Conventional wisdom says that 2012 is a year in which no one team will be known as a great team in the annals of college basketball history. Before the season, North Carolina was potentially one team that could go down as an all-time great club, returning all five starters from an Elite Eight team and bringing in a strong recruiting class. The Tar Heels, while still 23-4 and tied for first in the ACC at 10-2, have had their urgency and toughness questioned. Losing defensive stopper Dexter Strickland for the year with an ACL tear has hurt, as well.
The other team that resided at the top of most preseason rankings was Kentucky. No one can possibly make any similar charges about the heart the Wildcats show in 2011-12. Despite having a team consisting almost solely of freshmen and sophomores, Kentucky has succeeded expectations. If any team is to go down in history as having a season for the ages, it will be the Wildcats.
The memorable teams fans remember decades down the road are usually ones like 1996's Wildcats or 2005's Tar Heels. Those teams had many returning pieces from the previous year, and were known as elite from the beginning of the season. Kentucky would seemingly be disqualified from this list solely on the basis of its players not being fully known commodities by casual fans before the season.
However, Kentucky's playing group is indicative of a new status quo, where freshmen cannot only be the most talented players on the court, but tenacious, mature leaders. Michael Kidd-Gilchrist embodies those traits for Kentucky.
The other super freshman that leads the Wildcats is Anthony Davis, who barring injury or collapse, will be the first pick in an NBA draft many observers consider extraordinarily deep. One national writer summed up Davis' game beautifully, saying that he is more fun to watch on offense than defense.
College basketball has seen its fair share of extraordinary shot blockers. Alonzo Mourning, Hasheem Thabeet, Emeka Okafor, and David Robinson come to mind. But Davis single-handedly takes away the lane in a way that I can't ever remember seeing. For the season, Davis blocks 15.1% of opposing teams' two-pointers and contests or effects many others. His once maligned offensive game has improved over the course of the season, but he's not a back-to-the-basket post player. Davis gets his points regardless, 13.9 per game this season on a little more than 8 shot attempts per contest.
As a team, Kentucky is more known for defense than offense, but its ability to score may actually be more impressive. According to Ken Pomeroy's statistics, Kentucky scores approximately 1.21 points per possession (the national average typically hovers around 1), while giving up 0.86 per trip. In conference play, Kentucky is only slightly less stellar, scoring 1.19 PPP while allowing 0.92. Outscoring opponents in conference play by over a quarter-point per possession after 12 league games is typically reserved for top mid-majors playing a bunch of sub-200 RPI teams in their respective conferences. As a comparison, Ohio State has the second best efficiency margin in a major conference this season at +0.19 points per possession.
Here is a list of the in-conference efficiency margins of the national champions since 2003, the first year in which possession-based game data is available. When you consider that there are over 1,000 possessions in a 16-game conference season, the decimals below can add up to substantial point differentials.
Kentucky is currently at +0.27. In other words, the Wildcats are more dominant in conference play than any of the last nine national champions.
If John Calipari's club can go undefeated in the SEC, it will mark the first time that a team has gone undefeated in a BCS league since Kansas in 2003. Skeptics will point to the fact the SEC does not have a litany of good teams, and they would be right. Florida and Vanderbilt are the only teams in the conference likely to be above an 8-seed on Selection Sunday. Mississippi State has talent to keep up with Kentucky, but often can't get out of its own way, as evidenced by a weekend loss at Auburn. Nonetheless, teams in sub-par major conferences like recent editions of the Pac-10/12 haven't put up records or numbers anywhere close to Kentucky's.
As if Kentucky needed any more signs of encouragement, freshman point guard Marquis Teague has started to play at a higher level. Teague was just as highly regarded coming out of high school as Davis and Kidd-Gilchrist, but the Indianapolis native has struggled at times with turnovers and his shot. He tends to run the offense now as opposed to creating for himself.
At this point in the season, it makes sense to call Kentucky a near-prohibitive favorite for the national championship. Syracuse, who has one loss like Kentucky, struggles on the defensive glass to an alarming degree. Missouri is at a decided size disadvantage against the bigger teams, and has shown some defensive warts in conference play. Duke is also an average defensive team. It's tough to imagine Kansas running through six games without Tyshawn Taylor's turnover and free throw woes featuring prominently. Ohio State struggles with three-point shooting, which becomes especially key if teams can take away Jared Sullinger inside. North Carolina's problems have been documented above.
Michigan State may just be the second best team in the country right now. Draymond Green is not the most talented player, but he's unquestionably the best leader and best teammate. If a big play or big stop has to be made for the Spartans, the senior Green will probably be the one to make it. As a team, the only weakness Michigan State has is that it perhaps turns over the ball a little more than normal. The Spartans wouldn't have as much talent on the floor if they played Kentucky in a tournament situation, but they would certainly be capable of keeping up. I don't know if that can be said about some of the other possible top four seeds in the NCAA tournament.
If any commentators try to tell you that there is no great team in college basketball this year, don't listen. By most any quantitative or qualitative measure, Kentucky is the best in the land, and it might not be close. A special next six weeks could even make the 2011-12 Wildcats a historically great club.
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