Top 144

[cgeldmacher]

4 hours ago, bauman said:

Only if we want to get an automatic bid to the NCAA every year!

Your assuming that we will get the recruits we are getting now if we were in the Valley.  If we went to the Valley, which will never happen, we'd regress to that level due to not being able to recruit.

[bauman]

1 hour ago, cgeldmacher said:

Your assuming that we will get the recruits we are getting now if we were in the Valley.  If we went to the Valley, which will never happen, we'd regress to that level due to not being able to recruit.

My automatic bid if in the Valley post was not intended to imply that I wanted us to be in the MVC.  I do not and I agree with you, if we were in the MVC we would not be getting recruits like we are now.

[bauman]

Tulsa in at # 97.  It looks like the writers are going more with the big conference schools this year than last.

Out of the remaining 96, here is what we know for sure:

A 10 -7;  Amer East-1;  ACC- 12; AAC- 7; Big 10- 11; CAA - 1; CUSA - 7; Ivy - 2; MWC - 4; MAAC - 1; MAC - 1; Pac 12- 8; SEC - 11; WCC - 3.  That totals 76 of the remaining 96 slots.  We know the following have no one in the remaining group  WAC, MVC and Big West.

Unknowns are Atl Sun (probably 1 -Gulf Coast); Horizon (probably 0); which leaves 19 spots for two conferences---Big 12 and Big East.

As more teams get listed it becomes even harder to realize that either SLU or Richmond or Saint Joe is not in the top 144.  I think it will be Richmond.

[brianstl]

I would be really surprised if Oakland from the Horizon doesn't show up in the next 25 spots.

[bauman]

On 7/20/2017 at 1:28 PM, slu72 said:

Today's update of list: UC Irvine 113. Other's of note, Memphis, as stated above 119, Illinois 122, Tennessee 114. Gaps are filled in by a bunch of mid majors. None really notable. After LaSalle made the list, I thought we'd be the next A10 entry. Still might is anyone's guess. I'd made an earlier prediction we'd fall somewhere between 130-110, so I'm quickly running out of spaces. I won't be shocked if we fall into 109-90. If we don't fall into that range, I'm guessing we don't make it.

72, you are running out of 109-90 spots.  Princeton today at 94, Belmont yesterday at 95 . 

[slu72]

7 hours ago, bauman said:

72, you are running out of 109-90 spots.  Princeton today at 94, Belmont yesterday at 95 . 

No doubt, this guy is discounting SLU this year. But watch, if we do as well as we think we'll do this year, he'll have us in the top 40 next year. He's either not checked out Ford's transfers and the two FR or just going off our pathetic program over the last three years. He's got teams in the bottom 44 of his list that I think we'd beat hands down.

[bauman]

On 8/8/2017 at 5:04 PM, slu72 said:

No doubt, this guy is discounting SLU this year. But watch, if we do as well as we think we'll do this year, he'll have us in the top 40 next year. He's either not checked out Ford's transfers and the two FR or just going off our pathetic program over the last three years. He's got teams in the bottom 44 of his list that I think we'd beat hands down.

With today's team, it means that 7,  A-10 teams will be in his top 90.  Not bad.

72, I still think Richmond will be the team left out in this ranking service, not the Billikens, but I could be wrong-the writer could be that ill-informed.  As you said, either of the  A-10 teams which is going to be left out of the top 144 list (Richmond or SLU)  could wipe the floor with some of the 120-144 rated teams.

Side note:  Another reason for making this post is to push the W Reed thread down the topic  page without adding to that thread.  We have enough good things going on with Billiken basketball that we don't need constant WR posts .  Folks, there is nothing to see there.  WR does not represent anything that I want represented as SLU-related.  There are so many better former players to associate with SLU, most of whom keep in at least a minimal contact with our school/team. (Lisch/Conklin/Jett/Ash and of course the Legend)

[bauman]

St. John comes in as 8th in the Big East and 87th overall.

I'm not trying to say that the A-10 is better or even equal to the Big East, but it is interesting that both conferences will have 7 teams in the top 86. 

Wild @$$ guess-SLU will be number 76 in these rankings, but will finish the year much better than that.

One other thing, I just noticed that this Top 144 group is part of USAToday.

[3star_recruit]

The Internet is truly a strange place. Only on the Internet can a conference that's hemorrhaging talent have one of its best seasons ever. 'Cause that's what this list is predicting.

[hsmith19]

Are we really still talking about this list? When we get to the top 20 will we still be waiting to see our name?

[Old guy]

3Star, the internet is not a tool for prediction. The internet is a tool to express opinions, as misguided as they may be, and have them read and approved by possibly large numbers of equally misguided people who read the original misguided point of view. It is a great media, because you (plural you) can always find someone in agreement on anything that is said regardless of how accurate or way off it may be.

[cheeseman]

1 hour ago, Old guy said:

3Star, the internet is not a tool for prediction. The internet is a tool to express opinions, as misguided as they may be, and have them read and approved by possibly large numbers of equally misguided people who read the original misguided point of view. It is a great media, because you (plural you) can always find someone in agreement on anything that is said regardless of how accurate or way off it may be.

I think you have a rather narrow definition of the internet.  The internet offers many other tools that can indeed be used to create predictions.

[Old guy]

True it offers all kinds of things. Some of the tools you find in the net are quite valuable, others are not, the problem is to determine which is which.

[billikenfan05]

4 hours ago, Old guy said:

True it offers all kinds of things. Some of the tools you find in the net are quite valuable, others are not, the problem is to determine which is which.

It's great for porn

[bauman]

Trying to get this thread somewhat back on topic rather than debating the value of the "world -wide interweb" and it's value for those seeking porn, the two most recent entries on the top 144 list are South Car (86) and Harvard (85).

What I found interesting about the SC choice is that they were a Final Four team last year and now are being picked as # 86 in the country.  It does show that the writers on this site do some looking beyond just last year or the few prior years. and actually get into what talent a team has lost and what players have been added.

I'm sticking with my #76 prediction of a few days ago.  Still waiting for the 7th place team in the A-10 to appear.

[slu72]

Hahvahd Yahd in at 86. I did some calculating, not Wiz level at all, and figure we will make this list somewhere between 85 to 75.

Methodology: After Hahvahd there are 85 openings left. If you look at the top 9 hoops conferences (P5+Beast+AAC+MWest+A10) and add in 2 spots for Zaga and St. Marys, that totals 128 schools. To date, 19 schools from the above conferences have been listed, which leaves 109 schools in the top 9 competing for the final 85 spots. I went thru each conference and took a guess at how many of their unlisted schools would have a decent shot at making the final 85. For example the ACC has had one school listed to date, and I estimate another 11 will make the cut. I came up with a total of 60 schools that are likely to make the cut. This would leave 25 slots to be filled by good mid majors and maybe a few more top 9 hanger ons.

As for the A10 I figured 7 more schools will likely be named as 2 are already listed in the bottom 59. The 7 I figured likely are UD, VCU, St.B's, RI, Rich, Davidson, and SLU. So, I'm guessing we will be listed somewhere between 85-75.

Granted this is a lot of guesswork (SWAG really) on my part w/o doing any in depth analysis of each unlisted team. I went more or less on BB history of the schools in these conferences. I also acknowledge my A10 bias seeping thru, eg I've got the B12 getting a total of 7 schools listed while the A10 gets 9.  That may be a big stretch, since the B12 was one of the top BB conferences last season.

[Glorydays2013]

2 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Granted this is a lot of guesswork (SWAG really) on my part w/o doing any in depth analysis of each unlisted team. I went more or less on BB history of the schools in these conferences. I also acknowledge my A10 bias seeping thru, eg I've got the B12 getting a total of 7 schools listed while the A10 gets 9.  That may be a big stretch, since the B12 was one of the top BB conferences last season.

a Big12 and A10 matchup would be brutal

[bauman]

1 hour ago, slu72 said:

Hahvahd Yahd in at 86. I did some calculating, not Wiz level at all, and figure we will make this list somewhere between 85 to 75.

Methodology: After Hahvahd there are 85 openings left. If you look at the top 9 hoops conferences (P5+Beast+AAC+MWest+A10) and add in 2 spots for Zaga and St. Marys, that totals 128 schools. To date, 19 schools from the above conferences have been listed, which leaves 109 schools in the top 9 competing for the final 85 spots. I went thru each conference and took a guess at how many of their unlisted schools would have a decent shot at making the final 85. For example the ACC has had one school listed to date, and I estimate another 11 will make the cut. I came up with a total of 60 schools that are likely to make the cut. This would leave 25 slots to be filled by good mid majors and maybe a few more top 9 hanger ons.

As for the A10 I figured 7 more schools will likely be named as 2 are already listed in the bottom 59. The 7 I figured likely are UD, VCU, St.B's, RI, Rich, Davidson, and SLU. So, I'm guessing we will be listed somewhere between 85-75.

Granted this is a lot of guesswork (SWAG really) on my part w/o doing any in depth analysis of each unlisted team. I went more or less on BB history of the schools in these conferences. I also acknowledge my A10 bias seeping thru, eg I've got the B12 getting a total of 7 schools listed while the A10 gets 9.  That may be a big stretch, since the B12 was one of the top BB conferences last season.

72-no bias with regard to the number of A-10 schools in the top 144 list.  We know it is going to be 9.  Davidson came in today as #84.  The only question remaining about the A-10 is which possible school will be left out, either St. Joe, Richmond or us.  You obviously think it will be St. Joe.  I think it will be Richmond and quite a few on this Board seem to think it will be SLU..  Frankly, I was surprised to see Davidson listed lower than the 2 remaining possible A-10 schools. 

Repeating myself, I predict 76 for us.

We also know that the Big 12 is going to get a total of 10 teams in.  K St was ranked earlier this week and it was listed as the 10th best team in the Big 12 Conference.  This means that the Big 12 will have 10 teams in the top 144, while the A-10 will have 9 total.

With Davidson coming on board today that means the Big 12 will have 9 teams in the top 83, while the A-10 will have 6 in the top 83

The Davidson write up indicates the serious negative impact the loss of Jake Gibbs will have on the team and seems to indicate that they will be putting a lot of eggs in the Peyton Aldridge basket.  One incoming recruit is predicted to be a valuable addition at SG.  He is Kellan Grady and he is shown as the number 89 incoming recruit, although I don't know what recruiting service this ranking comes from-maybe their own.

[3star_recruit]

Kellan Grady has been a consensus 4 star recruit for well over a year. Most recruiting services list him as a point guard. He's Davidson's highest rated recruit in decades. You can pencil him in as a starter.

[bauman]

With too much time on my hands on a Sat. afternoon, I took an indepth look at the Top 144 website.  If the following is too much info for you then please just skip right by it, but if you are interested then here is where things stand in that preseason rating list.  There are 2 numbers listed after each conference, the first is the number of teams that conf will have in the top 144 while the second number is the teams that the conf still has to be named.  The teams are listed by total number of teams in the listing then by the number of teams left to be announced.

ACC                            13/12   No surprise here - only Clemson named so far

B 10                           13/10 

SEC                             13/9

B 12                           10/9

P 12                            10/8

AAC                             9/7

A -10                            9/6  Lasalle, GMU and Davidson named

B EAST                         8/7   Smaller number of teams in the conference than all of the above

MWC                           7/3

WCC                             4/3

CUSA                            4/2

SUN BLT                      4/1

MVC                              4/0

COLONIAL                  3/1

IVY                                  3/0

MAAC                             3/0

MAC                                3/0

SOUTHERN                  3/0

WAC                                3/0

AM. EAST                      2/1

HORIZON                      2/1

B WEST                          2/0

OVC                                  2/0

SUMMIT                          2/0

Big Sky,  Big South, MEAC, NEC, Southland and SWAC   all 1/0

Adding all the teams from the conferences above, gives us 142 teams, meaning that two conferences have yet to have their 1 team named.  I believe that those conferences/teams are Atlantic Sun/Fl Gulf Coast   and Patriot/ Bucknell.  The alternative is one of those 2 conferences having 2 teams yet to be named, but I don't see that happening.

Unless it is obvious you can have some fun looking at a conference you have some interest in and trying to figure out which teams, not yet listed, will be named after today.

As discussed, it seems like there are 4 locks for the 6 remaining A-10 spots (VCU, URI, Dayton and SBU)  with 3 possible teams vying for the final 2 spots (Richmond, St. Joe and the Bills).  I say Richmond misses the cut.

GO BILLS

       

[TFord and TRavs]

Didnt see Davidson was picked a few days ago. We are definitely going to be better than them so we are in. They seem to have done their research on all teams with a conference bias to narrow it down 

[wgstl]

So basically with using kenpoms final rankings from last season, along with this sites preseason rankings, if we show up from now thru the next 2 weeks, we are NIT bound.

It seems most of the NIT teams finished(obviously so) the rankings between  mid 70's - mid 90's with a few  finishing past 100

[Old guy]

I think you are giving the 144 list a degree of accuracy it plainly does not have. Just face it, this is not a predictive tool, and as far as last season's final rankings go, they really have nothing to do with our potential performance this season. Kenpom's final rankings from last season are accurate for last season.

[wgstl]

6 minutes ago, Old guy said:

I think you are giving the 144 list a degree of accuracy it plainly does not have. Just face it, this is not a predictive tool, and as far as last season's final rankings go, they really have nothing to do with our potential performance this season. Kenpom's final rankings from last season are accurate for last season.

aware this site isnt very accurate.  merely pointing out this site, if mentioned soon would have us in the NIT range. 

[bauman]

3 hours ago, wgstl said:

aware this site isnt very accurate.  merely pointing out this site, if mentioned soon would have us in the NIT range. 

When we look back at the end of this season (after rd 2 of the NCAA) i think we will all agree that this Top 144 list has its faults, however, I don't think any of us or any media source could predict with much better accuracy teams 1-144.  I think it's like ranking recruits.  It's probably easy to distinguish the top 20 from numbers 80-100, but not so easy to separate # 47 from # 58, for example.

What this site does provide is a pretty detailed summary of each team's strengths and weaknesses and informs us of who has left a program along with who will be new.  I don't know of another site that has this much information on this many teams in one place, with the exception of magazines which will not come out for a while and which cannot be seen and discussed online.  The other thing I like about this site is that it has been providing a source of CBB info starting in July.  Of course, starting to analyze teams that early can be a reason for mistakes due to late departures and/or additions.

Although I might disagree with some of the editors rankings, this list is like a car crash to me-I have to slow down to look, especially in August when there ain't much else to talk about related to CBB and our Billikens.