Here's where Xavier Musketeers were picked to finish in Big East
Tuesday marked the unofficial start to the college basketball season under the glitz and glamour of New York City's Madison Square Garden at Big East Media Day.
Along with the league's 11 head men's basketball coaches, there were over 30 players in attendance. Optimism for each program was accompanied by polling projections and all-league predictions with the season less than two weeks away.
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Xavier men's basketball was picked to finish sixth in the Big East preseason coaches' poll and its only player to be named to the preseason all-league team was forward Zach Freemantle, who earned an honorable mention nod but is expected to miss the entire year after foot surgery.
Last year, preseason projections were accurate as Xavier was picked to finish second in the league and ended as the runner-up, going 27-10 (15-5 Big East) and reaching the Sweet 16. This year, the Musketeers lost their top two returns from last year's tournament run (Freemantle, Jerome Hunter) and are working with 10 new players.
Xavier added three from the transfer portal in guards Quincy Olivari (Rice), Dayvion McKnight (Western Kentucky) and forward Abou Ousmane (North Texas).
Marquette, with seven-first place votes, was picked to win the Big East. Creighton was the only other team to receive any first-place votes (four) and was picked to finish second, followed by UConn, Villanova, St. John's, Xavier, Providence, Georgetown, Seton Hall, Butler and DePaul.
The sixth-place pick stems from hefty turnover on the roster. There's also the factor of a difficult strength of schedule for the Musketeers that includes nine games against teams ranked in the AP's Preseason Top 25 poll, including a murderer's row in the non-conference slate with Purdue, Houston and either Saint Mary's or San Diego State.
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"Your non-conference schedule is really your most vulnerable because it happens right away," Xavier head coach Sean Miller said Tuesday. "It’s at Purdue, it’s Houston at home, it’s the Crosstown Shootout, it’s just tough games. One thing you learn is each of those types of games, your team can really grow. I think where we are in terms of our ceiling, we’re nowhere close, for obvious reasons."
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Big East basketball: Xavier Musketeers picked to finish 6th
