Welcome to The Holy Land of Hoops

Eamonn Brennan wrote:
November is out, December is in, and -- if we may paraphrase some of history's greatest philosophers -- it's time to find out what happens when college basketball stops being polite and starts getting real.The first Saturday of December feels like the first real college hoops Saturday of the season, an eight-hour afternoon comprising four consecutive, overlapping top-25 tests.

No. 11 UCLA at No. 1 Kentucky, Saturday, 12:30 p.m. ET, CBS

No. 7 Xavier at No. 9 Baylor, Saturday, 3:30 p.m. ET, ESPN2 and ESPN App

All things considered, few teams in the country offer as much quantitative certainty as Baylor. That's pretty crazy, considering the lukewarm, fringe top-25-at-best expectations for Scott Drew's team heading into the season. Yet here we are, nearly a month into the season, and while most of the nation's best teams have grabbed an impressive win or two, Baylor is 7-0 with victories against Oregon, VCU, Michigan State, and Louisville. It would take a jarring nosedive to feel suddenly uncomfortable with the notion of Baylor as a top-10 team, in other words. Xavier is the wild card here: Wins against Clemson and Northern Iowa (twice in the same week, no less) don't quite have the same kind of perception-boosting impact that a road win against the surprise of the season to date would bring. We'll see.

No. 8 Gonzaga vs. No. 16 Arizona, Saturday, 5:30 p.m. ET, ESPN and ESPN App

No. 25 West Virginia at No. 6 Virginia, Saturday, 2 p.m. ET, ESPNU and ESPN App

GumbyDamnit! wrote:https://youtu.be/4uKvHbdlgNw

The Holy War in Philly is today. This is Nova's version of PC/URI or X/Cincy, or Marq/Wisc. Tremendous animosity from the St Joe (PA) fan base flows 8 miles down Lancaster Ave from Hawk Hill to the Main Line. I went to Catholic school and grew up on Big 5 BB. My dad was a Nova grad. A few of my friends fathers were St Joe's (PA) fans. Games were flat out wars and no other Philly Big 5 game was nearly as contentious. Think Auburn-Alabama, Mich-Ohio St within the rich Philly hoops scene.

If you want a good laugh, here is a local clip on the differences between VU and St Joes (PA), manifested in a simple student half court contest. The best line of the clip comes right at the end when the anchor says: "What's the moral of this story?...maybe you want to go to Villanova." Priceless.

Go Cats! The Hawk is dead.

Hall2012 wrote:
Why the (PA)? Is there really someone else they could be confused with or is it just supposed to be some sort of petty insult?

GumbyDamnit! wrote:

Hall2012 wrote:
Why the (PA)? Is there really someone else they could be confused with or is it just supposed to be some sort of petty insult?

Just a little inside joke as part of the rivalry. We just want to make sure they're not confused with other colleges by the same name: St Joe's (CA), St Joe's (NY), St Joe's (IN), St Joe's (ME). The respective fan bases don't care for each other's institution much.