Nevada Wolf Pack men's basketball

There's a few guys, I won't name names, with some attitude issues that And the Grand Canyon program, I think it's really easy for us to forget.

Their first year in the Mountain West, they fell short in the 4-5 quarterfinal, a game I was courtside for against Nevada last year.

That was, by and large, a disappointing opening year in the conference.

And then you go back to the WAC years, they did have the one great year where they got St. Mary's in the tournament, and then they... had a near win over Alabama, which would have put them in the Sweet 16 and established them for good, which they will be established for good.

Yeah, I mean, they play Illinois State, North Dakota State, UIC, like within their first four games of the year.

And obviously Nevada, but like Nevada is a team that is probably a tier above those three.

But those three games, like those are the games that St. Mary's has been winning by 20, by 30 points over the past couple of years.

Yeah, I mean, those are the types of games that vault St. Mary's from... 50th to 27th by mid-December in Ken Palm.

They split a couple exhibition games.

They went down to UNLV and won, and they went over to Reno and lost to Nevada.

I thought those things were secret for a while.

Now they're not secret?

It's not like a Muslim is a bad coach.

He had a great run at Arkansas, great run at Nevada, but just hasn't quite worked out at USC.

We'll see if this is the year he turns the corner.

They're at 21 and the rival is 22 UCLA.

Then how about Virginia Tech with 10 receiving votes? How about that? And then Indiana, Texas A&M, Villanova.

Villanova is way too far down, in my opinion.

I think Villanova should be closer to like I every time I do my rankings I'm like I got to get Villanova in there somewhere there's just kind of nowhere for them to go I don't think Virginia Tech should be getting more votes than Villanova same with Iowa love Ben McCollum but I think Villanova is going to be sneaky sneaky really good this year Auburn in year two under Steven Pearl right behind them then Marquette who I love this year I think they're going to be super fun then Nevada Grand Canyon Utah State Santa Clara a bunch of mid-majors to round out the other receiving votes Alrighty, so that is it.

That is your preseason AP poll.

You got Oregon State, Fresno, and then the newcomer Texas State.

Uh, and then of course, Nevada, UNLV on the Mountain West Side.

Uh, is there a specific emphasis on, on scheduling kind of other teams from, from the West Coast, from those conferences? Obviously Pac-12 being, being a new league, but, uh, is that something that you kind of prioritize? Does it just, you know, make more sense from a scheduling perspective? Or, um, does it kind of like a, a, a bit of a pseudo like we wanna compete with the Mountain West, we wanna show that we can be on that level? We wanna show we're on the level of this new Pac-12 and we can beat the teams in those leagues?

Yeah, I mean, we would love to stay regionally.

So it was a very fun week, and looking forward to the beginning of basketball season.

I know Nevada starts their exhibitions this Saturday, I think it is, which I said they will not be there for.

But still, basketball season is almost here, so it's going to be fun.

Um, but yeah, speaking of all that, uh, like I said earlier, Ken Palm rankings came out.

I put the average ranking because, obviously, like, the ranking won't be 82.3, but this was basically the exact number, and this was the ranking that it rounded out to.

And then the Mountain West, like I said, Grand Canyon at 40.

Then you have Nevada, New Mexico, and UNLV running out the top four.

And then the rest of the schools, Wyoming, which saw an appearance in the top 100 last season.

They're both winless in conference.

But when I've seen UTEP and some of their results, uh, for example, losing at home to Nevada.

Nevada is not a very good team either.

So when I look at New Mexico, just sticking with them, they don't really have an impressive win.

Uh, the point spread is what it is.

Creighton's usually pretty good.

Marquette, Xavier.

But anyway, the Mountain West, and I have said this, and I'll stick with it, uh, because I look on Instagram during the break from Nevada Sports Net.