It started this week! The usual suspects are at the top (5) Kansas Kentucky Gonzaga Duke Virginia Duke just absolutely destroyed Kentucky Tues night in the State Farms Classic and Kansas edged out Michigan State. The Irish have a way too young of a team to expect to be anything more than middle of the pack in the ACC. Texas is a middle of the pack B12 team again this year. Kansas and Kansas State are the top 2 B12 teams. Mich and Mich State are the top B1G teams. Tenn with the former Texas coach at the helm is a top 10 program and the #2 team in the SEC behind Kentucky The ACC powers Duke, UVa and UNC rule. Oregon and UCLA look like the best in the Pac12 Carsen Edwards of Purdue is likely the best player in basketball this year at least if you believe the pre-season hype. RJ Barrett a Duke Freshman is the top Freshman and on most 1st Team AA lists pre-season. I see that LaMelo Ball has move to Geneva Ohio and will enroll in Spire Institute and play his senior year. They say he can play because he never took any money when he played in Lithuania. I looked up Spire and they are an Ohio version of IMG Academy. I'm guessing nobody would buy his didn't take any money if he were trying to enroll in a Ohio Public school but they apparently don't play in a league and just play an independent schedule like IMG does in football. I wonder if he'll try to play NCAA basketball or try again to go Pro.
Ohio State defeated Cincinnati last night on the road 64-58. We had a 16 point lead early in the second half, and it was only a 4 point lead with a couple minutes to go, but this young team had some grit and came away with the win. The Bearcats were favored by 5 points.
Big upset last night. Michigan went to Villanova and just hammered them. The Irish (unranked) were beaten at home in an upset to Radford, I've never heard of them to tell you the truth. Going to be a rough year for us I think. We've got a lot of young players and that is not the Mike Brey formula for a good season. His best teams are Jr/Sr dominated. Radford after I looked them up is a Big South member and won a game in the NCAA tourney last year and were picked to win the Big South this year. So they aren't a bunch of chumps...still ND fans are not happy.
Terry, I was surprised when I saw that score this morning. I read the recap on the Tribune and see where Dane Goodwin, former Buckeye recruit from here in Upper Arlington, did get into the game in the second half, ninth man in the rotation.
I think Dane has a good future and we do have some good young freshmen this year, but they are not Duke/Kentucky freshmen, they are kids who will have to develop as the year goes along. We just don't have the upper classmen that we've been fortunate to have the last few years that are not only mature and developed as college players but great leaders as well.
Ohio State plays Creighton this evening on their home court. They have a 24 game win streak at home against non-conference foes. We will be challenged in this one for sure. We are listed as a 2.5 point favorite.
Article on Zion Williamson, the Duke super-freshman. I haven't seen him play but reading that article, this kid is maybe the next Labron James. https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/columnist/nancy-armour/2018/11/15/dukes-zion-williamson-making-mockery-one-and-done-rule/2014191002/
Tennessee is ranked 5th in the AP and 6th in the coaches poll. Judging by their performance in the last game against Georgia Tech, those rankings may not be deserved.
Purdue 3-0 but no real contests yet. Playing Davidson tonight in semifinals of Charleston Classic. The last and only time we played Davidson (2008) we won 76-58. We held some guy named Steph Curry to 5 for 26 shooting. :roll:
Tennessee is 4-0 but the last game with Georgia Tech was closer than it should have been. That game was on the 13th and we do not play again until the 21st in the NIT Tip Off in New York against Louisville. We win that one and I will feel better about our season chances.
That's the thing about College Basketball, this time of year a lot of the top teams are sort of playing warm up games mostly. Certainly there are some big matchups like UM/Nova and Kansas/MSU, Duke/Kentucky..etc. But it's a long season and it's about getting your rotations down figuring out things in the early games and then conference play starts and we're off. 68 teams make the playoffs, not 4...so you don't have to have a perfect season.
College Basketball 2018-2019 1 Nebraska = 99.66 3 0 60.14( 322) 1 0 | 1 0 | 101.00 1 | 97.74 2 | 94.71 2 BIG TEN 2 Duke = 98.25 3 0 72.78( 146) 0 0 | 1 0 | 98.47 2 | 97.80 1 | 95.51 1 ATLANTIC COAST 3 Indiana = 96.72 3 0 62.88( 298) 1 0 | 1 0 | 97.28 3 | 95.37 3 | 93.65 4 BIG TEN 4 NC State = 95.86 3 0 56.74( 342) 0 0 | 0 0 | 97.08 4 | 93.98 5 | 90.60 10 ATLANTIC COAST 5 North Carolina = 94.87 3 0 75.29( 106) 0 0 | 1 0 | 94.95 5 | 94.51 4 | 93.10 5 ATLANTIC COAST 6 Auburn = 93.48 2 0 69.63( 196) 0 0 | 1 0 | 93.98 6 | 91.86 8 | 91.41 8 SOUTHEASTERN 7 Gonzaga = 93.02 3 0 65.08( 267) 0 0 | 0 0 | 93.35 7 | 92.26 7 | 89.88 11 WEST COAST 8 Kansas = 91.67 2 0 82.30( 41) 1 0 | 1 0 | 91.14 9 | 93.25 6 | 94.27 3 BIG 12 9 Miami-Florida = 91.30 2 0 68.95( 213) 0 0 | 0 0 | 91.81 8 | 89.76 12 | 88.77 13 ATLANTIC COAST 10 Michigan = 91.12 3 0 68.89( 214) 0 0 | 0 0 | 90.91 10 | 91.34 9 | 91.61 7 BIG TEN
Right now, I don't think anyone is as good as Duke. I was surprised, but not shocked, that Michigan handled Nova. I guess the margin of score is the biggest shock factor there.
New NCAA computer tool for basketball to replace RPI evaluation is bound to cause some serious speculation. The new tool is being referred to as NET. Ohio State is currently ranked number 1. I think Kentucky is ranked #61. I would think it is safe to say there might be a few flaws in the new system?
Yeah I read an article over on ESPN about it and there are a lot of people scratching their heads over things like...
Big10/ACC Challenge is going on this week. Irish took care of Illinois tonight. I think after the ND win it was 2-2. IU is getting hammered by Duke tonight so that'd put it at 3-2 ACC, I think there are some other games as well tonight. It's always a good series.