ESPN: Conference Races

[GoldenWarrior11]

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/14592307/the-floor-season-surprises

Team we picked to win the Big East in November: Villanova

Barbershop talk then: You're a Nova fan? Man, I can spell Ryan Arcidiacono's last name without Google. A-r-c ... I think there's an 'h' somewhere in there.

Villanova is the only champion that the Big East has known in its second life as a conference. With Josh Hart and Ryan Arcidiacono returning and elite recruit Jalen Brunson arriving, Nova looked like the eventual Big East champs entering the season.

Team we'd pick to win the Big East now: Villanova

Barbershop talk now: I heard that Jay Wright's suits are lined with gold. That's the rumor.

Villanova's loss to Oklahoma and Virginia, both outside Philadelphia, encouraged doubters. Plus, Xavier, Butler and Providence all emerged from the nonconference season with quality wins. But the Wildcats, 6-0 in league play, opened the season with a 31-point win over Xavier. This is still their conference.

It's interesting that they list the "power" conferences by this order in the piece. 1.) ACC 2.) Big 12 3.) B1G 4.) Big East 5.) Pac-12 6.) SEC. Good to see ESPN start changing their course on the amount of publicity the conference receives. Two years ago, we would be left out entirely. A year ago, we would have been placed at the bottom. Today, we are at our rightful place in the middle of the power conferences.

FWIW, they list WCC (7), A-10 (8) and AAC (9).