2006-2007 College Basketball Preview

Ah, college basketball time! And you thought I forgot. Here is a conference-by-conference prediction breakdown, with some extra analysis for the ACC. All of this is followed by my Top 25. This will be the last time you see my Top 25 until January, as anything before conference play starts is kind of pointless. Maryland analysis will continue this season, but only for conference games and reasonably important out of conference match-ups (the first one should be this Thursday’s game with St. John’s). Sorry if you were looking forward to an UMD-Florida A&M game preview. Any team I predict making the tournament from the Big Six conferences is denoted with a *.

ACC
North Carolina* - UNC should be the beast of this, and any other conference. They are my early favorite to win it all and Tyler Hansbrough is my early favorite for player of the year. Freshman point guard Tywon Lawson is legit, much better than Steve Blake or Greg Paulus were coming out of high school.
Boston College* - Replacing Craig Smith will be tough, but the Eagles still have Jared Dudley, Tyrese Rice, Sean Marshall and Sean Williams. This team is easily good enough to finish second and get to the second weekend in the big dance.
Georgia Tech* - Tons of young talent finally gets healthy. Ra’Sean Dickey leads the charge with Anthony Morrow in the supporting role. Freshman Thaddeus Young may be the national freshman of the year. Paul Hewitt will lead the Institute to a revival after a couple of down years.
Duke* - Without Backne and the Rapist, the majority of the offense is gone. Josh McRoberts will be a one-man show with the new freshman filling in where needed. Paulus’ injury will be costly in the first half of the season because there will be no chemistry between him and another great recruiting class.
Virginia* - I had them penciled in here before they beat Arizona. This is the darkhorse team in the conference, and maybe, in the nation. Sean Singletary is the second best player in the conference and J.R. Reynolds helps him create a very scary backcourt. Maybe I should have put them up higher.
Maryland – It looks like a good recruiting class, but the Terps will be relying on raw freshman talent at the point. Never good in the ACC. Even with a good point guard, there is still only one proven scorer on the team in Mike Jones. That wouldn’t be a problem save for the fact that Maryland probably has the conference’s worst defense.
Florida State – Like last season, it looks like FSU will be on the outside looking in come tournament time. Only if Isaiah Swann can reach his potential could FSU sneak into the tournament.
Virginia Tech – With all the tragedy they suffered last season behind them, the Hokies return the majority of their roster. They’ll probably be the most veteran team in the conference.
Clemson – A lot of average players on the roster. That’s better than most seasons for the Tigers, but not good enough any season in the ACC to be competitive. They must consistently beat someone other than Maryland before moving into the top half of the conference.
Wake Forest – Two years ago this team should have won the national championship. Now without Justin Gray and Eric Williams, there is very little for Skip Prosser to work with here. Not much more than unheralded underclassman and upperclass role players.
Miami – Guillermo Diaz and Robert Hite are gone and take most of Miami’s offense with them. The cupboard is empty at The U.
NC State – New coach, new system, no players = last place. NC State barely hung on to beat Winthrop the other night. Worse news: I no longer have Herb Sendek to make fun of during the long ACC season.

BIG EAST
Georgetown*
Pittsburgh*
Connecticut*
Marquette*
Syracuse*
DePaul*
Louisville*
Villanova
St. John's
Notre Dame
West Virginia
Providence
Cincinnati
Seton Hall
Rutgers
South Florida
Notes: Georgetown almost returns their entire team from last season, when they were the only team to seriously challenge Florida in March. Pittsburgh will be good, but they never have enough offense to do anything in the tournament. Connecticut lost a lot of talent, but like Duke, they never rebuild, just reload. Joining Virginia in the darkhorse category will be Marquette and DePaul. Really look out for the Golden Eagles in March…they could be a Final Four team (remember the name Dominic James). Villanova is on the decline, West Virginia will be in a freefall and St. John’s is starting to improve.

BIG TEN
Ohio State*
Illinois*
Wisconsin*
Michigan State*
Indiana*
Michigan
Iowa
Purdue
Penn State
Minnesota
Northwestern
Notes: Even without Greg Oden for a couple of months, Ohio State will be fine. Oden will return in time for the bulk of the conference season, which should give the Buckeyes the conference. Illinois will be better than most people think. Wisconsin, despite returning the majority of their roster, will be worse. Like Pitt, they never have enough offense to seriously contend. Kelvin Sampson will take Mike Davis’ talent to the tournament. Tommy Amaker will be fired after another near miss in Ann Arbor. And while they’re both too young this season, Purdue and Penn State will be very good teams next year.

BIG TWELVE
(North)
Kansas* - 1
Kansas State* - 5
Colorado - 8
Iowa State - 9
Missouri - 11
Nebraska - 12
(South)
Texas A&M* - 2
Texas* - 3
Texas Tech* - 4
Oklahoma State* - 6
Baylor - 7
Oklahoma – 10
Notes: Kansas is the class of the conference, but they’re not too far ahead of Texas A&M. I told all of you about the Aggies last season and NO ONE listened. Now everybody is on the bandwagon. Billy Gillespie is still driving the wagon, but I’m sitting in the co-pilot chair as the Aggies will most likely roll into Atlanta in early April. Texas will rely too much on freshmen. Texas Tech will surprise most as Bob Knight will easily pass Dean Smith on the all-time wins list. Bob Huggins will make a huge difference at K-State. And don’t look now but Baylor, after all the sanctions that occurred following the Patrick Dennehy murder and following cover-up, could actually make a run at a tournament bid. If not this year then next season. Without Sampson, Oklahoma falls off and Missouri continues to plummet into obscurity following the Quinn Snyder debacle.

PAC-10
Arizona*
UCLA*
Washington*
Oregon*
Washington State*
Southern Cal
California
Stanford
Oregon State
Arizona State
Notes: Without Jordan Farmar, UCLA will barely lose the conference crown to Arizona. Washington is back again behind Lorenzo Romar (Gillespie and Romar are my two favorite coaches in the country right now). They have all the makings of being a 4/5 seed in March again. In Eugene, it’s do or die for Ernie Kent and the Ducks, as they will only have access to Malik Harrison’s talent for one more season. Don't sleep on Wazzau. Their defense is terrific. They may just be my Texas A&M team this season. Southern Cal is a program on the rise as Stanford continues their downward spiral. Sendek ends up at ASU, and not surprisingly, they end up in the bottom of my projections.

SEC
(East)
Florida* - 2
Kentucky* - 4
Tennessee* - 5
Vanderbilt - 8
South Carolina - 9
Georgia - 10
(West)
LSU* - 1
Alabama* - 3
Arkansas* - 6
Mississippi State - 7
Ole Miss - 11
Auburn – 12
Notes: LSU will win this conference. The competition is a bit easier in the West, and the Tigers should be a bit more hungry than Florida (while his team may be hungry to win a championship, Glen Davis is just plain hungry…please find the man some KFC). From friends and other accounts, the defending champs seem to be hot-dogging it in practice and showed up for training camp out of shape. Alabama, like Marquette, could really sneak up on people in March. In Ronald Steele, the Tide has the best point guard in the country. That alone is enough to get my attention. Kentucky will be dangerous as always. Tennessee is due for a dropoff. Arkansas is back after a decent year. Stan Heath is close to turning Georgia around, but he needs another season. And finally, another one of my favorite coaches, Kevin Stallings, is on the hot seat at Vandy. Unfortunately, he probably won’t see another season for the Commodores.

MID-MAJORS
Atlantic-10: Xavier, UMass
C-USA: Memphis, Houston
Missouri Valley: Wichita State, Southern Illinois, Creighton
Mountain West: San Diego State, Air Force
WAC: Nevada
West Coast: Gonzaga
Notes: Memphis is the class of the “others”. They won’t be a #1 seed again this year, but they’ll cruise in C-USA. Wichita State is back and they’re as good, if not better, then they were last year (like A&M, another team that no one listened to me on). San Diego State could get as high as a 7 seed come tournament time. Nevada and Gonzaga both take steps backwards, but are still the best teams in their conferences by far. Creighton will return to their roll as bracket buster. I gave Houston a darkhorse label last year and they let me down. I’ll give Tom Penders another try. The surprise of the season could come from Amherst, as the Minutemen will fill the void left by George Washington and St. Joe’s at the top of the A-10. Look for UMass in the Big Dance for the first time since Marcus Camby played at Mullins Arena.

TOP 25
1 North Carolina
2 Kansas
3 LSU
4 Florida
5 Georgetown
6 Arizona
7 Ohio State
8 Texas A&M
9. UCLA
10 Alabama
11 Pittsburgh
12 Memphis
13 Illinois
14 Boston College
15 Wisconsin
16 Washington
17 Connecticut
18 Marquette
19 Georgia Tech
20 Syracuse
21 Duke
22 Kentucky
23 Creighton
24 Texas
25 Wichita State

Next Five: Tennessee, Virginia, Texas Tech, Michigan State, Nevada
Keep Going: DePaul, San Diego State, Southern Illinois, Kansas State, Louisville