The road to San Antonio starts Monday when IU Indy – formerly known as IUPUI – tangles with IU Columbus at 11 a.m. ET to get the 2024-25 college basketball season underway. Feel the excitement.
Thus starts the long, fierce debates of who truly is a national championship contender or not.
Sadly, there is no magic formula.
Will Warren, engineer of Stats By Will, has long debunked the fallacy-laden “20/20 club” that incorrectly states that to win the national championship, a team must rate in the top 20 nationally in both offensive and defensive efficiency. Actually, 10 of the past 21 national champions have rated outside of the top 20 in offensive or defensive efficiency heading into the Big Dance.
So, what are the parameters? Has every national champion since 2002 rated inside KenPom.com’s top 25 entering the NCAA Tournament? Sure. Has each of the past 22 champions rated inside the top 57 offensively and the top 44 defensively entering March Madness? Yup.
It sure helps to be good on both ends of the floor if you want to reel off six (or seven) straight do-or-die wins to take the championship belt, but college basketball is changing. Of course, defense still matters. No one is saying otherwise, but if you want to win it all, champions have to score at an elite rate. Offenses are erupting. Last year was the highest-scoring season in the history of the sport. The rules have changed. Teams are making more free throws, turning it over less and taking more 3-pointers. Processes have gotten better with more programs embracing winning the math with either shot volume or shot quality.
It doesn’t feel like a coincidence that three of the best four offenses entering the Big Dance met in the Final Four. The teams who can’t score with variety and efficiency feel doomed from the start.
Let’s dive into the preseason national championship tiers, split three ways.
Tier 1:…
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