Though ranked sixth in the country, George Washington has been characterized as an overrated team. Given the opportunity to prove that their 26-1 record and 18 game winning streak wasn’t just a house of cards, the Colonials instead folded, losing 68-53 to Temple in the first-round of the Atlantic Ten tournament. The loss is not only disappointing and gives fuel to the team’s critics, but it likely cost them a couple of seeds in the upcoming NCAA Tournament.
It’s also bad news for bubble teams, as the Atlantic Ten, a one-bid conference if GW won the conference title, will now get two teams in (interestingly, the top four seeds all lost in Thursday’s first round). Those teams hurt by GW’s loss include local squads George Mason and Maryland.
The latter was able to help its cause last night with a convincing win over Georgia Tech. Despite the impressive performance, Maryland will probably have to beat Boston College in tonight’s quarterfinal (approximate tip is 9:30) to earn serious consideration for the Big Dance. The Terps edged the Eagles at Comcast Center on Dec. 11 in the teams’ only meeting this year, but a lot has happened since then. Boston College was making its ACC debut, and the Terps got 16 big points from Chris McCray, who, as we all know by now, is no longer with the team after being declared academically ineligible.
George Washington’s loss wasn’t even the biggest upset of the day; while the Colonials were getting beat up by the Owls in Cincinnati, top-ranked Connecticut was losing to Syracuse (another bubble team that may have earned an at-large bid). That benefits Georgetown, who edged Marquette 62-59. The Hoyas will face the Orange — instead of the Huskies — in the Big East semis tonight at 7 p.m. on ESPN. Georgetown won comfortably when the teams met two and a half weeks ago. Expect Jeff Green to find holes in the middle of Syracuse’s vaunted 2-3 zone, where he’ll be able to score if he has the open shot, dump it down to Roy Hibbert for easy layups, or kick it out to Brandon Bowman and Ashanti Cook for good looks at three-pointers.
Photo by Leafblower, used with permission.
