The top team debate

Good morning! And welcome to the part of college hoops where casual fans start paying attention. And to the regular Daily readers, we had ourselves yet another weekend with quite a few surprises.

So let’s dive in.

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1. Who’s the 1? Probably still Auburn or Duke

There’s a good chance Alabama ascends to No. 1 in the AP poll today. Given No. 1 Auburn and No. 2 Duke both lost on Saturday — the second time 1 and 2 have lost on the same day this season, a first since 1979 — that’s the expected behavior from voters.

It’s not that simple.

Yes, No. 3 Alabama held on for an 85-81 win at Arkansas. Nothing wrong with that. It was a fairly typical game for Bama (20-3, 9-1 in SEC): it shot 54.8% from the field, but just 26.3 on 20 3-point attempts. But it grabbed enough offensive rebounds (35% of its misses) and only committed 11 turnovers that it controlled most of the game, and looked like a Bama team capable of making another Final Four.

But the Tide are consistently ranked behind Auburn, Duke, Houston, Florida and Tennessee in predictive metrics from KenPom, Torvik and EvanMiya (don’t look at where Haslametrics has them).

Is that an apologizing for No. 6 Florida winning at Auburn, or Duke losing at Clemson? Maybe a little. But I’m trying to not overreact to one day.

After all, the Gators (20-3, 7-3) turned in a spectacular offensive show in their 90-81 win at Auburn. They trailed by 10 points early on, then ripped off a 14-2 run, and at one point hit 18 of 24 shots. They hit 13-of-33 3-pointers (39%), neutralized Auburn (21-2, 9-1) on the glass, and scored 1.22 points per possession, the most efficient game for any team vs. Auburn since December.

It also did all that without second-leading scorer Alijah Martin, who missed Saturday with a hip injury. Reminder: The SEC is stacked, and this was Auburn’s first league loss.

And Duke? Well, it’s fitting that Dick Vitale’s first game in years (he got a heart-warming standing ovation) was a 77-71 Clemson victory that resulted in a court-storming. The Devils (20-3, 12-1 in ACC) led at halftime, but looked flat in the second half as Clemson used a 12-0 run to take control and hand Duke’s its first league loss.

The ACC isn’t nearly to the SEC’s quality, but the Tigers (19-5, 11-2) clearly aren’t chaff like everyone else. They snapped Duke’s 16-game win streak and put themselves in position for the regular-season crown. Also a factor: It took Cooper Flagg (18 points) most of the game to get going, and when he was driving for a potential game-tying bucket, he found a slick spot on the floor.

Even the After Dark crew says there’s no reason to overreact to a day when No. 1 and No. 2 lost (and they do love their overreactions).

But if we have a couple more Saturdays like this, it’ll be time to reassess. And that would be just long enough to cement no clear March favorite.

2. K-State, Wake highlight NCAA tourney bubble winners

We’re less than five weeks from Selection Sunday. Get ready for regular NCAA Tournament bubble discussion. (It’s also a good time to remind you that Fielding the 68 projects the entire field on Mondays and Fridays at 5 pm ET.)

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