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.
West Georgia outlasts Troy in 2 OT
Troy had two of the best performances of the night, and it wasn’t enough. Sometimes the other team just plays better, so it goes. Junior forward Thomas Dowd had 20 points, and led all D-I players with 14 rebounds, tied with Emani Burks from Nicholls State. He also forced a second overtime with this 3-pointer:
And then there was Victor Valdes, the 6-foot-7 junior forward, who had 29 points to lead all scorers in D-I, tied with Davion Bailey from Incarnate Word on the men’s side and Sayvia Sellers on the women’s — more on her night in a moment. Valdes was huge, tying the game with a 3-pointer with just 43 seconds left on the clock in the second overtime, but again, it wasn’t enough to put away West Georgia.
Despite being on the road, despite this being just West Georgia’s second year in Division I, they both pulled off the dub and are now 5-3 on the season. Troy is 5-5, with two real tough losses that very easily could have been wins — you might recall they also came out on the wrong side of a triple-overtime instant classic against USC less than two weeks ago.
Obviously that’s all a team effort, but West Georgia can thank freshman guard Chas Lewless for coming out on top, too: he led their players in points with 26, went 5-for-6 on free throws, picked up a block and stole the ball four times, or, twice as much as Troy did as a team. The Wolves also mostly kept up with Troy’s rebounding prowess throughout the night, grabbing 48 of the total 100 — that, combined with scoring 13 points off turnovers compared to Troy’ 5, brought them to a 93-89 double-OT victory.
Villanova wins their sixth in a row
Monday’s game between Villanova and Temple, played as part of Philadelphia’s annual Big 5 Classic, was a lot closer than the final score suggests. Or at least it was, until Villanova opened things up in the last stretch of the game. Before then, though, the two looked evenly matched, and the score reflected that.
Sophomore guard Aiden Tobiason scored 15 points in 36 minutes, leading the Owls, and picked up a couple of those early on a dunk that, frankly, it did not look like he was going to actually pull off. He pushed through the contact in the air and just made it to the rim, though, before falling down.
Shortly after, 6-foot-7 junior guard Gavin Griffiths picked up one of his two blocks on the night, on a 3-point attempt. Obviously, the block was powered by his eyewear; how could it not be?
Temple kept up for than just a bit, but eventually, Villanova was just too much. Temple was up 35-32 with 15:57 to play in the second half, but then Villanova started putting consistent scoring together, leading to a 13-2 run that made it 48-42, Wildcats, with just under 12 minutes left in regulation, and they’d just keep pushing from there until the final score — 74-56 — made it look like they were always in control.
Villanova is now 6-1 on the season, and has advanced to the finals of the Big 5 Classic, where they will face Saint Joseph’s on Dec. 7. Meanwhile, Temple will take on Drexel in the third-place game.Â
How many blocks?
Fatima Diakhate might have scored just 6 points on Monday against Central Connecticut, but Pitt’s forward had one hell of a defensive outing in the 68-43 win. The 6-foot-5 junior pulled down 8 rebounds — 6 of them defensive boards — and amassed a career-high 8 blocks. That’s not only her best, but tied for the second-most in a Division I game this season, behind only Brown’s N’Famara Dabo, who had 11 of them against Hampton in a losing effort back on Nov. 14.
It’s also the most blocks by any women’s player in 2025-2026, breaking a four-way tie that had held to this point, UT Arlington’s Kira Reynolds had 6 on Nov. 7, Missouri’s Jayla Smith pulled that off on Nov. 11, Baylor’s Kiersten Johnston logged 6 on Nov. 22 and Mississippi State’s Madison Francis got her half-dozen on Nov. 25. They’re all tied for second now, as Diakhate managed 8.
What’s a little funny is that Diakhate hasn’t been a force like this on the blocking side this season: she’s averaging all of 1.6 per game, which is good, of course, but the rebound total is way more in line with what she usually does on a given night — Diakhate’s season-high before Monday was 2 blocks, and she averages 9.3 rebounds per game.Â
The transfer from Georgia is leading the ACC in shooting percentage at 67.1%, though, which makes being limited to 6 points on an 8-block night that much stranger as far as predictable outcomes go.
Sellers is off to a strong start
No. 21 Washington took down San Jose State on Monday, 80-54, and Sayvia Sellers had more than just a hand in that. The junior guard scored 29 points — again, tied for the D-I lead for the day — while pulling down 6 rebounds, dropping 3 dimes and grabbing a steal and a block each. She did this on 9-for-16 shooting while hitting 5-of-10 from beyond the arc, and sinking all six free throw attempts. A tidy day of shooting from the team’s best scorer.
Sellers is now averaging 19.1 points per game, good enough for eighth in the Big Ten, while Washington is 8-0 on the season and 7-0 at home. Next up for Sellers and Washington is their first significant test of the season: No. 16 USC, on Dec. 7.
Bama gets an ugly win
Alabama picked up a 79-65 win over Kennesaw State to remain undefeated on Monday, but the score hides that this was actually an ugly game for Bama — enough so that their coach, Kristy Curry, spent the halftime interview blasting her team for sloppy, inefficient play, especially from the bench players. And that happened with Alabama up by 13!
Here was the problem: Bama started out looking like a team of sharpshooters, with 29 points and 10 assists on their first 13 makes. They got sloppy after that, however, not only no longer hitting anything from beyond the arc — Bama didn’t make a single three in the second or third quarters after going 5-for-8 in the opening one — and Essence Cody got in foul trouble early, necessitating a trip to the bench. Alabama just kept turning the ball over, too, and finished with 18 total despite that near-flawless first quarter — Kennesaw State stayed in the game because they scored 18 points off of turnovers while racking up 13 steals, some of which were of the brutal “who were you even passing that to?” variety.
So, a 20-point lead was whittled down to 8 in the third quarter, and this was with Kennesaw State unable to sink their free throws (they were 14-22 from the line, 64%) or shoot well at all (they were 38% overall). Bama looked like they were trying to give the game away on multiple occasions, and were lucky to be attempting it with a team that couldn’t take advantage.
Alabama came out in the fourth quarter looking better, however, and Kennesaw State’s hope of a comeback vanished. Cody was limited to just 19 minutes due to foul trouble, but still picked up 8 points, 4 rebounds, a steal and 3 blocks, while Jessica Timons, at least, had a good night offensively — she turned the ball over just once, for one, and scored 21 points on 5-for-8 shooting and a perfect 10-for-10 on free throws.
Another double-double
Another big night for Maine’s Adrianna Smith, as the senior forward scored 24 points with 10 rebounds to secure another double-double on the season. She scored nearly half of Maine’s points herself against Boston University, but that was enough, as they won 54-45.
That was Smith’s fifth double-double of the season in eight games, her fourth game with at least 20 points and a worthy follow-up to Saturday’s triple-double performance against Saint Francis. She also did some fine work with assists on Monday, even if she couldn’t hit double-digits in that figure:
She’s up to a career-high 18.1 points and 5.1 assists per game, and the 9.5 rebounds per ties her second-best mark. She’s second in the America’s East Conference in points per game by 0.1, behind only New Hampshire’s Eva DeChent, is second in rebounds per game and rebounds and second in assists per game behind Bryant’s Mia Mancini. Maine is just 3-5 and hasn’t impressed as a team in the early going, but Smith is having an excellent comeback campaign after missing all of 2024-2025 with a knee injury.
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