Memphis passed its last regular season road test and now only has a few games to go to return to the “promised land” that they’ve never really left.

While the Tigers’ dominance over the rest of CUSA is nearly unparalleled in the history of modern college basketball, it doesn’t mean that every other team is chopped liver. Basically anything can happen in a tournament setting and the Tigers have endured a few close calls this year.

So here are the teams as they are seeded and some pertinent info:

#1: Memphis Tigers

Coach: John Calipari

Record: 28-3 overall (16-0 in CUSA)

Players to Watch: G Tyreke Evans, F Robert Dozier, F Shawn Taggart, G Antonio Anderson

Season Highlights: In a year that many thought would be fraught with ‘rebuilding’ and the like, the Tigers continue to look dominant. The arrival of the latest one-year wonder: Tyreke Evans, has allowed the blue and gray not miss a beat from last year’s final four squad. But the veteran leadership of guys like Antonio Anderson, Doneal Mack, Shawn Taggart and Robert Dozier has been a huge factor too. They suffered early-season setbacks against Xavier and Syracuse, but they’re currently riding 20+ game winning streak. There have been a few close calls and at the end of the day they’re still undefeated against the rest of the conference.

They Will Win If: They simply show up and play their game. I don’t want to imply that the Tigers will simply cream whomever they play, because they could well lose. But they’re playing an extremely favorable draw on their home court. This is a recipe for success and it also doesn’t hurt that they’ve won over 50 games in a row against CUSA teams.

First Game: vs. the winner of #8 Tulane/#9 East Carolina; Thursday at 8:30 pm.

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Allen R of Houston Basketball Junkies is the RTC correspondent for Conference USA.

1. Memphis: 18-3 (7-0)
2. UCF: 15-6 (5-2)
3. Tulsa: 15-7 (5-2)
4. UTEP: 13-8 (4-3)
5. UAB: 14-8 (4-3)
6. Houston: 12-7 (3-3)
7. Southern Miss: 13-7 (3-3)
8. Tulane: 9-11 (3-4)
9. East Carolina: 10-10 (2-5)
10. Marshall: 9-12 (2-5) 
11. Rice: 7-14 (2-5)
12. SMU: 6-13 (1-6)

“It’s the same old song…”

That isn’t just a line from a classic ‘Motown’ song, but the story of Conference USA basketball summed up in five choice words.

Some things change, but as last week proved, there are some things that always remain the same for a while.

1.) Don’t Boo the Aubrey: In his first game coming off the one game suspension by Conference USA, Houston guard Aubrey Coleman responded to boos and jeers from the Memphis student section by scoring 35 points. The only problem was none of Coleman’s teammates showed up and they combined for a total of 33 points, as the Tigers beat the Cougars 83-68 at the Fed Ex Forum. It was quite evident last Saturday that even in a down year, Memphis has far more talent than even the upper-tier CUSA teams like Houston.

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News from around the basketblogosphere…

• A couple of late summer transfers to report today. It appears Kenny Cooper is leaving Oklahoma St. to be closer to home (Louisiana) and Anthony Gurley (Massachusetts) is leaving Wake Forest for the same reason.
• Our new friends over at Plissken at the Buzzer put together a well-thought out and detailed analysis of the Pac-10’s non-conference schedules in an effort to determine how it will ultimately affect their postseason chances.
• Lion in Oil reports that the Final Four will embrace the BasketBowl approach to squeeze more fans into “distant view” seats on the final weekend beginning in 2009.
• Gonzaga’s Josh Heytvelt of psychedelic mushroom fame is set to return to the team after paying off his debt to society (no, it did not involve organic farming).
• NC State’s promising freshman Jonny Thomas is out for the season with a knee injury.
• Goodman reports Greg Monroe is down to his final eight schools (Duke, Georgetown, LSU, USC, Baylor, UConn, Texas, Kansas), and that KU’s Darrell Arthur is fully recovered from his stress fracture.
• Fluff Pieces. Parrish writes about Capel’s rebuilding project at Oklahoma, DeCourcy writes about Willie Kemp’s expected role at Memphis alongside Derrick Rose, and Goodman writes about Donnie Jones returning home to coach at Marshall.
• Shawn Siegel‘s teams that won’t make the NCAA Tournament (#144 – #72) are up, with some interesting comparisons to the preseason rankings from 2006.
• Finally, we have to mention that we’re excited to see what the combo of Ken Pomeroy and Baseball Prospectus can come up with in their new blog called Basketball Prospectus, which will focus exclusively on college hoops from a statistical bent beginning this fall.