Mr. Yost

November 18th, 2013 at 2:35 PM ^

Right now I think we've got a Sweet 16 team...and that's about where I'd put us #14-#16.

I'd expect us to go up and down rather dramatically until we put it all together during the B1G season.

I had us losing 3 games in the nonconference. ISU, VCU and Duke.

aiglick

November 18th, 2013 at 4:21 PM ^

Plus home court is huge in basketball. Bigger than football IMO. I really think this team makes its hay on the home floor this year and improves enough on neutral/away floors to potentially have a special Tourney run. Last night's game will be worth dividends down the road for this team.

Soulfire21

November 18th, 2013 at 2:50 PM ^

That's probably about where we should've started.  Didn't particularly look terrible, but not top ten.  Plenty of time to get experience and put it together by B1G season.

MGoLogan

November 18th, 2013 at 4:21 PM ^

I don't know, I don't think there are 10 teams in the country that have more talent than UM.  Plus it is really hard to judge how good any team is at this point.  Just look at Michigan State.  They beat Kentucky and then proceed to nearly lose at home to Columbia.  That is something you might expect from a young team like UM or Kentucky, but not a senior laden team like MSU.

LSAClassOf2000

November 18th, 2013 at 3:11 PM ^

Looking at individual voters, there was quite the spread - we were voted as high as 5 and as low as 25. Looking at the average, it comes out to 15.15 per Pollspeak as well as my tracker - the most common vote was #14 with 9 voters. Later, if I can tear myself away from storm work, I can provide an update using the poll tracker that I built. 

I Have A Gnarly Face

November 18th, 2013 at 3:32 PM ^

Meh, basketball rankings are even more meaningless than those in football, especially this early in the season. It's an early and non-conference loss, so I'm not worried one bit. Conference wins are what matter more than anything.

JHendo

November 18th, 2013 at 3:44 PM ^

I think that's a very fair ranking, but I would like ISU to be getting a little more love in the polls. That team is seemingly quite talented and legit.  

After yesterday's loss and seeing we're not going to be able to bully our way through non-conference foes like we did last year (with the exception Louisville), this looks like it's going to be a verrrry bumpy non-conference schedule:  #5 U of A,  #6 Duke, and possibly  #10 VCU.  Yikes...I don't think we've had one this rough since that one year we played Duke twice in a matter of a couple weeks.  We may not have a pretty record coming into B1G play, but we'll for sure be battle tested.

bronxblue

November 18th, 2013 at 4:30 PM ^

Looks about right.  I'm not going to panic because of one loss, especially to a decent ISU team that was going to cause problems for this team.  VCU and Duke are going to be tough, but this season should still be a solid one.

MGoLogan

November 18th, 2013 at 4:50 PM ^

Agree 100%.  VCU feasts on teams that turn the ball over and (again, knock on wood) that has never really been an issue for Beilein coached teams.  Duke, on the other hand, could be ugly.  Jabari Parker is exactly the type of player that will destroy UM.  And Aaron Gordon from Arizona, though I like UM's chances in that one with the game at home.

Saint_in_Blue

November 18th, 2013 at 4:38 PM ^

but after the non-conference schedule is over, more than likely we will not be ranked in the top 25 anyways. I think at this point we can only hope and pray that we steal at least one quality win (Arizona @ home is the best bet). I also think this team finishes no better than .500 in B1G play. Too many good teams and now ISU has provided a blueprint for teams to beat us. There are many teams in the B1G that are built exactly like ISU and therefore built to beat us. MSU, Purdue, and Iowa are good examples of such teams. The question is this: Is a .500 team in B1G conference play going to be good enough to make the tourny in March?

MGoLogan

November 18th, 2013 at 4:53 PM ^

Wow, interesting stuff.  Teams that will give UM trouble are those that have a good to great PF like Ejim.  This was an issue last year and will continue to be until UM has a PF that is taller than 6'6" and quicker/more athletic than Jordan Morgan.  MSU, Purdue and Iowa are not that type of team.  I suppose the "blueprint" could be hope they shoot 8-29 from three, but I can only hope that doesn't continue to happen.  The Big Ten is nowhere close to as good as last year and if UM finishes no better than .500, that is a bigger failure than what has happened with the football team this year.  

Saint_in_Blue

November 18th, 2013 at 7:39 PM ^

Well, the Big Ten may not be as to heavy as it was last year with 4 teams regularly in the top 15, but the middle is stronger than it has been in a while because teams like us, Indiana, and Ohio State lost great players but are semi-decent. And other teams like Iowa and Purdue have become stronger. Were going to see a lot of splits this year with more .500 teams than usual. MSU is going to run away with the conference (possibly run the table) with Ohio State following with 3-4 losses. After that it will be a cluster fuck.

MGoLogan

November 18th, 2013 at 8:09 PM ^

You could end up being correct and I have no issue with your opinion. I think you are highly overrating MSU, but that is my opinion. MSU has no real post threat (Payne tends to drift to the perimeter too much), have no legit back up big men and have a very weak bench by MSU standards. I think the winner of the conference will have at least 3 conference losses.

lilpenny1316

November 18th, 2013 at 10:44 PM ^

It may take us until B1G season to adapt to life after Burke, but this is still the second or third best team in the conference, and that's good enough to be a top 15 team.  Iowa and Purdue may be better, but neither their returning core nor incoming recruiting classes were as good as what we have.

For all the Sparty hype, they still drop games on the road in conference that are a bit mind boggling.  From what I've seen thus far, I don't see any difference. I think you're selling this team waaay too short.

Erik_in_Dayton

November 18th, 2013 at 4:47 PM ^

I'm usually relatively pessimistic, but that is really pessimistic...Something to consider re: yesterday is that Michigan's starting PG has only played three real college games and that McGary barely practiced before playing.  This team is still figuring out their roles and figuring out eachother.  They have a lot of time to grow and a lot of talent to grow with.

Another thought:  Michigan simply shot poorly yesterday.  That won't happen that often. 

AlwaysBlue

November 18th, 2013 at 5:28 PM ^

Teams have to match up against Michigan too and plenty of times I've seen opponents go smaller to accomplish that. The only thing to be learned from yesterday's game is you need to hit your open shots. They missed an experienced PG to calm them down at times but at the end of the day they had some great looks that didn't go down.

Mitch will play a bigger role in the offense too as he gets his legs and some practice time. I thought Caris played nervous which hopefully he can overcome.

B-Nut-GoBlue

November 18th, 2013 at 5:57 PM ^

Nice 7 position drop yet if one of the other top guys lost a road game at a tough OOC venue they drop maybe 3-4 spots.  A win is a win at the end of the day but Sparty doesn't get penalized at all for their display AT HOME against shitty Columbia*.  It all doesn't really matter but the bias against Michigan at times gets really old.

*Edit: I'm dumb, they also beat, ya know, Kentucky before that.

Tate

November 18th, 2013 at 5:04 PM ^

I think we will definitely be a good example of a team that is much better than our record indicates. A young team and very tough non-conference schedule is going to do that. But I would much rather have tough tests now so we can learn, then play our best basketball when conference play and tourney time comes around.

MichiganMan20

November 18th, 2013 at 7:52 PM ^

Does it really matter? It's November, wake me up in January when the games matter. I still expect this team to compete for the B1G with all the talent they have. Beilein is a good coach and his teams usually improve as the season progresses. Where we're ranked in November honestly doesn't matter to me.

pendingperil

November 18th, 2013 at 8:36 PM ^

no better than .500 in b1g play is insane.  especially with a crippled indiana team.  we also only play osu once this season (an osu that lost their best scorer).  if marginally better iowa and purdue teams are our biggest worries, i like our chances competing for a b1g title better this year than last.

Rather be on BA

November 18th, 2013 at 9:18 PM ^

Honestly, that probably seems about right and I could see us ending up around there.  I think we have a good team this year, I think we could make a run in the tourny, but I do not think we will have a top 10 resume by seasons end.  A 3-4 seed in the tourny would put us right around 14.