^{Had Otto Porter or Vander Blue returned, Georgetown and Marquette might have been in the Top 10 nationally. Unfortunately, the NBA draft was not as kind to the new Big East as it was to the Big 12. But even if the league does not have any true national title contenders, when the 8th place team (Xavier) is ranked 52nd nationally in my model, this could be the most entertaining bubble race in the country.}

^{Click here for an explanation of column headings and click here for a description of the model that generated these results.}

^{Georgetown: Greg Whittington was injured in January, and after his injury Georgetown refocused itself around Otto Porter. Porter’s PPG production almost doubled and Georgetown went from being a fringe bubble team to the Big East champion. But the Hoyas were still an over-achieving team and Georgetown lost to Florida Gulf Coast in their opening game in the NCAA tournament. That’s a fair narrative on the season. And given that narrative I understand why many people do not view Georgetown as a Top 25 team without Otto Porter.}

^{But let’s remember that John Thompson III has taken the Hoyas to the post-season in seven of his eight seasons, and usually with a dominant Big East squad. His average NCAA tournament seed in those seven years has been just better than the 4-line. To do that he has had to replace a lot of NBA players over the years from Jeff Green to Roy Hibbert to Greg Monroe to now Otto Porter.}

^{The real question is on offense. Georgetown might not quite be as good offensively as they were in February and March where they posted an adjusted offensive rating of 113.1, but the model expects them to come close at 109.8. Markel Starks and D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera are an elite offensive back-court. And Nate Lubick has been solid, if passive in his first three years.}

^{The real question is which forward runs the high post attack the team utilized last year. Mikael Hopkins was truly dreadful in that role early in the year, but he was still a Top 100 athlete out of high school. It is possible Hopkins will learn from all his turnovers last season. And if Hopkins isn’t better, the team adds UCLA transfer Josh Smith mid-season. Smith was once a dominant player at UCLA but conditioning and effort issue have prevented him from reaching his full potential.}

^{Regardless, the defense should be dominant again. The team brings back 82 percent of its minutes from one of the nation’s best defenses. And a healthy Greg Whittington should be able to replicate a lot of what Porter did defensively. JT3 often referred to Whittington as his best and most versatile defender before his injury.}

^{Marquette: Juan Anderson had an ORtg of 89 last year, second worst among Marquette regulars. Anderson’s biggest problem was Marquette’s biggest weakness last year. He couldn’t make jump shots. And this spring Anderson announced he was transferring. But after evaluating the decision, Anderson decided to return to Marquette. The model isn’t in love with that decision. Buzz Williams (more than any coach except maybe Mike Brey) tends to rely heavily on his veteran players and not give time to freshmen. And the model fears that Anderson’s return will take playing time away from Buzz Williams’ best recruiting class yet. Elite recruits JaJuan Johnson, Deonte Burton, and Duane Wilson need a chance to see if they can be stars, and Anderson’s presence could hinder that.}

^{PG recruit Duane Wilson is particularly critical this season because Derrick Wilson was not an effective PG last year. Derrick had the worst ORtg on the team due to his own shooting woes.}

^{The other big question for Marquette is the forward rotation. Buzz Williams has been reluctant to play traditional “bigs” together in his offense. He prefers versatile players who can drive the ball. But with Chris Otule getting a 6th year of eligibility, Davante Gardner proving to be an elite offensive force, and Top 100 JUCO recruit Jameel McKay joining the team, Buzz will almost certainly find it favorable to play a bigger lineup at times next year.}

^{The rotation is a question mark, but there are a lot of very nice parts. And with five straight NCAA appearances, an average NCAA seed just better than the six line, and fewer NCAA tournament flops than John Thompson III, Buzz Williams will get it figured out. The model views the race between Georgetown and Marquette as a coin flip.}

^{Creighton: Last year Grant Gibbs was Doug McDermott’s super pick-and-roll partner. If the NCAA gives Gibbs a 6th year of eligibility, I’ll move Creighton into the Top 25. Unfortunately, it currently seems likely that Austin Chatman, JUCO guard Devin Brooks, and JUCO guard James Milliken will have to fight it out to become Doug McDermott’s new pick-and-roll partner. I currently have Creighton at 29th nationally without Gibbs.}

^{The loss of Gregory Echenique means Creighton’s defense is going to be worse. Defense has rarely been head coach Greg McDermott’s calling card. But let’s not dwell on the negative. Doug McDermott didn’t declare for the draft. Creighton’s explosive offense will be back. And if I’m right about the depth of this league, Creighton will be playing NCAA caliber teams on a regular basis on Fox Sports One. Life is good.}

^{Butler: I’m not in love with the roster on paper. With a different coach and these players, Butler might be projected for 7th or 8th in the league. But my model really respects Brad Stevens at this point. Very few coaches could lose Rotnei Clarke and Andrew Smith, bring in a bunch of 3-star recruits, and expect to finish 4th in the Big East. But Stevens does a tremendous job of maximizing his talent. If the team doesn’t make Kellen Dunham into a national star, I will be shocked.}

^{Villanova: The loss of Mouphtaou Yarou should hurt the defense a little, but this team is surprisingly loaded. Everyone will write about Ryan Arciando and JayVaughn Pinkston, but with Rice transfer Dylan Ennis and Top 100 recruits Kris Jenkins and Josh Hart joining the fold, the top 8 players in the rotation look very solid. You could argue that Villanova is a little thin on the front line, but Jay Wright’s teams seem to do their best when they are slightly under-sized upfront.}

^{St. John’s: Three years ago Steve Lavin took a veteran St. John’s team to the NCAA tournament. Unfortunately, the last two years the team has had almost zero upperclassman. To say the young team struggled with growing pains would be an understatement. St. John’s would upset a Top 25 team one game, and then not show up the next game. But with a veteran lineup at last, the NCAA tournament should be the goal again. For fun, let’s discuss what the team’s best lineup might look like:}

^{G – Rysheed Jordan – Elite PG prospect who should start from day one. He may make some mistakes in November and December, but given his ceiling the team needs to get him on the floor and see what he can do.}

^{G – D’Angelo Harrison – A late season suspension might have cost him some All-Big East team votes, but he is still the most effective offensive player on the team. The fact that he is sticking around for a third season is huge.}

^{G – Dominic Pointer – Given that Jordan’s scoring game is more developed than his passing game, having another starter with solid passing skills is critical. Luckily St. John’s has two solid options in Pointer and Jamal Branch. Pointer had the most steals on the team last year and was fantastic at getting to the free throw line. His minutes steadily increased as the season went on and I don’t know how you leave him out of the starting lineup at this point.}

^{F – Jakarr Sampson – He needed an extra year to get his academics in order, but the star forward was the Big East Rookie-of-the-year last year. He took a few too many bad shots last year, but I expect him to make the sophomore leap and become a much more polished player this season.}

^{C – Chris Obekpa – His offensive game still needs work, but the shot-blocking monster has unbelievable athleticism.}

^Bench

^{G - Phil Greene – I know it is blasphemy to say Phil Greene should be coming off the bench given that he has played the most minutes of any St. John’s player the last two years, but I think that time may be coming. And St. John’s fans should take this as a good sign. Greene is a solid player, but he isn’t a star by any means. He’s a below-average shooter, he doesn’t get to the line, and he doesn’t create turnovers. On a young team without a lot of talent, he was solid as a rock. But St. John’s is reaching the point where Greene probably isn’t one of the team’s top 5 options anymore.}

^{G - Jamal Branch – The Texas A&M transfer took over at PG after joining the team last year, but with Jordan coming in, I think he is better off coming off the bench. He displayed similar passing skills to Pointer, but struggled to make jump shots, making Pointer the better choice for a starter.}

^{F – Orlando Sanchez – After initially declaring him ineligible, the NCAA finally granted the JUCO player a year of eligibility. He’ll provide another solid option in the paint.}

^{Honestly, I’m looking forward to watching St. John’s more than just about any team in the country. Steve Lavin has a nice combination of athletes and scorers, and I am very curious to see if it all clicks. My model has St. John’s at 44th nationally which given the typical number of at-large bids each year puts them squarely on the NCAA bubble.}

^{Providence: Random question: Is Sidiki Johnson ever going to play basketball? He played briefly for Arizona, was suspended, and transferred in December. Then he joined Providence, played a few games, and left the team for personal reasons. I can’t decide whether I should criticize him or have sympathy for him. On the one hand, it seems very selfish that he quit on two teams after only a handful of games. On the other hand, I think we are putting too much pressure on 18 and 19 year old kids to have everything figured out.}

^{A lot of people will write Providence off with Ricardo Ledo declaring for the pros. That isn’t fair because it overlooks what Ed Cooley was building last year. Ed Cooley developed Bryce Cotton, LaDontae Henton and Kadeem Batts into three very good basketball players. And Top 20 recruit Kris Dunn only began to show flashes of his PG skills with Vincent Council playing at such a high level. With Council gone, Dunn learning from last year’s mistakes, and Dunn being such a high ceiling player, I expect him to make great strides this off-season.}

^{This year the team adds Top 100 recruit Brandon Austin, and transfer Carson Desrosiers from Wake Forest and transfer Tyler Harris from NC State. With that seven player core, Providence will be much better than a lot of people think. But the margin for error is slim. If one of these guys gets hurt, or plays poorly, the drop off is pretty substantial. Providence could be a sleeper NCAA team, but they need all seven of these players to live up to their potential.}

^{Xavier: I know a lot of people are excited about this team because of star PG Semaj Christon. And I agree he is a talented player. There are also some nice additions like Western Michigan transfer Matt Stainbrook and Top 100 freshman Brandon Randolph. But last year was Xavier’s worst season since 2005 and the Muskateers must replace three of their better players. (That includes two starting forwards, and SG Brad Redford who wasn’t a starter but who made 66 threes on the year.) I think Xavier will be in the hunt for an NCAA bid; I have them 52nd nationally. But the Muskateers could improve from last season and still miss the tournament.}

^{Seton Hall: The model thinks that last year’s disaster was a bit of an outlier. Patrick Auda was injured early, Brandon Mobley was injured later in the year, and the lack of quality forwards definitely caused the defense to slip. Kevin Willard may not be a recruiting mastermind, but he’s a solid defensive coach, and a bounce-back on defense seems likely.}

^{Also, did PG Tom Maayan have some incriminating pictures of Willard or what? How could Willard give so much playing time to a guy with a 50% TO rate who couldn’t shoot? Maayan is likely to leave the team, and this might just be the biggest case of addition by subtraction in the country. Texas transfer Sterling Gibbs might not be a star, but he’ll be a tremendous upgrade.}

^{Meanwhile I expect SG Brian Oliver to bounce back. Oliver was a much better player for Georgia Tech but had a career low in ORtg last year, at least in part because the offense was broken without a PG last year.}

^{And don’t forget the team’s best player, Fuquan Edwin, is back.}

^{But even if many of Seton Hall’s problem areas will be better, this team still lacks elite talent. And all the blame for last year’s turnover prone offense can’t fall on the players. Some of that has to fall on Kevin Willard’s offensive system.}

^{DePaul: At one time Oliver Purnell was a solid defensive coach. His teams used pressure defense, and while they sometimes gave up easy baskets, in the aggregate they caused enough chaos to be competitive. But it hasn’t worked at all at DePaul. DePaul’s defense under Purnell has been disastrous for three straight years. If the defense doesn’t start playing better, even a change in league membership won’t lead to more wins.}

If you aren’t fired up for the conference tournaments, all you need to do is read Dana O’Neil and Conor Nevins piece on the history of the Big East tournament. Conference tournaments are basketball’s hidden jewel.

Tuesday Session 1

BE 13-seed South Florida vs 12-seed Seton Hall, MWC 9 Nevada vs 8 Wyoming

South Florida is playing in its Mellow Yellow shorts. They certainly aren’t worse than the Adidas Zubaz look.

One amusing note in the first half. Seton Hall reverses the ball to Kyle Smyth who hits a wide-open three. How wide open was Smyth? All nine of the other players were on the right side of the key, while he was the only player on the left side of the key. It is pretty hard to fit nine players in that little space, but Smyth was literally the only player in the frame.

You can tell these teams are struggling offensively because the announcers are not hiding their feelings Mike Patrick, “The best thing you can say about the first half – it was close.”

Len Elmore trying to sell this as a compelling match-up, “Most teams don’t want to play defense for 35 seconds.”

Patrick, “How do you go 8 and a half minutes without scoring and still lead by 5?”

Finally, late in the game, when Seton Hall and USF were shooting 22% and 21% respectively from three point range and kept jacking up bad shots, Elmore reached the breaking point. “Why are we settling for threes fellas?”

I hate the graphic that says USF has so many points off turnovers. They don’t have nearly that many transition points. If you get a turnover, and then need 30 seconds of half-court offense to score, those aren’t points off turnovers.

The announcers point out that the fewest combined points scored in a Big East Tournament game is 87. With 5 minutes left in the game these teams have scored a combined 59 points. USF leads 32-27. Does anyone else miss Keno Davis?

Meanwhile, I would love to tell you what was happening in the MWC first round game, but it lacks TV coverage. I’ll steal a factoid that Doug Gottlieb shared with us on day 2. Last year’s the women’s Final Four in Denver created a floor with mountain’s etched in the gridwork. The Mountain West Conference loved the floor so much they bought it and shipped it to Vegas for their conference tournament.

Back to Madison Square Garden: With 2 minutes left, USF gets trapped in the backcourt and is not going to be able to beat the 10 second clock and avoid a back-court violation. But head coach Stan Heath wisely calls time out. The announcers rightfully complain that you shouldn’t get a new 10 second clock when you call a timeout. One possession later, Seton Hall again traps USF in the backcourt, and again a timeout bails the Bulls out.

Finally, Seton Hall cuts the lead to two points with 35 seconds left, applies additional pressure, and forces the turnover. USF steps out of bounds and Seton Hall has a chance for the tie or win. Fuquan Edwin drives for a lay-up and ties the game at 37. USF then gets three looks at a game-winning shot in the final seconds, but since this is South Florida, none of those shots fall.

Tied at 37-37, the 74 points in regulation would be the fewest ever in a Big East tournament game, but thankfully for these teams, they get 5 additional minutes of action. Seton Hall eventually pulls ahead, and Fuquan Edwin’s last two free throws ensure that this will not be the lowest scoring Big East tournament game of all time. The Pirates advance 46-42.

Meanwhile, in the untelevised game, Wyoming advances.

Tuesday Session 2

BE 11 Rutgers vs 14 DePaul

Sean McDonough, “We’ll be hard-pressed to match the excitement of the first game you saw tonight.” Amazingly Jay Bilas and Bill Raftery manage to keep a straight face.

And yet McDonough may be right. While the game has its moments, including dueling threes to end the first half, that momentarily give DePaul the lead before Rutgers takes it right back, DePaul’s defense just isn’t stout enough to hold up for 40 minutes.

Rutgers shoots 61% in the first half and leads by only 1. Normally, this is a bad sign. Teams rarely shoot that well all game. But this is not fool’s gold. Since the Scarlet Knights are getting so many easy paint looks, they shoot 61% in the second half too.

Here is a random stat for you: When DePaul has at least 1 regular season conference victory, they are winless in the Big East tournament. (DePaul’s only Big East tournament win came the year they didn’t win any conference games during the regular season.)

Before the end of the game Rutger’s Wally Judge makes it to 9 for 9 from the floor which ties a Big East tournament record for most made baskets in a game without a miss.

Wednesday Session 1

BE 8 Providence vs 9 Cincinnati

Does anything beat afternoon basketball?

Early in the game Mike Patrick noted Cincinnati’s offensive swoon in February. “Cincinnati’s uniforms are camouflaged, but its Cincinnati’s offense that has been wearing camouflage lately.”

There is no question Cincinnati has been playing worse lately, but I am again going to question the wisdom of the shooting split they show. Cincinnati shot 42% from the field in the first 22 games of the season and 35% in the last 9 games. Yes, but that’s true for 95% of the major conference teams. The early season includes some cupcakes that inflate everyone’s shooting percentages. Please only show the split for Big East games. It might only be 39% vs 35%, but it would be more informative.

Cincinnati takes a 26-8 lead before Providence storms back to make it 31-27. This is the story of both team’s seasons. Cincinnati was dominate early and struggled late, and Providence surged late, but Cincinnati is still the better team. And down the stretch the Bearcats put it away.

Wednesday Session 2

BE 5 Syracuse vs 12 Seton Hall, MWC 3 UNLV vs 6 Air Force, P12 9 Arizona St. vs 8 Stanford

Incredible shooting to start the Syracuse vs Seton Hall game. Seton Hall starts out 6 of 8 from three point range and Syracuse starts out 5 of 7 from three point range.

At one point they pan to the stands and show all sorts of Syracuse alumni. They show a very sharply dressed Pearl Washington, John Wallace, and Derrick Coleman. Then they show Harvey Grant. Hey wait, he’s not a Syracuse alum. He played for Oklahoma and Clemson. But his son Jerami Grant is playing in the game, so I guess we will let that slide.

Out to Vegas: Air Force vs UNLV is a very intriguing game on paper. Despite a number of losses, Air Force has 4 Top 50 wins and might be able to make it into the bubble conversation with a MWC tournament run. 2 minutes into the game, the MWC’s leading scorer, Air Force guard Michael Lyons injures his knee. This game just got a lot less interesting.

Back to MSG: Jokes about players impaling themselves on the hologram Big East graphic are trending on Twitter.

Despite a tie score at half-time, Syracuse starts to pull away in the second half. I have to hand it to Seton Hall graduate student (and Iona transfer) Kyle Smyth though – he is fighting like crazy. Not only did Smyth hit three 3’s to open the game, he draws a tough charge on CJ Fair in the paint. You can tell Smyth doesn’t want his career to end.

But you can also tell Syracuse is gaining confidence. The zone defense is getting better. What people don’t understand is that zone defense actually takes more energy than man-to-man defense if you want to play it well. And with Syracuse lacking confidence in recent games, it has been hurting their energy level. But the offensive outburst today seems to be making the Orange’s defense better. Syracuse eventually puts the game away.

Back in Vegas, the game is a laugher, but Doug Gottlieb and Steve Lappas make up for it with fantastic commentary. They spend much of the game dissecting Anthony Bennett’s NBA chances. Everyone agrees he is a fabulous athlete, and his lateral quickness, leaping ability, strength, and shooting touch at 6’7” should make him a solid NBA player. But he might not be a lottery pick because of his size. He needs to play a power forward spot in the pros, and 6’7” might not be tall enough.

Lappas asks whether Bennett spends too much time on the perimeter. I disagree. He’s shooting 37% on his threes and attempts only 2.6 perimeter shots per game. This isn’t a case of Baylor’s elite post players falling in love with jump shots.

Gottlieb questions his motor. Bennett has to be pulled from the game because he is out of breath. Gottlieb says some teams wonder if Bennett might have an asthma issue.

Lappas and Gottlieb also agree that Bennett is far too erratic. That might be true, but for such a young player, NBA teams will be drafting him based on potential, not production. And his production is still pretty darn good.

At some point Air Force’s Taylor Broekhuis gets hurt too. A graphic shows that Lyons and Broekhuis are out of the game. Gottlieb, “So Mrs. Lincoln, other than that, how did you like the play?”

I’d love to tell you what is happening in the Stanford vs Arizona St. game since both those teams are good enough to make a Pac-12 tournament run, and need to make a Pac-12 tournament run to have any NCAA tournament hope. But basically every cable company on the East Coast doesn’t carry the Pac-12 Network yet. Arizona St. wins in OT. Grr, that looks fun.

UNLV and Air Force isn’t nearly that close. At least we still have Lappas and Gottlieb. The announcers are talking about Air Force’s win over New Mexico last Saturday. Lappas, “Both teams made 15 threes in that game. Have you ever seen a game where a team made 15 threes and lost?” Gottlieb mentions the Norfolk St. vs Missouri game from the NCAA tournament last year. Hey great memory Doug, but I just looked it up. Missouri only made 13 threes in that loss.

Wednesday Session 3

MWC 7 Fresno St. vs 2 Colorado St., P12 12 Oregon St. vs 5 Colorado

CBS Sports Network has a great video intro for these MWC Tournament games using the song “Hall of Fame” by the Script. You cannot argue with the production values.

35 seconds into the game we see 5 players diving full out for the ball. This is college basketball.

The highlight may have come late in the second half when Fresno St.’s Kevin Foster fouled out. Foster was called for a charge after running into 3 Colorado St. defenders. But he only knocked 2 of the 3 of them over. Lappas, “He got his money’s worth. Wow, how can he be complaining about that call, he ran over 3 guys?” Gottlieb, “He only knocked 2 of them over, it’s a spare.”

Gottlieb also nailed the punchline of this game. “People are going to look at the box score and see that Colorado St. struggled against Fresno St. and think that they played poorly. But Dorian Green sat out with an ankle injury, Colton Iverson and Greg Smith had foul trouble, and this was actually a very gritty win.”

Meanwhile, across town Colorado’s Andre Roberson scored 12 points and grabbed 7 rebounds. Roberson had missed the previous two games due to an illness but he was back in form in the win against Oregon St.

Wednesday Session 4

BE 7 Villanova vs 10 St. John’s, Big 12 8 West Virginia vs 9 Texas Tech, SEC 12 South Carolina vs 13 Mississippi St.

I am now watching three games at once on my computer using Watch ESPN.

Texas Tech somehow takes an early 14 point lead on West Virginia. Meanwhile Mississippi St. takes the lead on South Carolina. Since Texas Tech and Mississippi St. are avert-your-eyes horrible teams, I’m wondering whether Frank Martin or Bob Huggins has a bigger scowl on his face.

Back to MSG: You may be asking how St. John’s Chris Obekpa can score so few points. He is one of the top shot-blockers and you would think his athleticism would translate into a few more scoring opportunities. But with 7 minutes left in the first half Obekpa gets an open dunk under the basket and completely blows it. To say his offensive game is not polished is the understatement of the century.

St. John’s uses a lot of full court pressure, but Villanova mostly handles it, and eventually Villanova pulls away. I think Villanova was in the NCAA tournament even with a loss, but they are in for sure now.

Late in the game Jay Bilas mentions that St. John’s assistant Gene Keady still doesn’t know who he is. Keady referred to him as Bye-Las. I feel very bad for Gene Keady these days. His stint on the Big Ten Network was horrible, and he always looks old to me on Lavin’s bench. His comb-over is long gone now and seeing him just makes me sad.

West Virginia takes a late 2 point lead on Texas Tech and the announcer makes the most depressing pronouncement you can: “Texas Tech has played about as well as they can.” Uggh, if you play as well as you can and you are still losing to a team with a losing conference record, that’s not good.

But apparently Texas Tech can play a little better. They take a 1 point lead and have the ball with 45 seconds left. Unfortunately, not only do they miss a shot that would extend the lead, they foul on the rebound attempt. West Virginia’s Deniz Kilicli pretends that Aaric Murray was the one who was fouled, but the refs are having none of it. I’m not feeling very confident in Kilicli’s free throw shooting after that move.  And logically he only makes one of his two free throws.

Tie game, Texas Tech has the ball with a chance to win. And much like USF last night, they shoot early enough that they get three looks for the win in regulation. Unlike USF, the third shot, a put-back lay-up goes in with 0.4 seconds on the clock. Texas Tech wins!

Elsewhere, after cutting the lead to 4 points with 4 minutes left, South Carolina bows out with a whimper in their 12/13 game. Losing to Mississippi St. is about as embarrassing as it gets at this point considering that Mississippi St. only has 6 healthy scholarship players.

Wednesday Session 5

Pac12 7 USC vs 10 Utah, MWC 1 New Mexico vs 8 Wyoming, B12 7 Texas vs 10 TCU, BE 6 Notre Dame vs 11 Rutgers, SEC 11 Texas A&M vs 14 Auburn

Hmm, after 11 hours of action, nothing seems all that amusing anymore. Doug Gottlieb and Steve Lappas are arguing over who should be the MWC player of the year for the 3^rd time today. For the second straight day, Sean McDonough tells the story about how Rutgers coach Mike Rice is a nicer person since his University-imposed suspension. And during the Texas game, they are debating whether the Longhorn’s loss to Chaminade in the Maui invitational should count for NIT consideration. The last two days haven’t exactly featured the best teams, but up until now, I’ve been able to ignore that. This commentary just drives it home.

It hurts that the only close game (USC vs Utah) isn’t on TV. I momentarily perk up when New Mexico goes 12 minutes without scoring a field goal, but the Lobos defense is so good, they still lead by 5. What is the record for shot-clock violations in one game? It feels like Wyoming is looking for that record.

Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Notre Dame, and Texas A&M prevail in uninspired fashion.

Wednesday Session 6

MWC 5 Boise St. vs 4 San Diego St., Pac-12 11 Washington St. vs 6 Washington

And the day ends with a pair of dramatic comebacks. Washington leads by 62-47 with 8 minutes left, but Washington St. somehow scores 15 straight points to tie it up. And then Washington (thanks to a Desmonds Simmons bucket) wins the game anyway.

Meanwhile, San Diego St. is playing fantastic defense and Boise St. looks completely out-of-sync. But then San Diego St. makes a series of lackadaisical unforced turnovers on offense, and suddenly Boise St. is getting some easy transition baskets. San Diego St. is up 13, but a 14-0 run gives Boise St. the lead. Eventually San Diego St. gets enough stops to win it. Boise St.’s Derrick Marks ends the day a dreadful 4 of 21 from the floor. I still say Boise St. is in the NCAA tournament field, but it will be close.

Time for some sleep. Thursday remains the most under-rated day of college basketball on the entire calendar. If you love high profile teams playing win-or-go-home basketball, 7 of the top 8 conferences are in action with 56 major conference teams playing 28 games. That is the most marquee games of any day the rest of the season. If you like speculation, virtually every at-large bubble team will be in action. Bottom line: Thursday is going to be great.

New Year, New Start

How D1 Transfers Have Performed So Far

A number of high profile transfers have become eligible over the last few weeks.

Jabari Brown has joined Missouri and his 14.7 PPG is helping mediate the loss of Michael Dixon.

Sidiki Johnson is now eligible at Providence. Oddly his debut has coincided with two of Providence’s worst games of the season, losses to Boston College and Brown.

And Khem Birch has finally joined the UNLV active roster.

It is far too early to evaluate these players, but for the D1 transfers that debuted in November, we’ve already collected a fair amount of data. Today I look at which transfers are performing at a high level, and which transfers have failed to crack the rotation.

With hundreds of D1 transfers, I will not have time to examine them all in this edition, but I’m going to focus on transfers into high major programs, former Top 100 recruits out of high school, and a few other small conference players who have caught my eye.

Let’s start with some of the super transfer teams. Missouri forward Laurence Bowers has overshadowed Alex Oriakhi this season, but by averaging 10 PPG and grabbing 20% of the available defensive rebounds, Oriakhi has certainly been a key cog for the Tigers. Keion Bell was a high volume shooter at Pepperdine, but he no longer has to force bad shots at Missouri. While Bell’s PPG has been cut in half, Bell has become an efficient player with his new team.

Transfers who have gone from one BCS school to another have generally fared very well the last few years, but Kevin O’Neil continues to be offensive kryptonite. Neither JT Terrell or Ari Stewart have been able to play any better offensively in their new home. Their ORtgs of 82.8 and 70.5 are horrific. Eric Wise has been better. Much like Keion Bell, Wise has found efficiency through judicious shot selection.

For Utah, Aaron Dotson was a Top 100 player out of high school and he originally played for LSU. Thus Dotson was earning a lot of press heading into this season. But of all of Utah’s D1 transfers, Dotson has easily been the worst.

At Boston College, Matt Humphrey was a starter and key contributor. At West Virginia, he is getting lost in the shuffle. Perhaps he got tired of the losing at BC, but right now it doesn’t seem like his transfer has worked out.

Gene Teague has been a huge surprise for Seton Hall. The former Southern Illinois center is turning the ball over less often, and that has allowed the aggressive low-post player to become an incredibly dangerous offensive weapon.

Oregon St. recently lost to Towson and while that was an embarrassing loss, I think it is important to note that this is not the same Towson team that won only one game last year. Jerrelle Benimon, Mike Burwell and Bilal Dixon all played in the Big East previously, and while none of them were obvious stars, all three have blossomed and raised their level of play at Towson.

Focusing now on individuals, the transfers I was most interested in watching this fall were mostly at the point guard position.

UCLA’s Larry Drew may not be scoring much, but he has become the ideal passer for Ben Howland’s system.

Arizona’s Mark Lyons has turned the ball over more often, but his scoring (particularly his ability to drive to the basket late in the game) has kept his ORtg above 110.

Other transfers point guards have not fared as well. Korie Lucious is shooting the ball better at Iowa St., but his turnovers are up which has negated his efficiency.

Ryan Harrow has finally earned John Calipari’s trust and he played major minutes in the loss at Louisville, but he is off to a much slower start than expected.

And Tavon Sledge has had the unenviable task of trying to replace Scott Machado at Iona. Sledge hasn’t been horrible, but he hasn’t quite been a superstar transfer either.

Two players whose efficiency hasn’t been perfect, but who probably do deserve more praise are Penn St.’s DJ Newbill and Illinois-Chicago’s Josh Crittle. DJ Newbill wasn’t expecting to be the full-time point-guard for Penn St., but with Tim Frazier going down to injury, Newbill has elevated his game.

Despite posting point guard like stats, Crittle is actually a 6'9" forward, but his passing and scoring has helped add to UIC’s depth. The Flames started the season 9-1 before losing their last three games.

Need some physical rebounding inside, the next group of transfers has delivered that. Let’s start with a lesson about two players who were not very efficient with their former schools.

At Minnesota, Colton Iverson was nicknamed the human two-by-four because of his brutal physicality and lack of a polished scoring game. But suddenly Iverson is a star for Colorado St. His turnovers are down and his scoring is way up. 

On the other hand, Wally Judge didn’t mesh with Frank Martin at Kansas St. And now at Rutgers his turnover rate is at a career high. At one time Judge was considered to have more potential than Iverson, but Iverson is the player who has succeeded more in his new home.

The story of Allan Chaney returning to basketball after missing three seasons remains a touching one and he has done the job at High Point. But big man DeShawn Painter cannot be happy with his debut at Old Dominion. While Painter has been scoring efficiently and rebounding at a high rate, ODU is having one of the worst seasons of head coach Blaine Taylor’s career.

Valparaiso has a handful of transfers who have been little more than bench players, but with Indiana now near the top of the rankings, it is fun to recall the time when Bobby Capobianco was counted on to be a significant contributor for the Hoosiers.

Need some big time scorers? This next group of transfers has provided some scoring punch.

First, I have to laugh that the story in the offseason was that Rotnei Clarke might be the point-guard for Butler. His passing has improved, but Clarke will always be at his best as a perimeter scorer. Clarke is shooting 47 percent from three-point range this season.

Dez Wells on the other hand, was expected to be a primary off-guard for Maryland. But with Pe’Shon Howard’s continued turnover problems, Wells' passing has proven to be a nice asset.

Bryce Jones was a top 100 pick out of high school, and has always been capable of putting points on the board, but he has never been an efficient scorer. And on a deep and talented UNLV team, his low ORtg is a killer. But he played probably his best game of the season in the narrow loss against UNC, and his athleticism continues to earning him playing time.

Taran Buie’s 97.8 ORtg might be justifiable given his aggressive shooting (27% of possessions when on the floor), but I mainly included him in this table to remember how much more talent Buie could have had around him. UConn transfer Jamal Coombs-McDaniel was expected to be playing at Hofstra and Hawaii transfer Shaquille Stokes was supposed to be in the mix as well. But Coombs-McDaniel is out for the year with a knee injury and Shaquille Stokes was arrested and suspended. Not every transfer works out.

This next group of transfers has just kind of been there. None of these players has been terrible – they have all made their team’s rotations – but they don’t seem to be doing too much.

Sam McLaurin of Illinois is a huge puzzle. The forward has grabbed 14 percent of the offensive rebounds this year, but only 8 percent of the defensive rebounds for the Illini.

I think Luke Hancock is a bad fit at Louisville. He isn’t really a spot-up shooter; he’s actually a versatile wing player. But at Lousville, he isn’t a better driver than Peyton Siva or Russ Smith. And so Hancock never gets the ball in his hands. The result is that his free throw rate is at the lowest point of his career. I think he was a much better fit at George Mason where he would get the ball in an attacking position much more frequently.

And finally, we have a group of transfers who have been disappointing. These players haven’t really brought anything to the table, no passing, no rebounding, and no efficient scoring. Bo Barnes hasn’t even scored yet in 10 appearances. Barnes did start a few games as a freshman at Hawaii, so it wasn’t out of the question for him to do something this year.

And Trey Zeigler has looked nothing like a former Top 30 recruit out of high school. Clearly his DUI caused Jamie Dixon to lose trust in the versatile guard, but for Zeigler to be averaging one third of the PPG he averaged last year has to qualify as a major disappointment.

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