Texas

First place in the Big 12 in on the line Saturday afternoon with Texas (15-3, 3-0), fresh off of an impressive win over rival Texas A&M, visiting Kansas (18-0, 3-0) with the undefeated Jayhawks looking to keep their 69-game home win streak alive. In order for Texas to pick up the victory they're going to need their frontcourt to play as well as they did against the Aggies if not better because they'll be up against one of the premier frontcourts in America.

It would have been extremely difficult to find many people who expected Wednesday's rivalry game between Texas A&M and Texas to be a blowout. But that's what happened in Austin as the Longhorns took control of the game defensively while also executing on the offensive end, winning by the final score of 81-60 and ending the Aggies' 13-game win streak.

Wednesday night features one of the more spirited rivalries in college sports as Texas A&M heads to Austin for the first of two regular season matchups with Texas. Think these two don't compete over nearly everything? Check out the outline of the State of Texas on the Erwin Center court, and realize that in redoing their floor at Reed Arena the folks at A&M made sure their outline was larger. Mark Turgeon's team has won thirteen straight, the last of which being a thrilling overtime win on Saturday against Missouri with Khris Middleton scoring 28 points to lead the way.

Before the start of action on Saturday few had any idea that the day would end up being as wild as it was. Seven ranked teams fell to unranked opponents on a day that will have a drastic impact on Monday's polls, providing a reminder that the madness doesn't always wait until March to get going. Those results were as follows:

Conference play is in full swing on the second Saturday in January, but the biggest game is of the non-conference variety as #9 Connecticut (11-2) hits the road to take on #12 Texas (12-2) in their first meeting since the 2003 NCAA Tournament. The Longhorns, then led by point guard T.J. Ford, won that Sweet 16 matchup in San Antonio on their way to the Final Four and while they don't have a point guard in the mold of Ford they've got plenty of talent. At the top of that list would be sophomore wing Jordan Hamilton, who leads the Longhorns in scoring with an average of 19.6 points per game.

Notre Dame knew that they had to make Kemba Walker work for his points if they were going to beat Connecticut on Tuesday. And thanks in large part to Ben Hansbrough, who also scored 21 points they were able to do just that in beating the Huskies 73-70 to move to 2-1 in Big East play. Walker scored 19 points but had to attempt 23 field goals to do that, making just eight while outside of Shabazz Napier (4-6 FG, 18 points) and Roscoe Smith (11 points) his teammates struggled offensively.

Thursday provided quite the test for Josh Pastner's Memphis Tigers, with the more experienced Georgetown Hoyas invading the FedEx Forum. While Memphis' competitive spirit can't be questioned their execution, especially on the defensive end, was of no match for the Hoyas who diced up the Tigers to the tune of an 86-69 win. Austin Freeman scored 24 points while Chris Wright added 19 and Julian Vaughn 15 points and 10 rebounds in arguably Georgetown's best showing this season in moving to 11-1.

Wednesday is the final big day on the schedule before Christmas and one of the better rivalry games in college basketball will be front and center. Missouri (10-1) takes on Illinois (10-2) in St. Louis, and the game is also the first meeting this season between teams with ten wins on the season. But the Tigers will go into the game shorthanded as freshman point guard Phil Pressey, who had 15 points and 11 assists in their win over Central Arkansas, is out with a fractured finger but the recently suspended Michael Dixon returns.

The plan for head coach Bill Self was to bring along freshman guard Josh Selby, who missed nine games due to NCAA suspension, slowly against USC on Saturday. The Baltimore native didn't enter the game until after the first television timeout, but it became apparent quite early what his addition means to their attack. And by the end of the game Selby became the difference between Kansas extending their home win streak to 65 games and having to start a new streak.

Saturday usually marks the transition from the fall semester to winter break for most schools and with that comes the mid-season additions that many like to analyze in regards to their possible impact. And no addition may be bigger than that of freshman guard Josh Selby to the Kansas Jayhawks, who host USC at Noon. Bill Self's team has done fine without him in the win column as they're still undefeated on the season. But a look at their backcourt thus far reveals the need for a player who can make things happen in an explosive fashion, and the Baltimore native fits that role to a T.