Over the past 12 weeks, we've released a number of conference previews for the upcoming 14-15 college basketball season. Here are a few updates on what's changed since that project began. Read more »
UCLA Bruins Blog
College Basketball Preview Summary And Updates
Zach LaVine: Everything's Contextual
From a tools perspective, Zach LaVine is one of the most talented guards to come into the league in a long time. He’s not as big as Andrew Wiggins, but he’s every bit as athletic and he’s far more skilled. Read more »
Blue Blood Schools Again Taking Country's Best Talent
The programs who reel in multiple players from the McDonald’s game are the sport’s blue bloods. There were 13 schools represented at the game, but only five with multiple recruits - Duke and Kentucky with 4, UNC with 3, Kansas and UCLA with 2. Read more »
Balance Remains Key To Winning In March
While UCLA could only beat you with offense and San Diego State could only beat you with defense, Arizona and Florida could beat you with both. An elite team can beat you in multiple ways. Read more »
NCAA Tournament Day 2
The joy and pain of the upset, playing with reckless abandon, Muhammad's eligibility, Friday's crazy runs, and the coach who concerned me the most on Friday. Read more »
March Madness Through The NBA Lens (Round Of 64)
While the NCAA Tournament has cachet all its own, one way of looking at the Tournament from the perspective of NBA talent evaluators. Here are the games and prospects most worthy of your attention for the round of 64. Read more »
Major Conference Tournaments Day 4
Bill Walton quotes, the fate of early college enrollees, is Ryan Harrow a curse, angry coaches, and the end of the Georgetown vs Syracuse rivalry. Read more »
Freshman Prospects Before New Year's: Shabazz Muhammad
Shabazz Muhammad projects as a high energy slasher with a developing mid and long range game. As the season progresses, look for him to improve considerably and become one of the nation’s most un-guardable weapons, not to mention a surefire top-5 NBA draft pick. Read more »
Is Youth An Excuse?
If you want your team to have a great season, it isn’t enough to simply get better. You have to get better at a faster rate than your rivals. One thing I have said in the past is that teams that play a lot of freshmen have the potential to improve the most. Read more »
Schools Primed For Offensive Improvement
UCLA, Utah, USC, Arkansas and Butler are five teams that have added enough pieces to project a substantial improvement in their offensive efficiency for the 12-13 college basketball season. Read more »
Comparing The Conferences
The Pac-12 has been suffering through a long dark period. The Big Ten has been dominant (at least in the pre-conference schedule) for the last few years. Should we expect a change this year? Is the Pac-12’s slump over? Is the Big Ten’s boom about to come to an end? Read more »
Team-By-Team Gold Medal Winners
The Jazz and Thunder have had the most Gold Medalists since the USA began bringing NBA players in 1992, while Duke leads amongst colleges. How do the other 29 NBA teams rank? Read more »
Notes On The 2012 Jordan Brand Classic
Anthony Davis wanted to wear Michael Jordan’s number in this game last year. This year no one chose to wear #23. Maybe people are right when they say this year’s class of high school seniors is missing a larger than life star. Read more »
2012 Pac-12 Power Rankings
Washington won the regular season championship, but were ranked fifth statistically in a conference that was bunched together in the top half. Read more »
Major Conference Tournaments Day 2: Big East, Pac-12
How important is it to have Jim Calhoun on the sideline, Oklahoma's late game gamble, and other observations from Wednesday of Championship Week. Read more »
Who Is Hot, Who Is Not
When it comes to February in college basketball, some teams get better, the rest get left in the rear view mirror. Here are the teams that are surging and falling over their past 10 games. Read more »
Top NCAA Coaches Of Past Five Years
There are a lot of complicated ways to evaluate college coaches, but in this edition we look at the coaches with the best per possession numbers over the last five years. Read more »
Freshmen Bring Hope
Teams that play a lot of freshmen are the most likely to improve as the season goes on, while those with a lot of experience are more likely to plateau. In this piece, we examine freshmen minutes for every major school in the country. Read more »
College Continuity
The average BCS team loses 38% of its minutes each offseason. Teams that have more returners also have more continuity and more early season wins. Here is how they rank. Read more »
Pac-12 Prospect Watch List
The Pac-10 may have morphed into the Pac-12 this offseason, but the extra 24 players hasn't resulted in any surefire lottery players even though there are several sneaky good prospects. Read more »