FanHouse ChrisLowe

It's been a topsy-turvy week in the Atlantic 10 but one team coming out of it smelling like roses is UMass. The Minutemen followed up a win in Dayton with an 86-79 home win over Charlotte to leave themselves in a tie atop the conference. The only other team, save the Temple-Saint Louis winner today, to win both A-10 games this week is Fordham and the Rams didn't take home the pelts that the Minutemen did.

UMass won both games because no one can keep up with their guards. On Wednesday, Dayton sent the Minutemen to the line 36 times and yesterday they made 44 trips against the Niners. If they were a halfway decent foul shooting team, they'd be blowing out every team they played. Instead they hit 29-of-44 and keep games closer than they have any right being. The 49ers shot just 36% for the game but it wasn't settled until the final minutes.

Even though Charlotte plays just as fast as the Minutemen, they were no match in the quickness department. Chris Lowe's drives would find Ricky Harris for threes or Dante Milligan inside and each crippled the 49ers hopes of remaining unbeaten in league play. Harris knocked down four deep balls and Milligan went to the line 14 times to provide big chunks of the offense.

If there's a downside to the return to prominence for the Atlantic 10, it's nights like Wednesday night. It's not a downside for fans of good basketball, mind you, but for coaches and fans of favored teams like Dayton and Xavier. Rather than holding serve until their showdown next week, each found themselves upset on Wednesday night while Charlotte held serve at home and found themselves at the top of the heap after beating St. Joe's 70-66.

They can thank Leemire Goldwire, who may not settle for a spot on the all-conference first team. He may have designs on player of the year and last night's 36 points will help him make his case. While Goldmire was doing the offensive lifting, his teammates took care of slowing down the league's best shooting team. The Hawks were making more than 50% of their shots in A-10 play entering the game but were held to 44% and continued to struggle from long range.

Charlotte remains a flawed team. They turn the ball over too much and shooting 43% last night actually represented a step up in the world. That's going to make it hard for them to hold onto the top spot but three straight wins are three straight wins and, as Wednesday showed, there won't be easy nights in the A-10.

There's been no doubt about which mid major conference has been the biggest surprise to this point of the season. The Atlantic 10 has played the eighth toughest non-conference slate in the country and has a sparkling 113-65 record to show for their efforts. They've beaten teams from just about every one of the power conferences, they've won on the road and at neutral sites and reclaimed the standard that they ceded to the Missouri Valley conference in recent years.

You have to go back to 2004 to find a year when the league landed more than two teams in the big dance and, entering this season, it didn't seem like things would be all that different. Everyone knew Xavier is a consistently strong program but it was hard to find too many bullish projections about a second team that should be making March plans. What a difference two months make.

As of right now, it's almost impossible to see the league landing fewer than four teams in the tournament. Seven teams are in the top 67 of the RPI, three teams in the Top 25 and they've compiled so many quality wins that, barring a complete collapse by two of the front-runners, anything less would be criminal.

Let's break it down:

Vanderbilt and UMass can both put up points in a hurry and they didn't disappoint in Nashville yesterday. Shan Foster hit eight threes to become Vandy's all-time leader in made longballs and the Commodores improved to 15-0 in a 97-88 home win. While the Minutemen couldn't continue the A-10's upset string they did cast some doubts about the long-term fitness of VU.

Ricky Harris, Chris Lowe and Gary Forbes had their way with the Commodore defense and scored 25, 22 and 22 points, respectively. Their drives to the lane were unimpeded and their threes thrown up without a hand in the face, two things the Commodores desperately need to change if they hope to contend for SEC honors. Give Kevin Stallings credit, though, he realized that the one chance he had, with UMass up nine in the second half, was shifting to a zone that forced them to shoot from deep. Harris was 5-of-10 from three but his mates were 3-of-14 and Vandy ran away behind Foster's dead-eye shooting.

It wasn't like the Minutemen weren't guarding him. He was hitting with hands in his face and still finished with 32 points. The defense was keying on him, to its detriment, as A.J. Ogilvy was open inside all day, drawing fouls and finishing with 25 of his own. UMass hung with a good team but their lack of stopping power is going to cost them in A-10 play.

Elsewhere on the mid major hardcourts:

It's easy to see how last night's match-up between Houston and UMass may have flown under-the-radar for most college basketball fans. A game between two mid-level conference teams that haven't sniffed success in nearly a decade is only going to get college basketball nerds excited. But the Minutemen's thrilling 95-89 comeback victory in Amherst is exactly the kind of under-the-radar game that will go a long way in determining which of these likely bubble teams will be dancing in March.

Lost in the shuffle amongst fellow Atlantic 10 conference teams like Xavier, Rhode Island and Dayton, UMass is quietly having a fine season of its own. The Minutemen are currently 11-2, 22nd in the latest RPI and possess quality wins over Syracuse and Boston College. The Minutemen's strengths of perimeter shooting, scoring balance and depth are what propelled the comeback against Houston. After struggling to find a shooting rhythm in the first half, UMass shot a blistering 53% in the second half to get back into the game after trailing by 11 at the break. Leading scorer Gary Forbes led the way 19 points, but he was backed up by 18 points from both Chris Lowe and Etienne Brower and 16 from Ricky Harris. If the Minutemen's depth and scoring balance can hold steady for the rest of the season, there is no reason to think that the Minutemen can't return to the Big Dance for the first time since 1998.

As for Houston, the Cougars have to feel as if they just let a golden opportunity to pick up a quality road victory slip right through their fingers. At 11-2, the Cougars should still be in the at-large picture come March, even with a shaky 114 RPI ranking. Behind scoring machine Rob McKiver, the Cougars should rack up wins against the Conference USA pasties and pick up RPI points with upcoming games against Arizona and Memphis. But if the Cougars are left at in the cold on Selection Sunday, they can point to the blown opportunity at Amherst as the reason.

It's not every day that a team from the Big East plays a team from the Atlantic 10 and finds themselves in the position of underdog. That's just where struggling Cincinnati found itself last night during the intercity shootout with Xavier, though. They almost pulled off the upset, too, by playing a game in the tradition of their former coach Bob Huggins. The Bearcats played rough, physical defense and threw the Musketeers off their game. Xavier's Drew Lavender caught a forearm to the face and Josh Duncan landed wrong after taking a shove to the back and left with an injured knee. A 10-man pileup led to technicals on both sides and all the activity helped Xavier to a miserable 38.6% shooting night. But Cincinnati was even worse, 33.8%, and Derrick Brown scored 11 points over the final seven minutes to escape with a 64-59 win.

Xavier can expect to get such treatment in the future. They're a big dog now and will be hunted by every team they play for the rest of the season. It's been a few years since UMass was such a dog but it might not be much longer.

They opened up a 15-point lead against Boston College in the Commonwealth Classic and then held on for an 83-80 win thanks to Gary Forbes. The swingman scored 10 points in the final five minutes to put the finishing touches on the Minutemen's first win in nine tries against the Eagles. Forbes, Ricky Harris and Chris Lowe combined for 64 points as BC unwisely tried to run the floor all night.

Xavier and UMass are just the tip of the iceberg. Rhode Island is 10-1, Dayton is 7-1, Charlotte is 6-2 and Duquesne is 6-3. The conference slate is going to be chockablock with good games and the NCAA Tournament should be well stocked with the cream of the A-10 crop.