USC will be on Big Ten Network in the next three games and four of the next five. The Trojans are more visible on TV this season, escaping Pac-12 Network.

College basketball seasons now involve conference games in early December. That wasn't generally the case 20 years ago, when conferences were smaller. USC women's basketball beat Oregon in a conference game in early December.

Bottom line: Iowa earns a top-four Big Ten finish at 14-4, reaches the Big Ten tournament semifinals, lands a 4-seed for the NCAA tournament, holds serve at Carver to reach the Sweet 16 and narrowly misses a major regional-semifinal upset in Birmingham (or maybe Spokane).

USC rose two spots to No. 5 in the latest poll after the huge win over UConn. The Trojans host Michigan on Sunday, December 29, in the Galen Center.

Ready or not, the Washington women’s basketball team’s first season in its new conference begins in earnest this weekend.

With the calendar about to turn to the new year, the true equalizer awaits in women's college basketball: conference play. There's a vast range in how difficult women's basketball programs scheduled their nonconference slates.

The USC-UConn TV ratings are in, and they are good: The game averaged 2.23 million viewers, making it the second-highest-rated game ever shown on Fox Sports, and the most-watched women's college basketball game so far this season. This game got plenty of eyeballs on it.