Prerankings Wayyy to Early

[TAMU, Knower of Ball]

This year's Nova team is nowhere close to last year's. Ochefu was maybe the most undervalued player in the entire BE last year, they had no inside presence whatsoever this year, and they had absolutely no depth.

There is no chance in hell that a Mo Watson-less Creighton team is better than what Seton Hall was last year. They had a great RPI because of some great wins prior to Watson being injured. The team that they ended up being was a pretty mediocre team, and that's being generous.

I matched teams up with their conference standings. Not sure why 7th place 2017 would be compared to 4th place 2016 Butler or why 2017 4th place MU would be matched up with 2016 6th place Creighton, etc. or how you could possibly think that this Xavier team is better than last year's Butler team, but to each their own I guess.

The proof is in the pudding. The BE had a nice non conference and then was killed by injuries. Nova was a legitimate top team, Butler an inconsistent team who could beat some great teams while taking some awful losses, and everyone else was very "meh...not bad, but not great."

I told you what I was doing in my post.  I ranked them by KP. I also don't know why you are only judging them by the end of the season and not by their total body of work.  Think about it this way,  Creighton this year had a better KP ranking than Seton Hall last year despite losing their best player for half the season.  That should tell you how much better Creighton is this season.

You are entitled to your opinion but I prefer actual numbers as opposed to the good old eye test.

[brewcity77]

Villanova went 32-4 without Ochefu. They did fine. The Big East was unquestionably better. Non-conference results were better, Pomeroy rankings were better, NCAA bids were better. By every quantifiable metric, the league was better.

[wadesworld]

I told you what I was doing in my post.  I ranked them by KP. I also don't know why you are only judging them by the end of the season and not by their total body of work.  Think about it this way,  Creighton this year had a better KP ranking than Seton Hall last year despite losing their best player for half the season.  That should tell you how much better Creighton is this season.

You are entitled to your opinion but I prefer actual numbers as opposed to the good old eye test.

And I prefer actual on court results to a computer's crunched numbers. We play a double round robin schedule. Everyone plays the same teams in the conference. Comparing the 3rd place finisher to the 6th place finisher doesn't make any sense. They actually went into a basketball court 2 times against each conference opponent the past 2 years and played the games on those courts. Ken Pom is great at comparing schools that haven't played each other. But sign me up for using actual game results over computer numbers.

If you think that Creighton and Xavier are 2 of the top 30 teams because some computer crunched some numbers and forgot to take into account that the best player on each team wasn't actually able to play and their teams stunk down the stretch so be it. Those 2 teams clearly are not top 30 teams in the country. But if a computer says they are then throw the actual conference results out and let's just base what we know based on those results out the window.

[wadesworld]

Villanova went 32-4 without Ochefu. They did fine. The Big East was unquestionably better. Non-conference results were better, Pomeroy rankings were better, NCAA bids were better. By every quantifiable metric, the league was better.

Yes they were "fine." They were also nowhere near as good as last year's Nova team.

And yes, non-con results were great, computer numbers were awesome, bids were sweet. But I don't think some numbers that don't account for whose actually available are overly accurate when the best player on 2 of the 3 best teams up to their injuries are gone. Give me results over computer numbers every day. The 7 bids were awesome. The fact that we had the number 1 overall seed and still only managed an average of a 7.4 seed on those bids shows you just how mediocre they were.

[brewcity77]

Yes they were "fine." They were also nowhere near as good as last year's Nova team.

And yes, non-con results were great, computer numbers were awesome, bids were sweet. But I don't think some numbers that don't account for whose actually available are overly accurate when the best player on 2 of the 3 best teams up to their injuries are gone. Give me results over computer numbers every day. The 7 bids were awesome. The fact that we had the number 1 overall seed and still only managed an average of a 7.4 seed on those bids shows you just how mediocre they were.

If Nova pulls out the win over Bucky, no way you make this argument. Until Nova lost, no one was saying they were a worse team this year. If I missed all the posts this season where you said they were "nowhere near as good" because of Ochefu, feel free to correct me, but I'm calling BS until proven otherwise.

And computer numbers are based on results. They are solely results driven.

[TAMU, Knower of Ball]

And I prefer actual on court results to a computer's crunched numbers. We play a double round robin schedule. Everyone plays the same teams in the conference. Comparing the 3rd place finisher to the 6th place finisher doesn't make any sense. They actually went into a basketball court 2 times against each conference opponent the past 2 years and played the games on those courts. Ken Pom is great at comparing schools that haven't played each other. But sign me up for using actual game results over computer numbers.

If you think that Creighton and Xavier are 2 of the top 30 teams because some computer crunched some numbers and forgot to take into account that the best player on each team wasn't actually able to play and their teams stunk down the stretch so be it. Those 2 teams clearly are not top 30 teams in the country. But if a computer says they are then throw the actual conference results out and let's just base what we know based on those results out the window.

Again, you are only looking at the end of the season. Not the entire body of work. You don't get to throw out what Creighton did before the Watson injury or what Xavier did before the Sumner injury. Those wins are still on their resumes.

You also can't tell me with a straight face that you think Providence was the third best team in the Big East just because the tie breaker said they were the best of 4 teams tied at 10-8. Any objective measure says they were the 7th best team in the conference this season.

[GoldenDieners32]

If Nova pulls out the win over Bucky, no way you make this argument. Until Nova lost, no one was saying they were a worse team this year. If I missed all the posts this season where you said they were "nowhere near as good" because of Ochefu, feel free to correct me, but I'm calling BS until proven otherwise.

And computer numbers are based on results. They are solely results driven.

Totally agree

[wadesworld]

If Nova pulls out the win over Bucky, no way you make this argument. Until Nova lost, no one was saying they were a worse team this year. If I missed all the posts this season where you said they were "nowhere near as good" because of Ochefu, feel free to correct me, but I'm calling BS until proven otherwise.

And computer numbers are based on results. They are solely results driven.

I have been saying all season long that their ceiling this year was the E8.  No depth, no inside presence.  Maybe if I have time I'll search through my posts, but I said well before the Tourney bracket was announced that I thought the ceiling for Nova was E8, for Butler was S16, and for everyone else was 2nd round.  Once the bracket was revealed nothing changed other than realizing Xavier was sent a gift from God with their draw and I put them into the S16.

It's not just Ochefu.  Jenkins hasn't been as good this year, Divencenzo has a nice future but is nowhere CLOSE to what Archi was last year, Booth isn't available, etc.  They were simply not as good as they were last year.

[wadesworld]

Again, you are only looking at the end of the season. Not the entire body of work. You don't get to throw out what Creighton did before the Watson injury or what Xavier did before the Sumner injury. Those wins are still on their resumes.

You also can't tell me with a straight face that you think Providence was the third best team in the Big East just because the tie breaker said they were the best of 4 teams tied at 10-8. Any objective measure says they were the 7th best team in the conference this season.

I went by standings.  The results of what actually happened on the court throughout the season, not some computer projections that don't take into account injuries to the best players on 2 of the teams.  Providence finished 3rd.  There's really no debating that.  They played the 18 games and the result was they were the 3rd place team in the BE.

[Golden Avalanche]

I have been saying all season long that their ceiling this year was the E8.  No depth, no inside presence.  Maybe if I have time I'll search through my posts, but I said well before the Tourney bracket was announced that I thought the ceiling for Nova was E8, for Butler was S16, and for everyone else was 2nd round.  Once the bracket was revealed nothing changed other than realizing Xavier was sent a gift from God with their draw and I put them into the S16.

It's not just Ochefu.  Jenkins hasn't been as good this year, Divencenzo has a nice future but is nowhere CLOSE to what Archi was last year, Booth isn't available, etc.  They were simply not as good as they were last year.

You are being asked to do this work to back up your assertion. The least you can do is find the time to provide your past comments as the foundation of your opinion. Not doing so makes it seem like you're hammering a contrarian viewpoint based on nothing but the most recent result for every Big East team.

[wadesworld]

You are being asked to do this work to back up your assertion. The least you can do is find the time to provide your past comments as the foundation of your opinion. Not doing so makes it seem like you're hammering a contrarian viewpoint based on nothing but the most recent result for every Big East team.

That's fine.  It's abundantly obvious that the BE had 1 really good team (Nova), 1 good team (Butler), a bunch of mediocre teams (Creighton, SH, Providence, Marquette, Xavier), and a few bad teams (St. John's, Georgetown, and DePaul).  Whether I can quote a specific post from 2 months ago to prove these were my thoughts then or not is irrelevant.  The results show that the conference is exactly that.  1 top team, 1 2nd tier team, and a bunch of teams good enough to squeak into the Tournament and do nothing.  Again, the fact that the conference had a 1 seed and still had an average seed of 7.4 shows how mediocre just about everyone was.

[JamilJaeJamailJrJuan]

That's fine.  It's abundantly obvious that the BE had 1 really good team (Nova), 1 good team (Butler), a bunch of mediocre teams (Creighton, SH, Providence, Marquette, Xavier), and a few bad teams (St. John's, Georgetown, and DePaul).  Whether I can quote a specific post from 2 months ago to prove these were my thoughts then or not is irrelevant.  The results show that the conference is exactly that.  1 top team, 1 2nd tier team, and a bunch of teams good enough to squeak into the Tournament and do nothing.  Again, the fact that the conference had a 1 seed and still had an average seed of 7.4 shows how mediocre just about everyone was.

Your ratings of "really good", "good", "mediocre" and "bad" seem a bit skewed. 

The 5 mediocre teams all made the dance as at larges.  One as a 6 seed.  Tough to call those teams mediocre. 

I'd say the BE had 1 elite team, 1 very good team, 5 good teams, 2 OK teams, and 1 bad team.

[wadesworld]

Your ratings of "really good", "good", "mediocre" and "bad" seem a bit skewed. 

The 5 mediocre teams all made the dance as at larges.  One as a 6 seed.  Tough to call those teams mediocre. 

I'd say the BE had 1 elite team, 1 very good team, 5 good teams, 2 OK teams, and 1 bad team.

38 of 68 total bids came from the "Power 6" conferences this year.  Those conferences total 75 teams.  So over half of the teams from power conferences made the NCAA Tournament.  If you're playing in a "Power 6" conference, you don't have to be anything more than mediocre to play in the NCAA Tournament.

Sure, compared to the teams in the Horizon League or the Summit League Marquette, Creighton, Xavier, Providence, and Seton Hall are outstanding teams.  But that's not who we're comparing these teams to.

[JamilJaeJamailJrJuan]

38 of 68 total bids came from the "Power 6" conferences this year.  Those conferences total 75 teams.  So over half of the teams from power conferences made the NCAA Tournament.  If you're playing in a "Power 6" conference, you don't have to be anything more than mediocre to play in the NCAA Tournament.

Sure, compared to the teams in the Horizon League or the Summit League Marquette, Creighton, Xavier, Providence, and Seton Hall are outstanding teams.  But that's not who we're comparing these teams to.

So your arbitrary rankings only include the 75 P6 schools?  Then sure, I guess I get it.  But thats sort of a silly way to look at it.  But whatever, pointless argument. 

[Golden Avalanche]

That's fine.  It's abundantly obvious that the BE had 1 really good team (Nova), 1 good team (Butler), a bunch of mediocre teams (Creighton, SH, Providence, Marquette, Xavier), and a few bad teams (St. John's, Georgetown, and DePaul).  Whether I can quote a specific post from 2 months ago to prove these were my thoughts then or not is irrelevant.  The results show that the conference is exactly that.  1 top team, 1 2nd tier team, and a bunch of teams good enough to squeak into the Tournament and do nothing.  Again, the fact that the conference had a 1 seed and still had an average seed of 7.4 shows how mediocre just about everyone was.

Sure it's relevant. You hung your entire wardrobe on this being your opinion for months and not just the last 24 hours. Without that evidence of long term thinking, it feels very much like you're cherry picking after the fact to support your case the Big East was worse in 2016-2017 then in 2015-2016.

[wadesworld]

Sure it's relevant. You hung your entire wardrobe on this being your opinion for months and not just the last 24 hours. Without that evidence of long term thinking, it feels very much like you're cherry picking after the fact to support your case the Big East was worse in 2016-2017 then in 2015-2016.

Brew is the one who brought up whether there were past posts about it or not.  I didn't hang anything on it being my opinion for months.  I have brought up what they were lacking and the average seed of the BE teams.  7.4.  That's fairly unimpressive in and of itself.  Take into consideration that included in that 7.4 average seed for BE teams is a 1 seed and that's that much worse.  I couldn't care less whether you or Brew or whoever else thinks I just think Nova isn't as good because they lost to Wisconsin and prior to that I was all in on them being even better than last year.  I'm quite certain that when we had threads like this last season I said Nova, Xavier, Butler would all be down.  Like I said, maybe when I have time I'll go back and find them.  If I don't get to it and you want to call me a BSer, cool.  No problem at all.

Fact of the matter is the BE had 3 high seeds and a bunch of bubble teams, and one of those high seeds really wasn't very good after their starting PG tore his ACL early in the conference season.

I'll say this, I don't think Kansas or Oregon are as good as they were last year but they haven't lost in the Tournament yet.

[wadesworld]

By the way, my opinion on Nova did not change 1 bit based on the Wisconsin result.  I think if Nova plays Wisconsin 10 times they win 8 of them.  They happened to play poorly and UW played well and they got knocked off.  It happens.  I don't think UW is a better team than Nova, but Nova was legitimately the best team in the country last year.  They played the highest seed they possibly could have played last year in every round but 1 I believe (2 seed Oklahoma instead of 1 seed Oregon in the FF).  They smoked everyone but Kansas and UNC.  They won a FF game by 40.  They were unquestionably the best team by the end of the season last year.

I never felt that way about them this year.  A top tier team, but in my opinion they were not going to repeat.  They weren't as good.  Not deep enough, not versatile enough.  They had to simplify their offense because they didn't have all the pieces they had last year.

[willie warrior]

Yep, you nailed it...that's what we'll miss Luke for, his defense.

Just like you nailed it. Luke was our best rim protector.

[GoldenDieners32]

Just like you nailed it. Luke was our best rim protector.

He's pretty much deandre jordan

[GoldenDieners32]

Just like you nailed it. Luke was our best rim protector.

He's pretty much Deandre Jordan

[Otule's Glass Eye]

Nova really could've used the inside presence that 5 star freshman big man Omari Spellman would've brought had he not been ruled ineligible for the season. They're probably still in the tournament right now if they had him.

[GoldenDieners32]

Nova really could've used the inside presence that 5 star freshman big man Omari Spellman would've brought had he not been ruled ineligible for the season. They're probably still in the tournament right now if they had him.

That's what i told all my badger "friends"

[wadesworld]

Just like you nailed it. Luke was our best rim protector.

And if Luke wasn't our best rim protector then...who, exactly, was?

Nova really could've used the inside presence that 5 star freshman big man Omari Spellman would've brought had he not been ruled ineligible for the season. They're probably still in the tournament right now if they had him.

Agreed.  Had he been eligible I think they would've gone back to back.

[KampusFoods]

Nova really could've used the inside presence that 5 star freshman big man Omari Spellman would've brought had he not been ruled ineligible for the season. They're probably still in the tournament right now if they had him.

Don't think he is on NBA radar, but he could theoretically go pro rather than ever playing a minute for Nova, correct?

[Bocephys]

Don't think he is on NBA radar, but he could theoretically go pro rather than ever playing a minute for Nova, correct?

Happened with Enes Kanter out of Kentucky some years ago.