I'm pretty confident in saying that Georgia tossed their hat in the ring after tonight's performance.
1. Syracuse: I'm staying put. 2. tOSU: You gotta respect how they beat the [uck fay] out of IU in the return bout. 3. UK: I agree with BPV's assessment, but I can't drop them any lower than this. 4. Missouri: Mizzou @ Baylor should be pretty awesome. 5. Kansas: So the Big 12 is kinda okay this year. 6. UNC: I saw the pantsing they got at FSU, but did you three treys that one dude from FSU was dropping? Dude was unconscious. Everything went right for FSU in that game. 7. Izzo: the two consecutive road losses are rough, but they didn't get worked over in either game. They're fixin' to bounce back. 8. Baylor: I may have to shift this depending on their performance against Mizzou. 9. Duke: I'm not in love with this team at all. They aren't dominating games they need to be dominating. 10: UNLV: I should probably bump them, but there is actually a pretty decent drop-off after 9, and I didn't wanna put Florida in, and I still don't think Murray State is elite. Bumped out: Florida: they lost to us. Georgetown: gotta take care of business against Cincy at home. Indiana: Nebraska. That's it. I got my eye on: St. Mary's and UVA and Murray St.
1. Syracuse: Fab Melo is back. Syracuse now resumes beating the absolute [uck fay] out of teams. You just wait. 2. tOSU: Best team in the country based on efficiency in conference games. Considering the B1G is in my estimation the best conference this year, this is not a metric that I believe should be taken lightly. 3. UK: This team continues to get better. Anthony Davis is a marvelous marvelous defensive player. And when T Jones shows up to play, the Cats shift into an extra gear. This team can definitely win it all. 4. Mizzou: This team may have gotten a bit lucky in eeking out the road win against Texas. Or it could be that the senior-laden squad counts winning close games as one of the tricks in its bag. 5. UNC: Somehow losing their best defensive player made them better on defense. Small-scale Ewing Theory? 6. Baylor: The Bears sometimes give zone defense a bad name. But this team is (arguably) as talented as any in the country. They are not lacking in throughput. 7. Kansas: I can't weight the loss to Iowa State that heavily. Ames is a [dadgum] black hole. That, or Iowa State is actually pretty good. Or a combo of both. 8. Izzo: The loss to Illinois infuriated me probably much more than it bothered you...unless you also had money on it. So I reluctantly keep Izzo on my list, and only because Draymond Green was out. 9. Florida: This team certainly has some holes. But I can't put Duke or UNLV or anybody else at #9 in their stead. Not if I'm being intellectually honest, at least. I think UF beats those teams. 10. Murray State: When a team goes this long without losing a game, they earn a coveted spot on my list. That's just how I roll. Dropped out: Duke: This team just isn't that good. They aren't dogtrash, but they aren't an elite team and they don't have the potential to be an elite team. Not this year. UNLV: I've been high on this team, but there have been a few too many close calls against teams that they should be beating by 15. MOV is an important metric. They didn't get taken into overtime by Air Force because they thought it would be good tournament experience. They got taken to overtime against Air Force because they weren't good enough to win by 20 in regulation. And that, my friends, is a certifiable #fact. Got my eye on: St. Mary's: If they beat the Zags on the road, I will find a spot in my top ten for Randy Bennett and the Gaels.
The Duke/UF argument doesn't matter. Duke is good, but a game like today is the reason they aren't elite. They run into a mediocre Miami team that happens to be very, very athletic and they just can't handle them. They may very well come back and win this one today, but they'll run into a bad matchup like this one in the tourney and get ousted early.
Florida doesn't deserve elite status, IMO. Elite teams have to have that edge to them that makes them almost invincible. Florida doesn't have that. Ohio State, Syracuse, Kentucky: They got it. I haven't watched much UNC. I don't think Missouri is truly elite, although they are obviously good enough to make a solid run.
I agree -- if I were just going for truly elite I would have cut it off before 10. Probably at 4. It's a judgment call -- that depends on one's formulation of the word "elite" -- but it certainly wouldn't go to 10.
