First weekend

Good morning! The first college hoops weekend has come and gone. Let’s get to the news.

1. Virginia thumps Arkansas, UConn gets revenge

Three birds stole the show late in Virginia’s 91-72 win over Arkansas in Washington D.C., but the Hoos were letting it fly as well, knocking in 12 triples to help pave the way to victory.

Virginia’s experience in this game showed, and its entire starting five was in double-figures, led by 16 points apeice from Thijs De Ridder and Sam Lewis. Chance Mallory also chipped in 15 points, six assists and two steals.

Arkansas feeds off turning you over and getting out in the open floor, but it struggled to do both, especially in the first half. Virginia had just nine turnovers for the game, and Arkansas had to operate mostly in the halfcourt offensively.

The Razorbacks had just one assist in the first half and played too much 1v1 basketball, which John Calipari mentioned postgame is a rarity for his teams. They picked it up a bit in the second half, tying Virginia 45-45, but it was too late.

Moving on to the national title rematch, UConn handled Michigan 85-77 in TD Garden. It was a wire-to-wire win for the Huskies, and Michigan could never really get things going offensively. The Wolverines starting backcourt of Trey McKenney and Elliot Cadeau was held to 30 points on just 11-of-29 (37.9%) FG.

Dan Hurley has said many times this could be the best perimeter defense he’s had at UConn, and it showed against the Wolverines.

Inversely, Silas Demary (21 points, seven assists) and Braylon Mullins (23 points, 5/12 FG) played like the best backcourt in America, while freshman Colben Landrew (14 points) was also a spark off the bench. Rob Dauster broke down the big win on his Top Dogs podcast.

2. Buzzer-beaters help Valpo upset Purdue in Mackey

The upset of the young season belongs to Valparaiso. The Beacons defeated Purdue, 83-80 in double overtime, thanks to this triple from Justus McNair — a shot he got off with literally 0.1 seconds remaining.

That wasn’t the only buzzer-beater in the contest for Valpo. Rakim Chaney (35-8-6) also hit one to force double-overtime after the Beacons perfectly executed a free throw miss and kick out for three.

Those two shots gave Valpo the unlikely upset and first win over a Big Ten team since 2004. As for Purdue, it fell to 0-2 for the first time since 1976. There’s some real concerns with this Boilermaker roster, including the 3-point shooting (20.4%, 345th D-1).

You can see what head coach Roger Powell and players Rakim Chaney and Justus McNair had to say after the upset here. Bruce Webber, Powell’s old coach, also had a heartfelt interview with his former player on BTN postgame.

3. Memphis grabs a second big win over VCU

Subscribe to Premium to read the rest.