Going down 1-0 for the Big Ten on opening night didn't bode well for the Big Ten cagers.

"Arguably the biggest game of the year so far: Wake Forest @ Illinois tomorrow night... Mich St @ Duke could be a really good one as well. Big Ten-ACC is always fun, though I think that ACC is undefeated in the series history" - My friend's email

I will add my email response to that in a moment. I would tend to agree that Wake Forest-Illinois will be the biggest game so far, though the Wake Forest-Arizona match-up could have been prior to tonight. Because North Carolina missed the shot at playing Louisville in the Maui Invitational, we didn't get to see the two teams that a lot of people are touting for the championship this year face off. For a second, think back to what a match-up tonight's UNC versus Indiana game would have been a few years back. It is too bad that Mike Davis's team won't be able to handle the Tar Heels tonight, and you can quote me on that.

"ACC is undefeated though some years they have won 5-4. Usually they win the big games and lose the ones lower down. This year, it may be the opposite but I have the feeling the ACC will dominate again and possibly sweep. Illinois gets no love in this thing. For years, they played Duke and now Wake? The mean people at ESPN who put together this made for TV matchup must really hate the Illini." - Me

Ok, so after last night, it is clear that the ACC won't sweep. Maryland losing to Wisconsin guaranteed that, but the ACC might still go 7-2 which is about as close to a sweep as you get these days in college matchups like this. As for my second comment, well, I got hit for it in his recap of the game from last night.

"What's with the Mich St. players (specifically Ager) constantly slapping the floor at Cameron Indoor? You just can't do that. I'm sorry. And even if you do it, the whole thing about slapping the floor is that you do it once (MAYBE twice) towards the later stage of the game when you really need to pick up the defensive intensity and you sense a momentum change - gets the crowd and the team involved. You don't do it on every friggin' play for 20 minutes straight! Think "Boy who cried wolf" thing. What do you mean that Illinois gets no love? I'd say it's the opposite. Every year they've tried to match it up with "Best Big 10" against "Best ACC" and so on down the ladder. Illinois has consistently been perceived as one of the better Big 10 teams (a compliment to them), and thus they've had to play Duke (twice, and both were very very good games) and I think Maryland and now Wake. If I were Illinois, I'd rather have to play a tough early season game like this than to have a more cupcake game against, say, Clemson. I'd argue it's much better for them in terms of setting themselves up for the heart of season and postseason." - My friend's email

All of this was addressed by my points below:

1. This was the classic inside/outside matchup. Duke relied on the outside shot while Michigan State, for the first 13 minutes of the game, constantly tried to push the ball inside. While it didn't work early for the Spartans, they were able to go on a run where it was working and working well. Paul Davis was scoring and scoring at will. Even when he got blocked on one shot, he was able to get his own rebound and take it back strong. Shavlik Randolph and Sheldon Williams had no answer for him. Duke was probably lucky that Michigan State can only play one big man at a time as their team doesn't have the depth to field two. If they could have had two guys inside, they would have won with this strategy...BUT
2. With 7 minutes left in the first half, Davis was called for a charge on a play where he took the ball inside and slammed it down. The defensive player (who I didn't note but I think was Williams) got over just in time to get the charge call. When this happened, Michigan State changed their game and stopped feeding the ball inside to Davis.
3. About the same time, Duke's pressure outside defense started to work better. They prevented passes inside to Davis and they caused a number of quick turnovers in succession which gave them the momentum. These all led to fast break chances which earlier in the game they just weren't getting. The chances were turned into easy lay-up baskets instead of the outside jumpers which they had been living on up until that point. Is it any wonder that J.J. Redick and Daniel Ewing had 58 points combined? They were lofting threes and long range jumpers the entire game. Twelve of the first 17 points that Duke scored came via the three.
4. You have to give Michigan State credit. They stayed in the game. Their outside shooting was just good enough to keep up with Duke who didn't get the ball inside enough. I have watched teams live on the outside. It isn't pretty. When Malik Rose graduated from Drexel, they tried to become a shooting team. Your heart sticks in your throat every time they come down the floor because you wonder where the shot is going to come from. Now, granted, Duke has better shooters than Drexel ever did, and according to the broadcast last night, it seems that they have been really working on their shot (including either Sean Dockery or Ewing, though I think it was Dockery, taking 1000 jumpers a day, and Redick improving his conditioning and shooting to where he finally shoots at the top of his jump). You just can't live on a game like that and their inside guys are going to get murdered against teams like North Carolina who have two big men and a great point guard in Raymond Felton who will get the ball inside to them. Now, does Duke get a little lucky? Yes. Why? The ACC doesn't have the big inside man domination that it did starting about 7 years ago and working forward to last year. Most of the star players are the guards so the ACC may be more of a shooting conference this year. However, if North Carolina stays healthy, Georgia Tech's Luke Schenscher stays out of foul trouble, and Wake Forest's Vytas Danelius steps up again this year to his true form, Duke will have a tough time against those teams. Now, is it any wonder they were picked 4th in the league and could fall as far as 6th?
5. When Michigan State went back to feeding the ball inside, it was when Duke was in foul trouble. They just didn't do it enough. They needed to keep the pressure on Williams who was struggling to play any defense at all with 4 fouls.
6. The final dagger was Ewing hitting a 3 pointer with about a minute left in the game. That put Duke up 5 and Michigan State was just dying on the free throw line. They missed 5 free throws within a 90 second span that would have had the game tied. Instead, they were down five and looked dejected every time they ran down to the Duke end.
7. Slapping the floor is annoying. It was cute the first time Wojo did it, but only because the boy is like 3 feet tall and it really got the crowd into it. Now everyone does it. Maurice Ager should not be doing it when playing away though. And what is with coaches doing it now? Quin Snyder did during Missouri's game against Murray State on Saturday. He was so animated, his hair flopping all over the place. I am sorry, but if you need to slap the floor for your team, especially when playing against Murray State at home, your team has issues. My guess for the end of the season, Snyder will be FIRED!
8. As for the no love, yes, Illinois has been consistently one of the best teams in the Big Ten over the past 6 years. However, at the same time, they don't necessarily need the big game at this point in the season. They normally play a decent enough schedule to where another Top 25 game will not be that much of a deal. Plus, a tough game like this one (and a loss most times) can be killer. Look at Michigan State's schedule last season and how trashed they were. They went 6-8 in their non-conference games before going 12-4 in conference (in a very down year for the Big Ten). They were beat up before the conference season and then worn out at the end of conference season. They went into the tournament against a very good Nevada team and only had a 22% chance of winning the game (based on the MRI). Illinois just needs a break. They obviously weren't going to get it this year against the ACC no matter who they played, but every once in a while, a game against the 7th best team like Virginia would be nice. Or maybe even a matchup with North Carolina State which at least would have given the Big Ten a chance to win more than 3 games this year. Honestly, I don't care either way on Illinois as they are not my team. When this was first started, these were the best two conferences in the country, though the Big Ten didn't put its best 9 teams into the event every season. As it has gone forward, the ACC has gone so far beyond the Big Ten that they should change the conference that they play. The ACC should begin taking on the Big East next season and really determine who the best conference is. The Big Ten should have a consolation challenge with the SEC.

Whew. If you are still here after all that, thanks for sticking around. Have fun watching tonight's Wake Forest-Illinois game, called the Brawl in the Hall over at the Big Ten Wonk. I am personally hoping it will give me as much to think about as last night's feature match.