The college basketball season tips off November 9th. Here are my top 10 teams I am buying in 2021-2022
1. Saint Mary’s WCC- all 12 scholarship players return from last year’s 14-10 NIT team, Freshman guard Augustus Marciulionis from Lithuania appears to be the next great Gaels star
2. Kentucky SEC- HC John Calipari suffered his first sub .500 season since his first year at UMass in 1988-89, don’t expect a similar result in 2021-22 as the Wildcats are once again loaded with talent adding guards CJ Fredrick (Iowa), Sahvir Wheeler (Georgia), and Kellan Grady (Davidson) via the transfer portal
3. Northern Iowa Missouri Valley- 2019 Missouri Valley Player of the Year AJ Green returns after missing almost all of last year with a hip injury, seniors Trea Berhow, Tywhon Pickford, and Goanar Mar all chose to return for an extra year
4. Michigan State Big Ten- last year was HC Tom Izzo’s worst since his debut season in 1995-1996, Northeastern junior transfer and Colonial Athletic Association 1st team all-league Tyson Walker takes over the point guard role which plagued the team a year ago, the Spartans led UCLA by 5 with under two minutes to play before falling in OT showing last year’s team wasn’t that far away
5. Evansville Missouri Valley- the Purple Aces improved from 0-18 in the Missouri Valley two years ago to 7-11 and tied for 5th place last year in HC Todd Lickliter’s second season, with 4 starters back could be a dark horse challenger for the conference crown
6. Notre Dame ACC- after making the NCAA Tournament in 7 of 8 seasons from 2010-2017 the Irish under 22 year HC Mike Brey have missed the dance in two of the past 3 seasons, defense and rebounding were the primary issues which hope to resolved with the addition of Yale forward and 2019-20 Ivy League Player of the Year Paul Atkinson Jr.
7. Delaware Colonial Athletic- Martin Ingelsby enteres his 6th year coaching the Blue Hens improving the team’s win total every year with the exception of last year’s 14 game Covid-Shortened Season, all 5 starters return including the top 3 scorers in Ryan Allen, Kevin Anderson, and Dylan Painter
8. Western Illinois Summit League-Rob Jeter returns for his second season coaching the Leathernecks, Jeter won 20 plus games in 5 of his 11 seasons in his prior stop at Milwaukee, with 4 starters back including second-team All-Summit forward Will Carius, look for a continued climb up the conference standings in 2021-2022
9. Georgia Southern Sun Belt- former Chris Beard assistant Brian Burg enters his second in Statesboro, the team returns 4 starters including senior guard/forward Elijah McCadden (10.2 ppg, 5 rpg), freshman guard Mannie Harris a Georgia prep star should provide immediate impact
10. Portland WCC- after posting a 1-40 WCC record the past three seasons under former HC Terry Porter it can’t get any worse, the Pilots bring in Shantay Legans who posted an impressive 75-49 record at Eastern Washington along with an entirely revamped roster that includes junior guard Mike Meadows and senior guard Jack Perry who help get Legans and EWU to the NCAA Tournament a year ago