(03-16-2011 03:09 PM)OrangeCamel Wrote: Now that we're done with the A-Sun, I know everyone in the Creek is looking forward to next year in the Big South. It's exciting, but also a little mysterious. Gotta wonder how the BSC will look next year and where Campbell will fit in.
wufan offered some good info in another thread. I'm starting a more specific thread for this theme and pasting his info again here....
UNCA (edit) probably will be voted pre season fave, but they do lose John Williams which is basically one of only 2 guys they have that had a low post presence. He was huge to their success both defensively and offensively.
Should be the usual suspects from the past couple years fighting at the top, UNCA/CCU/WU (if CCU doesn't go on probation and Cliff Ellis isn't fired) as all of those teams return a lot but do lose one key senior. LU may be up there, they are hard to figure out. PC will get their all conference center back from injury and he makes them a lot better. Conference should not have a dominant team but quite a few good ones.
I say this not knowing anything about the Camels.
It will be very interesting to see what, if anything, happens at Coastal in the off-season. Will they lose players? Probation?
Here's a little more info and how I would rank them going into next year, without knowing of transfers and coaching changes that will inevitably happen, and excluding Campbell since I don't think I've seen the Camels play since a Winthrop trip to Buies Creek back in the early 2000's.
UNCA: Returns everyone except John Williams. They will have talented senior guards and wings that should be better on most nights than anyone else in the league. They will have a junior 6-10 center which the season will probably hinge on. He's injury prone but talented. He's the only low post guy they have---if he stays healthy they will be the favorite, if not, don't see them having enough post play to win it all.
WU: Will probabably have an all upperclassman starting lineup. This past year was a huge disappointment and it was because of defense and rebounding. WU has traditionally been in the top 50 or 25 of defensive efficiency in the nation---this year that dropped to the low 100's. Maybe I'm being optimistic as this year was bad, but I never bet against WU after a disappointing year---it's been something like 10-13 years since they have missed the dance in back to back years.
CCU: They will have the talent. They have another head case transfer coming in that can put up big points. They'll have their pg back from injury who is good, along with a 6-9 beast down low in Mclaurin. Heard that this year's leading scorer (who was declared NCAA ineligible) will not return. Will depend on if they get sanctions, if Ellis is fired regardless of any sanctions or not (have to think the admin is getting tired of the bad press), or if they can avoid another late season meltdown.
VMI: Return everything except their leading scorer. If you haven't seen them, they play Grinnell ball---take mostly all 3 pointers, trap every possession and lead the nation in scoring. The problem is that they don't play a lick of defense. When they are on from 3 they can beat anyone, but because of so much reliance on the 3 ball they are very up and down from game to game.
PC: Played well this past season when they still had their center who is a 15/10 guy against anyone, and passes really well out of the post. Probably no other team is more reliant on one guy. They don't lose anyone of significance and return the post guy. NOTE: INELIGIBLE FOR POST SEASON PLAY DUE TO LAST YEAR OF TRANSITION TO D1
Gardner-Webb: I like their new coach--didn't have much to work with this year and was respectable. Still think he's going to have to increase talent but with a year under his belt and some fresh recruits that are his---I think they will improve some although they lose their best player.
CSU: They are a weird team---they seem to always have the Freshman of the year and you look at them and see a lot of talent, but they never really do much better than 4th/5th in the league and that's a good year. They lose a great scorer in Warren, and I think they may lose their coach for the reasons above, so I'm putting them pretty far down although they have some really good individual talent
HP: Their coach seems like "I'm hiring this guy b/c he played at UNC" hire, and doesn't seem like he's cut out for it. All kinds of rumors of guys transferring, though they should return two really good scoring guards. Their problem is no post play at all, no discipline, and no defense.
RU: Greenberg's Euro pipeline dried up when Ali Ton left---they just don't have much talent to work with at all. They don't lose anyone of note, but they really didn't have anyone of note in the first place.