Week 1 College Basketball Preview

As the college football season gets into full swing, we will soon have yet another "favorite sports time of the year" for this writer. I have written columns about my love of Labor Day Weekend and March Madness before, so as you might glean, college football and basketball are my favorite sports (although it seems wrong to exclude the NFL from that).

November is when college basketball and college football converge for 3-4 weeks. I enjoy the early season of college basketball for the same reason I like the first few weeks of college football: interesting non-conference matchups. We know every year we will have the usual slate of conference games but when, I ask you, will Boise State play Georgia again?

The college basketball season kicks off as always with the 2K Sports Coaches vs. Cancer Classic (next year, the charity sponsor will be the Wounded Warrior Project).

I complain about this every year, but for the uninitiated, Coaches vs. Cancer used to be a much more interesting tournament. Four big-time schools would host three minnows on their home court, and the winner of each of the four mini-tournaments would meet in New York City to determine an overall champion.

Then one year, Gardner-Webb knocked off Kentucky in one of the preliminary tournaments, stamping their ticket to New York City. Tournament organizers said to themselves, "Now, instead of legions of Kentucky fans buying tickets, we will have eight Gardner-Webb fans making the trip. WE'RE LOSING MONEY, DAMN IT! WE'RE LOSING MONEY!"

So they changed the format so that the four host schools, no matter what, are the ones to go to NYC to fight for the championship, and the other schools in the preliminary tournaments are just along for the ride, and play each other in these complicated consolation tournaments.

Well, I'm happy to report that this year, the tournament organizers (the Gazelle Group) are getting a comeuppance of sorts. First, the four marquee teams are a bit down from years past: Arizona, St. John's, Texas A&M, and Mississippi State. (Mississippi State? Really?)

Second, they had an extremely hard time finding schools to fill out the field. I mean, really hard. In fact, they couldn't do it. Texas A&M will only have one game, against Liberty, in their preliminary tournament.

But the schools they did get for the consolation tournaments ... wow. The field includes not one, not two, but three Division 2 schools ... and keep in mind that there are over 300 Division 1 college basketball programs. We have Hiram, a small liberal-arts school not far from my hometown of Akron (Akron will be participating, too, in the Mississippi State pod), The University of District Columbia, which isn't even the most notable historically black college in Washington, DC (that would be Howard, if you were curious), and my personal favorite, Indiana-Kokomo, entering their very first year of even having a basketball program.

Why is the tournament struggling so hard to find teams, to the point that they can't even completely fill out the bracket with the dregs of Division 1 and 2? I'm really not sure. There must be a lot of traveling and accommodation costs involved and little or no payout from the tournament. That's my best guess.

So the very, very first game of the season will be William & Mary at St. John's, Monday November 7th at 7 PM Eastern on ESPNU. Although William & Mary play in a tough conference, The Colonial, which has given us Final Four teams like VCU and George Mason in recent years, the Tribe are not among the conference powerhouses and St. John's should win easily.

My pick to win the tournament is Arizona over Texas A&M. I expect Arizona and A&M to have little trouble with St. John's and Mississippi State, respectively, in the semifinals. They both return loaded from their NCAA Tournament teams last year, but Arizona made it all the way to the Elite Eight.

Other notable games in the first week:

Michigan State vs. North Carolina (Friday November 11th, 7 PM EST)

This game would have been even better a few years ago, when Michigan State was still elite. As it is, it's most notable for its venue. The game will be played on an aircraft carrier, the USS Carl Vinson.

Oregon vs. Vanderbilt (Friday November 11th, 10 PM EST)

This seems to be the only other game involving two teams from "Big Six" conferences. Vanderbilt will be looking to build on their recent success, having made the Big Dance four of the past five seasons. Oregon is a little bit farther behind the curve, having not made the NCAA tournament since 2008. They did win the CBI postseason tournament last year.

BYU at Utah State (Friday November 11th, 9 PM EST)

This matchup is the only one of the first week of teams who finished last year in the polls (pre-tournament anyway): BYU was No. 10 and Utah State was No. 19. While it may be inaccurate to call a Utah State win an "upset," BYU of course is the more prosperous program. However, they will have to make do without Jimmer Fredette on the road in a rivalry game. Unfortunately, as of now the game is only on local television in Southern Utah. Hopefully a national network will pick it up, or it will be streamed online.

Belmont at Duke (Friday November 11th, 9 PM EST)

Duke never seems to look past lesser opponents, but if they do here, watch out. Belmont made the NCAA tournament last year, as they have in four of the last six years. In 2008, they played Duke in the tournament. They lost, 71-70.

Wright State at Ohio State (Friday November 11th, 9 PM EST)

Duke may not look past lesser opponents, but Ohio State has, with ignoble losses to San Francisco and Valparaiso, among others, in the last 10 years. Wright State was strong in the Horizon League last year, and one of the teams they took down last season was Butler.