Michigan upsets #4 UCLA

Was I right about John Beilein? It was a typical UCLA vs. John Beilein game: low-scoring, plenty of defense, and from Michigan's perspective, a lot of effective backdoor cuts. Michigan goes on and plays Duke tomorrow in the championship game of this preseason tourney. If you think Duke will have a cakewalk, you are dead wrong. This is the exact style of basketball that eliminated the Blue Devils from the 2nd round of the NCAA Tournament last year, as they got eliminated by West Virginia. UCLA will play Southern Illinois in the consolation game tomorrow. It was not a good day for the PAC 10, as both UCLA and USC lost.

Seton Hall nips #20 USC

This was something I definitely didn't see coming. Seton Hall was projected to finish #13 out of 16 in the Big East. Yet, they went down to Puerto Rico and defeated #20 USC by 2 points. It is not farfetched to possibly see 10 teams coming out of the Big East and going to the NCAA Tournament. I did not get a chance to watch this game, so I won't be able to comment on the game or the players of Seton Hall, but I'm sure to catch a few Seton Hall games, thanks to my DirecTV ESPN Full Court package. Seton Hall is now 3-0, and we will see what they do in the next few games.

Another team to watch out for in the Big East is Providence. After underperforming again with Coach Tim Welsh, the Friars went out and got Keno Davis, formerly of Drake. While Providence lost their first game to Northeastern, I believe this team will start gelling around late January and February and become dangerous, once they learn Davis' system. The Friars return senior Geoff McDermott, who I believe is capable of a double-double every night at 6'8" and 235 pounds.

Duke Destroys Southern Illinois 83-58

Well, I was wrong. Coach Mike Krzyzewski apparently had one hell of a halftime conversation with his team and Duke's intensity picked up big time after halftime. They played better defense and scored 54 points in the second half. Duke had many drives into the lane and ferocious dunks. Swingman Gerald Henderson was the catalyst for the intensity lift and had a few thunderous dunks in the 25-point victory over the SIU Salukis. Duke definitely looked like a #5 team in the second half and the second-half run eerily looked like the 56-13 run that UConn had against Hartford on Monday (i.e. night and day).

Welcome to the PPI...Musings about Y2K Coaches vs. Cancer Classic

Welcome to your one-stop shop for college basketball analysis. Over the winter and early spring of 2008-09, I will be watching literally hundreds of games, while constantly updating my 1-342 college rankings, now known as the PREMiere Power Index. The first PPI will be released after December 7th's games.

Yes, it is only November 20th, but there are a ton of good games on already. Currently, the Y2K Sports Coaches vs. Cancer Classic is being held in Madison Square Garden, featuring four traditional NCAA superpowers: Duke, UCLA, Michigan, and mid-major Southern Illinois, who's done some damage in the NCAA. The early matchup (which I'm currently watching) features Duke and Southern Illinois.

An early observation (non-biased of course) is that Duke is not playing like a #5 team in the country. They struggled at home against Rhode Island last Sunday - for the record Rhody was picked to finish 9th in the Atlantic 10 conference. The thing that will plague Duke this year is once again the lack of frontcourt play. Yes, they have a healthy 7'1" Brian Zoubek (hailing from the "Armpit of America" - New Jersey), but he can't do the job himself. Meanwhile, Kyle Singler is not a natural power forward, he is more of a "European" type of forward. If you put him against a natural rebounding guy like Blake Griffin or Luke Harangody (GODY!!!), he would get eaten alive and would get in significant foul trouble. Moreover, this team will always get in trouble away from the friendly confines of Cameron Indoor Stadium, where they are the recipient of some quite ridiculous presents from officials.

The second matchup is Ben Howland's UCLA Bruins against John Beilein's Michigan Wolverines. UCLA is a team that will always be there because they are groomed to play defense first. Howland, even in his Pittsburgh days, won games when his team would score in the 50s and 60s, due to the fact that his team's defense would not give up more than 40-50 points. Yes, the team is younger, but they will make the Sweet 16, like they do every year due to Howland's coaching. Meanwhile, on the other side, Michigan had a very subpar last year, but this is Coach Beilein's second year on this team to get his system implemented. Look for Michigan to have a big-time bounceback season.

So, fasten your seatbelts. This will be a great year. Let the good times roll...