NCAA Basketball Thread

[Goliath Uterus]

College basketball is starting soon, so discuss your teams, news, predictions, rankings, and recruits here.

Josh Selby, the number one recruit is still waiting to be cleared to play for the Jayhawks, general consensous is that he will play though. Funny Big 12 Note: Kansas State was selected to win the Big 12 in a coaches poll (coaches can't vote for their own team).

Hillarious.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

Here's what the preseason polls are looking like.....

Spoiler

1 Duke (31) 33-5
2 Butler 32-4
3 West Virginia 31-6
4 Michigan State 28-8
5 Kentucky 35-3
6 Kansas 33-3
7 Kansas State 29-8
8 Syracuse 30-5
9 Tennessee 28-9
10 Baylor 28-8
11 Ohio State 29-8
12 Purdue 29-6
13 Northern Iowa 30-5
14 Xavier 26-9
15 Villanova 25-8
16 New Mexico 30-5
17 Cornell 29-5
18 Maryland 24-9
19 Saint Mary's 28-6
20 Pittsburgh 25-9
21 Washington 26-10
22 Brigham Young 30-6
23 Gonzaga 27-7
24 Wisconsin 24-9
25 Texas A&M 24-10

Only a few things I disagree with here. First is Baylor should be ranked a little bit lower, the teams returning leading scorer, LaDarius Dunn is suspended indefinitley for alledgedly beating up his girlfriend.

Also, Kansas should be ranked higher, they're an absolutely stacked team, there's only a few teams in the nation that I think can even contend with KU.

 

[Rhonda Rousey's Sports Bra]

I don't know much about West Virginia, but all the teams above KU are teams that can beat KU, so I don't see a problem with it. I do think Kansas will be at number 1 or 2 by the end of the season and should be a one seed come tournament time. KU is stacked as always, but they're fine where they are.

 

[Father Uncle Oscar]

Coming from a fan whose team is nowhere near contention to be a contender anytime soon (Virginia Tech; my sister goes there), this year should be wide open. I havn't been following any big names recently, but I'm sure I'll be following 5 or 6 certain guys in the near future. Also excited for the slightly new bracket. First Four should be entertaining.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

I don't know much about West Virginia, but all the teams above KU are teams that can beat KU, so I don't see a problem with it. I do think Kansas will be at number 1 or 2 by the end of the season and should be a one seed come tournament time. KU is stacked as always, but they're fine where they are.

Meh, besides Duke and Kentucky, there's not another team in the nation who is on KU's level. They've got 11 returning players, 8 of whom have had started at one point. They have the number one recruit, one of the top players in the nation (Marcus Morris), and possibly the best coach in the nation. There's not a better team in all of college basketball in my book.

 

[Big Sexy]

Angel, those rankings are from the end of last year. This years rankings have not come out yet. Butler and West Virginia will not be that high considering both teams lost their best player, Gordon Hayward for Butler and Da'Sean Butler for West Virginia.

The top two teams to start the season will almost certainly be Duke and Michigan State. MSU basically lost nobody and Kalin Lucas will be back healthy. Duke only really lost Jon Scheyer so they will still be very good. Plus both of those schools always have great recruiting classes. Kansas is good as well but they lost their senior point guard in Sherron Collins, their best big man in Cole Aldrich, and they lost a dynamic scorer in Xavier Henry. No way are they better then Duke or MSU going into this season.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

Yikes, you're right. That's what popped up when I searched for the preaseason polls, my mistake.

To respond to Big Sexy's post: KU may have lost 3 of their best players, but considering the guys that they still have, guys that have been on the bench last year, or even two years ago, they really haven't lost much. Tyreel Reed, Josh Selby, Tyshawn Taylor, and Travis Releford more than make up for Sherron Collins.

Jeff Withey (7ft), Thomas Robinson, Markieff Morris all make up for Cole, and I haven't even mentioned their best player, Marcus Morris.

So I actually do think they are just as good or better than every team in the nation.

 

[ThePeoplesChampion]

Seeing as my team is no where near these rankings (Indiana Hoosiers)..your top 4 will probably be Duke, Michigan St., Kentucky and Kansas....but watch out for Purdue past couple years have been good granted last year was a dissapointed one but if Purdue stays healthy maybe could be a sleeper

 

[Megatron]

Um, Go State. Let's make it 3 in a row, only this time, let's finish the job. Lucas, Summers, Green, Roe, Lucious, etc. etc. Dangerous team, and will obviously be in the top 5 of the polls to start off the year. Another Final Four, this time with (I believe) a junior PG, Senior SG, and some other talent, with most of them being there twice already, I like our chances. Purdue will be our toughest competition in Big 10 play.

 

[gd]

Tyshawn Taylor isn't a good player, I don't know how you could convince yourself of that. And neither of the Morris twins are one of the best players in the country. That's just entirely false. Also, pretty sure Selby isn't the #1 recruit. Thought he was somewhere in the teens.

I think Duke is going to fall a bit this year. Not only did they lose Scheyer, but they also lost Zoubeck and Lance Thomas, their two best post defenders. They'll have to rely on the Plumlee brothers this year, which is a little sketchy.

MSU is definitely going to be really good, they have a ton of depth and Lucas is a monster. WVU is going to be pretty good as well. They lost Butler and Ebanks (who was a bum anyway), but they still have a lot coming back.

Also, to be a homer, Pitt should have a decent enough year. We only lost Jermaine Dixon. Ashton Gibbs is one of the best shooters in the nation, Gilbert Brown has the potential to be an NBA player, and Gary McGee was apparently a really impressive big guy this summer. I have high hopes for them

 

[Goliath Uterus]

Tyshawn Taylor isn't a good player, I don't know how you could convince yourself of that.

He's pretty damn good, he averaged 7 points on a team loaded with talent, and is a fantastic defender. I don't know why you would think he isn't good.

And neither of the Morris twins are one of the best players in the country. That's just entirely false. Also, pretty sure Selby isn't the #1 recruit. Thought he was somewhere in the teens.

Marcus Morris is on the preaseason all american team. And Selby is definitley the number one recruit.

 

[Little Jerry Lawler]

It appears that Purdue's Robbie Hummel tore his ACL again. That sucks big time as I thought Purdue had a good chance to go to the Final Four with Johnson and Moore by his side. It's going to be tough for Purdue to even contend for a Big 10 title but stranger things have happened.

 

[Big Sexy]

Purdue definitely went from a top 3 team to probably a team in the 20-25 range with the loss of Hummell but this Purdue team without him will be better then last years for a couple reasons. Number one, they are now used to playing without him and know what to expect. Number two, they have a better recruiting class coming in this year so if the young guys can step up then that will help.

 

[Chardee Macdennis]

Looking forward to PITT again this year as always. If they continue their trend of tough aggressive Defense, they should have a decent season. They've both over and under acheived though in recent memory, so you never know with them.

On a side note: I had COURTSIDE seats for the Spurs/Cavs (pre-season) game at the Peterson Event Center last week. Seeing Blair again was really cool. He got a nice reaction from the crowd. I wasn't surprised, but still dissapointed that neither Duncan nor Ginobli made the trip.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

LeBryan Nash, 6'7 forward (class of '11) from Texas just picked OK State over Baylor and KU. Pretty shit decision if you ask me, why anyone would want to play for a shit team over a national contender team is beyond me. We'll still probably get Ben McLemore, and we've already got a commitment from Naadir Tharpe, though I hope we get Quinn Cook instead of him.

EDIT: Quinn Cooks is actually no longer considering Kansas. I like Naadir anyway.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

I double checked it this time, this is the actual coaches poll for the CB season, and yea, here it is.

Spoiler

1 Duke
2 Michigan State
3 Kansas State
4 Pittsburgh
5 Ohio State
6 Villanova
7 Kansas
8 Purdue
9 North Carolina
10 Kentucky
11 Florida
12 Gonzaga
13 Syracuse
14 Baylor
15 Missouri
16 Illinois
17 Washington
18 Butler
19 Memphis
20 Tennessee
21 Georgetown
22 Temple
23 Virginia Tech
24 Wisconsin
25 Texas

Obviously Purdue should be ranked a bit lower, cause they lost their #1 guy Robbie Hummel, and I know I complained about K-State being ranked above KU, but that was just me being a homer, they got it right when they ranked KSU over KU, they've got too many returning starters, KU will just prove they're better when they beat them both times they play them, just like they do every year.

Aside from a few teams, I honestly don't know much about teams outside of the Big 12, but the rankings look solid I guess. The Dukies should of course be #1 with all the experience and talent they have, same goes for MSU.

So, what do you guys agree/disagree with?

 

[Big Sexy]

Ohio State is ranked too high. I know they have a great recruiting class coming in but you can't lose a guy like Evan Turner and be as good as you were the year before. Turner was the one guy they had who could take over a game and trust me they needed him to do it multiple times over the course of last season. There were a number of games that OSU would have lost had it not been for Turner. William Buford is really the only veteran player coming back that can help fill that role somewhat but he's more of a shooter then a guy that takes over games.

 

[gd]

I think OSU will still be pretty solid. Buford's a nice player and do they still have Lighty? Also, from all I've heard, Jared Sullinger is supposed to be an absolute monster. Obviously he won't completely replace Turner, but he can come pretty damn close.

Pitt's going to have some huge expecations at #4. If Gilbert Brown ever gets his head out of his ass, they can be a really good team

 

[Big Sexy]

I think OSU will still be pretty solid. Buford's a nice player and do they still have Lighty? Also, from all I've heard, Jared Sullinger is supposed to be an absolute monster. Obviously he won't completely replace Turner, but he can come pretty damn close.

David Lighty is good but it remains to be seen whether he can take over a game like Turner, or if he was just a product of Turner's success. He is a little streaky and his best games usually came against inferior competition. I'm not saying OSU will be bad, I just think number 5 in the country is a little high. I would have put them around 15.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

Ben McLemore, the #38 overall player in the 2011 class is reportedly going to announce his college choice somewhere around Nov. 15-17. His college choices are down to KU and MU, with KU being his probable choice. In other Jayhawk news, they won their first exhibition game handily, and looked pretty good even without possibly their biggest recruit in the history of the school, Josh Selby.

Selby has still not been cleared, and technically could have played, but Coach Bill Selfs wish is that if they do give him a suspension, they can use the exhibition games as part of the suspension. Self has said that Selby will play this year, they just don't know when quite yet.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

So, McLemore didn't announce yet, he's waiting to talk to his momma and family, and will (hopefully) make a decision this weekend. The 'Hawks are looking good, the Morris twins are absolute beasts, Marcus in on the Naismith watch, and Tyshawn Taylor is looking quite a bit better, limiting his turnovers and not playing as outta control as he did last year. No word on Selby yet, the NCAA are acting like little bitches once again, let's hope this doesn't turn into a Renardo Sidney type situation.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

Josh Selby, the freshman I've been drooling over, will be ruled eligible after serving a nine game suspension. The games he's already missed will be part of the punishment, as will a $5,757.58 fine, which will be paid to a charity of his choice.

The official offense on Selby's part is that he and his family recieved impermissable benefits before he signed a LOI with the Jayhawks. Selby's first game will be against the USC Trojans in Lawrence, Ks (I'm gonna be there).

Quote from Selby....

"Even though I'm disappointed I have to miss nine games, I'm happy that I know when I can be on the court with my teammates, I'm looking forward to helping my team win another conference championship."

In other news, Vols coach Bruce Pearl, who, alongside John Calipari is one of the biggest slimeball coaches the NCCA has to offer, has been suspended 8 conference games, definitley a big blow to the Vols.

 

[Goliath Uterus]

Ben McLemore makes his decision today, and Kansas is considered the run away favorite, with Mizzou being an outside chance, hopefully he convinced his mommy that a two hour drive isn't to far for her baby. Quick vid of McLemore...

[YOUTUBE]rpwP0B6bn5Y&feature=related[/YOUTUBE]

He's in my schools gym at 0:14 in.

And heres some Selby vids for those who haven't seen this guy yet....

Spoiler

[YOUTUBE]36td_ejDRJ8[/YOUTUBE]

Spoiler

[YOUTUBE]YEEGg_qIFvY[/YOUTUBE]

Spoiler

[YOUTUBE]xtUDohpczL0&feature=channel[/YOUTUBE]

On that third vid, watch for the play around 0:32

Spoiler

[YOUTUBE]oMdMzlUavIA[/YOUTUBE]

 

[thrilla11]

Thank God they cleared Selby to play. I can't wait to see this kid go up against the USC and everyone else that Kansas will play. I believe that he can surpass Brandon Knight as the best scoring point guard in the country before this season is over.

 

[thrilla11]

Harrison Barnes is so fucking overrated that it's not even funny. He's now dropped from number one from many mock drafts and people see him dropping even further down with the emergence of Irving as the second coming of Chris Paul.

For a supposed "clear cut" number one pick next year, he's yet to scratch 20 points in the season and when the offense has been put on his shoulders, he has failed miserably.

I can't wait for the UNC Duke game because either Irving will show that actually HE'S the clear cut number one pick next year or Barnes will go out and justify some of the hype that was given to him before the season. I would go with the former on this one though as I don't see Barnes breaking out as a star anytime soon.