#22 In AP, #20 in Coaches Polls - Hanging In There
Nice win in nationally televised game at Wisconsin offsetting the clunker at Northwestern. Seems about right. Hopefully we start peaking now.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:35 PM ^
While ranking does not affect seeding, it defintely affects national perception. I am glad this team continues to hang in there in the rankings. Ranked teams are dropping game at a very high rate over the last several weeks. The parity within the top 80 teams this year is pretty remarkable. There is an opportunity for this team to do something special this year.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:41 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 2:48 PM ^
https://collegebasketball.ap.org/poll
http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/basketball-men/polls/coaches-poll/
Small quibble, Michigan is #21 in the Coaches Poll.
February 12th, 2018 at 4:44 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 12:38 PM ^
Hanging in where?
February 12th, 2018 at 12:42 PM ^
even though Michigan lost to Northwestern this week, they are hanging by in the Top 25. The win at Wisconsin is not as impressive as it would have been a year ago.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:39 PM ^
My alma mater Xavier is the highest at #4, followed by Cincinnati at #5. tOSU is now #8. For the first time ever Xavier and Cincinnati are in the Top 5.
With #19 Wichita State @ #5 Cincinnati Sunday and #3 Villanova @ #4 Xavier on Saturday, Cincinnati, OH is the place to be this weekend!
February 12th, 2018 at 12:41 PM ^
Is one of my F4 picks. Love that team.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:44 PM ^
This has been the best year in school history. They are #4 for the first time ever! If they beat Nova, you can make the case for them anywhere from #1-3 (I am biased but I think they should definitely jump MSU).
February 12th, 2018 at 12:46 PM ^
And it's a wide open field, you never know.
I was absolutely sky high on Virginia until they dropped to VA Tech. I thought their offense was finally coming around, but they showed that Bennett Ball is a really risky pick.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:17 PM ^
Xavier/Cinci rivalry never gets the love it deserves.
February 13th, 2018 at 2:37 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 12:39 PM ^
They are 2-6 over their past eight games and all of their best wins, sans the KU victory at home three weeks ago, are a month old or older.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:40 PM ^
Trae. Young.
He will still win National POY
February 12th, 2018 at 12:50 PM ^
Of USC when they had OJ Mayo for one season.
Trae/OJ are both ridiculously good college players, but in the tournament, those teams with one star and no one else tend to get shut down.
TY is a hell of a player, but he can't carry those guys.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:54 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 1:01 PM ^
Bad examples.
Syracuse had Hakim Warrick and McNamara.
UCONN had Jeremy Lamb and Napier, both who were taken in the 1st round.
I'll give you Curry because he's an absolute monster. But Oklahoma as currently set up? They don't even sniff Syracuse and UCONN in terms of talent with those teams.
February 12th, 2018 at 4:13 PM ^
That was a great Syracuse team - Warrick was seriously underrated and McNamara was a deadly shooter. Melo was the star but he had a really strong supporting cast.
UConn teams were also generally talented from top to bottom.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:41 PM ^
If Michigan could flip almost any of their losses to a win, it seems like it would help their resume a lot.
Any win against Purdue, OSU or UNC would look pretty good right about now. Conversely, if any of the clunkers (LSU, Iowa, Northwestern) had been a W, that would get a "bad loss" off of the resume. I guess that Nebraska doesn't move the needle much one way or the other. It shows how important each game is......and what a grind the regular season can be.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:45 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 12:50 PM ^
I know this sounds weird, but here is why it may be beneficial to be the 5 seed than the 4 seed. As the 5 seed, you get to play the winner of the 12/13 game. This should be a very winnable game. Then, you play against the 4 seed, Nebraska, who is coming into the game cold after a long layoff. You carry momentum into that game and have another win on your resume. If we are the four seed, Nebraska gets the warmup game and the additional win on the resume. Don't get me wrong, I wish we were looking at the four seed, but I can see the several lining of the 5.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:31 PM ^
OTOH, before that you have to take a week off and then play the 12/13 winner, who's already gotten their bearings in the arena (played the night before) and has nothing to lose. A loss there is a bad one.
If you're the 4 seed you have no worries about a bad loss.
February 12th, 2018 at 2:11 PM ^
Eh, the results don't bear that out. The Big Ten grew to 12 teams (necessitating the 5/12 game) in 2012 and since then the 5 seed has only advanced to the semis (i.e., won the 4/5 game) once. That was 2014, before there was even a 12/13 game.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:55 PM ^
because as the 5, we'll have to play a game to get to the 4/5 matchup, but judging by last year, it might help us get acclimated to the court, etc.
Obviously, it'd be a disaster to lose that first game, but in all likelihood, we'll be playing Nebraska in the 4/5 game which would be the case if we had the 4 seed.
That said, we need to make sure we get the 5.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:52 PM ^
Michigan beat Iowa at Carver-Hawkeye. That would indeed be a bad loss.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:14 PM ^
I missed that one (and can't edit it for some reason). Good catch!
February 12th, 2018 at 12:48 PM ^
Hmm so even voters forgot that Northwestern game already.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:51 PM ^
Nah, they just saw loads of other ranked teams losing to unranked teams as well.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:48 PM ^
after a lot teams behind us also lost to some unimpressive foes (Miami to BC, Nevada to UNLV at home) or teams lost twice (Butler, FSU and Kentucky both lost two tough games each).
Creighton and Florida probably deserve to be ahead of us, but we do deserve to be top 25 still.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:49 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 1:07 PM ^
what a down year for college bb -- we should be ranked like 30 something in a normal year.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:35 PM ^
Pretty normal for a 20-7 team from a power conference to be ranked.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:10 PM ^
Have a big opportunity this week to firmly get completely out of bubble territory. I hope Beilein has had Sunday's game circled in red since that first week in December. He has to still be sitting there and wondering how that game ever got away from him.
Those guys are beatable. Yes, they're very good this year. But they are beatable. If they beat MSU @ Breslin, and went toe-to-toe with Purdue twice, they can beat OSU.
This team seems to play up to its competition. Hope that holds true on Sunday, and I hope Crisler is rocking. Someone needs to take those bastards down. Might as well be Michigan.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:22 PM ^
Michigan is beating those inbred fuckers from Columbus on 02/18. Double digit win.
February 12th, 2018 at 5:44 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 7:21 PM ^
Probably not causal, but you can’t really be sure, can you?
February 12th, 2018 at 1:22 PM ^
#1 in the Coaches, #2 in the AP...#11 in the tourney. LOL
February 12th, 2018 at 1:33 PM ^
They barely survived against Iowa last week. I wouldn't be shocked if they were upset in one of these last games.
February 12th, 2018 at 2:15 PM ^
if they don't lose at least one of their last 3 road games at Minnesota, Northwestern or the last game of the regular season at Wisconsin.
Senior Day in Madison, Happ's last game, nationally televised on CBS with the Badger fans screaming - I wouldn't want to play there on Senior Day.
Screw Sparty! On Wisconsin!
February 12th, 2018 at 4:44 PM ^
even though they've been squeezing by in most of their games. Those are bad teams right now, except for Northwestern which is merely ok but still a team we likely would have beaten easily had Livers not been injured.
February 12th, 2018 at 6:01 PM ^
Haven't really paid much attention to MBB other than UM stuff.
February 13th, 2018 at 12:36 AM ^
my guess is OP thought he was a senior.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:25 PM ^
We can beat anyone in the field, we can lose to anyone in the field. And maybe the Jim Delaney Week-Long Spring Break that we're going to get before the NCAA tournament starts will have us rested and ready to go.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:28 PM ^
That's all that matters.
February 12th, 2018 at 4:15 PM ^
State is #2. BARF. It would be some sad state of affairs if they finish the season #1. I would love for Michigan to catch them at MSG and hand them another beating.
Let's beat the fuck out of #8 Ohio State this week. GO BLUE!
February 12th, 2018 at 7:19 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 8:32 PM ^
In a rare moment of boredom, I actually listened to Detroit sports radio on my drive home along I-94 (it took about an hour to get from downtown Detroit to Romulus this time), and I tried to call in when they were discussing these rankings. If a majority of the top five had actually not blown a game over the last week, I highly doub they get this high, but then I never got past the call screener....