We are now two months into the college basketball season. It’s a New Year and conference play is here. As always the season has been really fun so far. First lets take a look at some of the biggest disappointments in college basketball so far this season.
Biggest Disappointments In College Basketball So Far
Gonzaga Bulldogs
Talking about Gonzaga in a negative way just feels weird. At a glance, it may not seem like the Bulldogs have been a disappointment, They’re 11-4. But when you look closer you’ll see that they have not yet beaten a likely NCAA Tournament team. While they usually schedule well in non-conference, fellow disappointments UCLA and USC not living up to expectations has really hurt the Zags. As weird as it sounds, it’s not crazy to think that Gonzaga could miss the tournament this year. They are a bubble team right now. This is a good team, but they can’t keep missing opportunities for good resume-building wins.
Arkansas Razorbacks
Arkansas has been very up-and-down. At times they’ve looked great, such as during their win over then-#7 Duke. But then they also have a home loss to UNC Greensboro and just lost to then-#25 Auburn on Saturday by a whopping 32 points. The Razorbacks have been pretty bad defensively, giving up 76.9 points per game, which ranks 310th nationally. There are good opportunities left. And even if they remain disappointing that doesn’t mean they won’t go far in March. Look at last year: Arkansas disappointed and wound up as an 8 seed yet still made it to the Sweet Sixteen.
USC Trojans
I was not nearly as high on USC when the season started, but they have still been disappointing in my eyes. The Trojans had a losing record in the first two months of this season. That record includes losses to Long Beach State and Oregon State. Boogie Ellis is having a career year and true freshman Isaiah Collier is living up to the hype. It has mostly been just the two of them though. The Trojans are terrible at defending the perimeter, as opposing teams shoot an average of 36.3% from three against them. The good news is that there will be plenty of opportunities for this team to turn things around in a relatively weak PAC-12.
UCLA Bruins
On the bright side, the Bruins have been one of the best defensive teams in the country. They only give up 62.2 points per game, which is 12th best in the country. But it doesn’t really matter how awesome you are on defense if you can’t score. UCLA only averages 65.5 points per game, which ranks 339th in the nation out of 362 teams. They have losses to Cal, Stanford, and Cal State Northridge (Though to be fair the Matadors are having by far their best season in 15 years.). Being bad in a subpar conference is not good. But as I stated above there are ample opportunities for UCLA to right the ship.
Texas A&M Aggies
A loss on Tuesday to #22 Auburn dropped the Aggies to 9-6 on the season. The loss also gives them a second straight loss to start conference play. Outside of Wade Taylor IV the team has not been able to get enough consistency on offense to win games. I thought in the preseason that their lack of size depth could hurt them, and it seems like it has. On the bright side, none of their six losses are to bad teams. There is still enough talent on this team to be one of the best teams in the SEC.
Maryland Terrapins
After winning their opener, the Terrapins lost three straight games, Just like Texas A&M, Maryland also hasn’t been able to find consistency on offense outside of its best player. Point guard Jahmir Young is averaging 19.9 points per game, good for fourth in the Big Ten, but he’s in. The Terps only shoot an abysmal 27.4% from three, which ranks 350th nationally, meaning only 12 teams shoot worse from beyond the arc than they do. Additionally, Rutgers is the only Big Ten team that scores less per game than the Terps do. This team can still be really good if they can just figure out how to not stink on offense.
Michigan State Spartans
I want to preface this by saying that I have not and will not lose faith in my preseason number-one team. Sparty has been very up and down through these first two months. They lost a lot during the first month of the season, including that loss on opening night to James Madison at the Breslin Center, a place the Spartans never lose at in November. The team looked to be rebounding nicely until their six-game winning streak was broken on Sunday after a 14-point loss to Northwestern. If the Spartans can play more consistently then they are more than capable of achieving the preseason expectations.
The Atlantic-10 Conference
The A-10 as a whole is disappointing once again. There was hope that this conference could return to being the best mid-major conference in college basketball this season, but that just hasn’t happened. Teams in the conference have missed opportunities for big wins on multiple occasions. There are multiple good teams in the conference such as Dayton, George Mason, and a seemingly revitalized St. Joe’s program, but programs like VCU and Duquesne having disappointing seasons hurts. Unfortunately, this is probably going to be a 1-bid league again.
