Welcome to The Holy Land of Hoops

Here is another pre-season outlook for the Big East from Jon Rothstein of CBS sports in New York.

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2013/07/08/ ... -and-more/

In a nutshell, he has his rankings as follows:

1. Quette
2. Nova
3. G'Town
4. Johnnies
5. Providence
6. Xavier
7. Creighton
8. Butler
9. Seton Hall
10. DePaul

No way is Nova #2 and I can't see Creighton finishing 7th with McDermott on the roster.

Providence at 5 works for us if he thinks the Big East gets 5 NCAA teams.

I think he has Nova a bit high.

Some people like Katz have us as preseason favorites, 7 is way too low, I figure we will be 3 or 4.

We should get 7 or 8 bids. Depends on how Butler adjusts. 6 bids minimum.

billyjack wrote:We should get 7 or 8 bids. Depends on how Butler adjusts. 6 bids minimum.

When was the last time a conference got 80% of its teams in the NCAA tournament?

Sorry, I just don't see it.

bmorex wrote:

billyjack wrote:We should get 7 or 8 bids. Depends on how Butler adjusts. 6 bids minimum.

When was the last time a conference got 80% of its teams in the NCAA tournament?

Sorry, I just don't see it.

Before football arrived, when we let Miami (Fla) in for 1992, we had only 9 teams:
We got 7 of 9 teams in the 1991 NCAA's, 77%.
We got 6 of 9 teams in the 1990 NCAA's, 66%.
We got 5 of 9 teams in the 1989 NCAA's, 55% ---> but 3 in the Elite-8 ---> and 1 in NC final.
We got 6 of 9 teams in the 1988 NCAA's, 66%.


Looking at 1989 ---> we came close to another 3 in the Final Four... Seton Hall blew out UNLV in the Saturday game... on Sunday, Syracuse (Sherman Douglas, Derrick Coleman, Stevie Thompson, Billy Owens) lost to Illinois by 3 in a tight game... and Georgetown (Charles Smith, Alonzo Mourning, plus an unseasoned Dikembe Mutombo) also lost a tight game to Duke that was tied with under 10 minutes (Georgetown took only around 90 seconds to erase like a 14 point Duke 2nd half lead to a tie game--- Duke was on the ropes but recovered...)

Easier to group teams in bunches rather than assign a position.

Top Three (Alpha order) Creighton, Georgetown, Marquette - all in NCAA
Middle Four (Alpha order) - Providence, St. John's, Villanova, Xavier - one or two NCAA bids, two or three in NIT
Bottom Three (Alpha order) Butler, DePaul, Seton Hall - no NCAA bids

I don't even care where anyone finishes. I am just excited because this is going to be a great basketball league.