The Holy Land of Hoops

I'm a big KenPom junkie. Here's the first release for this season.

1. Villanova (#1 overall, 14-4 record)
2. Providence (#25, 11-7)
3. Xavier (#26, 11-7)
4. Seton Hall (#28, 10-8)
5. Butler (#42, 9-9)
6. Creighton (#45, 9-9)
7. Marquette (#49, 8-10)
8. St. John's (#51, 8-10)
9. Georgetown (#79, 6-12)
10. DePaul (#119, 4-14)

Just one team outside of the Top 100. We finished with one team outside of the Top 100 in 2014-2015 and 2016-2017. That said, Marquette was #93 and DePaul was #150 in 2014-2015, and St. John's was #99 and DePaul was #183 in 2016-2017. Additionally, at 15.05 Pyth, this is projected to be the best rendition of the Big East since 2010-2011.

Offense:
1. Villanova (#2 overall)
2. Xavier (#14)
3. Marquette (#24)
4. Seton Hall (#27)
5. Providence (#30)
6. Creighton (#35)
7. Butler (#43)
8. St. John's (#54)
9. Georgetown (#100)
10. DePaul (#136)

Xavier at #14 is a little surprising. Didn't think their offense would be that elite. Everything else makes sense.

Defense:
1. Villanova (#6)
2. Providence (#24)
3. Seton Hall (#31)
4. Xavier (#38)
5. Butler (#44)
6. St. John's (#46)
7. Creighton (#63)
8. Georgetown (#72)
9. Marquette (#85)
10. DePaul (#114)

I was a little surprised that Seton Hall is #31. I expect them to finish in a better spot than that. Everything else seems reasonable.

Conference Top 10:
1. Big 12 Conference +18.54
2. Big East Conference +15.05
3. Southeastern Conference +14.93
4. Atlantic Coast Conference +14.68
5. Big Ten Conference +13.77
6. Pac 12 Conference +10.71
7. American Athletic Conference +7.82
8. Atlantic 10 Conference +3.34 24
9. Mountain West Conference +3.05
10. Missouri Valley Conference +2.99

ACC is expected to take a huge step back. This is expected to be their worst season since 2012-2013. The Big Ten's struggles appear to continue, but I'm sure the IU and Purdue fans will tell us Butler fans it's better than the Big East. Pretty big rebound for the SEC, which makes sense. They will be greatly improved.

interesting that, if accurate, the 2 10 team leagues are 1 & 2. if that trend continue will the p5 split into smaller leagues? ha ha Who said realignment was dead?

gosports1 wrote:interesting that, if accurate, the 2 10 team leagues are 1 & 2. if that trend continue will the p5 split into smaller leagues? ha ha Who said realignment was dead?

Round-robin kills your conference though...at least according to our resident AAC fan...

milksteak wrote:I'm a big KenPom junkie. Here's the first release for this season.

Xavier at #14 is a little surprising. Didn't think their offense would be that elite. Everything else makes sense..

We're returning over 70% of our scoring from last year, so that may be the reason for the good #.

Glad to see these are up....

I'd just say look at the overall projected records....

Big East has only 4 teams projected end of the season to finish with fewer than 12 overall losses. Got Creighton at 18-12, Butler at 17-12, St John's at 17-12, and Marquette at 16-12. (note, not all games are in there- only 1st round exempt tourney matchups are in).

Meanwhile, ACC who is lower has 7 teams with at least 19 wins, and 2 others at 18-12 and another at 17-11.

Also looking- while yes Nova would get a good seed, Providence would be looking at 21-9. Xavier 21-9. Seton Hall at 20-10. Teams with those records get 6 or 7 seeds. Compare to the ACC which has 5 teams with 8 or fewer losses projected.

An explainer on his ratings from 2016:

The top 30 or so recruits have an impact on a team’s rating and beyond that the computer is mostly blind to newcomers. That’s not to say it can’t make some guesses, though. In fact, it’s kind of a fun challenge to predict the impact of recruiting classes without any information on the recruiting class itself. Things like basketball budget, conference affiliation, recent performance, and whether the coach is returning handle some of this. But history says you can also glean some information from what kinds of players have left a team.
(From last year:)This is the case with Ohio State, who is ranked higher here than anywhere else. They had a young team last season, and the other indicators in the model are very positive. Furthermore, even though three rotation players transferred, those players were replacement-level quality for the Big Ten.

His methods helped St. John's and Georgetown, which aren't listed this high anywhere else. The Johnnies have a lot returning, but note that last year's preseason ratings favored Ohio State for this reason too. Georgetown gets credit for its basketball budget and recent history (I think KenPom goes back 5 years).
Nova isn't ranked No. 1 anywhere else, but KenPom likes their key pieces returning and an outstanding recent history. Minnesota is ranked top 25 everywhere else but is 36 in KenPom, likely dinged for poor recent performance.

Some of his preseason methods (and results) are head scratchers, but he's retooled this formula over the years with the goal of producing the most accurate results.

stever20 wrote:Glad to see these are up....

I'd just say look at the overall projected records....

Big East has only 4 teams projected end of the season to finish with fewer than 12 overall losses. Got Creighton at 18-12, Butler at 17-12, St John's at 17-12, and Marquette at 16-12. (note, not all games are in there- only 1st round exempt tourney matchups are in).

Meanwhile, ACC who is lower has 7 teams with at least 19 wins, and 2 others at 18-12 and another at 17-11.

Also looking- while yes Nova would get a good seed, Providence would be looking at 21-9. Xavier 21-9. Seton Hall at 20-10. Teams with those records get 6 or 7 seeds. Compare to the ACC which has 5 teams with 8 or fewer losses projected.

Why would you look at overall projected records, when each team has unique OOC schedules, and the ACC doesn't play a round-robin format in a 15 team league?

The differences between the ACC, SEC and Big East preseason ratings are negligible. The SEC and Big East essentially only have 1, elite level team apiece according to his ratings. The SEC has less "bad" teams, but they also have a higher percentage outside the top 50. The ACC has more top level teams, but a higher percentage of teams outside the top 50, and more teams outside the top 100. Seems pretty straight forward.

Irishdawg wrote:

stever20 wrote:Glad to see these are up....

I'd just say look at the overall projected records....

Big East has only 4 teams projected end of the season to finish with fewer than 12 overall losses. Got Creighton at 18-12, Butler at 17-12, St John's at 17-12, and Marquette at 16-12. (note, not all games are in there- only 1st round exempt tourney matchups are in).

Meanwhile, ACC who is lower has 7 teams with at least 19 wins, and 2 others at 18-12 and another at 17-11.

Also looking- while yes Nova would get a good seed, Providence would be looking at 21-9. Xavier 21-9. Seton Hall at 20-10. Teams with those records get 6 or 7 seeds. Compare to the ACC which has 5 teams with 8 or fewer losses projected.

Why would you look at overall projected records, when each team has unique OOC schedules, and the ACC doesn't play a round-robin format in a 15 team league?

The differences between the ACC, SEC and Big East preseason ratings are negligible. The SEC and Big East essentially only have 1, elite level team apiece according to his ratings. The SEC has less "bad" teams, but they also have a higher percentage outside the top 50. The ACC has more top level teams, but a higher percentage of teams outside the top 50, and more teams outside the top 100. Seems pretty straight forward.

You are right that the ACC doesn't play a round robin format. And that makes it where it is easier for them to get both a lot of teams seeded highly(with 5 teams with 8 or fewer losses) and a lot of teams fighting for tourney spots(10 teams total with 12 or fewer losses). That's the point. End of the day, the committee looks at the final regular season records. The ACC teams aren't going to get dinged because they aren't playing a round robin.

Irishdawg wrote:

stever20 wrote:Glad to see these are up....

I'd just say look at the overall projected records....

Big East has only 4 teams projected end of the season to finish with fewer than 12 overall losses. Got Creighton at 18-12, Butler at 17-12, St John's at 17-12, and Marquette at 16-12. (note, not all games are in there- only 1st round exempt tourney matchups are in).

Meanwhile, ACC who is lower has 7 teams with at least 19 wins, and 2 others at 18-12 and another at 17-11.

Also looking- while yes Nova would get a good seed, Providence would be looking at 21-9. Xavier 21-9. Seton Hall at 20-10. Teams with those records get 6 or 7 seeds. Compare to the ACC which has 5 teams with 8 or fewer losses projected.

Why would you look at overall projected records, when each team has unique OOC schedules, and the ACC doesn't play a round-robin format in a 15 team league?

Leave it to Stever. Come on man. You should know better.

milksteak wrote:

Irishdawg wrote:

stever20 wrote:Glad to see these are up....

I'd just say look at the overall projected records....

Big East has only 4 teams projected end of the season to finish with fewer than 12 overall losses. Got Creighton at 18-12, Butler at 17-12, St John's at 17-12, and Marquette at 16-12. (note, not all games are in there- only 1st round exempt tourney matchups are in).

Meanwhile, ACC who is lower has 7 teams with at least 19 wins, and 2 others at 18-12 and another at 17-11.

Also looking- while yes Nova would get a good seed, Providence would be looking at 21-9. Xavier 21-9. Seton Hall at 20-10. Teams with those records get 6 or 7 seeds. Compare to the ACC which has 5 teams with 8 or fewer losses projected.

Why would you look at overall projected records, when each team has unique OOC schedules, and the ACC doesn't play a round-robin format in a 15 team league?

Leave it to Stever. Come on man. You should know better.

Stever also posts this BS on the other BE board. Here is what he said there, in response to a positive BE post showing KenPom's projection of the league at #2 in overall strength:

"RE: KenPom Projections: but not leading to help in the NCAA tourney. Have 3 teams projected with 9-10 losses(so like 6-7 seeds)- and then 4 teams with 12 losses(so clearly on the bubble). It's SO tough with 10 team round robin to get both great seeds and the number of teams in the tourney."

Stever is a troll. No matter what he claims about his affiliation with the BE, he is no friend of the league. My advice...ignore everything he, and his buddy crawdad, have to say about the BE and their love interest, the AAAAAAAAAACCC.