Your College Basketball Saturday Viewing Guide: February 19, 2022

32 games worth of national television broadcasting today, and not a single one of them involves Marquette. Terrible. Of course, Marquette plays Creighton tomorrow, so I guess it’s not really anyone’s fault.

Anyway, out of those 32 games, 13 of them involve a ranked team one way or another. That’s a lot of unranked basketball on TV if you ask me, but that’s also college hoops taking advantage of no more football on Sunday at all. Six of those 13 games have a ranked team on the road, and half of those involve two ranked teams squaring off.

The first one comes a little bit shaded into the start of the day at 11:30 am Central, when #11 Texas Tech makes their way to the state capitol to face #20 Texas. I am legitimately curious about what kind of crowd is going to be on hand in the Longhorns’ home arena. 30 minutes after that one gets started, #25 Alabama tips off in Rupp Arena against #4 Kentucky. Just that pairing of games alone would make for a pretty good run of the day. Coming up at 3pm CT is the final ranked team battle: #16 Tennessee at #23 Arkansas. Always something wild going on in SEC country.

In the other ranked team on the road games of the day, we have #12 Illinois up in East Lansing to see Michigan State, #2 Auburn trying to just walk into the O-Dome and get a win over Florida, and finally, in the 7pm CT slot, #6 Kansas taking their show on the road against West Virginia. Two of the three have an impact on Marquette, as the Golden Eagles have scored wins over both the Illini and the Mountaineers.

Make sure you stay fresh all day long, because ESPN and FS1 each have a game with a ranked team at home starting at 9pm tonight. The more interesting one is probably Oregon visiting #3 Arizona, although Mick Cronin’s #13 ranked UCLA Bruins are always a wild card even against 13-11 Washington.

Here’s the full national TV schedule for the day! All times Central, of course.