Ty's 2024-2025 NCAA College Basketball Preview
/Today I'm going to do a men's NCAA basketball preview. Now, as big a grain of salt I told you all to have with my NBA predictions yesterday, find a grain of salt that is double the size of that one. Men's college basketball is like the wild west, I don't know half the players, I can't seem to get into it until halfway through the season and the product is not always the best. And instead of going through the power 5 conferences, I'm going to go off the preseason top 25, and of course I'm going to talk about Michigan.
In fact, let's talk about Michigan right now. I was a big fan of the Juwan Howard hiring at the time. I loved it. And it started out pretty well too. They made the tournament. Hell, they even made the Elite Eight. But, after some players left for the pros, the rails fell off. Then Howard started to fight with the staff. Then he had a heart condition. Then the top recruits either fell off or transferred. Last season was bad, so they let him and the entire staff go. They hired Dusty May from Florida Atlantic, and he brought some of his players over and brought in some transfers from elsewhere. They looked good in their exhibition last week, but I'm not writing much into that. With that being said, I do have high hopes. I'm excited to watch them play. I think they could surprise a few people. But, the Big 10 is tough. There's going to be a ton of travel and that will take a toll on the players. I expect this team to be loads better this season, and make a push at the tournament. I don't know if they'll make the big one, but the NIT seems like a real possibility, with my hopes being they make the big tournament.
Now to the top 25.
Kansas is number 1, and that's not surprising. They have a great recruiting class coming in and Hunter Dickinson came back for another season. I think he's overrated, I did when he was at Michigan, but the talent around him is great. Alabama is 2, and I have zero idea who is on their team. I'm sure they're good, they were in the Final Four very recently. UConn is 3, and why they aren't number 1 is baffling to me. They have won two straight titles and Dan Hurley is the best college basketball coach. Houston is next, and then Iowa State. Kelvin Sampson is an upper tier college basketball coach and I couldn't tell you a damn thing about Iowa State. Gonzaga, Duke, Baylor, North Carolina and Arizona round out the top 10. Gonzaga is no Cinderella anymore. They're a legit title contending team. Duke has Cooper Flagg, and he is awesome. He is going to be the top pick in the draft. Baylor and UNC probably have the most depth and most veteran leadership. And Arizona has Caleb Love, who is awesome and really elevated his game last year. I wish he was able to go to Michigan.
Following the top 10 we have Auburn, Tennessee, Texas A&M, Purdue and Creighton. Auburn seems to be a much more respected offseason team than regular season and tourney team. Tennessee is hanging around and they are solid. I didn't know that Texas A&M was a good basketball team. Purdue made a push to the title game last year, but they have a ton of talent to replace, namely Zach Edey. And Creighton might be this generation's Gonzaga. They're always good. We then have Arkansas, Indiana, Marquette, Texas and Cincinnati. Arkansas hired John Calipari. He is a great recruiter and a mediocre coach. Arkansas will get great players, but they will burn out of the tournament way sooner than expected. Indiana is gooding good recruits, but they haven't really been able to become a serious threat just yet. Shaka Smart is still the coach at Marquette, and he will get the best out of his players no matter what. Texas usually brings in solid transfers and the new head coach is good. And RD could tell you more about Cincy than me (editors note: I could not really tell you more than Ty just did). The rest of the top 25 is Florida, UCLA, Kentucky, Ole Miss and Rutgers. Florida has become pretty steady. UCLA is a blueblood, but they haven't been as dominant as in the past. Kentucky has to replace Calipari, and they had to search hard to find one, so who knows how they'll look. I am confused as to why Ole Miss is here, and Rutgers got two top flight recruits. They will be very, very good this season.
Look, preseason polls are useless. I don't think you should rank anyone until a month into the season. We can't get a grasp on how good these teams are until we see them play a handful of games. Case in point, UConn isn't preseason number 1. What more do they have to do to convince pollsters that they're the best team in the country. If you want a Final Four prediction right now, on October 23rd, I'll go with UConn, Alabama, Houston and Duke. I'll go with UConn to win a third straight championship over Duke. Cooper Flagg will make Duke that good, but UConn has the far better coach, probably more vets and they will easily walk through the tournament for another season.
Ty
Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on the internet.
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