NCAA Weekly, Vol. 5.2: Updated SEC rankings, plus stock up/down among conferences

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Hello, and happy Friday. To make up for the lack of non-Tennessee posts this week (and to make up for Tennessee playing a game on Sunday), the fourth post this week is a grab bag of two things I like checking in on: how I’d rank the SEC teams, and what we can expect each conference to have waiting for us come March. The SEC power rankings are first; below that you’ll get the conference stock report.

This is the third free post of the week, which is highly unusual, but is also an open attempt to get more eyeballs and more subscribers. We’ll return to normalcy soon and the freeloaders will have to pay the cover charge. Onward!

SEC Rankings, December 9, 2022

TIER 1: SERIOUS FINAL FOUR CONTENDERS

1. Tennessee

(tiny gap, but a gap)

2. Auburn
3. Alabama
4. Kentucky

So: an explanation. This is obviously a Tennessee-first basketball coverage website; I promise that has nothing to do with this ranking. It instead has to do with Tennessee ranking 2nd on KenPom, 2nd on Torvik, 3rd on Evan Miyakawa’s site, 4th on Haslametrics, and 4th on Shot Quality. All five of those are excellent metrics websites I trust. All five of them believe Tennessee is one of the four best teams in America. This is before we get to Tennessee posting a start to the season on defense that is legitimately one of the best runs ever recorded at the Big Six level.

That’s not something I can say about the other three just yet. Alabama and Auburn are both consensus top-9 teams, per Massey, but the highest any of the above five sites has either of those teams at is 10th (Alabama on SQ). Both have a median ranking of 11th in the consensus and an average of 13th; they are top nine because someone is required to be. I like them and think they are very good, and they’ve certainly impressed more than Kentucky has so far.

Collectively, though, these are the four I trust most. Tennessee has the best defense in college hoops. Alabama ranks in the top 25 in both defense and offense and if they can get their turnover problem fixed, they might be even better than this ranking shows. Auburn has a great defense and another annoying-to-watch offense, but it’s Bruce Pearl and it’s Auburn. Kentucky, meanwhile, has yet to play a game against a quality opponent that’s come off as an impressive performance. I think they have the most pure talent of any of these four teams, but as usual with Calipari, we may just have to check back on these guys in January. The good news for Cal is that his guys are already fully with it on defense and are a legitimate top-10 unit.

Would I be surprised to see this grouping change in a month? Not at all; it’s pretty malleable, and Tennessee struggling midseason would not exactly be the most stunning thing to happen in basketball history. Still, they’ve earned their spot ahead of everyone else at the moment.

TIER 2: PRETTY GOOD NCAA TOURNAMENT TEAMS WITH AWFUL OFFENSES

5. Arkansas
6. Mississippi State

The Arkansas ranking is sure to make every annoying online Arkansas fan angry, but whatever. I just don’t see it. Even before the Trevon Brazile season-ending knee injury, which is a significant blow, these guys were and are absolutely unwatchable on offense. It is 2022, and in preseason, I noted that the Arkansas hype seemed to be glossing over the fact that there was one proven-ish shooter on the entire roster. A lot was riding on freshman Nick Smith, who was only recently cleared to play.

Brazile was not a proven shooter, but he’s tied for the team lead in made threes and has the second-best 3PT%. Those figures - 11 and 37.9% - were tied for 27th and 21st in the SEC, respectively. South Carolina, the worst team in this conference by a mile, has three players with more made threes than any individual Arkansas roster member. Last year, these guys couldn’t shoot either, but they could get to the free throw line like crazy and were an above-average passing team.

This year’s group has a worse FT% and ranks 245th in Assist Rate. Torvik has them rated as the #101 offense in America. Anthony Black has had a hot start and rates out as the team’s best shooter, but he made a total of nine threes in his senior season of high school. Jordan Walsh shot 9-for-62 from deep across two seasons of high school ball on Synergy.

If you want the upside, the fourth-most similar team to them in Torvik’s database is…2021-22 Arkansas, who went to the Elite Eight. If you want the downside, the most similar team is 2012-13 Oklahoma State, who got demolished in the first round by a 12 seed. (Also on the list, for our readers: 2020-21 Tennessee.)

Mississippi State, meanwhile, is a very pleasant surprise. I had pretty low expectations for this season, as did presumably a lot of their fans, but it turns out that Chris Jans is a legitimately terrific basketball coach. How real State’s whole thing is remains to be seen - they’ve played two top 60 teams and won by a combined six points - but at minimum, this is what last year’s State team should’ve been. Torvik gives them a 93% chance to make the Tournament, Lunardi has them as a 6 seed.

And yet: I still rank them behind Arkansas because I think State’s defense isn’t quite as elite and their offense might actually be worse. The Bulldogs rank 286th in 3PT%, 340th in FT%, rarely get to the line, and have one (1) player on the roster averaging double figures (SEC POTY candidate Tolu Smith). Simon at Shot Quality believes positive regression is coming for State at some point, so I’m willing to hold out there, but until that happens, this is a good team and a good story that’s likely not great. I’ll guess they’re a 7 or 8 seed in March, which is honestly terrific for a program with one NCAAT bid since 2009.

TIER 3: BUBBLE BOYS

7. Missouri
8. Florida
9. Mississippi
10. LSU

These are four teams, all of whom are very flawed, all of whom could make the NCAA Tournament, 0-2 of which will. The odds of all four making it are very slim; the odds of none of them making it are less slim, but still unlikely. Two of them have tremendous offenses and awful defenses; the other two either cannot figure out their identity (Florida) despite having a great coach or simply don’t have the horses on paper (Mississippi).

Missouri is the team I want to come out of this group most simply because they play hilarious basketball. Torvik rates Missouri’s offense as the 9th-best in America. He also rates Missouri’s defense 170th. Opponents are posting almost a 50% eFG% against Missouri, driven by Mizzou’s decision to give up a billion threes and offensive rebounds every game. They force a ton of turnovers (+9.6 TO margin, #1 in America), but if they’re not forcing turnovers, they’re giving up points.

The fun part is that they’re shooting almost 64% on twos, play faster than all but five teams in America, and take 29 threes a game. I love these guys. It’s Cocaine Bear basketball. God bless you, Dennis Gates, you wild man.

Florida is the second-most disappointing team of the first month of SEC play, which is a real bummer to share. I love Todd Golden’s philosophy and trust he’ll figure things out, but right now, this is a 6-4 basketball team with zero good wins that takes far too few threes for my liking and has struggled mightily to be efficient at the rim. I still think these guys will rebound, though, and Shot Quality sees them as a team ripe for positive regression. If they’re able to get to 18 wins, they’re in business.

Mississippi is…honestly, just kinda here. I have no strong feelings for or against this particular Kermit Davis edition; they started the season 49th on KenPom, have gotten no higher than 43rd, and have dipped no lower than 53rd. They are a bubble team to the bone. They’re in a similar-yet-different situation as Florida: if they get to 18 wins or more, they’re a real First Four candidate. The problem is that 18-13 likely means 8-10 in the SEC, and being an 8-10 SEC team with a fine-not-great non-conference schedule probably isn’t enough, barring a good SEC Tournament performance.

I think that LSU could do basically anything from here on out and I wouldn’t be surprised by it at all. Only 14 teams returned fewer minutes in college basketball, and the best player on this team was the second-best player on Murray State a year ago. They’ve benefitted from a very easy run-up to conference play - one team ranked higher than 127th so far - and will not play a top 25 team of any kind until December 28, when they play Arkansas. Unfortunately for LSU, that means six of their first eight games in SEC play are against top 25 teams. Check back on them in mid-January. Anything from 5th to 12th is on the table.

TIER 4: NIT FODDER

11. Texas A&M
12. Vanderbilt

The most disappointing team, by miles, is Texas A&M. After their run to the SEC title game, I was pretty in on these guys and thought of them as a likely NCAA Tournament team with an outside shot of making a second weekend run. Right now, I think they’ve got about a 20% shot to get in, and it’s probably even lower than that, given that I’m still biased towards thinking these guys are better than they’ve shown.

Buzz Williams’ defensive system is boom-or-bust by nature. If you can’t shoot over it and you can’t control the ball, you’re going to have an awful night against it. If you can shoot, or if you can avoid turnovers, you’re going to get fouled a ton and have good memories. Five of their defensive performances - the five wins - have been fine. The other three have been three of the worst games played by any SEC team this season. It’s one thing to lose to a middling Murray State team; it’s another to get demolished by 15 in Texas by Boise State. They can fix this by beating Memphis on December 17, but it’s a real uphill climb to find the bubble again. If they can dig up 18-19 wins, they may sneak in, but these guys bum me out right now.

Vanderbilt is a surprise in the sense that they look more competent than they did in the opening week of the season. Losing to Memphis is largely not a big deal; losing at home by 12 to Southern Miss is. Following that up by barely beating a mediocre Temple team and nearly losing at home to Wofford…I don’t know, man. Even so, Liam Robbins is blossoming into a legitimate capital-T Threat and Myles Stute continues to get a little better each year. I think of Vandy as a very specific type of 6-win SEC team: good enough to pick off one of the top four teams at home, but also weak enough to lose to both Georgia and South Carolina.

TIER 5: YEAR ZERO

13. Georgia
14. South Carolina

One of these is far worse than the other, but no matter. Georgia hired Mike White and to no one’s surprise, they look like a post-2016 Mike White team: slow offensively, a bad turnover rate, and generally very stodgy everywhere you look. I’ve been tremendously underwhelmed by Braelen Bridges, a guy I really liked last year, and no one on their roster really stands out in a “you must watch this guy play” deal. I won’t be surprised if/when these guys somehow pick off Auburn at home because they love to do that out of nowhere, but these guys feel headed for 4-5 SEC wins.

South Carolina, unfortunately, is horrible. I had them pegged for an overperformance in the preseason and I’ve been proven more and more wrong with each game. Frankly, they’re pretty lucky to even be 4-4; they should have lost on the road to Georgetown and easily could’ve lost their home affairs with Clemson or South Carolina State. The positive is that G.G. Jackson is averaging 17 & 8. They’ll be underdogs in every SEC game, though I’m sure they’ll find a couple wins somewhere.

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For the second half of this post, it’s time to look to March. Let me rephrase that: it’s not time to look to March, but rather time to look to January, as we close in on conference play for most of the conferences. We’ve had just one month of hoops, but even one month can change a lot of things.

I find this less interesting on the micro team level than I do the macro conference level. Teams can rise and fall with hot starts, but rarely will a whole conference have an entirely hot start or an entirely cold one. These early-season stats for the conference itself are more telling to me than anything else. Will this conference be a serious factor as we head towards 2023, or can we expect them to have an underwhelming February and March? This should give you a primer on who’s made hay early in the season, along with who’s seen better days.

All statistics referenced are via Bart Torvik’s TourneyCast tool.

Serious big-bid conferences

1. Big Ten (8.14 projected bids; +2.05 above preseason)

2. Big 12 (7.55; +0.1 above preseason)

3. SEC (7.37; -0.12 below preseason)

These are the big boys. Collectively, these three conferences are expected by Torvik’s TourneyCast tool to be responsible for 23 of the 68 NCAA Tournament bids (roughly a third) and eight, or half, of the eventual Sweet Sixteen entrants. Other conferences will factor in, but these three expect to run the show.

Honestly, is anyone surprised? These three were expected to be the top three conferences in the preseason; the only surprise is how much better the Big Ten looks than I would’ve guessed. There’s a real chance they get nine or even ten teams into the field, which would be a dramatic upgrade from the six I expected in preseason. The Big 12 and the SEC are more or less what we expected: one is a bloodbath from 1-10 and the other is a bloodbath from 1-6.

Less serious big-bid conferences

4. ACC (5.33; -0.62 below preseason)

5. Big East (4.09; +0.04 above preseason)

6. Mountain West (3.79; +1.08 above preseason)

7. Pacific 12 (3.51; -1.4 below preseason)

These conferences also expect to be serious factors, but perhaps not to the level of the top three. Collectively, they’re expected to be responsible for 17 of the 68 bids, or a quarter; that means we can anticipate seven conferences owning 40 of the 68 bids. These conferences all have their own problems, and the only one that looks shiny compared to preseason expectations is the Mountain West, now on pace to get four teams into the March field for the second year in a row. We’ll see if that holds.

Of note in a negative manner is the Pac-12, which has come in far below expectation and has just two teams ranked in KenPom’s top 40. Both of those teams are really good - UCLA and Arizona - but it underscores the problem with this conference. There are two sure things to go along with about seven teams that could make it. The third-highest ranked team in the conference is currently 4-5. Could they still produce a Final Four team? Of course; it’s only December. But no conference had a worse, more damaging November than these guys did. Torvik gives a 10% chance that this conference only gets two teams in the field, which is pretty shocking for any major conference.

Multi-bid mids

8. American (2.07; -1.1 below preseason)

9. West Coast (2.01; +0.5 above preseason)

10. Conference USA (1.98; +0.62 above preseason)

These are the three conferences on pace for exactly two bids. For one that’s a disappointment; for one it’s the expectation; for another it’s potentially a massive event. The American has only placed two teams in the field the last two years after putting four teams in the 2019 NCAA Tournament. Really, it’s a one-team conference: Houston and everyone else. For all of the garbage thrown Gonzaga’s way for supposedly playing in an awful conference, the American is now the West Coast Conference’s equal.

Speaking of which: the West Coast has less depth than I’d hoped but has perennial top-4 seed Gonzaga and new perennial top-25 team Saint Mary’s. I think they’re fine. The other, much more interesting piece, is the Conference USA’s rise. CUSA has not placed multiple teams in the NCAA Tournament in a decade. Right now, though, UAB’s ranked 38th, FAU 48th, and North Texas 67th in KenPom. The most likely outcome is two of those three getting in, and what a story that would be.

Single-bid mids

11. everyone else

12. Atlantic 10 (1.06; -1.17 below preseason)

If your conference is not listed here, it’s a one-bid conference, and there’s nothing wrong with that; it’s just a one-bid conference in all likelihood. The exception to this rule is the Atlantic 10, which came into this season with dreams of producing two if not three bids. Those dreams have been crushed by dramatic underperformances from Dayton, VCU, and Loyola Chicago, leaving Saint Louis as the only team that maybe could get into the field of 68 if they lost the conference tournament. Even then, it doesn’t look very rosy. There’s no sugarcoating it: this is the most disappointing conference east of the Rockies.