There are still many questions with players like Cam Hayes, DeAndre Williams, Jakwon Walton etc both at ECU and around the league about waivers that could impact these rankings. This is my best guess as of today.
My rankings are by what I expect the NET to be and the quality of the team. A team like ECU could win a more games in the league since they do not play FAU or Memphis twice each like a UAB. It's not apples to apples.
Tier 1
1. FAU
2. Memphis
FAU projects as a top 15 type of team this season and Memphis between 15 and 35 depending on DeAndre Williams. It seems similar to old CUSA with Memphis where there is a dominate team and everyone else, only now there are two of them.
Tier 2
3. Tulane
4. Wichita State
5. North Texas
6. UAB
This tier is a significant drop below. I would expect each of these teams to rank somewhere around 75 to 110. Likely will get an NIT bid or two from this group.
Tier 3
7. SMU
8. ECU
9. Rice
10. USF
This next group in Tier 3 is probably more in the 130 to 160 range nationally.
Tier 4
11. Tulsa
12. Charlotte.
13. Temple
14. UTSA
Some of these could sneak into Tier 3 range but this seems like the bottom of the league. There are a lot of new coaches or teams that were very bad last year. USF seems to be on the borderline of Tier 4.
Assuming DeAndre Williams can’t play the best 2 players in this league are David Jones from Memphis and Johnell Davis from FAU IMO. As dominate as Memphis and FAU are whoever wins the league will probably have the player of the year. Memphis is more unknown because they have so many good player that they might cannibalize each other statistically. Someone less deserving like Caleb Mills could lead them in scoring and get 1st team. I don’t think he would deserve it but I could see that scenario. As dominate as I expect both Memphis and FAU to be though they should have at minimum 2 All League players and honestly 3 like old Memphis teams used to have.
Here is my stab at All League. (No DeAndre Williams currently) The voters are kind of stupid if you see the preseason team, so I’m not predicting what they will do. This is my own take on who will deserve it.
1st Team
Johnell Davis
Alijah Martin
Kevin Cross
David Jones
Jordan Brown
2nd Team
Zhuric Phelps
Caleb Mills
Jaylen Forbes
Max Fiedler
Vladislav Goldin
