In honor of the GOAT Patrick Mahomes, Texas Tech returns to this week’s Top 25.
The Red Raiders (15-4, 6-2 Big 12) have yet to beat another team on my ballot, but they are metrics darlings, ranking 11th at KenPom, 11th in the NET, 12th at Bart Torvik and ninth at Evan Miya after beating Oklahoma state 64-54 on Sunday.
Texas Tech head coach Grant McCasland had an awesome offseason. He made a great hire, convincing Wyoming head coach Jeff Linder to take an assistant role running the Red Raiders’ offense. Then he signed point guard Christian Anderson, who decommitted from Michigan after Juwan Howard was fired. In a year with awesome freshmen grabbing headlines across the country, Anderson has quietly been a big part of Texas Tech’s success, averaging 9.5 points and shooting 42.9 percent from 3.
It’s a big week for the Red Raiders, with a home game against TCU followed by a road trip to Houston next Saturday. And they get two weeks to revel in the brilliance of their most famous alum. Go Chiefs.
Now let’s honor some awesome defenses…
Reminder: Below my Top 25, I give nuggets on an unspecified number of teams each week. So when a team appears in the table but not in the text below, that’s why. Scroll on for notes on Auburn, Duke, Iowa State, Houston, Michigan State, Kansas, St. John’s and Louisville.
GO DEEPER
Midseason All-America team: Cooper Flagg, Johni Broome, Kam Jones and more
The Tigers rank third in opponent assist rate, and their defensive discipline was on point in Saturday’s 53-51 win over Tennessee. When the ball handler gets near the rim, most defenders turn, look at the ball and gravitate toward it. Watch what Auburn does when Zakai Zeigler does a Nash dribble (keeping his dribble alive underneath the basket):
Similarly, when Igor Milicic has a one-on-one in the post, the Tigers put their faith in Chaney Johnson and stick to their assignments:
Auburn’s impressive defensive communication and awareness off the ball was on display on the second-to-last possession of the game when Johni Broome and Tahaad Pettiford switched a ball screen. Watch how Johnson (No. 31) realized immediately that Pettiford was getting switched onto 6-foot-11 Felix Okpara and communicated to Pettiford to take his man on the perimeter:
When Pettiford ran Milicic off the line, Johnson was there again to save the day with a contest at the rim, and Broome and Chaz Baker-Mazara were there to help the helper. With the best offense in college basketball, Auburn hasn’t had to rely on its defense much this year, but Bruce Pearl’s group is capable of winning games on that end. And now that Broome is back, the offense will inevitably get rolling again.
GO DEEPER
Auburn’s statement against Tennessee: We can miss everything and still win huge games
Cooper Flagg is putting together a historic January, averaging 25 points, 7.6 rebounds and 5.2 assists in six games. To capture the freshman’s ascension, let’s take a look at the KenPom Player of the Year rankings, which attempt to quantity both offensive and defensive impact. Ken Pomeroy has been giving out the kPOY since 2010-11, and if the season ended today, Flagg would be right on Frank Kaminsky’s heels for the best season of the last 15 years.
| kPOY rating | |
|---|---|
|
Frank Kaminsky (2014-15) |
2.794 |
|
Cooper Flagg (2024-25) |
2.749 |
|
Zach Edey (2023-24) |
2.699 |
|
Russ Smith (2012-13) |
2.636 |
|
Johni Broome (2024-25) |
2.198 |
Broome would win the award most seasons with the year he is having, but Flagg is expanding the gap and only seems to be getting better as the season progresses.
GO DEEPER
Duke discovers another defensive tool in a rare ACC test at Wake Forest
Coming into this season, T.J. Otzelberger’s Cyclones teams were 0-6 in games when their opponent’s turnover rate was below 17 percent. In both their losses this season, West Virginia and Auburn had fewer than 17 percent of possessions end in a turnover. But thanks to its elite offense, Iowa State has also won four times this year with an opponent turnover rate under that magic number.
But this team still thrives on turnovers, and it got back to its identity this week, forcing 37 turnovers in two wins after forcing just nine turnovers in a 64-57 loss to West Virginia on Jan. 18.
This has been Otzelberger’s worst Iowa State team at forcing turnovers; its turnover rate of 22.2 percent ranks 22nd nationally. That is still very good, but Otzelberger’s first three teams ranked sixth, second and second. The offense was awesome too this week — the Clones hung 108 on UCF.
Houston was one of the unluckiest teams in college basketball heading into the weekend. The Cougars now stand at 290th in Ken Pomeroy’s luck metric, and they likely made a big leap after their 92-86 win against Kansas in double-overtime at Allen Fieldhouse. (Pomeroy does not archive the luck data.) The Coogs held late leads in all three of their losses this season, with the following peak win probabilities in each:
With 20 seconds left in Saturday’s first overtime, Houston had a 0.4 percent chance to win. Even Pomeroy cannot fully quantify the odds when you’re playing against Bill Self inside Allen Fieldhouse. Self was 26-12 all-time in overtime games as Kansas’ coach and 12-2 at home.
Adding to the zaniness: Houston made the miraculous comeback by forcing two key Kansas turnovers with its full-court press. Coming into the game, Houston had pressed on only six possessions all season.
Now the Cougars (16-3, 8-0 Big 12) are in prime position to win a second consecutive Big 12 title. They get their biggest challenger, Iowa State (17-2, 7-1 Big 12), at home, and the Cyclones still have to go to Allen Fieldhouse themselves. The win was also huge for Houston’s NCAA Tournament seeding. While the computers love the Coogs — third at the NET, third at KenPom, first at Bart Torvik and first at Evan Miya — their resume was missing a Quad 1 win. They have one now.
GO DEEPER
Kelvin Sampson, Houston flip their script in stunning 2-OT rally at Kansas
It’s pretty amazing what Michigan State has been able to do this season by relying almost exclusively on scoring inside the 3-point line. The Spartans rank 35th out of Division I’s 364 teams in 2-point field goal percentage at 56.4 percent. Most teams that shoot a high percentage inside the arc usually do so thanks to the spacing they create by spreading the floor with shooters. Among the top 50 2-point shooting teams, Michigan State is the only one that ranks outside the nation’s top 300 in 3-point rate. (The Spartans attempt 31.9 percent of their shots from 3, ranking 335th in 3-point rate.) The Spartans make only 28.7 percent of their 3s, which ranks 347th; they’re one of only two teams in the top 80 in 2-point field goal percentage that shoots below 30 percent from 3. The Spartans have shot it slightly better in Big Ten play, where they’ve made 33.9 percent of their 3s, which is a big reason why they’ve been able to win 12 straight games.
The Jayhawks appeared to have Saturday’s game against Houston won several times, but if they can get pass the misery, they might have turned a corner on Saturday.
The Hunter Dickinson-Flory Bidunga pairing is taking off. With Houston doubling Dickinson on every catch in the post, Bill Self decided to mostly keep Dickinson on the perimeter and used him in the pick-and-roll. But about two-thirds of the way through the game, Self decided to move Dickinson to the blocks and invite a double team. After the under-12 timeout, Kansas ran a post pin play for Dickinson, and as soon as he caught it, he passed to a cutting Bidunga for a lay-in:
Self also had Bidunga set a majority of the ball screens and used Dickinson to give the guards an outlet to throw the ball ahead after the ball screen, then let Dickinson make reads on the roll. That, too, worked beautifully:
Bidunga can get out of a ball screen and get to the rim so quickly that it really puts the defense in a jam, and Dickinson’s passing was phenomenal. He made decisions quickly and found the open guy every time. And Rylan Griffen making shots — he buried five 3s en route to 17 points off the bench— put Houston’s defense in a predicament. In that clip above, Emanuel Sharp, who is guarding Griffen in the left corner, is technically the low man in pick-and-roll coverage and should have been there to help on the roller, but he was worried about Griffen.
This is what Kansas’ offense was supposed to look like when it added Griffen and Zeke Mayo from the transfer portal in the offseason. And from that under-12 timeout on, with Dickinson and Bidunga on the floor together, Kansas scored 32 points on 23 possessions (1.39 points per possession) against a defense that came in No. 1 in adjusted efficiency. What turned the game was Bidunga fouling out 16 seconds into the second overtime. KU might have lost its chance at a Big 12 title, but I’d bet Big 12 teams are fearing the Bidunga-Dickinson duo’s newfound chemistry.
GO DEEPER
The buzzer-beating Blakes siblings: Jaylen and Mikayla hit game-winners on same weekend
The Johnnies currently have the best in-conference defensive efficiency of any Big East team since the league reformed in 2013-14, with plenty of cushion. They are allowing just 89.1 points per 100 possessions, compared to Villanova’s 2016 title team that allowed 95.3.
When St. John’s tightens the screws, finding a decent look is exhausting. Xavier led St. John’s 50-34 with 17 minutes left on Wednesday. I charted the defensive possessions from that point forward:
| Quality shots | Contested shots | Turnovers | |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Xavier |
6-11 |
1-17 |
8 |
The Musketeers scored 21 points on 35 possessions (0.6 PPP) over that stretch. The reason it’s so hard to find a quality look is that St. John’s can switch everything.
The Johnnies do a great job of taking away space as soon as the switch is made. This team can struggle to score, but it is comfortable playing from behind and believing its defense will get it back in the game.
Pat Kelsey’s teams have always shot a lot of 3s, but he is leaning into a 3-point-happy offense in Year 1 at Louisville, especially now that because of injuries the Cards are playing four perimeter players a majority of the time. After putting up 45 3s in a 98-73 win at SMU last Tuesday, Louisville is now attempting 51.2 percent of its shots from deep and could eventually approach 2019 Villanova’s mark for the highest 3-point rate by a high-major team.
Dropped out: West Virginia.
Keeping an eye on: Maryland, Arizona, Saint Mary’s, Drake, UCLA, Creighton.
(Photo: Stew Milne / Getty Images)
