NCAA Basketball // The Observer

The Observer is a student-run, daily print & online newspaper serving Notre Dame, Saint Mary's & Holy Cross. Learn about us.

Sports

J.J. Starling commits to Notre Dame, becomes highest-rated recruit in program history

Observer Sports Staff | Wednesday, October 13, 2021

This afternoon La Lumiere School guard J.J. Starling, the number one recruit in Indiana and number 33 recruit nation-wide (per 247sports), announced his verbal commitment to Notre Dame. Starling, who became the highest-ranked commitment in Irish history since 247 started ranking recruits, was generally considered to be head coach Mike Brey’s highest-priority target in the

Sports

Observer Roundtable: Baylor-Kansas highlights games of the week

Aidan Thomas, Liam Coolican, Dominic Gibson, Patrick Gallagher, Nate Moller and Inigo Yturralde | Wednesday, February 19, 2020

After a very fun week, we are back with the same format for the basketball roundtable. Last week, as promised, there were a lot of points scored, highlighted by Iñigo Yturralde jumping into fourth place despite not participating in the first week. Aidan Thomas went 5-0 in game picks and won the “draft” game to

Sports

Observer Roundtable: Baylor going down?

Aidan Thomas, Nate Moller, Liam Coolican, Inigo Yturralde, Dominic Gibson and Patrick Gallagher | Wednesday, February 12, 2020

Welcome back to the Observer Roundtable! We have some exciting new changes to announce in this week’s edition. First off, we welcome Inigo Yturralde Cadavid to the team, as he replaces David Kramer. Secondly, doing upset pick of the week was proving difficult with basketball, so we decided on something different. We hold a draft

Sports

Observer Roundtable: It’s basketball season

Aidan Thomas, Patrick Gallagher, Liam Coolican, Dominic Gibson and Nate Moller | Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Welcome back to the Observer Roundtable! After David Kramer retired on top after his victorious football season, we return with five writers offering picks for the college and professional basketball season. Enjoy our three games of the week from both the NCAA and the NBA, as well as a guarantee and upset pick at the

Sports

Adams: Time for the one-and-done rule to end

Hayden Adams | Thursday, January 30, 2020

Being a Kentucky basketball fan, I am acquainted more with the NCAA’s one-and-done policy than most. Wildcats head coach John Calipari was the originator of the one-and-done era during his time at Memphis when he made a national championship game with freshman Derrick Rose in 2008. Soon after that, he made his way to Lexington

Sports

Hoonhout: Taking an early look at March Madness contenders

Tobias Hoonhout | Tuesday, November 6, 2018

March may be a long way away, but it’s never too early to start thinking about it. With college basketball set to open the season on Tuesday night, the AP preseason top-25 has been out for over a week. Here’s some quick thoughts on the “top” teams — who will manifest the hype come the

Sports

Klaus: NCAA gifted South Carolina home court against Duke

Ryan Klaus | Friday, March 24, 2017

As college basketball dives into the second weekend of March Madness, I’m still having an tough time coming to terms with a small, yet undeniably significant, detail regarding the tournament’s first weekend, and specifically South Carolina, the team that pulled off arguably the most astonishing upset so far. While the seventh-seeded Gamecocks certainly deserve credit for

Sports

Klaus: LSU and Simmons demonstrate the problems with the one-and-done rule

Ryan Klaus | Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Since its inception in 2006, college basketball’s contentious one-and-done rule has consistently and deservedly been criticized. Year in and year out, the rule highlights the laughably-conspicuous hypocrisy of an organization that, on the surface, stands for a balanced intersection of academics and athletics, but annually makes a significant portion of money on games headlined by players

Sports

Carson: Parity is a beautiful thing

Alex Carson | Friday, January 22, 2016

The NCAA men’s basketball tournament won’t have an undefeated team gunning for the title this year. We’ve known that for a little bit, ever since South Carolina picked up its first loss of the season in blowout fashion to Alabama. But aside from those now-one-loss Gamecocks and the undefeated but tournament-ineligible SMU, everyone in college basketball has dropped

Sports

Carson: Charging to conclusions

Alex Carson | Thursday, April 9, 2015

I’ve got to admit, it was pretty funny. All year long we had to put up with the complaints about college basketball; the pace of play, the physicality, the low-scoring games, the one-and-done players. A term I heard a lot? “Unwatchable.” But then a funny thing happened on the way to doomsday. On March 28, Notre Dame

Next Page ↓