ESPN preseason prediction-no Cuse but ACC has three of top six

[newmexicuse]

As of this second we do not deserve to be top 25. In order to get there we need to happen:

1. Solve the C issue. DC2 needs to both come back healthy and build upon where he left off. Even so he probably is only good for 25 to 30 MPG tops. Diagne is the most likely backup, and it is still not 100% certain that he even makes it onto campus.

2. Solve the PG issue. Can Kaleb make the jump ? If not G probably plays the point, which would leave us thin upfront.

3. We will need at least one or two of the frosh to be solid rotation players. As mentioned above C will be a huge issues if Diagne can't be one of those guys, assuming that he even gets here. If G ends up at the point then we will probably need Lydon to step up big time to flesh out the frontcourt.

4. Shake potatoes - At this point Trevor is what he is. It is unrealistic to expect more than incremental improvement from him. He will shoot us into some games. He will shoot us out of other games. It will be key for the staff to not ride him when he is cold and to get some scoring from Malachi or Frank from the 2G on those days. You just can't let Trevor miss 8 straight & hope he will catch fire, no way the team can be consistent with that game plan.

 

[UVA#1]

The pre season ranking is always based on returning players with name recognition plus incoming elite top 15 impact freshmen. SU has neither so it's no surprise we are not ranked. Doesn't mean we can't have a good season IF some of the guys step up, develop and play well. But the fall into middle of the pack status in the ACC is a concern. While our level of recruiting has remained good, certainly on par with the norm during the Big East years, it is not good enough to keep SU near the top of the ACC. Duke is on a whole different level and I was afraid of that when we switched leagues. But as good as we've done, it's not good enough (at least so far) to stay with UNC, Ville, and UVA. Hope the staff has another gear and can shift into overdrive to get more of the players needed to stay in the top rung. Getting Battle certainly provides hope.

Do you guys really think the ACC is that much better than the old Big East? That was a tough league. The ACC is top heavy, but the rest of the leagues is mediocre in my opinion.

 

[jordoo]

Do you guys really think the ACC is that much better than the old Big East? That was a tough league. The ACC is top heavy, but the rest of the leagues is mediocre in my opinion.

Well college bball itself is much weaker than its hay day when NBA players all played 3/4 years of college ball. So no but if we look at it in terms of the toughness of the conference relative to the overall strength of college bball at the time the ACC has a chance to be the strongest conference ever. I agree that right now its top heavy but the pieces are in place and there is no other east coast conference that can compete at all. Duke, UNC are blue blood power programs. SU and Lville are top 10ish all time programs. UVA has some real highs in program history and with Bennett is establishing themselves as a year in year out top team. There is a collection of teams with good history bellow that like NCST, Wake, Pitt, ND that are or can be good second tier programs. After that Miami & FSU are big football schools in fair weather locations that have the money to be competitive or at least build to that. If the top tier dominates all of these other teams will benefit because the ACC will be the best conference by far and kids will want to play there.

I do think that V-tech, Clemson, BC, G-tech may be destined as bball bottom feeders. BC's basketball program has been in the dumps for years and no one seems to care. Its a fball/hockey school now. Clemson has just never been a bball school and although they might have a good season here and there I'm not sold its a priority for them. The techs are well the techs. These 4 are all in the show me category.

 

[jordoo]

As of this second we do not deserve to be top 25. In order to get there we need to happen:

1. Solve the C issue. DC2 needs to both come back healthy and build upon where he left off. Even so he probably is only good for 25 to 30 MPG tops. Diagne is the most likely backup, and it is still not 100% certain that he even makes it onto campus.

2. Solve the PG issue. Can Kaleb make the jump ? If not G probably plays the point, which would leave us thin upfront.

3. We will need at least one or two of the frosh to be solid rotation players. As mentioned above C will be a huge issues if Diagne can't be one of those guys, assuming that he even gets here. If G ends up at the point then we will probably need Lydon to step up big time to flesh out the frontcourt.

4. Shake potatoes - At this point Trevor is what he is. It is unrealistic to expect more than incremental improvement from him. He will shoot us into some games. He will shoot us out of other games. It will be key for the staff to not ride him when he is cold and to get some scoring from Malachi or Frank from the 2G on those days. You just can't let Trevor miss 8 straight & hope he will catch fire, no way the team can be consistent with that game plan.

I have no issues with SU not being in the top25. From the outside it looks like we have no center, no established PG, 2 returning 5th year guys and a decent group of freshman coming in. I get it because as you state even from the inside there are some major questions that have to be answered and we simply won't know until the season starts. Plus again as you mention we will have to rely on at least 2 freshman to be solid rotational players.
I will say looking at that top25 does give me hope because there aren't too many scary teams and some in the top 10 that probably have 0 chance to get past the S16.

 

[SBU72]

Villanova way overrated. Pinkston and Hilliard were the heart of that team

Is Villanova in its own way, like Pitt. Pitt was a power in the BE when they were able to use their "rough" m-2-m but fell when not allowed to in the NCAA and now the ACC. Villanova has been a guard dominated team for years and is able to make hay in the BE especially the watered down BE, but when they get into the NCAA, they can't hold their own lacking enough big men to defend and rebound. How would they fair moving to a strong conference like the ACC.

 

[UVA#1]

SU will be a top 25 team by midseason once the incoming talent gets used to playing zone

 

[orangefog]

Is Villanova in its own way, like Pitt. Pitt was a power in the BE when they were able to use their "rough" m-2-m but fell when not allowed to in the NCAA and now the ACC. Villanova has been a guard dominated team for years and is able to make hay in the BE especially the watered down BE, but when they get into the NCAA, they can't hold their own lacking enough big men to defend and rebound. How would they fair moving to a strong conference like the ACC.

Villanova, if they were in the ACC, I contend would do better than Pitt, because they would recruit better. I think they would be able to snag a few top flight big men to go with the guards they usually get.

 

[UVA#1]

Is Villanova in its own way, like Pitt. Pitt was a power in the BE when they were able to use their "rough" m-2-m but fell when not allowed to in the NCAA and now the ACC. Villanova has been a guard dominated team for years and is able to make hay in the BE especially the watered down BE, but when they get into the NCAA, they can't hold their own lacking enough big men to defend and rebound. How would they fair moving to a strong conference like the ACC.

Villanova would struggle because their guards are no better than the guards at the top schools in the ACC and they would get dominated down low on the boards, night in and night out. Now...if they could recruit some big men they would certainly contend, but it's a tough road in the ACC.

 

[orangefog]

Villanova would struggle because their guards are no better than the guards at the top schools in the ACC and they would get dominated down low on the boards, night in and night out. Now...if they could recruit some big men they would certainly contend, but it's a tough road in the ACC.

I think they would be able to get some big men because of the league, and I agree, their guards may not stand out so much, especially right now. But, when they had Lowry, Foye and Ray, they would have been better than any set of guards in the ACC. Now, they have good guards, not great guards, on a guard oriented team. Jay Wright gets the best out of his guards. It is reasonable to think that the talent of their guards would even pick up if they were ever in the ACC.

 

[UVA#1]

I think they would be able to get some big men because of the league, and I agree, their guards may not stand out so much, especially right now. But, when they had Lowry, Foye and Ray, they would have been better than any set of guards in the ACC. Now, they have good guards, not great guards, on a guard oriented team. Jay Wright gets the best out of his guards. It is reasonable to think that the talent of their guards would even pick up if they were ever in the ACC.

Good point, I just don't think they would have dominated the ACC last year like they dominated the new Big East, I could be wrong. I do think Jay Wright is a good coach and recruiter, I'm just not sure the new Big East is as appealing as the ACC for recruits.

 

[orangefog]

Good point, I just don't think they would have dominated the ACC last year like they dominated the new Big East, I could be wrong. I do think Jay Wright is a good coach and recruiter, I'm just not sure the new Big East is as appealing as the ACC for recruits.

OMG, no way would they have dominated the ACC. If you saw the SU vs Villanova game, you would have your proof. SU had that game won, we were dominating them, but the second half was officiated as if it were an old style Big East game.

 

[HOFCeluck]

Nova had one legit big man (Cunningham) even when they were playing in the best conference in America.

 

[jordoo]

SU will be a top 25 team by midseason once the incoming talent gets used to playing zone

Its more about having a healthy effective Coleman/Diange on campus and the play we get at PG. We will need a couple of the freshman to be solid rotational players but Cooney, Gbinije and Roberson will eat up a lot of minutes as established returners. If Joseph makes the Sophmore leap and Coleman is not only healthy but effective we could be a very good team. You are correct though that it takes the freshman some time to play our defense the way JB wants it played. That's pretty common on any team known for their defense though. You guys have the same thing with your defensive system. Freshman miss an assignment, rotation or obvious scouting report item and coach pulls them, informs them and lets them watch for a while.

 

[jordoo]

Good point, I just don't think they would have dominated the ACC last year like they dominated the new Big East, I could be wrong. I do think Jay Wright is a good coach and recruiter, I'm just not sure the new Big East is as appealing as the ACC for recruits.

They may not have made the tourney out of the ACC last year. We should have beaten them at Nova and basically choked it away and last year was the weakest SU squad in quite a long time. I agree with orangfog though about them recruiting better than Pitt if they were in the ACC. Wright would once again get top level guards and his big men would be better than what they currently have as well.

 

[orangefog]

Nova had one legit big man (Cunningham) even when they were playing in the best conference in America.

They did get McDonalds All American Jason Fraser as well. He was recruited by everyone, including us. Injuries held him back. Ochefu was a big recruit as well, if I am not mistaken.

 

[orangefog]

They may not have made the tourney out of the ACC last year. We should have beaten them at Nova and basically choked it away and last year was the weakest SU squad in quite a long time. I agree with orangfog though about them recruiting better than Pitt if they were in the ACC. Wright would once again get top level guards and his big men would be better than what they currently have as well.

I think they would recruit better for four reasons. Their style of play is more attractive than Pitts. They have a history (NCAA Championship), they are a basketball school and they have a great location. I think they would pull kids from the whole mid atlantic region. Pitt, although in the same state, is a football school out west. They are more likely to pull kids from Ohio that typically want to go to a B1G school than a mid atlantic kid that wants to play in the ACC.

 

[jordoo]

I think they would recruit better for four reasons. Their style of play is more attractive than Pitts. They have a history (NCAA Championship), they are a basketball school and they have a great location. I think they would pull kids from the whole mid atlantic region. Pitt, although in the same state, is a football school out west. They are more likely to pull kids from Ohio that typically want to go to a B1G school than a mid atlantic kid that wants to play in the ACC.

Agreed Nova's issue is that they do not have D1 fball and with conference realignment that will hurt a bball program that otherwise has a ton of great things going for it. Its really the only reason I could see Jay Wright leaving. There will be some huge coaching openings coming up when you look at the age of some long time coaches, the lack of success at some bigtime schools ect. I could see Jay trying his had at one of these as the BE becomes more and more a midmajor type of bball conference and player destination.

 

[SBU72]

I think they would be able to get some big men because of the league, and I agree, their guards may not stand out so much, especially right now. But, when they had Lowry, Foye and Ray, they would have been better than any set of guards in the ACC. Now, they have good guards, not great guards, on a guard oriented team. Jay Wright gets the best out of his guards. It is reasonable to think that the talent of their guards would even pick up if they were ever in the ACC.

Like it or not, Wright has the rep as being guard orientated. He has used so many guards in the past, that when he gets 2 quality big guys, that is news. So the problem is that Wright can't recruit ENOUGH big men. He doesn't seem to be able to get more and when he has two, he often has to fall back to a 4 guard offense because of foul trouble/fatigue. Even joining another league ain't going to change his rep. Its back to like what I originally said about Pitt. They have a rep for doing well with average recruits using hands on defense, Dixon can't get traction to do things differently.

 

[HOFCeluck]

They did get McDonalds All American Jason Fraser as well. He was recruited by everyone, including us. Injuries held him back. Ochefu was a big recruit as well, if I am not mistaken.

Jason Fraser was very forgettable, to be fair.

 

[Gotothehole]

But Fraser was world

 

[Dave85]

We need a center to be ranked.

 

[orangefog]

Jason Fraser was very forgettable, to be fair.

Absolutely agree, but if not for injuries, he could have completely changed how Villanova was viewed with regard to being so heavily guard oriented. He came in with Foye and Ray and he was more highly regarded than both of them. He would have been more of a focal point if he were healthy, but in his absence, Jay Wright put his best players on the floor, which meant at least 3 guards. It worked out well and that became their MO. At least that is how I remember it, and I surely could be wrong.

 

[Knicks411]

Imagine being worried about a top 25 ranking in August.

We weren't very good last year. We lost our best player. We have a good recruiting class coming in, but there's plenty of reason to not rank us in the top 25 right now. If one or two of the freshmen turn out to be really good players, that can and will change, but I can't hate on not being included.

 

[Briancuse]

We need a center to be ranked.

Dc2 is the biggest key for this team.

 

[orangefan13]

I don't feel we have a unanimous educated guess at our 3rd/4th scorers this year yet. Its up for grabs.

I like Cooney and expect him to be more consistant than ever this year. I would like to see him attack the lane instead of the baseline more, and finish with the left (like devendorf).
But if he isn't more consistent, we are going to need a 4th, not just a 3rd go to guy to go from good to great.

Roberson is a mid post player and you need a post up isolation game to be a leader in the post.(He hasn't shown that .....Yet).
Kaleb wasn't far from breaking out imo, its all in his shooting numbers.

If BJ returned I think we get ranked.