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Daily Sports: Monday Night Showdown In San Antonio

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Its conference tournament week in college basketball and five championship games are on tap tonight, including one involving #1-ranked Gonzaga. But unless you’re a fan of one of the small-conference teams playing for their NCAA lives, the biggest action tonight is still in the NBA. The top spot in the Western Conference is on the line when Oklahoma City visits San Antonio (8:30 PM ET, NBA-TV).

The Spurs are playing without Tony Parker right now, though the point guard will be back in time for the playoffs. They have to hope that a combination of homecourt and a potentially tired OkC team can make up the talent gap. The Thunder won a competitive game yesterday with Boston and now have to immediately turn around and play what might be their biggest game between now and the playoffs. San Antonio comes into the game a slight two-point favorite.

Spurs-Thunder is one of two big games in the pros on Monday night. New York pays a visit to Golden State, a rematch of a game a couple weeks ago when Golden State’s Stephen Curry lit up MSG for 54 points, but the Knicks survived with a win. Golden State was playing without power forward David Lee that night. Lee, one of the best in the game, was suspended for a fight in Indiana. Now Golden State has its full roster, while Carmelo Anthony’s availability is a question mark for the Knicks. Golden State is 2 ½ games ahead in the race to hold on for the playoffs, and New York is only plus a half-game on Indiana for the two-seed in the East. The Warriors come in as a three-point favorite on their home floor.

Golden State’s lead in the playoff standings—along with Houston’s—as now over Utah, as the Lakers have replaced the Jazz in the 8-spot in the Western Conference. I’ll refer you over to Jeff Fogle’s Stat Intelligence blog, where he’s broken down the upcoming schedule to see how this race is going to shake out.

Now on to college hoops. I really can’t excited over Gonzaga-St. Mary’s (9 PM ET, ESPN) tonight for the West Coast Conference tournament title. The Zags are going to be a 1-seed regardless, and even if a loss knocked them off the top line I don’t think it really matters. I think St. Mary’s has its bid wrapped up. This game might have been interesting had BYU come through the bottom half of the bracket as the opponent for Gonzaga—the Cougars were unlikely to be an at-large and had shown they could at least play competitively with the Zags. But BYU poured more dirt on its grave with an early loss to San Diego.

There are four more games that are winner-take-all for NCAA bids, with no at-large cushion for the losers. Three games go at 7 PM ET. Northeastern-James Madison play for the Colonial title on the NBC Sports Network. This is a league that’s been decimated by the loss of Virginia Commonwealth and the collapse of Old Dominion. Davidson meets the College of Charleston in the Southern Conference final on ESPN2.  Undoubtedly Stephen Curry will take a peek at a score to see how his alma mater in Davidson is faring. And the Sun Belt bid will be settled on ESPN by Florida International and Western Kentucky. Then at 9 PM ET, opposite the Gonzaga-St. Mary’s telecast, will be the MAAC final of Iona-Manhattan on ESPN2. Iona got in as an at-large last year, but they shouldn’t expect the same mercy this time around.

I’ll be podcasting this afternoon at 4 PM ET with Greg DePalma of Prime Sports Network. Our projections for the field of 68 will be the prime topic and there will be plenty of discussion about these championship games going tonight. And tomorrow TheSportsNotebook’s college basketball coverage will look at what’s on the line in the power conference tournaments.

It’s a very quiet night in hockey, with Boston-Ottawa being the only notable game and it not picked up by any national outlet. The Bruins were featured here yesterday as part of TheSportsNotebook’s NHL analysis, as they and rival Montreal joust for position in the Northeast Division.

Daily Sports: Big East Battle Keys Tonight’s Schedule

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The Big East basketball race is coming down to the wire. Georgetown holds a one-game lead in the loss column on Marquette and Louisville, but a difficult final push for the Hoyas starts tonight. They visit Villanova (7 PM ET, ESPN2). The Wildcats are right on the NCAA bubble and desperate for a  win themselves, having just coughed up consecutive games to Seton Hall and Pitt. The argument for Villanova is built around their success against the conference’s best—the Wildcats have home scalps against Louisville, Syracuse and Marquette. If ‘Nova can add Georgetown to that list, at a time when the Hoyas are the hottest team in the country, you would think it would seal the deal for an NCAA invite.

Georgetown-Villanova is the top game on today’s daily sports docket, and for the fan looking to plan an evening around the TV set, they can have the remote control ready and be prepared to check in on another key game on the East Coast. This one’s in the ACC and its North Carolina-Maryland on ESPN. The Terrapins are likely on the outside looking in right now, but if they beat the Tar Heels, it gives Mark Turgeon’s team a real case heading into this weekend’s game with Virginia and the ACC Tournament next week.

The East Coast Parlay of Georgetown-Villanova and North Carolina-Maryland in the 7 PM ET window is the way for the fan with no rooting interests involved to spend the night. Other key games include Oklahoma State-Iowa State (7 PM ET, ESPNU), where the Cyclones need to keep winning, I think Iowa State should be much safer than they’re generally considered, but my vote doesn’t matter. This would be a good home win against an Okie State team whose freshman swingman Marcus Smart is as exciting as any player in the country. And if you get the Big Ten Network, don’t overlook Michigan-Purdue at 7 PM ET. Indiana’s home loss to Ohio State last night has opened up the conference race to three other teams, including Wolverines. And since Michigan is the team that hosts Indiana on the weekend, UM now controls its destiny for a piece of the Big Ten crown.

ESPN picks up with NBA coverage at 9 PM ET, and Chicago-San Antonio promises to be a good one. The Spurs are playing without Tony Parker for a few weeks and as such, their lead over Oklahoma City for the 1-seed in the West cannot be considered safe. The Bulls are part of an increasingly packed Eastern Conference middle and lower class. The 4 thru 8 spots in the bracket are up for grabs, something TheSportsNotebook made mention of in today’s NBA commentary on the Milwaukee Bucks, the current 8-seed. The Bucks visit the Clippers tonight, while the seventh-place Celtics go to Indiana. Both are good games, but you’ll need to be a League Pass subscriber to watch either one.

In the world of hockey, the Chicago Blackhawks kept it rolling with a win over the Minnesota Wild last night, erupting for four goals. They put their astonishing 20-0-3 start on the line tonight with a trip to Colorado. The game will be shown by the NBC Sports Network and the puck drops at 8 PM ET. Another key game in the Northeast Division is Ottawa-Toronto, where both teams aren’t far off the pace being set by Montreal and Boston in this competitive division.

CLEANING UP FROM LAST NIGHT

I mentioned Indiana’s upset loss to Ohio State. I’d refer you to Jeff Fogle at Stat Intelligence for some thoughts on the long-term implications of the loss for the Hoosiers and what it means. Iowa got a must-win game over Illinois. I don’t know if the Hawkeyes are an NCAA team—I personally have a problem with putting eight of twelve conference teams in the field, since it kind of eliminates the whole purpose of a regular season. But the Committee says such concerns do not matter, and at 19-11, Iowa kept itself alive. They have to take care of business against Nebraska on the weekend and probably make a little splash in the Big Ten tournament, where they would be lined up to play the top seed (anyone’s guess right now) in the quarterfinals.

Iowa was one of the few teams in must-win spots to get it done. Arkansas got crushed at Missouri. St. John’s got hammered at Notre Dame. Fights broke out in that game—could it be the Catholic schools are having the tension overflow as deliberations over the next pope have begun in Rome? Boise State lost a tough one to UNLV in spite of hitting 13 three-pointers. It sets up a big game between Boise and San Diego State this weekend. And Alabama fell to Ole Miss 87-83. Officially, both teams were on the bubble. In reality, ‘Bama probably had a better shot than Ole Miss, so this loss likely hurts the SEC.

I would mention Oklahoma City’s win over the Los Angeles Lakers, but it’s plastered all over ESPN, both the website and the talk shows, as the Lakers have blown away Tim Tebow in the category of Most Undeserved Air Time From A Major Sports Network. And in hockey, the Los Angeles Kings are playing with the urgency appropriate to a defending Stanley Cup champion being out of the playoffs at the halfway point. They beat St. Louis yesterday 6-4. It’s the Kings’ second straight win against a contender, and they’ve scored seven goals in the two third-periods to come from behind both times.

BEST BET

My best bets are now 1-1. I lost a pick’em hockey game on Monday night, and nipped out a pointspread cover with Alabama last night, as the Tide were getting five at Ole Miss. I’m going to go the other direction and look for Michigan to snap out of its funk and smell a conference championship in West Lafayette tonight. I’ll take the Wolverines and lay the (-6.5) against Purdue.

Betting Unit Tally: (-0.1)