Stanley Roberts (Getty Images)

1. Unlike other former college basketball players who return to their former schools to finish their degrees once their NBA careers are over, ex-LSU center Stanley Roberts had more than just a semester or two left. He was starting from academic ground zero. The New Orleans Times-Picayune tells the heartwarming story of Roberts overcoming financial limitations, a learning disability and ultimately triple-bypass heart surgery to walk across the stage and get his diploma Friday.

2. The splintering of the Big East dominated the college basketball news cycle for the past 24 hours, so not surprisingly plenty of good content emerged. My favorite is this piece from Hartford Courant columnist Jeff Jacobs, who puts UConn's plight into perspective, scoffs at the notion the Catholic Seven deserve sympathy and makes a compelling case the Big East brought this on itself.

3. Fiery Rutgers coach Mike Rice's three-game suspension without pay apparently stems from a series of incidents during practice. According to the Star-Ledger, the suspension followed an internal investigation that revealed Rice used abusive, profane language toward his players and also threw basketballs at some players' heads. Athletic director Tom Pernetti told the Star-Ledger he never considered firing Rice, but it's clear the school is sending a message.

4. The reaction from Wake Forest fans to this blog post by ESPN.com's Eamonn Brennan is a clear sign of the pressure on athletic director Ron Wellman to fire Demon Deacons coach Jeff Bzdelik. Not only were Wake Forest fans happy with Brennan's criticism of Bzdelik for no longer taking live calls on his weekly radio show, they encouraged him to take every opportunity to rip the struggling Demon Deacons the rest of the season in hopes it is one step closer to getting rid of Bzdelik.

5. Among the many excellent reads Thursday that were lost amid the torrent of Big East breakup news stories was this excellent piece from Dana O'Neil on the impending 50-year anniversary of the "Game of Change" between Loyola (Ill.) and Mississippi State. The story is especially timely with the two teams meeting for the first time in 50 years on Saturday in Chicago.  

Villanova is one of seven schools that is on the verge of breaking away from the Big East (Getty Images)

You'll hear a lot in the coming days about how the impending breakup of the once-mighty Big East is a sad day for college basketball.

In reality, that's not entirely true.

Watching the Big East splinter apart is indeed tough for anyone who grew up on Sherman Douglas and Patrick Ewing, but Dave Gavitt's basketball-centric Big East was doomed to vanish months ago. The Big East irreparably damaged its basketball brand the second it chose to respond to the departure of basketball cornerstones like Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Louisville by scrambling to salvage its football future with the additions of UCF, SMU and Tulane.

What makes the final step of the Big East's breakup a positive for college basketball is that a quality hoops-centric league now appears destined to emerge from the rubble of what was once the most formidable conference in the land.

The Big East's seven basketball-first members — DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, St. John's and Villanova — reportedly will sever ties with the rest of the league and branch out on their own. They'll likely raid the Atlantic 10 or other leagues to add three to five other basketball-focused schools.

That league may not be of the caliber of the Big East in its heyday, but college basketball will be better for the decision of the Big East Seven to break away from their football-playing cohorts. Annual matchups between Villanova and Xavier or Georgetown and Butler sound intriguing. Annual games between St. John's and Tulane or Marquette and UCF did not.

Michael Carter-Williams (Getty Images)

As his Syracuse teammates changed into fresh clothes and emerged from the locker room after their 87-73 victory at Providence last January, backup point guard Michael Carter-Williams chose to stay behind.

The former star at nearby St. Andrew's School dreaded the thought of facing the friends and family who made the short drive to see him play because he'd hardly left the bench that day. With veterans Scoop Jardine, Brandon Triche and Dion Waiters in front of him in the guard rotation, Carter-Williams logged only four first-half minutes and didn't play at all in the second half.

"That was a really hard time for me, especially because my friends and family were there," Carter-Williams said. "I felt a little embarrassed, but now looking back, it was a learning experience. For me to be able to make it through something like that, it's preparing me for hard times in the future."

Exasperating days like that were common for Carter-Williams during a difficult freshman season in which he didn't play in 11 games and received sporadic minutes in others. The former McDonald's All-American admits he'd get so fed up he'd call his mom and step-dad almost daily to vent and he'd float the idea of transferring once in a while, but now he's thrilled he persevered long enough for his patience to be rewarded.

Through eight games this season for No. 4 Syracuse, Carter-Williams has been a fixture in the starting lineup at point guard, averaging 12.4 points, a national-leading 10.4 assists and 3.8 steals. The 6-foot-5 sophomore is currently on pace to become only the third player in the last 30 years to average 10 or more assists per game, joining Baylor's Nelson Haggerty (1995) and Southern's Avery Johnson, who did it twice in 1987 and 88.

[Rutgers coach suspended three games, will undergo anger management training]

In an era in which players transfer weeks into their freshman seasons because they're not happy with their playing time or how they're being showcased in a system, the success of Carter-Williams is refreshingly old-fashioned. Many of the 500 players who transfer each year could learn from how Carter-Williams worked through adversity rather than running from it.

St. John's lines up before a game against Georgetown last season (Getty Images)

Frustrated the Big East has irreparably damaged its basketball brand with recent additions geared toward saving its football future, the presidents of the league's seven non-high level football schools met Wednesday to discuss their options.

An ESPN.com report late Wednesday night indicated a decision could come in the next 24 to 48 hours and it would be "an upset" if the seven schools chose to remain in the league.

DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John's, Seton Hall and Villanova have essentially three options.

They can remain in the Big East despite the likelihood that a new TV deal will not meet their expectations and the chance that new additions like Tulane, Houston and SMU drag down the league's basketball standing. They can leave the league and forfeit millions of dollars in NCAA tournament win shares and exit fees paid by previous departees. Or they can dissolve the league altogether if they have the two-thirds majority necessary to make such a decision.

According to the ESPN.com report, dissolving the league is a real possibility because new member Temple is not allowed to vote on the dissolution of the conference until after July 1. As a result, the seven would have the two-thirds majority they need even if existing Big East members Cincinnati, UConn and South Florida voted against them.

[Related: School president will shave head if Cincinnati beats Marshall on Saturday]

The ramifications of such a move would be widespread in college athletics because the ripple effect would be felt from coast-to-coast.

The Dagger will chronicle the college basketball season's best dunks again this year. If you spot one we missed, let us know here or here.

Here's a sure sign Minnesota's Rodney Williams is one of college basketball's premier dunkers: He pulled off a 360 dunk in transition Tuesday night against North Dakota State, and all anyone asked him about after the game was why he went back to a move he'd done before rather than getting creative. "I got nervous," Williams told the Minnesota Star Tribune. "I had to do what I knew would go in, so I did a 360. You see I almost broke my back afterward, so maybe next time I should just lay it up or something." Tubby Smith would probably prefer that, but the rest of us certainly wouldn't. Stale or not, anytime Williams wants to go to the 360, I'm fine with that.

The line for free tickets Wednesday morning (via @adamostate)

At 8 a.m. Wednesday morning, a line of thousands of sleepy-eyed Oklahoma State fans snaked from the school's ticket window all throughout the concourse of Gallagher-Iba Arena.

A young fan is very excited for her free tickets (via @sgreerjones)They were all there to collect their holiday gift from billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens: free Oklahoma State basketball tickets.

Oklahoma State announced Tuesday that Pickens purchased the remaining 4,000 unsold tickets to the Cowboys' marquee New Year's Eve matchup against Gonzaga and asked that the school distribute them for free on a first-come, first- served basis Wednesday morning. The tickets were gone in less than 90 minutes Wednesday morning even though fans who showed up in time could only obtain up to six tickets per person.

"I thought long and hard about what gift I could give my fellow OSU Cowboys this year," Pickens said in a release. "I couldn't find enough basketballs, but I did find enough basketball tickets. Let's put them to good use, pack Gallagher-Iba for the Gonzaga game, and put a great exclamation point on a promising OSU basketball season."

Gestures like this one are why every college fan base in America should be jealous that Oklahoma State has the allegiance of Pickens. Not only does he fund practice facilities and stadium renovations the way other mega-boosters do, he also generously gives back to the fans in ways that surely endear him to the Stillwater community.

One look at Pickens' mentions on Twitter on Wednesday morning show that the gesture was appreciated.

A ref talks with Halil Kanacevic after his obscene gesture toward Villanova fans (US Presswire)

When St. Joseph's forward Halil Kanacevic sank a tie-breaking 3-pointer midway through the second half on Tuesday night, he celebrated with both middle fingers raised in the direction of the Villanova student section.

It was an immature gesture by Kanacevic under any circumstances. It looks more foolish in retrospect since he turned out to be the game's biggest scapegoat.

Showered in boos and catcalls every time he touched the ball during the final 10 minutes, Kanacevic did not score the rest of the game. Not only was the 3-pointer the only field goal Kanacevic tallied against Villanova, he also made several critical mistakes in the final two minutes that enabled the Wildcats to escape with a 65-61 victory.

He fouled James Bell 25 feet from the basket, enabling the Villanova guard to sink two foul shots with two minutes to go and close the Wildcats' gap to three. He turned the ball over on the ensuing possession attempting to throw a backdoor pass into a very tight window. And later he shot free throws facing the Villanova student section and had a pair rim out harmlessly with 45.8 seconds to go and Saint Joseph's leading by one.

The most nightmarish moment for Kanacevic came a possession later when Saint Joseph's coach Phil Martelli had Kanacevic inbound the ball from the deep right corner with three seconds to play and the Hawks trailing by two.

Nobody was open and a five-second call was approaching, so Kanacevic attempted to throw the ball off Villanova's Mo Sutton. The ball caromed first off Sutton, then Kanacevic, a costly turnover that extinguished Saint Joseph's last chance to leave with a victory over its city rival.

Dick Vitale dances before last February's Murray State-Saint Mary's game (US Presswire)

Like the last embers of a campfire, BracketBusters died quietly Tuesday.

ESPN's announcement that it will end the made-for-TV mid-major showcase after its 11th edition this February did not spark much protest, uproar or debate. The quiet demise was fitting for an innovative but unwieldy event that had outlived its usefulness years ago.

When ESPN created the event in 2002 to help top mid-majors get the marquee games and TV exposure they needed to receive at-large NCAA tournament bids, the concept was new and intriguing. Any mid-major coach with a quality program will bemoan the challenge of getting power-conference opponents to agree to play a home-and-home series, so this was a way around that problem.

BracketBusters did serve its purpose a few times, most notably when victories over Wichita State helped both George Mason and VCU sneak into the NCAA tournament with at-large bids in 2006 and 2011. Of course, the Patriots and Rams went on memorable Final Four runs that may not