"In-depth" conference prediction

[TrueBlue82]

You've got to love the incompetence of this guy's blog - he even touts himself as "The most honest and in-depth NCAA prediction source on the web".

So, how many errors can you find in this???

Oral Roberts was a sexy upset pick in the NCAA first round. Even though the miracle didn't happen over Memphis, the team still had an excellent season. And there's no reason that the fun needs to stop for the Golden Eagles as they return their two top scorers, including the team's best player, Caleb Green (21 points, 9 boards per game). Their biggest graduation loss is probably Jonathan Bluitt, who has averaged over 4 assists per game for the past three years. Coach Scott Sutten will do his best to replace Green with two good recruits, Dominique Gaines and Jeremy Hazell. ORU can expect competition from the reigning regular season champions, IUPUI, led by star guard George Hill (19 points, 6 rebounds & 4 assists per game, 52% shooting from the field). The Jaguars also return a slew of rising-seniors who will be ready to make another push at the tournament. This conference will not be a two-horse race, however, with UMKC and Chicago State returning all 5 starters each. UMKC finished higher in the standings this year, but Chicago State should be considered the most dangerous for next year. After a slow start to the season, the Cougars finished on a roll with wins over UMKC and IUPUI (twice) in their final five games. Led by the tiny guard combo of Royce Parran (5'9", 18 ppg) and David Holston (5'6", 13 ppg), the Cougars should be primed to challenge for the conference title. But that said, the alphabet soup of ORU and IUPUI were clearly the dominant teams this past year, and ORU seems to lose more parts to graduation than IUPUI. So, IUPUI should be the preseason favorites to repeat as regular season champion.

I count at least 5 major errors (including the pick of IUPUI!)

If you want to read more "honest insight", check out his site at:

http://basketballpredictions.blogspot.com/2006/03/2006-07-preview-small-conferences-part_25.html

[tmh8286]

Ha!  That's almost like a comedy routine. However, when I went to the article I saw that he wrote it last March - which would explain most of the errors.  We didn't know about Chicago State till May, and we didn't know about Gaines and Hazell till mid- to late summer.  Guess he needs to update his PRE-SEASON predictions, now that the facts have changed.  March may be a little early to be making pre-season predictions. 

Actually, I'm often amazed at how much some of these prognosticators get RIGHT.  There's plenty of info floating around out there about the major conferences, but they have to do a lot of research to figure out the lesser conferences, like the Mid-Con.

Obviously this guy needed to do a bit more work.  He doen't have much excuse for naming IUPUI conference champions.