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The third-best week of the college basketball season is in the books and there's only one way to appropriately describe what we saw during the Thanksgiving break. Unadulterated Chaos.
#2 UConn left Maui as the last-place team in the eight-program field, losing to three unranked opponents in Memphis, Colorado, and Dayton. #1 Kansas eked out a win in a heavyweight battle with #11 Duke after late-game execution plagued the Blue Devils yet again. SDSU crushed #21 Creighton and edged out #6 Houston. West Virginia handled almighty #3 Gonzaga and #24 Arizona in two huge overtime wins. Michigan blew the doors off of Xavier by 25, while #9 Alabama outlasted a pesky Rutgers team by 5. And that was only a snippet of the action!
Last week alone TWELVE matchups featured an unranked opponent taking down a ranked one. And that is why this is the greatest sport on earth. Like I said, chaos at its finest! After all of the insanity, we of course must identify some Overrated and Underrated College Basketball Teams based on the new AP Poll that dropped Monday. All rankings are based on the Week 5 Associated Press Poll.
Overrated College Basketball Teams For Week 5
Oregon Ducks: Unranked to #12
Bravo to the Ducks. That is not meant to be sarcastic. Oregon has had as good a start to the season as anyone, currently at 8-0 with double-digit wins over #20 Texas A&M, SDSU, and a narrow victory over #9 Alabama. The first NET rankings were released earlier this week and the Ducks' impressive resume has them sitting at #15.
One week of basketball gave Oregon the biggest bump any team has experienced thus far, going from unranked to #12 in the country. While I am a fan of this Oregon team that hasn't been truly relevant for a few years, I don't believe in the talent here to uphold their top-12 ranking.
Especially in the Big Ten which has more than their fair share of teams in the 20-50 range, the Ducks will likely fall victim to cannibalization throughout the season. Dana Altman is one of the more underrated coaches in the country so I would love to see Oregon back on the map, securing top-five seeds and competing for Elite Eights/Final Fours annually, but this squad does not hold a candle to the Dillon Brooks / Chris Duarte / Payton Pritchard teams of old.
NATE BITTLE OH MY GOODNESS 😱
HE'S GOT THE WINNER FOR OREGON 🤯 pic.twitter.com/gh9SzCOyRX
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) December 1, 2024
Memphis Tigers: Unranked to #16
What a finish we had in the Maui Invitational opener last Monday. #2 UConn looked dead in the water, down by 12 to the Tigers with about three minutes to go. The Huskies stormed back with a 15-3 run that was capped by a Solo Ball three to tie the game with less than a second left. Memphis was able to survive in overtime, breaking UConn's 17-game winning streak that dates back to last February.
The Tigers then took down Michigan State, a win that has aged well after the Spartans beat #12 UNC a day later. Auburn proved to be too much in the championship though, as Penny Hardaway and Co. took a 14-point loss. Overall, it was more than a successful business trip for the Tigers. So why are they in the overrated section?
Memphis does the #1 thing extremely well and that's shooting the three-ball. They are currently #1 in the country at 46.9%, a wholly unsustainable conversation rate from deep, but it has been impressive how well they've shot given their sub-120 ranking a season ago.
Hardaway went out and got himself some shooters, and they have been hitting. Outside of this, their offensive is a lot of iso-ball, which does work sometimes when you have talented, quick guards who can get into the lane and draw fouls, but it's not exactly a recipe that usually holds up throughout a season.
I like this team in a tournament setting and spoiler alert, I will have them winning 1-2 games in the Big Dance, but this ranking is a bit too high for my liking right now. Their game at Clemson on 12/14 will be a great test for this team.
Look how much it means to Memphis.
The Tigers win an OT classic in Maui against No. 2 UConn ‼️@Memphis_MBB pic.twitter.com/I3zH0GAtwh
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) November 25, 2024
Underrated College Basketball Teams For Week 5
West Virginia Mountaineers: Unranked (11th in 'Others Receiving Votes')
The real junkies already knew about the dynamic father-son duo that resides in Morgantown but if you do not classify as such, fret not. We are here to fill you in.
I am referring to Tucker and Darian DeVries who came over from Drake University in the offseason. Tucker, the prolific scorer and sharpshooter hasn't quite had the Dalton Knecht-like production transfer to his respective power conference, but he's still shooting the lights out from downtown (47%). His father, Darian, took over the program from legendary figure Bob Huggins this past spring and has already coached his team to massive wins over #3 Gonzaga and #24 Arizona in the Battle 4 Atlantis.
Tucker and his backcourt mate Javon Small, a transfer from Oklahoma State, form arguably the top perimeter in the Big 12 and should help lead this team to an upper-echelon finish in the conference. I'm not quite sure yet if this team is a legitimate top-25 as they have been quite inconsistent, but one thing is for sure. They will be an absolute nuisance to play all year and are very fun to watch.
West Virginia Senior Tucker DeVries had a great game in the win against Arizona. He finished with
26 Points
4 Rebounds
6 Assists
8/12 3FGTucker had a great shooting performance where he made a ton of ridiculous shots, he also had a strong passing performance as well, and… pic.twitter.com/zQU3EyW9dZ
— KJ (@KJ__Hoops) November 29, 2024
