hairylunch

So, my alma mater is ranked 37th in Sports Illustrated's college basketball preview. UC isn't that strong this year, coming up 3rd in C-USA in the pre-season coaches poll. Perhaps more interesting is Xavier's exclusion from the SI list. CollegeHoopsnet has Cinci at 36 and the Musketeers at 51. Maybe SI thinks since Matta went to Ohio State (which seems to have worked out okay), Xavier won't be the same caliber of team.

More importantly, UC has started off with a win, with a shaky 88-70 win over Valpo, and it even looks like fan favorite, and fellow Trojan John Meeker got to make an appearance on the court from the box scores.

The question on my mind though is for the 2005-2006 season, when UC moves to the Big East, will they be able to compete? You can find a list of who's going to make up the Big East in 2005-2006 here. It's not the best football conference (which is perfectly fine for UC football since it's not in the top tier anyway), but it's going to be a pretty strong basketball conference with Seton Hall, St. John's, Marquette, Syracuse, UConn (and their amazing women's basketball program . . . ), Georgetown, hell even Notre Dame is pretty solid these days. My gut feel is that UC will have a rough year or two (still winning seasons, just not as dominating as some years), and will then be right back in it. Playing the the Big East should get them some more media attention, and also better recruits. All around, it'll be good to play up a level, for all the sports involved.

Wow, from reading this post, you might think I actually care about college basketball . . . eek!