College basketball is different then most sports. The big four professional sports in North America have between 30 and 32 teams; college basketball has 350 teams in Division 1. Everyone has a favorite team, whether it’s based on proximity, alma mater, what you were born into or randomly selected, sports fans have a team to cheer for. Not all teams are created equally, though, and some schools don’t get their due respect.
In all reality, a good chunk of those 350 teams will never compete for a national title. Unfortunately, that is not something that can really be changed. If your team is in that group – and only you know whether they are or not – that’s unfortunate. Good for you for sticking with them though.
For the sake of this article, I won’t be talking about small market teams that deserve respect. While teams like Hawaii, Southern Mississippi, and Mercer are having a good year worthy of respect, they won’t be competing for a national title in the foreseeable future. I will be discussing teams not currently ranked in the AP Top 25 despite solid a solid performance up to this point.
An article about respect can’t be started without first talking about Pittsburgh. The Panthers have never won an NCAA title, despite being the #1 seed in 2009 and 2011, and they have only made the Final Four once, way back in 1941. Though the history of the program shouldn’t matter – though that’s not always the case, like when you look at Duke.
Pittsburgh is having a fantastic year so far. They have started the season 14-1, 2-0 in conference play with big wins over NC State and Maryland. The only loss was by one-point at home to Cincinnati, a team who is having an outstanding season of its own. Pittsburgh has not been ranked yet this season despite the fact that 14 of the teams 16 games were double-digit wins. They also won the Legends Classic to start the season.
They are now in the ACC and have a very tough road ahead of them. The thing is, it’s not any tougher then the schedule they faced every year in the Big East. The lack of a tough schedule to start the year hurt. They will have a chance to earn respect in the coming weeks, especially with games against Wake Forest, Syracuse and Duke in January. Look for them to create some “upsets,” if you can even call them that when the team winning only has one loss.
When you think of NCAA champions, or even the AP Top 25, most people don’t think of the Cincinnati Bearcats. I know I certainly don’t. They are making it hard to ignore them with the way they have started the year and they don’t show any signs of slowing down.
The Bearcats have started 14-2 and now are 3-0 in conference play, most notably a 16-point road victory over #18 Memphis. They have had many double-digit victories of their own but the trouble lies in back-to-back loses in December. Those loses, while to very good teams in New Mexico and Xavier, dropped them far from a spot in the Top 25. They went on a surge after that and are on the cusp of breaking through onto the list for the first time this season.
Breaking through might not be the tough part, though, which comes in the form of remaining on the list for an extended period of time. Cincinnati has games against Louisville and Connecticut, as well as a rematch with Memphis to contend with. They’ll need to compete against these big teams to stay on the list. If not win, they must keep the score close. Look for them to leave their mark this season.
A team that finally got the respect they deserved is Kansas State. The Wildcats are 12-3 and 2-0 in conference play with wins over Oklahoma State and TCU. Yes, I said Oklahoma State; the same team that was ranked in the Top 10 for weeks and have been people’s pick to go deep in March. Kansas State is in an incredibly tough conference – one where five of the 10 teams are ranked. January will be tough for them with road games against Kansas, Texas and Iowa State. They are experienced and well coached. They will compete.
College basketball is a great sport; night in and night out, any team can win. I know, that can be said about every sport but how many other sports have teams filled solely with 18-22 year-olds? Emotions get the best of most players; bad decisions can be made or off nights can be had. Every season is different and new teams compete every year. It’s why I love the sport.
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