Big East looking for 3rd straight NCAA championship
It’s hard not to look ahead in the Big East. Everyone knows the league is going for its third straight national champion, after Syracuse and Connecticut cut down the last two sets of nets. It has four teams ranked in the preseason Top 25. And Syracuse’s Hakim Warrick and Providence’s Ryan Gomes are on any short list of the nation’s best players.
So what gives? Why do more people want to talk about 2005-06 than the season that starts this week?
Next season is when five schools from Conference USA join the Big East to form a 16-team league that could have nine, and maybe more, teams good enough to make the NCAA tournament. This current 12-team Big East seems strong enough to have at least half the league’s members called on Selection Sunday.
“This happens every year with this conference: People always want to talk about how we were better or we’re going to be better,” Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said. “We’ve always been good. We are good. We will be good. This is a great league. That never changes.”
Syracuse (No. 6), Connecticut (8), Pittsburgh (17) and Notre Dame (20) were ranked in The Associated Press’ preseason Top 25.
Boeheim has all five starters back from last season, including Warrick and Gerry McNamara. Syracuse also has a new nickname, having gone from Orangemen to just plain Orange.
Connecticut had underclassmen Emeka Okafor and Ben Gordon go as the No. 2 and 3 picks in the NBA draft, and the Huskies are still considered a Top 10 team. The frontcourt is loaded with the likes of Josh Boone, Charlie Villanueva, Hilton Armstrong, Rashad Anderson, freshman Rudy Gay and Georgia Tech transfer Ed Nelson.
“I don’t know if you can a find team anywhere with as many good players up front as we do,” Huskies coach Jim Calhoun said. “These guys can really pass the ball. This is the deepest and best frontcourt I’ve ever had.”
There are some other pretty good forwards in the league, including Warrick, Gomes, Pittsburgh’s Chris Taft and Boston College’s Craig Smith.
Providence coach Tim Welsh heard firsthand this summer how good one of those forward matchups is expected to be.
“I ran into (former Syracuse star) Carmelo Anthony on the street in Manhattan a couple of months ago, and he told me there were two games he wouldn’t miss this season, and that’s when Hakim and Ryan go at each other,” Welsh said. “He’s right, and it’s great they meet twice.”
Miami and Virginia Tech left the Big East this year for the Atlantic Coast Conference, and Boston College joins them next season.
Cincinnati, Louisville, Marquette, DePaul and South Florida will move from Conference USA to the Big East.
There are two new coaches in the Big East this season: Former Kansas assistant Norm Roberts takes over at St. John’s, and John Thompson III moves from Princeton to Georgetown, the program his father took to national prominence during the 1980s.
“Whatever burden is put on me, it’s going to come 10-fold from that office up there,” Thompson said, nodding toward his own workspace.
The Atlantic 10 will have a tough time matching last season.
The league had its second straight national player of the year, had a team reach a No. 1 national ranking, and put two schools in the NCAA tournament’s regional finals.
Well, there’s no one in the league this season on the level of David West of Xavier and Jameer Nelson of Saint Joseph’s, the last two national players of the year. Nobody from the Atlantic 10 cracked the preseason Top 25, and only George Washington and Xavier received any votes at all.
Saint Joseph’s Phil Martelli, the consensus national coach of the year last season, doesn’t sound too worried about the league’s outlook.
“There’s always going to be ebb and flow,” he said. “This league will play out and get to that point in March where you say ‘Who wants to line up and play you?”‘ he said. “Whoever comes out of this league, they’ll play well because they’re prepared.
“You look at these young players, you see the bounce will come back. It’s a whole new cast of characters, really. There are stars in this league, NBA players. They’ll emerge.”
The Atlantic 10 will change in 2005-06 as well, adding Charlotte and Saint Louis from Conference USA.
Manhattan will be chasing a third straight Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference title. The Jaspers won’t have two-time league player of the year Luis Flores, but they will have coach Bobby Gonzalez, who signed an extension through 2009-10 after being mentioned for several openings in the offseason.
Princeton has former assistant Joe Scott back in charge in the Ivy League after he led Air Force to the best season in school history.
Tom Brennan announced this would be his 19th and final season at Vermont and he’ll try to go out with three straight America East titles. The Catamounts will be led by two-time conference player of the year Taylor Coppenrath.
Lehigh has four starters back as it tries to repeat in the Patriot League, while Monmouth is expected to repeat in the Northeast Conference.