C-USA Basketball: State of Conference USA — January 6th
The first weekend of Conference USA play in 2021 is over. We now have an idea of how good most of the teams in this conference are but if…
The first weekend of Conference USA play in 2021 is over. We now have an idea of how good most of the teams in this conference are but if there’s one constant in C-USA, it’s the lack of predictability.
One thing different about this season is that C-USA will be using divisional standings for basketball, similar to that for football. It will feature East and West divisions and will crown divisional champions at the end of conference play come March.
After this weekend, Rice are currently the best team overall in C-USA with a 2–0 sweep against UTSA while Marshall leads the East side due to their higher winning percentage due to one less game than WKU.
One of the things we’re going to see a lot and probably have to live with is a bunch of split games. The Tops were able to get a win against Charlotte in their first matchup but the following day against the same team they lost in overtime. And that seems to be the trend in not only C-USA (Rice was the only team to sweep) but in the NCAA as a whole. One of the craziest ones being Army beating Colgate after losing to them by 44 points.
You could tell the Tops hadn’t played in a while the first game but they were able to come back from being down 11 and win. I was expecting them to have a better showing the next day but instead they had 22 turnovers and weren’t able to get a win. Not having that extra day of rest and time to adjust in between will be brutal but all the teams are in the same boat so that can’t be an excuse. I’m not too worried about the Tops though because Charlotte is a little better of a team than people give them credit for. Jahmir Young looks like one of the best guards in the East and coach Sanchez’s smothering defense really caused a lot of issues for the Tops both games.
North Texas and UAB haven’t been able to play yet due to COVID concerns so we’ll have to wait a little bit to see how 2019–2020 regular season C-USA champs Mean Green will look in C-USA play. This is a matchup I really wanted to see because I think both of them could be tough games for the Tops.
WKU now prepare for Louisiana Tech for their next two games in Diddle Arena. LA Tech has the same record as WKU so both of these games should be a good test for the Tops. They’ll have a sparse crowd in attendance but being at home is definitely still a good thing.
The Tops still have a lot to work on. If they can’t take care of the ball any better than they did against Charlotte then they’ll lose more games they shouldn’t. Hopefully having the series against Charlotte behind them they’ll know what they need to work on as well as how this new conference play is gonna go.
The next slew of games should be interesting. Rice hosting UTEP is a game to look for as well as UNT and UTSA. The Roadrunners have been very underwhelming this season. Even with Keaton Wallace and Jhivvan Jackson they can’t play at the level they need to in order to be a high level.
I’d also keep an eye on Charlotte and Marshall. If the 49ers can make a good showing against the Herd then that might make some Hilltopper fans feel better about dropping a game to them. Either way this game can cause some shakeups atop of the East standings.
Hopefully with another two games coming we’ll see how the Tops look against a stout Louisiana Tech team with an identical record as them. C-USA play is always full of surprises so we’ll have to see how things end up this time next week.