CHAMPIONSHIP OR BUST
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There are 5 "Power conferences. In those 5 power conferences, there are 65 total schools. I think we would all agree that the chances a non-P5 team will win a title is incredibly low. The last to do it was UNLV back in 1990. The last to make the title game was Butler in 2011. So it is an incredible uphill battle for a non-P5 school to make the title game, let alone win it.
Of the P5, the two conferences based primarily west of the Mississippi are the two smallest conferences. There are only 27 P5 schools west of the Mississippi. The other 38 are all East of the Mississippi. The numbers dictate that basketball power will consistently reside east of the Mississippi.
Taking it a little deeper, the list of schools with the most victories goes like this:
- Kentucky (East)
- Kansas (West)
- North Carolina (East)
- Duke (East)
- Temple (East)
- Syracuse (East)
- UCLA (West)
- Notre Dame (East)
- St. John’s (East)
- Louisville (East)
- Indiana (East)
- BYU (West)
- Utah (West)
- Arizona (West)
- Cincinnati (East)
- Illinois (East)
- Texas (West)
- Purdue (East)
- Western Kentucky (East)
- Penn (East)
- Washington (West)
- West Virginia (East)
- Villanova (East)
- Oregon State (West)
- Princeton (East)
That’s 17 of the top 25, 8 of the top 10 and 4 of the top 5.
If more population was further west, particularly in the Plains and Rockies, I think the distribution would be more even, but that’s just not the case.
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@justanotherfan Arebt most of the eastern schools older? Might that skew the all time win totals? Or is it close enough?
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dylans said:
@justanotherfan Arebt most of the eastern schools older? Might that skew the all time win totals? Or is it close enough?
It’s actually fairly close overall. The list is here for perusal.
The top 20 in terms of seasons goes like this:
- Temple (122 - East)
- Kansas (120 - West)
- Purdue (120 - East)
- Illinois State (120 - East)
- Michigan State (119 - East)
- Indiana (118 - East)
- Penn (118 - East)
- Syracuse (117 - East)
- Cincinnati (117 - East)
- Oregon State (117 - West)
- Ohio State (117 - East)
- Iowa (117 - West)
- Akron (117 - East)
- BYU (116 - West)
- Washington (116 - West)
- Vanderbilt (115 - East)
- Kentucky (115 - East)
- UConn (115 - East)
- Bradley (114 - East)
- K-State (114 - West)
Those early seasons don’t carry nearly as much weight as you might imagine. In the first 9 seasons of KU’s history, coached by James Naismith, KU played 115 games total. For perspective, Devonte Graham had 122 wins in his KU career.
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HighEliteMajor said:
In fact, I think the bias is based in large part on sound business decisions.
That’s exactly it. Not a second of national tv happens without a complete assessment by media wonks. Every second has a value, and the goal of tv is to get the highest price they can. You know it isn’t paramount to show Big 12 basketball in the east when they can show teams from their area and it will bring perhaps a larger crowd and may involve substantial savings in production costs.
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FAKE NEWS ALERT>>>>
I did not want to open a new thread so I figure this would be the next best place. This is on the Twitter feed for the NBA Draft Wire…
Of course we know that on the lone year Durant was at Texas (2006-2007), KU won the regular season title outright and then beat Texas in OT in the Big 12 Tournament title game. Durant did not lead his team to “the” Championship, he led them to “the Championship game.”
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Lead him TO the game, not won it
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@JayHawkFanToo Ironically, Texas tied KU for the reg season title both the year before and the year after Durant, and was seeded #1 in the Big 12 tourney both years, too, because they beat us in the single games played those years. Geez, Durant was a relative failure compared to his contemporary Longhorns.
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@JayHawkFanToo It says nothing about Durant winning a title. Nothing in that statement is factually inaccurate, just written in a misleading way. KD didead UT to a B12 championship, they just didn’t won that championship. Again, misleading, but technically inaccurate.
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I respectfully disagree. He led the to the “championship game” not to the “Championship.” FWIW, I just ran it by a family friend who was an English college professor for a number of years and she agreed that as written it clearly implies they won. Durant never beat KU and was 0-3 against the Jayhawks; funny how they missed that part.
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@JayHawkFanToo It is technically accurate like I said. It’s just a very misleading way to to state it that does imply he won a B12 title which is why it’s misleading. Also, Durant was only 0-2 against Kansas.
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@JayHawkFanToo implies isn’t the same as they won-fact
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@JayHawkFanToo You, I believe, have the better case here. Absolute fact: since he failed to lead UT to the Big 12 championship, he cannot also have led them to the Big 12 championship.
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Crimsonorblue22 said:
Lead him TO the game, not won it
Except that is not what the post says. It says he led them to the “Championship” not to the game. See @mayjay post.
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Crimsonorblue22 said:
@JayHawkFanToo implies isn’t the same as they won-fact
Actually it does more than implying, it says he led them to the “championship” which he did not. He led them to the championship game which they lost.
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@mayjay explains it much better than I did. Yes, 0-2 is correct; I knew he was winless againsT KU but I forgot that at the time KU played Texas only once during the regular season.
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It doesn’t say he led them to A big 12 championship it says he led them to THE big 12 championship
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A friend of mine from Australia who is a professor from the university of Australia told me that.
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I challenge anyone to find another example of using “the championship” without “game” in the context of a player or coach leading a team to it when it means only a second place finish. So, Watson led Clemson to two NCAA football championships in 2016 and 2017 while Saban simultaneously led Alabama to the very same two championships?
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Back to KU basketball. Interesting article on the NCAA site comparing KU and UK and the aurhor gives a slight node to UK; however, he does not even mention either De Sousa or Big Dave.
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HEADLINE :
DURANT LEADS GOLDEN STATE TO NBA CHAMPIONSHIP:
STILL COULDN’T LEAD A TEAM TO THE BIG12 CHAMPIONSHIP BECAUSE KU OWNED HIM
FILM AT 11…
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Here’s a fun one…this guy watches video and reacts to players. This segment is him reacting to Quentin Grimes:
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The thing I like most about Quentin Grimes is his ability to control and manipulate the pace and spacing on the floor to his liking. There are several times in the clip you posted where he changes the floor just by taking another dribble, or pulling the ball back out.
You rarely see a guy able to control the other 9 guys on the floor, but Grimes did that in high school. It’s one of the reasons I am so high on his ability. He can control every aspect on the floor.
It’s also one of the reasons I see him more as a PG than a SG. He knows how to change the floor to create space for himself and his teammates. He was a “2” in HS because his team was dependent on him for so much scoring, but he has natural PG skills.
By the end of the season I envision KU closing games with Dotson, Grimes, the Lawson brothers and Vick. That gives KU defense, shooting, ball handling and rebounding, and might give KU a MUA at every spot since most college 4’s and 5’s won’t be able to combat the Lawson’s, and most collegiate teams won’t have enough talent at the wing to deal with both Vick and Grimes. It will spread the floor for everyone and give everyone space to operate - Vick’s shooting drags another defender out of the lane to cover the corners.
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HighEliteMajor said:
Nothing matters this season. Nothing. Unless we win the NCAA title. We’ve had it all. It’s all that matters now.
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You are right, but the paradox of our sport is Self must build a new team, as if the team were most important.
Self’s great accomplishments are based on building teams to reach the full potential of their talent; that is the only way to win a ring IMHO.
It is in some of his choices about who can and should play where and when that most controversy arises and quite logically so. He makes hundreds or thousands of choices in a season about who to play where and when. He makes good enough decisions to win 82% or so and 14 straight conference titles and one ring. But that still involves significant amounts of error and room for reasoned second guessing.
This season I am uneasy about the youth, the lack of proven trey ballers, and the over abundance of big men.
Champion teams need basic pieces. They need all the pieces, not more or less. And they need MUA in 3 of 5 starters and in 2-3 subs come the Carney.
Lacking the above, a Coach must invent a better mouse trap (scheme), and hope no one figures it out during March.
If Self can find 3 40% trey ballers, then the surplus of bigs becomes an advantage, and I suspect he can fit the pieces together.
If he finds only two, it’s a crap shoot.
If he finds none, I foresee no chance for a ring even with a better mouse trap.
And, of course, he and his team will have to overcome seeding path bias and asymmetric whistles, and exceedingly long reviews of calls apparently to give Nike-EST opponents a chance to win at the end of close games.
It is a tall mountain to climb without credible trey shooters, even with two. But three is like having Sherpas help you up Everest.
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drgnslayr said:
I’m pretty sure we will remain undefeated… for at least the next 3 months!
PHOF
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Huggy thinks his front line is pretty good…wishful thinking?
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Best might be stretching a bit, but they have a very good collegiate frontcourt.
Konate is a tremendous shot blocker at the collegiate level.
Esa Ahmad is healthy, and probably their best overall player.
Andrew Gordon was a top juco player, and is a very good defender (and shot blocker specifically).
They have six guys that can likely play up front, which is perfect given their style of play.
So although I don’t think WVU has the most talent up front of anyone in the country (particularly top line talent), they are going to be a pain to deal with because they are deep and athletic up front, and they have multiple shot blockers they can deploy at the back of that press to shut the door on any run outs.
Having shot blockers at the back of a press makes the press that much better. Usually, if you break a press quickly, you get an easy layup. Having a guy back there to stop the layups means you can break the press, but won’t necessarily get the reward at the end. And we know how tough WVU’s press can be already.
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Last season KU had no depth so it had to play conservatively inside. This team has plenty of depth…and bulk and will overwhelm WVU. THe WVU press was very effective but with new personnel and teams more aware of it, its effectiveness is not nearly as much as it used to be. KU beta WVU 3 times last season including a comfortable win in the Big 12 Championship game, so it looks like Coach Self has gotten a handle on how to control and beat WVU.
BTW, as good as Konate is, he still is a punk; I wonder what is the line on technical fouls he will earn next season.
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@JayHawkFanToo Wvu is going to be in for a heck of a surprise when they face us.
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No doubt. WVU will not be as good and KU will be a lot better than last year so I am not too worried about them.
