Ten teams enter the new year with tourney champ credentials:

As I wrote in the December 6 blog, I changed this year’s qualifications for potential champs to accommodate the shifting dynamics of the NCAA tourney. Instead of examining the entire 27- year history of the 64- team era, I restricted the analysis to the last decade. What I discovered is that there are eight statistics you can use right now to narrow your list of potential champions. Every single one of the last 10 champs have:

• Earned a one, two or three seed
• Come from a Power conference (ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac- 10 or SEC)
• Been led by a coach with more than five tourney trips and at least one Elite Eight run
• Either went to the previous year’s dance or had an All- American
• Averaged more than 73 points per game
• Allowed fewer than 73 points per game
• Owned an average scoring margin of at least seven points per game.
• Played a schedule among the 75 strongest in the country

At this point of the season, 11 teams have the statistical chops to be champs. They are: Syracuse, Kentucky, North Carolina, Duke, Ohio State, UConn, Georgetown, Michigan State, Florida, and Kansas. Check out the numbers:



(PR = Pythag rating, CF = Conference, */ 11 = have a star or went to the previous dance, CO = coach criteria. All the rest of the abbreviations should be clear.)

This is the same number of teams that owned champ credentials a month ago. The only difference is that Pittsburgh dropped off the list and Michigan State earned its way on.

The other thing we track on a periodic basis is which teams’ AP rankings don’t reflect their possession- based efficiency numbers. This is the invaluable “Pythag” rating that Ken Pomeroy tracks on www.kenpom.com.

Right now, according to efficiency numbers, five teams don’t deserve to be in the top 20. The biggest imposter would be Mississippi State (Pythag ranked 55th), but Michigan (43), Murray State (31), UConn (28) and Marquette (24) aren’t playing as efficiently as their ranking would indicate.

They’ve supplanted five more efficient squads: St. Louis (14th best Pythag), St. Mary’s (15), Wichita State (16), BYU (18) and California (19).
... more » « less