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

For the last few seasons there’s always been the hope (misguided or not) that Conference USA basketball will return to the level it was prior to the Big East/Atlantic 10 exodus of a few years back.

As we enter the 2009 calendar, it’s looking more and more like the 2008-09 season will be another year of futility for the conference. There are still a few months to go in the season, but it’s clear that the teams in CUSA did not prove much in non-conference play.

1.) Ole Missed: The news has been mostly negative lately when it comes to CUSA basketball, but the Southern Miss program scored a huge win last Wednesday by defeating in-state rival Ole Miss 78-59. It has been an up and down few years for Golden Eagles coach Larry Eustachy, but it appears as though he has a pretty good team now in Hattiesburg. The credit for this improvement also should go to veteran guards Jeremy Wise and R.L. Horton. They are now sitting at 9-4 and have as good of a shot as anyone to be a top-echelon CUSA team.

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So if you haven’t heard, tonight is the beginning of college basketball regular season games.  What we’re really talking about, though, is two games from Durham as part of the Coaches v. Cancer Tournament (only one televised on ESPNU).  In fact, the first game (Houston v. Georgia Southern) starts in about forty minutes. 

So we wanted to throw up the brackets again just to remind ourselves of who was playing in this thing, and what we might expect to see in a week or so.  Some predictions below the bracket.

Duke Regional.  Obviously, Duke will be heavily favored in both games, but Houston is a slight sleeper here.  The Cougars won 24 games last season, defeated Kentucky, and played Memphis tough in both of their CUSA contests.  They lost their top two players from last year, but return their next four, and Coach Tom Penders’ teams play hard and typically can score with anybody. 

SIU Regional.  Two easy first round game for S. Illinois and UMass, but that matchup presents an interesting contrast in styles – SIU with their methodical pace and UMass with its breakneck pace (#4 nationally in possessions/game last year).  We’d expect SIU to win because they simply don’t lose many nonconference games at home, but it could be an interesting game.

UCLA Regional.   Ho-hum.  UCLA will have no problem with anyone in this region, but we’d recommend bringing your iced double latte if the Bruins play Miami (OH) in the second round.  That game won’t break 100 pts total. 

Michigan Regional.  It wouldn’t shock us if Michigan lost a second-round matchup with Northeastern here.  In fact, this is probably the most likely shot at an upset in the four regionals.  Northeastern returns its entire starting lineup from a team that some expect to make some noise in the CAA this year.  And while we love John Beilein, he’s probably a couple years away from fully implementing his system in Ann Arbor. 

The Picks to go to MSG.  Duke, S. Illinois, UCLA, Northeastern.