Some Things To Look Out For Now That College Basketball Is Officially Upon Us
Everything you need to know about what's happened so far.
So far there have been over 23 college basketball games played, and some teams have really shown up. Most games went as predicted, however, others did not. For example, the unranked Navy ended up pulling out a win against Virginia who is ranked 25. Their final score was 66-58.
Most teams, however, were able to pull off a victory with a huge margin. Florida State played University of Pennsylvania and came out with a huge score difference, beating the University of Pennsylvania 105 to 70. Another huge blowout was in the Texas versus Huston Baptist game. Texas defeated Huston 92-48.
Most of the top 10 teams at the moment come as no surprise. Ranked number one, as usual, is Gonzaga, followed closely by UCLA. Third is Kansas, who is always ranked fairly high. Fourth again is no surprise as Villanova is always a top-tier team. Fifth is the Texas Longhorns. Sixth and seventh are both big 10 teams from the Midwest, Michigan followed by Purdue University. Eighth is Baylor. Ninth is Duke, who always has a phenomenal year and one of the greatest coaches of all time. The last team ranked in the top 10 is Kentucky.
There are also some phenomenal players returning and new freshmen that are already lighting this season on fire. The first is a player from Gonzaga that returned for the 2021-22 season after an outstanding previous season, potentially being one of the most essential players for the 2020-21 season. Drew Timme was one of the key players from the outstanding 31-1 Gonzaga team.
The freshman that no one can stop talking about is Chet Holmgren from Gonzaga. He is not what a person would think of when it comes to a typical basketball player. He is a 7-foot thin player who is predicted to put up a monstrous numbers on the board. Chet Holmgren is going to be an outstanding Zags player this year, and his 7-foot stature is going to allow him to do major damage in future games. Between Holmgren and Timme, the Gonzaga team is set up to have another run at the NCAA championship title.
Trayce Jackson-Davis from Indiana University is also a great player who is comfortable with the IU team and playing in the college basketball atmosphere. The new head coach will most likely be relying on him to step up and help lead the team.
A new freshman that is a front runner for multiple freshman awards and is being watched is Caleb Houstan from Michigan.
The next freshman that is predicted to tremendously help their team is Paolo Banchero from Duke. Banchero is supposed to be able to help Duke bounce back and come back fighting from missing the 2021 NCAA tournament.
Finally, there are some other big things happening this season. This will be Mike Krzyzewski's final season. Coach K is the coach with the most wins in Division I men's basketball history. He has five national titles and 12 Final Four trips. He has been a coach at Duke for almost 42 years now.
This is also the first in 18 seasons that Roy Williams will not be coaching at North Carolina. He retired and the North Carolina Tar Heels quickly hired Hubert Davis who was William's assistant for many years. There are going to be a lot of changes and there are bound to be a lot of surprising turns of events this season.
