2018-19 Conference USA Post-Mortem

Parity works in college basketball for conferences that can afford to buy their way to power ratings gold, crafting ultra-favorable non-conference schedules with 60+% of such games at home and only a smattering truly on the road. On the other hand, it’s no friend of leagues like Conference USA when it comes to making noise on the national scene, as was seen in the 2018-19 season.

Coming off a year of significant improvement collectively, Conference USA actually was even slightly better than its very solid 2017-18 season, when seven teams won at least 20 games and the league placed 14th in the conference RPI. This year, C-USA finished 13th in the conference RPI (per WarrenNolan.com), one spot better than a year ago. It also came in 13th in the NCAA’s new NET rating of conferences.

Eight teams won at least 20 games this time around. The problem was a dearth of separation among its teams. A look at the final regular season standings shows a whopping 11 of the conference’s 14 teams were separated by a grand total of three games. Four teams finished with 11-7 league marks, four more came home at 8-10, and there were three more between them as too many teams hung around the break even mark. The second-through-seventh-best teams in the standings were separated by one game.

The problem of this was manifested in that just two teams finished inside the top 100 of the NET, and one of them (champion Old Dominion) snuck in just inside the cutoff at 100. (Southern Miss was the leader at No. 91). It should be noted Conference USA may have been hurt as much as any league by the NCAA’s move away from the RPI ranking, where four of its teams finished inside the top 100 (and another was just three spots from making it five). Two teams were in the top 80, and three in the top 100 of the RPI (Marshall, Old Dominion and Western Kentucky) all were at least 31 spots better there than the NET.

C-USA did wind up with a clear cut best team-if narrowly so-in Old Dominion, which won both the regular season and tournament championships in very distinct fashion. The Monarchs scored a blow for old school basketball, with their slow-paced offense heavy on baseline screens and mid-range shots and their emphasis on pounding the glass and stingy defense. ODU won 26 games despite shooting barely over 40% for the season, really a remarkable feat any year and especially in this offense-first era of college basketball.

Margin of victory ratings care more about teams playing close in defeat (see: Penn State and its 14-18 record ridiculously in the top 50 of the NET) than teams that consistently find ways to win, no matter how ugly. They have virtually no appreciation for a team like Old Dominion, which showed remarkable toughness and resiliency, never breaking despite some defeats that came in downright crushing manner. The Monarchs won 13 games by six points or less, including a pair of incredible escapes in the Conference USA tourney, and it was hard not to be happy for Jeff Jones, one of the class acts in college basketball who announced that he had a recurrence of prostate cancer before the season.

Old Dominion also established itself as the best team in a season where Conference USA debuted its new flex schedule format. Teams played everyone in the conference one time (plus a second game against their travel partner) before breaking into three separate groups of round-robin play at the end. ODU held a two-game lead on the field heading into bonus play among the top five teams, and the Monarchs finished with that advantage after group play in taking the regular season crown.

Intended to improve top teams’ power ratings by playing the league’s best teams a second time rather than possible games against bottom feeders, creator and TV analyst Mark Adams noted the new format accomplished that goal, even as the league’s parity may have hidden that growth. For a 14-team, far-flung conference looking for any edge it can find especially as non-conference scheduling only gets tougher, it was and will continue to be a worthy experiment. Ultimately, C-USA’s overall success will chiefly require continued improvement by a number of programs with considerable basketball histories, as well as some needed separation at the top, too.

Final Standings:

* – UAB officially finished ahead of Marshall in the final standings, with placements locked up when teams were divided into groups of three for bonus play. Teams within each group clinched finishes no lower than the bottom of their group.

Conference Tournament
For the second straight year, Conference USA conducted easily the quirkiest of all Division I conference tourneys, with both its men’s and women’s championships held at Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas, the practice facility for the Dallas Cowboys. Two courts separated by a curtain were lined up inside the facility, with games taking place on both courts concurrently the first two rounds.

The tourney included just two upsets by seed, and even those were of the mild variety. North Texas was the 10th seed but never trailed in dumping No. 7 Florida International 71-57. The other slight upset by seed was 5 seed UAB upending No. 4 Texas-San Antonio 85-76, outscoring the Roadrunners 50-34 in the second half. Among the early highlights was Louisiana Tech rallying from 16 points down in the second half to nip Florida Atlantic 57-56 in the 8-vs.-9 game, and 3 seed Southern Mississippi avenged a semifinal loss to Marshall a year earlier, this time taking out the defending champion and sixth-seeded Thundering Herd 82-73 in the quarterfinals. Southern Miss would be eliminated a round later with a 70-59 loss to No. 2 Western Kentucky in the semifinals; La Tech would also go down in the next round as well after a golden opportunity went by the wayside.

The real story of the event was top seed Old Dominion living on the edge one game after the next. The Monarchs trailed Louisiana Tech all of the second half of their quarterfinal game and were down by seven with just over 90 seconds left, yet Ahmad Caver scored the game’s final eight points including a game-winning three with three seconds left in a 57-56 win. ODU then was down by nine against UAB with 4 1/2 minutes to play and still by three with under 20 seconds left, but Caver made two free throws, the Blazers missed the front end of a one-and-one and then Xavier Green converted a three-point play with four seconds left in a 61-59 victory.

The championship game matched the Monarchs against old Sun Belt Conference rival Western Kentucky, which had cruised to the semis after topping North Texas 67-51 in the quarterfinals and Southern Miss in the semis. This time, Old Dominion played from ahead down the stretch of a tight game, with Green scoring 14 second-half points in a 62-56 victory for the Monarchs’ first-ever Conference USA tournament title. Green won MVP honors, and ODU became the sixth different school in the last seven years to win the tourney.

Postseason Awards
Player of the Year: B.J. Stith, G, Sr., Old Dominion
Defensive Player of the Year: Charles Bassey, C, Fr., Western Kentucky
Freshman of the Year: Charles Bassey, C, Western Kentucky
Newcomer of the Year: Antonio Green, G, Jr., Middle Tennessee State
Sixth Man of the Year: (tie) LaDavius Draine, G, So., Southern Mississippi & Xavian Stapleton, F, Sr., Florida Atlantic
Coach of the Year: Jeff Jones, Old Dominion

All-Conference Team
Charles Bassey, C, Fr., Western Kentucky
Ahmad Caver, G, Sr., Old Dominion
Jon Elmore, G, Sr., Marshall
Jhivvan Jackson, G, So., Texas-San Antonio
B.J. Stith, G, Sr., Old Dominion

Season Highlights

• Old Dominion won its first-ever Conference USA regular season and tournament crowns in making its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2011. The Monarchs’ season included a win at Syracuse plus another win over rival and NCAA tourney contestant VCU.
• In all, C-USA teams scored four non-conference wins over NCAA tourney at-large teams. In addition to ODU’s wins, Western Kentucky also defeated Wisconsin and Florida Atlantic stunned Central Florida.
• A total of five C-USA teams advanced to the postseason. ODU fell to Purdue in the first round of the NCAAs, ending the league’s string of four straight first round wins from seeds of 12 or lower, but Marshall won the CollegeInsider.com Tournament title. Florida International also won its first game in the CIT before bowing out against Wisconsin-Green Bay, while Florida Atlantic lost in the opening round of the CIT and both Southern Mississippi and UAB were eliminated in the opening round of the College Basketball Invitational.
• Florida International turned up the defensive pressure and the pace this year and led NCAA Division I in steals per game (10.6). The Golden Panthers also were first in turnovers forced (19.62), turnover margin (+5.6) and second in total steals (359).
• Individually, FIU’s Brian Beard was second nationally in steals/game (2.97) and fourth in total steals (101). Teammate Osasumwen Osaghae also was fourth in total blocks (96) and blocks/game (3.10). UTSA’s Keaton Wallace also finished fourth in three-pointers/game (3.78) and Southern Miss guard Tyree Griffin was fifth in assists/game (7.1).
• Marshall’s Jon Elmore finished as the conference’s all-time leader in points (2,638), assists (783) and three-pointers made (356). He also ranked fifth in the country in total minutes played with more than 1,330 on the season.

What we expected, and it happened: Texas San Antonio was a darkhorse title contender entering the season, and the Roadrunners were Old Dominion’s top competition in the regular season. Also, in these spaces last year we compared Middle Tennessee State to an expansion team, and indeed the Blue Raiders took a big fall, losing 20 games for the first time since 2000-01.

What we expected, and it didn’t happen: Marshall was expected by many to be at least a strong contender for the title, if not the favorite, but the Thundering Herd wasn’t even in the first group in the league’s bonus play. Neither was Louisiana Tech, which we expected to be improved after an injury-plagued 2017-18 season. The Bulldogs were improved some, but also were still mired well in the middle of the pack.

What we didn’t expect, and it happened: Old Dominion is always more than respectable under Jeff Jones, but the Monarchs were much more than that this year, emerging as C-USA’s clear best team. We probably shouldn’t have been surprised at all; under Jones, the Monarchs have now quietly won at least 25 games four of the last five years.

Teams on the rise: Florida International, Rice. Jeremy Ballard did one of the underrated coaching jobs in the country last year and led the Golden Panthers to 20 wins for the first time in more than 20 years. Rice may have finally stopped the flood of transfers who have jumped ship and decimated the program the last several years, and Scott Pera has some nice young talent to work with on a team that had five freshmen playing big roles. The Owls just need more experience.

Team on the decline: Middle Tennessee State. For this year at least, it was a steep drop from the heady days at the end of Kermit Davis’s tenure. Nick McDevitt was a success at UNC Asheville, and most are expecting he’ll have the Blue Raiders on the uptick very soon, but it likely will take some time.

2019-20 C-USA Outlook
If Conference USA was wide open and balanced last year, on paper it could be every bit as much and maybe even more next year. Defending champion Old Dominion loses three seniors, but Ahmad Caver and B.J. Stith only combined for over half the Monarchs’ scoring and were their only two double-figure scorers. ODU still has plenty of people to do the dirty work rebounding and defending that it regularly does so well, and Xavier Green looks fully capable of stepping into a lead scoring role after finishing the year strong, but Caver and Stith will be sorely missed.

Who’s the favorite? Western Kentucky might be a good place to start. The Hilltoppers will be the heavy pick if somehow NBA draft entry Charles Bassey returns for a second season, but even if he doesn’t WKU should be stout with Taveion Hollingsworth and Jared Savage leading the backcourt and Rick Stansbury’s recruiting.

Even with its uncertainty, don’t discount Old Dominion. The Monarchs had some good young talent last year with tough guard Jason Wade and bouncy forward Kalu Ezikpe, and Marquis Godwin was a capable three-point shooter and fourth on the team in scoring before a broken foot ended his season after just 13 games. Experience and point guard will be the question marks. Louisiana Tech might be a chic pick for some, with the Bulldogs bringing back four starters and getting back senior guard Derric Jean from injury. Texas-San Antonio also will bring back four starters, including a pair of 20-ppg scorers in Jhivvan Jackson and Keaton Wallace, but the Roadrunners need to become more efficient in their fire-away three-point attack.

UAB will be stubborn, but the Blazers need to score more easily than they have to make a real run at the title. Florida Atlantic and Florida International are certainly interesting possibilities in their second seasons under new coaches. Rice has a young team that might be a year away. Marshall will miss C.J. Burks and Jon Elmore. Southern Miss made a smart coaching hiring bringing in Jay Ladner from SE Louisiana, and though the Golden Eagles lose five seniors, including leading scorer and superb distributor Tyree Griffin. Middle Tennessee also has four starters back and wasn’t far away from challenging in conference play.

Twitter: @HoopvilleAdam