Northwestern - Rutgers

I'm not sure how good Rutgers is, but they have some real-deal players.  This Diamond Johnson was supposedly one of the top point guards among the recruits and is up for one national award, they have a young center that is foul prone but scoring, Guirantes (while this is her last year) is up for some nice awards as well.  Mack is solid, and all this with Broughton out with an injury.

In recent years it was my contention that RU went to heck late season because there was ultimately chemistry issues, evidenced often by transfers.  Of course, right now CVS is playing the starters 40 minutes / game, which could lead to a collapse on its own.

That said, right this minute they look pretty good, they were not before their 5 week Covid break.  Part of the issue is that they have been scoring more than you would expect, but in their losses the defense was suspect.  CVS never cares for that dynamic.  Its a Pat Summitt quote, but offense thrills the fans, defense wins games and rebounding wins championships.  CVS believes that.

If I had to bet on it, I would say that RU will play well, make the NCAA's as a lowish at large and go out in the 1st or 2nd round.

The biggest difference between the Rutgers of its heyday and later years (to me) has been the inability to pull off a (real) upset.  Back when, leaving out a few victories over you guys, we always had a fighting chance to pull the upset, against a better team.  Haven't seen that in a while, and most RU fans seem to feel it is endemic to the style CVS plays.