Welcome back to the Morning Dish for the 2017-18 season. With college basketball opening day just a week away, we begin quick looks at each conference entering the season, in alphabetical order:
After placing four teams in the NCAA Tournament in 2016, the American Athletic Conference had a disappointing year with just two making the dance, including SMU going one-and-done. The league attempted to address that by luring Wichita State from the Missouri Valley, and the Shockers and Cincinnati should wage a terrific race for the title. Real improvement, though, will come from teams like Connecticut and Temple returning to prominence, as well as schools like Central Florida and Houston taking the next step.
When most think the America East this preseason, they’re thinking Vermont, which ran the table in conference last year, showed well in the NCAA tourney against Purdue, returns four starters and is a popular choice for hot ‘mid-major’ status. The Catamounts are far from a lock to repeat their success, though, not with Albany and Maryland-Baltimore County both returning four starters. The Great Danes, in particular, nearly knocked off UVM on the road in the conference tourney final last year and always seem to be a factor in March (four trips to the tourney final in the last five years, including three championships from 2013-15).
Powerful as it is, the ACC has a lot of questions entering this year. Duke is retooling with its now-annual rent-a-frosh recruiting. Louisville’s coach was suspended and later fired just before the season. Miami has joined Louisville amid the muck of schools associated with the FBI’s investigation into college basketball recruiting. Florida State and Virginia are in serious reload mode, and you can say similar about defending national champion North Carolina too, for that matter. Of course, ACC questions aren’t like most league’s questions. Duke is the Associated Press preseason No. 1 team, Louisville, Miami, Notre Dame and UNC are considered sure top-five teams, and 8-9 NCAA Tournament bids again wouldn’t be a surprise.
The Atlantic Sun has all initial appearances of being Florida Gulf Coast’s playground, and the Eagles should be good again led by Brandon Goodwin, a frontcourt full of transfers with backgrounds at big-name schools, plus 5-foot-3 freshman point guard Darnell Rogers, son of former George Washington great Shawnta Rogers (who was 5-4) and sure to be fun to watch. Not so fast on dismissing the rest of the league, though. High-powered Lipscomb, in particular, returns four starters, including Garrison Mathews, a name the country should start to get to know. In fact, the Bisons were picked first in some preseason polls, so games between Lipscomb and FGCU should be of the must-watch variety this year.
Perhaps the best way to handicap the Atlantic 10 this year is to write each team name on a piece of paper, put it in a hat and draw them out. Saint Louis-11th of 14 teams last year-was picked second in one preseason publication (Street & Smith’s). There does seem to be a consensus that Rhode Island is the favorite, though the Rams-experienced as they are in a good backcourt led by E.C. Matthews-haven’t been the greatest shooting team in recent years, and thus seem a little thin up front to be relying so much on guard play. Watch St. Bonaventure, with its own superb backcourt in Jaylen Adams and Matthew Mobley, and Saint Joseph’s also could fly up the standings if the Hawks can get healthy, with Shavar Newkirk still recovering from a knee injury and Charlie Brown now out for a while early this year with a fractured wrist.
Side Dishes:
- As part of our Hoopville preseason content, we looked at 20 teams we’re especially curious to follow this season.
- Auburn is one of the programs involved in the FBI’s investigation into college basketball recruiting, and the school announced Thursday that it is sitting out Danjel Purifoy and Austin Wiley indefinitely “to avoid any potential eligibility issues,” as explained in a university statement. It has been assumed that both have a connection to the probe and former Tigers assistant coach Chuck Person, and their loss will be a huge one for however long it lasts. Purifoy averaged 11.5 ppg last year as a freshman and led the team in three-pointers, while Wiley is a 6-11 center with huge potential. The news didn’t get any better last night, as without those two, Auburn lost to NCAA Division II Barry (Fla.) 100-95 in overtime in an exhibition game.
- Georgia Tech also took an eligibility hit Thursday, as the school announced it is holding out Tadric Jackson and Josh Okogie from competition pending resolution from the NCAA after the school self-reported NCAA violations involving the two players receiving extra benefits. The two will not travel for the Yellow Jackets’ season opener next weekend against UCLA in China.
- Louisville recruit Brian Bowen has been cleared by the FBI in its probe of college basketball, opening the path for him to pursue reinstatement to the Cardinals. It’s an interesting development, ringing of the NCAA’s investigation into then-Auburn quarterback Cam Newton in 2010, where the NCAA decided that Newton was clear to stay eligible even as it believed his father had solicited money from schools. The NCAA changed some rules since then, and rightfully so, so it will be worth watching to see where the association goes with this.
- Among other exhibition games last night, Florida blasted Jacksonville 88-47, Seton Hall held off La Salle 87-74, and Boise State edged College of Idaho 74-69.
Tonight’s Menu: It’s a very busy schedule of exhibitions and ‘bonus’ preseason games given an exemption this year by the NCAA.
- Among those playing traditional, non-Division I exhibitions include Kentucky, Michigan, Michigan State, Nevada, Notre Dame, Santa Clara and VCU. One of the more intriguing games is Wake Forest hosting Queens (N.C.), the No. 2-ranked team in NCAA Division II entering the season, while UC Irvine welcomes Alaska-Anchorage, regularly a pest for D-I schools in the Great Alaska Shootout.
- Two NCAA-approved exhibitions will have Illinois at Eastern Illinois (try and imagine that ever happening in the regular season) and Sacred Heart at Manhattan. Also a salute to HoopsHD.com for their excellent work compiling an exhibition schedule this year.
Have a superb Friday.
