Michigan State has all the tools to win a national championship. The Spartans have future pros, they have experience and they have a coach who has won before. But they've just been missing one thing: a pass-first point guard. Those aren't my words. That has been Tom Izzo's message to Keith Appling, Michigan State's scoring guard, who has had to play point guard for three seasons. Earlier this month, Izzo told Mike DeCourcy of Sporting News: "We told ...

The 2013-14 University of Kentucky basketball team is the favorite to win another SEC crown and on the short list of favorites for a national title.  However, as we've seen in the past, just because you are projected for success before the season does not mean there won't be trouble getting to March. Every team in the country has some weaknesses, no matter how much fans think otherwise. Read on to see five specific issues that should ...

The Duke basketball machine is expected to keep rolling in the 2013-14 college basketball season. The Blue Devils will likely enter the season ranked in the top 10 in the polls and be viewed as a favorite to reach the 2013 Final Four. It will be one of the deepest and most versatile teams Mike Krzyzewski has had in Durham in quite a while. But the 2013-14 Blue Devils will not be invincible or unstoppable. Although the ...

Is it a bit early to be talking about 2015 college basketball recruits, especially considering these kids just kicked off their junior years of high school? Probably, but that is the nature of what recruiting has become in today’s day and age. Fans are hungry for news about potential stars who will one day don their school’s colors, while coaches must make sure they have the future of their program locked up years in advance. Click ahead ...

Memorable hoops performances are created when a player does something that remarkably exceeds the norm. Some of the most unforgettable moments in college basketball history have not always received a flood of media reporting at the time they happened. But the quality of the achievement is more important than the quantity of the coverage. Here are the 10 most memorable individual performances in college basketball history. You will immediately recognize some of these historic bursts, while you may be ...

A season ago, Indiana basketball was the class of the Big Ten conference. The Hoosiers won their first outright regular season conference title since 1993. Indiana was a complete team. It had shooters (Jordan Hulls and Christian Watford), athleticism (Victor Oladipo), a legitimate big man (Cody Zeller) and a spark off the bench (Will Sheehey). The roster created problems for nearly every team it faced. This season could be much different. The roster has completely changed and ...

Think making a preseason Top 25 is hard? Try figuring out who the top scoring tandems in the country are going to be.  It takes a willingness to share, and it also helps if your other best players are willing to be complementary threats. Nowhere on this list will you find Creighton and Doug McDermott, because that's mostly a one-man show.  These are the duos coaches hate game-planning for, because it's easy to focus on one guy. ...

In college basketball, one star player can make all the difference. Legends from Danny Manning to Kemba Walker have dragged their teams to championships in the last quarter century alone. Unfortunately, players like those don't simply grow on trees. Most teams need a group of scorers to perform at their best. When that leading star is having a rough night, other talented performers can be the difference between a national title and a round of 32 loss. These ...

The biggest shot of Aaron Craft's junior season was on a play which was run for Ohio State star Deshaun Thomas. The Buckeyes were tied with Iowa State in the round of 32 of the NCAA tournament, and Thomas came off a staggered screen. Craft had missed the front-end of a 1-and-1 with 1:15 left and the game tied, and he had missed a jumper with 29 seconds left and the game still tied. Statistically, he was ...

Serving as an early barometer, Michigan State coach Tom Izzo consistently and purposefully throws upper-echelon teams on his nonconference schedule to test his team's stomach.  So far, so good. Izzo's asking-for-it mentality when it comes to clashing with the big boys has paid dividends in the form of six Final Fours and Big Ten supremacy.  A chip on the shoulder would benefit the Spartans this year. The loss to coach Mike Krzyzewski's Duke Blue Devils in the ...