25 college hoops storylines to follow heading into 2019-2020 season

The horribly named Fair Pay for Play Act was a major sea change in the relationship between student-athletes and the NCAA. The California bill is designed to allow student-athletes to benefit financially on their likeness and still regain their eligibility. It is very new and won't go into effect for a few years, so there is a lot of unknown right now, and it won't affect anyone this college hoops season. What is known is the NCAA first threatened the state of California that its universities would be banned from postseason play then kind of backed off that, as other states are pursuing similar legislation. New York, Florida, Illinois, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Minnesota, Nevada and South Carolina are considering or have plans to propose bills similar to California's. Just as that movement started, the NCAA voted to make its own Fair Pay to Play Act for the entire association. It is a work in progress, so this will be one of the more interesting stories to follow all season long. 

The 2018-2019 college basketball season will be known for a lot of things, but the main storyline was Zion Williamson. There was so much wall-to-wall coverage of Williamson that it caused its own backlash. ESPN was all in on Williamson, as the network ran a web series on the team and had huge blocks of its "embrace debate" format devoted to talking about how special he was. It became downright comical after Williamson hurt his knee 30 seconds in the first Duke-North Carolina game that there were cameras devoted to him the rest of the regular season even as he sat on the bench, and there was a national debate about whether he should risk suiting up for the Blue Devils again. That is thankfully over as the Zion Hype is an NBA problem now and college hoops moves along without him. While there certainly are stars in the college game this season, there won't be anyone who will be covered like Zion was. For many fans, that calls for a sigh of relief. 

Transfers are nothing new, but the amount of movement and talent that is moving certainly has risen in recent years. With the transfer portal and graduate transfer rules, student-athletes have more options than ever during their college careers. And it isn't just the lower level power conference schools that are dealing with transfers anymore — it has become a must for even the bluest blooded programs. North Carolina welcomes Christian Keeling and Justin Pierce. A year after having transfer Reid Travis, Kentucky welcomes Nate Sestina from Bucknell. Isaiah Moss transferred from Iowa to Kansas. Max Hazzard led UC-Irvine to an NCAA Tournament win last year but now is at Arizona. The biggest transfer was Virginia Tech's Kerry Blackshear leaving for Florida. That doesn't even count the players who transferred the old way and sat out a year or gained immediate eligibility. Ex-Kentucky guard Quade Green is now at Washington, and CJ Walker is now at Ohio State after starting 34 games for Florida State. 

Save Michigan State, which brought back much of the team that toppled Duke and reached Tom Izzo's eighth Final Four, the other three participants may have some shoes to fill. Virginia lost a lot from its title team as De'Andre Hunter, Kyle Guy and Ty Jerome left for the NBA and Jack Salt graduated. Texas Tech lost Jarrett Culver and Matt Mooney, while Auburn will need to replace Bryce Brown, Chuma Okeke and Jared Harper. Michigan State is the preseason No. 1 team so it figures to be a major factor in the championship race. Texas Tech still has some major holdovers, and Virginia's program is at that point where it is just reloading. Since 2014, only North Carolina has been to consecutive Final Fours. 

The Big Ten hasn't won a national championship since Michigan State's Flintstones won it in 2000. That's a two-decade drought that many feel will end with this year's version of the Spartans. Cassius Winston enters the year as a clear front-runner for national Player of the Year, and guys like Xavier Tillman and Aaron Henry look to take on bigger roles. The injury to Joshua Langford is a major hit to those plans, and the Spartans' depth will be mined to fill his spot for as long as he is out. The last four national champions were veteran-laden teams that were solid defensively and had experienced guard play that got them through the tough times. With most of the other contenders facing big question marks on their rosters, Michigan State fits the profile of a national champion. 

Tony Bennett and the Virginia Cavaliers finally broke through and won their first national championship. It was quite a redemption, as the Cavaliers spent a year being the butt of jokes after losing to UMBC in the first round of the 2018 tournament, becoming the first No. 1 seed to lose to a No. 16. But this title wasn't just about what Kyle Guy, Ty Jerome or De'Andre Hunter brought to the program. Virginia has become a system program that relies on that suffocating pack-line defense and a deliberate offense but has still put guys like Malcolm Brogdon and Joe Harris in the NBA. Bennett is one of the most likable coaches in the game, and how he handled the loss to UMBC has been applauded by many in his profession.
Still, this team lost a lot from its title team and will have to reload around Braxton Key, Mamadi Diakite and Kihei Clark, transfer Tomas Woldetensae and incoming freshman Casey Morsell. With other ACC powers also rebuilding, Virginia's adherence to a defensive effort could give it an upper hand early on. One thing is for certain: UVa has arrived and it isn't a one-time deal.  

Don't forget Texas Tech was sooooo close to winning the national championship last April. Quite an amazing feat, considering the Red Raiders lost a lot from the 2018 Elite Eight squad yet still pressed on to go even further last year. The same scenario applies this year, as Tech enters 2019-2020 without Jarrett Culver, Matt Mooney, Tariq Owens, Norense Odiase and Brandone Francis. This rebuild/reload will center around holdovers Davide Moretti and Kyler Edwards and freshman Jahmius Ramsey and grad transfers T.J. Holyfield and Chris Clarke. Now we've seen these pop-up programs rise and fall before, and we've seen some that have had staying power. Head coach Chris Beard isn't to be doubted. He has created a culture in Lubbock that should continue to keep the Red Raiders as annual contenders to the Big 12 crown and a dangerous team come March. While Texas Tech may not get back to the title game this year (North Carolina and Butler are the only schools to lose an NCAA championship game and get back in the last 20 years) it will continue to be a force. 

Kansas is one of the serious contenders for a national championship again, yet this time around it feels a lot different. A huge NCAA cloud surrounds the program (it is doubtful that any resolution on the matter will occur during the upcoming season) that has already had an effect on recruiting and its reputation. Head coach Bill Self has been addressing it rather defiantly and will continue to do so all season long, as the questions will continue to be fired his way. Also of concern is that the Jayhawks players have struggled to be able to stay on the floor of late due to injuries or suspensions. Again, most of the problems for  this team are off the court, but it could spill over into the locker room as questions about and to their coach can be draining. How Kansas and Self handle this will be key to the upcoming season.  

With the advent of the ACC Network, the league has now embarked on a 20-game schedule. It isn't the first league to have a 20-game conference slate — the Big Ten and Big Sky have already been doing it — but it is a major shock to the top part of the conference as it may limit how many power teams they play in non-conference. The move was made to stock the ACC Network with more league games (instead of some cupcake games) to draw more eyes. The entire conference — except Duke, which will play in the Champions Classic — will play each other in their season openers. That's nice for the fans who get to see Louisville-Syracuse instead of Eastern Washington-Syracuse, which was last year's opener for the Orange.

The 2019-2020 season starts off with a bang with this quartet of national championship contenders. Kansas will face off against Duke to lead off the proceedings, while Kentucky and Michigan State meet in the nightcap. The top four ranked teams in the Associated Press poll going at it to start the season! This has become the premier early season event, as these four schools continue to produce great teams and great players, though these four have combined to win just two of the last nine championships. While the event is fun, it doesn't foreshadow anything, as three of these teams are very young. Duke, Kentucky and Kansas have been at the forefront of the one-and-done culture and routinely fill the NBA Draft with fresh talent, while Michigan State steadily builds with veteran players and toughness. 

We all know about the rivalries that come with conference play, but some of the fun of the non-conference schedule is the great teams from other parts of the country battling it out. Whether it is the conference challenges (ACC-Big Ten, SEC-Big 12), holiday tournaments or just plain ol' contracted games, we will be treated to some fantastic matchups. Among them are the aforementioned Champions Classic of Duke-Kansas and Kentucky-Michigan State, Kansas-Villanova, Florida State-Florida, Villanova-Ohio State, Michigan State-Seton Hall, Utah State-LSU, Memphis-Oregon, Duke-Michigan State, Tennessee-Kansas, Ohio State-North Carolina, Arizona-Baylor, Louisville-Texas Tech, Gonzaga-Arizona, Memphis-Tennessee, North Carolina-Gonzaga, Maryland-Seton Hall, Kentucky-Texas Tech and Kentucky-Louisville.

Every year there are plenty of coaches who know they need to have a major improvement if they want to keep their jobs after the season . Some are coaches who are running out of time to show they can turn their programs around, while others aren't winning enough to satisfy their hungry fan-bases. Nearly one-third of the coaches in the ACC are on alert (Boston College's Jim Christian, Clemson's Brad Brownell, Georgia Tech's Josh Pastner, Wake Forest's Danny Manning) while playing in a league that has Mike Krzyzewski, Roy Williams, Jim Boeheim, Tony Bennett, Leonard Hamilton, Jim Larranaga, Chris Mack and Mike Brey. Shaka Smart is feeling some heat in Texas, so if the Longhorns have another average season will their brass look to make a move? Is this the year that Penn State's Pat Chambers and DePaul's Dave Leitao finally get the ax? How long does Tim Jankovich have at SMU now that Larry Brown's recruits are pretty much gone?

What Penny Hardaway is doing in Memphis will be a major story to watch all season. He has one of the top recruiting classes coming into the season, as he has become a major factor in recruiting circles. He has nine freshmen this year, including highly ranked James Wiseman, Precious Achiuwa, Boogie Ellis, D.J. Jeffries and Lester Quinones. The Tigers will likely start five freshmen, as the program will start to look as it did in the 2000s under John Calipari. Now we get to the most interesting part: Can Penny coach them? Kentucky and Duke have become one-and-done havens over the past decade, but each school has won just one national championship during while reloading their rosters with freshmen. And that's with Hall of Famers John Calipari and Mike Krzyzewski doing the coaching. Even if Hardaway is a capable coach, he's not anywhere near their level. Since the one-and-done era started in 2006, only Kentucky (2012), Duke (2015) and North Carolina (2017) won the national championship with a one-and-done players. 

The Wolverines are in one of the most interesting coaching transitions in recent years. John Beilein's tenure in Ann Arbor saw Michigan reach two national championship games (losing to Louisville and Villanova) and saw the program as one of the more respected outfits in the country. Beilein left for the NBA's Cavaliers this offseason and instead of hiring an experienced college head coach, the school went to the past to fuel the future. Juwan Howard takes over the program after a 19-year NBA career as a player and six years as an assistant coach for the Miami Heat. Howard isn't just some former player coming back to coach at his alma mater. He was part of arguably the most famous era of Wolverines basketball yet one that is basically erased from memory by the university after the booster scandal of the 1990s. This is a major step toward reconciliation of that past and has already thawed some relationships of the Fab Five era. Even with all of the good feelings, there is a job to do. Howard inherits a good team and a great program that it is in a bit of a rebuilding mode right now. 

Every new season brings us new coaches in new places. Juwan Howard (Michigan) isn't the only big name who will make his debut with a new team this year. Fred Hoiberg is back in college basketball as Nebraska's head coach. Eric Musselman leaves Nevada after a successful run and takes over at Arkansas. Buzz Williams takes over at Texas A&M after guiding Virginia Tech basketball to one of its best stretches ever. Don't forget the biggest move: Mick Cronin leaving Cincinnati to become the head coach at UCLA. Howard isn't the only former NBA player to make his college head coaching debut. Jerry Stackhouse takes over at Vanderbilt. You have your usual retreads like Mike Anderson (St. John's), Mark Fox (Cal), Darrin Horn (Northern Kentucky) and John Pelphrey (Tennessee Tech), as well as the mid-major coaches getting their shots at a power conference school. Nate Oates leaves Buffalo for Alabama, Northern Kentucky's John Brannen moves across the Ohio River to Cincinnati and Kyle Smith leaves San Francisco for Washington State. 

Last year, mid-majors factored greatly within the season, as Gonzaga was one of the top teams in the nation and Murray State's Ja Morant was one of the top players. While we saw some great upsets early in the NCAA Tournament, the Zags were the lone mid-major to advance to the Sweet 16. They'll be a factor yet again, but we'll have some newer names on the national scene. In fact, Saint Mary's should challenge the Bulldogs for supremacy in the West Coast Conference. Utah State should find itself in the rankings most of the season, while schools like Davidson and VCU will be putting everyone on notice. Come tournament time, Vermont, New Mexico State, Western Kentucky, Dayton, Liberty and Belmont will again put fear in teams in their brackets.  

Thirty years ago, UNLV went on one of the best runs in college basketball history. The team is legendary: Larry Johnson, Greg Anthony, Stacey Augmon and Anderson Hunt were the star players with Jerry Tarkanian as the towel-chewin' head coach. Ironically, the 1989-1990 team wasn't as dominant as the 1990-1991 team that went undefeated until it lost to Duke in the Final Four. The 1990 Runnin' Rebels lost five games during the season, including to New Mexico State and UCSB. It nearly ended well before the championship game as Ball State hung with them before losing by two in the Sweet 16. No, what we most remember about this team is that high-scoring blowout of Loyola Marymount (two weeks after Hank Gathers' death) in the West Regional final and their 30-point dismantling of Duke in the championship game — still a record.

Greg Anthony's son, Cole, is one of the top incoming freshman for North Carolina.

Other interesting championship anniversaries:
*20 years since the "Flintstones" won Michigan State's second title
*25 years since UCLA's last NCAA title
*70 years since CCNY won the NCAA and NIT titles

With the NBA all but set to end the one-and-done era as we know it, Duke and Kentucky are still holding on to the system of accumulating as many stud freshmen as they can. This year is no different. The Blue Devils replace one of the best recruiting classes in history with one that is completely different. Instead of a fast-breaking team with Zion Williamson tearing up rims (and shoes), they will be bringing in more size with Vernon Carey and Matthew Hurt and slashers Wendell Moore and Cassius Stanley. Kentucky brings in a huge haul of all sorts of pieces for John Calipari. Tyrese Maxey, Keion Brooks, Kahlil Whitney, Dontaie Allen and Johnny Juzang lead the latest crop of prep stars. The difference this season is there are some solid holdovers on both teams who will take over leadership roles. Duke brings back Tre Jones, one of the best defensive point guards, and Javin DeLaurier, a defensive big man who will help ease the load of Carey. Kentucky also brings back a great defensive lead guard in Ashton Hagans and solid frontcourt contributors EJ Montgomery and Nick Richards. Neither Duke nor Kentucky has been to a Final Four since both made it there in 2015, though both reached the Elite Eight last season. That year the Wildcats saw their undefeated season end to Wisconsin in the national semifinal, while the Blue Devils would topple the Badgers two nights later to win their fifth national championship. 

UConn seemed to be one of the big losers when conference realignment hit a fever pitch earlier this decade. The Big East as we knew it essentially split into three directions: schools jumping ship to the ACC, the hoops-centric schools forming a new Big East and the leftovers forming the new American Athletic Conference. The ACC didn't need UConn, and the basketball schools moved on. So UConn, a program that has won four national championships since 1999, was relegated to joining up with the expansive AAC. Sure, the Huskies shocked the world by winning the 2014 national championship, but the program has fallen on tough times of late. UConn has been to just one NCAA Tournament in the last five years and had an ugly divorce with head coach and former player Kevin Ollie. The program lost much of its identity with Jim Calhoun gone and the prestige of the Big East lost. Until now. UConn will be playing in its final season in the AAC as it is set to rejoin the Big East in 2020-2021. It is a major move for this program, which will now will be back around many of its old rivals as well as playing schools that are closer geographically. No more trips to Tulsa and SMU...though this iteration of the Big East does have Creighton and Butler. So not only is UConn taking a victory lap around The American this season, but it also brings some guess work to what school the AAC could invite to replace the Huskies and if the Big East is planning on adding a 12th member.

For much of the last decade, the joke was that Kentucky owned the weak SEC, but that can't be further from the truth. Last year, Auburn stunned everyone by beating Kansas, North Carolina and Kentucky consecutively to advance to the school's first Final Four. That made the Tigers the fourth different SEC program to reach the Final Four in the last six years. Now the league has assembled a great stable of coaches. John Calipari, Bruce Pearl, Rick Barnes, Tom Crean, Frank Martin and Ben Howland have all reached a Final Four, though only Calipari won a championship. It's also brought in Eric Musselman, Nate Oats, Buzz Williams, Kermit Davis and Jerry Stackhouse. That doesn't even mention Will Wade, whose LSU Tigers won the regular-season title last year. Recruiting has gone way up, as the league has transformed into more than just a football conference. 

What can the ACC do for an encore? Last year, Duke was covered by certain media as a story bigger than the sport. The Zion Williamson love was strong. Three of the four No. 1 seeds in the NCAA Tournament (Duke, Virginia, North Carolina) were from the ACC. And of course, Virginia brought home its first national championship. Can the league be that strong again? Well, that's hard to say. Duke has become a one-and-done factory where it replaces virtually its entire roster every year, and 2019-2020 isn't much different. A new crop of freshmen join holdover Tre Jones (and some role guys) to make another run for Mike Krzyzewski's sixth title. Virginia lost most of its stars from its championship team and will need to reload with guys taking on bigger roles and the new guys blending in. North Carolina lost most of its scoring punch and experience and will rely on freshman Cole Anthony and a couple of transfers to get Roy Williams back to the Final Four. Florida State also is undergoing a roster upheaval. The top teams won't be as strong as usual, and the middle of the pack teams took a hit too. Virginia Tech lost Buzz Williams to Texas A&M and Kevin Blackshear to Florida. Syracuse looks to take a step back. NC State was supposed to take a step forward, but highly rated recruit Jalen Lecque never suited up for the Wolfpack. The bottom of the league looks to be much worse than usual. The two risers are Louisville, which could be a national championship threat, and Notre Dame, which is coming back from the tail end of the standings to get back into the mix for a league title. This isn't the typical tough ACC season, but it should be a wide open affair this winter. 

One major rule change this season is the three-point line will be moving back to the international distance: 22-feet, 1 3/4 inches. This was an expected move, as the international distance was tested during the last two NITs and data found it didn't greatly impact the amount of threes taken nor the shooting percentage. Oddly, the NCAA felt that the harder shot would deter teams from jacking up threes at the current rate, but schools in last year's NIT actually shot more threes than they did during the regular season. Still, the move should allow for more space for big men and dribble drives. Another rule change of note is the shot clock resetting to 20 seconds after an offensive rebound.

The Pac-12 has been much maligned over the past few years. UCLA has been a mess, Arizona has had the FBI investigation cloud surrounding it, while the rest of the conference hasn't stepped up to fill the void. Two years ago the Pac-12 didn't win an NCAA Tournament game, as Arizona, UCLA and Arizona State all lost their only games. The Pac-12 hasn't won a national championship since Arizona won it in 1997 and has produced only six Final Four teams since and just one (Oregon) in the last decade. Last year, the league got just three teams into the NCAA Tournament, but all three managed to win at least one game. Arizona State won a First Four game, Washington beat Utah State before losing to top seed North Carolina and Oregon won twice to get to the Sweet 16. But is this the year the Pac-12 makes its move? Recruiting is up and the league is probably as deep as it has been in years, but it lacks that national championship contender. Washington, USC and Arizona have outstanding freshman classes coming in, Colorado, Arizona State and Oregon bring in experienced squads, and there are several dark horses like Oregon State and Utah. Don't forget that UCLA (remember them?) has moved on from Steve Lavin and has Mick Cronin leading the rebuild. While it is doubtful to see a Final Four run out of this bunch (let alone ending that 22-year title drought), the league should at least make its presence felt in March.

The Big East returns two of the more exciting guards in the nation in Seton Hall's Myles Powell and Marquette's Markus Howard. Powell averaged 23 ppg last year and had some of the biggest offensive explosions of the season as well as some big letdown showings. The senior from Trenton will again be the focal point of the Pirates offense this year, as they look to make a Final Four run. Marquette doesn't quite have the lofty expectations, but Howard is still going to wow Eagles fans. He averaged 25 ppg in 2018-2019 and went toe-to-toe with Murray State's Ja Morant in the NCAA Tournament. Most Big East fans will remember the 53 points he put up on Creighton in January (10-of-14 from three) and the 45 points the night he scorched Buffalo. Both of these seniors will have giant seasons and in a day of so many early entrants, we should treasure every moment we get with scorers like this. 

We are at the moment of drastic change in college basketball. As we mentioned, the "Pay For Play" era is fast approaching where endorsement opportunities could be a major factor in recruiting. It gives the student-athlete a bit more power on their side of the big business of college sports. The NBA will soon likely end the one-and-done rule, which could mean the best 20-30 high school kids will never set foot on a college campus. That's already happening to a certain extent, as guys like RJ Hampton elected to play in a professional league overseas instead of going into the NCAA. Even guys who know they need further development have more avenues to build up their skills. The high school to college to the NBA model will be dead, as the NCAA will have to adapt to be able to stay as the go-to path to get to the NBA. Then you need to stop and think that in the not-too-distant future there will be a changing of the guard with some legendary head coaches. Guys like Mike Krzyzewski, Jim Boeheim and Roy Williams probably won't be heading up their programs at the end of this decade, and those schools will need to find the next icon to run those teams. (Ask Indiana and UCLA if it is that easy.) Add in the fact that a lot of those television deals that were struck during the last game of "conference musical chairs" will be ending in the next few years, and we could see more movement.

Enjoy this season. There will be a noticeable change soon and while our favorite teams will still be dribbling orange basketballs in historic arenas, the skill of those players may not be what you're used to seeing. Have fun as we enter the 2020s!