2011: Mid-Summer Preseason Top 50 Ranking

Shawn

I've been following you for three years now and you always underate Washington. What you call a hot finish was them playing to their ability. They had a mid season drop off but what you saw at the end was the real deal. They should be ranked about 12th I think and no lower that 15th. I wish I could bet you on this.

They didn't get a top 25 ranking!

I think these rankings look pretty good. I only have a handful of reactions. I think Duke has to be #1 at this point. If you are the reigning champs, I think the burden is on the other teams to show they are clearly better. And the other teams just can't do that right now. Duke, Mich. St. and Purdue are all right there very close to each other, and so the tie should go to the reigning champs.

Kentucky in the top 5 is a little high right now. I realize they have an incredible class coming in, but until they step onto the court and prove they are ready to play at the next level, I think I'd tone down expectations to closer to the top 15 or top 20.

Kansas St., Pitt, Nova, Syracuse, Kansas, and Ohio St., I think you can put those in any order from 4-9. I think Butler is a little high without their best player, and I think I'd bump UNC, Florida and Baylor up a little bit right to the 10-15 range, maybe with Kentucky and Butler getting pushed back closer to 14 or 15 or so.

I'd probably also want to flip flop Gtown and WVU. I don't see the Mountaineers being top 15 good after their losses, and I don't think losing Monroe will cripple Gtown as much as some people are saying. Chris Wright and Austin Freeman will be one of the best backcourts not named Duke this year.

Where are the Rhody Rams? They will have the deepest team in the A10. Also the have two 1st team A10 calibar players in Delroy James and Akeem Richmond. Granted the A10 will be the deepest it has been in years, but the Rams will finish in the top 3, which easily puts them in the top 50 in the nation....

The post asking "Where's Rhode Island" opens an interesting aspect to Shawn Siegel's predictions. Siegel probably does a good job on the typical top teams in the nation and with 347 teams to analyze you have to choose your spots for in-depth analysis carefully. Nonetheless Siegel's misses on URI have been notable. Missing a prediction by 100 positions is understandable, but doing it two years in a row is an eye opener. In '08-'09, Siegel picked the Rams to finish about 160 and their final RPI was 68. Siegel had another go last year when he predicted URI at 140 and the Rams finished at #40.

Two successive bad misses on URI as well as bad misses on other schools should have automatically triggered a deeper evaluation. So like most other basketball services, Siegel does a good job with the tried and true, the "big names" in college basketball, but the college basketball public needs so much more.

Where is Siena in this?

You need to look at Missouri State. All five starters back from a 24-win team that won the CIT and led the nation in home wins. Definitely room for two Missouri Valley teams in your top 50 ... Previous post on Siena is spot on. What more does Siena have to do to prove its legitimacy?

I'll admit my bias, but I don't see how you can't have Duke at preseason #1, especially over Purdue, a team Duke has beat the last two seasons. Yes, Duke lost Scheyer, Zoubek and Thomas, but they also return a pre-season National Player of the Year candidate and Final Four Most Outstanding Player in Singler plus Nolan Smith, not to mention several other key returning players. On top of that Seth Curry is now eligible to play (and every report says he's scary good) and they're bringing in the top freshman point guard in the nation in Kyrie Irving. The only real question mark with Duke is how much the Plumlee brothers have improved, but the backcourt should be the best in the country.

Ohio may be a good pick, but Armon Bassett will not be a part of it... He was signed by the New Orleans Hornets after remaining eligible for the NBA Draft and going undrafted.

Your nuts leaving Dayton off this list. Chris Wright was just named a the # 19 player by Gotlieb. 2nd $ 4th best players also back. They blew threw 4 straight BCS teams in the road. They will be top 25 early into the season

How can you put Murray at 47 and Vandy at 12 when Murray beat Vandy in the tourney. I know Murray lost 2 good players and Vandy only lost one and it's a new season so I'm not arguing that Murray should necessarily be ahead of Vandy but there is no doubt the 2 should at least be a little closer together in the rankings.

You better take a long look at them. I'm not a UGA fan but they will be Dawggone tough next year.

UMIAMI should be in the top 50. ended the year great in the ACC tourny and bring back a lot of players, though collins loss will hurt. I expect Durand Scott to become and All-American player on this squad

In April and in the new poll, you list Tyler Haws as a reason for BYU's potential success. Tyler Haws is not going to be playing for the next two years as he's going on his Mormom mission.

UNLV will need the services of Tre'von Willis this year and that is extremely unlikely as he is facing some serious legal issues. Also, Dayton will be at or near the top of the A-10 this year - good recruits and solid players returning. URI may have been "missed" over the past two seasons but they will struggle this year. Barron's own son doesn't want to play there.

NCAA Football 11 is out now. I get my rosters from NCAA Football 11 Rosters. Where are you getting yours?

Duke not #1??? must be trippin

Cuse is at ten and thats just about right for the pre-season. Open up with a tough N Iowa team and early season games with Michigan, Ga Tech/Utep and Michigan State could have this Cuse team in the top 5 sooner than later. Look for a pair of 8-0 top 10 teams to meet in the early "game of the year" in MSG...Think we'll get the treat of seeing the number 2-3 team in the nation (MSU) up against a 6-7 range team in Cuse...we all know how well Jimmy B's teams play in MSG and this could once again (did it last year)put this team on a pedestal on a national stage. Kris Joseph will be a candidate for National Player of the year and this is the deepest team Cuse has had since 2003...will JB utilize all these players? Probably not , but he FINALLY has the depth that has plagued this team in previous years (especially last year)...hopefully JB learned his lesson last year that playing your backups 2.3 minutes a game will KILL you in the post season if one of your big guns goes down...Fab Melo AND Dion Waiters will be top frosh in the big east and probably amongst the best in the nation...a very deep backcourt and another great 1-2 punch at PF, C...if Joseph pans out like 315 thinks he will this team is a legit national title contender

Raymar Morgan is graduated and gone to play in Israel. What are you thinking?