Georgetown at #57 in KenPom Preseason Ratings

Preseason ratings for the 2018-2019 college basketball season were released on KenPom.com this morning, and your Georgetown Hoyas are sitting at #57 out of the 353 total NCAA D1 teams. This puts them within statistical whispering distance of Provy, Seton Hall and Xavier, as well as representing a 22-spot jump in expectations over Coach Ewing’s first year on the job.

Source: KenPom.com

The remainder of the BIG EAST squads are rated as follows: (#5) Villanova, (#29) Marquette, (#31) Butler, (#33) Creighton, (#39) St. John’s, (#49) Providence, (#54) Seton Hall, (#55) Xavier and (#77) DePaul.

In addition, these ratings provide our first quantitative estimates of how the Hoyas’ non-conference scheduling stacks up. It’s not all sunshine and roses, but the presence of the traitors at (#8) Syracuse, along with (#37) SMU and (#85) Illinois, gives Georgetown a critical opportunity to earn important “good” wins in an otherwise underwhelming opening half of the season. (Can I call it “whelming?”) As always, this framing only matters if the Hoyas also consistently beat their opponents in the lower tiers, and those victories must be earned. Nothing should not be taken for granted.

KenPom’s ratings for Georgetown’s whole pre-BIG EAST lineup are listed below:

• UMES: 339
• Central Connecticut State: 304
• Illinois: 85
• Loyola Marymount: 140
• South Florida: 287
• Campbell: 219
• Richmond: 115
• Liberty: 144
• Syracuse: 8
• SMU: 37
• Appalachian State: 178
• Arkansas-Little Rock: 283
• Howard: 312

The BIG EAST is not expected to earn multiple top seeds in the NCAA tournament this season, but it is on par with the rest of the major conferences and in a signficantly better place than the AAC. I’m sure UConn is doing fine, though.

17 days until tipoff!