Editor's Note: All week-long, we will be trying to figure out just how good our basketball team is in a 5 part series. Tonight, we take a look at when we can get a good barometer...
We all know about the 37 point more-than-domination of the Ohio Bobcats. The 6-3 top-half MAC team that beat Maryland in College Park. What we don't know is how good we really are.
As good as we looked the past two Saturdays, the first two games we have had an entire team healthy, it is hard to tell how that translates to quality opponents. We have played two solid teams thus far, two fair barometers of just how good we are. Arizona at home and against USC in Los Angeles. Both games there was no Sherron Collins, and against the Trojans there was essentially no Brandon Rush.
And, according to Jason Whitlock, SC is our best player. Jason tells us to wait until the next time we take the court in the Sprint Center, in the Big 12 Tournament in March. I understand the idea, trying to tie Saturday's domination to a time where we will be even better, 100% healthy and all. But I think we will be able to tell just how good we really are tomorrow night. Sure, Georgia Tech isn't great shakes or anything. They had a chance to be insane this year were it not for the early departures of freshmen Jarvaris Crittenton and Thaddeus Young to the NBA. Last season, with their two best players freshmen, GT was good enough to get a #10 seed and only narrowly lose to UNLV.
Of course, they are a vastly different team this season, having lost their two best players. Still, they are an ACC team, and everyone knows that is God's conference in college basketball. Yes, they lost to UNC-Greensboro 83-74 and only beat the juggernaut of a program in Georgia State 72-67. But they barely lost in Bloomington. And in Nashville. They are better than DePaul and better than Ohio. That means they are the best team we will have played with our entire team intact. And the game is in Atlanta, on the road.
I know GT isn't a true barometer of how far this team can go. That probably won't happen until February 11th in Austin, Texas. Now there, there is a really good team. But we won't have to wait that long before we can tell if we are really 'that' good or not. I promise.
Right now, I think there are only 5-7 teams that can truly compete with us. And that isn't even including when SC gets healthy and can shimmy-shammy his way into the lane again.
Part 2 Coming Tomorrow.....
ROCK CHALK!