The Champions Classic has become one of the signature early season events in men’s college basketball, featuring some of the sport’s top teams and most intriguing storylines. And this year’s edition of the doubleheader is no different.
On Tuesday night in Atlanta, Ga., Michigan State will square off with No. 1 Kansas, followed by a showdown of blue bloods in No. 6 Duke and No. 19 Kentucky.
Of these four teams, the one capturing all the headlines a little more than a week into the season seems to be the Blue Devils (2-0), powered by their star freshman phenom Cooper Flagg. The 17-year-old from Maine has already inked lucrative NIL endorsement deals with New Balance and Gatorade, and wowed fans in a win over Army with an alley-oop dunk and smooth 3-pointers. His name and face is peppered across ESPN’s website, taking up much of the real estate on the World Wide Leader’s hub for men’s basketball. The hype train for Flagg has continued to roll since he more than held his own in an exhibition against Team USA before the Olympics.
But a concern has emerged early on with Flagg: cramping.
The 6-foot-9 forward had a double-double in the first half in Duke’s win over Army on Friday, but didn’t get the opportunity to pad his stats in the second half because he spent the majority of it on the bench, guzzling various fluids and using a massage tool on the areas above his knees. Flagg finished with 13 points and 11 rebounds in just 25 minutes of action. He left Duke’s season-opener against Maine with cramps too.
“We got to help him. I’m not happy about it, for him,” Duke coach Jon Scheyer said. “We can’t have that happening – bottom line. I thought he had it going too. You know, that first half, he was just really controlling the whole game with his rebounding, his passing, his playmaking, his scoring, was assertive shooting the ball. So, that can’t happen. I’m not happy with it, we’re going to fix that.”
Kentucky, under first-year head coach Mark Pope, is also off to a 2-0 start with wins over Wright State and Bucknell. In both games, the Wildcats put up at least 100 points, making it the first time in 46 years that Kentucky has topped the century mark in its first two contests.
In past years under former coach John Calipari – now at Arkansas – Kentucky was often led by a collection of star one-and-done freshmen. Through two games under Pope, the top players emerging for the Wildcats have been junior guard Otega Oweh and graduate guard Koby Brea. Otega, who transferred to Kentucky from Oklahoma, is averaging 15.5 points per game, while Brea, a former two-time A-10 Sixth Man of the Year at Dayton, is averaging 19 points per game. Brea is shooting 10-of-12 from 3-point land through two games too.
Kentucky is 12-11 all-time against Duke, a series that has produced many memorable moments in the history of college basketball. This will be the first time that Scheyer and Pope get to coach in the Big Blue rivalry.
It might be crazy to say consider Kansas is the No. 1 ranked team in the country according to the AP Top 25 Poll, but the Jayhawks are playing the undercard of the night, going against an unranked Michigan State squad. It is a matchup that features two Hall of Fame coaches who have each won national championships. Kansas is eighth in the KenPom rankings, while Michigan State is 34th.
The Jayhawks and Spartans represent two things that we’re seeing less and less of in men’s college basketball these days: a senior star and a decorated coach heading into his 70s with no signs of slowing down.
Hunter Dickinson represents the former. A two-time consensus All-American, the 7-foot-1 center is back in a Kansas uniform, playing his fifth season of college basketball. He played a key role in the Jayhawks’ home win on Friday over a ranked North Carolina squad, piling up 20 points, 10 rebounds and three assists, helping Kansas hold on to a win after the Tar Heels erased a 20-point deficit. In a sport where the names and faces change often, Dickinson is one of men’s college basketball’s most recognizable players.
Michigan State coach Tom Izzo represents the latter. He’ll turn 70-years-old in January and this is his 30th season at the helm of the Spartans. Many of his peers – from Mike Krzyzewski to Roy Williams to Jay Wright to Jim Boeheim – have called it quits in recent years. Among active head coaches, nobody has more NCAA Tournament victories than Izzo’s 56, or more Final Four appearances than Izzo’s eight.
While Izzo has piled up accolades at Michigan State, his Spartans haven’t won anything significant since 2019, when they won the Big Ten and went to the Final Four. Since then, they haven’t advanced past the Sweet 16.
Still, Izzo shows no signs of slowing down, telling the College Hoops Today Podcast recently, “I got no interest in getting out of it.”