5 biggest winners and losers in college basketball this week

Penn State's not just a football school anymore. The Nittany Lions had a particularly strong week in the loaded Big 10, upsetting then-No. 16 Michigan State on the road Tuesday before hosting the Minnesota Golden Gophers for an 83-77 win. They'll take on the Purdue Boilermakers — who are fresh off of a 36-point upset of the then-No. 17 Iowa Hawkeyes — Tuesday before taking on conference bottom-dweller Northwestern Saturday.

Markus Howard is one of the most electric players in all of college basketball, and his Marquette Golden Eagles are finally stepping into the national spotlight after a slow start to the season. This week, Howard and company beat the then-No. 19 Butler Bulldogs by 19 points to immediately break into the top 20 after not finding themselves in the rankings all season. The Golden Eagles will face a big test this week as they travel to Philadelphia to take on the No. 15 Villanova Wildcats at The Pavillion Wednesday night.

The North Carolina Tar Heels are having a historically bad season, but that didn't stop Roy Williams' squad from leading the then-No. 7 Duke Blue Devils for all but 1:47 of the 100th rendition of the greatest rivalry in college basketball. With 4.4 seconds remaining in regulation and his team down by three, Duke point guard Tre Jones stepped to the free-throw line. He drained the first shot, then threw the ball off the rim, recovered the offensive rebound, and chucked up a contested jumper at the buzzer to send the game to overtime.

The game once again came down to Jones at the charity stripe after five minutes of extra time. With 6.6 seconds left, Jones made the first shot to tie the game at 96. He missed the second, but the Blue Devils once again snagged the offensive rebound, and the sophomore ball handler took a nearly-identical jumper to the one he sank to send it to overtime. This time luck wasn't on his side, but teammate Wendell Moore came away with the rebound and laid it in as time expired to give Duke the edge.

The San Diego State Aztecs are the only undefeated Division I team in the country, yet they're ranked behind three other teams. Though their strength of schedule doesn't compare to their counterparts in Power 5 conferences, the Aztecs are flying high with a double-digit win this week against Air Force. San Diego State will look to move two more games closer to a perfect season with games against the New Mexico Lobos and Boise State Broncos this week.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. After starting the season ranked No. 1 in the country, the Michigan State Spartans find themselves out of the AP Top 25 Poll after enduring one of the tougher weeks of the country's top teams. They lost to the then-No. 22 Penn State Nittany Lions at home before losing by nine against the unranked Michigan Wolverines. Tom Izzo's squad won't have any time to regroup, as Michigan State visits the No. 22 Illinois Fighting Illini Tuesday before hosting No. 9 Maryland four days later.

Villanova also dropped two contests this week, but both losses came against ranked opponents. First, the Wildcats fell on the road to the then-No. 19 Butler Bulldogs, and then they lost their third straight to the then-No. 12 Seton Hall Pirates at home. Jay Wright's team will host Markus Howard and the newly-ranked No. 18 Marquette Golden Eagles before taking on their crosstown rival Temple Owls Sunday.

Oregon lost its second consecutive game this week to in-state rival Oregon State. The unranked Beavers pulled out a solid 10-point win on their home court to set the Ducks back three spots in the AP Top 25 poll. Oregon has a few days to recover before hosting the No. 16 Colorado Buffaloes Thursday night and the Utah Utes Sunday.

The Iowa Hawkeyes have looked relatively solid as of late, so their 36-point loss to the unranked Purdue Boilermakers this week came as quite a surprise. They bounced back to beat the Nebraska Cornhuskers by 24 on Saturday, but it wasn't enough to keep them from backsliding in the rankings.

West Virginia started off the week with a strong, 15-point win against the Iowa State Cyclones, but the weekend brought some tumult for the Mountaineers. They dropped a 10-point decision on the road against the unranked Oklahoma Sooners Saturday to slide back a spot in the AP Top 25 Poll, and now they only have a few days to prepare for this week's gauntlet featuring No. 3 Kansas and No. 1 Baylor in a three-day span.