In Raleigh, Mark Gottfried had to cajole his star CJ Leslie a bit, but Western Michigan was ultimately a small roadblock for the Pack, as State won with relative ease.
Their frontcourt continues to shoot brilliantly. Richard Howell was 8-8, TJ Warren was 7-9 and Leslie was 5-10.
Collectively, the Pack shot 54.5% and they held Western Michigan to 35.8%.
Mark Gottfried wasn't happy with his team's offensive rebounding, but he did say that âweâre doing a lot of things well right now, but I still think we can get a lot better.â
He didn't say that they have already gotten a lot better, but they have.
Carolina had a big game Sunday as well: playing without Reggie Bullock, who suffered a concussion in practice, the Heels beat UNLV anyway, 79-73.
A Top 20 win is always good; one without a main player is really great, especially for UNC, a team which has struggled this year against tougher opponents.
PJ Hairston had a nice game and finally hit .500 in a game, shooting 5-10.
UNC forced 17 turnovers but still got outrebounded, including 14-10 offensively. James Michael McAdoo grabbed nine boards, but otherwise it looks like rebounding by committee.
Incidentally, Khem Birch left Pitt last year with a certain amount of confusion over his role. He got 17 minutes for the Rebels and finished with five boards and three points.
Though they have struggled, FSU has now won four straight, including Saturday's win over Danny Manning's Tulsa squad. Michael Snaer, who has been surprisingly erratic thus far, led the way with 19.
There was a lot of intrigue when people realized that Leonard Hamilton had put together one of the tallest rosters in the country - Boris Bojanovsky is 7-3, Michael Ojo 7-1 and Keil Turpin 6-11. Robert Gilchrist is 6-9.
Most of the frontcourt minutes though are going to Okaro White and sixth man Terrance Shannon, which suggests the big guys aren't quite there yet.
BC got by Holy Cross by identical half scores - 35-30.
Patrick Heckmann had 19 points and Ryan Anderson had 18 points and 10 boards.
The Eagles went with a four-guard lineup with Lonnie Jackson, Olivier Hanlan and Joe Rahan. Dennis Clifford, recovering from an injury, came off the bench for 16 minutes.
Anderson, we should note, would be averaging a double-double if he hadn't been injured earlier. He's currently putting up 16.1 ppg and pulling down 9.7 rpg.
State is coming along nicely; Georgia Tech may be as well. Brian Gregory's bunch assisted on 20 out of 29 baskets against Fordham and had only eight turnovers.
It's worth mentioning that last year Fordham pretty much hammered Tech last year.
As we thought, Virginia Tech had a really tough time in Provo. For a running team with no depth to suddenly play a mountain team at their altitude -well, it's a lot to ask, even if you go early as the Hokies did.
BYU soph Tyler Haws racked up nearly half of BYU's points with 42.
Erick Green, who is the nation's leading scorer, was just 4-17.
With just seven scholarship players available, Tech had to go 14 deep. Again, you just can't win at this level with walk-ons.
Cadarian Raines has been pretty invisible lately. Though he did score 16 against Bradley, he has lately whiffed against Mississippi Valley State, Georgia Southern and BYU and had just two against Colorado State.
Charles Mitchell, who has been freshman erratic, racked up 19 points and 14 boards against Delaware State.
Alex Len had an off day with just six points and two boards in 17 minutes. He also picked up four fouls.
On Sunday, Virginia takes on Wofford. It should be easy money, but with the way the season's gone, you never know.