Men’s college basketball, women’s college basketball – there’s no shortage of college ball, every night.
Don’t worry, we’re here to help you figure out what you missed but shouldn’t have. Here are all the best moments from last night in college basketball.
Oklahoma ends losing streak by upsetting South Carolina
What a game. What a game! After starting the season 14-1 and moving to No. 5 in the poll, Oklahoma lost three in a row: to Ole Miss, Kentucky and LSU. All three opponents were ranked, which made it feel like maybe the Sooners just couldn’t keep up with that level of competition despite their own ranking, and they fell to No. 16 in the poll this week. Oklahoma can absolutely hang, though, as evidenced by a shocking overtime win over South Carolina that somehow turned into a dominant W despite needing extra time.
South Carolina had just one loss on the season — a defeat against Texas back during Feast Week, which the Gamecocks avenged themselves for this month. A win, even one on the road, would not have been a surprise given South Carolina’s general dominance and Oklahoma’s recent issues. Instead, the Gamecocks couldn’t quite create separation, as they were up by 7 at the half but then were outscored 25-16 in the third to enter the fourth quarter down 2.
South Carolina managed to go ahead with a late 10-2 run that started with 4:03 left in the game, which concluded with a bucket from sophomore forward Joyce Edwards and the score 75-73. With 18 seconds left, Oklahoma senior center Raegan Beers tipped it in to tie the game up, and then Edwards turned the ball over on South Carolina’s attempt to avoid overtime.
And then, Aaliyah Chavez took over. The freshman guard scored 26 points on Thursday, except she saved 15 of those points for the 5-minute overtime. South Carolina did not have an answer for her, and it resulted in a 12-point loss.
Chavez made four 3-pointers in four attempts in OT as well as a layup — her only miss of the period came on a free throw, but she got the other one. She had gone 1-for-6 from deep before overtime and 4-for-14 overall in what had been a frustrating shooting day but at least one loaded with assists — the guard finished with 8 dimes and pulled down 4 rebounds, too — but OT was another story.
Oklahoma is now 15-4 overall and back to even in SEC play. South Carolina, meanwhile, is 5-1 in conference play — that loss to Texas in November didn’t count as a conference game —
Vanderbilt is now 20-0
Shea Ralph has turned this Vanderbilt program around in short order, huh? Ralph took over as coach of the Commodores for the 2021-2022 season, and by 2023-2024 Vandy had made the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament again for the first time since 2014. That first season, Vanderbilt was a 12 seed, and last year, a 7. In the 2025-2026 season, Vanderbilt is the No. 5 team in the country and owner of a 20-0 record — one of just two undefeated women’s college basketball teams along with UConn.
After a hard-fought win against No. 7 Michigan on Monday, Vandy faced off against Auburn Thursday. The Tigers are on the bubble — they rank 68th in the NCAA Evaluation Tool, or NET — and the Commodores crushed them, 81-53. Sophomore guard and star Mikayla Blakes had a bit of an off night, a continuation of Monday against Michigan, but still scored a game-high 20 points despite 8-for-21 shooting and had 4 rebounds, 5 assists and a steal, as well.
Vanderbilt shot 50% as a team in spite of Blakes’ performance, and outrebounded Auburn 44-25 while dropping 24 dimes as a team. The defense still needs work for the Commodores, at least relative to the offense — Vandy ranks 6th in Offensive Rating — but holding Michigan to 69 points earlier in the week with disruptive, aggressive defense in the first half and then limiting Auburn to 53 next time out is a good sign, at least. Especially with South Carolina up next on the schedule.
UConn is 20-0, too
Vanderbilt wasn’t the only team to reach the 20-win mark on Thursday, as UConn got there as well with a win against Georgetown. Playing in the home of the WNBA’s Washington Mystics, in front of a crowd that was loaded with Huskies fans thanks to it being fifth-year guard Azzi Fudd’s backyard from her high school days, UConn moved to a 10-0 record in the Big East and logged its 36th-straight win overall by defeating the Hoyas, 83-42.
Fudd had another rough night from beyond the arc, shooting just 3-for-12 on 3s, but found more success on 2-pointers where she was 5-for-7 and finished with 19 points. Fudd found other ways to contribute, too, picking up 6 rebounds with 5 assists, 2 steals and a block. Sophomore forward Sarah Strong dominated, with 25 points on 10-for-17 shooting, a team-high 8 boards, 5 assists, 4 steals and a block in 31 minutes. While the Huskies as a whole had a down shooting game from 3 — just 8-for-29 — they shot 52% overall and piled on the points in all besides the ice-cold third quarter… which they still outscored the Hoyas in, 9-8. Georgetown sank a single 3 in 19 attempts and shot 29% overall.
Iowa outlasts Maryland
Oklahoma-South Carolina wasn’t the only ranked-ranked matchup on the schedule last night, and it also wasn’t the only one that needed OT for resolution. The No. 10 Hawkeyes visited No. 15 Maryland in a game that went from 0-to-60 late.
Entering the fourth quarter the two teams had combined for 87 points, with Iowa up 48-39. Both offenses exploded in that last frame: the Hawkeyes scored 25 points, their lone quarter over 17, and the Terps dropped 34 to catch all the way up. Even more astounding is that, with 3:15 to go in regulation, Iowa was up 66-49. Maryland went on a 12-2 run until there was just a minute left in the game, though, cutting the lead to 6, and then a 9-0 run stopped by a couple of Iowa free throws with 21 seconds to go. Junior guard Oluchi Okananwa would then nail a 3-pointer with 9 seconds to go, bringing Maryland into a 73-73 tie with Iowa, and 5-foot-9 freshman guard Kyndal Walker would block Iowa’s final shot of the quarter to keep the tie alive and force OT.
Overtime did not go nearly so well for Maryland, however. The Terps mustered just 5 points there compared to Iowa’s 12-point barrage, with sophomore guard Chazadi Wright scoring 8 of her 18 points in those 5 minutes. Senior forward Hannah Stuelke had a double-double with 12 points and 11 rebounds in 43 minutes — tied with Wright for the game-high — while sophomore guard Ava Heiden led all scorers with 20 and pulled down 8 boards, too. Iowa remains undefeated in the Big Ten at 8-0, while Maryland, despite being ranked, is now just 5-4 in conference play.
Tennessee upsets Kentucky
No. 11 Kentucky dropped its second game in a row, this time to No. 17 Tennessee, and the Wildcats are suddenly just 4-3 in the SEC because of it. The Lady Vols, meanwhile, are 6-0 and in a less crowded tie with Vanderbilt following South Carolina’s defeat against Oklahoma.
Tennessee led for 87% of the game, but that makes it sound like it was a more dominant W than it was: the Vols won by just 2 points, 60-58, and their largest lead of the entire game was 10 points about halfway through the third quarter, 36-26. Kentucky very briefly led in the fourth, 49-48, as its offense finally woke up from its slumber, but the back-and-forth that ensued both on offense and defense from there just didn’t go Kentucky’s way.
Eli King’s big game
North Dakota senior guard Eli King did a little bit of everything against Oral Roberts on Thursday. He scored 18 points on 7-for-13 shooting (and 2-for-3 from 3), with 7 rebounds, 5 assists, zero turnovers and 7 steals. He hit both of his free throws, so the only real blemish on his game — and this is nitpicking for effect — was that he committed three fouls. North Dakota won, 79-62, so he can probably be forgiven for those transgressions.
While King didn’t lead in scoring — sophomore guard and teammate Zach Kraft had 22 with 6 3-pointers getting him there — he did have the game-high in boards, dimes and steals, which is something. King, by the way, is leading the Summit Conference with 2.5 steals per game, and just misses the Division I top-10 there, as well.
Whittaker drops 37 in Gonzaga L
Thursday’s point leader was Gonzaga freshman forward Lauren Whittaker, who exploded for 37 points against Oregon State. She shot just 1-for-8 from beyond the arc, but made up for that poor showing by sinking 12 of 14 from the line and pulling down 14 rebounds. The sixth board of the night was the 210th of her season, a new Gonzaga record for freshman — Whittaker leads the conference in rebounds per game at 10.3, as well as points at 20.1.
Sadly for Whittaker and Gonzaga, no one else on the Bulldogs could seem to get any offense together — just one other player even reached double-digits, and Gonzaga would lose in overtime, 92-87.
The Beavers had their own 30-point scorer — junior guard Jenna Villa scored 31 with 15 of her own free throws — but the real difference was in that she had help. Four Beavers scored at least 14 points, and the starters played heavy, quality minutes to make up for a lack of bench production. None more impressive than junior guard Kennedie Shuler, who scored 17 points with 5 rebounds, 9 assists and 10 steals, tying her with Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo for the most of anyone in women’s or men’s Division I ball on Thursday.
Oregon State is now 7-1 in West Coast Conference play, one up on Gonzaga, thanks to the kind of win that the Beavers are going to need to point to in order to get an at-large bid in March, should they not come out on top in the conference.
9 blocks! 9!
Multiple players with 10 steals is something, but Georgia Tech senior guard Brianna Turnage had 9 blocks on Thursday, tying a program record as well as setting a career-high. Turnage had 5 of those blocks in the first 15 minutes of the game, and added 4 more rejections along the way to post the most by any ACC player in a single game since 2015. Turnage also added 7 points and 11 rebounds, which meant she was one block shy of a seriously rare double-double effort.
Like with Whittaker’s huge game, though, Turnage was on the wrong side of a loss despite her efforts. The Yellow Jackets would drop this one to North Carolina, 54-46, with UNC improving to 16-5 and 5-3 in ACC play.
Having a good night was bad, actually
It wasn’t just on the women’s side that having a huge game for a losing team was the thing. Campbell’s DJ Smith scored 31 points on 11-for-18 shooting, sinking 6 from beyond the arc while adding 8 rebounds, 6 assists and 4 steals. The senior guard led all players across men’s and women’s Division I basketball in John Hollinger’s Game Score, which measures the overall effectiveness of a single-game performance on a scale meant to line up with scoring. Smith beat out Georgia Southern’s Jashani Simmons by all of 0.1 points, 31.6 to 31.5, owing to the additional boards and points (Simmons went 28/6/6 with 6 steals and 2 blocks, to boot).
Simmons won her game, though, with Georgia Southern downing Troy 80-69, while Campbell fell to Charleston 87-83 despite his best efforts to keep things close.
