The college basketball season is approaching, and while the biggest schools get the national championship attention, the mid-majors all get their moment in the NCAA Tournament, an opportunity to prove themselves on a large stage. Which teams are going to lead this pack of teams as the 2016-2017 begins to take shape? Here is a look at the four best mid-majors in the country right now.
Harvard Crimson
There are a lot of talented mid-majors, but none might be more talented than Harvard. Tommy Amaker, the head coach of the Crimson, has landed four freshmen recruits who were ranked in or very close to the top 100 of the country according to various recruiting services. That’s the kind of recruiting haul which belongs more to a major conference school than to an Ivy League school. Amaker’s recruiting ability is a game-changer for Harvard, and because the Ivy League plays its conference games on back-to-back nights most weeks (Friday for one game and Saturday for the next), highly athletic teams are in the best position to win the Ivy. Harvard should be able to beat out Princeton for the league title, as long as the freshmen consistently develop during the season. As long as no more than one freshman hits a wall in February, and the others can pick the team up, the Crimson should be dancing in March.
We’ll get to know quite a bit about Harvard right off the bat as they’re going to start their season with a matchup on the road against Stanford. That’s a game that will be featured on ESPN2, so we’ll get to see first-hand whether they’re in fact ready to compete or whether they’re going to be on the outside of the tournament looking in March.
Monmouth Hawks
The team that many felt was robbed of an NCAA Tournament bid last March is back, angry about its snub and very motivated to do better. Monmouth lost a few too many games in its conference and will try to make the selection committee unable to keep them out of the tournament. No mid-major will have quite the same hunger to make the NCAAs as the Hawks will this next season. That’s a powerful thing to realize and keep in mind as a bettor.
In terms of their schedule, we’ll get a very good idea of who this team is early on. They’ll start with an easy matchup against Drexel but then they’ve got a road trip to South Carolina followed by a visit to Syracuse. They won’t be favored in either college basketball game but a win in one or both of those spots would be the foundation of their March Madness resume.
Saint Mary’s Gaels
The Gaels return all five of their starters from the previous season and we all know that consistency and returning experience is key in college basketball. That’s pretty good, but what’s more is that all five starters last season started 35 games. This is not a starting lineup which took shape in the middle of last season. It played all season in a starting capacity. That kind of cohesion and savvy will be very hard for other teams to handle, except for rival Gonzaga, which is often not seen as a mid-major due to its very high recruiting and resource budget. Saint Mary’s should be an NCAA Tournament team this season. If all goes well, they could be in line for a deep tournament run.
Northern Iowa Panthers
The Panthers suffered the most crushing defeat of any college basketball team which lost in the first round of the 2016 NCAA Tournament. They led Texas A&M by a double-digit margin in the final 40 seconds of regulation. That’s just about impossible to lose, up 12 with 35 seconds left, but the Panthers did it. Everyone in that locker room knows how bitter a loss that was. Everyone in that locker room who is coming back this season will be mindful not just of the need to get back to the tournament, but to display poise and calm late in a game. Northern Iowa will be a better team at the end of a game thanks to that A&M defeat. That will help the Panthers a lot this next season.
