Chansky's Notebook: Duke vs. Carolina

The way-too-early college basketball polls are, well, way too early.

Let’s guess at why almost every basketball blog out there titles their summertime predictions for the coming season Way Too Early.

Maybe because they have to keep writing about college hoops through the dog days of summer and don’t know much about most of the teams except players lost and players gained and their averages.

In the eight of maybe 80 preseason rankings I looked at, Duke was ranked from No. 2 to No. 14, and Carolina was almost always in the second ten, except for one poll that left the Tar Heels out.

The differential for my two most closely-watched programs are, first, Mike Krzyzewski is coaching the last of 42 seasons in Durham and Hubert Davis is in his first as a head coach. Coach K wasn’t much of a player and how Hubert’s star status in college, his 12 seasons in the NBA and nine as Roy Williams’ assistant factor in, we will find out soon enough; it doesn’t mean much though since players win games.

Duke has the No. 2-rated freshman class coming in, but Carolina has three transfers who will be better sooner than the Blue Devils’ freshmen, and four starters back. That doesn’t move the needle for some pollsters, who by the way are already picking Gonzaga to play UCLA again in the Final 4. I will take the field against that happening.

All the following polls prominently mention the two coaches and the Tar Heels superior experience, but that doesn’t seem to matter.

The WTE polls I looked at are from USA Today, SI.com, ESPN, SB Nation, CBSSports, 247 Sports, which owns Inside Carolina, and Basketball Articles.com, which must be owned by a Dukie because it has royal blue at No. 2 and light blue missing the top 25 completely.

That leaves the average Way-Too-Early Preseason rankings for Duke at 7.8 and Carolina at 14.5. And there are dozens more polls out there if you, too, would like to waste your time and check them out.

Jeff Goodman, who I never liked at ESPN for various reasons, has his own poll and is the only one with the Tar Heels on top, No. 13 to No. 14 for Duke. Funny how now I like Jeff Goodman a little more.

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Chansky’s Notebook: Duke vs. Carolina

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