specialsauce wrote:Big East appears to be overrated.
Baller we know you hate CU as much or more than you like WSU, but this is a plainly inaccurate statement. From Matt Norlander:
Since being forced to adopt a no-FBS-schools, 10-team union in 2013, the Big East has averaged NCAA Tournament bids for half of its membership. It's on pace to do that again. A guarantee: The Big East will put at least five teams into this year's Big Dance. Why? As you'll see below, the performance in non-league play has secured the conference's fortunate fate for March. While the college landscape changed around the Big East, the league remained steady and refused to become a two- or three-bid outfit.
A lot of people predicted the Big East would be closer to the Mountain West than the Big Ten. Those people were wrong.
Look at this season: The Big East boasts four teams with legitimate expectations of reaching the Final Four in 2017. Only the ACC can claim the same.
Villanova (undefeated), Creighton (undefeated), Butler (11-1), Xavier (10-2) and Seton Hall (10-2) represent a heavy and mighty top half. (Sort of reminds me of that spell when the Big 12 was essentially split into "GOOD" and "EHHH" columns for four or five years in a row.) Nova is the No. 1 team in every ranking: AP poll, coaches poll, KenPom, Massey, RPI, KPI, all of it. The Wildcats have been the undeniable top club in the country for nearly a month now.
But the Big East is a lot more than the Wildcats.
(Not far) behind VU is Creighton and its quick offense, which puts up 90/game and has taken out Wisconsin. Butler's beaten Arizona, Indiana, Cincinnati, Northwestern and has a road win vs. Utah. This was supposed to be the down year for BU. Instead, it would probably be a No. 2 seed if the NCAA Tournament started tonight.
Xavier currently comes in at the 4 spot in the league's power rankings, but it was a 2 seed in last year's tournament, has a 10-2 record now and could wind up being the No. 2 team in the league standings again.