Tomahawk Nation CBS Blog Poll Entry

by TrueCubbie on Mar 8, 2009 6:21 PM EDT in FSU Basketball

Well here it is the last regular season poll...and it was not the easiest to put together.

Once again...Congrats to the Seminoles on an amazing victory, taking 4th in the conference and playing better than any of us expected.

Take a look inside for the ballot. Look forward to hearing your thoughts.

Rank	Team	Delta

1	Memphis
2	Pittsburgh	1
3	North Carolina	1
4	Louisville	1
5	Connecticut	3
6	Duke
7	Michigan St.	2
8	Missouri	1
9	Kansas	1
10	Gonzaga	6
11	Oklahoma	3
12	Wake Forest	1
13	Clemson	2
14	West Virginia	2
15	UCLA	4
16	Arizona St.	1
17	Villanova	1
18	Marquette	4
19	Purdue	2
20	Washington	1
21	Florida St.	1
22	Syracuse
23	Brigham Young
24	Louisiana St.	2
25	Butler
Last week's ballot

Dropped Out: Illinois (#24), Utah (#25).

This was a difficult one for me. Again, I take the two major media polls, Ken Pomeroy and my own poll to put together an poll that represents an average of those 4. I then make some adjustments. The major polls are from last week so they do not represent, for example, Pitt's victory over UConn and hence the reason I need to do some adjusting once the averaging has been done. This is probably also the reason there isn't a ton of movement in my poll from week to week...as the folks at CBS pointed out, all of this averaging likely brings everyting back to the mean and little movement.

Memphis stays number one. They did nothing to move themselves away from the number spot. Longest winning current winning streak in basketball. Ridiculous defense. Solid solid team.

Louisville moves up based on their recent Big East victory and surviving a tough game at West Virginia. In one of our other posts, I wrote this about them:

I like Louisville a lot. They have the second ranked defense in the country and those losses to Western Kentucky, Minnesota and UNLV were early in the season. 15-2 in the Big East is a remarkable record. Yes the Big East has been at time the Big Easy conference, but the top teams really are some of the elite in the country and night after night it is a battle. Their big weakness on offense is their ability to get to to the line, which I think plays a big part of tournament play. You have to be able to get your opponent in foul trouble and put points on the board without the clock running. Plus, they don’t shoot well from the line, but last year’s Memphis team proved that doesn’t mean anything. They are a big, young team that likes to rely on the three, scoring 65% of their points from deep. 37% of their shots are three which is higher than the national average of 33%. I think they will make some noise in the tournament because of their defense and will likely be a sweet 16 team. But I think their youth, reliance on the three and inability to get to the line will prevent them from getting further.

Big winners this week. Gonzaga and UCLA. This partially stems from their high rankings in the Pomeroy ratings. UCLA is probably a little high in my poll. They have the potential to be an outstanding team and were expected to do so, but they haven't quite lived up to expectation.

Gonzaga sits at #8 in the Pomeroy ratings. The hiccup against Memphis is their only hiccup since the start of the new year. Their only other losses are to Arizona, Connecticut, Utah and Portland St. Aside from PSU the others are solid basketball teams. They are a very big team and they defend the ball extremely well. Plus they play well on both ends of the court, ranking 13th and 15th respectively on OE and DE according to Pomeroy.

Marquette and West Virginia are the biggest losers this week. Marquette ended the year with losses to UConn, Louisville, Pitt and Syracuse. What a way to end the year. I was probably a little generous with them last week. Pomeroy has them way up in the polls. They have the #22 and #7 defense. Although they drop here, look for them to make some noise in both the Big East and NCAA tournament. They won't win either, but could upset a team or two. Granted, they really haven't upset anyone this year.

I look forward to your comments. Again, this won't reflect any of tonight's/afternoon's games. Let me know what you would like to see changed...and more importantly why. Always enjoy these Sunday afternoon discussions.

Oh...Noles drop a little with the loss to Duke. I was a little generous with them last week. We did have a huge win today but a 25% TO% and not getting to the line at home brought us back to reality. Still a top 25 team for sure.

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Comments

Marquette losing Dominic James as them done

They’ve lost all 4 of their games since the injury, though those games were against four elite teams.

As an Unabashed supported of WVU, I do not think they should drop 4 spots. A one-possession loss to Louisville is not bad.

I again applaud your praise of Memphis. They are elite.

Tomahawk Nation: No-Holds-Barred Nole Analysis

by Bud Elliott on Mar 8, 2009 7:23 PM EDT reply actions

Also... LSU lost to Auburn, a team that would e in the bottom 4 of the ACC, yet they move up?

Tomahawk Nation: No-Holds-Barred Nole Analysis

by Bud Elliott on Mar 8, 2009 7:31 PM EDT up reply actions

Totally missed that as I was going through things...will be corrected...

by TrueCubbie on Mar 8, 2009 7:33 PM EDT up reply actions

The above poll now reflects the comments by FSUn...missed the LSU losses as I was looking. And maybe I shouldn't be so hard on WVU.

by TrueCubbie on Mar 8, 2009 7:36 PM EDT up reply actions

You two seen Memphis's 2009 recruiting class?

They have the #2 and #3 players in the nation (Cousins and Henry) already, and they lead for the #1 player (Wall). They also have a couple of 4 stars.

Ridiculous. The rich get richer.

Kill a fly with an axe - Mickey Andrews, his 1998 playbook

by FSUSOM on Mar 8, 2009 7:54 PM EDT reply actions

It's disturbing.

We’ll be there one day…this season helps recruiting significantly. With Snaer coming in and the fact that we have already signed 2 4-star recruits for the 2010 class

by TrueCubbie on Mar 8, 2009 8:02 PM EDT up reply actions

It also means those kids are not signing with UNC, Duke, or UF

Tomahawk Nation: No-Holds-Barred Nole Analysis

by Bud Elliott on Mar 8, 2009 8:18 PM EDT up reply actions

UF is done as a basketball program.

Kill a fly with an axe - Mickey Andrews, his 1998 playbook

by FSUSOM on Mar 8, 2009 8:29 PM EDT up reply actions

. . . . . knocks on wood . . . . .

Kill a fly with an axe - Mickey Andrews, his 1998 playbook

by FSUSOM on Mar 8, 2009 8:29 PM EDT up reply actions

Im sorry can you say that again

I just love hearing those words. I cant wait tell I hear them about the other sport.

Why is the sky blue? Because, God Loves the Infantry

by Desman on Mar 9, 2009 10:21 AM EDT up reply actions

What's the scouting report on this Snaer kid?

I’m too lazy to google it….

by FSUjab on Mar 8, 2009 11:29 PM EDT up reply actions

He is a great coach. I'll take him ove Roy Williams or Rick Barnes every day of the week.

Nobody adapts like him.

Tomahawk Nation: No-Holds-Barred Nole Analysis

by Bud Elliott on Mar 8, 2009 8:18 PM EDT up reply actions

Missouri has gotten spanked twice in a row....not a Top 10 team in my opinion

-Clemson should be a little further down, or we should be further up
-Marquette is toast, as FSUn has mentioned
-It’s such a log-jam….really tough to make a Top 25 poll right now

by Zach_Nole on Mar 8, 2009 10:51 PM EDT reply actions

I made another adjustment and moved Clemson down and we moved up, which is not reflected here.

Missouri probably is a wee bit high. Granted they played 3 games in 7 days against Kansas, OU and Texas A&M, two of which were on the road. I agree they probably shouldn’t be top 10…I’ll move them down.

And totally agree about the difficulty of putting a top 25 together…

Always appreciate your input Zach.

by TrueCubbie on Mar 8, 2009 11:36 PM EDT up reply actions