Monday, December 20, 2010

We have a basketball team here

As usual, it’s taken me a little while to get into the college hoops season, especially with the way the last few years have concluded for the Cincinnati Bearcats. This year, I’ll admit, I was very skeptical after uninspiring wins against the likes of Mount St. Mary’s, IUPU Fort Wayne, and Savannah State. Since the early shakiness, however, Cincinnati has done all you can expect, absolutely destroying a decent Dayton team and now rolling over Oklahoma (sandwiched between routs of Wright State, Utah Valley, and Georgia Southern.

Admittedly, the strength of schedule has been laughably weak (even Dayton and Oklahoma, the two marquee wins, are no Goliaths), but Cincy has done just about all you can ask on the court. The offense still hasn’t been great, but the defense has been very strong. Regardless of the competition, you know you’re doing something right when you play ten straight games against D-1 competition winning by ten points or more in every one of them. edit: not sure what I was talking about here, there were a couple within ten.

The real challenge – the Big East conference schedule – is still to come, not to mention non-conference games against Miami of Ohio and Xavier. Still, UC has set themselves up nicely by taking care of business, and if they finish anywhere near Pomeroy’s projections (22-9, 10-8 BE) the NCAA tourney will, for once, be a lock. Games are played on the court, of course, but I have to say – hesitantly -- that I’m just a little bit excited to see how this one unfolds.