C-USA Basketball: State of Conference USA — February 3rd
The first full month of conference play is in the books and the picture of C-USA is starting to take form despite all the postponements due…
The first full month of conference play is in the books and the picture of C-USA is starting to take form despite all the postponements due to Covid. Let’s see how things are looking.
The East was hit with Covid issues with WKU vs ODU being postponed along with FAU vs Marshall so all of their records stay the same.
UAB still technically leads the conference with a 7–1 conference record and 14–2 overall record. A lot of the bracketology projections have UAB as the sole C-USA representation in the NCAA Tournament but I still feel like they’re the best team, on paper that is. The Blazers struggled more against MTSU this past weekend than WKU did and both of their games were a lot closer than they should’ve been.
Charlotte ended up sweeping FIU as well as North Texas over Rice and Louisiana Tech over Southern Miss. UTEP and UTSA ended up splitting games against each other.
Louisiana Tech has kind of flown under the radar in the West in my opinion. They have a 14–5 overall record and are 7–3 in C-USA with one of those wins over the Tops. With big games against North Texas and UAB coming up this month they could potentially prove to be the best team and end up taking the lead in the West when it’s all said and done.
ODU should be back in action against the Herd in an important East matchup and hopefully FAU should be good to go against the Tops this weekend.
I’m interested yet slightly concerned to see how WKU will look against FAU. I feel like the extra time off will either be a blessing or a curse for them, no in between. I hope they don’t show up in Boca ice cold and drop a game to the Owls or that would probably be the nail in the coffin of them getting any chance at an at-large bid and would likely make C-USA a one-bid league once again. I’m hoping the extra rest benefits the team, especially Charles Bassey who has quite literally been carrying the team on his back this year.
The other big matchup to watch is Louisiana Tech and North Texas. I feel like the Bulldogs could definitely end up splitting games with them or potentially sweep the Mean Green. We’ll see how they look in this important Western showdown.
One question I have is how will UAB look against UTEP? The Miners are still trying to find themselves and are 8–8 overall this year but do they have enough in them to steal a game or two from the Blazers? If they do that would have big implications in the West, especially if UNT were to sweep LA Tech.
One thing that is for certain is this is an important weekend of games for C-USA.