In the next three weeks leading up to season tipoff, the Pac-12 microsite will be evaluating each of the league’s 12 teams. Today, we head to Berkeley.

California Golden Bears

Cuonzo Martin’s first season as the head coach at Cal was a rebuilding year for a team that had lost senior leaders Justin Cobbs and Richard Solomon, and also dealt with injuries to star sophomore Jabari Bird on its way to an 18-15 season (7-11 Pac-12). Things are looking way up for the Golden Bears this season, however, primarily because Martin managed to convince two of the very best high school players in the country to matriculate at Berkeley this season. These newcomers may not be around for more than a season, but for at least this season, Cal will be loaded with elite athletes and are a trendy sleeper pick to win a conference with no clear favorite. With an influx of talent the likes of which Cal basketball hasn’t seen in over two decades, anything less than an NCAA Tournament appearance this season will be considered a severe disappointment.

Cuonzo Martin Begins Year 2 at Cal With a Loaded Roster

Strengths: Only Arizona and UCLA in this conference can compete with the athleticism that Cal will be able to put on the floor. Returning wings Jabari Bird and Tyrone Wallace are legitimate two-way players who can fill a box score in a variety of ways, and their attacks on the rim should open things up for sharpshooter Jordan Mathews (44.3 percent from three last season). Georgetown transfer Stephen Domingo is a rangy forward who can shoot and defend multiple positions as well. But the real reason why the Bears will be a superior athletic team against nearly every team they play is because true freshmen Jaylen Brown and Ivan Rabb are one-of-a-kind type talents who have certain NBA futures. At 6’11” and 220 pounds, Rabb has plenty of shooting range, a variety of moves in the post and he runs the floor extremely well for a player his size. At 6’7″ and 225 pounds, Brown is the quintessential bull in a china shop and might very well be the Pac-12 Player of the Year before the season is over. His brute size and strength make him nearly impossible to keep away from the rim and he will be a human wrecking ball in transition. Finding the right combination of playing time for all of these talented athletes will be an interesting juggling act for Martin, but it is hard to view that as a problem. If all goes according to plan, the Bears’ offense will improve and the team become downright frightening defensively; but at the very least, the additions of Brown and Rabb will improve the team’s offensive rebounding and ability to get to the free throw line, two of the squad’s most glaring weaknesses last season. Read the rest of this entry »

This team preview is part of the RTC ACC microsite’s preseason coverage.

Can Jim Larranaga lead another experienced team to a magical season?

When the USA Today/Coaches Preseason Poll was released in October, we were a little surprised to see Miami among the others receiving votes grouping rather than listed in the Top 25. Even more shocking was that the Hurricanes came in 37th in the overall voting, behind seven other ACC schools. The recently released AP Preseason Top 25 gave Miami slightly more respect, placing them 31st in the voting. It’s our view that the Hurricanes are going to be better than that, and several notable media members seem to agree; both Gary Parrish (CBS) and Dick Vitale (ESPN) rank Miami at #21 in their Top 25s, and the ACC Media listed the Hurricanes as the ACC’s fifth-best team heading into the season. Our main reason for optimism regarding this year’s Miami squad involves the long and demonstrated coaching track record of Jim Larranaga.

In looking at Larranaga’s last 12 seasons, a clear pattern emerges that shows that experience on his teams really matters. And it REALLY matters. From 2005-15, there have been four occasions in which Larranaga brought back a more experienced squad than the previous year. In each case, his team’s conference wins rose dramatically (average of +4.5 wins) and Larranaga led all four of those squads into the NCAA Tournament, including the George Mason team that made the 2006 Final Four. With a returning roster that includes four seniors and two juniors among his top eight players, this year’s Miami club is well-poised to make another similar jump. It says here to watch out for the Hurricanes as a possible darkhorse league championship contender. Read the rest of this entry »

The SEC got an early start in its annual quest to shed its label as an underachieving basketball conference. By swapping out Anthony Grant, Rick Ray and Donnie Tyndall for Avery Johnson, Ben Howland and Rick Barnes, the league upgraded in coaching talent and brand name recognition. Losing Florida’s Billy Donovan to the NBA was counterproductive to that pursuit, but by and large, the SEC was the clear springtime winner when the coaching carousel came to a halt. Now the focus shifts to what happens on the court — resumes don’t much matter if you’re not winning games. Here are several ways how the SEC can sustain the momentum to improve its national standing this upcoming season.

Can Bruce Pearl help raise the SEC’s national profile? (athlonsports.com)

• More and higher seeds: Let’s get the obvious out of the way first: The best way for the SEC to get more national respect is to put more teams in the NCAA Tournament. Last year’s five teams invited on Selection Sunday counts as solid improvement on this front. This year you could make an early, sight-unseen case that six or even seven SEC teams could be in position to make the field by March. That volume would be great, but even if the number of teams ends up as fewer than six, it would be good to see a few higher seeds. Last year, the league’s seeds other than Kentucky came in at #5, #9, #10 and #11. There was no other SEC team that was consistently in the Top 25 last season.

Read the rest of this entry »

This team preview is part of the RTC Big 12 microsite’s preseason coverage.

Burning Question: Can the Mountaineers get back to the NCAA Tournament without Juwan Staten? 

West Virginia alumnus Bob Huggins returned to Morgantown in April 2007 to take over as head coach of the men’s basketball program. He made his presence immediately felt by getting the Mountaineers back into the NCAA Tournament during his first season. The school would go on to make five straight appearances in the Big Dance and produce one of my favorite tournament moments along the way. In the Elite Eight of the 2010 NCAA Tournament, a Mountaineers squad led by Da’Sean Butler and Devin Ebanks upset a Kentucky team keyed by John Wall and Demarcus Cousins, 73-66. The game itself wasn’t all that interesting, but I’m a sucker for a bit of showmanship combined with just the right amount of taunting. So when I later stumbled across video of West Virginia players celebrating the victory by doing the John Wall dance on the podium, the moment became forever etched in my mind. It was peak college basketball — young kids without much an NBA future enjoying their victory over a roster full of NBA talent on the sport’s biggest stage.

Daxter Miles Jr. and Jevon Carter will look to replace Juwan Staten in Morgantown. (Greg Bartram-USA TODAY Sports)

Unfortunately, West Virginia’s fall from that peak was rather precipitous. Sure, the Mountaineers made the NCAAs the next two seasons, but they failed both times to get past the first weekend. In 2013 and 2014, the school missed the NCAA Tournament altogether, and after a 2014 trip to the NIT, two of Huggins’ top three scorers transferred out of the program. Things in Morgantown appeared to be in a downward spiral, as the Mountaineers were picked to finish tied for sixth in the Big 12 going into last season. Last year’s team, though, would end up exceeding those expectations. Behind All-Big 12 point guard Juwan Staten, West Virginia stormed out of the gates to a 12-1 record in non-conference play before finishing 11-7 in the Big 12, good for a fourth place tie with Baylor. The catalyst to that run was a decision by Huggins to employ a fast-paced, high-pressure full-court press that forced opponents to make very difficult decisions. The change worked. The Mountaineers returned to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in three years and made the Sweet Sixteen where they ran into a Kentucky team stacked with NBA talent once again. Despite the successful season to that point, there was no celebratory John Wall dance this time as the Mountaineers were pummeled by 39 points.

Read the rest of this entry »

Everyone has had one of those days where NOTHING goes right. You wake up late and burn the coffee, only to realize there isn’t enough time to make another pot. You try to brush your teeth but forgot you threw out your toothbrush last night, so you have to use your finger. You leave the lunch you made the night before in your fridge. This and more, all before 9:00 AM.

At a time when he needed a break or two, John Groce has had a rough off-season.

For Illinois head coach John Groce, this kind of bad day must have felt like it lasted for the entire offseason. Now entering his fourth season as the Illinois head coach, the 44-year old is at a breaking point in his tenure. The Illini have missed two consecutive NCAA Tournaments and are an uninspiring 24-30 in conference play over the same span. Memories of the excitement of his first season in Champaign are long gone; in those days, the Illini were a play or two away from the Sweet Sixteen and in the mix to land a few different blue-chip recruits. But monumental setbacks this offseason both within and outside his basketball program have the likelihood of a comeback campaign feeling quite remote. The head coach needs to coax some signs of life out of his program soon in order to rally the troops.

The list of mini-crises that have adversely affected the Illinois basketball program is long; here are a few of the lowlights:

1. Football and women’s basketball scandals. The revelation that Illini football coach Tim Beckman was a real life Bud Kilmer — and appropriately fired one week before the start of the season — summoned a dark cloud over the entire athletic program. Ultimately, a different investigation found no wrongdoing into claims of racial discrimination against the women’s basketball coaching staff, but the public relations damage had already been done. These external distractions do not create an environment for the kind of administrative “support” the head basketball coach needs coming into a make-or-break season. Read the rest of this entry »

So you guys are back to being actual humans now, right? You’re no longer in sleep-mode or whatever? It feels like forever since we have met. In reality, though, it has only been since April. I guess that means I need to ask the question: How did you handle your offseason blues? The good news for the amateur shooty hoops obsessed was that there wasn’t lack of top-notch scandals to hold our attention during that period of time. No worries, either. We will get to (parts of) that in a little bit.

How was my offseason? Thanks for asking, not at all an inanimate object! Things went pretty well. I scribbled words that barely formed sentences at other places. Those columns tend to be on the more serious front than our beloved A Column of Enchantment, but it would be dumb to not acknowledge that without Randy (our fearless leader) letting me scribble this barely about college basketball column that I wouldn’t be writing at all. It in a sense rejuvenated me, as I grew (still am to a degree) tiresome of the everyday grind that is covering basketball. I mean, it is brutal when you think about how seriously people take sports. It isn’t life or death or anything remotely all that important. Anyway, you can blame Randy if you hate me for giving me enough motivation to start actively writing again. Those more serious works (plug time!) can be found at numerous places. Here are the links to my author page for each: The Student Section — Crossover Chronicles — Today’s Fastbreak. They pay me for some unknown reason, so go support me there if you like my work. If you hate me, then why in the hell are you reading this?

Should have mentioned this earlier, but those familiar with A Column of Enchantment already know that our column is — by design — all over the place. But for those new to reading our column (it is ours, because I like to think all of you are my friends and stuff), it is generally a very light and hopefully fun look at college basketball (barely) and pop-culture type stuff. Our first entering of this season, unfortunately, starts with some of the sads.

_________

Grantland is gone. It is done. It sucks. There aren’t proper words in the English language (or ones that I am smart enough to know of) which can properly describe how I feel about this. I am aware that it is no longer cool or hip to be a writer who likes Bill Simmons, but I always have. When I was (much) younger he was a breath of fresh air to me. His style was fun, even with his obvious homerisms, and I was always of the belief that reading one lengthy yet fun column a week was better than reading 2349082390429892348239042.03 iffy-at-best ones, was the best of best options.

Read the rest of this entry »

College basketball fans can breathe a little easier today. Certain milestones come along during October and November that make the season seem that much closer. Midnight Madness, conference media days and the release of your go-to preseason magazine all show incremental progress toward that first tip-off. On Monday afternoon, the second of the two major college basketball preseason polls was finally released, meaning that we really aren’t very far away now — just 11 days, in fact. A total of six Big Ten teams were on the AP voters’ initial ballots — Maryland, Michigan State, Indiana, Wisconsin, Purdue and Michigan — so here are a few quick takeaways from today’s release.

Denzel Valentine is a big reason why Michigan State is one of six teams ranked in the preseason AP top 25(Getty).

• Best Conference Debate: Many pundits feel that the ACC and Big Ten will be battling all season for the crown as best conference this season. Score round one for the B1G, as the league put two more teams inside the Top 25 (six) than the ACC (four). The Big 12 also has four teams listed in the AP poll, while the SEC and the Pac-12 each have three. Give credit to the ACC, however, for listing three teams (UNC, Duke, Virginia) among the top six. The ACC also has four more teams listed within the next 10 of the “Others Receiving Votes” category, while the Big Ten only has one (Iowa). We’ll have to wait for the ACC/Big Ten Challenge in early December and the rest of the non-conference portion of the schedule to see how this particular competition between leagues plays out.
• Purdue and Michigan Get Extra Love:  Maryland (#3), Michigan State (#13), Indiana (#15), and Wisconsin (#17) all start in the exact same spot in both polls, whereas Purdue and Michigan both ended up with a slightly better position in the AP poll. The Boilermakers were tied for 24th in the Coaches’ Poll but will tip off at 23rd in the AP. Michigan just barely finished outside the Coaches’ Top 25 by two points, but they cracked the AP by taking the place of West Virginia in these rankings.
• Plenty of Chances Against the Top 25: There will be at least 16 games where Big Ten teams will have a chance to knock off a Top 25 team, as of the current rankings within this poll. Many of these games were already highlighted in our previous posts. In addition to these match-ups, there are also 10 possible games in tournaments, where if the bracket plays out a certain way, more resume-enhancers will be available for the league.

Thad Matta’s entire career can be summed up in one word — winner. Think of it this way: The 48-year old has won at least 20 games in each of his 15 seasons as a head coach. He’s missed the NCAA tournament only twice, and he ended up as the NIT champion in one of those two years. In the other year — his first season at Ohio State — he took over a team that finished below .500 in Big Ten play and was ineligible for the 2005 postseason and led it to a 20-12 record that included an upset of top-ranked and then-undefeated Illinois on the regular season’s final weekend. Doubt him if you dare.

Thad Matta is a proven winner, but leading a freshmen and sophomore-laden team through the Big Ten is a tough task. (USA TODAY Sports)

While Matta has proven his knack for winning year in and year out, he has a big challenge ahead of him this season. He’s got plenty of talent but not much experience on this year’s team. Seven of Ohio State’s scholarship players have never played a minute of college basketball in Columbus; six are freshmen; one is a junior. There are no seniors. Departed players from last year’s Round of 32 squad accounted for 65 percent of the scoring, 87 percent of the assists and 61 percent of the rebounding. The bottom line is that Matta will have to rely on a group of freshmen and sophomores to replace star guard D’Angelo Russell and four seniors.

Russell is the glaring loss. The wunderkind freshman accounted for 26 percent of the team’s scoring, took 26 percent of the shots and logged a usage rate of 30.2 percent, per KenPom. He was the go-to scorer for a team that didn’t have a consistent second scoring option and really hasn’t since the Jared Sullinger/William Buford days. The good news for Ohio State is that beside Russell (and Shannon Scott’s terrific on-ball defense), no one else did anything completely irreplaceable. No other player averaged more than 10.2 points per game and no departing player had a usage rate higher than Scott’s 21 percent, a relatively average rate. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the biggest developments in the SEC this offseason was the star power added to the league’s coaching ranks, as no fewer than three programs added a head coach with an impressive pedigree. Mississippi State hired Ben Howland, a man who led UCLA to three straight Final Fours from 2006-08 and has won conference titles in the Big Sky, Big East and Pac 10/12. Tennessee quickly ended its tumultuous relationship with Donnie Tyndall and added a coach with a Final Four to his name as well (plus three Sweet Sixteens and two Elite Eights) in Rick Barnes. And after swinging and missing on Wichita State’s Gregg Marshall, Alabama was nonetheless able to win the press conference by hiring Avery Johnson, a former NBA Coach of the Year who led the Dallas Mavericks to the NBA Finals in 2006. Florida didn’t make a splashy hire, but the Gators replaced its legendary coach with Louisiana Tech’s Michael White — no stranger to the SEC after playing and coaching at Ole Miss.

Ben Howland inherits a better-than-you’d-think situation in Starkville (stationcaster.com).

Of the four, Howland and White are poised to have the biggest impacts this season. For Howland, this is in no small part because of the situation former Bulldogs’ head coach Rick Ray left him. It would have been more than understandable had Mississippi State stuck with Ray for at least another year. His three-year results weren’t great, but there had been incremental improvement: The Bulldogs won six SEC games under him last year (his highest total) and were poised to return a strong and experienced core that he had recruited and developed. But as cruel as it was for Ray to lose on the chance to continue building his program, it’s refreshing that Mississippi State strived for more — the type of ambition the league needs if it wants to raise its national profile. Howland arrived in Starkville and delivered right away, signing Jackson native Malik Newman (Rivals’ #8 overall prospect) away from the likes of Kentucky, Ole Miss and LSU.

Read the rest of this entry »

This team preview is part of the RTC ACC microsite’s preseason coverage.

Burning Question: Is Syracuse an NCAA Tournament Team?

It may seem like an odd question to ask of a Jim Boeheim team, but remember, this is only half a Boeheim team (he will be suspended for the first half of ACC play). This year’s Orange squad will have talent, as three consensus four-star recruits join a solid group of returnees (Rakeem Christmas and Chris McCullough are the only contributors who won’t be back). But let’s not forget another key fact, which is that last year’s team was not going to be an NCAA Tournament team (self-imposed ban notwithstanding). This year’s team will likely be better, but losing big man Christmas will place a lot of pressure on Michael Gbinije and Trevor Cooney to score more frequently if the frontcourt doesn’t pick up the slack.

Dajuan Coleman is the key to Syracuse’s season. (Photo: Kevin Rivoli/Syracuse Post-Standard)

The other challenge the Orange will face is the relative strength of the ACC. The league is a great bet to be improved this season (a scary thought), and Syracuse may have drawn the toughest road schedule of any team in the conference. The Orange travel to play every team expected to be in the top half of the league, save Notre Dame. Throw in a non-conference schedule with only two real chances for quality wins (at Georgetown; home versus Wisconsin), and this team could have a tough time earning enough quality road wins for the Selection Committee’s liking. Boeheim teams always win 20 games (last year was only the third time one of his teams didn’t win at least 20 games since the 1977 season); if they can simply achieve that total and those wins include at least nine conference victories, Syracuse has a great shot to return to the NCAA Tournament. Read the rest of this entry »