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Conference Play Set to Begin + Is the Big 12 still the #1 Hoops Conference?
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Welcome to Episode #36 of the No Conference for Old Men Podcast.
Our Houston Cougars are 8-3 after 2 thorough beat downs of Toledo & Texas A&M-CC. Now with pre-conference games completed, we have a much better sense of every team's identity heading into Big 12 Conference play. And Oklahoma St is 1st up on the schedule for the Cougars. So the Old Men will preview the game, but will also tackle the question of the week: "Is the Big 12 still the #1 Conference in the Land"? Lots of chatter on Twitter around this topic, & the Old Men try to separate fact from potential media bias.
Please have a listen as the 3 Old Men weigh in and discuss the topic of the week, as well as provide some quick-hit game summaries and previews.
- No Conference for Old Men is available for free via Spotify / Apple Podcast / SoundCloud & the GoCoogs.com website; we're also available via the Republic of Football Podcast feed from the folks at Dave Campbell's Texas Football as their only basketball-centric offering
- Intro / Exit music: Ground Zero provided by FreeBeats.io
- Please follow us on gocoogs.com/old-men/
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Network
00:00:07
Speaker
Welcome folks to episode number 36 of the No Conference for Old Men podcast, podcast where three old guys are talking Houston and Cougar's basketball with a bit of big 12 coverage added in end as well. And proud members of the Goku's.com network, the undisputed number one Houston Cougars content provider.
Team Performance Post-Vegas
00:00:25
Speaker
Well, the team continued reinforcing the adjustments post Vegas strip with a pair of destructions of Toledo 78 to 49 and Texas A and&M Corpus Christi 87 to 51 today, showing more of the gritty and connected team that we all have grown to know.
00:00:41
Speaker
Both games were noticeable in how we continue the toughness on D, along with Sharp, Arsenal, and Oozan getting more looks on offense, like we all talked about after Vegas.
Big 12 Conference Play Preview
00:00:51
Speaker
And as the calendar a year comes to a close, we open Big 12 Conference play with a road game at Oki State. And finally, again, we'll continue with a special topic of discussion. And for today, as the pre-conference slate wraps up, the old men will discuss whether the Big 12 Conference is still the number one hoops conference in the land.
Injury Updates and Team Challenges
00:01:10
Speaker
So let's get into it. In looking at our two games this week, let's begin with the Toledo game and then move to the A and&M Corpus Christi game. And like last week, why don't each of you cover both games with brief summaries? Let's start with you, Tom. What were some of the recurring themes you saw from a coach's perspective in the Toledo game and then the A and&M Corpus Christi game?
00:01:32
Speaker
Yeah, you know, in the Toledo game before I talk about the game itself, Ramon's going to be out surgery on his hand. He's going to be out for a while. He will return before the year's over with. Juwan didn't play a whole lot but because of a nagging foot injury. Jojo didn't play much the first half, just two absolute BS calls on on Jojo. The first one was he was fighting for post position and the guy flopped. And then right on the next possession down the floor, it was a clean block and they kind of fell on that. So JVA was rusty, not sure how much.
00:02:07
Speaker
Practice he's getting you know Kelvin mentioned earlier that he had gone 19 days straight without any practice with that nagging growing injury ah He had his trouble catching the ball and making any kind of moves Cryer couldn't hood a bull in the ass from five feet. Open shots. I don't know what to deal with that is. He's not purposely missing them. Nobody goes out there and is going to purposely miss a shot. Held him to 22 first half points. And of course, we have the ubiquitous bitching about the offense. And then Kelvin at halftime to the reporter commented, well, you know what? We got 39 points. We're on pace for 80.
00:02:48
Speaker
Four for 24 from three-point land overall. I thought some highlights of that game Malik ten five and four points rebound assist the same as Milos who also had a stat line of ten five and four so it was just a dismantling the throttling of ah Toledo and Toledo is not a bad team. They'll do well in their conference now moving on to the game today against Texas A&M Corpus Christi. Bill, you'll like this. Jim Shaw, the head coach at Texas A and&M Corpus Christi, he played his college ball under David Arsenault at Grinnell College in Iowa. And Bill, for you guys that don't know, Bill had a high school teammate who went on to play at Grinnell.
Lineup Changes and Defensive Strategies
00:03:33
Speaker
Grinnell is that team that
00:03:36
Speaker
When Jim Shaw was there, they averaged 130 points a game, but they almost gave up just as much. you know they'll They'll pass up a a wide open layup and kick it out for ah for a three. They're the team that had that Jack Taylor score, like 138 points in the game. I mentioned that because Texas A and&M, Corpus Christi, is scrappy. I mean, even though the score doesn't indicate it, scrappy team, they they played to the end. There was there was no quit in them, but they were just overmatched.
00:04:05
Speaker
Yeah, they were bigger than us up front too. Yeah two You know when they were they were out rebounding us for a while. Yeah, we started a smaller lineup But anyway Malik again eight points 11 rebounds to assist JVA looked a whole lot better even though he played 19 minutes and has zero rebounds That's not gonna sit well with with Kelvin Kelvin might give everybody a day off and have JVA go in there and work on this rebounding No kidding Shot really well from three point land, 14 for 29. And I wouldn't call it garbage time because in a great program there's no such thing as garbage time. But in the last four minutes, I think that three point percentage went down a little bit. ah But when the game mattered, Cryer, Sharp, just knocking down Uzan, knocking down Threes. But overall, it was a good win for the Cougs. Juwan didn't play. We sat him out the whole time.
00:05:00
Speaker
ah getting ready for Oklahoma State on and in nine days here.
Player Performances and Game Strategies
00:05:04
Speaker
Nice. Hey, Tom, I was going to ask you, and Coach Sampson hinted at it before the game, this last game, especially with Juwan out, that we might see a little bit of the double post lineup with Tuggler and Francis together. And we actually did get to see a bit of that, especially in the first half. What were your impressions of that? What do you think of that lineup?
00:05:23
Speaker
with With that lineup, I believe we're better defensively because we have ah two rim protectors. We should be better rebounding, but on the offensive end, it's not going to be as good. I mean, that's the, that's the trade-off you have. yeah You know, when you play four perimeters, you know, around one big, you know, you, should you should be better offensively because you can stretch the floor with that one premature player. But defensively, you know, you're probably going to give up.
00:05:50
Speaker
If you play the small lineup, you're probably gonna give up ah a few more offensive rebounds. There's not that rim protector. So you're probably gonna have teams drive the basket more and not have to worry about where the big men are all the time. It's a catch 22, it's a trade off. I gotta be honest, i don't I don't think it's a whole lot different than playing Tuggler and Juwan.
00:06:14
Speaker
or, or Francis and Joanna bottom line is that Tuggler is active enough. He's, he's athletic enough. He can get out. He's not just stuck on down in the post. Well, more like Francis would be. So I didn't see a whole lot of difference when the two played, but, uh, but, uh, that's just my, my perspective. ah Okay. I mean, so, so what's your player perspective on both games, Bill?
00:06:42
Speaker
Toledo, you know, everyone was talking about the four of 24 and everyone was specifically down on Cryer. And if you watched, really watched the game, I mean, Cryer one was defending the perimeter just unbelievably well. I mean, he, he actually played a great game. He, he defended well, he moved the ball. The shots just didn't fall. And you know, it's just one of those things. ah We, we talked about it in the preview that Toledo is one of the worst defensive teams in the nation. And and if the shots fall, we'd probably score a hundred points. We'd probably win by 40, 45. I mean, it was a complete annihilation in every as aspect. We just, the shots just didn't fall. and And, you know, it's going to happen from time to time. and
00:07:33
Speaker
but everything else was so strong. And there was a clear emphasis from the very beginning to go inside, whether that caused you a little bit to lose focus, because instead of, you know, catching and thinking, okay, catch shoot, if I'm open, you're, Is there a good look into into Tuggler, Francis, you know, so for whatever reason, the shots didn't fall, but the team played just unbelievably well. We crushed them on the boards. We limited their field goal percentage. We forced bad shots. I mean, it was just the only negative was that shots didn't fall.
00:08:17
Speaker
That's why you play defense. I hear Calvin talk about it all the time. it's Yeah, shots are the one thing that you can't really fully control your effort, your defense, your rebounding. You can control that, but sometimes the shots just aren't going to fall. So that's fine. I also heard a lot of people saying that, you know, how can Arsenal not be in the starting lineup? Of course he was today, but yeah.
00:08:41
Speaker
not be in the starting lineup with 16 and he had nine boards. Well, and Tom, you you alluded to this. A, Roberts got hurt and didn't play 10 minutes. And B, because of the fouls and they replayed that block where Tubler got called.
00:08:59
Speaker
a couple of times in the Fertitta Center and the crowd went nuts. Yeah, between the two of them, they played a total of, I think, 26 minutes. So, of course, it's going to be a smaller lineup. And, you know, quite honestly, Arsenal better to have that many rebounds when there's no other height in the game. So, I think everyone everyone stepped up, played well, and I thought it was a great win. Shots just didn't fall, big deal. Adam Corpus Christi today.
00:09:28
Speaker
He, he shot really well. I mean, really well, but you know, down garbage time at the end, I think we ended up just barely below 50% both from the field and and from three. And we were well above it for the overwhelming majority of the game. We're up 35, 36, 38, whatever it was late in the game, big deal.
00:09:53
Speaker
Benches are cleared and and we miss shots and it starts to revert back toward the mean. But the guys that take the shots versus yeah Kansas and Baylor and Iowa State and everybody, ah Sharp, Arsenault, Cryer, Oozan, they were hitting their shots. so The rebounding was tight today. We were down rebounding for most of the game. But again, no Roberts. So take it for what it's worth. ah That's not something I'd really stress out over. Defensively, we were we were absolutely on point. They shot 32% for the entire game, 26% from the field. are twelve I'm sorry, 26% from three. And it was just
00:10:36
Speaker
They were out of class. And yeah, on to conference play. Hey, just a quick question for you, Bill. What's your take on Malik finally getting more play in both of these last two games and actually playing well after not seeing but one minute of garbage time versus Butler, which, you know, at least from an observer perspective, it looked like it was trying to teach a lesson, so to speak. Yeah. Well, and.
Game Analysis: Toledo and Texas A&M
00:11:04
Speaker
There wasn't really anything said about it, so it's all speculation. But I'll take Malik's, it's not really his side, but I'll defend him. And in this case, he did have a wrap on his leg, which I've never seen before. And so I'm assuming that you know maybe he had been limited in practice. I'm assuming he was hurting to some extent. And I think that must have had, and neither one of us, we were at the game together, neither one of us noticed that, but it was pointed out to me. and I heard Kelvin's press conference after the Toledo game and the two guys he had with him or the two players were Tuggler and Malik. And he said that these two are, and there's like no question about it. These are the two supreme athletes on the team. These are the two best athletes. And you want someone that's that athletic on the floor. Malik does everything. Sometimes he.
00:12:01
Speaker
obviously doesn't do everything as well as he could. and and And sometimes everything isn't as good as it could be. But overall, and when you've got the talent and the athleticism that he has, I mean, he's a he's a backup point guard that can you know grab five, six boards a game and in limited minutes.
00:12:21
Speaker
He can get the ball to other players. He can put the ball on the floor and score. He can defend. For him, it's just a matter of putting it all together. But he's just got so much ability that I think it's difficult to keep him off the floor when ah when he is playing well. And it sounds like he plays well in practice and Kelvin knows what he can do. and Yeah, he's starting to show it a little. move kind of It's almost reminiscent of last season where he really yeah got off to kind of a mediocre start and then turned it on later in the year. This is a little earlier than he did last year. So hopefully that's a good sign. Stepping up even more as as the season winds down and we make our way toward the title.
00:13:08
Speaker
Yeah, completely they agree. I mean, from an analytics perspective, looking at the Toledo game, it was an OK game on offense, but ah another stellar game for our Cougs on D. And as a reminder, now that it's deep into December, we will begin our transition to using this season's stats as a reference point versus still looking at last season's, given that there's enough games played at this point for this season's numbers to be meaningful.
Oklahoma State Game Preview
00:13:33
Speaker
So on offense, as you guys have highlighted, we were actually miserable from three-point range, 16.7%. But fortunately, we shot a blistering 60.5% from two, which is nice, quite honestly, since this area has been our worst two-point shooting team in quite a while. But our overall effective field goal percentage was still only 47.8% for the game, well below our 52.1% standard for the season.
00:14:00
Speaker
offensive rebounding rate at 32% was also a little bit below our usual rates. And our turnovers were again, a bit of an issue at 16.7%. So a mixed bag on ah offense, but as you guys had highlighted, especially you, Bill, that it was a great outing for Arsenal in Jojo.
00:14:17
Speaker
On defense, we put on another masterclass limiting Toledo to 34.3% effective field goal shooting in a dismal 30.6% from two point range and 27.8% from three point range. We also had 12 steals to completely smother Toledo.
00:14:34
Speaker
And then quickly onto the A&M Corpus Christi game, a different kind of game, you know, just given their size and pressing style, as you had mentioned, Tom and us playing without Roberts, but the same result with a 19 point lead at the half and ending with a 36 point win.
00:14:50
Speaker
We blitzed them offensively, shooting 61% from the field and 61.5% from three in the first half, while limiting A and&M Corpus Christi to 34.6% from the field and 22.2% from three at the half. Game was basically over at that point with the ending margin of 36 point.
00:15:11
Speaker
when we got lots of backups into play. So let's get to our first big 12 game of the season to end the year on the road at Oakey State. Bill, why don't you kick it off and provide your players take on the matchup versus Oklahoma State. OK, this is not a ton here because I think this is going to be a I don't want to say a complete walk over since it is at Oklahoma State. yeah but But we're going to be fine.
00:15:38
Speaker
They're seven and three right now. They're actually off to a pretty good start. They've got a brand new coach, Steve Lutz, who is a solid coach. First year there, they've only got one starter back, which yeah I remember you guys talking about BYU when you were predicting BYU to be poor last year, saying they've got all their starters back. But the bad news is they've got all their starters back. well At the opposite side of that spectrum, Oklahoma State only has one starter back. And I think that's good news for them that they're bringing in all new people. and And so far, so good for them. 7-3, their best win was in the Big 12 Big East Challenge they won at.
00:16:20
Speaker
Seton Hall, 85-78. So one of the you know the big 12 didn't fare as well as some of us thought they would have during during the challenge. But Oklahoma State was one of them. They recently lost at home to Oklahoma, 80-65. So that's one of the three losses. Probably their worst. I'll mention their top three scores. The one starter back from last year, Bryce Thompson,
00:16:48
Speaker
He's a 50 or senior start to guard shooting guard averages 10 points shoots 37% from three. Just wanted to defend him on the perimeter Abu Osman a he's a 610 senior center. He came in from Xavier. He is averaging 11 and a half points.
00:17:07
Speaker
five rebounds, and he can actually hit threes if you don't pay attention to him. He can't step out on the perimeter. And then their their leading scorer, probably their best player, Markellis Avery, he transferred in from UCF, another senior. So they've got some experience. The top players all have experience.
00:17:28
Speaker
to say 210 forward is averaging 13.5 points, 5.5 rebounds, 44% from the field, which is not great, but forty just over 40% from three. So the top three players can shoot well. I won't get into any other players, but I do want to mention, at least in depth, but I do want to mention two.
00:17:51
Speaker
Brantley and Dean, they're two point guards that came in. And the reason I mentioned them, ah and they're small, 161, Brantley, 511, Dean. The reason I mentioned them is because Oklahoma State's okay, not especially great offensively, they're a little better defensively, but they are one of the top teams in the nation in turning the ball over and that is forcing other teams to commit turnovers. And Brantley and Dean really lead that. So we just need to protect the ball, which we, which we always do move the ball. Well, we can test their threes, which we always do, you know, starting out conference play on the road, but
00:18:37
Speaker
we're going to win this game. we're We're going to walk away with an 82-67 win. 82-67, okay. How about you, Tom, from a coach's perspective on the OSU game? Well, Bill mentioned they have a new coach, Steve Lutz. Steve Lutz had ah rebuilding a quick turnarounds at Texas A and&M Corpus Christi. He was there for a couple of seasons, and then he was at Western Kentucky last year for one year.
00:19:03
Speaker
ah Corpus Christi, he led them to back-to-back NCAA bids. He's to done some assistant coaching under Greg McDermott and and Matt Painter. He also spent some time before that with ah Danny Casper at incarnate word and Stephen F. Austin. So that makes him part of the old Eddie Sutton and Hank Iba coaching tree. So, you know, he's going to emphasize defense. A matter of fact, when he was with Painter at Purdue, he was their quote unquote defensive coordinator.
00:19:33
Speaker
You know, so expect them expect Oklahoma State to be tough and play good defense kind of like we do. I don't know this game. I hope I'm wrong, but this game could be a dogfight. Somebody by once you mentioned that there's no upsets at home. We do have something going in our favor. The students will be on break, so that's going to limit maybe some of the energy in the building with with the students being gone. So like I said, I hope I'm wrong, but You know, this could be, this this could be a nail biter, not good for my stomach. When I'm watching these type of games, I think we'll win, but it's conference season. They become, they become grinds. and Anything can happen. You never know. Ask Kansas when they went on the road last year.
00:20:23
Speaker
I do feel though that the team that's going to win the big 12 this year, I think we'll win it. But I think they have to go at least nine and one at home and six and four on the road. So important road game here to give those important six road wins. Yeah, definitely. Especially to kick off the conference slate. So from an analytics perspective,
00:20:46
Speaker
Oklahoma State has been kind of a middling team this year. That's been slightly better than last season. And they come in at number 102 in Ken Palm. They're number 124 in adjusted offensive efficiency. And they're currently 96th in adjusted defensive efficiency, where when you look at our new numbers this year, we're actually 15th in the country.
Basketball Conference Rankings
00:21:07
Speaker
Uh, and I think it actually moved up to, uh, I'll restate it 12th in adjusted offensive efficiency. And we're number three in adjusted defensive efficiency.
00:21:16
Speaker
really close to our usual numbers at this point. Oklahoma State doesn't do anything well on offense and gets most of their points from the free throw line of all places and on D OSU focuses strictly on one thing and that's stealing the ball and forcing turnovers with their ranked number 27th in steel percentage in Ken Palm.
00:21:34
Speaker
So a key point for us on offense will be protecting the ball where we've been a little bit sloppy this season as the teams adjust to Oozan at point guard based on the metrics. This is projected to be a 12 point win for the Cougs on the road by Ken Palm, the way we're playing at this point. And I think the adjustments that we've made, I think it's going to be a bigger win. I look for us to clean up things on our turnover side, entering conference play. So I'm projecting a 78 56.
00:22:04
Speaker
18 point win on the road. So we'll see 22. Is it 22? Oh, sorry.
00:22:13
Speaker
Using the new math. Yeah, really. And I'm supposed to the analytics guy. That's pretty sad. I should restate that is 78 to 60, I guess, right? 18 point one. That's better. Yeah. So now let's get to our topic of discussion today is to be conference slates have completed for all the teams this month.
00:22:34
Speaker
It was all over Twitter this week about how the SEC was this season's top conference and not the Big 12, as has been the case over the course of the last five or six years. So the three old guys are going to take a closer look to see if this is truly the case or a bit of media bias. Tom, why don't you kick things off and what's your take from a coach's perspective as well as your kind of reasons for how you view the different conferences?
00:23:01
Speaker
Well, right now I see Auburn's kicking produce ass 55 34. Uh, so it looks like Auburn's going to take care of that. I it's, it's so hard to say, you know, which conference is going to be the best right now, because last year people were crapping on the ACC yeah and then NCAA tournament time comes and NC state makes that run through the tournament. I think it was Clemson. Clemson did well too. Clemson coach Brad Brunell.
00:23:29
Speaker
you know, made some comments and they they they backed it up. They won a couple of games there too. But if you look at before conference play starts, you know, if you look at everything, you have the SEC, you could say they're probably the best. South Carolina has the worst record at eight and three. A lot of teams were just playing a bunch of tomato cans and beating those to smithereens. They have eight teams in the top 25, five teams in the top 10. That doesn't even include Mississippi State, you know, Mississippi State.
00:23:59
Speaker
They're the team that pumbled number 18 pit and beat Memphis soundly today. Yeah. Or are they the team that Butler beat by 10, a team that we just absolutely destroyed about ah about a week ago. So you could, you know, you can make a case for the SEC, but conference play starts and once conference play starts.
00:24:19
Speaker
They're going to cannibalize each other and, you know, the losses are going to start to accrue in all these conferences. so They're pretty balanced. Go to the big 12. We have Iowa state, Kansas, U of H and Cincinnati, the top 25, possibly Baylor, BYU, Arizona, and tech could eventually get in there. But once again, conference play starts. And, you know, if they're starting off 500, they're probably not going to get in top 25.
00:24:46
Speaker
Arizona's sitting at five and five right now, even though they played a tough schedule. So we'll just have to see big 10. They have five teams in the top 25. So you could say those are the three, three best basketball conferences. That's the way to look at it. We'll just, we'll just have to see, I think, you know, whatever happens to the regular season.
00:25:04
Speaker
you have to back it up in in march when the when the game really count and well said how about you bill what's your take on the conference comparisons and hoops okay well before i get into this i want to reiterate something that i've probably said a thousand times is going to win the national championship. They are. a With that said, there is no argument right now. The SEC is a better conference. Conference, every team. Yeah. And Steve, sometimes I get on you, not often.
00:25:39
Speaker
But occasionally, and yeah you mentioned like Bart Torvick's numbers and and some of the others, ah because I feel like oftentimes it doesn't take into account things like, and it's always but been kind of around Shedd and Shedd's leadership and what he did off the court and so forth. But in this case, the numbers are are more than applicable. and And I looked at the Ken Palm numbers and right now Auburn's one, Tennessee's three, Florida's seven, Alabama's nine,
00:26:09
Speaker
Kentucky's 12 and I can keep going down the list. Mississippi State 18, A and&M's 21. So there's seven teams. The worst team in Ken Palm is South Carolina at 67. So it's crazy. They're the absolute worst.
00:26:27
Speaker
We've got competing with South Carolina. ASU is 62. Utah, 64. Kansas State, 75. Colorado, 76. UCF, 80. TCU, 90. And Oklahoma State, today they moved up one, Steve, they're up to 101. That's two, three, four, five, six. That's seven teams that are right around or much worse than South Carolina. And, you know, I remember when We were talking about U of H's predicted, when we did the U of H preview and Jamie Hollinsworth was on and and was saying that, not necessarily directed, he challenged me, but
00:27:08
Speaker
The fact of the matter was, Jamie had mentioned that the conference was better this year. and you know everyone ah There's a lot of improvement. And I just don't see it. I think that we've got ah a good top half of the conference and a kind of a mediocre bottom of the conference this year. Whereas I don't see that gap in the SEC, I think.
00:27:30
Speaker
even South Carolina, didn't they just, I think they took apart Clemson just recently. And not that I'm an apologist in any way for the ACC, because I think they're absolutely abysmal. But nevertheless, that's their worst team. you know And they're at 67 in Ken Palm, and and you know we've got one, you know, TCUs at 90, they're approaching 100, and Oklahoma State's just at at over 100. So Right now, there's no question. I don't even think it can be argued that SEC is a better conference top to bottom. Yeah, let me ask you this, Bill, how would you rank the top conferences right now? Just at this granted, it's this point in time. So SEC one, who's two? Yeah, big 12 is two. Okay. And then who do you have third? I agree with Tom big 12, big 10.
00:28:22
Speaker
Then we'd go kind of a toss up, but I might go big East over ACC. It's, it's awfully close. Clemson, I guess is the second best team in the, in the ACC. I so far i remember when we did our.
00:28:36
Speaker
top eight, top nine, when we were doing our conference and, and national previews. And I said, the one team I thought was overrated going into the season was Carolina. And and you're right. Yeah. And they've kind of backed that up. It's I thought it was because they couldn't shoot the ball. They, they actually score a lot, but, uh, yeah, they've been bad in other areas, particularly rebounding, but yeah I would Put the ACC at fifth right now. Okay. How about you, Tom? How would you rank the top five conferences? I would go SEC, big 12, big 10, big East. And what else is there? ACC fifth then?
00:29:17
Speaker
ah yeah yeah Yeah, by the way, Steve, and ah and this was pointed out to me by buy a big SEC fan, my corporate attorney Kevin McAlpin, he said that the SEC going into this week was 30 and 4 against the ACC.
00:29:38
Speaker
30 and four. That's crazy. It's it's got to be right around 80, 89%. Yeah, so you guys have the same top five, I think, right? So it's SEC, big 12, big 10, big East, then ACC, you guys both agree. Yep. I mean, so as the analytics guy, and granted, I am a biased analytics guy as well, right? Because we cover the big 12.
00:30:01
Speaker
But the stats are indeed a bit damning for the Big 12 so far this season. And you guys had highlighted the AP top 25. Right, Tom, SEC has eight in the top 25, Big 12, four, Big 10, five, ACC two, Big East has two. If you look at Ken Palm and they're my Bible of stats with their top 50, SEC's got 13 in the top 50, Big 12's got nine, Big 10's got 10, ACC five, Big East four. So on the surface, it appears that the Big 12 not only may not be number one,
00:30:35
Speaker
but they may even be behind two conferences in the sec in the big ten coming in third potentially but then when you dig in just a little bit deeper in the analytics it looks a bit better so when ken palm actually ranks the conferences in his analysis he compares the Ken Pomp ranking of the 500 team in each conference, right? So kind of the middle team of each conference. And with this lens, it's SEC number one, then there's a big drop to big 12 at number two, slightly ahead of the big 10. Then there's a big drop again to the Big East and then ah at number four, and then another big drop to the ACC at fifth.
00:31:14
Speaker
When you look at Bart Torvick, he does an average power ranking for each conference that determines conference teams' chances of beating what they call the average Division I team. And with this paradigm, there's a bit more separation across the conferences. But again, it's the SEC number one, big 12 number two, big 10, then big East, and finally the ACC.
00:31:37
Speaker
Then, of course, for me, I went even deeper myself in the analytics. And you start to see even style of play around each conference's makeup as it relates to emphasis on offense versus defense with how each team is structured. And with this lens from Ken Pong, you see the SEC is split in half in terms of certain teams being dependent on defense more or offense more. On the Big 12, all of a sudden, you see a heavily defensive dependent makeup of teams with 12 teams out of 16 leaning on that side. The Big 10 and the Big East are like the SEC and being split basically in half across offense dependent versus defensive dependent teams. And finally, the ACC is going to be the one that is slightly more offensive dependent coming in.
00:32:28
Speaker
Now, what does this mean? I don't know. For me, at least, I was going to come into this debate with the intention of basically saying, hey, It boils down to national championships, just like in football with the SEC when people start talking about conference strength. And you know my argument was going to be that, hey, defense travels come turny time. And the big 12's defensive-oriented makeup was going to shine come March. So we're still number one. And plus, like you guys said, we're going to win the championship anyway. So who cares?
00:33:01
Speaker
But then as I started looking more closely at historical champions in this day and age, it's been the offensive side, interestingly enough, that has had a slightly stronger correlation to winning the national championship within in general.
00:33:15
Speaker
The kind of profile of national champion in the last 10 years has been a team that's roughly top 10 ish, I'll say offense paired with something like a top 20 ish defense as the profile needed to win it all come March. If I take that profile as of today, these would be the teams to look out for a come March. It would be Auburn where they've got, you know, number one on offense and 15 on defense.
00:33:42
Speaker
Gonzaga, number two on offense, 19 on defense. Iowa State, number four on offense, if you can believe that, and number 11 on defense. Florida, seven on offense, 16 on D. Duke, 11 on offense, number one in defense, and Houston at number 12 on offense and number three on defense.
00:34:03
Speaker
And when you look at that makeup of six, that's still two SEC teams and two big 12 teams. Now, it's my belief that with conference play beginning, just like you guys said, especially Tom, right there's going to be a bit of cannibalization. And when I look at those six teams, you know one of the two SEC teams in Florida is a pretender, as I stated at last week's episode, even though they did beat North Carolina. But the reality is, if I'm being true to the stats,
00:34:30
Speaker
as of today, even I have to admit, begrudgingly that the SEC as a conference has outperformed big 12. So I think we're at a consensus even in the rankings of the top, you know, five conferences in order. But this is definitely a topic I want to revisit come season end and whoever wins the championship and hopefully it's us. So and again, Steve, I'll go back to the first thing I said, which was, we're gonna win it all. But It's not which conference is going to beat the other conference for the title. It's which team is going to beat the other team. We've got the best team. and We just don't have the best conference. And the cannibalization is going to happen just as much in the Big 12 as it is everywhere. So everyone's going to lose. I'll argue that the SEC will be the best conference from start to finish. yeah do But the best team is not going to end up in the SEC.
00:35:28
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, i'll but I'll be curious to see how many actually make it to the NCAA tournament out of each of the conferences
Podcast Conclusion and Social Media
00:35:35
Speaker
this year. I agree. You know, a lot of the teams that we thought were going to be good in our own conference have not performed up to this point. The Bailers and the Arizonas. Arizona arion for sure. Yeah. So we'll see. But I mean, people are talking about, you know, almost every SEC team making the NCAA tournament at this point. It's like that's impossible come conference play.
00:35:58
Speaker
there's going to be some separation. So I think that the rankings won't be as drastically different once conference play begins because of the cannibalization. I think we're going to get it as well. But there's already a bit of a stratification even in non-conference within the Big 12. And I think we'll see it in the SEC moving forward. And hopefully it we'll be there.
00:36:18
Speaker
at the end, right? We will. So that's it for our 36th episode of the No Conference World event podcast. Hope you all enjoyed it. And again, we'd really appreciate it. Folks would follow, subscribe, or collect our podcast, depending on your podcast platform of choice.
00:36:34
Speaker
We are also available via the Republic of Football podcast feed from the folks at Dave Campbell's Texas Football as the only basketball-centric podcast or at the go-koos.com website for those that prefer to digest the content that way. We appreciate the continued support from all. Also, please give us a follow on our Twitter account, No Conference for Old Men. Thank you all again for listening and be on the lookout, I'd say, after the new year for our next episode to drop. Take care, everyone.