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Remember playing King of the Hill as a child?
The Villanova Wildcats ascended to the top step in the Associated Press and USA Today Division I men’s basketball polls in the rankings released the week of February 8. Villanova became the sixth team to hold the top spot in the polls, following North Carolina, Kentucky, Michigan State, Kansas and Oklahoma.
‘Nova has led the polls the last three weeks, but fell to its last ranked opponent of the regular season, #8 Xavier, February 24 in Cincinnati. Its predecessors at #1 all dropped from the top after road losses, three of them to ranked teams.
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Now Kansas gets another turn in the crosshairs. After a date in Lawrence with a Texas Tech team the Jayhawks handled by 10 points in Lubbock, they travel to #25 Texas and finish the regular season at home against #17 Iowa State.
According to the AP website, “The record for most schools to reach No. 1 in a season is seven in 1982-83, and the most consecutive weeks with a different No. 1 is seven in 1993-94.” Believe it or not, then, this season does not have a patent on craziness in the rankings.
A recap of this year’s history:
North Carolina was the AP’s preseason #1 team; the coaches voting in the USA Today poll tabbed Kentucky. The following week, the first regular season rankings showed Carolina atop both. Kentucky moved up after the Tar Heels lost at Northern Iowa, staying there for two weeks before a loss at UCLA.
Michigan State topped the next four weeks in both polls until losing at Iowa. Kansas stayed two weeks, then lost at West Virginia. Oklahoma spent three weeks as AP’s #1 — in the third week, the coaches returned North Carolina to the top spot. Then Villanova assumed the perch after Oklahoma lost at Kansas State and North Carolina dropped consecutive games at Louisville and at Notre Dame.
So why all the turmoil at the top?
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First, there seems to be more parity this season; plenty of teams look good, but none appear close to unbeatable. Many observers attribute this to a downturn in talent, as well as what talent there is having spread out across the country rather than concentrating on just a few teams. There appears to be something of a vacuum in terms of outstanding individual players as well; LSU’s Ben Simmons has led the Player of the Year speculation all season, but seemingly by default. His game has holes, and the Tigers look no better than a bubble team for the NCAA tournament; in addition, no consensus challengers have emerged, save possibly for Oklahoma’s Buddy Hield.
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Second, more made for television matchups. ESPN has ties to most major conferences, which gives it a major say in who plays when. What makes for good television often makes it difficult for top teams to hold serve, producing in seasons like this a revolving door at the top.
Third (and a corollary to #2), backloaded conference schedules. It appears as no accident that the strongest teams in a league play each other close to the end of the season. Take, for example, the ACC. North Carolina leads by one game over Miami and Louisville, with Virginia, Notre Dame and Duke another game back in the loss column. Carolina has games remaining against Virginia and Duke, Miami must play Louisville and Notre Dame, and Louisville has Miami and Virginia.
Think that’s a coincidence? The phrase “made for television matchups” should come to mind. In contrast to the wackiness of deciding who is the best in the country, the conference standings appear for the most part dominated by the usual suspects. To few people’s surprise, those teams are meeting each other as the schedule winds down.
Kansas may have a hammerlock on its 12th consecutive Big 12 regular season title, but no one outside the Jayhawk fan base views KU as a juggernaut on the level of last season’s Kentucky squad. Every team that has reached the #1 spot has proven itself beatable, and the most dangerous situation for any upper-echelon team, it would appear, is a conference road game.
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(Contrast this with the women’s game, where there’s Connecticut and there’s everyone else. Pardon the digression.)
With one week left in the regular season, perhaps the only certainty remaining about the NCAA tournament is that neither Louisville nor SMU will win , with both banned from participating this year. Otherwise, it’s anyone’s guess as to what will happen.
The conference tournaments will bear more watching than usual, because every seed line in the NCAA bracket appears open. No consensus exists on which teams will earn the #1 berths, and one might argue that every school seeded #5 or higher conceivably could cut down the nets in Houston. Perhaps this year might even see a #16 seed surprise a #1 – in a season of parity gone mad, you can’t rule it out.
All things being said, it is pretty clear that whomever finishes the tournament as the final King of the Hill will not get there without bruises. and this season’s “One Shining Moment” will definitely have been hard-earned.
