SEC basketball this season

[swinesation]

Man, talk about a murky picture. You've got Kentucky and Florida at the top - both will be in the NCAAT. After that, who knows? I'd say there are fewer bad teams than in the recent past. Missouri sucks, and Mississippi State looks pretty bad, even though they are very young and had an awesome recruiting haul last year and will probably get better, so who really knows?? It seems the SEC is on the rise, but whether any teams other than Kentucky and Florida make any noise in the NCAA this season is anybody's guess. I don't really think anybody knows.

A lot of talented new coaches with rosters that have experienced a great deal of upheaval. It's interesting to note that the Razorbacks look to have one of the oldest rosters, if not the oldest, in the SEC (sorry I'm not going to research that - I'm sure someone will want to). The only SEC team being led by as many juniors and seniors is Vanderbilt. Though I realize Macon, Barford and Thomas are first year juniors, and Hannahs a second year senior, still Arkansas and Vandy are pretty much the only teams with no freshmen or sophomores playing key roles. I'm not really sure how significant that fact is - just really a side note.   

Obviously we'll have a clearer picture in a couple of weeks. Will be interesting to see what teams rise toward the top and which ones sink. Arkansas could end up third best in the SEC and in the tourney, or sixth best and out.

Though there several experts in this forum who I'm sure are certain how the SEC will shake out, I think it's very difficult to rank the SEC right now, and I think RPI tells us very little at this point.

[Wisco Pig]

Agreed.  Murky's a good one-word description at this point.  I'm looking at the Hogs' upcoming five-game stretch between UK and OSU.   If the Hogs can get to 6-2 in conference play, which I think is doable, they're in great shape for the stretch run.  By then, the RPIs will be more meaningful as well.

[Kevin]

murky or weak.
the conference is just not very good.
I hope we can be the team that beats all the teams we should beat.
if they do that, they should be dancing.

[King Kong]

Good news is most teams outside of Mizz and Miss State have a respectable RPI.

That helps us

[Biggus Piggus]

According to Pomeroy, Arkansas is the most experienced team in the SEC, among the 25 most experienced teams in the country.

Next are Ole Miss and Florida. Georgia and Vanderbilt are near national average, and everybody else -- nine teams -- are below average.

Next-to-last is Kentucky, so experience doesn't always matter.

Auburn, LSU, Tenn, Mizzou, UK, MSU -- all among the least experienced teams.

Classes of offensive efficiency...

Outstanding - Kentucky
Among the best - Florida, Arkansas
In the top 100 - Vandy, aTm, Tenn, Ole Miss, Georgia, LSU
Challenged - South Carolina, Auburn, Miss St, Alabama
Awful - Missouri

Classes of defensive efficiency...

Outstanding - South Carolina, Kentucky, Florida
Among the best - Alabama, Georgia
In the top 100 - aTm, Mizzou, Arkansas, Auburn, Tennessee
Challenged - Vanderbilt, Ole Miss, Miss St
Awful - LSU

Arkansas has two remaining regular-season games against the best offensive teams and five against the best defenders -- combine those two, five games.

And 11 games against the mediocre to bad.

[swinesation]

According to Pomeroy, Arkansas is the most experienced team in the SEC, among the 25 most experienced teams in the country.

Thanks Biggus. I had a feeling you'd be the one with the data. I guess they count experience as year in college, because as far as years playing together, we're pretty average I'd guess, maybe below. Probably not much difference between a highly recruited sophomore and a junior college transfer.

[Atlhogfan1]

UK
UF


Hogs
SC w Thornwell

Pool of mediocrity


Mizzou

[Razorod]

I hope we can be the team that beats all the teams we should beat.
if they do that, they should be dancing.

Doing just that should result in no less than ten more wins--eight home games and Mizzou and LSU on the road. That would put as at 22-9 at the end of the regular season.

It would be nice to win at least one more 50/50 game--A&M, Vandy, OSU and Auburn to finish 23-8.

[Biggus Piggus]

Oklahoma State is an excellent offensive team that is crazy-good at forcing turnovers, offensive rebounding, getting to the line, and shooting threes. They tilt heavily toward pressure D and foul like nutburgers. West Virginia dominated them by forcing even more TOs and scoring lots of easy hoops.

Our Saturday game falls after the Pokes have five days off + we're coming off a Tuesday road trip to Vanderbilt. Talk about contrasting styles.

[zuko]

Nothing really to report yet. Tennessee in rebuild so the game shouldn't have been as close as it was. Mike still on a tightrope and running out of reasons. Lots of losses coming up. Don't get too happy with the record since most of the wins are nothing more  than wins against high school caliber teams.

[The_Iceman]

Nothing really to report yet. Tennessee in rebuild so the game shouldn't have been as close as it was. Mike still on a tightrope and running out of reasons. Lots of losses coming up. Don't get too happy with the record since most of the wins are nothing more  than wins against high school caliber teams.

Go look at who Tennessee has played and the scores. Stop being ignorant.

[Atlhogfan1]

Nothing really to report yet. Tennessee in rebuild so the game shouldn't have been as close as it was. Mike still on a tightrope and running out of reasons. Lots of losses coming up. Don't get too happy with the record since most of the wins are nothing more  than wins against high school caliber teams.

Tenn was a 2pt fav.

[dchoss]

does lsu or mizzo have a player from, Arkansas    about 2 minutes left in first half the guys were talking about Arkansas,  didn't catch all of it,  oops,  nm.  end of half,  injured player for mizzo  smith  from  van buren

[Biggus Piggus]

Vanderbilt's new coach, Bryce Drew, is whipping the Commodores into shape. They dominated Auburn last night, making 14 threes and getting 33 points from Matthew Fisher-Davis.

Vandy played a top 50 nonconference schedule and has looked much improved lately.

[RaisinHog]

LSU is getting smoked at home by miss st

[Letsroll1200]

3rd and 4th place in the SEC is between Arkansas and South Carolina. I give South Carolina the edge right now. Mississippi State guard play is very good. They will be a tough out.

[GoHogs1091]

Calipari and Kentucky better enjoy this season.

Starting next season, Ben Howland is going to teach Calipari a lesson.

It should be remembered that at Howland's last 2 head coaching stops, his record was the following in his 3rd season.

32 wins 7 losses
29 wins 6 losses

[PonderinHog]

[GoHogs1091]

Steve Alford out-coached Calipari a few weeks ago.  Alford coached circles around Calipari.

Alford is no Ben Howland. 

Besides the fact that Howland will probably be out-coaching Calipari, starting next season there is not going to be much of a talent discrepancy between Calipari's team and Howland's team.