PREVIOUSLY: Intro: Parallax, Previews Part One, Previews Part Two, Previews Part Three, Previews Part Four, Previews Part Five, AAC, WCC, Mountain West, ACC, Pac-12, Big East.
Hello! This is Part Eight of our multi-week conference preview series, which is nine parts long. Today’s previews cover the Big Ten, SEC, and Big 12, which are ordered using KenPom’s conference rankings. These are all separate posts, because we are finally to the portion of these that are both pretty long and require their own address. This one is for the SEC, which is either the most annoying conference in the world (negative) or the most annoying conference in the world (positive) entirely depending on whom you ask.
The difference between these three conferences and the other 29 is that all three will be genuinely deeply disappointed if they do not produce a single Final Four team. Like it or not, these three are a slight level ahead of the competition. Each is going to produce anywhere from 7-9 NCAA Tournament teams, meaning they’re going to constitute over a third of the future field of 68. Any of the conferences producing fewer than six Tournament teams would be an unmitigated disaster, the likes of which would force everyone to look in the mirror for a very long time.
I talked yesterday about why these three conferences separate themselves from the remainder of the Big Six. Here’s a reminder: together, they represent half of the current top 12 teams on KenPom. They also collectively have one team - Minnesota - below 100th. The other three Big Six conferences have eight between them. These are deeper, more competitive groups all the way down. That’s why they matter most.
Lastly: as has been outlined a few times now, all conference previews are behind a paywall.
…
Except this one.
I’ve opted to make this specific post free because I have an inordinate amount of SEC followers thanks to the Tennessee coverage. I also like free engagement and whatnot. Gift horse, mouth, etc. If you like it, consider paying the $30/year for the subscription ($20/year for people with .edu emails). Alternately, I think you can use a free trial for a week or whatever. Just get in touch. Also: if you’re a media member reading this and want to use a quote or whatever from my paywalled work, go for it. As long as you’re not sharing the whole thing in a PDF I do not care. It ain’t that serious.
Onward. With no paywall!
SEC
Tier 1 (locked-in top 15 nationally for me, plausible title contenders)
Tennessee
Texas A&M
Tier 2 (all somewhere between 18th-32nd best?)
Arkansas
Kentucky
Auburn
Alabama
Florida
Mississippi State
Tier 3 (likely one but not 2-3 NCAAT teams in the bunch, up to them to decide who’s who)
Ole Miss
LSU
Missouri
Tier 4 (various small businesses living check to check, waiting for that NIT bid in the sky)
Vanderbilt
Georgia
South Carolina
There was a time when this was a pretty nasty basketball conference to follow. Said time really wasn’t that long ago! From 2008 to 2021, the SEC never finished higher than 4th as a conference in KenPom’s conference rankings. The nadir was pretty clearly the 2013-2016 run, in which the SEC did place a total of four Final Four teams but had just 14 total bids (3.5 per season) to show for it. That was after they added Missouri and Texas A&M to get to 14 teams, by the way. There was a real time in history when the third-best coach in the SEC, after John Calipari and Billy Donovan, was probably Kevin Stallings.
And take a look at these guys now! All grown up. Look at ‘em. This is a real contender for the Best Conference in America™ title. Torvik gives them a serious chance (52%) at getting nine or more teams into the field of 68, which is something the SEC has never managed. It’s only been done five times ever, the last by the Big Ten in 2021. The depth of coaching in the conference is now to the level that Todd Golden, a coach I legitimately like and admire, probably has the 10th or 11th-best resume in the conference. He would’ve been Stallings-level in 2016.
I think I’m stalling here because I don’t want to talk about my pick for #1. Tennessee is the team I cover year-round, so naturally, seeing them at #1 makes me a little nervous. Am I being a bit of a homer? Too positive towards the team I cover? Too willing to overlook the flaws to accentuate the strengths? In any case, the most objective version of me genuinely believes the Vols have the best roster in the league, maybe because they’ve just got the highest floor.
Like any metric, Evan Miyakawa’s Bayesian Performance Rating isn’t perfect. But I do think it’s useful because it weighs defense as much as offense. As such, it’s telling me Tennessee returns four of the 112 best players in all of college basketball from last season. Four of the 40 best defenders from last season are back. No SEC team has more players on it who made 40+ threes a year ago than Tennessee’s five. Only Mississippi State has more players with a 3% Steal% or higher. Between those two teams, they have nine of the 16 players in the SEC who hit that metric.
The floor, as it stands for Tennessee, is sky high. There are no real scenarios, minus those with severe injury, where Tennessee is not at minimum a top 25 team. There’s probably few where Tennessee isn’t one of the 15 best. The problem is finding those where Tennessee ends the year as one of the 5 best. It all depends on if this is finally the year Rick Barnes can marry his perennially-elite defense with a top-25 offense to craft a serious contender. Maybe, finally, this is it. We’ll see.
Anyway, I will admit I’m saving most of the real analysis for the Tennessee preview that comes out next week, considering that alone will be 15,000 words or something. The makeup of Tennessee’s roster leads me to believe that this will probably be one of the 3-5 best defenses, but with enough offensive improvements to be one of the…I don’t know, 25-30 best offenses. I basically think Tennessee is 2022-23 UCLA (21st O, 2nd D) or 2020-21 Alabama (30th O, 3rd D), but not 2022-23 Tennessee (#64/#1) or 2022-23 Houston (#11/#5). With a little bit of push they can be 2018-19 Texas Tech or 2017-18 Texas Tech or one of the other numerous non-Texas Tech I have lost to memory.
Given the recent history (aka, last 5 years) of SEC play, it could be unwise to do a two-team Tier 1 that doesn’t contain any of Kentucky, Auburn, or Alabama. But whatever, if forced to rank the rosters on a national scale I would safely say Texas A&M is one of the 15 best. You could make an argument for them having one of the ten best, though that might be a half-step too far. Either way, really good group that is going to contend for both SEC titles and for something in the 2-5 seed range come March. Let’s say they’re #12 or #13. Tennessee is, I don’t know, #6.
The reason for A&M optimism is pretty obvious. No SEC team returns more production from their 2022-23 side, and A&M’s was a 7 seed that won 15 SEC games after a terribly slow non-conference start. Only one starter departs, and even so, they added a pair of transfers that combined to average 29 PPG/11 RPG last season at smaller schools. The real case for optimism roster-wise is that they probably have the best backcourt in the SEC, with the only serious arguments coming from Tennessee or Alabama. (I’ll believe it when I see it re: Kentucky.)
The dual hydra running this show are Wade Taylor IV (16.3 PPG, 3.9 APG, 36% 3PT) and Tyrece ‘Boots’ Radford (13.3 PPG, 5.3 RPG). Taylor in particular might be the very best returning player this conference has, one of just two returning players at the high-major level (Boogie Ellis, USC) who posted a 25% or greater Usage, a 110+ ORtg, and a 35%+ hit rate on 150+ three-point attempts. Taylor is also an excellent bad shot maker. He put up a 55.6% eFG% on pull-up jumpers last year (#1 in the SEC by a mile) and 40% on runners (again, #1 in SEC min. 60 attempts). That gives A&M’s offense a new dimension on nights when they don’t produce elsewhere.
Probably notable is that A&M really needs them on the court together at all times. You could write certain things off like a huge shooting split (35.4% 3PT with both on the court, 27.8% with one or the other off) as part of sample size, but when either leaves the court, they become far less threatening on the boards. They turn the ball over way more. They also struggled to produce any points not at the free throw line. About 16 minutes per game last year was spent with one or the other on the bench, so they’ve got to figure out how to better manage those minutes.
Along with the best backcourt they’re probably the scariest offensive rebounding/foul drawing offense the conference has. Over the four-year Buzz era A&M’s averaged a #13 ranking in OREB% and #5 in FT Rate nationally. The only other team in the same stratosphere in the league is Auburn. A lot is built around the truly nasty frontcourt pairing of Henry Coleman III and Julius Marble, who combined to average 9.8 rebounds a game last year as well as 8.5 fouls drawn per 40. During the 678 possessions the pair shared on-court last year, A&M won the rebounding battle by roughly +10 per 100 possessions (+4.4 otherwise).
I guess the main thing holding me back here is history. We’ve had four years of Buzz at A&M and exactly none of the four seasons have featured both a quality non-conference and conference performance. For example:
2019-20: 6-6 non-conference, 10-8 SEC
2020-21: 6-1 non-conference, 2-8 SEC
2021-22: 11-2 non conference, 9-9 SEC
2022-23: 8-5 non-conference, 15-3 SEC
In every season A&M has been outright stinky for 1.5 months of the season and fairly awesome for the other 2.5. It’s roulette as to which is which. Part of this is due to a truly pathetic non-conference schedule. A&M’s scheduled nine (9) top 100 non-conference opponents in four years, which is the same number Alabama scheduled in 2022-23 alone. In 2023-24, Buzz has scheduled four with potentially more to come in their Thanksgiving tournament. Finally, for the first time, we might actually know something about these guys before January. Just be prepared to forget all you know in said January unless this is finally the year they turn normal.
The difference between Tiers 1 and 2: I would be pretty surprised if any of Tier 1 finished outside of the national top 25 and stunned if either missed the Tournament. I would not be surprised if any of the six teams in Tier 2 finished out of the top 25 and one of them will probably manage to miss the Tournament. I definitely think all of them should get in, though.
Arkansas tops the list of these teams because while these rosters are roughly equal (like, 19th-31st best?), I think they have the best coach. It’s them or Alabama, and I like their roster more than Alabama’s. The Razorbacks are doing their usual thing under Eric Musselman, which is turning up the roster difficulty rating to 9/10 while replacing ~65% of their production every year via the portal. Exactly one player from the 2021-22 Elite Eight team is still here: Davonte Davis, back for the billionth year in a row to be an agent of chaos on both offense (in a bad way) and defense (good).
I know pretty well what I’m getting with Davis every season. His motor and speed may be unmatched in the sport. He doesn’t create that many steals but he’s very good at running shooters into no man’s land. With Davis on the court last year, Arkansas opponents attempted just 29% of all shots from deep. I also unfortunately know what I’m getting with Davis on offense: a guy with a career 99 ORtg and 31% hit rate from deep who commits plenty of turnovers.
He cannot and presumably will not be the lead guy. That’s likely going to be either Khalif Battle (17.9 PPG Temple) or El Ellis (17.7 PPG Louisville), two transfer guards who have lead experience but have various flaws. Battle shot 35% from deep on fairly high difficulty at Temple last year but has been a net-negative defender over the course of his career. Ellis I’m almost willing to give a straight mulligan because he played on possibly the worst Big Six team of all time, but his defensive numbers are similarly awful and I think of him as a fine shooter, nothing special.
The guys that I trust most, and the guys that I am actually looking to to see what Arkansas really is this year, are Tramon Mark (10.1 PPG, 4.9 RPG) and Trevon Brazile (11.8 PPG, 6 RPG, 38% 3PT). Mark immediately comes in as the best defender and likely best overall player on the roster. I adored what he did at Houston as a role player and think he’s got a real chance to elevate his game here. Brazile, meanwhile, was about the only shooter worth caring about on last year’s roster and is a genuinely very good interior defender.
What we have here is a roster that is absolutely stuffed with guys I would like as my second or third option. I’m waiting to see who that #1 is before I get super interested in them offensively. But: at this point you just trust these guys until you have a reason not to. Musselman’s finished top 25 at KenPom in three straight seasons with three straight top 20 defenses. They also generally take care of business when they’re supposed to; Muss is 44-31-2 ATS as a favorite the last three years and the Razorbacks are 50-6 against Quadrants 2-4 post-COVID.
I think I’m going to regret having Kentucky, a team with 5,000 questions and not all of the answers readily available, at 4th. In terms of pure roster talent on board I’m not sure anyone in the SEC comes close. There are five (!) five-star freshmen recruits, a pair of former blue-chippers on the bench, and two grad student starters that averaged 12+ PPG a year ago. They even have one of the best pure scorers available sitting right there at shooting guard in Antonio Reeves (14.4 PPG, 40% 3PT), one of two returners in the SEC (Santiago Vescovi) who made 80 or more threes last season.
There is all of that, and there is even more uncertainty. In the process of writing this, John Calipari subtly dropped the news that both Aaron Bradshaw (5-star center) and Ugonna Onyenso (1 BPG, Kentucky’s best rim protector by a mile) are out for around 5-6 weeks. I finished writing this section on October 11. If that timeline is accurate, that places their return after the November 14 Kansas game…which is the lone decent test you’ll get for these guys prior to Thanksgiving.
You can see where, if everyone stays healthy, this grand experiment in youth works. Justin Edwards currently sits as the odds-on favorite to go #1 in the next Draft; he is a fairly obvious pick for Freshman of the Year in this conference. He pops off as an excellent inside and outside scorer, though he more frequently defaults to attacking the rim. D.J. Wagner is a potential top five pick and will run point for Kentucky. I think he’s an excellent passer and creator who needs work on his jumper, but he has insane potential. He’s always looking to score.
There is Rob Dillingham, a real microwave scorer who more or less plays exactly the same way as Wagner. There is Reed Sheppard, an excellent shooter that could help space the floor quite a bit. The talent is truly undeniable. I simply do not envy Calipari and staff figuring out how it all fits together. By my count, there are two plus shooters on the roster: Sheppard and Reeves. They play the same position. Wagner’s shooting numbers were far less impressive than what he did inside the perimeter in high school. Edwards is a good shooter who doesn’t shoot it nearly enough. Tre Mitchell is profoundly okay from deep. Dillingham ran extremely hot and cold on threes in high school.
If this all works, it’s because Calipari is and always has been a bit of a strange genius. If it doesn’t, it was honestly fairly easy to see coming. The talent is so high here that I have to assume they can survive well enough, but I think you’re going to get a mix of Final Four-level performances with 20+ point losses. It also feels like a team everyone freaks out about in January but talks themselves into in February.
I genuinely cannot tell if I am too high/too low/just right on Auburn. I have seen these guys ranked literally anywhere from 2nd to 8th in the SEC this offseason and all of it seems reasonable. Maybe it’s a punt to have them fifth, I don’t know. Last year’s team was just the second in six seasons to not finish with a top-4 conference record in the SEC, meaning Bruce Pearl and company get this done more often than not. But: last year gives me a bit of pause.
If you don’t recall, Auburn went into last year with a fair bit of hype despite losing Jabari Smith to the NBA. They brought back a ton of production, were highly experienced, were pretty deep…and plummeted from KenPom preseason #13 to a 9 seed and a nondescript Round of 32 exit, along with a boring 10-8 SEC finish. Gone is Wendell Green, but returning is the hyper-chaotic K.D. Johnson (8.9 PPG, 98 ORtg) in the backcourt. The offseason’s big moves to replace backcourt production were a five-star freshman PG (Aden Holloway) and an FIU transfer in Denver Jones (20.1 PPG, 37% 3PT).
It probably goes without saying that, for the third straight year and probably the fourth, I’m not a fan of whatever it is Auburn is attempting to do in the backcourt. Holloway has the most upside; Johnson is topped out as a chaos agent and Jones rode a likely unsustainable 48% hit rate on midrange twos last year. (He is also an openly bad on-ball defender.) I do not rate Tre Donaldson beyond that of a fine bench player.
So it’s going to fall on the frontcourt once again, and luckily for Bruce, I love this frontcourt. You are well aware of Johni Broome (14.2 PPG, 8.4 RPG), but you may not be aware of how impactful Broome was a year ago. The following is adjusted for three-point shooting luck, via Hoop-Explorer:
That is a defense that went from top-30 to top-110 when Broome left the court. He’s a fabulous rim protector and Auburn’s defense funnels perimeter shooters into the paint, not the midrange, so Broome can take care of business. He has real room to grow away from the rim, as he shot just 31.4% on anything that wasn’t a layup/dunk/tip last year, but he’s so good otherwise I can forgive it.
The other options are nice, too. Jaylin Williams may be the most underrated player the SEC has, a stretch 4 that shoots 35% from three and plays fabulous defense. Auburn’s offense looked far more functional last year with him on the court. I also remain a steadfast believer in Dylan Cardwell, who made 75% of his shots a year ago and is as good a shot-blocker as Broome. I think these guys basically go as far as their frontcourt goes, barring Holloway or Jones coming in way over expectation.
The problem with ranking Alabama 6th is this, per our friend Jon Fendler:
Such is the Alabama quandary. When the shots go in, especially from deep, they’re unbeatable. Nate Oats’ Tide are a perfect 22-0 post-COVID when hitting 40% or more of their threes. They don’t necessarily need an amazing day from deep to beat you, though. Last year, Alabama’s worst day of the SEC season - a 3-for-22 (14%) day from deep against Arkansas - still resulted in a win, because they made 26 of 42 (62%) twos. Every game is a math equation to Nate Oats, which makes sense because Nate Oats was formerly a math teacher.
Anyway, enough nerd stuff. What about the actual talent? Torvik’s metrics believe this is the least-talented (in terms of recruiting stuff) Alabama team in quite some time. I think that lowers the ceiling the Tide can offer this year but likely raises the floor, as what is here includes four senior starters. More importantly: a backcourt I think everyone can get excited about on offense. Mark Sears (12.5 PPG) is back as the point guard, but Aaron Estrada (20.2 PPG, 37% 3PT) comes in from Hofstra as a real Bucket Problem. (RIP.)
Estrada has more upside as a scorer, as he was one of just three players last year (Jalen Wilson of Kansas, Andrew Taylor of Marshall) to hit my dumb 70/70/70 Trio: 70 made shots at the rim, 70 made midrange attempts, 70 threes. That’s going to travel regardless, but I would argue Sears is the bigger impact guy. Alabama’s offense, already quite good, was significantly better at scoring inside the perimeter with Sears on the court last year. Rylan Griffen makes sense as a Year Two breakout guy though I’d like better than 30% from deep.
What this comes down to, both good and bad, is the frontcourt. Oats brought in Grant Nelson from North Dakota State, a terrific interior scorer who’s scuffled a bit as a shooter (27% 3PT last year) and comes from a truly horrendous defensive conference. If you’re a believer in Nelson’s NBA future you may think he translates better than I, but I don’t know. I’m more worried about center, where Oats has to decide between Mohamed Wague and Nick Pringle at the 5. Neither are remarkable options, neither can do much offensively. Can they play Nelson - primarily an interior guy - and one of those two together? It would go against what I’ve historically known Oats to do.
The back two of Tier Two are intriguing. One finished 9-9 in the SEC last year, the other 8-10. One finished 74th in KenPom, the other 53rd. Neither had a top-125 offense. Yet, thanks to some well-timed wins and late game luck, Florida had the far less impressive Year One under a new coach compared to the team beneath them in these rankings. Todd Golden more or less blew up that roster and is starting anew with five transfers. (This was six, but Yale transfer EJ Jarvis left the program while this preview was being written.)
So last year’s data - which suggests a program with a horrible offense and excellent defense - is more or less not useful. Only two players of any repute return from it, one of which is everyone’s breakout candidate and a darkhorse POTY contender. Riley Kugel (9.9 PPG, 38% 3PT) may not have the most impressive numbers in the world, but the way he closed last season has everyone salivating, scoring 17.3 PPG over the final ten games. The only guy who scored more during that time among freshmen: Brandon Miller.
I anticipate Kugel will be pretty awesome, but the guy with the higher overall floor as a returner is Will Richard (10.4 PPG, 40% 3PT). With both on the court last year, Florida actually resembled a functional offense.
Kugel AND Richard ON: 114.6 ORtg (#31 nationally)
One or neither of Kugel/Richard ON: 103.2 ORtg (#195)
A ton of that was driven by Kugel and Richard being the only useful shooters the team had, but Florida also turned it over less and made the drawbacks both have as defenders a bit less painful. Golden’s bread and butter at San Francisco was funneling everything away from the perimeter and into one-on-one scenarios where his defense could force tough twos. Even with a roster largely comprised of former mid-major athletes, that should still work just fine, considering it did with mid-major athletes for three years at USF.
The offensive portion of the excitement/turnaround here is therefore entirely transfer-driven. A new look backcourt will be headed by Walter Clayton Jr. (16.8 PPG, 43% 3PT) from Iona, who might be the most impactful player on the roster. Clayton gives Florida four players who shot 38% or better from three last year, including UC Riverside transfer Zyon Pullin (18.3 PPG). The loss of Colin Castleton is tough particularly on O but I love Micah Handlogten (7.6 PPG, 9.8 RPG, 2.3 BPG) as a defender and rim protector. Tyrese Samuel is a solid defender and made Seton Hall a much better rebounding outfit on the court last year.
I see three problems. In order:
This is an unfixable problem, which is that the level of talent here is largely up-transfers from smaller, lesser leagues. Florida’s Talent Rating of 36.3 would be the lowest ever in his database for a top-25 SEC team. (The current high for someone sub-45 post-expansion is 2021-22 Texas A&M at #32.) It’s happened in the Big 12 several times, though, so who knows.
The frontcourt is really really limited on offense. So your two starters look to be Samuel and Handlogten. The two of them combined for five made threes a year ago and shot a combined 11/40 on all jumpers. The problem within the problem is that Florida doesn’t have an obvious replacement for either and leans into the third problem…
Florida has six trustworthy, playable guys as of right now. I mean I do not think this is extreme to say. Even in The Almanac, a perfect area to dispense all one’s Coach Speak, Todd Golden said he had four guys in the backcourt (Kugel, Richard, Clayton, Pullin) plus two in the frontcourt (Samuel, Handlogten) that he seems fully comfortable with. That’s a six-man rotation and two useful guys up front, which is just not enough for a whole season of ball. Someone - potentially either of the two big freshmen in Thomas Haugh or Alex Condon - is gonna have to step up to provide help up front. Either that or Florida’s gonna have a lineup with four 6’4” or shorter players in it against Texas A&M, a thing no one wants to see.
Mississippi State rounds out this tier, and I desperately hope they are more watchable than the slop they put out last winter. The Bulldogs were the first non-16 seed to shoot 27% or worse and make the NCAA Tournament since 2004-05 Boston College, which is a kind way of saying they had an amazing defense that dragged them to the finish line. Is there a person on Earth, aside from Mississippi State fans, that enjoyed what they watched last year? Anybody?
Well, the good news first: the engine that dragged them to the NCAA Tournament is out until conference play at earliest. Tolu Smith (15.7 PPG, 8.5 RPG) was an obvious All-SEC pick this year and last year. Across MSU’s 16 games against top-75 competition (aka, roughly NCAAT-level schools), Smith averaged 15 & 9 while shooting 56% from two. The rest of the MSU roster combined shot 44% on twos and barely cracked 0.94 PPP as a team. If Smith could shoot a basketball he would be a miracle worker.
Unfortunately, Smith isn’t a shooter and he’s now out for at least two months, unless MSU’s medical staff works some magic. Adjusted for shooting luck, MSU was roughly as bad at shooting and turning the ball over but worse at getting to the FT line and protecting the boards when Tolu left the court.
State does have the benefit of returning their rotation mostly intact. All five starters (Smith included) are back from a year ago. The best of these in that same sample size against quality competition was Dashawn Davis (8.7 PPG, 3.5 APG, 1.7 SPG), not coincidentally the only player on this roster that shot decently at all last year. Davis hit 37 threes on 34% shooting and was the team’s best ball-handler. They added Andrew Taylor via Marshall, a score-first point who shot 36% on threes last year. (I’m obligated to mention freshman newcomer Josh Hubbard, who scored 4,300+ points in high school.)
The good news for Jans is that the defense should yet again be awesome. Returning the same starting five from an immediate Year One top-10 defense likely keeps them at least in the top-20 even with some regression on the opponent 3PT% front. 12 players posted a Steal% of better than 3% last year among this year’s SEC roster members; four of them play for MSU. An additional four play for Tennessee. When those two teams play please watch literally anything else.
I guess this just comes down to how much you trust Jans and the rest of this State roster to deliver. I cannot stand watching the non-Taylor/Davis members of this roster on offense. Even those two are pretty flimsy. If they can escape non-conference play at 10-3 or even 11-2, they’re going to be in business for March once Tolu hopefully comes back in January. If not, and they start dropping games to Arizona State (November 8) or Washington State (November 17), they might be in trouble.
Tier three is a simple one: I believe that one of these three teams is making the NCAA Tournament. I have my best guess at which of the three it is. I am under no delusion that it is a lock any of the three get in. I suppose I am riding with Ole Miss and Chris Beard to be the best of this very flawed bunch. They’ve got the best roster of the group. They’ve probably got the best coach of the group. However, in Year One with a very different roster from last season, it’s not a lock that everything comes together flawlessly for a Tournament bid.
Still, this is a damn good roster…if a certain waiver goes through. I do not believe it to be an overstatement to say a lot is riding on whether Moussa Cisse (6.8 PPG, 8 RPG, 1.9 BPG) gets a waiver to play. If he’s available, this is a frightening defense. Oklahoma State held opponents to an 86.8 schedule-adjusted defensive rating last year when Cisse was on the court, which is Tennessee-level good. He’s a tremendous rebounder, unreal rim protector, and overall scary fella. Also, his backup would be Jamarion Sharp (7.4 PPG, 7.7 RPG, 4.1 BPG), a 7’5” freak from Western Kentucky who is one of the greatest shot-blockers in modern history.
If both are available, Ole Miss has a very serious shot at having a top-20 defense in year one of Beard, which would be critical because I am far from convinced of anything they offer offensively. Matthew Murrell (14.4 PPG) and Jaemyn Brakefield (11.1 PPG, 5.7 RPG) are both back from last year’s rough Rebels squad, but that’s basically it in terms of proven high-major guys who can score somewhat efficiently. Brandon Murray comes in via Georgetown but posted a 93 ORtg and offers two years of data showing a very middling offensive player. Jaylen Murray shot 36% from deep but isn’t efficient elsewhere. Beard’s best shot is being a more watchable version of last year’s Mississippi State team: a very bad offense held afloat by a nasty defense. When MSU and Ole Miss tangle this year, they will be mopping blood off the court for hours after.
Based on the preseason poll, which has them 13th, I have a feeling I may be higher than a lot of people on LSU. Not higher than Ken Pomeroy, whose ratings have LSU 9th in the conference, but higher than most. Year One of Matt McMahon, which mostly consisted of him importing his Murray State roster, was an unmitigated disaster. LSU’s hot-ish start turned into a 2-16 SEC finish. Some of that was poor luck (ShotQuality had LSU as worth five more wins than they actually got), but it was also self-inflicted. Only South Carolina had a worse eFG% margin, and the only thing LSU did particularly well was crash the offensive boards.
This year’s roster is heavily remade once again, but I like their backcourt more than I liked last year’s. Jalen Cook (19.9 PPG, 4.9 RPG) is imported from Tulane, where he was the Green Wave’s lead scorer and best offensive option basically every night. Cook gives LSU something they didn’t really have at point last year, which is a point guard we know can score consistently even against quality competition. Cook was one of just five 6’2” or shorter players last year to go 55%+ FG% at the rim and 45%+ FG% from midrange. That’ll play in a really strong conference that demands some amount of quality scoring.
I guess the problem, perhaps more long-term, is that I don’t really care for any of the LSU returners. The best is Derek Fountain (8 PPG, 5.5 RPG), who had a real impact last year on the boards and is a solid all-around player. That’s not bad, but Fountain is probably the fourth or even fifth-best player on the 10th-best SEC roster. The three guys I actually do like quite a bit are all transfers. If McMahon manages to sustain that, good for him, but this is obviously a super-deep and competitive conference that only gets tougher next year.
I know what I have in Cook. The season hinges on the success of three other transfers for me: Jordan Wright (Vanderbilt), Carlos Stewart (Santa Clara), and Will Baker (Nevada). Wright has a career 98 ORtg and is just 31% from deep, but he was the best perimeter defender on Vandy’s roster last year and is a proven double-digit scorer at the SEC level already.
The two non-Big Six guys are swing pieces, and one of them absolutely has to hit for LSU to be a good team. Stewart shot 40% from deep a year ago at Santa Clara on high volume and was a quality defender, while Baker is a seven-footer that can shoot it a little and does most of the things you expect seven-footers to do. If both hit, LSU’s a Tournament team. If neither hit and if Wright doesn’t become more efficient, they’re probably finishing 12th or worse. I think these guys are at minimum a matchup problem for certain favorites, but also carry a risk of a whooping against the wrong opponent. (Alabama, probably.)
Lastly: Missouri. I am certain that the most normal SEC fanbase of all of them will be perfectly accepting of being told I have them 11th of 14 in the SEC, just one year after going a surprise 25-10 with a Round of 32 run. To be certain, their fans should be thrilled with that. I just think it was a year-long paper tiger run. Here’s me showing my work:
They went 9-1 in games decided by 6 or less. We have years and years of research showing that there is no magic sauce (beyond being really freaking good) at winning close games at high rates. They were lucky and had the efficiency profile of a 20-15 team, not a 25-10 one. Who cares! It happens to teams every year. But:
They had the most extreme close-game shooting splits of any team in America, bar none. Like, anyone. Here is a real thing I found this offseason on Hoop-Explorer: in games where the scoring margin was somewhere between -6 and +6 in the final six minutes - aka, a close game - Missouri shot 54% from three. Their opponents shot 24%. That alone would explain no fewer than three wins being pure 3PT shooting luck, which is wholly unsustainable year-over-year, particularly in such a small part of the game.
Their defense was utterly terrible. I mean, if anything else, that was what I found most alarming. Mizzou finished the year #362 of 363 D-1 teams in defensive rebounding, 277th in eFG% allowed, 281st in 2PT% allowed, and they also fouled a ton. The only redeeming factor, admittedly a huge one, was that they ranked #6 in defensive TO%.
I like Dennis Gates a lot; I think he was a good hire for Missouri. His defensive strategy based on his final year at Cleveland State/first year at Mizzou is just “we believe you are too stupid and also too young to not turn the ball over” and at some level, he’s right. That’s college basketball: a sport full of guys who make a lot of mistakes. I personally don’t have to like that viewpoint, but it worked to win a bunch of close games with a just-okay roster in Year One.
The flipside of all that overachievement is unfortunately losing the clear two best players on the team in Kobe Brown and D’Moi Hodge. Once again, Gates had to hammer the portal and look for guys that best fit his hyper-active system. The irony is that I think I like this roster a little better than last year’s but it might have worse results. Nick Honor returns as the point guard and was very efficient in low usage. Noah Carter is everyone’s next Kobe Brown, a guy who posted a 117 ORtg on 22% Usage and was crazy efficient inside the perimeter. Carter was a huge piece of why the offense was as good as it was last year, as Mizzou shot 66% at the rim when he was on the court.
But, as usual with Gates, it’s the transfers that catch my eye. There’s a few different breakout candidates here, but the guy I trust most in this system is John Tonje, who arrives from Colorado State. Here’s why: aside from Honor, he’s the best shooter on the team (37% 3PT last year). He hit at a 67% rate at the rim last year and is a great foul drawer, meaning he’ll fit in perfectly in this offense. He also got better every year at Colorado State. Even accounting for a small stepback in efficiency he’s in line for a huge glow-up.
I’m also fully in the tank for life for Connor Vanover, a bafflingly fun 7’3” center that will bomb away from three and blocks a ton of shots. They also added Caleb Grill from Iowa State, who is instantly the best defender on the roster and a solid deep shooter. A couple of the depth pieces (Sean East II, Tamar Bates) are fine and whatnot too.
What I cannot get past is thinking this is functionally the exact same team as last year - high-quality twos, a ton of threes, no rebounding game at all, an awful defense (though again, Grill’s good), and every game having a final score of 80-78. If you think these guys are going 9-1 in coin-flip games again, then you probably think of them much more highly than I do and believe they’ll go right back to the NCAA Tournament. If you think a regression to the mean is coming, the path for a team that’s analytically better than 2022-23 but goes 19-12 in the regular season is easy to picture.
Tier four is a grouping of teams that I would legitimately be surprised by making the NCAA Tournament this year. Anything above an NIT bid would be a pleasant upsetting of the apple cart. Torvik collectively gives a 7% chance that any one of these three teams sneaks in, which might be harsh but also feels accurate.
If any of these three actually does overachieve I think it would be Vanderbilt. I love Jerry Stackhouse’s offensive designs and of all the SEC coaches, he seems to be the one that most consistently cracks Tennessee’s defense. I think that he has the X’s and O’s part of coaching more or less nailed, though I wish his defenses were better. He just can’t recruit, or at least cannot get the level of talent you need to consistently compete in the SEC. This year’s team ranks alongside Grand Canyon and St. Bonaventure in Torvik’s numbers, which gives you a good read into the talent deficit they face.
Both Ezra Manjon and Tyrin Lawrence are back from last year’s team that surged late. Manjon is a rare point guard that simply does not shoot threes (9 makes all of ‘22-23) but Lawrence is a truly nasty scorer at the rim for his size. Among 138 players last year who attempted 125+ shots at the rim, per Torvik, Lawrence ranked 8th in FG% at 65.5%. Beyond those two and a nice portal add of Evan Taylor (42% 3PT) I don’t have much to get jazzed about here. The hope is likely that one of the rising sophomores (Colin Smith, Paul Lewis, Lee Dort) has a breakout year, with Smith being most likely, but it just feels like too thin of a roster.
All of that being said, Vandy’s going to be a thorn in a few teams’ sides. They have three wins against top 25 KenPom teams over the last three years, quietly tied for sixth-most in the SEC. The problem is that Memorial Magic actually hasn’t worked the last few years; Vandy is just 25-14 at home over the last two years and has the only negative efficiency split in the conference. You actually want to bet on these guys when they’re away from home. Might be a conversation to be had there about Vandy’s home environment, their AD, etc…ah, another day.
I fiddled with who should be 13th for too long here and ultimately chose Georgia despite some misgivings. I straight-up do not trust Mike White in this role, and last year’s paper tiger 16-10 start in which Georgia actually underachieved their preseason KenPom ranking of #93 heavily wasn’t convincing. The three best players from that team are all gone, too, so I’m unsure what or where excitement would be coming from here.
If it exists it is found in Noah Thomasson, a MAAC transfer who is a true beacon of endurance (nearly 37 MPG last year) and is hard to guard on pull-up jumpers…of a certain variety. Thomasson attempted 172 pull-ups last year, far more than any SEC player did. He shot 36% on threes - good! - and 31% on twos. On a roster largely devoid of plus shooting talent, he’s gonna have to star out to make these guys interesting. Otherwise, this is a classic 5 or 6-win SEC team that pulls off a couple of interesting wins but is Wednesday fodder for those wandering about Nashville a day early.
That leaves South Carolina. Now: I do not think they can possibly be worse than they were a year ago. There is simply no way. Getting rid of GG Jackson is only a positive. The roster talent is a little more reasonable for competing in this conference than it was a year ago. I loved the add of BJ Mack from Wofford, the only player on this roster who achieved a +2 OBPR at EvanMiya last year. I like Meechie Johnson more as a creator of fun than a winning player, but hey. Myles Stute was a good, solid add, and I think getting a 36% 3PT shooter who can really get hot can’t be bad.
But this really isn’t a roster that is ready to compete. I like Lamont Paris a lot; I do not believe that this roster-building strategy is one that I love. Using Evan’s numbers again, the best player on this roster in the ‘22-23 season was either Myles Stute or B.J. Mack. Neither would’ve ranked out as a top 75 player in the SEC. The 2023-24 version of Mack is a borderline top 20 player in the conference, per Torvik; the next-best player is either Ta’Lon Cooper or Johnson, neither of whom rank as top 45 players.
No offense to anyone involved, but don’t bring what would be the third-best roster in the Sun Belt to the SEC. I sincerely hope it works out for Paris, but I’m not optimistic.
THE PLAYER OF THE YEAR IS: Wade Taylor IV, Texas A&M.
THE BREAKOUT PLAYER OF THE YEAR IS: Riley Kugel, Florida.
THE ALL-CONFERENCE FIRST TEAM IS:
Wade Taylor IV, Texas A&M, G
Mark Sears, Alabama, G
Santiago Vescovi, Tennessee, G
Tolu Smith, Mississippi State, F
Johni Broome, Auburn, F
THE BEST GAME IS: Texas A&M at Alabama, February 17. In terms of pure, on-court fun, I think this is your best bet. The actual best game is probably Tennessee at Texas A&M on February 10, so just watch both.
OTHER PREDICTIONS: For the millionth year in a row, everyone gets suckered in by Kentucky looking like a First Four contender in non-conference play before turning it on in February. Vanderbilt pulls off no fewer than two ranked upsets but can’t turn that into an NCAAT bid. Tennessee - far and away the best team in the league in non-conference play every year - pulls off an 11-2 run to start the year and wins one of the Wisconsin/UNC road games. (I’m not counting on Maui just because that’s gonna be a brutalizer.)