College Basketball Couch Power 10 (Feb. 28th)
Desmond Cambridge Jr.'s 60-foot buzzer beater would have been a tremendous moment anyhow. Considering the context, though, in which it gave a bubble team a much-needed win and dinged their rivals' top seed chances, it may be the most impactful game-winner all season.
Welcome back to the Couch Power 10, college basketball fans! Can you smell the cherry blossoms in the air? Can you see the snow beginning to melt? Can you feel the rays of sunlight on your skin? Can you hear Aslan's march beginning in the distance? That's right, in just a few short hours, it will officially be March. The month of madness, of realized glory and of crushed dreams.
That makes this the penultimate Couch Power 10 of the regular season, sadly, but thankfully the college basketball gods are still giving me plenty of material to write about. In the week since my last rankings, a whopping 19 ranked teams dropped decisions, and 11 of them were to unranked opponents!! You know the one word that can describe such a phenomenon? Madness. A few examples of madness in action over the last seven days:
On the same night, #2 Alabama barely ekes out a win over South Carolina, and Tennessee gets upset by Texas A&M. Three nights later, Tennessee beats that same South Carolina team by 40 points
Oft-beleaguered Northwestern scores a historically evasive Top 25 ranking, then promptly loses to two unranked teams
With their weakest team in years, Villanova upsets two ranked teams in a four-day span
#6 Virginia, with a golden chance to secure the regular-season ACC title, instead loses two games to unranked teams that had yet to score a 'Quad 1 win'
#13 Miami, with their own chance to make a play for the ACC title, blows a 20+ point halftime lead at home to 8-win rivals Florida State, culminating in buzzer-beater loss
Later that same day, #8 Arizona also loses at home to their unranked rivals (Arizona State) on a buzzer-beater, this one from beyond half-court
I've said it before, I'll say it at least one more time: it's been a wild and unpredictable season. Despite this, I’ll try my hand at ranking the top teams based on what they’ve done to date:
1. Houston
Houston etched closer to solidifying their 1-seed (and remaining in contention for top overall seed) by annihilating Tulane and East Carolina, by an average of 25 points. The AAC's relative weakness-- it's likely to end up with at most 3 tournament teams --puts the Cougars at a disadvantage, but they can happily point to their sterling record on the season, and 4-1 clip in "big games," the lone loss coming by 5 points to potential fellow 1-seed Alabama.
2. Kansas
Kansas had only one game this last week, but they held off a tough challenge from West Virginia, who was (and still is) desperate to get a big win to get off the bubble. It was the latest in a remarkably impressive stretch for the defending champs, who have won 8 of their last 9, all but one over likely tournament teams, a winning streak that has seen them vault to the top of the Strength of Record ratings. The Jayhawks close with two more big ones, another matchup against a bubble team tonight (Texas Tech), and a huge showdown Saturday against Texas. Win both, and there's a real argument to be made for them earning the top overall seed.
3. Alabama
It was a tumultuous week for Alabama, with more information coming out regarding star player Brandon Miller's involvement in a fatal shooting last Fall, and various PR missteps from the program. Perhaps relatedly, the Tide flirted with disaster on the court as well, narrowly escaping upset bids from South Carolina and Arkansas. Still, they pulled out both (thanks, ironically, to 65 combined points from Miller in the two games), and they enter a crucial closing stretch against tournament teams Auburn and Texas A&M having won 8 of their last 9, and owning one of the more impressive resumes in the country.
4. UCLA
Well, it took a number of teams losing, but voters and I are finally on the same page regarding UCLA. I still need to see the Bruins beat a big-time opponent to be sold on them being a top-tier team, but give them some credit: with two tough road wins at Utah and Colorado (two sides that knocked off Arizona), they extended their winning streak to 8 games and maintained their outright lead on the Pac-12. A huge two-game stretch against the two Arizona teams stands between them and the end of the season; if they can win both at home, it will be hard to deny their 1-seed credentials.
5. Baylor
We may be approaching the end of the regular season, but I still have real reservations about a team with 8 losses on their schedule crashing the Top 5. If I'm going to rank them that high, they better have a damn impressive resume. Well, the 2021 national champs inarguably do. Baylor bounced back brilliantly from back-to-back losses against the Kansas teams, first with a huge win against fellow Big 12 and top seed contender Texas on Saturday, then a clutch victory last night against desperate bubble team Oklahoma State. A ridiculously deep Big 12, plus a high-value non-conference showdown against Arkansas, means that every opponent they have played in 2023 is likely a tournament team, and if the Bears can secure the win at home, it will mark 16 wins out of 19 despite that insane slew of opponents.
6. Texas
I was tempted to rank Texas ahead of Baylor still, even with the Bears' weekend victory, in no small part because the Longhorns had already won the first matchup between the two. In the end, I gave their rivals the edge due to a superior schedule strength, but some recent losses notwithstanding, Texas still has a mighty impressive resume. A 22-7 record with the #12 schedule strength is nothing to sneeze at, nor is their 11 quality wins, a number bettered only by Kansas. With a matchup against Kansas on the docket, as well as a road showdown tomorrow at TCU, there's still plenty left to play for in the regular season alone.
7. Purdue
I may have still them rated lower than the major polls, but just like those polls' voters, I didn't drop Purdue for yet another loss last week, this one at home to rivals Indiana. That is both due to a slew of losses elsewhere from highly ranked teams, as well as some early non-conference wins that are aging tremendously well (including the next two teams in this ranking). That said, I am far from convinced that the Big Ten is the good, deep conference the metrics are arguing it is, and as such, am very concerned about the Boilermakers' form as we enter March. The likely Big Ten champs have lost 4 of their last 6, and just like last season, are sputtering down the stretch.
8. Marquette
Marquette, after flirting with the Top 10 in both major polls for a while now, makes their first foray in to the Couch Power 10. Shaka Smart's men are epitomizing "peaking at the right time": after an inconsistent first half of the season, the Golden Eagles have become the toast of the Big East by winning 13 of their 15 games in 2023, the lone losses coming on the road to ranked opponents Xavier and UConn. Their gritty road win at #19 Creighton last week proved their top-team mettle, and took them one step closer to their first conference title in over a decade.
9. Gonzaga
Gonzaga's stellar finish to the season continued last week, with a massive win over San Diego followed by a revenge victory over Top-15 opponent Saint Mary's to give the Zags a share of yet another WCC title. Considering their three non-conference losses were all to teams ranked ahead of them in this Power 10 (and all were competitive), they won't be scared of nor surprised by the uptick in competition in March.
10. Arizona
I'm not going to hold losing on a near-flukish buzzer-beater too much against a team, especially when the buzzer beater came from a bubble team in desperate need of a quality win. Arizona could replay the end of that game 10 times, and probably win all 10. But still, for a team that has counteracted nearly all their good wins with losses to unranked teams, you would expect the Wildcats to have not even been in the position where they could lose in their home finale to unranked Arizona State on a near-flukish buzzer-beater. The loss puts their Pac-12 and top seed hopes in serious jeopardy. More than likely, their only chance for either would involve winning their last two games in L.A., over a bubble-dwelling USC who will be looking for another trademark win, and #4 UCLA, who will be playing for a conference title and a 1-seed in the tournament. Good luck!
Just missed: Kansas State, Connecticut, Miami, Indiana, Tennessee, Pete Nance on Lemon Oreos
BONUS!
Couch Regional Seeding
SOUTH (Louisville):
1. Houston
2. Texas
3. Kansas State
4. Tennessee
MIDWEST (Kansas City):
1. Kansas
2. Marquette
3. Arizona
4. Indiana
EAST (New York City):
1. Alabama
2. Purdue
3. Connecticut
4. Miami
WEST (Las Vegas):
1. UCLA
2. Baylor
3. Gonzaga
4. San Diego State
Opmerkingen