7 storylines as the season approaches
Posted: Saturday, November 07, 2009 5:10 PM
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2009-10 season previews
It’s almost here.
Once four games tip off at 7 p.m. ET Monday –North Carolina vs. FIU and Ohio State vs. Alcorn State – the 2009-10 college basketball will officially be under way. We’ve provided previews, All-American teams, players to watch and everything else needed to be ready for the season.
For those late to the party and just want the big stories, Ken Davis has you covered with the biggest storylines of the season.
Ed Reinke/AP |
John Wall
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And below you’ll find the goofy and random stories to watch this season. Enjoy.
Impact freshmen return?
The 2007 recruiting class was one for the ages – Derrick Rose, Blake Griffin, Michael Beasley, Kevin Love, James Harden, Jonny Flynn, to name a few – but last year’s suffered by comparison. Expect this season’s to be somewhere in-between.
Kentucky’s John Wall is the biggest game-changer, while guys like Xavier Henry (Kansas), Avery Bradley (Texas), Mouphtaou Yarou (Villanova), Abdul Gaddy (Washington), Tiny Gallon and Tommy Mason-Griffin (Oklahoma) and John Henson (UNC) all figure to play prominently in the national title chase.
Big Ten breakthrough
This could finally be the year the Big Ten beats the ACC in their December challenge. Seriously.
No conference has more teams in the preseason AP poll than the Big Ten. The elite teams (Spartans and Boilermakers) are more likely to make Final Four runs than the ACC’s best (Duke, UNC), while there’s more quality teams in the middle of the Big Ten.
The bottom of the ACC (Virginia, Miami) is probably better than the Big Ten’s cellar dwellers (Iowa, Indiana), but the less said of those teams, the better.
Say hello to the Great West!
College hoops’ 33rd Division One conference has campuses on both coasts, so don’t let the name fool you. The league isn’t eligible for a bid to the Big Dance until 2020, so this may be the last you hear of them.
And of the seven former independents – Chicago State, Houston Baptist, NJIT, North Dakota, South Dakota, Texas-Pan American and Utah Valley – only two are eligible for an at-large berth, but the conference winner does snag a bid to the CollegeInsider.com tourney. So they got that going for them.
Mountain West still > Missouri Valley?
For the first time in years, the Mo Valley wasn’t right behind the BCS conferences in the RPI or kenpom.com’s ratings. The Valley’s young teams took turns beating up on each other in conference play and didn’t log many impressive non-conference wins like they’d done in the past. As a result, Northern Iowa was the only Valley team to earn a Big Dance bid, while the Mountain West had 2 and three more that had strong arguments.
So what to do? Set up a challenge series, of course! Between Nov. 13 and Dec. 23, nine games will be played between the league’s teams. The must-see matchups include Southern Illinois at UNLV (Nov. 21), Creighton at New Mexico (Dec. 19) and Illinois State at Utah (Dec. 19). Whoa. How’d the MWC score all those home games?
Coach with cancer
BYU’s Dave Rose was diagnosed with pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor cancer in June. The rare form of pancreatic cancer has been a trial thus far – as you’d expect – but Rose is doing his damndest not to let it affect him and his Cougars this season.
"The one thing I keep remembering from what the doctor said is how rare this is," Rose told Andy Kats this summer. "Out of a million people [who get pancreatic cancer], five get this type of [treatable] tumor. Nobody wants cancer. Everyone has their own way to deal with it. But I feel really lucky about my odds and my prognosis."
Coaching’s hard enough without something like this, but to think that Rose could possibly have the Cougars back in the NCAA tournament is astounding. Keep that in mind when watching BYU.
Block party
Mississippi State’s Jarvis Varnado needs 141 blocks this season to break the all-time markof 535 by Louisiana-Monroe’s Wojciech Mydra, set in 2002. Barring an injury, it should be cake. The 6-9 senior’s had more than 141 each of the last two seasons when he led D-I in blocks.
More interesting will be if he can approach David Robinson’s single-season record of 207, set in 1986. The closest anyone’s come was Northeastern’s Shawn James, who totaled 196 in 2006, which also set the average per game record of 6.53. Varnado would be hard-pressed to top either given the Bulldogs’ additions along the frontline.
Coaching milestones
Unless Syracuse suffers a second big upset in less than a week, Jim Boeheim’s headed for some rare air against Albany on Monday: Career win No. 800. Only 11 coaches have won that many games, the most recent being Jim Calhoun last season. It’s a nice career tribute for a guy who’s never coached anywhere else.
Meanwhile, Rick Barnes needs 28 wins for No. 500, Bill Self should hit No. 400 in early March, and Dana Altman’s getting to 400 before Christmas. Coach K’s headed for 850 in Feb.
And Roy Williams needs 6 victories for his 600th victory. When that happens, only two coaches will have earned it faster – Adolph Rupp and Jerry Tarkanian. Few people rack up the wins like Roy.
There you go. What else should we be paying attention to this season?
Follow me on Twitter (@BeyndArcMMiller) and get more college basketball news at NBCSports.com.
