College Basketball is Heating Up- Games to Watch This Week and a Potential Final Four Preview Saturday

The Super Bowl has come and gone, and the sports world is eagerly waiting for March Madness. There are a number of massive games with conference implications this week, as teams are trying to finalize their resumes before the big dance.

Monday 2/16: ESPN calls it Big Monday for a reason, at 9pm Monday night second ranked Houston takes their 23-2 record to Ames, to take on the 6th ranked, 22-3 Iowa State Cyclones. With Arizona dropping two games last week, the winner of this matchup will have a leg up in the Big 12 conference title race.

Tuesday 2/17: Tuesday the focus shifts to the big ten, where new #1 team in the country Michigan kicks off their gauntlet of a week traveling to Purdue to take on #7 Purdue. Michigan State badly needs a win to get back on track, they welcome UCLA to the Breslin at 8:30 Tuesday night. In other Big Ten action #9 Nebraska heads to Iowa City to take on an Iowa team that could use a top ten win to solidify their tournament resume. Wisconsin might be the hottest team in the country, they take on Ohio State in Columbus Tuesday night as well.

Wednesday 2/18: Arkansas and Alabama face off in Tuscaloosa in a top 25 matchup between top 4 teams in the SEC. #23 BYU just lost one of their top players for the season in Richie Saunders with an ACL injury, the schedule does them no favors as they travel to a pissed off Arizona team that has dropped two straight.

Saturday 2/21: A potential final four preview takes place on Saturday. #1 Michigan takes on #3 Duke Saturday at 5:30. Assuming Duke takes care of Syracuse on Monday night they will bring a 24-2 record into this game in a matchup that will feature several future professional players. Michigan will have their hands full with projected top 5 pick Cam Boozer, veteran guard Caleb Foster, and Patrick Ngongba. This matchup will be a heavyweight fight and we may see this game played again in Indianapolis. Another top 5 matchup takes place between Houston and Arizona Saturday. Houston is coming off a run to the national championship last season with returning veteran guard Emmanuel Sharp, paired with star freshman Kingston Flemings who’s averaging 16ppg. Similarly for Arizona, they are lead by veteran guard Jaden Bradley averaging almost 14ppg, and freshman Brayden Burries averages 16ppg for the Wildcats.

This is the best time of the year for college basketball fans and this week has a number of matchups and big games across multiple conferences, capped off with a potential final four preview on Saturday.