If Tomorrow were March...

Alright folks, we've finally gotten the college basketball season warmed up and a few games into conference play, so obviously its time to skip ahead and begin thinking about everyone's favorite month of the year, March! So, for the next few weeks, John and I will take a look at what the seeding would look like if we didn't have enough information on the teams to seed them properly, so, if we were trying to seed them in mid-January.

#1's - Kansas, UCLA, Memphis, UNC - This is in order of #1-#4 as well, with UNC getting the benefit of the doubt having not yet lost. Kansas has easily been the best team, UCLA has the most impressive wins against good opponents, and Memphis is yet to let anyone get near beating them.

#2's - Duke, Wash St, Georgetown, Tenessee - Duke is playing very good basketball right now (well, except for a certain someone), Wazzu is also playing extremely well (which just makes UCLA that much more impressive), Georgetown, though they haven't exactly proved much of anything, is still hanging around in the polls, we'll tag them the UNC of this grouping (and wait for the meat of the Big East schedule 1/19 ND, 1/26 @WVU, 2/9 @L'ville), and Tennessee seems to have the pollsters hearts as well, though they meet Vandy tonight so we get to see who's the top dog in the SEC.

#3's - West Virginia, Wisconsin, Indiana, Marquette - (This group appears to be where the stats and the voters diverge, we'll stick with the stats, thanks) West Virginia seems to not be garnering much national attention but I would easily rank them above the second half of the top 25 (though no voters seem to agree), Wisconsin is very good at the style of basketball they play (read: Big Ten style) and they're hard to beat when they execute, Indiana is something of a wild card, as they haven't had many oppurtunities to prove themselves, unfortunately we'll have to wait on February before the heavy lifting within the Big Ten schedule arrives, Marquette is another KenPom pal who will have to prove themselves in the coming days (@L'ville 1/17, @UConn 1/20), we'll have a much better idea of what they're capable of next week.

#4's - Xavier, Texas A&M, Clemson, Pitt - Now, rounding out the theoretical Sweet 16, Xavier, recently punished for their A10 blunder, as is Texas A&M, but their track records keep them in the conversation, Clemson seems to have righted the ship, but hanging with the Devils (@Duke 1/19) will be a big test, stay within 5 and they will seem to be the answer for the "who else is in the ACC" question being bandied about, lastly Pitt is here on good faith, they're holding up well without Fields and Cook, but I don't feel like they can play that way for long.

Who's knocking and what they can do to come in - Michigan St - show that 36 pts was an abberation, Butler - we're going to need to see some 20 point Horizon victories, Louisville - beat Marquette tonight, Stanford - show you're the upper middle class of the Pac 10 (AZ 1/17, ASU 1/19 @Cal 1/26)