2011-2012 Season Preview: The Uber-Post

Princeton or Harvard. Harvard or Princeton.

Last year, that was pretty much the only question that mattered. This year, who will win the Ivy title is pretty much the only question that doesn't matter.

Of far greater importance are the debates about Yale as the number one contender, the fall of Princeton, the rise of Penn and the high hopes of Brown, Cornell and Columbia. With most pundits worrying far more about where Harvard will be seeded rather than if the Crimson will win the title, the goal of this year's projections will be to parse out the good Ivy teams from the decent and the decent from the bad.

2011-2012 Season Preview: Pre-Season All-Ivy

The projection of team statistics is far more stable than their component parts, primarily due to the law of compensating errors.

But the awards that many fans love so much are bestowed on an individual level, making more granular prognostications necessary in preparation for the upcoming season.

In this portion of the season preview, we'll take a look at the returning players to watch as well as the top talent from the incoming class. These are not projections of who will make each team per se (obviously if Noruwa Agho scores over 15 points a game, they'll put him on the First Team regardless of whether he needs 25 shots per game to do it), they are merely a representation of the value of each player as seen by the tempo-free community.

Preseason Primer

The release of the final preseason projections on this site is still a few weeks away (though the Ivy League will release its official media poll this Wednesday).

It's expected that Harvard will top the preseason list for the first time in the history of the poll, and not to ruin the surprise, the Crimson will probably be favored pretty heavily in this site's release as well.

That (and maybe that Dartmouth will finish last) is where the consensus stops, however. Different prognostications have had Princeton as the number one contender or as far down as fourth. Yale has been tabbed by many as the likely runner up, but by others out of the upper division entirely. Penn is probably the most egregious offender, as some think the Quakers could steal second, while others have them in a fight to avoid seventh.

The purpose today is not to rank the teams, but rather to provide some starting points for thinking about each Ivy team and the league as a whole, which should help better prepare you, the reader, for establishing your own preseason hierarchy.

Final Ivy Composite Schedule

At long last, here is the full and complete Ivy slate. Tip off is in less than two months. (Games in yellow are placeholders for a tournament format. Actual opponents will depend on results in the tournament games.)

UPDATED: Ivy Composite Schedule (As of 9/15)

We're getting closer to the full release of the Ivy schedules, but for now, here are the announced/expected games and dates, where available. Cornell, Harvard and Yale's schedules are officially released. Each of the other schools has at least half of its non-conference games on this list (Brown and Columbia at around 50%, Dartmouth and Princeton at about 65% and Penn at about 80%).

Games in yellow are either part of a tournament - thus the pairings are mere placeholders depending on game outcomes - or in the case of Penn and Princeton, guesses at game dates based on traditional scheduling.

Excluding the non-Division I games (all of which are denoted DIII, regardless of whether the opponent is DII, NAIA, etc.) and based on last year's Pomeroy finish, Princeton currently has the toughest expected non-conference strength of schedule at .674. Penn is a close second at .644. The Quakers are easily in front when considering DIII contests into the SOS, and one should expect Penn to end up with the toughest SOS even when excluding the DIII games after the remaining dates on each of the Quakers and Tigers schedules are revealed.

Following Penn and Princeton, Cornell has the third toughest schedule with Dartmouth, Harvard and Brown right behind. Expect the Bears and Big Green to see their SOS slip as more games are released, though. Finally, Yale and Columbia bring up the rear as the only two teams with SOS ratings below .500.

(UPDATE: Brown's full schedule has been released and sure enough, the Bears have slipped to the weakest league schedule. Expect Columbia to challenge for that title when its full slate is released.)

(UPDATE 9/9: Columbia released its full schedule and sure enough, it now has the weakest slate by a landslide. Excluding non-D-I games, the league's SOS sits right at .500 now. We have 90 percent of the games on the schedule with just Dartmouth, Penn and Princeton yet to release. The Tigers still lead in the SOS category, but assuming they actually want to play at home during the non-conference slate, their SOS will probably take a tumble as the remaining games should include enticing some cupcakes to play at Jadwin.)

(UPDATE 9/15: Down to just 10 or fewer games to go - depending on whether teams max out their schedules. Dartmouth and Princeton have four left and Penn has two. Those are also the only three with schedules remaining to be released. The Tigers are still hanging onto the top spot in the SOS battle with Penn close behind. Cornell and Harvard remain in third and fourth, then a huge gap before getting to Yale, Dartmouth and Brown and another huge gap to get to last place Columbia.)

Initial Draft of Preseason 2011-2012 Rankings

It's been almost four long months since Brandon Knight beat Kareem Maddox off the dribble and finger-rolled in the game winning shot that sent Kentucky past Princeton in the First Second Round of the NCAA tournament.

The Wildcats used the 59-57 win as a springboard at the start of a Final Four run, while for the Tigers, it was merely the first loss of many.

First was the known reality that seniors Kareem Maddox and Dan Mavraides had exhausted their eligibility and would be need to be replaced. Second was a more troubling and unexpected departure, as Coach Sydney Johnson left to take the same position at Fairfield.

Ironically, it was the latter which was the easier fix. Princeton once again stayed inside the family, hiring another BCS assistant who was with the Tigers in their mid-90s glory days - Mitch Henderson. Trying to replace a legitimate All-Ivy candidate and the team's best offensive and defensive player in Maddox as well as the team's best three-point shooter in Mavraides will likely prove to be a much taller task.