Chronicling the 44 busiest hours, so far, this men’s college basketball season

And by Sunday night, college basketball could finally rest. This after a weekend blizzard of plot twists, otherwise known as Much Ado About March. There were four top-10 showdowns — something that’s never happened before on the same weekend during the regular season. There were coast-to-coast showdowns between conference contenders. We haven’t seen this much commotion coming out of the TV since the last shot of Taylor Swift cheering for a Kansas City Chiefs first down.

Here, then, is a chronicle of 44 mad hours, with stats, oddities and takeaways, starting at 7 p.m. Friday in New Haven, Connecticut, in the gym that sits in a nine-story tower that looks like a cathedral from a Monet painting. And ending at 3 p.m. Sunday in Madison, Wisconsin.

Yale 70, Princeton 64

Only five of Yale’s first 19 games have been at home so it’s good to be in the friendly confines. “It’s hard to lose when you have that kind of atmosphere at home,” Yale coach James Jones says afterward. Also hard to lose when you shoot 25 free throws and the visitor shoots three. The Bulldogs end the weekend 6-0 in the Ivy League and tied for the lead with Cornell. Princeton, coming off a Sweet 16 season, is suddenly two games back. Since the pandemic scrubbed the Ivy League tournament in 2020 and ’21, it has been five years since the championship game was not Princeton vs. Yale. They’ve split the past two years.

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Akron 77, Toledo 70

They take the court tied for the Mid-American Conference lead at 8-1. The Zips win but gasp to the end by committing four of their 12 turnovers in 37 seconds. Akron’s Enrique Freeman is still one of college basketball’s best under-the-radar stories. The senior gets 20 points and 14 rebounds for his nation-leading 19th double-double, continuing a stellar career that began with him getting no offers out of high school, attending Akron on an academic scholarship and showing up at an open tryout to walk on.

Butler 99, No. 13 Creighton 98

It’s the first Big East game in 13 years with both teams topping 95 points in regulation. Butler commits only five turnovers, two of them in the final 10 seconds. The Bulldogs apparently never got the memo that Creighton can’t be beaten on Friday night at home. The Bluejays had won 33 in a row in Omaha on that day going back to 1975, turning TGIF into a team policy. Butler bears watching, with victories already at Marquette and…