The blogpoll blogpool continues to grow, as we’re now up to 13 contributors, with two more expected to begin next week. Memphis remains #1, but UCLA is rising..

Note: blogpoll does not include Tues. 11/20 games.

Justifying Our Ballot. This week we didn’t have much movement in our top ten. We switched UNC and Memphis based on UNC’s struggle with Davidson. We also jumped Louisville (#9 to #6) and Duke (#13 to #11) up a few spots based on the way they’re both playing right now. We dropped Stanford down from #12 to #24 based on their loss at Siena, and VCU was knocked completely out due to its two losses in Puerto Rico. Arizona and Arkansas were also left out, while Pitt, K-State and Villanova were added to our ballot this week.

Two Left Out. The two teams we voted for that were left out of the blogpoll this week were Florida (#23) and Stanford (#24). The Gators are 5-0 and have been mowing down opponents lately, but they lack a marquee win and they haven’t left their home court yet, so we understand that omission. Stanford’s loss at Siena was a bad loss, but they had several solid wins (vs. UCSB, @ Northwestern) prior to that, so we weren’t completely ready to drop them altogether. There was a bit of a clamor amongst the bloggers to include Miami (FL) this week, as the Hurricanes performed well in defeating VCU and Providence in the Puerto Rico Tipoff. We also considered Baylor after its impressive wins over Wichita St., Notre Dame and Winthrop in the Paradise Jam last week. We’re definitely going to be keeping an eye on the Bears.

Tightening Up. The bloggers are still unsure where to rank the two Big Ten teams, Indiana and Michigan St. Amazingly, there is still one blogger who refuses to rank the Hoosiers at all, but we won’t name names. Here are the top five most uncertain teams (remember, a high std dev means greater variation in blogger rankings of that team):

• Indiana (std dev = 5.41; range = 4 to nr)
• Michigan St. (5.09; 9 to nr)
• Kansas St. (4.37; 11 to nr)
• Syracuse (4.27; 16 to nr)
• Villanova (4.12; 12 to nr)

Conversely, the top seven teams in the blogpoll are extremely well-supported by the bloggers. Only two other ballots than ours (with Indiana at #4) supported a team other than the Memphis/UCLA/UNC/Kansas/GTown/UL/Tenn septoika. One ballot had Wazzu at #7 and another ballot had Indiana at #6. Now that’s conformity!

Conference Call.

• Big East – 6
• ACC & Big 12 – 4
• Pac-10 – 3
• Big 10 – 2
• CUSA, Horizon, MVC, SEC, SoCon, WCC – 1

After 12 seconds of hand-wringing and almost twice as much debate, the first regular season Blogpoll is out. Make sure to tip your local bloggers for this public service. The complete ballots (we’re up to 11 bloggers now!) are located here.

Justifying Our Ballot. We moved UCLA into the #1 spot and dropped Kansas from there simply because we watched both teams play several times this week and just feel like something is off with the Jayhawks. Maybe it’s Brandon Rush not back yet, maybe we’re just seeing things. But for now, we think UCLA is the better team. Memphis and Indiana also impressed us more than KU, so we moved them ahead also (and we expect UNC to do so tonight). Similarly, we watched parts of all three Oregon games over the weekend and felt they were underrated at #10. Same goes for Duke (up to #13 from #20) and Stanford (#15 to #12). The only other teams we dropped were simply a spot or two in order to make room for teams we watched play and thought deserved the higher rankings. The first few weeks will be like this, as we work to adjust based on expectations v. performance.

Two Left Out. The two teams we voted for on our ballot who were left out were #20 Syracuse and #25 Gardner-Webb. What can we say, we’re a sucker for those kickass Orange unis. And we made a vigorous pitch for the inclusion of GW as a symbolic #25 (similar to what App St. got in the AP poll for football after beating Michigan), but nobody was listening.

Early Season Creep. Obviously, this early in the season there isn’t going to be a lot of movement unless someone loses, but we’re seeing a little bit of creep in either direction with a few teams. The top seven teams are the same, but clearly the bloggers took Michigan St.‘s exhibition loss to Grand Valley St. into account by dropping the Spartans from #8 to #13 (interestingly, we only dropped MSU one spot on our ballot). Oregon, Indiana, Duke, Stanford, Davidson and VCU were rewarded with slight bumps up the list, while Marquette and Mississippi St. were downgraded for, um, what exactly (it wasn’t us!)? NC State (grrrr…) and Southern Illinois entered the blogpoll in place of A-Sun upset victims Kentucky (who still shockingly had two blogpoll votes) and USC.

Where’s the Argument? We added the Standard Deviation column (Std Dev) this week to show where bloggers were having significantly disparate opinions on teams. A high number (> 5.0) represents substantial variance between how the bloggers ranked a team. A low number (< 3.0) represents consistency in the strength of the ranking. So here are the teams that bloggers are having the most trouble getting a handle on.

• Michigan St. (stdev = 7.39; range = 6 to NR)
• Stanford (6.04; 10 to NR)
• Indiana (5.53; 4 to NR)
• Gonzaga (5.52; 10 to NR)
• NC State (5.36; 12 to NR)

The top 4 are tight, though. Kansas has the lowest collective ranking among Memphis, UNC, UCLA and itself at #7 in one ballot.

• Memphis (stdev = 0.81; range = 1 to 3)
• Kansas (1.19; 2 to 7)
• UNC (1.21; 1 to 5)
• UCLA (1.60; 1 to 6)

It’ll still be a few more weeks before we get a good sense of who the favorites will actually be this season.

Welcome to After the Buzzer. We’re sorta envisioning this to be a one-stop recap of notable information from each night’s games. Think Daily Dime meets Doug Gottlieb (w/o the credit card fraud conviction). Or something like that. Now, we’re not promising we can do this every single night of the season – a weekly Friday’s Ivies would put everyone to sleep, including especially us. But we’ll do our best to get you some college hoops insights for your morning bourbon coffee. Except for this morning, because it’s already the afternoon. Details, details. If there’s anything you guys want to see as a regular feature, hit us up at rushthecourt@yahoo.com and we’ll unabashedly claim the idea as our own think about adding it.

11.05.07

The 07-08 season got underway at the Memphis Regional last night for the CvC first round games.

· Richmond 44, Maine 42. Remember when the Richmond Spiders were good with Dick Tarrant on the sidelines beating the likes of Syracuse and Indiana? No longer. 100 Memphins (?) showed up early to watch a high school game break out.

· Memphis 102, UT-Martin 71. The nightcap that nobody outside of the Pyramid saw (thanks ESPNU) showed just how explosive the #1 blogpoll Tigers can be. Joey Dorsey didn’t play, but no matter. Chris Douglas-Roberts led the way with 28/8, but reviews were sparkling for the debut of superfrosh Derrick Rose (17/6/5), fueling message board chatter about the number of trip-dubs Rose will have this year. Possible Memphis concerns – 1) they let UTM’s Lester Hudson drop 35 on them (do they play D?); and, 2) 58.6% from the line (17-29).

[vodpod id=ExternalVideo.438596&w=425&h=350&fv=]

On Tap Tonight. The Memphis Regional continues and the Lexington Regional of the CvC gets started.

• #1 Memphis (-29) v. Richmond (ESPNU) – maybe the Fedex will open up the concessions?
• # 15 Kentucky (-27.5) v. Central Arkansas (ESPNU) – Gillispie’s debut at Rupp
• Gardner-Webb (-3.5) v. Alabama A&M – keep an eye on A&M’s Mickell Gladness

Another week full of information to catch up on…

• Lute Olson is taking a leave of absence (not medically related) from Arizona (see video below). Asst. Coach Kevin O’Neill will take over during the interim (update: UA isn’t looking very good during its exhibition game vs. Concordia today).
• This is a very cool map of every D1 school – did you know there’s only one D1 school in Minnesota? We didn’t either. (h/t to Meaningful Collateral)
• Post Game Heroes breaks down the College Hoops 2K8 Sports player ratings (nice to see Bo McCalebb (#3 SG) and Kyle Hines (#2 PF) getting their due). EA Sports NCAA08 March Madness also lists its top 25 teams.
• Did you know that Davidson is playing at Texas today? Yep, a closed scrimmage. We’ll see if we can find a report of this game later.
• Everyone’s favorite play-in game is now worth the same amount as any other first round game.
• MTD plugged a college coaching simulation game that really sounds interesting – once we figure out how to quit our job and watch hoops all day manage our time more effectively, we’re all in.
• NCAA Hoops Today gives a sweet rundown of upcoming games on the tube.
• After whiffing on Greg Monroe, Duke got a commitment from Elliott Williams, a shooting guard from the Memphis area. Oh, and Duke’s three football fans were miffed when Coach K scheduled a scrimmage at the same time as their game vs. FSU last weekend.
• It turns out the college hoops fans are the most superstitious of all. Now excuse us while we arrange our chair just so in front of the tv.
• Injuries, Suspensions, Returns –
  • Washington three-point specialist Ryan Appleby broke his thumb and will miss 6 weeks.
  • UCLA guard Michael Roll tore the plantar fascia in his foot and will be out 3-5 weeks.
  • Sticking in the Pac-10, USC is battered and beat up.
  • Marquette’s Trevor Mbakwe is out for the season with a knee injury.
  • Wisconsin’s Michael Flowers has returned from a two-week leave of absence.
  • Auburn top returning scorer and rebounder Josh Dollard will miss the season for medical reasons.
  • Tennessee forward Duke Crews was allowed back on the team from his month-long suspension. His buddy Wayne Chism, however, was taken to the hospital with a concussion last week.
• Season Preview Materials –
  • In case you’re just tuning in…
  • Here are Jeff Goodman’s preseason all-americans. Here are MSN’s.
  • Here are some off the radar players to know.
  • M2M asks whether we should trust Vegas’s predictions. (answer: no).
  • Dan Hanner takes a unique look at doing a season preview through computer modeling (most interesting observation to us – Kentucky over Tennessee for the SEC title).
  • A non-blogpoll Top 25: Eric Byrnes Tries Hard (UT #1?).
  • MTD gives its F4 sleepers.
  • Gary Parrish previews: WCC, CAA, Mountain West, WAC, CUSA, A10, MVC, Big 12, Big 10, SEC, ACC, Big East, Pac-10.

[vodpod id=ExternalVideo.438249&w=425&h=350&fv=]

Per ESPN today…

Initial reactions:

• UNC is #1, yet UCLA garnered more first-place votes (12-10).
• 9 of the top 10 match the online Blogpoll – the one difference is that coaches like Indiana more than Marquette. Fwiw, so do we. (come on blogpollers! We should represent the non-MSM contrarian voice!)
• Did the coaches go with the “name” programs over Calipari’s squad at #1? Interesting that the bloggers voted Memphis a solid #1 while UNC/UCLA were left behind.
• Only one coach agreed with us that Kansas is preseason #1 (Bill Self?), although we aren’t predicting KU to win it all.
• Buy: Oregon (mighty mite Tajuan Porter!), Gonzaga (magic mushroomania), Texas (hey mr. DJ put that record on…), S. Illinois (you sexy mother Falker!), Davidson (spicy Curry), VCU (Eric Maynor alone is worth more than five votes).
• Sell: Duke (anxiously awaiting the Brian Zoubek experiment), USC (Young+Pruitt > Mayo+Jefferson), NC State (folks, they were 5-11 in the ACC last year!!), Alabama (no Steele = no chance).
• Conference breakdown (top 25, all 54 teams receiving votes): Pac-10 (6, 8), Big East (5, 8), ACC (3, 6), Big 12 (3, 5), SEC (3, 6), Big 10 (2, 5), MVC (1, 2), CUSA (1, 1), WCC (1, 1), Colonial (0, 3), WAC (0, 3), A10 (0, 2), Mountain West (0, 2), Horizon (0, 1), Southern (0, 1).
• Word to the Colonial and WAC with three teams each receiving votes even though none are in the Top 25.
• Is there any value in this meaningless poll whatsoever? Some. Last year the top 6 (and 8 of the top 10) in the preseason coaches poll finished in the top 11 of the final poll (before the NCAA Tournament), and every team in the final top 11 had been ranked somewhere in the top 25 before the season started. Additionally, all four F4 teams were ranked in last year’s preseason top 8 (#1 Florida, #4 Ohio St., #5 UCLA, #8 Georgetown).
• Only six of the preseason top 25 last year didn’t make the NCAA Tournament (#7 LSU, #12 Alabama, #16 Washington, #18 Connecticut, #20 Syracuse, #23 Creighton), so that’s fair evidence that the coaches (at least last year) have a bit of a clue. Note we said only a bit.

The 2007-08 preseason blogpoll is out!

Contributors: March to Madness (administrator), NCAA Hoops Today, SEC Hoops: TGTBTD, March Madness All Season, A Sea of Blue, College Hoops Heaven, Rush the Court. All ballots archived here.

We’ll delve further into the reasons why we voted the way we did as the season preview moves along this month, but suffice it to say that we don’t have many major beefs with the way the preseason blogpoll turned out. We generally think Michigan St., Marquette, Texas and Duke are a little overvalued, while Indiana, Gonzaga and VCU are undervalued, but we were pretty much in lockstep with the group as to who the collective best five teams are.

FYI – our two ranked teams that were left on the outside looking in were Syracuse (#21) and Southern Illinois (#22).

This should be a lot of fun – we can’t wait to get the season started.

Now that we’re firmly into October, roughly ten days from Midnight Madness and only about five weeks from the opening tipoff of a regular season game, we’re going to try our hand at providing some preseason content here. Here’s what we envision (but please don’t hold us to it):

1. Conference Primers – a daily rundown of some useful and not-so-useful information on all 31 conferences from worst to first.

2. NCAA Bracket – a semi-weekly update as we go through the conferences as to where we predict each team will be slotted in the 2008 Dance.

3. Preseason Magazine Reviews – as they come out fast and furious over the next month, we’ll grade them as we already have with Athlon and Lindy’s.

4. Blogpoll – we’re teaming up with our new friends over at March to Madness (administrator extraordinaire), NCAA Hoops Today, SEC Hoops: TGTBTU, March Madness All Season, A Sea of Blue and College Hoops Heaven (likely more to come) to provide the first annual college hoops preseason blogpoll.

5. All-Everything Teams. We’ll do a traditional all-american team right before the season begins, but we’re going to try to mix that up with some other nontraditional all-whatever teams here.

6. Anything Else – we’ll continue with our usual fare of linkage and thought-provoking (gulp…) commentary where appropriate. If anyone has an idea of something else they’d like to see, hit us up at rushthecourt@yahoo.com.