Early and Lofty Basketball Expectations
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The 2009-10 WVU Men’s basketball team will be playing with a different mentality than the 2008-09 team. Losing all but Ruoff while gaining top prospects, WVU’s good depth makes it poised to have a successful upcoming season. Unlike the consistently unranked previous 08-09 team, next year’s squad will most likely begin the season with a near-top-ten ranking.
Although very early, ESPN’s Andy Katz has the mountaineers all the way at no. 7, edged out by the highest currently ranked big east member, Villanova at 6th. Surprisingly, the only other Big East teams that cracked his 25 were Syracuse and Pitt, and barely. Likewise, Sports Illustrated has WVU in their preseason top 10 power rankings. Coming in there at 9, WVU trails only UConn and Nova.
With the major networks projecting WVU so high in 09-10, one wonders how the Big East will vote its league preseason. WVU has not cracked the top five in its conference voting since its inception. Traditionally, the Mountaineers have played the underdog role in the 2000s with Beilein’s unorthodox game play and catching other teams off-guard. 2006 was the exception when WVU was voted 5th in the league in the fall and ranked 14th in the preseason AP poll.
With basically all players returning from last year’s team, it will be interesting to see how the group responds to their differing status on college basketball’s map. Senior leader DaSean Butler should facilitate the sophomore trio’s (Bryant, Ebanks, Jones) handling of the enhanced perception. Butler was a freshman when WVU made its run to the Elite 8. Perhaps that experience will positively translate to his team this year.