As a gift for our post-Thanksgiving slumber, the college basketball world treated us to the 16-game SEC-ACC Challenge. These two conferences house six of the last seven national champions, so the second annual challenge occupied the bulk of my attention this week.
The SEC captured a 10-6 overall victory, headlined by South Carolina taking care of Duke, and Oklahoma and LSU completing massive comebacks against Louisville and Stanford, respectively. The Tigers remain one of the more befuddling teams in the country — their winning pedigree makes it difficult to bet against them, but they are testing the limits of their fourth-quarter resilience.
The ACC, meanwhile, had four upsets of ranked teams, starting with Notre Dame’s overtime victory against Texas. Loyal readers of the power rankings will know that I wouldn’t necessarily consider the Irish’s home win an upset, but it was still important for Notre Dame to shake off a two-game losing streak and capably defend the Madison Booker/Rori Harmon backcourt. The Longhorns impressed even in defeat, forcing overtime despite shooting 37 percent and committing 23 turnovers.
The other wins for the ACC made more of a statement. North Carolina routed previously undefeated Kentucky as Teonni Key made a rather meek return to Chapel…
