proud of, but ones which best reflected the muddied state of college hoops this year.

It’s painfully clear now that there is a very thin upper crust in the NCAA this season, and a lot of other mediocre teams filling up the middle. But even amidst that thin upper crust, there’s not much differentiation, as it’s a season in which no one is the clear frontrunner for the national title.

This week’s vote was a little easier, as only ten teams which we ranked were victims of a loss over the last seven days. Below is our ballot from this week, followed by superfluous explanation. If you’re enjoying the new “change” data in the third column, you might also be interested in our previous ballot, from February 23rd.

Rank	Team	Change
1	Connecticut	1
2	Memphis	2
3	Pittsburgh	2
4	Oklahoma	1
5	North Carolina	—
6	Louisville	—
7	Duke	—
8	Wake Forest	1
9	Michigan St.	1
10	Kansas	5
11	Missouri	3
12	Villanova	1
13	Marquette	1
14	Gonzaga	2
15	Clemson	2
16	Washington	4
17	Arizona St.	3
18	UCLA	1
19	Louisiana St.	2
20	Illinois	2
21	Purdue	4
22	Xavier	1
23	Florida St.	1
24	Brigham Young	2
25	Syracuse	1

At first glance, some readers may be confused by the very minor slides from Pitt and Oklahoma. At this point, we feel that a team should be valued more on their overall body of work than simply the results from the last seven days. The recent games certainly must be taken into account, but even Pitt’s road loss to unranked Providence isn’t enough to overshadow the fact that the Panthers have many more quality wins than the Tar Heels. As for the Sooners, they get some leniency when you consider that they lost to a Kansas team which we’ve moved into the Top Ten, and that they did so without superstar Blake Griffin.

Those Jayhawks are our biggest movers of the week, shooting up from No. 15 to tenth in this week’s ballot. Kansas finished the week with an absolute mudholing of Missouri in Allen Fieldhouse yesterday, and they were also aided by the fact that Marquette, Clemson, and Arizona State all lost a pair of games during the last week.

The other portion of our ballot that is worthy of discussion this week is, as always, the troubling bottom five spots. As we mentioned in the introduction, there’s really not any consistency or exceptional quality once you get past the initial contenders, and losses this week by West Virginia and Texas muddied things up at the bottom once again. You may notice that even though Florida State lost on the road against Boston College, they actually climbed a rung in our rankings this week. That’s an anomaly explained by both the Seminoles’ huge win against Clemson on Saturday, and the fact that once again there was a dearth of teams wanting to crack the rankings.

Some bloggers have been ranking Butler, which actually resulted in the Bulldogs checking in at 24th in our consensus poll last week. Considering that they won their pair of games this week, they likely will even climb when the consensus poll is released this afternoon. But the simple fact of the matter is that Butler lost at home to Loyola-Chicago and on the road to Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Wisconsin-Green Bay. Do you honestly think the Bulldogs would be sitting at 25-4 if they played in a conference that was worth a damn?

As we’ve mentioned, the consensus blogpoll will be up later this afternoon. Fast Break will be here for your late afternoon enjoyment, including new bracket projections, bubble watches, and the real polls from the AP and coaches. The Baylor game preview will follow in the late afternoon.

After a week’s absence in the blogpoll, we’re back in the mix with today’s ballot. Here are our votes, with the official compilation poll to come later today:

Rank	Team
1	Pittsburgh
2	Connecticut
3	Oklahoma
4	Memphis
5	North Carolina
6	Louisville
7	Duke
8	Missouri
9	Wake Forest
10	Michigan St.
11	Villanova
12	Marquette
13	Clemson
14	Arizona St.
15	Kansas
16	Gonzaga
17	Purdue
18	Illinois
19	UCLA
20	Washington
21	Louisiana St.
22	West Virginia
23	Xavier
24	Florida St.
25	Texas

It was an interesting week with losses by half of the top ten teams from the last poll. Only Wake Forest and UConn suffered their defeats at the hands of other top ten teams, while North Carolina, Michigan State, and Oklahoma all lost on the road to unranked opponents. As a result, it was a little easier to ignore the instinct to slide teams up and down based on the most recent results and instead reshuffle everyone based on their complete body of work this season.

The middle of the pack all held their own by winning their games this week, but our votes differed slightly from the consensus of last week’s blogpoll, when we didn’t submit a ballot. We chose to slot Marquette ahead of Clemson based on a more robust list of quality wins, although they could quickly take a nosedive with an absolute nightmare of a schedule awaiting them over the final two weeks. The Golden Eagles have to face UConn and Louisville this week before closing the season with a road trip to Pitt and a home game against Syracuse.

After that quality in the middle of the poll, things were a bit dicier with the lower rankings. Five of the bottom seven teams lost a game this week, and practically every other team that could have been considered for the 24th or 25th slot dropped at least one game as well. LSU slides up two spots to No. 21 in our ballot, but it’s more a reflection on the lack of other candidates than a rousing endorsement of the Tigers. They are playing in an incredibly weak SEC, leaving a home win over Washington State as their only remarkable victory this year.

The full compilation ballot will be released later this afternoon.

Hoops is certainly back in full swing, with ESPN broadcasting college basketball all damned day. Unfortunately, we’re not quite in full swing here at LRT with insanity at the McJob and cramming to get everything ready for Maui by Friday. We’ll try to get back to the daily content sometime this week, and look for some cosmetic changes around the site before December arrives. You can thank the 20-plus hours on airplanes to and from Hawaii.

The Big 12 is off to a hot start, with its members logging a perfect 19-0 record through last night’s games. The conference probably won’t match its solid RPI numbers from last year, when it spent most of the season slotted as the second-toughest league in the nation. But the Big 12 teams are taking care of patsies so far, something that couldn’t be said even during last season’s strong start — yes, we’re looking at you, Oklahoma State and Texas Tech.

Oklahoma faces the league’s stiffest test yet when it hosts Davidson tonight in the NIT Season Tip Off. It’d be great to watch this Top 25 match-up on TV, but the “Worldwide Leader” has better things to show. Like Kansas hosting the mighty Florida Gulf Coast (ESPNU, 8 PM CT). Or maybe Billy Wrong Way Gillispie getting demolished by The Anointed Ones better suits your fancy (ESPN, 8 PM CT)? If you thought VMI was bad, Billy Clyde, just try not to clench the muscles…

Tulane preview will be headed your way this afternoon. In the meantime, you can find us in a basketball coma with remote in hand.

Edit (3 P.M. CT): ESPN2 will now be broadcasting the Davidson/Oklahoma game at 8 P.M. You’ll definitely want to check that one out once the Horns are finished discarding the Green Wave.

Andy Katz reported on Friday that reigning National Player of the Year Tyler Hansbrough will miss at least two weeks with an injured shin. UNC head coach Roy Williams confirmed that Hansbrough’s bone scan showed a stress injury, but no sign of fracture. It’s unclear if the setback will cause The Great White Hope to miss any regular season games, as team doctors will re-evaluate the situation in two weeks.

There is a distinct possibility that Texas and top-ranked North Carolina could meet in the championship game of the Maui Invitational on November 26th. And while the Longhorns are a top ten team according to both the Associated Press and the ESPN/USA Coaches Poll, the Tar Heels at full strength are without a doubt in another stratosphere. Williams’ team will be without lockdown defender Marcus Ginyard in Maui, so a recovering Hansbrough could give a little more hope to a bracket of challengers that also includes ninth-ranked Notre Dame.

The Tar Heels open the season at 4 P.M. (EST) on November 15th against the Penn Quakers

Texas moved up two spots in each of the polls this week, sliding into the #10 slot in both the AP and ESPN/USA Today rankings, while Kansas holds steady at #2. The Big 12 has five teams in the AP poll with Kansas State (22nd), Texas A&M (23rd) and Baylor (25th) all hanging around on the lower rungs.

Stefhon Hannah could miss the rest of the season after a brawl outside a Columbia nightclub late on Saturday night. The Tigers still have to tackle a rematch with Kansas, a pair of showdowns with K-State, and roadies in Waco and Norman. Without their leading scorer, Mizzou could be a lot closer to the cellar than anticipated.

This afternoon, Luke Winn introduces us to twin brothers and UNC commits Travis Wear and David Wear, Jr. The 2009 class for Roy Williams is looking absolutely ridiculous when you add in Dexter Strickland and Round Rock product John Henson, who had Texas in the mix before committing to the Heels earlier this month.

Joe Lunardi is high on the Big 12 this week, putting six of the conference’s teams in today’s Bracketology. Kansas still leads the way with a 1-seed, while Texas is slotted as a 3 in Little Rock. K-State (6 seed), Baylor (7), Texas A&M (9), and Oklahoma (9) make up the rest of the conference’s dance card.

Missed Scott Drew’s interview on Sportscenter after the 5-OT thriller on Wednesday night? Thanks to the technical know-how of an LRT co-traveler, you can watch the video through the interweb tubes. Check it out below, and be sure to check out the rest of his Longhorn videos on his website.

A scary, scary moment in the Raptors game in Atlanta last night when T.J. Ford was fouled hard by Al Horford and fell straight to the court, slamming his head. T.J. was carted off on a stretcher, but has since been released from the hospital and is cleared to play. I’m guessing he won’t be right back out there, but it’s good to know things are looking up after seeing that frightening footage last night.

So much for St. Mary’s being ranked when they come to town. The Gaels ran into Southern Illinois on the wrong night, losing 71-56 to a team that had almost no offense over their first six games. All this really does to Texas is give a slight ding on the RPI later in the season, but it’s better to be playing a tough, one-loss St. Mary’s squad than a 16-loss Prairie View A&M.

Don’t ask me how I missed this in SI’s weekly power rankings last week, but apparently the Penn students brought their A-game for Tyler Hansbrough and UNC. They blew up pictures of his mother, who was a former Miss Missouri, and waved copies of this horrible senior picture collage. I pulled the photo from Tyler50.com, the official website of Mr. Hansbrough. Why, oh why would you put something this hilariously awkward on the internet when you are a college athlete? I half-expect to find Uncle Rico’s glamor shots if I keep clicking around long enough.

Chris Low at ESPN.com has a good feature on A.J. Ogilvy over at Vanderbilt. After seeing the Commodores shock a lot of folks last year, I thought they just needed a good inside presence to help out Shan Foster and get them over the hump. There was some below-the-radar buzz on the Aussie before he hit the college hardwood, but I wasn’t sure he’d be the answer as only a freshman. It turns out that Ogilvy is just as good as advertised, if not better, and has Vandy poised to be one of the top three or four teams in the SEC.

Finally, some more action on the tube for hoopsheads tonight. Cincy takes on Xavier and former OU guard Drew Lavender in the Crosstown Shootout (6 PM, ESPN2). Check out the 7-1 Musketeers if you haven’t had a chance yet, as they should absolutely school the ‘Cats. If you don’t believe me or Chris Low about the Ogilvy kid, watch Vandy hunt for a road win at DePaul (7 PM, ESPN Classic). And if you remember when UMass was solid and the A-10 was a part of the Big Monday package, reminisce as the Minutemen host BC (8 PM, ESPNU).