May 21, 2013

Big Ten owns NCAA men’s basketball coaches’ poll

October 18, 2012 by 13 Comments

With Tyler Zeller’s little brother Cody deciding to stay in school for his sophomore season, the Indiana Hoosiers sit proudly atop the 2012-13 NCAA Division I men’s basketball  ESPN/USA Today coaches’ poll.

The Hoosiers received 21 out of a possible 31 first-place votes and 761 overall points from a panel of coaches. Zeller is one of four starters returning to Bloomington for the upcoming season. The Hoosiers, however, will undoubtedly have their hands full as two Big Ten rivals sit in the top five with Thad Matta’s Ohio State Buckeyes and John Beilein’s Michigan Wolverines being ranked fourth and fifth, respectively. Indiana will close their 2012-13 season by facing the two teams in consecutive games.

Usual suspects Louisville, Kentucky, North Carolina State, Kansas, Duke, Syracuse and Florida help round out the top 10.

[Related: The Ohio State Perspective]

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  • NamedMyKidPrice

    Did not think the Buckeyes would be ranked that high. DeShaun Thomas may be POY though.

  • Natedawg86

    Do they know sullinger got drafted…lol

  • http://www.waitingfornextyear.com Andrew Schnitkey

    Yeah, I’m not that high on OSU. I think they will be very good, but I’m not sure I see them as a top 5 team in the country.

  • http://twitter.com/bbo13 B-bo

    B1G! B1G! B1G!
    That’s how that works, right? Gonna be weird having 12 favorite teams, but that’s how it’s done in a clearly superior conference, y’all. And our in-conference losses are always “good” losses, because we just beat up on each other. Awesome. The Midwest shall rise again!!

  • Natedawg86

    Did you vote yourself up again?

  • Natedawg86

    Not where you start, but where you finish

  • mgbode

    cannot wait until Cody fakes a foot injury to slip to the Cavs in the draft.

    already copyrighted “Zeller Fellers”

  • FearTheRoo

    Clearly Superior? when was the last time the Big10 won a championship? Big10 fans have always had an inferiority complex and it shows. Same with football, where the Big10 has been terrible this year. It’s always been SEC vs. Big10, but in reality it’s not even close!

  • mgbode

    who has said the Big10 isn’t terrible in football this year?

    and, it has NOT always been SEC vs. Big10. It was Pac10 vs. Big10 for years and years and years. The SEC only started to enter the equation about 30yrs ago.

    and in basketball, it has never been SEC vs. Big10. SEC is pretty terrible at basketball other than a team or two at a time. heck, the Big10 is looking up at the Big East and ACC in recent history (past 25-30 years).

  • Dee P

    Don’t worry Andrew. Many people feel that way about tOSU this year….BUT….they shouldn’t. This is a different team, yes, but it could be a better team – much better. Sully was great at certain things, but he hurt in other areas too. The Buckeyes didn’t run very much, and missed any true shot blocker in the lane that didn’t allowed our perimeter defenders to use their athleticism to take chances and cause turnovers knowing that if they got beat it was a score. Put Williams in the middle, and we will watch Craft increase his steals, as well as Smith. Ross is a true shooter as well – something Buford was just not able to do with consistency. Ross is a Diebler type in that regard.

    Again….much different team than last, but top-5 worthy no doubt. Very excited to watch.

  • http://twitter.com/bbo13 B-bo

    I’m not even sure I should bother given the whole “University” of Akron thing, but here goes. I’ll type slowly:
    3 of the top 5 and 20% of the coaches’ poll overall for the B1G: pretty impressive. As mentioned in the title of this article. It’s the sort of dominance of the polls that one might see from other conferences (oh, say, the SEC) in other sports (oh, say, football). I then proceeded to poke fun at the seemingly incestual fandom of SEC supporters with their penchant for rooting for their conference as a whole, as well as the Lost Cause mentality of the South in general.
    I do take responsibility for not utilizing the sarcasm font in that first post. My apologies for the carelessness.

  • http://www.waitingfornextyear.com Andrew Schnitkey

    I hope you’re right for sure. I think Craft will be the key. How much can he advance his offensive game? He needs to be more assertive this season, IMO.

  • Dee P

    I’m actually more confident/hopeful that Amir Williams and Lenzelle Smith can score more than what people are counting on. I think asking Craft to score more changes and hurts what he does so well. Of course, a small uptick in ppg is fine and expected with basic growth, but I don’t think we need him to be a 15-a-night player. Smith has shown flashes of scoring brilliance, and then goes to nothing. If he can consistently score in the 12-15 range that will do wonders. Williams doesn’t have the low post game, but offensive rebounding, and dishes from Craft’s penetration, and dump offs from double-teams on Thomas, will get him, in my opinion anyways, many more buckets then people are expecting. 8-10 a game from him is what I see, with the occasional “threat of 20″ if things break right for him. Any way you slice it, Craft’s natural increase, Smith’s improved consistency, and Williams exceeding offensive expectations will get us where we need to be – and all three of these things are possible, and probable.