The EvanMiya College Basketball Show

Evan (00:00)
if Darren Peterson is fully healthy, I truly believe

This will be one of the most under seeded teams in the tournament in terms of whatever seed they're at, they're far better than that, if healthy.

Matt Norlander (00:05)
Ooh. Yeah.

I love watching him play basketball. I want to see it as much as possible at the college level.

But if you don't have real time together on the court for extended periods, then I do think that

major issue for Kansas that will prevent it from making a final four.

Evan (00:29)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Evan Mia college basketball show. I'm your host Evan Mia Kawa and we've got a lot to get into this week. Kansas beats BYU, but the Darren Peterson injury saga continues. Illinois got a big road win for the second weekend in a row. Michigan made a statement Friday night over Michigan state in the sec Florida and Kentucky both got some big wins this weekend and perhaps most notably

Arizona is still undefeated. So I'm very excited to get into all of it. Matt Norlander is here on deck with me in a second to talk about it. And later on in the show, we've got Fran Fraschilla joining us. So you won't want to miss that. Also in this week's analytics corner, I'm going to talk about some notable resumes, highlight a few most improved players in the country, and talk about teams with multiple star players that we want to keep an eye on.

So we've got a great show lined up for you, but first we got to get into the big storylines from this week. And here with me to do that is the great Matt Norlander from CBS. Norlander, we will get to the Kansas and Darren Peterson saga and all that in a second, but I actually want to start in the big 10 with two statement road wins this weekend by Illinois and Michigan. Illinois goes into Nebraska and wins 78 to 69. Michigan goes on the road against Michigan state and wins by 12.

I think both of these games coming in were kind of pick-ems. They could have gone either direction. you saw on Friday night, Michigan started out strong, withstood a Spartan comeback to end up winning at the end. And on Sunday, Nebraska actually had the lead and a lot of momentum against Illinois until the fighting Illini really asserted themselves late to take over that game. We're going to talk about both games, but which result in performance was more notable to you?

Matt Norlander (02:21)
The Illinois result was more notable to me, although they're very close. And as we record here on a Monday, um, it's great to be on the show. It's great to follow Steven Hartsell. Um, he got on the show before me. Totally understand. If you haven't gone back and listened to the Hartsell interview on this great podcast, please go do so. I do a show on college sports now with Steven Hartsell during the back half of the college basketball season. That's in addition to Ion college basketball. So I was all too happy to see him.

some opportunities before I made my not so grand debut to your question. Illinois doing that. And I shared this fact on another podcast, two road winds, top five teams within an eight day span. Illinois just did it. Only the fourth team instance ever for that to happen, which is way lower than I would have ever guessed. Credit to our CBS sports research department that brought that stat to me. And in fact, I got another one for you right now. Let me just dig this up here.

it got sent to me this morning. ⁓ if Illinois, okay. So Illinois plays number 10, Michigan state on Saturday, the AP top 25 has been released for this week since we started recording. If Illinois wins against Michigan state, it will become the first team in the AP poll era to ever win three road games against top 10 opponents in a 14 day span.

That's what we're looking at with Illinois. Incredible if they can do it. They got to do it. We'll see if they can do it. ⁓ Illinois didn't have Kylan Boswell. Didn't matter. Nebraska wasn't at full strength. The players were on the floor that were on the floor. They got the win. Illinois continues to rise. And I feel like the win put them a bit more in ⁓ the thick of the conversation for national title contenders. Honestly, I've had Illinois there for about two weeks. And certainly, when the Purdue win happened last weekend,

Evan, that's when I thought with clarity, they arrived in that conversation, ⁓ plenty to get to about the Michigan win as well also done on the road. But for me, after what Nebraska had done to nearly beat Michigan, had the game on its home floor, Illinois walked right into Pinnacle Bank. That's what they did. In fact, there was a, an image that has since, ⁓ been shared widely in big 10 circles where they had something written on the white, on the whiteboard in the Illinois locker room, Rob the effing bank. Well, they did it 78 69.

Evan (04:45)
I do.

Matt Norlander (04:48)
Keaton Wogler outstanding again. is rising to potential first team All-American status. It's amazing to see what he's doing. And I get a big joy out of seeing teams that can play just outstanding offense and do it in a variety of ways. And to me, when you actually watch Illinois play, there's a lot of that. They can hit some threes. They're not an amazing three-point shooting team. They can get into the lane. They can shoot from the mid-range. They're reliable from the foul line. They've got big bodies, obviously. And then Wogler's the centerpiece of it all.

When Boswell returns, he's going to be a really, really good two-way player again. ⁓ Illinois has a lot of rightful buzz behind it, a lot of momentum behind it. And to me, was the second most, this wasn't your direct question, Evan, but it was the second most notable win of the weekend to me. What Florida did to Alabama was outrageous. And I thought that was one of the best 40 minute performances by any team in the past three or four weeks in the sport. But to your specific question between those two, I lean slightly toward the Alina.

Evan (05:37)
Yes.

I think the fun thing about seemingly every Illinois team each year is that they have just a bunch of really good players and you don't really know exactly who's going to emerge. Well, this season it's more unexpected than ever with Keaton Wogler. He just continues to be extremely excellent and make almost no mistakes in almost every game. had 28 points in this game, five rebounds, five assists, two steals, just two turnovers. What really sticks out to me is in this performance ⁓ on the road against a really tough Nebraska team.

And then you go back to a week ago and their win against Purdue, it's his free throw shooting ⁓ reliability. He was 10 for 12 from the line in this game and 11 of 13 against Purdue. like he is being put in these pressure positions, you know, as one of the youngest players on the team and he's just delivering. And then you look at the other guys on this team. I love the way that this team is like morphed around him, especially in the absence of, Kyle and Boswell, where you have this, these role players like

Jake Davis had 13 points, ⁓ Tomislav Avichas had 12, Mirkovic had 10. Against Illinois, it was like all of the other guys making threes. Keaton Wogler had nine threes in that game that was obviously like a crazy. But there were four other players on Illinois who had two threes in that game as well. So they're all able to pitch in ⁓ when they need to. But Wogler, mean, he's really the story here. I have him up to third right now in overall offensive value among all players in the sport.

behind Cameron Boozer and Braden Smith, according to BPR. And I'm really curious, like, what do you think is going to happen when Kyle and Boswell comes back? Because obviously on paper, you want your full strength team and Boswell does a lot of great things for this team that they are missing, but they're also having so much success putting the ball in Keaton Wogler's hands and having him play 35 minutes a game. So what do you think that dynamic is going to look like when they're hopefully fully healthy come March?

Matt Norlander (07:38)
This is a real question. Now, it depends on the locker room coach, players involved. ⁓ I honestly think a lot of times teams can handle it just fine. And Boswell is a vet, and his defense is very key. Illinois is a good defensive team. It is not a great defensive team. I actually wonder if it gets caught in that kind of game where suddenly it's mid-60s with 2 and 1 to go. How does it respond in that kind of spot there? ⁓

So you're going to have this dynamic where you've got this freshman Wunderkid who really might be a first team All-American after not being a top 150 prospect coming into the into the year. And then Boswell, who's been around the block, ⁓ very tough, good perimeter defender, just a smart guy on that end of the floor and, you know, is also capable of helping distribute and set up your offense in major ways. ⁓ We'll see. I think they get back to a lot of what they were without him. I mean, with him on the floor.

The losses four points to Alabama, 13 to Yukon at the Garden the day after Thanksgiving. And then against Nebraska, they lost at the buzzer at home and a really just an entertaining game, an awesome game there. I do, maybe it takes a game or two to maybe get back in the flow, but if Wagler continues to be like this, like you have to play around him. He's just been too good. That's a good problem for Brad Underwood and the staff to have.

We wait and see on that. Also, Illinois is going to take, it's 10 and one in the league. It's going to take a second loss at some point here. It might be this weekend in Michigan state. They've still got road. They've got the LA trip. Can they get out of there without a scratch? They've got a host Michigan right now. They're pacing to be 17 and three in the league. According to Ken Palm, I presume I can invoke Ken Palm on this podcast. ⁓ I think that sounds about right to me. 10 and one finished 17 and three. And by the way, if that's the case, that means Illinois is 26 and five going into the big 10 tournament.

This is such a competitive group of teams vying for a one seed. Illinois could be like top four in the metrics, 26 and five, and maybe not have a chance at a one seed going into the league tournament despite that record because of the teams that are surrounding it. We gotta wait and see on how that all unfolds there. But regardless of that, I still consider them to be a viable national title contender. And of course with that, our very real Final Four threat.

Evan (09:55)
I do want to touch on the other team at the top of the Big 10 in Michigan who withstood two big tests this week. think the narrative around them coming into this last week was like, is Michigan really as good as all the metrics say? They seem a little bit shaky. If you throw out that Gonzaga 40 point win, how good of a team are they? Well, they they withstood Nebraska, albeit Nebraska not at full strength. And then they go on the road and have a very, very convincing win, in my opinion, against Michigan State in a game that's like

That's going to be as hostile a road environment as you're going to find in the country. And they, you know, they were up early, they withstood a run, they ended up closing it out. Yaxle Lendeborg has been kind of the the linchpin for when they've been really great or just okay. And he really returned in a big game to his best form. had twenty six points, thirteen and fifteen from the line, twelve rebounds, two blocks. I still have him as the second best player in the country in terms of his value behind Cameron Boozer. I know that he's not necessarily

Matt Norlander (10:50)
Ooh.

Evan (10:53)
considered to be second for national player of the year, nor do I think he should because Michigan has so many players, but in terms of the value he's bringing on the court and what he's predicted to do going forward, I still think he's really strong. But Elliott Kadeau also has been huge for this team. It's the three point improvement from Elliott Kadeau that it's been remarkable for this Michigan team. He made three threes in this game. He leads Michigan in three point shots this year in

He's made 37 of them. He's shooting 43%. That's more than any other Michigan player. I think if you asked any North Carolina fan last year, there's no way they would have predicted that to happen. ⁓ But it's really the defense as well. mean, Michigan State, I think only had five points through the first eight minutes of this game. And that was in stark contrast to Nebraska, I think probably had 22 points within eight minutes when they played Michigan back on, I think that was Tuesday. ⁓

Matt Norlander (11:30)
I

Yeah.

Evan (11:50)
So, and I think Jeremy Fears was great, we can touch on him, but Michigan, I think, has really quieted a lot of the doubters. ⁓ I certainly think there are people lurking in the shadows saying they're not buying this Michigan team, but for the time being, they've proved them wrong.

Matt Norlander (12:05)
Like, what does that even mean for anyone that was out there expressing that opinion on social media or in podcast form? Team is 20 and 1. It's now back at number one in a variety of predictive metrics. I'm interested though, did you dive into like, is there correlation? Michigan's best wins in the Yak-Cels performances and its closest wins? Okay, I'd be curious on that.

Evan (12:28)
That's something I've noticed anecdotally. I've not specifically studied that, but it seems like

when they've played the best opponents on their schedule for the most part, he's been like excellent. And so, you know, that's been something I've been watching.

Matt Norlander (12:38)
Yeah, Michigan's got a variety of ways to beat you. Lennon Borg is the best player. Cadeau has come on really strong. Mares Johnson, like if you watch the Big Ten, you know how good he is and the staff obviously values him tremendously. He is the the the glue guy, if you will. Adai Mara has taken the jump. thought he would. Namaari Burnett is just a quiet senior leader that can maybe he's really more the glue guy than anyone there. Wasn't a huge factor at all in the game in East Lansing over the weekend. But ⁓ with those and then they've just they've just got

They've got like nine reliable guys. So if Michigan doesn't win the national title, doesn't mean they were overrated. ⁓ they're pacing toward a one seed. That was a really nice win. And actually, as we talk here on a Monday afternoon, dusty may had his media availability earlier in the day and he has no issue just fanning the flames of that rivalry, essentially calling out Michigan state for dirty play. There is a, a video that has been shared a bit of Jeremy fears, dipping his foot in, ⁓ and, and basically trying to take out a Michigan player.

And Dusty May said, go watch the tape. Like it's all over it for 40 minutes. ⁓ So there's that. Listen, there's no love lost in this rivalry. Credit Dusty May for walking right into that job and leaning right into it. He of course had ⁓ the picture beforehand, which has been shared widely as well. ⁓ But Michigan is as good as any team in the country. Not named Arizona. Arizona fans.

want to continue just to harp on anyone that doesn't put them clearly above all the others. 22 and 0, I get it. Until you lose, I'll put you there. You're a high major team. You've played incredible non-conference schedule. You're in the big 12. You've got to lose. Got some beast games coming later this month for sure. But that was mighty impressive by Michigan. then I don't like, Michigan State 19 and 3, it's done really well for itself. It was number one in defensive efficiency going into the game. Now it's number two.

It's just a matter of, fears has been outstanding. think fears is. Fears has a case to be an all a first team or he's definitely second team at worst. He's been right there with Braden Smith and assists per game. but, ⁓ I, I, can they get enough around him? Jackson Kohler has been productive. Cohen cars, the best in game dunkers and Zion Carson Cooper is a reliable big, like I like the way that he plays, but they can't have these games where it's like, okay, it can be fears and one of the guy when you play legit teams, it's gotta be more than that. So.

We wait and see on where that goes with them. I still buy them as a national title contender. Yes, I mean that national title contender, but it was a missed opportunity and they just got down too big. Now they overcame the deficit. I get that, but sometimes you just exert so much trying to get back into the game. Can't hold onto the rope and there it is.

Evan (15:17)
I want to touch on some other stuff here, but I will say really quickly on Jeremy Fears. I love what he's doing for this team. ⁓ I have him as the second most indispensable player in the country to any team behind Cameron Boozer. So when we're talking about how important a player is to their team's success and how much the drop off is without him, he rates as the second most important guy in the country. I think that tracks. I also think he's the best player maker in the country. I think he's been even better than Braden Smith, and that's saying a lot.

Matt Norlander (15:31)
Yeah, okay.

Evan (15:45)
given that Braden Smith is gonna potentially break all time records and stuff, but that's how good Jeremy Fiers has been. So I'm not out on this team. I think they're playing arguably the best team in the country. ⁓ So I still think this team is capable of a lot. And they've really overachieved relative to expectation this year. ⁓ so, regardless of where they end up, it's been a really fun year. I do wanna touch on the Kansas Darren Peterson stuff. We're taping this on a Monday, so we don't know.

yet what's going to happen in tonight's game for Kansas. really, want to focus on Kansas wins this game 90 to 82. They had a tremendous first half. I was looking at the box score. And if you look at the box without having watched the game, it's very misleading because all five Kansas players are in double digits. Every buddy's between 12 and 21. It looks like it was just a very, you know, spread out performance. And that's not really what happened. It was the Darren Peterson show in the first half where he looked like

by far the best player in college basketball, number one pick, all that stuff. He rates as the best pure scorer in college basketball according to my metrics. The analogy that I was thinking about this weekend in describing Darren Peterson of seeing how good he was on the court and then his, I don't know, apathetic body language on the bench when he stopped playing in the second half was I kind of thought it was like if you're playing in an adult rec league playing basketball,

and you like really need to make the playoffs and you like phone a guy who would know played like former D1 or G League or something. And you're like, Hey, like, would you mind playing with my team for a night? And then he comes in like plays really good and then decides like, my, I'm, I'm, don't want to break too much of a sweat. That's sort of what it seems like with Darren Peterson. My question for you is we've seen how elite this Kansas team can be. And if Darren Peterson is fully healthy, I truly believe

This will be one of the most under seeded teams in the tournament in terms of whatever seed they're at, they're far better than that, if healthy. But obviously the swing without him, at least in terms of just the dynamics around this team and what they're capable of massively change. If there's any level of doubt even going into the tournament of whether he's going to be able to play full games. Do you think this is going to end up having an impact on Kansas when we get to March?

Matt Norlander (17:39)
Ooh. Yeah.

This is I think I thought about this in the past couple of days. ⁓ Again, we are recording this before the Kansas game at Texas Tech on Monday night. And I know your listeners are going to get this on Tuesday. So who's to say what's going to happen in that game? Is Peterson going to play 33 minutes and look incredible? Is he going to be on a minutes restriction? Will he be set for some of the first half so we can play more in the second half? I have no idea. Right. So not knowing what's going to happen here versus when your listeners are actually taking the podcast. I have wondered when we get to March.

Evan (18:08)
Correct.

Matt Norlander (18:30)
and the stakes are the highest there. It's clear cut. And I'm not even necessarily just talking the NCAA tournament, although that's the most important. What if Kansas is in a position here where it's, you know, dancing on the line? I don't think I'll get to a one seed, but dancing between a two or three or three or four. And it's got a particular game with real urgency that has a lot of leverage to it. ⁓ How much will we see in Peterson in those moments? ⁓ If the game over the weekend was an NCAA tournament game,

with Darren Peterson have been on the floor for the second half. I don't know. They were up big. They were at home. They were able to hold on despite Richie Saunders. ⁓ Also, suddenly looking like a first round NBA lottery pick. ⁓ The more I'll say this again, not knowing what happened Monday night.

The more that this continues, the more liable and vulnerable Kansas will be to falling short of any kind of expectation because this has been in my estimation without debate, one of the five biggest stories in the sport this season. You can probably make the case it's a top three story in college basketball and a season loaded with so many plot points. And we're about to have the Super Bowl. ⁓

the NBA is going to have the All-Star game. get all that. The Olympics, Winter Olympics, I love them. I'll be writing about them a little bit for .com as well. They'll take some attention. But college basketball is really about to have its annual turn into the bigger spotlight by mid-February. And then March is just another level. And then the tournament jumps up five more levels after that. This story will only increase the noise around the team as the season goes on. And

In particular, when it comes to gameplay, because Bill Self has admitted this, when it comes to playing with each other over the course of a full game, like Peterson is just outstanding. I love watching him play basketball. I want to see it as much as possible at the college level. But if you don't have like real time together on the court for extended periods, then I do think that is a major issue for Kansas that will prevent it from making a final four. Hopefully this doesn't wind up being the case, Evan. Hopefully.

In the weeks to come, Peterson, there's no lingering issues with any body parts and he can just go out there and play. And even if, even if he is on a publicly stated or an unspoken agreement of being on some sort of minutes restriction, if he can get out there for 30 minutes or 28 minutes per night on average and that, and that can be deployed across first and second half play. Cause right now it's so tilted in favor of the first half. ⁓ Kansas can be a real threat to go deep. They don't want it to be a what if situation. They kind of had this with Embiid.

more than a decade ago. ⁓ Different kind of injury, different kind of player, of course. But we'll see if they can maximize it. Remain riveted by this storyline. I've never seen something like it before. Hopefully, DP can stay on the floor and continue to wow. And maybe if he can, in the process, push himself to be an All-American. Because right now, he just hasn't played enough games. If I had to do a ballot today, he wouldn't be an All-American for me. He has not played enough.

to justify it. The NBA actually has this rule now where you gotta play I think 65, 64 out of 82 games, something like that. Peterson has played in 10 and a half out of Kansas' 21 games. He needs to lock more time on the floor before, at least from my end, he can get real consideration for All-America status.

Evan (21:47)
Yeah, think if we had even four or five games where he was totally healthy going into the tournament, the level of intrigue around this Kansas team of what can they do in the tournament, I think would be amazing for the sport. So I'm really hoping that he's fully healthy. Speaking of the Big 12, I want to touch on this a little bit before we get to a fun game here. I put up an article that you can read on my blog on Friday that came up with a new metric for ranking or rating how good all the conferences are. There's been a lot of discussion this year.

about how the SEC is down in terms of their elite teams, in terms of their potential to win a national title, make final fours, all that stuff. And yet according to the metrics, Ken Palm, the net, my side, et cetera, the SEC is still ranked as the best conference. We've talked about it. It's because the middle and bottom of the conference is still really strong. But I think when we talk about which conference is actually going to move the needle the most in March, whether that's having the best chance of winning a title, making final fours, getting teams in the tournament.

It's been the big 10 and the big 12 that have been the clear cut top of the sport and the SEC and third.

So I created a new metric that more heavily weights the teams at the top of each conference that basically is more of a proxy for which conferences are going to matter the most in March. And when you look at this new metric, again, this is not evenly weighting all teams. It's more putting emphasis on the top and less on the bottom teams.

Matt Norlander (23:11)
Right.

Evan (23:13)
The Big 10 and Big 12 are neck and neck and actually when I published the article, the Big 10 was slightly ranked higher, but it's actually flipped now where the Big 12 is the best conference. Do you agree with the fact that those two conferences should be above the SEC in terms of just what we're talking about on a daily basis and how strong we think the conferences are in terms of what people really care about and which of those two would you say has the edge over the other?

Matt Norlander (23:39)
Yeah, I would. I have one quick question though on your process. Do you at least a lot for like extraordinarily bad teams to bring the league down a little bit if that's the case? Because I would do that. Like to me, it's got to be a balance of every team has to matter, obviously in the ranking. But if you have five teams in the top 20 of your metric, and then you've also got two teams near the bottom that are like, you know, 110 and 123 overall, like those aren't good teams.

Good teams are not great teams at all, but they're not historically bad. But if you had a team in your league or two teams that were like sub 150, I do think that should bring you back down a little bit to earth. Like I don't want to discard the bad teams because they're in the league. You got to have them mean something. So do you at least have some counterbalance for that?

Evan (24:24)
Yeah, so every team still matters, but the amount of weight on each team is not even. It's more towards the top and less towards the bottom. And I honestly think some, again, this is all a little bit, like there's, this is, ⁓ there's not an exact science to this necessarily, but I think part of it is the Big 12 and the ACC, for example, could argue that it's not their fault that you shouldn't peg the conference for adding a team like a ⁓ Utah.

or like one of the bad teams from the ACC that they should then pull the conference down because you've added a team. There's some of that discussion going along in recent years because of all the realignment stuff. Should you penalize a conference for adding another member that ends up being really bad and dragging down the conference? I think at the end of the day, it's important to have both. It's important to have a metric that measures just like from top to bottom, how difficult would it be to play?

Matt Norlander (25:03)
Yeah.

Evan (25:18)
against every team in that conference. And I still have that and the SEC still ranks as number one there. But then another way of looking out of saying which conference is going to actually is more top heavy and going to matter the most in March. And when you put it that way, right now, the Big 12, I mean, they have three of the top seven teams at EvanMia.com, six of the top 17. know, half the conference will be in the tournament or close to that. The Big 10 is very close in that regard as well. So I think it's deserved that those two conferences would be ahead of the SEC there.

Matt Norlander (25:20)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I like the ambition from you here and I agree with this. The SEC does rank as the number one league in basically every advanced metric from top to bottom kind of evaluating with even weight on all of them. But I don't think you'll find many people this season saying the SEC is the best league unless they're broadcasting games specifically for that league on television. It's just not going to happen. The Big Ten and Big 12 are the two best leagues. Big 12 for me is the best league in the country because you've got Zona, Iowa State, Houston, Tech, Kansas.

throw BYU in there because it's still dangerous. Six teams for sure. Final four capable. That's a, that's a healthy, healthy crop of teams. There is going to, there could be a gap. There could be a tear. get all that, but those are the teams that, that really matter. UCF has done a nice job this season, of course, as well. And we'll see if anyone else can break through. Maybe, maybe not. Big 10, I think has the widest middle. So you've got Michigan, Illinois, Michigan state, Purdue, keep Nebraska in that conversation.

final four capable teams. And then you get into the likes of Iowa, uh, Indiana, maybe USC, UCLA, and that might be it. They've got the, big 10 has like a, this is why I would put the big 12 over the big 10. Cause the big 10 has Maryland bad, Oregon awful Rutgers, terrible Northwestern sub 500. Minnesota's not been able to have any kind of success despite having some real threats on some teams. Penn state's not good.

Evan (26:59)
I still really like Ohio State. I still really like Ohio State as well, yeah.

Matt Norlander (27:16)
it's got like a bottom third. That's just woof. And so for me, that's why big 12 would be number one. It's got the best combination of title contenders, final four contenders and, ⁓ teams at the bottom Utah is not good, but I think the bottom five, teams in the big 12 collectively are better than the bottom five, six in the big.

Evan (27:33)
Yeah, and the Big 12 does edge out the Big 10 slightly in this metric, which you can find at evanmia.com. Okay, I want to end with a fun game. ⁓ I think we're a little more over a month from the bracket coming out when we will make all of our official picks and there will be exact regions that teams can go through to get there. But I want to do a little bit of a trust exercise right now. I've picked about 15 notable teams. I've randomized the order here. You do not know the order. I've not really thought about this much either.

Basically what we're gonna do is one at a time, I'm gonna give you a team in rapid fire. I want each of us to pick, if you had to pick right now, how far do you think that team is going to advance in the NCAA tournament all the way up to the national championship game? We don't necessarily have to pick a title team in this exercise, but how far do you think they're gonna advance? And we'll just do this rapid fire if there's some.

Matt Norlander (28:23)
This

is the Squidward meme, but not with seating, but with results. Okay.

Evan (28:27)
Correct. And

this will look really wrong in two weeks, I'm sure. ⁓ But this is going to be...

Matt Norlander (28:30)
Yes. Okay, so

I am projecting and predicting the NCAA tournament fate of all of these teams.

Evan (28:39)
Yes, that is correct. And I will do the same. OK, we're to start with Michigan State. How far do you think Michigan State is advancing in the tournament?

Matt Norlander (28:46)
Elite 8.

Evan (28:48)
I think I'm at Alidae as well, Purdue.

Matt Norlander (28:51)
Final four.

Evan (28:52)
I don't think I can get there. I think I would have been there two weeks ago. I think I'm gonna say a lead eight for Purdue. Kansas.

Matt Norlander (29:01)
Sweet 16.

Evan (29:03)
Yeah, sweet 16 for me as well. ⁓ Florida.

Matt Norlander (29:06)
Sweet 16.

Evan (29:07)
Man, I thought you were gonna go higher there. I was also gonna say sweet 16. We're in lockstep. Okay, Nebraska

Matt Norlander (29:14)
Sweet 16.

Evan (29:16)
I'm taking a lead eight for Nebraska. I really believe in this team.

Matt Norlander (29:18)
Keep in mind as we

do this, some of these teams will lose in the first weekend, which is what makes the tournament incredible. Without knowing the matchup, it's hard to say. So I'm actually, I'm prone to pick a sweet upset here and there. It's going to be hard for me to say a lot of these teams. I don't know where you're going. Maybe I'm to get one before that where I can say with like real conviction and clarity that I can see them falling before the first weekend or the second weekend. When we get to the bracket, I'm going have a different opinion. I just want to give a little more context as to why I'm answering how I'm answering.

Evan (29:22)
Yes.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Okay, what about Gonzaga?

Matt Norlander (29:47)
Elite 8.

Evan (29:49)
I'm gonna say Sweet 16. Yukon. ⁓

Matt Norlander (29:52)
Final four.

Evan (29:54)
I'm going to lead eight, I'm not quite there with Yukon. BYU.

Matt Norlander (29:56)
time.

tell you what this is the team you want to talk about a team that could drop in the first game or make the final four that's one I will split the difference and say AJ DeBonse experiences at least a sweet 16 I'll say sweet 16 for the Cougs

Evan (30:13)
I'm also Sweet

16. Michigan.

Matt Norlander (30:15)
title game.

Evan (30:16)
I'm gonna say Final Four. I feel like this Michigan team. They're the number one team on my site. So I believe in them a lot. They feel a lot like Auburn last year to me. A team that was really good during the regular season. You know, and they'll get to a Final Four at least. I don't know if I can put them further than that just in terms of my gut feel right now. ⁓ Okay, Illinois.

Matt Norlander (30:37)
Elite 8.

Evan (30:39)
I think I'm gonna say Final Four. Houston.

Matt Norlander (30:41)
Okay.

title game winner.

Evan (30:45)
Yeah, I'm putting them in my title game right now, I think. ⁓ Okay, fun one, St. Louis.

Matt Norlander (30:51)
Mmm, yeah. Sweet 16 with definitiveness and I am flirting with saying Elite 8 but I will say Sweet 16.

Evan (31:00)
Wow, I love that. I can only get to round of 32, but I would love to see more.

Matt Norlander (31:03)
Nope,

they're too good, Too good right now. am sweet 16. Let's go. They're gonna, they're gonna carry the torch because Miami, Ohio is not making the sweet 16. They are going to carry the torch a year after there were no mids in the second weekend. They're doing it this year.

Evan (31:19)
think that's just a lot of pressure for them to be carrying into the tournament, but I hope you're right. ⁓ Okay, let's do Kentucky.

Matt Norlander (31:25)
Okay, here we go. I'll go. I'll go second round on Kentucky. As I said over the weekend, whatever you do with this team in your bracket, you are going to be wrong. Just accept it, embrace it. If you say they're getting upset in the first round, that's not what's going to happen. If you're right, I'm into the sweet 16. That's not what's going to happen. But I will say second round for the Kentucky Wildcats.

Evan (31:46)
I currently predict them to win their first game by three points and then lose their second game by 20. So I'm saying second round as well. Arizona.

Matt Norlander (31:54)
Final Four.

Evan (31:56)
I will say title game for Arizona. Okay, two more Vanderbilt.

Matt Norlander (32:02)
Sweet 16.

Evan (32:03)
I I think, I think Sweet 16 as well. I was thinking about Elite 8, but I don't know if I can get there. Last one, Duke.

Matt Norlander (32:12)
okay. I've given you Houston over Michigan and Yukon and, ⁓ Purdue in the final four. I gotta go to lead eight with Duke. gotta be, I gotta be proper about this. So I will give you a lead eight with Duke speaks to the depth of this year though. ⁓ and I, and Purdue, I had in the preseason final four, I'm just going to stick with that. ⁓ we'll see. I almost liked the idea of a lot of people fading Purdue and then them.

Exceeding those expectations when we get to March, I'll go with Elite 8 Duke. I'm guessing you're going to say Final 4 Duke though.

Evan (32:42)
I

do have Duke in the Final Four. think they're being slept on nationally. think the fact that they're playing very, no, no, no, no, no, not in terms of like informed, cut.

Matt Norlander (32:49)
No,

Evan (32:59)
I think people are disregarding how good this Duke team is because it feels in some ways similar to last year, just not quite as good. But the reality is I think this team ⁓ is not quite as capable, but close to what Duke did last year. I think that they're, I've not seen enough love being given Duke's way for how good of a team I think they are.

Matt Norlander (33:23)
You heard

it here folks, Evan Mia needs the media to talk and write about more about Duke. They'll be thrilled to hear that down in the triangle.

Evan (33:29)
Absolutely. Okay, well, we will see how all that shakes out. ⁓ But I think that was a fun exercise. for the record, who did you have winning the national title?

Matt Norlander (33:39)
I have Houston over Michigan in the title game.

Evan (33:41)
Okay, I think I had Arizona and I think I had Arizona and Houston in the title game. ⁓ So I kind of feel Houston would win that game to be honest, but we're going to get to see that matchup, ⁓ you know, much earlier than that. So that'll be fun. ⁓ All right. I think that wraps up what we're going to do here. But thank you so much for coming on. You are ⁓ one of my favorite analysts to listen to and read and all that stuff. And you're seemingly everywhere these days. So I appreciate you taking the time to come on the show.

Matt Norlander (33:53)
Yeah. Yep.

I appreciate you bud and congrats on this new venture. Obviously your site is a daily check in for me without a doubt and I look forward to seeing you at the Final Four in your backyard. You know what this means? ⁓ know, hosting duties are now kind of on you. Like I kind of assemble that, you know, get in Thursday night, Wednesday night, ⁓ dinner with some folks. ⁓ It is on you potentially to organize such an event. I hate to break it to you but.

But there's another thing that's going to be on your table in late March, Earbud.

Evan (34:42)
Thank you to Matt Norlander, he does a great job writing for CBSsports.com. You can find his weekly court report that comes out on Wednesdays among other things. And then of course, the ION College basketball podcast that he does with Gary Parrish. Always a must listen for me every single episode, so be sure to go check that out.

Evan (35:00)
Well, we've got more games and big storylines to get to and with me to do that is a very special guest, Fran Frischila from ESPN, who had a front seat to a lot of the action this week. Fran, I want to start by talking about Kentucky's big win over Arkansas on Saturday. You were in the building calling this game in Fayetteville. Final score, Kentucky 85, Arkansas 77. Now, this was a game to me that

Fran Fraschilla (35:21)
Yes.

Evan (35:27)
did not set up to finish this way at all. This was kind of polar opposite for me, the storylines and trends for both of these teams. So Arkansas has been notoriously excellent at home, undefeated this season in Bud Walton Arena. They've looked like a top five, top 10 team in the country playing at home. And then on the flip side, Kentucky, I've been documenting this for a while. Kentucky has really struggled to keep their level of performance against the very elite teams on their schedule.

They've Mollie Wap a lot of bad teams and some of the middling teams in the SEC they've had success against. But really outside of a game or two, it's been pretty nonexistent for them. So I don't think a lot of even Kentucky fans were necessarily expecting them to play well on the road. And then you talk about Darius Aikov, who's been unstoppable. But Kentucky had a very convincing win in this particular case. take away had a great game kind of showing why people voted him as the SEC.

preseason player of the year, 24 points, eight rebounds, three assists. He was nine of 12 from the floor and they also limited Arkansas from the three point line. think Arkansas only had three threes in this game. They were just three of 14 and you know, this is actually kind of an interesting trend for Arkansas. They had two threes in their previous game, their win against Oklahoma, but before that they had always hit five or more threes in every single game. So this is maybe a dip for them. So what were your overall takeaways from this game, both for Kentucky and for Arkansas?

Fran Fraschilla (36:54)
See Evan, you're the analytics guy, but I'm the psychology of coaching guy, OK? And and we could talk about Texas Tech UCF later, because that was set up for a for a home win for UCF. But I've always been a big believer in the psychology to schedule. ⁓ You know, and you say what does that mean? Well, a lot of times when let's take let's take Kentucky, for example, they were on a five game win streak, right? They go to Vandy had they played really well at Vandy, we'd be they probably have cracked, you know.

Evan (36:59)
Yes.

Fran Fraschilla (37:23)
top 15 maybe six in a row. Win it, Vandy. Oh, they're going to Arkansas. They should be really on a roll and it doesn't work that way with young people when you're between 18 and 22. There's a lot of going up on in their head and so so my feeling was it was going to be a close game and by the way last year Cal Cal and his team go into Lexington one and six in the SEC first game back. You know the hoopla the craziness and.

Arkansas comes away with the wind. So this was a this was a definite psychology to schedule game for 72 hours. The Wildcats were told that they're not any good and that's listen. It's different. It's different than coaching at Saint Louis U or you know Seton Hall. When you play Kentucky, the entire Commonwealth is following everything you do as a player and coach. So I think the key when I was coaching in games like this.

was to get off to a quick start or don't get blown out early. And you know how poorly Kentucky's played in the first half of many, many games this year. It's almost mathematically just seems impossible to be trailing like it, I don't know, 14 of 16, 14 of 16 games against Power Con or something crazy like that. So I wasn't really surprised because I felt like they had.

They had that going for them. Arkansas is at home feeling good about themselves. Five game winning streak, stealing a game at at Norman where they could have easily lost and but the key in those games for a team like Kentucky, given all the magnitude of that game was stay in the game TV timeout to TV timeout. And one of the things that I remember saying early second half. It's really funny because I have so much respect for what you do analytically.

Whenever my team had a big lead at the half, especially when it was kind of unexpected, we used to literally practice first four minutes of a second half. Because when you're up seven or eight at the half and you're on the road, the other coach is going crazy in that locker room and you know that their team's gonna come out firing on all cylinders. And the worst thing you could do after 20 great minutes is to give away a seven, eight, nine, 10 point lead like in the first three minutes.

Well, Kentucky had a good start to the second half. Then they went through all the technical fouls where they were, it was a parade to the free throw line. That was crazy. But they kept their composure and down the stretch, they got more confident and the Razorbacks got tighter. And that's why I say these are games that sometimes defy the analytics and it's really the psychology of the schedule.

Evan (39:58)
Yeah, and that technical foul situation. I mean, if there's anything that could have come out of the blue to derail the team, that was wild. I think in that 39 second sequence when Kentucky had three technical fouls, I think it tweeted something like they were on pace for 200 for the game or something. That was that was wild, but they were able to survive that. ⁓ And I mean, this team is looking night and day different overall than where they were even two weeks ago. I think early January, Kentucky fans would have said,

Fran Fraschilla (40:05)
Right?

Hahaha.

Right.

Yeah.

Yes.

Evan (40:27)
I do not care what seed we have. Just give me a ticket to the tournament. It can be Dayton. And now they're looking at on my website, I have them as about a six seed in terms of their resume. They're a top 30 team in the country in terms of the predictive analytics. So they've really turned a corner. Now, are they reaching the levels that that Kentucky fans and many national pundits thought? No. But this is a team that has shown like, hey, we're going to be solidly in the tournament if we continue.

Fran Fraschilla (40:30)
Right.

Right.

Yeah.

Go. Go.

Yeah.

Evan (40:56)
on this track, I think one thing that helps them a little bit is, I've been talking about this, the SEC, yes, is maybe missing the number of elite teams at the top that we saw last year outside of maybe Florida, but the middle to bottom of this conference is still just as loaded as ever. And for that reason, every single win that Kentucky gets is very significant in terms of adding to their resume. And that's been super, super huge for them. And now looking at this point in the season,

Fran Fraschilla (41:07)
Yes. Yep.

Yeah.

Evan (41:23)
They've got several marquee wins. think that several of their wins like at Tennessee versus St. John's, they've really like looked a lot better in retrospect than they were maybe at the time. yeah. ⁓

Fran Fraschilla (41:23)
Yeah.

Carry weight. Yeah, they carry weight.

Yeah, I agree.

I would say this about that. First of all, I think the back end of their schedule still reasonably difficult, but those are opportunity wins. Here's what I would say about Kentucky. They don't have a point card as good as Otega Owe is. ⁓ Yeah, Malik Thomas, terrific freshman. Yeah, those guys. No Malik's on the other team. I'm sorry I'm losing my mic because I'm thinking of Cal and Jasper Johnson, but Jasper is not playing that much, but.

Evan (42:01)
Jasper Johnson

Fran Fraschilla (42:05)
Denzel Aberdeen is who I was thinking of. You know, I got them all mixed up because of Cal. It's Cal. It's Cal Perry's fault because he was a good. But no, I they don't have a point guard. Even Denzel is not a pure point guard. He's a scoring guard. Oh, take always a wing playing point guard and so that but that could be a problem. But they're galvanizing as a team. I think because of all the all the pressure that comes with playing at Kentucky. So I agree with you. I don't know that there are juggernaut by any stretch.

Evan (42:10)
It's all the same team.

Fran Fraschilla (42:34)
They can beat any team in the SEC except for Florida. ⁓ I studied Florida for for about two weeks recently because we were supposed to go to Florida last week and do the Auburn game and with all the weather issues they kind of just sent us out to Provo. But Florida is playing outrageously good. That front line is just amazing. But to your point ⁓ could good for Mark Pope and his team because there's so much pressure coaching there and and playing there that. ⁓

They so far again psychology to schedule because now they gotta take what they did at Arkansas and try to turn that into some currency here in the next three four games. So we'll see, but certainly impressive performance.

Evan (43:16)
We'll talk about another impressive road when that we, you know, mentioned earlier, UCF goes ⁓ or sorry, a home win. UCF wins against Texas Tech 88 to 80. And this is UCF's second marquee home win against some of the big top dogs in the big 12. They also have a road win at Texas A ⁓ I think you can make an argument that this that UCF is the team that is at least in the big 12.

Fran Fraschilla (43:24)
Yep.

Yeah.

Evan (43:43)
most massively outperforming kind of the strength of their roster in terms of getting marquee wins, because in terms of the predictive analytics, like on my side, I have them ranked about 50th in the country in a normal season that would maybe leave you a little bit short of the tournament, but they have a top 20 resume in the sport. They don't really have any bad losses. I mentioned some of those wins. They have a knack for like coming up big, especially at home. And on the flip side of this, like Texas Tech, JT Toppin was great again.

Fran Fraschilla (43:48)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Evan (44:11)
Tristan

Anderson ended the game with 17 points and nine assists, but I don't necessarily think you would say it was his best game. But I really think the pitfall for Texas Tech, and I want to get your opinion on this, like, where does this cap their ceiling, is again, the depth. If they don't have guys outside of Toppin and Anderson who are able to contribute, you know, a little Juan Watts or someone like that, this was a game where they weren't able to get that production. And all of a sudden, they're not able to play with the same amount of depth and production as the other team on the other end of the floor.

Fran Fraschilla (44:16)
No.

Evan (44:39)
We've seen many games this season where they've been able to overcome that, not a problem, but this was not one of those. So, impressive from UCF and what are your takeaways for Texas Tech?

Fran Fraschilla (44:39)
Yeah.

Yes.

Well, this is a perfect example of what I say psychology to schedule. I'm going to tell you why you beat. beat a great team at home in Houston. You have a week off now. Grant McCaslin is not doing this, but everybody in Lubbock is telling this these kids when they're when they're going to Brahms for a Sunday or you know McDonald's. Hey, you guys are great. You're great. You're great. They had the week off. Now they gotta get on a plane. It's not a 45 minute trip to Fort Worth. It's a longer trip to Orlando.

Now they're going to Orlando with the week off. Everybody telling him how good they are. They're playing a team that to your point is way better than I expected them to be. And I don't know where you know you had him before the season, but a lot of people didn't really know how good the Miss folks was who is, you know, is playing great basketball. You know, Riley Kugel's been at four schools and one and a big guys inside. think Jordan Burks is playing well. Former Kentucky guy Georgetown now here.

When I watched them on Saturday, what I took from it was a trap game like. I when I coached again, ⁓ different than you studying those numbers and I know you love watching the games too. When you play 35 games a year, there's always five games where you play over your head. OK, you're playing a November game against Bethune Cookman. If you're Texas Tech and you make 19 threes and you go, why couldn't we save this for Kansas? You know and you win by 45.

But there's five games you play over your head. There's five games you play poorly over the course of the season. And there's 25 who your team really is, right? And Tech played one of its five games that they played poorly and they looked like they were in quicksand. They absolutely did not look like the same tech team. They got beaten on the boards badly and the key to a great season is to win the games when you play poorly. On the other hand, UCF to your point already beat Kansas.

They obviously are better than we all thought, and now they have an opportunity to add to their resume. And right now I have to tell you, like we have a top six heavy in the Big 12. They're not that far off, especially at home from being like in that mix with tech and even a Kansas team that day to day. We don't know if Darren Peters is going to play or play a lot. So kudos to Johnny Dawkins because he has done a great job with that team.

They have size, have guard play, they have shooting, they play hard. And as you know, Evan, they're really tough at home.

Evan (47:14)
Yeah, and it's interesting you mentioned the whole like having five great games and five bad games. I think that that range of outcomes for Texas Tech is wider than most teams in the country because I mean like what they showed, for example, ⁓ coming back from close to 20 points down against a Duke team when they had like three guys were available was like absolute peak. Like that is that is an incredible performance. And then the swings the other direction.

Fran Fraschilla (47:20)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Evan (47:40)
I just checked their consistency rank in terms of their game to game consistency on my site and their bottom 20. So they're one of the most volatile teams ⁓ from game to game. You know, a team that is not volatile, they're extremely consistent from game to game is Arizona. I want to spend some time on Arizona because you have spent a lot of time, you've spent a lot of time studying this team. were, you know, saw their big win on the road against BYU last week.

Fran Fraschilla (47:47)
Yeah.

I knew you were gonna say that, yeah.

Evan (48:07)
This weekend again, they're still undefeated folks. It's February and this team is still undefeated. They win, ⁓ there was tied against at halftime against Arizona State, but they ended up winning this game comfortably. Koa Pete had a big game, but really to me it's the depth of this team. All five starters in double digits. You have Tobi Awaka coming off the bench and having 13 boards. And then of course their win last week where you had Jayden Bradley and Braden Burys who were close to scoring 30 points each and looked like

the best backcourt tandem in the country, the most reliable backcourt tandem. ⁓ I mean, you cannot be more impressed with this team, the consistent elite level that they have to game to game. do they do it?

Fran Fraschilla (48:51)
Oh, it's a great question and I love watching them. They're my favorite team to watch in the country because they remind me of the old school teams that I kind of came up with. You gotta have two big guys. You gotta have a great point guard. know little it was not as much. You know layups, threes and free throws as we have now. Obviously for good reason. Jaden Bradley reminds me of Chris Paul in the mid range. You know when he gets to that right elbow, especially late in the shot clog.

he's incredible. He's like, I don't know what he shoots, analytically, mean, anecdotally in my head, I'm thinking he's 75 % from that pull up. But they got everything. And I don't know that when I say everything, I mean, they're not the most talented team of the last 20 years. I'm thinking of Villanova with that great run, with all those pros. they have, first of all, let's give Tommy Lloyd credit for his GM hat.

I thought they were going to be devastated by the loss of Vesar to North Carolina. And in retrospect, no, it sounds crazy because Vesar's got a chance to be a first round pick, but it'll play in the league. They're better with Crevasse and I'm sure analytically, I know I was looking at some CBB analytic numbers. They're like 20 % better defensively when he's on the floor because he's a mountain man. And I don't know if your numbers show that, but he's a phenomenal fit with Pete and

⁓ I look at it as like having a great defensive line in football. You know, it's hard to run the ball on them. Let's say it's hard to score inside on them, so they got that. They're their their freshman are precocious. ⁓ I love Braden Burry's first seven first five games of the year. He averaged seven points a game and everybody was wondering like what's up with this guy? Karchenkoff is a. He's the villain in the James Bond movies like he is tough. He looks he's robotic.

He's a great defender. He knows how to play. Everything you have in their top eight. They have everything you need to be a national champion and then my favorite player in college basketball right now. But I think you know what I'm going to say. It's Jayden Bradley. He's so old school. I was texting with Jay Wright the other day and I said if you were coaching Jayden Bradley would be a Villanova Diocono Brunson, you know, Gillespie kind of kid and.

Tommy Lloyd and here's the other crazy thing. They're not a bad three point shooting team. They're shooting in 3637 % range and people are some people ignorantly. If you don't mind me saying that, think they can't shoot the ball. The problem is. They want to annihilate you inside and in annihilating you inside with twos and free throws. If you get Burys an open shot or even Bradley this year over 40 % carchenko.

You know, Del Orso is not playing great, but he could shoot it. They'll make threes, but that's not what they want to do first. So I love this team. They're going to get beat somewhere along the way. And getting back to my psychology to schedule theory, I hope they lose a game or two in February because I'd hate to see them go into the postseason undefeated like that Kentucky team at 14 did and then ended up losing in the semifinals.

Evan (52:05)
Yeah, we'll touch on that. have an absolutely brutal stretch, which we'll get to in a second here. The thing for me that sticks out about this team is you sort of talked about this. I don't think they're necessarily elite at any one thing like the best team in the country at this one category. I really do think their superpower is their consistency. I have them first in the entire country in game to game consistency, which is basically saying this team never plays absolutely amazing.

Fran Fraschilla (52:08)
Yes.

Yes.

Evan (52:34)
never poorly, it's always consistently their level and their level is the like, excellent, excellent, excellent. And you've seen this in so many games and so many late game scenarios where they just never seem faced. don't like, they rarely give up scoring runs. They are just so composed. I mean, my takeaway from watching their game against BYU was watching Jayden Bradley and Brandon Burys. was like, I don't necessarily know if that's the back court that most people

would pick as their favorite backcourt in the country. But if I think, who am I gonna see in the final four? That is the backcourt that really typifies like final four guards of tough, aggressive, composed, never rattled, making all the right plays. And Burys like, he was 13 of 14 at the free throw line in their win over BYU. For a freshman.

Fran Fraschilla (53:22)
Yeah. ⁓

In front of 20,000. Yeah.

Evan (53:26)
Yes. Yeah.

And then on the other side of the coin, you have AJ DeBansa, who is just six for 24 from the field. like, know, Burys, you know, was the best performer on the court, arguably in that game. ⁓ So and the thing, too, is like, Jaden Bradley has an argument to be a first team All-American, but there are probably 15 players who can make a strong case for being a first teamer this year. That's how good the field is. So they may not end the season with a first team All-American. And yet, like they definitely.

Fran Fraschilla (53:38)
Yes.

Yes.

Evan (53:54)
have an argument to be the overall best team, the best squad, the most togetherness. It's so impressive.

Fran Fraschilla (53:57)
Yeah.

Well, here, you know, everything you said, I agree with. And it starts with Tommy Lloyd because when you talk to him or you listen to him in the post game, he's even killed and he's even said like, it's so funny. Even he's even said like, we're going to lose a game. You know, like it's so a matter of fact, you know, like we're not going to go and defeat it. And so he's got his team to your point, which is not easy to do. First of all.

For eight kids who were in many ways somewhat heavily recruited, even Jayden Bradley was a McDonald's All-American, started on a number one seed at Alabama when he was a freshman. And now he's had three years with Tommy. But you think of all those kids, they played at a high level. Karchenkoff comes over from Germany where he played with Shabazz Napier and Nick Weiler-Babb, a really good college player. He's been around good players. But they're all even keeled. And the ego level of each of those kids individually is low. The ego level of the team is high.

But it's a humbleness to that Tommy Lloyd keeps everybody in check. So great coaching job. You know, mean, I think Freddie to me, Freddie Hoyberg, maybe buggy McMillan. Obviously they're going to get a lot of votes for national coach of the year, but Tommy Lloyd probably won't get as many because his team is so good and consistent. But what a great coach and the proofs in the pudding. I gotta check this, but pretty soon it might even be tonight or next couple games. He's going to be to winning his coach in NCAA history in his first five years.

Evan (55:26)
Wow.

Fran Fraschilla (55:26)
I gotta

do some, I think Mark Fuse up there, Roy Williams, but Tommy's a great basketball coach and not because of the X and O's necessarily, although they're not bad. He just has a great way with putting together a team and you gotta give him credit for that.

Evan (55:39)
So here's the four game, the stretch that that Arizona has coming up later in February. They're playing Oklahoma State this weekend. But then you have this murderers row of all top, you know, basically the best teams of the Big 12. You've got at Kansas, which that might be if especially if Darren Peterson is healthy, that might be the game of the season ⁓ that that will be unbelievable. So you're playing at Kansas, who I have ranked as the 13th best team in the country. Then you're playing at home against Texas Tech at home against BYU and then at Houston.

Fran Fraschilla (55:49)
Yes.

Yeah, yes.

Evan (56:09)
And so my predicted record for them through those four games is to go a 2.7 wins out of four. So there's a very small chance of them winning all those games. And like you said, maybe they shouldn't even win all those games. What do you think is gonna happen during that stretch for them?

Fran Fraschilla (56:11)
Crazy.

Right.

Well, I just think it gets back to the psychology to schedule. mean, I they you know what? If your coach is telling you will probably lose somewhere, it allows them to lose somewhere without the pressure. You know I can. I think I can remember back in 2014 that as the season went on and this was true with Saint Joe's years ago, my first year at ESPN I did. I covered the A10. You know they gotta stick me somewhere and so I did the Saint Joe's run. I think to the Elite 8 where they finally or they lost the game.

⁓ in the 810 tournament. But anyway, go back to Kentucky in 14. There's a lot of pressure on a team that's undefeated. It hasn't been done since 76. So ⁓ yeah, could they win all four? Could they go into the Big 12 tournament undefeated? They absolutely can't. But I know you're the expert here. The odds are, know, ⁓ my friend Brent Musburger, who knows a lot about gambling, would probably say that's not going to happen. And you'd probably say, yeah.

Evan (57:22)
Yeah, it can happen. There's a 19 % chance it'll

happen, but you you would bet against it and it won't really matter. Like this team, they're gonna get a one seed unless things fall apart. Like it's not gonna matter. And in some ways it's probably better for them if they have at least a one in the last column going into the tournament because then I'll, yeah.

Fran Fraschilla (57:25)
I know. Yeah.

That's right. Yeah.

think so. Yeah,

I think so. Evan, because I'm going to tell you like. You know, I I love I love following your stuff because I love the analytics that you know. I'll be honest when I when I got to ESPN, I was the guy that brought Ken Palm to us. Nobody knew what Ken Palm was and I I've stumbled on Ken stuff accidentally like 04 and all of a sudden everybody at ESPN now is you know into the analytics, which is great, because it it allows me as a coach.

former coach, it allows me figure out what my eyes are telling me. Okay, like what you do is a lot of times matches what my eyes are telling me. But I know this about coaching. Losing a game is not a bad thing sometimes. And it's gonna be interesting to see how that plays out with Arizona. Because as you just pointed out, they could lose two of those games, maybe three of those games and still be a one seed. You know, so it's gonna be really interesting. I love that team. I think to your point,

It's my favorite team to watch and I've got some guys on the team that I love watching play too. They're all. You know that in their own way they got eight starters. mean, Aristote is going to be really good too. You don't hear about him as much, but they Aristote would start on two thirds of the teams in the Big 12 at least and they got eight starters, which makes them so much fun.

Evan (58:53)
think big picture, it's the fact that we have a team that's the number one ranked team in the country that's undefeated going into February. First of all, like that never happens. But then two, I don't think a lot of people would even say that like Arizona is by far the best team in the sport. There are other teams that people would say like could could give them a game potentially even be favored. That's how strong the top of the sport is this year. And speaking of like the top of the sport, I do want to kind of to get your thoughts on.

Fran Fraschilla (59:02)
I know.

Yeah.

Yes.

Evan (59:22)
some of the national player of the year conversation this year, because it's been a really interesting race. think Braden Smith was probably the front runner going into the year. He was certainly the player. I had the highest rated in the preseason. He's certainly still in the mix, but I think it's hard to argue that Cameron Boozer is the most deserving at this point of being national player of the year, at least in my opinion, both in terms of how good his team is, how he's performed. He's averaging, here are the numbers here, he's averaging 23 and a half points per game.

Fran Fraschilla (59:25)
Yes.

Yeah. Yeah.

Evan (59:48)
9.6 rebounds, almost four assists, a steal and a half per game, shooting 60 % from the field, almost 40 % from three. You know, I have him as the number one most valuable player in the country. I think he's been great, but it's certainly not a case closed like it felt like it was with Cooper flag last year. You've got AJ DeBonta in the mix. Braden Smith is still capable. You've got other players like Yaxle Lendeborg, and you know, maybe if, if Jayden Bradley continues to play well, he's in the mix. What, are your overall impressions of just how

Fran Fraschilla (1:00:05)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Evan (1:00:18)
Competitive the top players in the sport have been this year and who do think is really in the mix to potentially win this thing?

Fran Fraschilla (1:00:23)
Well, normally in a given year, the guy that plays at Duke and has a great year is the guy that's the front runner because it's Duke and it's the exposure. But this is one of those years because of Peterson and the bonds and all the talk for the first three months. You know, he's quietly dominated the sport. You know, like if I had a draft pick in a high draft pick, if was an NBA team, I'd want the three pick. I want the third pick this year because everybody's going to take either Peterson or the bonds of one or two. Now it's early.

And teams I talked to teams all the time. I know it's not quite that cut and dried, but cam Boozer to me is going to average 20 and 10 as a rookie wherever he goes. He's just so consistent. People say, well, he can't jump over. You know we used to say phone book, but there's no phone books anymore. You know New York phone book was like that thick, but ⁓ he I would have to say right now it's going be hard to knock him out of the perch and not because he plays at Duke, but because his consistency of of excellence.

has almost been underrated or under the radar this year, which is crazy because his numbers, I've been told the numbers are right there with Cooper Flags. Maybe they're even better, you would know. yeah, know, Lendeborg's been tremendous. That's a great team. You know, going back just quickly to Arizona, when you look at Arizona, let's go back ⁓ to the first game of the year because we didn't expect them to beat Florida and they beat Florida.

and they've had some wins like that. You going on the road, beating Alabama handily. But to your point, Lendeborg is to Michigan what Cam is to Duke and maybe what, I was going to say Chinolou, but it's probably Thomas Hauck at Florida. He's not going to be National Player of the Year, but ⁓ I'd have to say right now it's going to be Cam. I quite honestly, as good as it is at the top with those great

all Americans, I think you'll get it somewhat easily. do. Just because Duke and they're winning, they got one loss, and the consistency of Kamboozler's been Cooper flag-like. Let's put it that way.

Evan (1:02:32)
Yeah, let me put some numbers to this because you're absolutely right about the consistency. First of all, big picture. My metric I have at evanmia.com, Bayesian performance rating basically measures everything about your performance to tell you how good of a player you are. Cam Boozer's BPR this year is 13.9. Cooper flag last year was just a plus 13 and that was the highest we'd like ever almost ever seen. So Boozer in terms of the numbers is performing even better than flag last year. But the consistency, like you mentioned here,

Fran Fraschilla (1:02:38)
Yep.

Yeah.

Crazy. ⁓

Evan (1:03:02)
Here are his game logs. First of all, the fewest points he has scored in a game was 14 points in his second game of the season. But if you look at his game log from the last like 15 games, 24 points, eight rebounds, 19 points, 10 rebounds, 32 points, nine, 30 and 14, 21 and 13, 18 and seven, 27 and eight, 17 and five, 26. Like there is never a game where he's bad. And the only way that someone is like losing this commanding of a position

Fran Fraschilla (1:03:11)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Evan (1:03:30)
is if they just like start playing horribly. That's we've never seen. Yeah, that. That's not happening. That's not happening. So I'm with I'm I'm with you. He's been excellent. And I think, ⁓ you know, he wasn't as hyped as Cooper Flagg was coming into the year because partly because of Darren Peterson and AJ DeBansa all being in that conversation. And to like, I think people.

Fran Fraschilla (1:03:33)
If they get five and yeah, they get five points, four rebounds for the next month. I know.

Evan (1:03:56)
Saw how good duke was last year and then this year the attitude is a bit like there goes duke They're doing that thing again ⁓ I don't I don't think

Fran Fraschilla (1:04:01)
Exactly.

He's getting penalized for being a dude.

Evan (1:04:06)
Yes, yes. And I

don't think that he's getting enough recognition for the year that he's having. And I think once we get towards the end of ACC play, once we're talking about one seeds, once we get to the tournament, ⁓ I think people are to be like, look at the production of this guy. He is doing everything in maybe a way that you don't realize how many points and boards he's scoring because he doesn't carry himself like a guy who wants to get all the numbers. He just does everything for this team. It's so impressive.

Fran Fraschilla (1:04:11)
Yeah.

It's almost like if they get to the Elite 8 where we really focus on those last eight teams or the Final Four, the average fan is going to say, well, I didn't know he was this good. Well, you know, you haven't you haven't paid attention because he's been this good all year. And the other thing about those numbers too is remember there's games where I'm trying to think of who's like this and AJ's like this a little bit like I and I've watched AJ forever and watch cam forever USA basketball. Like there's nights where they're playing. ⁓

Evan (1:04:40)
Yeah.

Fran Fraschilla (1:05:00)
Florida State and they're up 25 and he gets the 18 and 9 like now. I don't know like you just shouted out all those numbers, but I know AJ at times when he was at USA basketball. He's such a great teammate that if they're killing Finland by 40, he's getting 1385. But if it's a if it's a gold medal game for the under 19s, he's the MVP and and to a certain extent, you know those great players who are on great teams.

They don't have to be great every night. So when they are consistently great, I think it says a lot about their character too, where I'm just going to kill people until coach Shire tells me he's taking me out. And that's a mark of a good player who's consistently good every time.

Evan (1:05:45)
Yeah, well, I know we could talk all day about this, but I want to be respectful of your time. You've got another big game you're calling tonight. So I just really thank you so much, Fran. You do so much great things for this sport. ⁓ you know, most people who listening this are are seeing you on their television once or twice a week. So, you know, you're not going anywhere, but I just really appreciate you coming on the show today.

Fran Fraschilla (1:05:51)
Yep.

No, it's a pleasure and I when I discovered every media.com it made my day because I I I love you know trying to find all the way. I actually I love teaching the game and if I could teach it a different way like with numbers, which as I said, you know when I was a young coach we did analytics but we did it by hand. You know we charted things that were important to us winning. We just didn't call him analytics by that back then. So now the job that you do ⁓ it. It helps all of us helps coaches.

and certainly on occasion broadcasters who are smart enough to figure it out. So thank you. ⁓

Evan (1:06:40)
That really means

a lot. Thank you so much. Yeah, this has been great. I really appreciate it.

Evan (1:06:44)
Thank you so much to Fran Fraschilla for joining me on the show today. You can find Fran on seemingly every big ESPN broadcast these days. I know that he's going to be calling a lot more of the massive Big 12 games that we talked about in the upcoming weeks. He will be on your televisions for those. And ⁓ he was one of the earlier adopters of the kill shot ⁓ when it comes to college basketball and that being mentioned on broadcast. So I really respect his work and I am very appreciative.

to Fran for joining me today.

Evan (1:07:15)
All right, it is now time for analytics corner. This is the part of the show where I pick out some more interesting stats and metrics that have caught my eye often from evanmia.com that we can talk about. And we'll start with looking at some of the most notable resumes in the

So if you're unfamiliar, I have a metric at evanmia.com called resume quality that measures how good every team's resume is in terms of their wins and losses and who they've beaten and where those games took place.

It's very similar in the way it's constructed to Winds Above Bubble, if you're familiar with that. But basically, I think it is the most fair way that we have of evaluating how good a team's resume is. Basically, the nutshell version of it is every single game that a team plays, we evaluate it based on who the opponent was, where the venue was, home away neutral. And basically, in terms of how difficult would it be for another team, specifically a team that's about the level of

an at-large team that's just getting in the field, how difficult would it be for that level of team to win that game according to the game probabilities that we have at evanmia.com? And basically it looks across your schedule and says, how many games would an average bubble team or an at-large team be expected to beat against your schedule and then how many games did you actually win? And the difference there really ⁓ illustrates what you've actually done relative to all these other teams in terms of the resume you've put together.

And I actually separate this into win quality and loss quality because this is a really nice way of gaining perspective on ⁓ which teams have really good wins, which teams have fine losses. So an example of this actually, as I'm looking at this is Miami, Ohio has the 32nd best resume quality. ⁓ They have the number one loss quality in the country because hello, they're still undefeated. And as of ⁓ February 2nd, they only have the 96th best win quality in the sport.

but it is very impressive that they've lost any games, so all of it all, that shakes up to be the 32nd best resume and would be about an eighth seed there in terms of that metric. So if we look at the top of the sport, there are four teams that have separated themselves as of right now to be the four one seeds, and it is Arizona, Michigan, Duke, and Yukon. They're all pretty close there. Arizona is number one.

This is not very surprising. They obviously have the best loss quality in the country tied with Miami, Ohio, because they haven't lost any games. ⁓ But Michigan is right behind them and Michigan actually has the best win quality of any team in the country. Michigan has some really nice wins. Their win at Michigan State ⁓ from Friday was obviously the most notable. Beating Gonzaga on a neutral, beating Nebraska at home, they're all great. Michigan though has a lot of mid-tier wins that I think a lot of people will...

Probably not give them enough credit for winning all those games, but games like at TCU at Washington versus Auburn, San Diego State at Oregon, ⁓ Ohio State, Indiana, Villanova, all of those are worth plus four in the resume quality ⁓ metric category. That's 12 wins of plus four or better. No other team is anywhere close to that. think Arizona only has nine. So Arizona has some maybe more eye popping top wins like at UConn at BYU versus Florida.

But Michigan overall has assembled a lot of really, really good wins that are not a guarantee for a lot of these teams. So that's been impressive.

If we scroll down to looking at the teams that are right around the cut line, I just want to briefly touch on some of these teams. So right now, according to resume quality, based on who deserves to be in the field, there are seven teams right now that I label as just in the field. And in order, those are from right on the cut line to more safely. And those would be Iowa State,

Missouri, George Mason, UCLA, New Mexico, Georgia, St. Mary's. Those are the seven teams that are just in the field. And then Indiana has moved into the nine to 10 seed category. They ranked 38th overall in resume quality. Indiana was on the flip opposite side as of about a week ago or so where they were at a, I think a minus 0.7 in terms of resume quality. So they were like almost a full win off of

the tournament picture and now they're a plus point seven. So almost a full win inside the tournament based on what they've done against their schedule. Obviously a huge piece of that is getting wins at UCLA over the weekend and then at home to Purdue. Those are huge, huge wins for Indiana. So they're really trending in the right

⁓ I also want to just talk about the mid-major teams and where they stack up here. ⁓ Gonzaga in a mid-major conference, but you know, we know they're not a mid-major. They have the 10th best resume.

But outside of that, St. Louis, who is 20-1 this year, they have the 26th best resume in the country. That's good for somewhere in the, I think, six to seven seed range. Miami, Ohio, I mentioned them. They have the 32nd best resume. That'd be about an eight seed. And then other teams that should be in the field according to what they deserve based on resume quality in the mid-major ranks. Utah State ranked 36th, St. Mary's 39th.

New Mexico 41, George Mason 43. All of those teams are kind of in the like 11 to 12 seed range, 10, 11, 12 seed range right now. San Diego State is just outside the field. They're lurking. Some other possible mid-majors that could get there with an at-large berth, Santa Clara, Liberty, VCU, McNeese State, Tulsa, Belmont. Most of those teams won't get in as an at-large, but if they were to ⁓ win a lot of games going forward,

and then somehow slipped in the conference tournament, they could be in the conversation. So keep an eye on that going forward there, but I thought that was worth noting.

Evan (1:13:08)
Another interesting thing I wanted to mention here is looking at teams that have multiple players inside the top 30 nationally at evanmia.com according to Bayesian performance rating. BPR basically measures on offense and defense how valuable a player is when they're on the court taking into account their individual stats, their impact on team performance and kind of predicting their productivity level going forward. It's what I believe to be the best metric in college basketball for just evaluating

how good or valuable these players are.

so if we look at teams that have multiple players inside the top 30, I think this list is really interesting. First of all, there is only one team in the country right now that has three players inside the top 30, and that would be Iowa State, who I think according to this has an argument of having the best trio of players in college basketball, Joshua Jefferson at fifth overall, but then you also have Milan Montilovic.

and Tame and Lipsy all in the top 30. So Iowa State there has an advantage right now that no other team does in terms of having ⁓ three players of that caliber. But there are seven other teams that also have two players in the top 30. Those teams would be BYU, Duke, Kansas, Michigan, North Carolina, Purdue, and Texas Tech. So for BYU, that would be AJ DeBonsa and Richie Saunders.

For Duke, it's Cameron Boozer and Patrick Ngongba. I think that's actually the highest rated tandem in the country. Boozer's number one, that's not a surprise. Patrick Ngongba ranked as the sixth best player right now according to BPR Nationally. Not a lot of people are really recognizing what he's doing, but he's been great for them, especially defensively. ⁓ Kansas, the two for them is Flory Badunga and Darren Peterson. Michigan, is Yaxel Lendeborg, and who's the other one here? Merez Johnson, yeah. They're very close to Duke.

because Yaxle is second in the country, Maures Johnson the seventh in the country. So that front court has been really, really good there. ⁓ North Carolina might be the most surprising one on this list, but not really when you think about what they're doing because Caleb Wilson and Henry Vesar have been really, really good for them this year. They're a great one to punch in the front court. So they have been fantastic. Purdue has Brayden Smith and Oscar Clough as the second player there.

A lot of people would have thought coming into the season it would be Trey Kaufman Wren or Fletcher Lawyer, but it is Oscar Clough. He has been really, really important for the Purdue team and should hopefully be a key for success as they hope to rebound and play better down the stretch in Big Ten play. And then finally, Texas Tech, no surprise here. It's Christian Anderson and JT Toppin in this tier. ⁓ So interesting to note those teams there and some of the other teams that are notable that don't have two players in the top 30.

Again, some of this will change by the time we get to Selection Sunday. And for a lot of those teams that just have one player, it's, they have one really good player and that's super great. But those eight teams have an advantage over everyone else right now in terms of having multiple players in the top 30. So found that to be very interesting.

Evan (1:16:14)
Lastly, I want to touch on two players in particular who I have just been really impressed with the way that they have improved this season, specifically in several key areas. I want to start with Elliott Caddow. We mentioned him a little bit earlier in the show, but one of

big gripes with Elliott Caddow coming from North Carolina was a lot of people were very skeptical about whether he was going to be able to improve in his three-point shooting because he was mid to downright awful at UNC.

In his freshman season at UNC, he shot 19 % from three. Last year he shot 34 % from three, but I think the way that teams were guarding him defensively, they still weren't really giving him much respect out of the three point line. This year, Elliott Cadot is shooting 42 % from three on over four attempts per game. I mentioned this, he's the leading three point shooter in terms of makes on the team at Michigan. And when you look at overall his progression,

In terms of his three-point shooting ability at EvanMia.com, one of things that you can do is for all of these skill areas like three-point shooting, you can actually pull up a player's profile and look at a graph of how their skill grade in this has gone up or down over time, basically as I projected what they're going to do in terms of their shooting percentage going forward. At the end of his season last year, his projected three-point shooting percentage going forward was 33%. Basically, that was saying, I'm predicting he's going to shoot 33 % this year, which I think

Michigan would have taken because that means that if you're shooting at 33%, that's someone you have to at least give some respect to from outside the arc. But shooting 42 % this year, I do expect that to come down probably going forward right now. His projection is at 35%, but that is a market improvement from what we saw from Kado at UNC and has become a huge, huge part of why he has been a successful point guard for Michigan.

So I just wanted to give some a special shout out to his improvement from outside the arc because that's been really key for them.

other player I wanted to highlight today was Ruben Chinhulu. Ruben Chinhulu, think some people have been talking about recently as maybe the national defensive player of the year, certainly best defender in the SEC. ⁓ And I agree with the SEC part at least. ⁓ He has the best defensive BPR of any player in the SEC and he's one of the best in the country.

In particular, his rebounding has just skyrocketed. Last year as a sophomore, he was playing 19 minutes a game and he was averaging 6.6 rebounds per game. This year, his minutes has gone up a little bit, 25 minutes per game from 19, but he is averaging 11 rebounds a game. That's almost double of what he averaged last year. He has been absolutely incredible. And if you look at...

where he ranks among rebounders in the country according to their skill grade and projections at evanmia.com. He has the second best rebounder in the entire country now behind only Tobi Awaka Arizona, who has notably been a great rebounder for a very long time. But Chinulu's improvement in both the offensive and defensive side, rebounding wise, has just been extraordinary to watch. And so I have been very, very impressed to see him and

He has been an absolute key piece to why Florida has been so good, especially recently, but really just reaching the potential that this front court has had because we knew coming into the season that this would arguably be the best front court in the country. ⁓ And it was a bit shaky at first, but I think they've kind of established themselves as that now. And Shin Yuliu has been maybe the biggest reason why. He's been outstanding. ⁓ There was a defensive sequence.

this last weekend where he guarded like four different players on a single possession and just completely shut the water off for everybody ⁓ against Alabama. So he's just been very impressive. Wanted to give some love to him there. So that, yeah, I thought that was worth noting today. ⁓

we'll see how Kado and Shinny Lu do going forward, but they have been extremely impressive to me.

Evan (1:20:22)
that is a wrap for our show today. I really hope you enjoyed it. We'll be back next Tuesday with another episode ⁓ As always this is an ad free show so anything that you can do to help support the show by subscribing and liking on YouTube or Rating it five stars and giving it reviews on Apple and Spotify really really helps the show and I really appreciate it We also have a winner from our listener contest last week. The listener contest was

having people submit what they thought would be the best starting five in all of college basketball if you combine all possible players. And we ran it through the lineup analysis tool at evanmia.com to determine the

And our winner is kducey at Illinois Deuce on Twitter. And the winning lineup is Brayden Smith, Keaton Wogler, Yaxel Lindaborg, Flori Badunga, and Cameron Boozer as your best starting five.

Thought that was a pretty good lineup. I think that was a great submission. It had the best score of any, best grade of any lineup submitted. But let us know in the comments if you agree with that or think that you could have come up with a better combination. But congrats to you KDucy. I will be sending you your free evanmia.com merch item in the mail soon.

And for the rest of you, you can find the merch link at evanmia.com. ⁓ But again, thank you guys so much for listening. This show has been so fun to do.

and this truly means a lot to me. I will see all of you guys next time.