College Basketball: Preseason Conference Ranking

Shawn, Why dont you think more than 7 teams from the Big Ten can get to the tourney? They are clearly the most loaded conference in America and if they play well in nonconference and finish .500 or better in the Big Ten they should have a good shot. I see at least 8 teams: Purdue, MSU, Ohio State, Illinois, Minnesota, Michigan, and then 2 of these 3: Wisconsin, Northwestern and/or Penn State. The Hoosiers will be improved but no tourney appearance this year and Iowa is suffering way to many transfer losses to even think about the postseason.

Shawn is thinking 7 will make the tournament, probably because it would be all but impossible for more than 7 teams to be over .500 in the league this year. Iowa is bad and will probably only get 2-3 wins, but IU will be much improved and will steal some games, and no one else is anywhere near doormat status.

Penn State isn't making the tournament; they lost way too much and don't have anything to replace it. They'll be battling IU for 9th place in conference. As much as I'd love to see Northwestern make it, they probably won't without Craig Moore; they'll have a tough time getting above 8th. I'd say Wisconsin will be in, but just by a nose.

I count 7. ::shrug::

I'd say the Big Ten would need to at least win the Big Ten/ACC challenge FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER if they're going to get 7 teams in

With 16 teams, the BE is particularly hard to rank against conferences with 10-12 teams.

If you consider conferences as a whole, ACC is still strong in that its worst teams like NC St and UVA are not really awful teams like Texas Tech, Nebraska and Colorado that weaken B12, or Iowa, or Rutgers, DePaul and USF that weaken an already hard to measure BE, or Auburn or Stanford.

When I rank order the top 100 teams and then sum and adjust BE by 12/16 factor, I get a statistical dead heat and give a demerit to SEC for Auburn:

710 - ACC (1 tie vs. your 3)

710 - SEC (1 tie vs. your 4)

640 - B10 (3 vs. your 1)

610 - BE (814 unadjusted, 4 vs. your 5)

607 - B12 (5 vs. your 2)

456 - P10, so much weaker than the other 5, we agree #6

If you just sate at the top all 6 major conferences have 2 of top 12 teams, with B12 then B10 having the best pair.

But if you start at the bottom, B12 and BE have the most weak teams.

With respect to # of top 50 teams, using a composite of as many pre-season rankings as I could get my hands on:

8 of 12 - ACC

10 of 16 - BE (adjusted to 7.5 of 12)

7 of 11 - B10

7 of 12 - SEC

7 of 12 - B12

3 of 10 - P10

So pretty much the same order except SEC moves from 2 to 4 and BE switches places from 4 to 2.

I did not do the other conferences as in depth but expect about this order, but came up with the same #7 through # 13 conferences in very similar order

5 - A10 (Dayton, Xavier, La Salle, Richmond, Duquesne)

5 - MWC (BYU, San Diego St, UNLV, Utah, New MX)

4 - MVC (N Iowa, Creighton, SIU, Ill St with Wichita St and Bradley on cusp)

4 - C-USA (Memphis, Tulsa, UTEP, Houston)

3 - CAA (ODU, VCU with NE and G Mason on cusp)

3 - WAC (Nevada, Utah St, New MX St)

3 - HOR (Butler, Wright St., WI-Milwaukee)

The Hoosiers are young but, they'll surprise you. They will be tougher than most people think. When the Mr. Basketball isn't your top recruit, let alone top 5, you're going to be tough. These guys are big, quick and like I said, you'll be surprised.

Almost every year the pac 10 gets no love. why? This year the huskies have argubly the best backcourt in the country with thomas gaddy and overton plus forward quincy pondexter should finly have his breakout year. anyone who doesnt think theyre a final four threat is an idiot. UCLA well once again be a powerhouse like they are every year. Eventhough they lost alot of big time players from last years squad they'll find a way to reload because thats what they do. Cal has there top four scorers from last years 22-9 team returning(randle 18.3ppg, christopher 14.5ppg, robertson 13.1ppg and boykin 9.6ppg) so they should be a big threat. All three of these teams should be seeded 4th or higher by the time march rolls around. outside the big 3 you have arizona, arizona st, usc, and oregon st who all have a chance of making the tourney. dispite oregons terrible season last year they do have the talent to be decent this year but most likely wont be a tournement team. washington st could be a sleeper to make the tourney depending on how they react to new coach ken bone. they do have some talent and if they can continue to play shutdown d they can surprise some people. the only team in the pac 10 that looks like crap is stanford thats it. the bottom half of the pac 10 looks way better than the bottom of any other conference and with washington ucla and cal at the top theres no way u can call it the 6th best conference. i would rank the pac 10 3rd behind the big ten and acc. both the big 12 and big east have no depth and the sec doesnt look good at all again (with exception to kentucky).

GO HUSKIES!!!

MAAC should be up 3 spots, especially over CAA which is trash and also the Horizon, which just has Butler. Even the sunbelt doesnt belong ahead of the MAAC. Who came up with this. Oh well, Siena will have to prove themselves again in the Tourney....no love

The B10 is loaded at the top, but I don't see these teams making the tourney: NW, PSU, Michigan, Iowa, Indiana. Indiana will be better, but how can they not be? Michigan does not have as much talent as last year, and they were mediocre at best. Iowa will win 3-4 conf. games if they pull a few outta of their but. PSU is a one man show, and he's 5'11", although they return everyone from a whopping 11-20 team.