Now that the college football season is over, it’s time to the attention to the court and the march toward the madness of the NCAA men’s tournament.
On Monday night, confetti fell from the rafters of Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta as Ohio State hoisted the College Football Playoff trophy as the champions of the 2024 season.
While the moment was meant to celebrate the Buckeyes, it inadvertently served another purpose. After the longest season in modern college football history, much of the college sports world will now shift its attention to college basketball.
There’s been plenty of storylines in the first half with expanded conferences, domination by the southeast and freshman sensations. If you haven’t been paying attention to what’s been going on in men’s college basketball, here are some of the key points this season with Selection Sunday only eight weeks away,
Who is the college basketball best team so far?
Auburn has separated itself as the top team in the country − the No. 1 team in the country has the best record in Division I at 17-1.
While the record is fantastic, it doesn’t tell the full story of how good the Tigers are. They emerged from the crowded Maui Invitational as champions and have played their best against quality opponents. Auburn has a 10-1 record against Quad 1 opponents while no other team has more than seven victories in the category. The only defeat Auburn suffered was a tough road contest at Duke (more on the Blue Devils later).
The Tigers were led by center Johni Broome, and even though he suffered an injury that has sidelined him for a few weeks, Auburn hasn’t skipped a beat during its 10-game winning streak. It certainly looks like a team headed toward being the top overall seed in the tournament.
SEC dominance
Auburn leads a pack of a conference that has dominated the first few months of the sport, proving that it does just mean more in hoops.
Before conference play began, SEC teams were a combined 185-23, with no team having more than three losses. It was an astounding start to the season that has led many to believe could send a record amount of teams to the tournament (the current best is 11 bids by the Big East in 2011).
Since conference play started, the SEC has started to cannibalize itself with some of those teams already struggling as a result of the difficulty. But it won’t be that harmful considering teams with losing SEC record will make the tournament. At the moment, 13 SEC teams are in the top 50 of the NET rankings, nine are in the Top 25 of the USA TODAY Sports men’s basketball coaches poll with five in the top 10.
The Cooper Flagg show rolls on
The 6-foot-9 Maine native is perhaps the most ballyhooed freshman since Zion Williamson was also turning heads for Duke six years ago. Already the No. 1 recruit in the 2024 class, Flagg boosted his profile the summer, when he competed on the United States select team and held his own in a scrimmage against the NBA’s best players on the men’s national team preparing for the 2024 Paris Olympics.
At Duke, he has largely lived up to his lofty billing and shown major improvement. He is averaging 23.4 points, 6.9 rebounds and 4.6 assists in his team’s past eight games, a run highlighted by an ACC-freshman-record 42 points in a win over Notre Dame. He even got a viral moment, too, when he threw down a transition dunk over Pitt seven-footer Guillermo Diaz Graham on Jan. 7.
If that progress continues, it’s possible that when he leaves Durham for the NBA after this season, he’ll do so after a run to the national title.
Connecticut looks vulnerable in quest for three-peat
Dan Hurley’s Huskies faced little resistance on their way to back-to-back national titles, winning each of its 12 tournament games by at least 13 points.
Nearly 20 games into this season, they haven’t looked nearly as invincible, with a 13-5 record that includes losses in two of their past three outings. UConn lost four of its top five scorers from last season’s championship team, including a pair of top-10 NBA draft picks – Stephon Castle and Donovan Clingan.
Still, there’s plenty of talent in Storrs, with Alex Karaban and five-star freshman Liam McNeeley, and it’s worth remembering that Hurley’s first title team, dominant as it was by the end of the season, was 15-5 this time two years ago.
The Big 12 is reliably entertaining
After it helped cannibalize the Pac-12, the Big 12 helped fill the void as the go-to league for chaotic late-night football. There hasn’t been a lack of drama in basketball, either.
In nine of the past 11 seasons, the Big 12 was rated by KenPom as the best conference in the sport and while it’s not quite to the level of the SEC so far this season, it remains the home to some of the best programs in the sport. Iowa State looks like the class of the conference so far, especially after a 17-point thumping of Kansas last Wednesday. The Jayhawks aren’t too bad themselves, lurking just outside of the top 10 of the coaches poll. Houston is yet again one of the country’s toughest teams. West Virginia has emerged from Bob Huggins’ messy exit with a superb first season under coach Darian DeVries. And after a rough start, newcomer Arizona has been one of the top teams in the nation over the past month.
How are new teams doing in new conferences?
For the most part, it’s been a tough start for the Power Four teams in new homes. Of the new additions, only four − Oregon, Arizona, SMU and Stanford − have winning records in conference play, with the Ducks the only team ranked in the coaches poll.
As for the others, UCLA cooled off from a solid start with four-game losing skid as nearby Southern California has also struggled in the Big Ten. Utah is middling, and California, Washington, Arizona State, and Colorado are at the bottom of their new leagues. Meanwhile, Oklahoma and Texas are learning just how tough the SEC is with each at 1-4 in league play. If you want to see just how tough it’s been for these teams, just look at any postgame press conference from UCLA head coach Mick Cronin.
Oregon and Arizona are the best chances for the respective Big Ten and Big 12 newcomers to win their conference, but it’s been a rocky start in some new places for the majority of newcomers.
Veteran coaches off to fast starts
What’s old is new again with veteran coaches − Tom Izzo, Rick Pitino and Dana Altman − having successful seasons well into their careers.
After years mixed tournament results, Izzo has Michigan State relevant again with a 16-2 start that has the Spartans at the top of the Big Ten and ranked No. 8, its highest ranking this late in the season since 2020. Pitino has St. John’s at 16-3, and the Red Storm have an early lead in the Big East with a 7-1 mark, the best conference start since 1998-99. Then there’s also Altman and Oregon, which went perfect in non-conference play and its seven Quad 1 wins is second-most in the country.
All of the aforementioned coach’s have their teams on the way to the tournament, and experience is one of the greatest qualities a coach could have in March.
Who has disappointed?
While there’s been some impressive play, some squads aren’t living up to expectations are face the danger of not seeing their names in the bracket unveiling.
The biggest disappointment has been the arrival of John Calipari at Arkansas. The Razorbacks have been beaten up badly since conference play began and are off to an 0-5 start in the SEC that has them trending toward being one of the few in the league to miss the tournament. North Carolina is another squad that can’t capitalize against quality opponents. The Tar Heels, a preseason top 10 team, struggle to put together complete games are just 1-6 in Quad 1 contests, and coming off a bad loss to Stanford at home.
Other teams that started with high hopes and haven’t lived up to them include Gonzaga and Baylor − both teams that had losing weeks − and Indiana with a fanbase that is ready to fire Mike Woodson since the highly touted transfer haul hasn’t impressed.
