Surprise Teams in Power Six Conferences this Year

PHILADELPHIA – This is one year where there may not be a truly great team in college basketball.

Virginia, Villanova, and Purdue have all been stable enough to make a deep run in March, but the season has been marked by chaos with marquee programs like Kansas, Kentucky and Arizona taking unexpected spills.

With that in mind, here are the biggest surprise teams in each of the six high major conferences.

Big Ten: Ohio State. This has been a rare down year by Big Ten standards and the conference may only wind up with four or five NCAA teams, but first year coach Chris Holtmann, who worked wonders at Butler, has the Buckeyes, who were picked next to last in pre-season, up and running quicker than expected. Ohio State (21-5, 12-1) jumped into a tie with Purdue for first place in the after defeating third-ranked Boilermakers, 64-63, in West Lafayette and 6-7 junior forward Keita Bates-Diop, who missed all but nine games last season with a stress fracture, is suddenly a Player of the Year front runner.

Pac 12: Washington. I’ve always been a big fan of Mike Hopkins when he was a long time assistant at Syracuse. But I figured it would take some time to rebuild the Huskies’ program after blue chip recruits Michael Porter and his brother Jontay transferred to Missouri after former head coach and family friend Lorenzo Romar was let go. But Hopkins have exceeded my expectations, turning a team picked to finish 10th in the league into an 17-6 NCAA contender with back to back wins over ranked teams, Arizona and Arizona State, for the first time since 2007 and a 7-3 record in league play. Forward Noah Dickerson, a potential double double every game, has become one of the five most effective players in a fluid league and Hopkins has clamped down defensively on opposing teams with the old Syracuse zone.

ACC: Clemson. Brad Brownell was reportedly at a crossroads when before the start of the season when the Tigers were picked to finish 13th in the league after the graduation of forward Jaron Blossomgame, their best player the past three years. But Brownell has senior guard Gabe Devoe, junior guard Shelton Mitchell, a Vanderbilt transfer; and junior guard Marcquise Reed, a transfer from Robert Morris, playing at a high enough level to offset a season ending ACL injury to 6-8 forward Donte Grantham. The Tigers, who has strengthened their defense with the use of a zone, are 19-4 and second in the ACC ahead of Duke and Carolina with an 8-3-conference record. Pencil them into the NCAA tournament.

SEC:  Auburn. Tigers’ coach Bruce Pearl started the season looking for replacements for two starters, powerhouse sophomore center Austin Wiley and double figure scoring forward Daniel Purifoy, who were suspended indefinitely due to eligibility concerns stemming from an FBI probe into illicit recruiting. But the Tigers, who have entered the Top 10 for the first time since 2000, are 21-3 and occupy first place the SEC with a 9-2 record because junior guard Bryce Brown and sophomore guard Mustapha Heron have emerged as elite scorers who can light it up from beyond the three point line and 6-7 Anfernee McLemore has become on the best rim protectors in the conference.

Big 12: Texas Tech. Who would have thought the Red Raiders (20-4, 8-3), who are tied for first in the Big 12, would pop into the Top 10 and have a higher ranking than perennial Big 12 champion Kansas midway through the season. Tech coach Chris Beard, whose team finished 6-12 in conference play last year, is currently ranked seventh in the AP poll. Tech has two senior stars, point guard Keenan Evans and 6-8 forward Zach Smith, and has the deepest, most experienced team in the conference with 10 players who can contribute.Big East: St. John’s. After going winless in league play during the month of January, the Red Storm (12-13) snapped an 11-game Big East losing streak with two huge wins over No. 4 ACC power Duke, 81-77, at the Garden and top-ranked Villanova, 79-75, in a Big East game at Wells Fargo within the space of five days. Sophomore guard Shamorie Ponds, who has been doing most of the heavy lifting for the Red Storm, has been nothing less than sensational for Chris Mullin’s team, lighting up the young Blue Devils up for 33 points, then getting 26 against Nova.