One of our readers texted us on Sunday, following the Packers loss Saturday night, asking for a summary of the college basketball season, given…well, the Packers loss. This is for you, Wilbur. Hopefully it helps others as well.
Five Types of Teams
As far as the average college basketball fan is concerned, there are five kinds of teams right now. The first is national championship contenders—teams that look like they could win the title, for whom there aren’t any hugely significant red flags. The second is national championship possibilities—teams with one or more red flags who could nonetheless conceivably win the title. The third is safe tournament teams—teams that could certainly collapse, but at the moment look pretty likely to make the NCAA Tournament. The fourth is bubble teams, or at least teams with bubble ambitions (if you’re currently aimed at the NIT, we’ll mostly take you). The fifth is teams average college basketball fans don’t need to care about.
It’s important to note that teams have moved through these five categories. Iowa State, of whom I’m fond, rocketed from the fifth category to the third over November and December. Marquette, of whose coach my colleague Stu is fond, did the same these last few weeks. Purdue and Duke have spent time in the first category but currently occupy the second. This is all far from static. But it’s where things currently stand.
Conference-by-Conference
With that, then, let’s go around the country, through the Power Six leagues and the nationally noteworthy mid and low-majors. We’ll do a quick state-of-the-conference for each league in question, then break it down team by team.
Big 12
Were Oklahoma State postseason-eligible, the Big 12 would be looking at a non-zero possibility of putting all ten of its teams in the NCAA Tournament. It would be difficult—the Pokes and Kansas State would each be facing an uphill climb—but it would be possible. As it stands, nine of the ten could make the field. Kansas State probably needs to overperform expectations by three or four wins, and they need to come against teams that don’t thereby get knocked off the bubble, but it’s possible! All of that is possible! And Oklahoma State being ineligible is a useful foil for this thing. Now:
- National Title Contenders: Baylor
- National Title Possibilities: Kansas
- Safe Tournament Teams: Texas Tech, Texas, Iowa State
- Bubble Teams: TCU, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Kansas State
It’s easy to focus too much on Kansas State, especially when you’re a little in the Kansas State world (as we are), so let’s look up at Baylor and Kansas. The first of these is obviously a contender. They have just two losses, they’ve routinely annihilated teams, even good teams, and they’re the defending champions. Any discussion of national championship picks includes Baylor.
For Kansas, the story isn’t as perfect, but the Jayhawks are good, and while they’ve only spent a little time in the top category, that’s partially been a function of schedule. Rattle off three straight wins here—home against Kentucky, at Iowa State, home against Baylor—and they’re probably in the first category. Things between Remy Martin and Bill Self haven’t been as terrible as feared, Martin’s getting healthy, the team’s loaded beyond Martin. Could easily be a Final Four favorite depending where the bracket comes out.
Big Ten
The Big Ten is, with Illinois fighting injuries and Purdue fighting its own inability to consistently win basketball games, without a title contender. It’s still good, though. Really good.
- National Title Contenders: (vacant)
- National Title Possibilities: Purdue, Illinois
- Safe Tournament Teams: Michigan State, Wisconsin, Ohio State, Iowa, Indiana
- Bubble Teams: Michigan, Minnesota
Ok, so it isn’t as deep as it’s been, but what a top eight. Illinois is the most interesting, somehow beating Michigan State the other night without Kofi Cockburn or Andre Curbelo. Purdue has the highest ceiling, but when they’ve reached it they’ve always immediately crash-landed.
SEC
Yes, we’re going in order of quality of conference. The SEC is great, and had Alabama not just given Tom Crean fans a shred of hope, the SEC would have five teams in our “possibilities” category. Even as it stands, their four is more than any other conference.
- National Title Contenders: (vacant, sorry Auburn)
- National Title Possibilities: Auburn, Kentucky
- Safe Tournament Teams: LSU, Tennessee, Alabama
- Bubble Teams: Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi State, Texas A&M
If you’re scoring at home, Texas A&M is closer to the field than Kansas State or Minnesota, making the SEC the most likely league to get nine teams in this thing. But that’s not the biggest matter to discuss. We need to talk about Auburn.
The SEC contenders are a strange crew. Having watched Tennessee play, it’s hard to believe they’re good, and yet they are. LSU is a train wreck in action at times, and they still sometimes win those games. Kentucky is dealing with the classic recent Calipari-youth thing, without as much of the youth. Auburn, meanwhile, is ranked first in the country and has a presumptive top-three pick in Jabari Smith. Yet we’re listing them only as a possibility.
A thing about Auburn is that they, not Kentucky, are dangerously young. Another thing about Auburn is that Bruce Pearl’s never had a team finish in KenPom’s top ten. Good coach? Sure. Good enough coach? Not buying it. The biggest thing about Auburn, though, is that while they beat Kentucky at home, they’d likely be underdogs right now on the road, and maybe even on a neutral floor. They’re a very good team, and they’ve arguably played better than anyone in the country, with not a single regulation loss (their only defeat came in two overtimes to UConn), but they’re just not in that top group, and at the moment, they’re looking like a team a lot of folks could get suckered into picking to win it all just because of their ranking and their seeding and the fact they’re a little unusual.
Big East
We must stress, now, that there is a big gap between the SEC and the Big East. There’s certainly a Power Six in college basketball, and there’s even more certainly a Power Three this year within that Power Six. The Big East is not nearly as good as the SEC, and it’s a lot closer than these next two up. With that established:
- National Title Contenders: (vacant)
- National Title Possibilities: Villanova
- Safe Tournament Teams: UConn, Xavier, Seton Hall, Marquette
- Bubble Teams: Providence, Creighton
UConn, in an odd phenomenwon, might be the best team I’ve heard nothing about all year, but we should address Villanova, and the thing to address about Villanova is that they’re good and they’re in the mold of past good Villanova teams but they aren’t as good as those teams were. Good team, not great team. Would pick them against Auburn, and not just on Jay Wright vs. Bruce Pearl principle.
Pac-12
Here’s where it gets fun. Because while the bottom half of this league is historically atrocious, the top is a blast.
- National Title Contenders: Arizona
- National Title Possibilities: UCLA
- Safe Tournament Teams: USC
- Bubble Teams: Oregon
I mean, look at that lack of depth. Impressive, really. But hey, Arizona!
While UCLA entered the year with all the fanfare, and UCLA just beat Arizona in Westwood, Arizona’s the team to watch here. Long, athletic, international (it doesn’t matter but it’s kind of exciting), 1-2 in games of national focus, the Wildcats are a couple wins away from being projected to win out through the regular season, which is a hilarious thing to be writing in January. You may have noticed that only two Power Six teams are title contenders right now, and the fact none of those come from the Big Ten and the SEC, where consistency is a big deal, may feel telling. This might be true. We might be undervaluing the benefit of playing cupcakes night in and night out. But if Arizona does win out, you’re going to be talking about them a lot more than you talk about Auburn. Because Auburn’s not going to win out.
ACC
WARNING: IF YOU HAVEN’T FOLLOWED THE ACC THIS YEAR PREPARE YOURSELF FOR SHOCK AND HORROR, AND NO THEY DIDN’T REALIGN AND NO WE DIDN’T FORGET ABOUT LOUISVILLE OR VIRGINIA OR SYRACUSE OR NC STATE OR GEORGIA TECH OR PITT THEY ALL JUST STINK.
- National Title Contenders: lol
- National Title Possibilities: Duke
- Safe Tournament Teams: lol
- Bubble Teams: Wake Forest, North Carolina, Florida State, Miami, Notre Dame, Virginia Tech
Remarkable respect from the rest of the league for Coach K, as nobody but Steve Forbes deemed it appropriate to field a team this year. Remarkable inadequacy from Coach K, whose team has bounced back strongly from last year but still isn’t that good. Take all of your Gonzaga-ain’t-played-nobody takes and apply them to Duke, because the WCC has four teams better than the ACC’s second-best.
AAC
- National Title Contenders: nope
- National Title Possibilities: Houston
- Safe Tournament Teams: nope
- Bubble Teams: SMU?
Houston’s good again, probably better than Auburn, even harder to gauge than normal though because man does the AAC stink. How did this league used to be the Big East?
WCC
- National Title Contenders: Gonzaga
- National Title Possibilities: none
- Safe Tournament Teams: BYU, Saint Mary’s
- Bubble Teams: San Francisco
Remarkable stratification here by the WCC, which is using the Big Ten football strategy of putting together enough good teams to get its best team some fiber but enough bad teams to give that best team plenty of space to work out the kinks. Not as necessary in basketball as in football, but it’s important to try things.
Gonzaga had its issues in nonconference play, but when you keep testing yourself, you might not always pass, and the Zags have done enough since the Alabama loss to assuage any concerns. They’re the national championship favorite. Period. And there’s a 2019-Virginia aspect of this where that might be undervalued because they were so dang good last year and failed in such a spotlight.
Mountain West
Funny league, this one.
- National Title Contenders: none
- National Title Possibilities: none
- Safe Tournament Teams: Colorado State
- Bubble Teams: San Diego State, Boise State, Wyoming, Fresno State, maybe Utah State?
Utah State has us asking questions after they walloped San Diego State this week in Logan, but we’re probably stretching by including them here. Even without them, this is a solid top five, and the top four are legitimately on the right side of the bubble. Fun, fun league.
One thing to remember here, which last year particularly demonstrated with Boise State, is that it’s very easy to pick up terrible losses quickly in the Mountain West. Not to get all ominous, but Boise State’s last three games include a trip to UNLV, a visit from Nevada, and a trip to Colorado State before the MWC Tournament. Could be getting an encore.
A-10, MVC, Conference USA, OVC, MAAC (Rick Pitino)
- National Title Contenders: none
- National Title Possibilities: none
- Safe Tournament Teams: none
- Bubble Teams: Davidson, Loyola, Murray State, UAB, Iona, Belmont
You could try adding Chattanooga and North Texas and Toledo and Missouri State to this list, but it’s hard to see an at-large bid for any of those, because not winning their conference tournament would require a loss they probably can’t afford. If this strikes you as a comedown for the A-10, you’re right, they’re having a rough year, with St. Bonaventure particularly disappointing but the bigger problem a leaguewide failure to step up in an opportune time. Bad year for Atlantic’s everywhere, and I know little about the magazine.
The big three here, the three with the most pop, are Loyola, Murray State, and Iona. They aren’t the best three, but they offer the most intrigue. Loyola’s only losses are to Michigan State, Auburn, and Missouri-State-in-league-play. Murray State’s are to Auburn and ETSU-way-back-in-November. Iona’s are to Belmont, Kansas, and Saint-Louis-in-a-hastily-scheduled-game-at-the-peak-of-Covid-cancelations-earlier-this-month. Loyola lost Cameron Krutwig but brings back most of its roster and is aimed directly at making a two-seed wet its pants when the bracket comes out. Murray State beat Belmont by 22 the other weekend and that was on the road, making them favorites from here until potentially the second round. Iona has a lot to prove, but Rick Pitino’s a good enough in-game coach that they always have a chance, and they just keep beating expectations. Nightmare first round matchup for a five or six-seed.
The others—Davidson, UAB, and Belmont—are solid. Belmont’s got a good chance when it goes to Murray State later in the year, Davidson’s played admirably against a treacherous A-10 (treacherous because any loss is a bad one), UAB’s just not quite good enough and has missed all its good win opportunities but could still finish up with five or six losses and an at-large case. Davidson’s the only one of the three on the right side of the at-large cut line (by the way, Iona’s not getting an at-large bid unless Pitino gets a huge name-brand bonus), but they’re all solid. They just aren’t as exciting as Murray State or Iona, partially because Davidson’s more of a known quantity by virtue of their schedule and by virtue of the A-10, though down, not being anywhere near as bad as the MAAC or the OVC.
***
Overall, then, the list breaks down as follows:
- National Title Contenders: Gonzaga, Baylor, Arizona
- National Title Possibilities: Auburn, Kansas, Houston, Purdue, Villanova, Kentucky, Duke, UCLA, Illinois
- Safe Tournament Teams: LSU, Michigan State, Tennessee, Texas Tech, Alabama, Wisconsin, Xavier, USC, UConn, Ohio State, BYU, Saint Mary’s, Colorado State, Iowa, Seton Hall, Texas, Marquette, Iowa State, Indiana
- Bubble Teams: Providence, Davidson, Wake Forest, Loyola, San Francisco, Florida, San Diego State, TCU, Boise State, Murray State, Michigan, West Virginia, Wyoming, Arkansas, Florida State, Creighton, North Carolina, UAB, Oklahoma, Iona, Oregon, Mississippi State, Miami, Belmont, Texas A&M, Notre Dame, Virginia Tech, Minnesota, Kansas State, Fresno State, and we put a question mark by SMU
The cut line in our model, we should note, keeps popping up around 46 or 47, which means 15 or 16 of the 30.5 bubble teams we listed should ultimately make the cut. Again, though, these are rotating categories. “Safe” tournament teams might not stay safe. Teams below our perceived bubble might climb up on it. Kansas State might disappear with hardly a moment’s notice. The bottom lines are:
- The ACC stinks.
- The SEC is fun.
- The Big 12 is doing the thing.
- Gonzaga and Arizona are both for real.
- Nobody else but those two and Baylor might actually be for real, and we emphasize that this designation includes Auburn.
- Rick Pitino might miss the tournament, but if he makes it, someone’s going to shit their pants, and my money’s on Rick Barnes.
There. You’re all caught up.
Go Pack Go