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The AP poll of men has never felt further from reality on the court. What can be done about it?

College basketball needs to rethink its rankings.

If you’ve been following Gary Parrish’s recent weekly CBS Sports “Poll Attacks” column over the years, you know that the reporters who vote in the AP men’s top 25 poll make some pretty confusing ranking decisions. One such “attack” pointed out voters who moved Michigan State up on the ballot from the previous week while the Spartans were on a three-game losing streak. Another noted voters had placed Texas Tech seven spots behind a Northwestern team that had been beaten by 36 that week. Parrish retired the column because, in his words, he “felt like [he was] writing about the same careless people/mistakes every week.”

While it’s clear, these “sloppy” votes aren’t the biggest problem in the AP poll. It is far too heavily anchored on the previous week’s rankings and preseason expectations, making the top 25 feel more detached from reality on the court every week. It has become nothing more than a symbolic number next to the names of 25 teams on television scorebugs with little to no real value in evaluating who is “the best” in college basketball.

Ranking changes every Monday we feel formulaic. Every losing team will be dropped a few points, with almost zero regard for the strength of the opponent or the circumstances surrounding the loss. If the team doesn’t lose, it goes up, again with almost zero regard for how the team actually played that week.

Did Wisconsin deserve to climb eight points in the AP poll to beat two very weak opponents?

For example, Wisconsin entered the poll for the first time this season at No. 22 on Dec. 12, the morning after a road win at Iowa to start 2-0 in the Big Ten. Analytics-based metrics like KenPom aren’t as high as the Badgers (Wisconsin was No. 35 in the KenPom rankings on Dec. 12), but with wins over Marquette, Maryland and the Hawkeyes in the previous 10 days, few will quibble with the Badgers’ entering the poll. Since December 12, Wisconsin has played only two teams: KenPom No. 325 Lehigh and KenPom No. 310 Western Michigan. The Badgers trailed at halftime against Lehigh and led WMU by only two at the break before leading by 10. Meanwhile, Wisconsin’s two best wins have been less, with Maryland and Iowa struggling early in Big Ten play.

Yet since the December 12 poll, the Badgers have risen from No. 22 to their current No. 14 AP ranking, despite falling from No. 35 in KenPom to No. 42 in that period. Auburn, No. 17 in KenPom, has dropped from No. 19 to No. What did voters see during that time to justify the change?

Meanwhile, TCU is one spot above the Badgers at No. It is now No. 17 in the AP poll, three spots behind the Badgers. If we’re using these rankings as a valid measure of who’s good and who’s not, what we’ve learned about TCU and Wisconsin over the course of three weeks is to decide Wisconsin is better now than the Horned Frogs otherwise. before? Again, this is not an individual voter’s ballot, but the collective work of all the 60-plus voters who came to this conclusion.

Then there is the top of the poll. Voters put North Carolina No. 1 in the preseason makes sense (I also have UNC at No. 1), though preseason metrics have the Tar Heels outside the top five. But the determination to move UNC off the top line to lose the game is another perfect illustration of the poll’s limitations. Do voters really believe the team struggling to win past Gardner-Webb and UNC-Wilmington is still the best team in the country on November 21, when the Heels won the same number of first place votes they did in the preseason poll?

Next week, the No. 1 will almost certainly change hands after Purdue loses to Rutgers at home Monday. If it wins the two games it plays this week as a double-digit favorite, now No. 2 Houston will replace the Boilermakers. The Cougars will get the nod over UConn due to the lone loss of No. 4 Huskies this season came more recently, although UConn beat the team that gave Houston its only loss of the season (Alabama) by 15 on a neutral court. Houston has a real case No. 1, but the difference is whether the Cougars will be No. 1 and not UConn will be that Houston’s loss came on December 10 and UConn’s came on December 31. This is another defect of the poll: The loss. The more recent events are basically heavier, as if a team that played great for 10 games had to prove again that it was great when it lost game No.

KenPom rankings shouldn’t rule everything. This is an incredibly useful tool and does a better job of ranking teams based purely on quality than any human can with their own eyes, but wins and losses do and should be a problem. Wisconsin’s work force has earned that spot in the top 25, although how the Badgers did it has them outside the top 40 in KenPom. There is room for rankings produced by people who watch a lot of games, consider data/analytics and produce results-based ballots that balance résumé and quality. It won’t be perfect, but it would be a huge improvement over the current system, which asks often-overworked reporters to spend all night focused on reporting each beat to digest the work of 363 college basketball teams and rank the best. Like many of the writers who took the ballot, I find it hard to believe that many tune into Synergy Sports to rewatch key games they missed that week.

Asking people with full-time jobs who don’t watch college hoops games to come up with rankings that fuel sports discourse until March asks for rankings like these—ones that often seem to have less logic behind them than “Team X lost last week. , and Team Y no. But even if we still rely on the task of ranking the nation’s top 25 teams to the current crop of mostly local journalists, the polls need a fresh look at why the program is up and down during the week and should eliminate all-too-general anchoring. Otherwise, it will be a less reliable source of who is really good than before.

Brown has helped Mizzou to a surprising 12-1 start.

Jay Biggerstaff / USA TODAY Sports

Five More Observations From Around College Basketball:

With No. 11 Iowa State’s 59-54 upset win over No. 6 LSU, the perfect final bracket of the 2022 basketball tournament – created by ESPN user “Bekins24” – busted. It took 28 games to eliminate the last perfect bracket.

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Who is projected to win March Madness?

According to Caesars Sportsbook, North Carolina and Kentucky are the favorites to win the 2023 NCAA Tournament at +900. Read also : Fordham University Hosts Sports Career Camp for High School Students. Then it’s Gonzaga and Houston at +1000, UCLA at +1200, Arkansas at +1500, Baylor at +1600, and Duke at +1800.

Who is predicted to win the 2022 Final Four? North Carolina has six national titles, while Duke (five), Villanova (three) and Kansas (three) will try to close the gap. 2022 Final Four odds from Caesars Sportsbook list the Jayhawks as 4.5-point favorites against Villanova. Meanwhile, the Tar Heels are a four-point underdog against Duke.

Who is most likely to win the March Madness 2023?

Houston (700, DraftKings, FanDuel, & BetMGM) They have been dominant all season, though it was their road win over Virginia – arguably the biggest win in college hoops last week – that solidified their status as the favorite. On the same subject : The 5 Best Travel Insurance Companies for October 2022.

Who is favored to win March Madness this year?

Who likes to win March Madness? There are currently two teams with the best odds to win the NCAA tournament. The Gonzaga Bulldogs and North Carolina Tar Heels both have 900 odds.

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Who is the best players in class of 2022?

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1Dereck Lively Video | Scout Report215
2Dariq Whitehead Video | Scout Report190
3Video Nick Smith | Scout Report170
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Who is the No. 1 high school player in the country? At the top of the list is cornerback Desmond Ricks, overall No. 1 in the composite rankings.

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What is best college division?

FBS college football conference rankings from 1-10 for the 2022 season

  • SEC. Top 25 Team: 6. SP + Average: 24.6. …
  • Ten big. Top 25 Team: 4. SP+ Average: 41.3. …
  • big 12. Top 25 Team: 3. SP + average: 40.7. …
  • acc. Top 25 Teams: 5. …
  • Pac-12. Top 25 Teams: 3. …
  • America. Top 25 Teams: 2. …
  • The Sun Belt. Top 25 Teams: 0. …
  • Conference USA. Top 25 Teams: 0.

Is Division 1 or Division 3 better? The division is roughly in line with the level of investment and interest the school is putting into its athletics department. Division I is the largest, most well-funded school, while Division III athletic programs are generally smaller. This same idea is carried over to athletic scholarships, as well.

Is NCAA Division 1 or 2 better?

Division 1 is the largest college and university, while Division II and Division III member schools are smaller in size. A common misconception among athletes is that the level of Division II is by definition weaker than in Division I; or Division III compared to Division II.

Which is better D1 D2 or D3?

You have the top conferences, the mid-majors, and the bottom D1 conferences. D2 has some pretty solid teams and athletes, but the schools tend to be a little smaller and have lower budgets. D3 is the lowest division and consists of many small private universities with relatively low budgets.

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