Every Big East Program Sans Villanova Unranked by Sporting News
By Joe Nardone
Preseason basketball rankings are the best. Well, not really the best, but they sure as hell beat the living Sam Cassell out of preseason college football rankings. The latest wave of people using their expertise to rank young kids who play basketball comes from the fine people of (the) Sporting News. And, well, only one Big East Conference team gets ranked by their esteemed panel of basketball people.
(H/T Sporting News, obviously)
| RANK | TEAM |
|---|---|
| 1 | Arizona Wildcats |
| 2 | Kentucky Wildcats |
| 3 | Wisconsin Badgers |
| 4 | Duke Blue Devils |
| 5 | North Carolina Tar Heels |
| 6 | Kansas Jayhawks |
| 7 | Louisville Cardinals |
| 8 | Virginia Cavaliers |
| 9 | Florida Gators |
| 10 | Wichita State Shockers |
| 11 | Villanova Wildcats |
| 12 | Texas Longhorns |
| 13 | Gonzaga Bulldogs |
| 14 | Iowa State Cyclones |
| 15 | Connecticut Huskies |
| 16 | San Diego State Aztecs |
| 17 | Virginia Commonwealth Rams |
| 18 | Michigan State Spartans |
| 19 | Oklahoma Sooners |
| 20 | Utah Utes |
| 21 | Ohio State Buckeyes |
| 22 | Nebraska Cornhuskers |
| 23 | Syracuse Orange |
| 24 | Harvard Crimson |
| 25 | SMU Mustangs |
Villanova is the only team from the Big East Conference who happens to be ranked.
None of that is truly a shocker though. The league is coming off a disappointing rebirth year. However, it could be said that the Big East could get as many as five teams in the NCAA Tournament this year, which would go a long way in changing naysayers’ minds and putting the conference back on the trajectory to respectability.