The CBS Sports Classic returns for its 12th iteration on Saturday when four of the biggest names in men’s college basketball square off in a doubleheader inside Atlanta’s State Farm Arena. No. 22 St. John’s will face Kentucky in the opener at 12:30 p.m. ET, with No. 12 North Carolina and Ohio State set to go at it 30 minutes after the conclusion of game one. Both games will be televised nationally on CBS.
Before the action tips off Saturday afternoon, here’s the biggest question facing each of the four participating teams.
Has Kentucky figured something out?
No team in college basketball has been more disappointing through the season’s first seven weeks than Kentucky. That said, the Wildcats are coming off of their most impressive win and performance of the season, a much-needed 72-60 home win over regional rival Indiana last Saturday.
The question still remains though: Are the Wildcats poised for a second half turnaround, or did they simply play a good, not great game against a good, not great opponent?
Rick Pitino and Mark Pope squaring off 30 years after Pope captained likely Pitino’s greatest college team — the 1995-96 national title-winning UK squad — is a cute subplot, but make no mistake about it, Kentucky fans will be keeping the main thing the main thing this weekend, and the main thing is building some essential momentum heading into the New Year and the start of conference play.
There are rumors swirling that likely lottery pick Jayden Quaintance may make his Wildcat debut on Saturday. Whether the big man does or does not play, Kentucky has to find a way to negate St. John’s advantage on the interior with Zuby Ejiofor, Bryce Hopkins and Dillon Mitchell. After being whipped inside in their losses to Michigan State and North Carolina, UK controlled the glass and the paint in the win over Indiana. It’ll likely take a similar effort from the Wildcat bigs to pull off the mild upset in front of what figures to be a pro-BBN crowd in Atlanta.
Can St. John’s get its best win of the season?
While the Johnnies haven’t been quite the disappointment that Kentucky has through the season’s first month and-a-half, a loss to UK on Saturday would mean that they would head into the heart of Big East play (in a down Big East) without a single win over a team that, at the moment, seems to be an NCAA Tournament lock. With the Wildcats playing in a conference that will provide far more quality win opportunities than the Big East, you can make the case fairly easily that Saturday’s double-header opener matters more to Rick Pitino’s team than it does Mark Pope’s.
There’s obviously a lot of basketball to be played and a lot of moving and shaking to take place, but at the current moment, St. John’s has an 0-3 mark in Quadrant I games, and has just six Quad I opportunities remaining on its schedule. That’s a dangerous position for a squad many had pegged as a top five team heading into the year.
The common denominator in Kentucky’s losses this season has been the Wildcats being the less physical team. Expect Pitino’s squad to implement a healthy dose of bully ball to try and win their fourth straight and notch a vital quality win to carry with it into the New Year.
Can Bruce Thornton make a national statement?
Bruce Thornton is a fourth-year starter at a major program who has averaged double figures in scoring in all four seasons, and is currently 8th in the nation in scoring. So why aren’t we talking more about this guy?
The short answer is because the average college basketball fan hasn’t had much of a reason to tune-in and watch Ohio State play so far this season. While Notre Dame, Pitt, West Virginia and Northwestern are all … fine? … the Buckeyes haven’t played a non-conference game against a likely NCAA Tournament team. That changes Saturday afternoon.
The nationally televised game against North Carolina will give the world an opportunity to see what they’ve been missing in Thornton, who is averaging 21.8 ppg and has already gone over the 34-point mark on two occasions this season. In addition to those numbers, Thornton is also shooting 60.2 percent from the field and has made 26 of his 52 three-point attempts. He ranks eighth nationally in true shooting percentage (74.0%), ninth in offensive rating and 13th in effective field-goal percentage (70.7%).
The game also gives Thornton, who starred at Milton High School in Fairborn, Ga. before arriving in Columbus, to put on a show in front of friends and family in his home state.
The college hoops world needs to be talking more about Thornton in terms of being a likely midseason All-American. A big-time performance in a spotlight game just before Christmas would go a long way towards jumpstarting that conversation.
Will we see Seth Trimble?
North Carolina has dominated its all-time series with Ohio State, going 6-1 against the Buckeyes, including 2-0 in CBS Sports Classic games. A development that could help continue that run of dominance would be the return of Tar Heel guard Seth Trimble on Saturday.
Trimble played in just two games for UNC this season before fracturing his arm during a November workout. While Tar Heel coach Hubert Davis made no proclamation about when Trimble is expected to return to the court for game action, he did note earlier this week that Trimble was back practicing with the team.
Pound for pound, Trimble is North Carolina’s best defensive player. If he’s able to play, even sparingly, on Saturday, he could make a world of difference when it comes to slowing down Ohio State scoring machine Bruce Thornton.
UNC has gone 8-1 in Trimble’s absence and has a quality win over Kentucky over that span, but there’s no doubt that they need the veteran guard for the uptick in competition they’re about to be faced with. Getting productive minutes out of him on Saturday would be a godsend.
