Failing college basketball juggernauts
Many college basketball juggernauts are having disappointing seasons.
The first school that comes to mind is Coach John Calipari’s Kentucky Wildcats. The perennial powerhouse is sitting at an abysmal 8-15 record, and 7-9 in conference play as of March 3. But don’t be mistaken thinking the Wildcats are the only team struggling. Michigan State, Duke, and North Carolina are also having trouble finding their footing. For the first time since 1960, Duke and UNC played their annual game both unranked in the AP poll. So what is the reasoning behind this?
Ej Montgomery, power forward for the wildcats. catches a pass from teamate. Montgomery was a starter on last years’s team. He averaged 5.4 rebounds per game. Photo By Thomas Savoja Via Flickr
A lot of these top teams have talented freshman classes coming in this year. Kentucky came into this season with the first ranked recruiting class in the nation, followed by fellow blue-blood Duke. Neither of these teams are ranked.
“There’s constant turnover at every level, so if you had a senior dominated team the year before and now you’re relying on a new mix of players for this season that could be a factor on how things come together,” Saint Joseph Varsity Basketball Coach Greg Shaffer said when asked why teams with talented freshman classes were struggling so much.
To further elaborate on the Wildcats struggles this year, their problems lie in their turnovers. They average 12.1 assists per game and 14.5 turnovers, giving them a 0.8 assist/turnover ratio. Their opponents score about 17 points a game of Kentucky turnovers. The Wildcats need to bring this number down if they want to win more games. They also seem to struggle scoring in transition, only averaging 12.7 points of turnovers per game. This is a number they need to bring up, capitalizing on other teams mistakes.
So who has filled the huge gaps at the top of college basketball? For starters, the Big Ten conference is having a great season, with seven teams in the top 25. The Big Ten is cementing themselves as the new best conference in college basketball. This is a highly disputed claim being discussed by college basketball fans across the country. The Big Ten is led by number two ranked Michigan, who is regarded as one of the hottest teams in college basketball. This team, led by Coach Juwan Howard, are sitting at a 18-2 record and 13-2 in conference play as of March 5. They waited the same three weeks that MSU did at the beginning of the new year, but did not have any Covid cases so were able to do full contact practice throughout the pause.
Their in-state rivals Michigan State are not playing as well as the Wolverines, with many embarrassing losses to Rutgers and Iowa, along with many others. The Spartans struggled hard in the middle part of the season, but recently have shown sparks of what they used to be in their recent 81-72 win over the 5th ranked Illinois Fighting Illini. Their struggles seem to start at the one, with Rocket Watts straying from his normal position of shooting guard to take the spot of Cassius Winston who graduated last year. Watts is a talented scorer, but having played shooting guard his whole life, had trouble running the Spartans offense this year.
After going over all of these things, I’ve noticed a glaring issue that is plaguing these teams. They aren’t spreading the rock. For example MSU has only three players scoring in double digits, and Kentucky’s assists leader averages an embarrassing 3.1 apg.
These teams are traditionally good in the NCAA tournament, and for the ones that will make it, I think they can turn themselves around when they need a win. All they need is a spark, a spark they can get from tournament play.