NCAA Basketball Tournaments 2015: Last-Second Predictions for Major Conferences
The truth is, March Madness doesn't actually begin with the NCAA tournament.
It has, in fact, already started with some smaller conferences engaging in their postseason tournaments and will ramp up the rest of this week with the major college basketball conferences doing the same. And it is going to be a worthy, full plate of appetizers for all the sweet hoops that will follow in the coming weeks.
In the ACC, will it be Duke, Virginia or another one of the conference's talented teams? Can Kansas match its regular-season Big 12 supremacy with a tournament title? Can anybody beat Wisconsin in the Big Ten?
And, of course, there is Kentucky. Now 31-0 and looking to become the first team since Indiana in 1975-76 to go unbeaten throughout the season all the way to a national championship, the Wildcats must first navigate their way through the SEC tournament. Can anyone challenge them?
"It's very exciting because no one wants to lose, and of course we're to this point now where we just want to keep it going and we're just trying to get ready for March and play to the best of our ability," Kentucky freshman guard Tyler Ulis said, per the Gwinnett Daily Post.
We'll not only take a look at Kentucky's chances in the SEC, but predict the winners in each of the college basketball's major conference tournaments.
ACC: Duke Ready to Roll
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Duke has won 11 consecutive games and is coming off its second win of the season over ACC archrival North Carolina.
The Blue Devils (28-3, 15-3 ACC) are one of five nationally ranked teams in the ACC, jumping to No. 2 in both the latest AP poll and the latest USA Today Coaches Poll. But technically they should not be the favorite to win the ACC tournament.
Virginia won the regular-season title, was ranked higher most of the season and owns the better overall and conference records (28-2, 16-2). The Cavaliers, however, committed the cardinal sin of losing their regular-season finale last Saturday, 59-57, at Louisville.
Duke not only comes in with more momentum, but also with more firepower behind ACC Player of the Year Jahlil Okafor (17.6 PPG, 9.2 RPG), the first freshman to ever capture the honor. While the Blue Devils sometimes suffer through inconsistency on defense, they can score baskets in bunches and offer a contrast in style to Virginia, which gets it done with defense and is very deliberate on offense.
The other contenders: No. 12 Notre Dame (26-5, 14-4), No. 16 Louisville (24-7, 12-6) and No. 19 North Carolina (21-10, 11-7).
Notre Dame and Louisville join top seeds Virginia and Duke in receiving double-byes to the quarterfinals, while North Carolina, a team frankly lacking in overall talent level when compared to Duke, now must play an extra game and likely will have to beat both Louisville and Virginia just to reach the finals. That isn't going to happen.
Surprisingly, Duke has won 19 ACC titles, but none since capping a string of three in a row in 2011. This is the year the Blue Devils get back on top, beating Louisville in the finals to do it.
American: Bearcats Are Ballin'
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No one would have blamed the Cincinnati Bearcats if their season went south after head coach Mick Cronin was sidelined in mid-December when he was diagnosed with a vascular condition known as arterial dissection, per ESPN.com.
Instead, the Bearcats have rallied behind Cronin, who has taken on an advisory role but can't attend practices or games, and interim coach Larry Davis.
The beauty of the Bearcats isn't just their trademark defense, which is good once again, but their balance on offense. In the last six games, Cincinnati has had five different leading scorers, including four different ones during a current five-game winning streak they'll take into the AAC tournament.
The 11 teams competing in this year's tourney, including defending national champion Connecticut, have a combined six NCAA titles between them, 22 Final Four appearances, 67 Sweet 16 appearances and 173 NCAA tournament appearances.
That's all very impressive, but the fact of the matter is that this year, even the team that finished second in the conference in the regular season, Tulsa (21-9, 14-4 AAC), is no guarantee to make the NCAA field after losing its last two regular-season contests to Cincinnati and champion SMU.
No. 20 SMU (24-6, 15-3), is the conference's only ranked team. The two hottest teams in the conference, though, are Cincinnati and Temple (both 22-9, 13-5). And the Bearcats are the hottest, with the most incentive to win. Look for them to continue scorching the competition in the conference tourney, making Cronin smile.
Atlantic 10: Davidson Dupes Everyone
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When Davidson made the decision to leave the Southern Conference after dominating it since seemingly the beginning of time, some questioned the wisdom of the move to the much more competitive Atlantic 10.
The media who cover the Atlantic 10 certainly weren't impressed. They picked Davidson to finish 12th in the 14-team conference prior to the season.
The Wildcats (23-6, 14-4) have made them and most of their Atlantic 10 opponents this year look silly. They clobbered VCU (22-9, 12-6) at home last week, 82-55, and then clinched the regular-season title by rolling to another lopsided win at Duquense in their regular-season finale on Saturday for their ninth consecutive victory.
This is an underrated, highly entertaining conference, where the top teams have been getting after each other all season. Depending on how the conference tournament goes down, as many as five teams could be headed to the NCAA tournament.
Davidson should be headed there no matter what happens, and it will face its stiffest competition in the Atlantic 10 tournament from Dayton (23-7, 13-5) and Rhode Island (21-8, 13-5). VCU, once ranked as high as 14th in the national polls, has been reeling since losing one of the keys to its vaunted pressure defense, guard Briante Weber, for the remainder of the season because of a knee injury.
The other two schools who need to make a deep run in the conference tourney and probably even win it to get to the NCAA tournament are Richmond (19-12, 12-6) and George Washington (20-11, 10-8).
But they'll probably be NIT-bound, because of the way Davidson plays on offense—No. 1 in the nation in assists-to-turnovers ratio (1.81), second in three-point field goals made per game (10.9), third in overall assists (504) and fourth in scoring average (80.6 PPG)—no one is going to beat the Wildcats in this tournament.
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Big 12: Rock Chalk, Jayhawks?
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It might seem boring to pick Kansas (24-7, 13-5) as the Big 12 tournament favorite. So we won't.
The fact is that as good as the Jayhawks have been in winning 11 consecutive regular-season Big 12 titles, they've not always rolled so easily through the conference tournament. The first 10 times they won the regular-season crown, they were foiled in the tournament on four occasions, the latest being last year, when Iowa State beat Baylor in the championship game.
Now Kansas comes in having lost its regular-season finale on a last-second putback by Oklahoma (21-9, 12-6), and with the availability of three key players still in question for the conference tournament.
Leading scorer Perry Ellis (14.2 PPG) missed the Oklahoma game with a sprained knee, freshman Cliff Alexander (the team's second-leading rebounder) has missed the last three and is being investigated for possible NCAA violations and coach Bill Self suspended Brannen Greene for at least the Oklahoma game for violating team academic rules.
That doesn't sound like a team ready to play its best against the likes of Iowa State (22-8, 12-6), Oklahoma, Baylor (23-8, 11-7) and West Virginia (23-8, 11-7). Any one of those teams stands a better chance of surviving this melee, which should provide some of the most entertaining games of the week.
The pick here is Iowa State. The Cyclones looked unstoppable recently while reeling off 59 points in a half against the same Oklahoma team that just dispatched Kansas.
Big East: 'Nova Knows Hoops
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Villanova blew out St. John's last Saturday in a statement game, 105-68, outscoring the Red Storm 55-22 in the second half to turn a close game into a rout.
St. John's (21-10, 10-8) had entered the game as arguably the hottest team in the Big East, looking to make a statement of its own. Instead, Villanova (29-2, 16-2) proved again that its lofty record and No. 4 national ranking are no flukes.
It's true that the Red Storm played the game against 'Nova without two key players who sat out with injuries, but St. John's coach Steve Lavin downplayed that and pointed out how well the Wildcats played while winning their 12th consecutive game.
"They’re playing the best basketball of any team in the country," Lavin told New York's Daily News.
So who's going to stop Villanova in the Big East tournament? Butler (22-9, 12-6), Georgetown (20-9, 12-6), Providence (21-10, 11-7) are the best bets to put up the greatest challenge. But the real answer is no one.
Big Ten: Wisconsin Will Have Its Way
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It's possible someone might rise up to surprise regular-season champion Wisconsin (28-3, 16-2) in the Big Ten tournament. But it's not likely.
No. 2 seed Maryland (26-5, 14-4) has the best chance, in part because it is on the opposite side of the bracket and also because it has proven it can do it. The Terrapins beat the Badgers in College Park on Feb. 24 by spreading the floor and attacking the basket with Dez Wells going off for 26 points. That was just one of seven consecutive victories Maryland registered leading up to this tournament.
But Wisconsin still has national player of the year favorite Frank Kaminsky and a capable, experienced supporting cast that likely would welcome a rematch with Maryland in the championship game to exact revenge.
The Badgers, ranked No. 6 nationally in the AP poll, geared up for the postseason by pounding Ohio State (22-9, 11-7) by a score of 72-48 in their regular-season finale last Saturday. That was a reminder that as good as Kaminsky is and as efficient as Wisconsin is on offense, defense is really where the team excels under coach Bo Ryan, giving up an average of just 55.7 PPG, which ranks seventh in the nation.
Other Big Ten tourney title contenders could emerge from this group: Michigan State (21-10, 12-6), Iowa (21-10, 12-6), Purdue (20-11, 12-6) and maybe even shell-shocked Ohio State—but only if it somehow avoids facing Wisconsin again.
Pac-12: Arizona at the Top
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Arizona (28-3, 16-2) is clearly the class of the Pac-12 and will roll to the tournament championship in Las Vegas unless it is the victim of a major upset. You can take that to the nearest Vegas sports book and bet on it.
The No. 5 Wildcats enter the tournament on an eight-game winning streak and are the only team in the conference ranked at all.
So why is there any trepidation at all on the part of Arizona, its fans and Coach Sean Miller? Well, that's easy to answer because, for Miller, winning the Pac-12 tournament has been anything but.
In his first six seasons at Arizona, Miller has reached the conference tourney finals three times—and lost each time. That includes last season, when the top-seeded Wildcats lost to unranked UCLA.
"We can't overlook our opponents in Vegas and look to the NCAA tournament because that's when you get beat," Arizona senior point guard T.J. McConnell told The Associated Press, via USA Today.
The three teams with the best shot to do it are Utah (23-7, 13-5), Oregon (23-8, 13-5) and UCLA (19-12, 11-7). But this time, look for Miller and Co. to finally get the job done, in large part because they can't possibly come into the tournament this time around taking a championship for granted.
SEC: Kentucky Can Do It
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To say the SEC tournament begins and ends with Kentucky (31-0, 18-0) is not an overstatement.
Let's face it. No one is going to beat these guys in this tournament, and probably not in the tournament to come after it, either.
The time to get Kentucky was early on this season in the SEC. Now the Wildcats just seem to get better every game and have a growing sense that they're on the verge of accomplishing something that hasn't happened since 1975-76, when Indiana ran the table all the way through to the NCAA championship.
Now, even when the Wildcats are off a little, like in their late regular-season game at Georgia, there is still a sense that they can score and defend almost effortlessly at levels their opponent cannot match when they ramp it up. That flips all the pressure over to the other team. And the results? Well, they've been predictable.
Kentucky has too much of everything: size, speed, shooting, defense, depth and, most of all, talent.
There are five other teams in the SEC tourney who have won 20 or more games and have had decent seasons: Arkansas (24-7, 13-5), LSU (22-9, 11-7), Georgia (20-10, 11-7), Texas A&M (20-10, 11-7) and Ole Miss (20-11, 11-7). It might be interesting to watch them fight it out for the right to be slaughtered by Kentucky in the title game, but that's about it.
Joe Menzer has written six books, including one about college basketball entitled "Four Corners," and now he writes about it and other sports for Bleacher Report. He also works as a writer and editor for FoxSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @OneMenz.
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