![\"beasley\"](\"http:\/\/i.a.cnn.net\/si\/2007\/basketball\/ncaa\/11\/11\/pittst.kstate.ap\/p1.beasley.ap.jpg\")
The 6’9″ Beasley\u00a0is emerging as\u00a0the poster boy for the Year of the Freshman.\u00a0 He came into last night’s game leading the nation in scoring (26.7\/game) and rebounding (15.1\/game), leading many to give him the obvious but appropriate nickname of “Beast-ley”.\u00a0 He didn’t have one of his best games last night, as Notre Dame had him constantly double-teamed, and sometimes triple-teamed when he caught the ball in the post.\u00a0 Of course, he still scored 19 points and pulled down 13 rebounds, but he was an unspectacular 8-20 from the field and had 5 turnovers.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Beasley is similar in size and skill-set to Toronto Raptors forward\u00a0Chris Bosh.\u00a0 He has\u00a0good low-post moves, especially for an 18-year-old, can hit jump shots, and is a monster on the glass.\u00a0 Bosh may be the superior shot-blocker, but Beasley can do that\u00a0as well and he is more advanced offensively at this stage of his career than Bosh was as a college freshman.\u00a0 He is also, like Bosh, left-handed.<\/p>\n
All the focus was on Beasley and K-State coming in, but Notre Dame ended up pulling off the minor upset.\u00a0 For the first seven minutes of the game, Beasley was overshadowed by\u00a0the Irish’s young big man, sophomore Luke Harangody.\u00a0\u00a0He was dominant\u00a0early and had 11 points and 7 rebounds when he came out for a breather at the 13:00 minute mark of the first-half.\u00a0 Harangody doesn’t look like much of an athlete (i.e. wide-bodied white guy with a crew-cut), but he uses his size well,\u00a0has a soft-touch, and can score with both hands inside. He finished with 19 points and 14 rebounds.<\/p>\n
The other main contributor for the Irish was point guard\u00a0Kyle McAlarney, a Staten Island native who had plenty of fan support at the Garden.\u00a0 McAlarney\u00a0struggled\u00a0in the first-half, probably feeling the\u00a0pressure from the hometown crowd, but he played great in the second-half and scored\u00a0Notre Dame’s last nine points of the game to\u00a0secure the 68-59 win.<\/p>\n
USC vs.\u00a0#2 Memphis<\/strong><\/p>\n Coming in, this one had all the makings of\u00a0great game, with two of the most purely talented teams in the country facing off.\u00a0 What actually\u00a0transpired was, well, not a great game.\u00a0 In fact, for the first 34 minutes or so of game action, it was one of the\u00a0ugliest\u00a0college basketball games I’ve ever seen.\u00a0 It was one ill-advised pass or shot after another and even the open shots were clanging off iron, but with about 6 minutes to play, the game did\u00a0pick up and both teams started to play\u00a0as expected.\u00a0 The game actually got exciting for a bit, going into overtime, before the level of play reverted back to earlier levels and Memphis pulled out the 62-58 win.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I’ll give at least some credit to the defensive efforts by both teams, particularly to Mayo, who basically owned Rose on defense, and USC point guard Daniel Hackett, who did a great job on Memphis’s leading scorer, Chris\u00a0Douglas-Roberts.\u00a0 Rose and Douglas-Roberts, who combined were\u00a0averaging nearly 40 points a game, had combined for 2 points at half-time and 14 at the end of regualtion.\u00a0They also combined to shoot 7-22\u00a0from the field and turn the ball over 9\u00a0times.\u00a0 Not good.<\/p>\n As\u00a0my BroadStreetBelievers <\/em>colleague pointed out in his College Hoops Preview<\/a>, Memphis’s downfall may be their inability to\u00a0shoot the 3.\u00a0 That\u00a0shortcoming was painfully evident last night.\u00a0 It’s hard for me to imagine a team winning the national championship when not a single one of their five starters\u00a0can make a 3-pointer.\u00a0 Their starting five last night was a combined 0-7 on 3’s.\u00a0 I think John Calipari may\u00a0have to\u00a0consider putting Willie\u00a0Kemp into\u00a0the starting line-up\u00a0in place of Antonio Anderson and giving Doneal Mack\u00a0more minutes off\u00a0the bench.\u00a0 Both Kemp and Mack are capable long-range shooters.<\/p>\n For USC, they can expect to win a lot\u00a0of games this year thanks to the\u00a0backcourt duo of Hackett and Mayo.\u00a0 Everyone knows that Mayo can score, but he also showed\u00a0last night that he can defend and pass, as well.\u00a0 He also has a presence on the court and looks like a team leader\u00a0already.\u00a0 Star\u00a0forward Taj\u00a0Gibson, a Brooklyn native,\u00a0had a rough night, with just 5 points and 5\u00a0turnovers.\u00a0 Another USC\u00a0player to watch is freshman forward Davon Jefferson, who had 12 points and 13 rebounds.\u00a0 He is a freakish athlete who had the highlight of the game with\u00a0a reverse alley-oop jam, in traffic, on a\u00a0pass from Mayo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Last night I went to the Jimmy V Classic, an annual college hoops double-header at Madison Square Garden.\u00a0 This was the third year in a row that\u00a0I attended this underrated event.\u00a0 There’s always good teams involved and I call it … Continue reading ![\"mayo\"](\"http:\/\/media.theinsiders.com\/media\/image\/30\/306741.jpg\")
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