It is Time for Arizona Basketball to Let Sean Miller Go

The tournament officially started last night, and just like every other year, a contender got beat by a mid major. The reason this one feels different is how it happened, and to who it happened. Most people, me included, thought that this was finally the time that Arizona was going to push through. They have the presumably number one pick in the upcoming draft in DeAndre Ayton, they have Lonzo Trier, they have very good role players, and they came into the tournament on fire.

Well, none of that mattered to Buffalo last night. They absolutely throttled Arizona, especially in the second half. Buffalo seemingly could not miss from three in the second half. And Arizona had no answer. I was half watching the game because Michigan was playing at the same time. The Wolverine's game was brutal, boring, long and just all around bad basketball, but Michigan found a way to win. So, I was more interested in scoreboard watching the Arizona game. It was close in the first half too. I believe Buffalo held a halftime lead, but it was only 2 points. I figured that Arizona, with all the talent they have, would cruise in the second half after some adjustments.

That was how the second half kind of started. I kept checking the score and Arizona would go up 2, but Buffalo always had an answer. Then, with about 7 minutes to go, I checked on the game and Buffalo was suddenly up 14. As I said, they could not miss from 3. They were also out hustling and just played a much, much better game overall. Buffalo’s coach completely out coached Sean Miller. And that is where I think the problem with Arizona starts and ends.

Sean Miller is one of the biggest chokers in the tournament every year. Never mind the fact that he has this whole FBI thing going on, because he was basically cleared. This should have lit a fire under him and his players, but clearly it did not. They laid a total egg. No one, not even Ayton, could do anything to stop Buffalo. I feel like Arizona walked onto the court and just expected to win. To me, that is on the coach. He did not have his players ready to play. He expected a win. He didn’t prepare them for a fight. He thought they could just walk onto the court, let Ayton do his thing, and they would easily win. The exact opposite happened. I don’t know, maybe Miller isn’t the guy to bring Arizona back to their glory days of the early 90’s. Every year he has coached there they have been no lower than a 4 or 5 seed, but they always come up short. And the collection of talent they have this year, to get blown out in round one by a 13 seed is rough. Look, I’m not even a fan of Arizona basketball, but I expected them to at least make it to the second weekend. They are just too good.

Now, after last night, it is clear that Ayton is going to the NBA. I would be shocked if Trier didn’t do the same. Then, who will Miller have next year? I don’t know, but I don’t think it will matter. As long as Sean Miller is the head coach there, I think Arizona will continue to choke. He cannot get this team over the hump, and that is a shame. I filled out a good amount of brackets for this tournament, and on most of them I had Arizona, at least, in the Sweet Sixteen. Hell, every year my wife and I fill out brackets, make a bet, and I picked Arizona to win it all. I bought in, and that was my mistake. This has to be one of the bigger upsets in tournament history because of how badly Buffalo beat them. This is also frustrating as a college basketball fan that wanted to see Ayton play in a few more college games before going pro. Unfortunately, that won’t happen, and I blame Sean Miller.

This was disappointing, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Arizona decides that he may not be the right person to lead Arizona back to glory. He is one of the biggest chokers, at the head coaching level, in all of college basketball. He really messed up last night, and it could be his undoing. What a disappointment.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on all the internet.

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

The Latest College Basketball Scandal is Completely Worthless

I have been trying my best to not write about the whole FBI investigation into NCAA basketball, but I have heard so many different theories, I just have to put mine out there.

For those of you that may or may not know, the FBI launched a big time investigation into college basketball players getting "impermissible benefits". This basically means that players were given money to go and play for certain colleges. Some big time programs are involved with this whole thing too. I'm talking the Duke's, UNC's, Michigan State's, Kansas' and Kentucky's of the college basketball world. There are many more schools involved, but when blue bloods like that are being named, it becomes a big deal. The money that is being tossed around ranges anywhere from 40 dollars to hundreds of thousands of dollars. It is a mess.

Now, for the entirety of my young adult life, my early to mid 20's, I thought that a full scholarship was more than enough for these kids. I figured, if med students have to pay for school, but athletes don't, what more do they need? But, the older I get, the less I think that is true. Lets get something straight right off the bat, yes these kids are getting full rides to play basketball at these schools, and when you break it down, 4 year tuition to these schools can be as much as 70 to 80,000 dollars a year. But, look at all the money the schools make off the athletes. It is millions, if not billions, of dollars. The schools sell these kids jerseys in their stores for upwards of 75 dollars a pop, and these kids see none of that money. That is bull shit. Imagine that happening in the pros. Imagine LeBron or Steph or KD not seeing a dime from the sale of their jerseys. It would be ludicrous. Why is there is a double standard when it comes to these scholar athletes? They should see some kind of money off the schools using their likeness, shouldn't they? And for people like I used to be, the whole tuition is more than enough people, get the hell out of here. That isn't even close to being enough money for what the schools are pulling in.

What I went back to after this story broke was Michigan and the Fab Five stuff. Yes, they got hammered for paying those guys, mainly Chris Webber, and at the time I was mad. But, looking back on it, I had a number 4 Michigan jersey. I wore black socks. I wore Nikes. I wore Michigan shorts. And my parents got all the stuff from the University. All that money they spent to put me into all the things Webber and the rest of the Fab Five wore had to cost them more than 100 bucks. That was going on all over the country. And to crush a program for years because a kid who was making the school more money than they could print for taking 250,000 dollars, that's insane to me. That is a drop in the bucket compared to what Webber, Juwan Howard, Jalen Rose, Ray Jackson and Jimmy King brought into that school, and still do. I still see people wearing their throwback jerseys at games. The same can be said for the football program at Michigan. This is my school, so that is why I'm using them as an example. I still see those dumbass "throwback" jerseys with Denard Robinson's number 16 on the front and back when I go to games. Do you think Denard saw a dime from those jersey sales? Hell no. But, the University of Michigan easily made six figures off of those dumbass jerseys.

So when I'm looking at the schools being mentioned, and the players being named and what they supposedly took, or their parents took, it drives me nuts that they are being investigated by the FBI. The FBI has much bigger fish to fry, (clears throat), the current "government". But, they are choosing to go after college kids. I mean, Michigan State should be getting investigated by the FBI, but not for giving Miles Bridges 40 bucks. They have the entire athletic department involved in a massive sexual assault scandal, but Miles Bridges is being raked over the coals for taking 40 dollars? What a crock. And the other blue bloods involved, why is it so surprising that they are giving elite prospects money to come to their schools now? Of course Duke, UNC, Kentucky, Kansas, and so on and so forth are giving young kids and their family something to come play ball there. Don't try and tell me, and I loathe Duke, that they weren't giving guys like Christian Laettner money, just like I'm sure they gave Jahlil Okafor, Justice Winslow and now Marvin Bagley and the other star freshman they have and had money and other stuff. Same with KU. I'm not shocked that Josh Jackson's mom took 2 grand from them. I'm sure Danny Manning got some money from KU. I'm sure Mario Chalmers got stuff he couldn't afford from KU. I'm pretty sure Joel Embiid and Andrew Wiggins got stuff too. Who cares? Roy Williams and UNC have been doing this for years, so no, it doesn't surprise me that they were named. And I say again, who cares? John Calipari is one of college basketball biggest cheaters of all time. So, for Kentucky to named, of course they were named. They are giving these kids money to come there. And again, who cares? Even with the supposed phone tapped conversation of Arizona head coach Sean Miller saying that he wanted to give DeAndre Ayton 100,000 dollars to come there doesn't surprise me. And I think, if Ayton took the money, he did the right thing. Arizona is cashing in on him being there right now. I told my father after this story came out that if my son or daughter goes to school on an athletic scholarship, becomes a star and the school makes millions off using their likeness, I would fully support them taking money from agents if they were given the opportunity. Let these kids get theirs. I cannot say it enough. The schools are making tons and tons and tons of money off these athletes, so why not let these kids get something more than a full scholarship.

This has been going on forever, and if you think this is a new thing, you are wrong. Now, the FBI is involved. That is the only difference, and that is absurd. The FBI needs to deal with bigger problems, not cheating in college athletics. And for those of you that think this story will crush college basketball, you are wrong too. None of the blue bloods are going to face any real punishment, save for Michigan State, which should get hit for the horrific sexual assault stuff. Duke, UNC, Kentucky and Arizona will be just fine. Hell, some of the players named have already been cleared to play. This whole "breaking scandal" is stupid and pointless. This is being blown way too far out of proportion and in a month or two, we will have all forgotten about it. That is how I feel about this whole "scandal".

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. Ty one time took 10 bucks from a representative at Whatsamatter U. 

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

Rich Rod was a College Football Innovator. Today He is an Unemployed Creep.

Again, my other topics for the week are getting pushed back due to another sports story that broke last night.

I was watching a show with my wife and my phone buzzed with a Bleacher Report notice. I opened the notice and saw that the University of Arizona had fired their head football coach Rich Rodriguez for "the football program and the university going in different directions". I saw this, assumed it was due to his subpar record as a head coach there and kind of left it at that.

My phone kept buzzing with more and more news coming out as to why Arizona really fired him. Like I said, he had a subpar record, but it is Arizona football. Arizona is a basketball school, so I just assumed that 8-5 and 7-6 seasons were considered successful. Arizona also has a legit Heisman candidate at QB with Khalil Tate. I assumed they'd give him one more shot simply because of Tate. But, as I said, more and more stories started to pop up. I am now always interested in Rich Rodriguez stories because he is the guy that destroyed Michigan football for 3 years. When his name is mentioned I cringe, but I also read the story to see what the writer is talking about. I do the same thing with Brady Hoke. Basically anyone that was attached to Michigan football, I read stories written about them.

Well, the Rich Rod stories were quite terrifying. More and more people were saying he was being let go because of harassment allegations. More specifically, sexual harassment allegations. I do not know who brought up the allegations, but this is some serious stuff. Women are becoming more open, which is awesome, and they aren't taking this stuff from gross guys anymore. According to the few reports I read, Rich Rod had "multiple" reports of harassment since he took the head coaching job at Arizona. He, of course, vehemently denies all of this. But, I tend to believe the women now. There are too many instances of men in power thinking they can take advantage of them, and women have had enough. They are fed up. They are sticking up for themselves, and I love it.

I will say though, these allegations made me think, did he do this while at West Virginia or Michigan, his 2 previous stops as head coach? He was big time while at West Virginia. He had that team constantly in the top 15, playing in major bowl games and was considered an innovator with his spread offense. Since he was so popular at WVU, was he harassing women, but the university kept it quiet because the team was successful? If so, that is a big time shame. That is appalling. That is scary. That is some Penn State type shit. Then, after leaving WVU for the Michigan job, was he doing the same stuff there? Was he harassing women there? His teams were trash, so he didn't have the success to be his "excuse". Michigan has also been extremely compliant with the NCAA to a fault. Their football program is one of the cleaner programs in all of D-1. That is not just fan boy me saying this either. It has been proven that they have run a clean program since Bo Schembechler took over in 1969. But, was he being this disgusting while at Michigan? I don't know. I'm sure with these new allegations that more women will come forward, so we will see.

This also brings me to my final point of the day. Has there been a coach that has had this hard a fall from grace over the past decade? This ranks right up there with the Bobby Petrino stuff. This is just as bad as everything that Rick Pitino was doing at Kentucky and Louisville. This is some Hugh Freeze level stuff. Sexual harassment is no joke, and if this is proven true, Rich Rodriguez will never ever coach again, and he shouldn't be able to. This is all very odd, but surprisingly unsurprising to me. He always has had an air of superiority, and I would not be shocked at all if he did everything that was reported yesterday. This is a true fall from grace to a guy that was considered a "offensive genius" and an "innovator" at one point in his career.

Rich Rod is a creep, and stuff like this needs to stop right now.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. He has recovered from his late 2017 illness. Unfortunately, Michigan Football made Ty start 2018 by throwing up all over the place. 

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

Midseason NCAA Men's Basketball Checkup

As I did with the NBA last week, today I will look at where men's college basketball is at the half way, or more so the 3/4 mark of the season. I know I trash men's college basketball, and while I still think it is very low quality, this season has been a bit better. At least the good teams are playing each other during the regular season as opposed to only facing off during the tournament. With that being said, my conference, the Big Ten, has been an absolute shit show. The Big Ten is, by a wide margin, the worst major conference in all of men's college basketball. But, I will talk about that conference more a little later. Let's take a look at the season so far.

I am going to start with the Pac 12. The Pac 12 is very top heavy. Oregon, UCLA and Arizona are far and away the three top teams. Arizona just beat up on UCLA, and while it was a throwback to see UCLA at number 2 in the polls a few weeks ago, they are kind of crashing back down to Earth, and it all started with Arizona beating them up. Lonzo Ball is one freshman worth watching, but UCLA is a run and gun team that does not play much defense. They may make it to the second day, or even the Sweet Sixteen, but anything beyond that would surprise me. Oregon, my preseason guess to win the title, started off very poorly, won 17 in a row, then just recently got beat by Colorado. They are a very inconsistent team. I still would not be surprised if they won the whole thing, but it would not surprise me if they got beat in the first round of the tournament as well. Also, Dillon Brooks has the flop of the century. Go check it out, it is a thing of beautiful hilarity. Arizona, now at full strength, is the team to beat in the Pac 12. They looked really good against UCLA, and if they can keep it up, they are a real threat to go to the final four. They have a very, very good team. One other player from the Pac 12 I want to point out is Markelle Fultz from Washington. Washington is terrible, but Fultz is really, really good. He is a better version of Ben Simmons, in my personal opinion. If you happen upon a Washington game, do not watch for the Huskies, but watch for Fultz, he is incredible.

Now lets look at the ACC. This was supposed to be Duke's year. They had the best returning players and the best class. Things have not gone that way though. Look, I have written so much about what is wrong with Duke, but they still have a loaded team, and if they ever figure it out, they could win. But, they have way, way too many problems and I just do not see them doing much damage. They are not as great as some thought they would be. Florida State on the other hand, I know they have lost 2 straight, looks really good. Their mini losing streak is a fluke and happens to every good team. FSU has a great coach and they look like a legit threat to make a long tournament run. They also have one of those really good freshman as well. They also have the biggest basketball player I have ever seen. I do not know his first name, but his last name is Ojo, and not only is he big, but he is tremendous around the rim. UNC has a really good team, but they are not the same team as last year, and who knows what they will look like come NCAA tournament time. They could make a push, or they could go out on opening weekend. I do like that they have a bunch of upperclassmen though. After these teams, it is kind of a jumble. Notre Dame, Virginia, NC State and Louisville are all good, but I do not know what they bring to the table as a real threat. The only team on that short list that I think could unseat one of the three teams I mentioned is Louisville, but their offense is very mediocre. NC State has a great freshman, Dennis Smith Jr, but that's it. Notre Dame is just average everywhere, and so is Virginia. I think, at this moment in time, that FSU will win the ACC.

Next, the Big 12. Baylor, Kansas and West Virginia are the only teams worth mentioning. Baylor is a ton of fun to watch, but when they run into a team with similar athleticism, they just cannot keep up. They are currently the number 2 team in the country, but I do not see that lasting too long. While a ton of fun visually, I just do not see them as a real threat. WVU runs that suffocating press, but where does the scoring come from? sure, they just beat KU for the third straight year, but when they play in Allen Fieldhouse later this season, I'm sure KU will demolish them. This team is also coached by Bobby Huggins, so they are bound for an early tournament exit. KU is KU. This KU team feels a bit different to me though. Sure, they have super freshman Josh Jackson, but Frank Mason is the engine that runs this team, and Frank Mason is so damn good at basketball. The Jayhawks also have a swagger that some older KU teams did not have. KU is typically a heart-breaker in the tournament, but this team kind of reminds me of the team with Mario Chalmers that won the title a long time ago. I really like this KU team, especially after they beat Kentucky in Rupp Arena. Look for KU to be the Big 12 champ for the 13th straight year.

The predictable SEC is Kentucky and everyone else. People may say, well Florida and South Carolina are top 25 teams, I say, who cares. Kentucky is so much better than any team in the SEC, it is not fair. I don't think, nor they should, Kentucky fears any team in their conference. They will destroy those teams at will. Malik Monk and D'Aaron Fox and Bam Adebayo are great, great basketball players that play beyond their years. They all know their roles perfectly and they play them very well. Kentucky's kryptonite is teams like KU, Louisville and UNC. Those teams have upperclassmen that are not fazed by player rankings ad have been around for awhile. These are the types of teams that can beat Kentucky. Kentucky will win the SEC with ease though.

Now, lets tackle the awful Big 10. I had high hopes coming into this season for the Big Ten. I thought it would highly competitive. Unfortunately, it has been an absolute bore and a showcase for how not to play high level college basketball. Wisconsin is the "best" team in the Big Ten, but they have had recent struggles against both Rutgers and Michigan. Wisconsin is slow and shoots way too many threes and they don't utilize their best player, Nigel Hayes, nearly enough. After that, you have teams like Purdue and Northwestern that are top 25 teams. Purdue has a glut of supposed good big men, but they have not really shown out this year. Purdue's guard play has been suspect as well. They are a first round out in the tournament for sure. Northwestern is ranked! Good for you guys. You may even make your first tournament ever. That's right, they have never, not once, been in the NCAA tournament. I'm sure they'll make it this year and I'm sure they'll get bounced in the first round. But yeah, you guys are ranked. After that, the rest of the Big Ten is just bad. Michigan State has been an absolute disappointment. Michigan plays no defense and hasn't been making the three like they thought they would. Ohio State has played well below their expected level and people now want Thad Matta fired. Nebraska has been abysmal after an okay start. Maryland is ranked, but who have they played, and they look like they are struggling at all times, even when they are winning. After that, who cares. Wisconsin will probably win, but so what. The Big Ten is bad and not one team will get to the Sweet Sixteen, mark it down.

The Big East is still a conference, but the only teams worth mentioning are Villanova and Creighton. Xavier was once ranked highly too, but they have fallen off a cliff as of late.  Villanova is exactly who I thought they would be, a well disciplined, three point shooting machine. Josh Hart is awesome and they have replaced the players they lost from last years title team with ease. Maybe this is the new normal for Villanova. Creighton is okay. They beat the teams they should and get beaten by the teams they should. They are a first round out for sure. I miss the days of Georgetown being good, but things are cyclical and they will be good once again. But, for now, it is Villanova's conference to lose.

Outside of these conferences, the only other teams worth mentioning are St. Mary's and Gonzaga. St. Mary's is okay, they may win a game or 2 in the tournament, but that is about it. Then we have Gonzaga. They are undefeated and crushing each opponent with ease. With that being said, they do not have a tough schedule. So, they are doing what they're supposed to be doing, but they are not playing many tough teams. Some of that is their fault, some is other top teams not willing to play them. I think this will hurt them come tournament time, but I do think they will enter the tournament undefeated. They are this generation's St. Joe's.

As far as my final four picks, I'll go with KU, Arizona, Villanova and, what the hell, Gonzaga. The title will be KU and, what the hell again, Gonzaga, and I am picking KU to win, in a landslide. My player of the year is Frank Mason. He is the best player on the best team.

That is my midseason men's college basketball update. Take it with a grain of salt.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man. He works really hard on these college basketball articles. The pieces usually start with "College basketball sucks" and ends with "screw Flanders". Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

Ty takes a few guesses with his Men's College Basketball Preview

Finishing up with all my basketball previews, I'm going to preview the upcoming NCAA season. Now, before I get started. I want to point out how hard this will be for me. I was doing research last night, and during my research, I found out that I don't know many of the new "stars" in college basketball today.

That's a problem.

Men's college basketball is now being defined by this new "one and done" culture, and I hate it. There's no continuity anymore, and players come and go after one season. We don't get any sense of how good a team can truly be because of the rule that you have to be one year removed from high school before you can go pro. I wasn't a fan of the straight from high school to the pros, but the "one and done" culture may be worse. These athletes are basically rentals. A school recruits these kids knowing that they will only be there for one season, and coaches and upperclassmen don't seem to care. Every year it's a revolving door. A five star comes to a school like Duke or Kentucky or Kansas, leaves after the season and a new crop of five star recruits come in. Another thing that blows my mind, pundits and professional broadcasters can't seem to understand how a team like Wichita State or Gonzaga can compete with the blue bloods of college basketball. It's simple dummies, the Wichita State's and Gonzaga's of the world have something that these teams that play mostly freshman don't have, camaraderie. The kids playing at Wichita State or Gonzaga have been playing together for four, or at the very least, three years. They know each other and they know each others tendencies, strengths and weaknesses. The teams led by freshman don't have this and it hurts them when it matters most.

Take last years Final Four game between Wisconsin and Kentucky. Kentucky was undefeated, led by a bunch of All Americans and had just come off their closest game of the year in the Elite Eight against Notre Dame. Wisconsin steamrolled Arizona, another freshman laden team, and they were ready for Kentucky. Wisconsin was also led by a senior(Frank Kaminsky), a junior(Sam Dekker) and a slew of upperclassmen. Wisconsin beat Kentucky up and by the end of the game, the freshman at Kentucky were bruised, battered and physically and emotionally tired. Age won out. Now, that didn't work in the championship game against Duke, another team with mostly freshman, but Coach K is a better coach than Bo Ryan.

Men's college basketball is becoming tough to watch. It's a shit show of, look how high I can jump to dunk this ball, or look at how many threes I can shoot in 10 minutes, or look at the little amount of interest I show in playing defense. It's not very good. The talent is better, but the product has gotten worse. When Geno Auriemma, head coach of UConn's women's team, said that men's college basketball is unwatchable, I, at first, vehemently disagreed with him, but now, I'm coming over to his side. It's not that much fun to watch anymore.

With all this being said, I'm going to give a brief breakdown of the upcoming season and pick who I think, and it will be a flat out guess, is going to win the title. I'll also pick a player of the year as well. When researching, I stumbled upon a great article on cbssports.com, rating every team in division one basketball with a one or two sentence description of the team. I'm going to use this article, but only for the rankings.

They have UNC as their preseason number one. This team actually has one upperclassmen, Marcus Paige, on their roster. He's their point guard, and everything runs through him. If he plays well, UNC will be good, but the rest of his supporting cast are either freshman or sophomores and I know very little about them. Staying in the ACC, other good teams will be Duke, Virginia, Notre Dame and Miami. Duke lost three of their five best players to the draft, but they have a bunch of five stars coming in to take their place. They won't win the title again, but they'll be good, they always are. Virginia and Notre Dame are senior laden teams, but both lost their best players to the draft. They'll still make the tournament, but their runs won't be as deep. Miami should be better this year, they get better every year, and they should challenge UVA and Notre Dame for the third spot in the conference.

CBS's number two team is Kentucky. Yep, the same team that lost 7, I repeat 7, players to the NBA draft is preseason number two. They just did what Calipari does, and out recruited everyone and replace five five stars, with five more. Kentucky is the only SEC team that will do any sort of damage on a major scope this season. LSU does have the top incoming recruit, Ben Simmons, but he won't make them a contender in his one college season. And Vanderbilt may make some noise, but they are very, very far behind Kentucky.

Kansas was their number three team and they will be, once again, the class of the Big 12. They lost Cliff alexander and Kelly Oubre Jr to the pros, but they do get Perry Alexander back and they also have "star" freshman coming into Lawrence. The Jayhawks could, and will be challenged by Iowa State, Baylor and Oklahoma. Iowa State did lose their coach to the pros, but they have most of their starting five back, and that includes Georges Niang. He's one of the anomalies, and decided to stay in school to improve his game. Baylor is always lurking, and they have been for almost a decade now. It's time to take Baylor serious and stop calling them a surprise contender. And Oklahoma may have the best player in all of college basketball in Buddy Hield. He leads that team and he can do great things with the basketball.

The first Big 10 team to crack CBS's poll is Maryland, coming in at number four. Maryland surprised a lot of people last year by how well they played, and they may be the best team in all of college basketball. They did lose Dez Wells to graduation, but they have Jake Layman and Melo Trimble back. Trimble may be Hield's only competition for player of the year. The other Big 10 teams that will fight with Maryland are the usual suspects. Teams like Michigan State, Indiana, Ohio State, Purdue and Michigan will all be tournament teams. Michigan State has a fine recruiting class coming in and Denzel Valentine is back. Indiana has one of the best offenses in the country and they have some serious recruits coming in. Ohio State will be down from where they have been, but they will still be decent. Purdue has a huge frontcourt, and they will be hard to score on in the post. And Michigan, if they can stay healthy, will be lethal from the outside.

The first Big East team to make their poll is Villanova. They're coming off a 30 plus win season and look to be in good shape once again. Georgetown and Providence will be fine, but the Big East is Villanova's to lose.

The Pac 12 should be competitive. Teams like Utah, Arizona, Oregon and California will be good. Utah did lose Delon Wright to the NBA, but Jakob Poeltl is back and he's a beast inside. Arizona replaces McDonalds All Americans with more McDonalds All Americans. Oregon is a fine team, but they're not really a threat nationally. And Cal. How in the hell is Cal in this discussion? I'll tell you how, they snagged three of the best recruits in the nation somehow, and they will be really competitive for one season. I'm sure an investigation will come out in a year or two involving Cal and recruiting violations, because they haven't been relevant since Jason Kidd played point guard for them in the 90's.

The AAC has three good teams in UConn, Cincinnati and SMU. SMU loses respect because of the sanctions just handed down, so they're not relevant. Cincinnati will win a lot of games they shouldn't, make the tournament with a decent seeding, then crap out in the first or second round. UConn is the class of the conference, and they will win it going away. They have a good recruiting class, and the best coach in their league.

Outside of the power conferences, there's only two teams that really warrant a mention. These teams are the afformentioned Wichita State and Gonzaga. Wichita State returns everybody from a team that should've made the Final Four last year, and the same goes for Gonzaga. If they're ever going to finally make the jump to elite status, this is Gonzaga's best, and probably last chance.

These are the teams I wanted to break down today. There's over 300 division one men's college basketball teams, but the ones I wrote about today, in my opinion, are the only real threats to do damage. Tell me why I'm wrong and who I left out in the comment section. For a more in depth look, if that's what you want, I suggest checking out the CBS website I mentioned earlier.

As far as predictions go, my Final Four teams, right now, are Maryland, Wichita State, Gonzaga and UNC. I think the title game will feature Gonzaga and Maryland, and I'm picking Maryland to win the whole thing. Melo Trimble will also take home player of the year. This will be a big, big season for Maryland basketball. I'll revisit this later in the season, but that's how I see things right at this very moment, 2:49pm central time on October 19th. Thanks and leave a comment telling me why I'm right or wrong.

College basketball and the NBA are almost here folks.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man podcast. His first big sports heartbreak happened after an ill fated time out call in the NCAA Men's Basketball championship game. I think UNC played in that game. Follow Ty on twitter @tykulik