This weekend college football decided a regular season rematch would be the best fit for the national championship game. And after North Carolina vs Kentucky was decided by a last second block, many will be calling for the same thing in college basketball. There are a lot of ways to look at Kentucky’s one point home win over North Carolina. The computers will see it as a victory for the Tar Heels. Anytime you lose by a single point on the road at one of the top teams in the nation, that’s less than the standard home-court advantage, and it suggests that in a rematch you will stand a better chance of winning. 

But that assumes these teams are static. That assumes they are not still growing. With so many new players in the lineup, can Kentucky really be a well-oiled machine at this point? Sure, Anthony Davis has been a shot-blocking machine, but what happens when his offensive game starts to round into form. And what happens if Marquis Teague and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist who have been turnover machines, can play as under control as they did on Saturday? If Kentucky is this good this soon, this team could be extremely scary late in the year.

The truth is, as much as we want these early season games to mean something, it isn’t until January and February that we truly learn what teams are made of. Who can win on the road? And which teams will win even when they don’t play well? These early season games give us a snapshot into teams, but what they really tell us is which conferences are going to get multiple bids. Checking out the early season Sagarin Ratings, we see the conference race has shaken out as follows:

1. Big Ten
2. Big 12
3. MWC
4. ACC
5. Big East
6. SEC
7. A10
8. MVC
9. Pac-12 

Given the big early season games, nothing here is a surprise. The Big Ten dominated the Big Ten - ACC challenge for the first time in league history. And while the SEC looks plenty strong at the top, the Big East won the Big East – SEC challenge, and seems to have more depth.

Meanwhile, the MWC has been a huge surprise. Despite the loss of Trevon Willis this off-season, UNLV still had enough firepower to beat North Carolina. And even though the roster was decimated, San Diego St. has been shockingly competitive. They’ve defeated Big West favorite Long Beach St., Pac-12 co-favorites California and Arizona, Pac-12 also-ran USC, and they almost beat a strong Creighton team, losing by a single bucket. Even TCU, which looked ill-prepared for a BCS league a year ago, beat Virginia and nearly beat Ole Miss down in the Paradise Jam tournament.

On the flip side, the Pac-12 has been a complete disaster. I wrote in the Basketball Propectus Book that Utah needed to recruit at a higher level to compete in the Pac-12. But even I did not expect them to lack a victory against a D1 team at this point. And while UCLA and Arizona’s problems have been heavily documented, the bad losses have been spread pretty evenly throughout the league.

Overall, it looks like a year where a 9-9 record in the Big Ten will lead to a NCAA tournament bid, while in the Pac-12, even a 12-6 mark might not be enough if the wins don’t come against the right teams.

And even though it is early, here are a few under-the-radar thoughts on teams and players:

- Cincinnati had high expectations coming into this season, but so far the offensive efficiency has been lacking. The key culprit so far is senior big man Yancy Gates. Gates has been playing more minutes and taking more shots which has kept his PPG average up. But Gates is shooting a disappointing 44% from the field, and Cincinnati has clearly not found its offensive rhythm.

- Missouri’s destined to be overrated in the computers all year thanks to the blowout win over California, but I’d like to see them play some teams with a legitimate front line, before I believe. Still, if you are going to be a guard heavy team, you have to dominate at shooting the ball, and so far Missouri has knocked down 43% of its three-point shots.

- After an impressive start, the wheels are starting to fall off for St. John’s. I love Nurideen Lindsey, but right now, the team is asking him to do too much in the offense.

- Indiana has been desperate for a big man in the paint, and so far freshmen Cody Zeller has lived up to the hype.

- As strong as the Big Ten has been, Iowa has not shown any improvement from last year, getting blown out by Clemson, Creighton, and Campbell. After a strong freshmen campaign, I thought Melsahn Basabe might become a sophomore star this year, but so far that has not happened.

- Drew Crawford has absolutely broken out for Northwestern in the early going, joining John Shurna as an extremely dangerous second weapon for the Wildcats. And that made Baylor’s dominating defensive effort on Sunday all the more impressive. Baylor held Northwestern to just 41 points at home. Baylor wouldn’t have been disciplined enough to shut down Northwestern last year, and if they can keep up that defensive effort, they might be able to win the Big 12 after all.

Indeed there is much left to be learned about a number of teams. And now that college football is over, college basketball can finally take back Saturday afternoon.