By Aidan Joly
The first month of the college basketball season is in the books. To put it lightly, lots has happened. Here’s some of the things we have learned through the first month of the season.
Top preseason teams vulnerable
No team has said this more than North Carolina. The Tar Heels were the preseason No. 1 team and have already dropped out of the rankings, the fastest a preseason No. 1 team has dropped out of the rankings in the 25 team era. The No. 2 team, Gonzaga, has fallen to No. 18 after going 6-3 in its first nine, including two blowout losses. It also had a close call against Kent State on Monday night. The No. 4 team, Kentucky, has fallen to No. 16 after a pair of losses.
In turn, this has allowed Houston (9-0) to jump to the top spot. UConn, who started unranked, is up to No. 5 after a 9-0 start. The preseason No. 18 team, Virginia, is up to No. 3 after an 8-0 start and Purdue, who also started unranked, is up to No. 4 after an 8-0 start.
Bubble is weak
A lot of teams in major conferences such as the ACC, Pac-12 and Big Ten have struggled, creating a weak NCAA tournament bubble through the first month of the season. It may prove to be a challenge for the committee to find 34 deserving teams from high-major conferences. This might create some opportunities for mid-major leagues to have more bids. A great example is Iona, who picked up what is right now a Quad 2 win against St. Louis at home on Tuesday night.
The ACC is down
Expanding on the last point, the ACC may be the worst power conference in the country. Virginia, Duke and Miami have been good, but it hasn’t been smooth sailing for the rest. As stated before, North Carolina has dropped out of the rankings and has lost four in a row. Syracuse has losses to Colgate and Bryant. Notre Dame has a loss to St. Bonaventure. Boston College has losses to Maine, Tarleton State and New Hampshire. Florida State is 1-9. Louisville is 0-8 and looks like one of the worst power conference team in recent memory. The league has been down in recent years, but a good chunk of the league is borderline unwatchable right now.
New stars emerging
As with any other season, we have a crop of new stars emerging across the landscape. Purdue’s 7-4 center Zach Edey has emerged into a household name with his sheer size and his 23.3 points and 12.8 rebounds per game for a top five team. Kansas’ Jalen Wilson has blossomed from a role player the past two seasons to a superstar this season for the Jayhawks. Die-hards have known about Indiana’s Trayce Jackson-Davis for a few years now, but now he’s doing his thing for a top-ranked Hoosiers team. UConn’s Adama Sanogo has taken a jump with the Huskies, now the best player on a top-five squad.
Of course, you have the freshman. Kansas’ Gradey Dick is a game-changer. Keyonte George has made a huge impact at Baylor. Nick Smith missed Arkansas’ first six games, but has been great in his first three games. Kentucky’s Cason Wallace has made an impact for what is a generally older Wildcats team. Kyle Filipowski is Duke’s leading scorer and rebounder. Finally, Amari Bailey has been a stud for UCLA.
Coaches on the hot seat
Yes, we have to talk about this too. The coach with the hottest seat right now is California’s Mark Fox as his Golden Bears sit at 0-9 this year. Georgetown’s Patrick Ewing has been on the hot seat for a few years now, a 4-5 start with losses to Loyola Marymount and American has not helped matters. That might be a situation that ends in a “mutual parting of ways” after the season. After a surprise Elite Eight run in 2021, Oregon State’s Wayne Tinkle won just three games last year and went 1-19 in Pac-12 play and has lost five of the past six right now. Fred Hoiberg may have bought himself some more time at Nebraska with a win against Creighton earlier this week, but it’s tough to see him in that job after this year.
Will any of these coaches lose their jobs mid-season? There always seems to be one or two changes mid-season, so maybe that will happen. If there is one, my money is on Fox.
Chaos reigns supreme
This year seems more chaotic than year’s past. It seems like a ranked team is losing to an unranked team almost every day. In fact, it has happened 19 times already in the first month of the season. Expect many, many more to come as we get into conference play in the coming weeks. Expect the unexpected.
AJ Hoops 