Katz's 06 pre-season Top 25

[prhoya]

sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=2030071

We still do not get his respect. This year's team almost cracked the top 25 several times. Next year's team will have more experience with JT3's offense and defense, a good recruiting class coming in, and several potential BE first and second team selections.

[FOTP]

At first I thought we might crack this list, but after reading it I'm not shocked.

These things don't matter at all. It's all hype and Katz and Vitale kissing the rear ends of guys like Calapari etc.

[prhoya]

Does your "etc." include Coach K?

[the_way]

Lets remember, this is Andy Katz we are talking about here. He has no clue who will be good next year. I wouldn't get to upset over the snub.

[ShimmyJr]

i mean the 'Cuse at 22? Really? the names they gave me are totally inconsequential other than G-Mac and God knows he can't win games himself...

It is just big-name bull - give me a break - though we didn't cement our right to be there with the late-season slide...

I still think Gay won't be awesome next year, but that is just me - hope he doesn't make me eat my words - I think that Gay-Boone-Williams led team is good, but not #1 - especially with Duke returning JJ Gaybag and Shelden Cro-Magnon man Williams...they are going ot be ridiculous with Dockery and their recruiting class

still love seeing shavlik randolph be SUCH a stiff - makes me smile everytime i think about it - he is a good for a charge every now and again though.

[JimmyHoya]

Yeah, that's a pretty awful list. He basically picked the top 5 of the 5 major confrences and assorted them. Prolly took him all of 20 minutes.

"23. Arizona

The Wildcats will find a way to be this good next season even if Hassan Adams were to declare and leave with Salim Stoudamire and Channing Frye."

AWESOME ANALYSIS, ANDY!....now fetch me a wall to slam my head into.

[RDF]

Gregg Doyel had Hoyas on his list of 10 teams who didn't play in Tournament that will be in next year. Had us listed #8 on his list and mentioned something about "Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert were that productive as FR, how good will they be next year".

I'd rather have Hoyas be under the radar next year and be the team that is peaking come March---like Syracuse did a few years back. I'm not saying we'll be remotely close to that good but that's how I'd like to start our trek back to the top, not as some team with a bullseye that hasn't earned it on the court yet. That day will come, but a lot of work left to do before Hoyas get to that level and might as well let Nova and UConn get the press so when we beat their butts it is even sweeter.

[ColumbiaHeightsHoya]

Katz is a punk. Him & Dickie V are just plugging the ACC/ESPN connection.

[hoyarooter]

This is just totally bogus. I'm surprised he didn't include Oklahoma State because JamesOn Curry will be back. Why not just take this year's sweet 16 and go from there?

I think 20 minutes of analysis is way too charitable.

[AustinHoya03]

JimmyHoya said:

Yeah, that's a pretty awful list. He basically picked the top 5 of the 5 major confrences and assorted them. Prolly took him all of 20 minutes.

"23. Arizona

The Wildcats will find a way to be this good next season even if Hassan Adams were to declare and leave with Salim Stoudamire and Channing Frye."

AWESOME ANALYSIS, ANDY!....now fetch me a wall to slam my head into.

Yeah, it seems as if 1/2 the picks are like this. Look at Florida. Katz's essentially says: Well, every Gator with talent might bolt for the league, but even if they do Billy Donovan will do a good coaching job and all the freshmen will play well so I'm picking them #12.

Or, to boil it down even further: There are a lot of variables in assessing Florida's chances next year, but I'll ignore those variables and spew out some oft-used ESPNisms of dubious truth, such as: "Billy Donovan is a good coach" and "if a recruit is on ESPN's radar screen, he's got to be great ."

(Donovan has one of the biggest budgets in the NCAA and consistently gets McDonalds All Americans. A blind pig could win the SEC East every other year with the kind of resources that dude has. And Andy had Harvey Thomas as the #8 player in the nation before his freshman year at GU. We all know how that worked out.)

[AustinHoya03]

I know I just ripped Katz in the above post, but I should also say this less than stellar "article" may not be entirely his fault. I can envision the following conversation...

ESPN.com editor: Andy, we need you to write an article on next year's Top 25.

Andy: Uh, okay. Don't you think it's a little early to be making predicitions?

ESPN.com editor: No. Write the damn article. Your deadline is 8pm.

Andy: Well, what the hell am I going to say about half these teams? I mean, shouldn't we at least wait until people declare for the league/stay in school?

ESPN.com editor: I don't care, I just need something to put on the College Hoops website that will detract from the North Carolina championship win. Don't forget that the Duke University basketball program owns your soul, Andy. It's part of your contract with the network.

Andy: Alright, alright. I'll pull something out of my rear. Got to make Coach K proud.

[HoyaAlbany]

Come on guys, let's not get hysterical here - we don't belong in anyone's top 25 for next year. We had a nice improvement this year, but we still had to hang on for a tie for 7th in our league, won 1 game in the BET, and 2 games against very mediocre teams in the NIT. We have most of the team back, and what appear to be some solid recruits, but none of the big-time recruits. If we can nudge up toward the top 25 by the end of next year, earn a spot in the NCAA's as an 8-10 seed, and pick up an even stronger recruiting class for 2006-2007, we will be on our way.

[hoyarooter]

I don't think anyone was being critical of Katz because he didn't include us (well, anyway, I wasn't). It is arguable that someone might include us, but I certainly wouldn't expect it. The gripe here is that Katz didn't seem to put any thought or care at all into compiling his list. Of course, as Austin pointed out, he might have had this assignment forced on him, and responded the way he did because the entire concept at this stage of the year is idiotic.

[david]

katz didnt really know who was good this year, much less next.

[HoyaLawya]

Just for fun ........ Katz's predictions right after the '03 Final Four for the '04 top 25 .......

sports.espn.go.com/ncb/ncaatourney03/columnist?id=1535407&name=katz_andy

He got it exactly right with UCONN as #1 since they won the '04 NC, missed badly with Mizzou at #3 (not sure if the Ricky Clemons fiasco had fully hit that campus yet, and the incoming recruits were stellar if Queen could figure out what to do to coalesce them into a team). Am going to try to look up the end-of-season (for '04) AP poll to see how well the rest of the crystal ball gazing "picks" performed.

Edited to add: Here's the coaches' poll taken after last year's NCAA tournament.

FINAL USA TODAY/ESPN COACHES POLL (April 6, 2004)
No. School Previous ranking
1. Connecticut 7
2. Duke 6
3. Georgia Tech 15
4. Oklahoma State 3
5. St. Joseph's 5
6. Stanford 1
7. Pittsburgh 8
8. Kentucky 4
9. Kansas 14
10. Texas 11
11. Illinois 13
12. Gonzaga 2
13. Mississippi State 9
14. Xavier NR
15. Wake Forest 16
16. Wisconsin 10
17. Alabama NR
18. Cincinnati 12
19. Syracuse 24
20. NC State 17
21. Nevada NR
22. North Carolina 20
23. Alabama-Birmingham NR
24. MARYLAND 21
25. Vanderbilt NR

Others Receiving Votes: Southern Illinois 37; Memphis 34; Providence 29; Arizona 28; Boston College 24; Texas Tech 23; Michigan 13; Utah State 12;DePaul 10; Pacific 7; Manhattan 6; Western Michigan 6; Seton Hall 5; Air Force 4; UCF 4; Michigan State 2; South Carolina 2; Louisiana-Lafayette 1.

[Fan Of The Game]

We're going to need to earn our respect, not feel entitled to it. The fact is that a) we were never a top 25 team this year and b) while we brought something new to the table and found some success with it, teams did better against us the second time around.

A team a year older is not a team a year better.

[TigerHoya]

RDF said:

Gregg Doyel had Hoyas on his list of 10 teams who didn't play in Tournament that will be in next year. Had us listed #8 on his list and mentioned something about "Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert were that productive as FR, how good will they be next year".

It's good that he mentioned us but Doyel is an ass and he's one of the Tobacco Road butt-kissers from when he covered that beat for the Charlotte Observer.

[JeffGreenistheMan]

A team older is usually a team better when there was only one senior contributor. Jeff Green is about to bust out, and, assuming he comes back, Bowman should be good again. The real key to the team I think is the play of Hibbert. If he can be a consistent force down low and guard big men, Georgetown is at least a top 25 team