-Jim Root
No intro - let’s dive right in:
1. Ohio State (Last week: 3)
Alright, this is getting absurd. The Buckeyes are carving up their schedule like a Jedi shredding a platoon of hapless battle droids (there’s a new Star Wars coming out soon, I can’t help myself), and they’ve now seized the top spot at KenPom, Haslametrics, and BartTorvik (Sagarin still has Duke at number one – apparently he has a quantifier for Coach K’s stomach flu). I’ve drooled over the Buckeyes’ defense in this space before, but I wanted to take a deeper look into how Ohio State is so thoroughly constricting its opponents.
For that, I turned to our friends at hoop-math, whose data helps stratify the shots the Buckeyes are allowing, especially inside the arc, where Ohio State ranks #1 in the country in opponent 2P%:
For simplicity, let’s agree that allowing a midrange jumper is better defense than allowing a shot at the rim. There’s obviously some nuance to this if you have great rim protection, but we’ll ignore that for now.
Ohio State ranks 6th in the country in a statistic I made up that I’ll call “two-point defense optimization,” which is simply the percentage of two-point jumpers allowed minus the percentage of shots at the rim. So from the above, it’s the 37.3% from the far left column less the 23.6%. The higher the number, the better, because it means more inefficient jumpers. Here’s the top 10:
And for fun, here’s the bottom 10:
Summary: Ohio State forces you into taking a ton of midrange jumpers, contests all of those jumpers, and completely takes away the rim – both in terms of quantity and efficiency. So that’s how you become the country’s best 2P% defense!
2. Kansas (2)
Everything is going quite well for the Jayhawks right now, having absolutely blitzed previously-undefeated Colorado on Saturday night at the Phog and made routine work of Milwaukee on Tuesday. I’m going to nitpick quickly, though, because this Kansas team is awesome and I can only praise them so much. And so I ask: why the heck does Ochai Agbaji never get to the free throw line?
Agbaji is undoubtedly an elite athlete, as his litany of highlight reel dunks indicate. But for some reason, the 6’5, 210-pound wing is allergic to the charity stripe, having taken just 12 free throws total in 302 minutes of game time this year – a rate (one every 25.2 minutes) that’s drastically lower than even his own freshman year frequency (one every 15.8 minutes). For reference, teammate Udoka Azubuike takes a free throw every 6.9 minutes of court time, while even a more comparable player like Kansas State’s Xavier Sneed also checks in at every 6.9 minutes.
I’m going to (fairly or unfairly) call this “Josh Langford Syndrome,” meaning a physically talented wing who simply does not get to the line. This affliction really caps the efficiency ceiling of the player: Agbaji has more assists (23) than turnovers (20) and is shooting 52.8% from two-point range and 39.5% from downtown, but he only just boosted his offensive rating above 100 last night against the Panthers (a game in which he took five free throws).
Of course, this isn’t some fatal flaw for the Jayhawks; in fact, it’s not really an issue at all, considering Agbaji’s role on this Kansas team (provide some secondary play-making, knock down perimeter shots). It’s simply a curiosity for me, and one I’ll be interested in finding in other highly touted wings.
3. Louisville (1)
Louisville spent the first part of the week consolidating its power atop the Ranks, grinding Michigan and Pittsburgh into dust with elite defensive performances. Michigan’s vaunted offense managed just 0.65 points per possession last Tuesday, and Pitt didn’t fare much better, tallying a meager 0.78ppp over the weekend. But then the Cardinals ran into the Chris Beard Meat Grinder, mustering just 0.75ppp against a shorthanded Texas Tech squad at Madison Square Garden, ceding the #1 spot in these rankings in the process.
We’re going to keep this section positive, though, because I have been thoroughly impressed by Ryan McMahon so far this year. The fifth-year senior with Brad Calipari-esque measurables (good luck figuring out which guy I’m insulting there) has been a revelation, emerging into more than just a potent perimeter shooter – all while becoming even more deadly at that particular skill.
According to the Cardinal roster archives, McMahon has put on 20 pounds since his freshman campaign, though it’s unclear whether that’s muscle from workouts or simply going through puberty:
Jokes, aside, McMahon has been an assassin (48.2% from three-point range on nearly six attempts per game) while being an actively positive contributor on the defensive end, as well. Per Hoop Lens, Louisville has been far better defensively (and offensively) with McMahon on the court:
Tip of the cap to Mr. McMahon for continuously improving throughout his career, to the point that he is now a vital starter for one of the best teams in the country.
4. Gonzaga (6)
In the offseason, we (and plenty of other Gonzaga prognosticators) paid a ton of lip service to the transfer backcourt of Ryan Woolridge and Admon Gilder – known affectionately at this website as “The Texas Two-step.” And while both newcomers have been quite solid, despite both being banged up at times, the best guard on Gonzaga is redshirt sophomore Joel Ayayi.
After a phenomenal summer with the French U19 team at the FIBA World Cup (averaged 20.9ppg, 5.6rpg, and 3.4apg on 51% shooting), perhaps we should have been wiser to the young Frenchman’s star turn. Ayayi’s biggest moment came with 25 seconds left at Washington on Sunday night:
But it’s been Ayayayayayi’s all-around brilliance that has helped the Zags’ to a blistering 10-1 start:
Perhaps you noticed those player comparisons: Sam Merrill won a MWC Player of the Year Award last year, and the next three (Matthew Dellavedova, Ian Clark, Landry Shamet) all ended up cashing consistent NBA paychecks. Also notable, though, is that none of the “similarity scores” even approach 900, making Ayayi a thoroughly unique player. His combination of size, hyper-efficient shooting, and sublime decision-making (42 assists, 14 turnovers) is a rare package indeed, and he has the potential to get even better.
5. Duke (10)
We’ve frequently roasted Coach K in the past for his hilariously loose usage of the word “indefinite,” notably in reference to Grayson Allen’s joke of a one-game suspension, but he really outdid himself with the Cassius Stanley situation. Krzyzewski referred to Stanley’s ailment as a “muscular injury” and proclaimed that the dynamic freshman would be out for at least a month:
“He’s going to be out a while. He’s not going to be able to play,” Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said after the (Winthrop) game. “Hopefully [he will be back] right after Christmas. That’s my hope.”
Instead, Stanley was in the starting lineup just one game later at Virginia Tech, shocking many a college basketball observer, myself included. Really, though, I shouldn’t have been surprised – Coach K is not exactly a bastion of timely, forthright information.
To be clear – it’s awesome that Stanley came back so quickly, and I hope he’s actually healthy going forward. But even his return raised some questions: he only played seven minutes and was clearly not the same player. If he’s not healthy enough to play more than seven minutes, perhaps he’s not healthy enough to play at all? Maybe next time, just say he’ll be out “indefinitely” and live in the glorious uncertainty of that word.
6. Michigan (4)
There’s absolutely no shame in getting suffocated at Louisville following a three-game run through the Atlantis field, so I have no reason to drop the Wolverines precipitously, especially given how they turned around and hung 100 on Iowa. That win was about as far from what I expected from this Michigan squad as possible: a virtuoso offensive performance paired with a total stinker on defense, including the colossus that is Jon Teske getting repeatedly punked by Luka “9-pound cyst” Garza. After watching Teske swallow Gonzaga’s frontcourt whole in Atlantis, I wasn’t sure Shaq could have scored on him in the post, so seeing Garza score over, around, and through him was like watching The Rock lose an action movie fight.
In a way, though, that’s a positive sign. Great teams can win games in a variety of ways, and Michigan proving they could win a shootout is a promising sign for the offense going forward – regardless of the fact that it was against Iowa’s illusion of a defense. The Simpson- and Teske-led defense will rarely get so thoroughly destroyed (Iowa scored 1.23ppp despite only hitting three triples), but if players like Franz Wagner, Eli Brooks, and Brandon Johns are providing a scoring punch, the Wolverines can still scrape out wins on off nights.
7. Baylor (12)
In my preseason preview of the Bears, I wrote about how Scott Drew smartly shifted his offense to a far more perimeter-based attack last year once Tristan Clark got hurt. Well, it turns out Drew is flexible on defense, as well, because he’s undergone a massive stylistic shift on that end this season.
Per Synergy data, Baylor played zone on at least 39% of possessions for each of the last six years:
This year, though, the Bears have played man-to-man on 96.5% of possessions, leaning hard into the athleticism up and down the roster – to great effect. Baylor ranks in the 94th percentile in half court defense (94th in man-to-man defense), locking up a high-scoring offense in Arizona on Saturday (58 points on 73 possessions). Davion Mitchell has been a ferocious on-ball defender, while Freddie Gillespie and Mark Vital have been dominant in the paint.
8. Kentucky (11)
Quick piggyback off the Ohio State blurb above: Kentucky ranks 9th in defensive 2P%, but they’re doing it differently than the Buckeyes. The Wildcats rank 84th in that “two-point defense optimization” statistic, but they’re still elite thanks to the fact that opponents are bricking jumpers at historic levels:
All of those teams fit a pretty similar mold: a ton of length, especially on the wings, allowing them to heavily contest shooters and make an already-tough shot considerably more difficult.
But for context, none of those rates are sustainable. In the last five seasons, the lowest opposing FG% on two-point jumpers is 2016-17 Minnesota, who allowed just 26.8% shooting in that range; typically, the best teams allow around 28%. So all of the above teams will likely have some slight defensive regression coming, and Kentucky’s in particular is concerning because the Wildcats can’t rely on the same kind of elite rim protection they’ve had in the past:
Yes, I added an extra year to that graphic just to show how obnoxiously terrifying the 2014-15 team was.
9. Virginia (5)
After getting blitzed by Mackey Madness last Wednesday, the Cavs found the perfect medicine on Sunday: a UNC team that, while talented, was beat up and totally lacks the shooting necessary to crack UVA’s defensive shell (if only UNC could trade for Sasha Stefanovic…).
Virginia’s win over UNC reminded me of the fun rock-paper-scissors game that is the elite ACC coaches:
Tony Bennett owns Roy Williams: Virginia is 5-0 in its last five against UNC, as well as 7-3 in its last 10 – both straight up and against the spread.
Mike Krzyzewski owns Tony Bennett: Duke is 5-1 in its last five against Virginia, although just 3-3 ATS in that stretch.
I won’t say Roy Williams owns Coach K, but UNC is 4-2 in the last six meetings between the two, and the Tar Heels have covered five of the last six.
BONUS: Unfortunately, this one is no longer relevant, but Tony Bennett owned Rick Pitino: Virginia went 5-1 straight up against Pitino-led Louisville teams (4-2 ATS), consistently suffocating the transition-reliant Cardinals.
The varying styles among these top tier coaches makes for extremely interesting clashes; it’s a shame we only get one Duke/Virginia game this year.
10. Dayton (15)
On Sunday, while watching the Flyers become the physical embodiment of the flaming basketball that adorns the court at Talking Stick Arena, one play stood out for me that encapsulates so much of what I love about this squad:
The audacity of Rodney Chatman to throw that pass from half court, the trust between Chatman and Obi Toppin as teammates to execute something like that, the flair for dramatic, highlight-reel plays — particularly Mr. Toppin, an anthropomorphized SportsCenter Top 10 Countdown — all of it comes together to make Dayton one of the most aesthetically pleasing hoop squads I’ve seen this year.
And look, it also helps to be boiling lava hot from the perimeter. Dayton has played four neutral site games year (three in Maui, one in Phoenix), and the Flyers have knocked down 50 of their 108 three-point attempts in those games (46.3%). While that rate won’t maintain, Dayton’s ability to spread the floor with five shooters will always make them a nightmare to guard.
11. Oregon (17)
After some re-evaluation of the teams around the edge of the top 10, the Ducks snuck into my top 12. The only two-loss team in the group for now, Oregon has earned this spot with wins over Memphis (with James Wiseman), Houston, and Seton Hall (with Sandro Mamukelashvili). The Ducks have played the 14th-toughest schedule in the country, per KenPom, and losses to Gonzaga in overtime and UNC on the third day of the Battle 4 Atlantis are nowhere near deal breakers for me.
The Ducks now get the matchup with Michigan that they barely missed out on in the Bahamas, although this one will be in Ann Arbor. Dana Altman’s zone-heavy schemes will be tested by the savvy Wolverines, particularly Zavier Simpson, whose passing vision has been impeccable this year. Michigan shredded Iowa’s zone looks (as well as any other defense the Hawkeyes threw at them), but the Ducks have considerably more length and athleticism to send at the host Wolverines, so this one likely won’t be the same kind of fireworks show.
Altman will throw out a three-quarter court 1-2-2 look, dropping back into a morphing matchup zone that often takes the shape of the opposing offense. It requires a ton of communication, though, something that might be more difficult in the Crisler Center environment on Saturday. UT Arlington easily gets an open three here thanks to confusion on the back end of the zone:
Michigan’s shooters — namely Eli Brooks, Isaiah Livers, and David DeJulius — have been deadly this year, and if Oregon loses them too often (Oregon ranks 306th nationally in defensive 3PA rate), the Ducks could get torched.
Regardless of who comes out on top, though, I will make this bold claim: whoever it is will wake up Sunday with the country’s best collection of wins.
12. Butler (18)
Full disclosure: I wrote the below section before Butler lost at Baylor on Tuesday night. However, I’m not going to punish the Bulldogs for losing by one on the road against a team I have ranked ahead of them. I’ll narrowly take their collection of wins over the teams right behind them (a reminder, though: Florida stinks).
We mentioned this on our Monday night podcast, but Kamar Baldwin has finally become the guy we hoped he would be last year. Before the 2018-19 season, we fully expected Baldwin to ascend into the clear alpha role sans Kelan Martin, ranking him a lofty 11th in our Top 100 Players. However, saddled with that much larger workload, Baldwin struggled with his perimeter jumper (31.1%) and turnovers (only a 1.13 assist-to-turnover ratio). Turns out, we were a year too early; Baldwin now ranks 9th in KenPom’s kPOY award, improving both his efficiency and volume in one fell swoop.
Praising “the man” for Butler’s offense unfairly ignores the “man behind the man,” though. Part of Baldwin’s improvement stems from the emergence of Aaron Thompson into a sort of Zavier Simpson Lite. Thompson now guards the opponent’s best perimeter scorer and is the clear lead ball-handler offensively, pushing Baldwin into a role more geared towards what he does best: putting the ball in the bucket. The lineup data backs it up, too — the below excludes the first two games of the year in which Baldwin barely played/was hurt:
As a result, Baldwin has seen incremental increases across the board in all of his percentages while decreasing his turnovers. The Bulldogs’ backcourt complements each other perfectly, and with copious experience among the two, Butler passes my eye test as being a legitimate top 15 team.
Next 10, in order: Maryland, Auburn, Arizona, Villanova, Tennessee, San Diego State, Xavier, Michigan State, North Carolina, Wichita State
The Mid-Major Five
1. Liberty
From this section just eight days ago:
Two weeks ago, mighty Evansville held this spot after taking Rupp Arena by storm. The Purple Aces then lost to SMU, East Carolina, and George Washington in succession, plus barely squeaked by Morgan State in triple overtime, so let’s hope this spot isn’t the Roots Rankings version of the Defense Against the Dark Arts position.
So, about that…ETSU lost at North Dakota State, and while that’s by no means a bad loss (or dying, like Professor Quirrel), it is the DADA equivalent of Professor Lupin having to leave Hogwarts for being a werewolf. Liberty now wears the crown, and heavy is the head of the Flames as they enter the toughest stretch on their schedule (@ Vanderbilt, Towson in Washington, D.C., and @ LSU). If Liberty wins at Vandy this week, you have my word that I’ll write up a detailed breakdown in next week’s Rankings of how important Caleb Homesley is now that he’s healthy again.
2. UNC Greensboro
The Spartans hold the title of “The Team That Broke Georgetown,” having won on the Hoyas’ home court just before Josh LeBlanc and James Akinjo bolted. Of course, given the results since then, perhaps the title should be “The Team That Fixed Georgetown.”
Greensboro has scraped by in two games since, beating Kennesaw State and earning a strong victory at Radford, but the offense has clearly missed the scoring punch provided by wing Kaleb Hunter, who got hurt in the Georgetown game. Hunter and freshman Kobe Langley remain sidelined by injury for now, but if the Spartans do ever get fully healthy, they could end up assembling the best mid-major at-large resume. Opportunities vs. NC State on Sunday and at Vermont in a week loom large.
3. Yale
Yale has been something of a “mid-major Ohio State” this year in terms of dominance against the spread. The Bulldogs are currently 9-1 ATS with an average cover margin of +7.8. For raw results, that’s equated to an 8-3 overall record with wins over fellow mid-major powers Vermont, @ Stony Brook, and Siena. The Bulldogs’ three losses - at Penn State by two, at (healthy) Oklahoma State by seven, at San Francisco in overtime - are nothing to sneeze at, and it looks like James Jones and his squad will once again be a threat atop the Ivy to ultra-talented Harvard.
4. Kent State
Coach Rob Senderoff has been remarkably consistent at the helm of the Golden Flashes, finishing at .500 or above in the MAC in seven of his eight seasons and inside the KenPom top 145 five times. But this may be his best team yet, especially defensively, where interior anchors Danny Pippen and Phillip Whittington have made scoring in the paint a nearly impossible task. This is the first Senderoff defense to creep inside the top 100 of KenPom’s Adjusted Defensive Efficiency rankings, and Pippen’s presence has a lot to do with that.
Almost as surprisingly, the offense has not fallen off despite the loss of the “Jalen/Jaylin” backcourt from a year ago. Jaylin Walker and Jalen Avery were an outstanding pair of complementary guards, but the emergence of New Mexico transfer Troy Simons into one of the country’s best snipers has helped mitigate that loss, and Pippen has altered the geometry of the floor with his ability to shoot from the center position.
Aside from Ohio State’s season opener against Cincinnati, it was Kent State — not Villanova, not North Carolina — that gave the Buckeyes their toughest challenge, tying that game with ten minutes remaining before a late Buckeye surge (21-2 run) sealed the deal for Kent State’s only loss thus far. Watch out for the Golden Flashes, folks.
5. (tie) Furman and Louisiana Tech
Both of these teams almost commanded a higher spot in these rankings, but each tripped up towards the finish line: Furman blew a double-digit second half lead at Auburn (the Paladins were also up five with under four minutes remaining), while Louisiana Tech couldn’t follow up its huge win at Mississippi State, dropping one on the road to Jason Hooten and the boys (Sam Houston State). Instead, they’ll have to settle for being tied here.
Still, both teams are definitely worth a watch, especially for their offensive systems: Furman puts five shooters on the court most of the time, and skilled bigs Noah Gurley and Clay Mounce can pick on mismatches against slower or less skilled foes. Louisiana Tech, on the other hand, plays almost all four-guard lineups (especially once 6’5 wing JaColby Pemberton gets healthy again), pushing in transition and letting its dual PG lineup of DaQuan Bracey and Derric Jean make lives miserable for opposing defenses.