SEC Basketball power rankings updated as league play begins

Welcome back, folks, to another edition of On3’s 2023-24 SEC Basketball Power Rankings, where this week we’ll look back at non-conference play and dish out some New Year’s resolutions.

The Holiday season means college basketball winds down for a couple weeks as kids finish up mid-term exams and take a few days to visit with their families over Christmas. However, beginning this Friday, the games ramp back up and the sport is preparing for launch straight into league play.

So below, you can see how the entire SEC hoops picture shakes out with non-conferene play mostly behind us. Meanwhile, each team has been assigned one New Year’s resolution, a weakness they need to improve on or perhaps a strength they should further assert. Either way, take a look at the full rankings right here:

1. Kentucky (9-2)

Kentucky is not without flaw (see the complete lack of focus in the UNC Wilmington loss), but they’re certainly the top performers amid a weird start to the season for the SEC. After going toe-to-toe with Kansas, smashing Miami at home and then fending off North Carolina in a Game of the Year candidate so far, this 2023-24 group appears to have more juice than other teams of the 2020s decade in Lexington.

New Year’s Resolution: Well, it’s always been the defense. Kentucky is cooking with a gas stove on the offensive side of the ball, but they’ve struggled mightily to defend really anyone. They let opponents shoot nearly 50% from the field and also let them take more than 40% of their shots from three. Thankfully, they rebound well and now have rim protection, but guarding the perimeter remains a massive flaw.

2. Tennessee (9-3)

We’ve seen Tennessee against the best of the best and it was very clear that the Volunteers occupy land a rung below the likes of Purdue and Kansas (and probably North Carolina). There’s not shame in sitting as a 5-15 caliber team nationally, but it’s where they are. But their path to an SEC title does look a bit easier than previously since a few of the top SEC clubs have had worse starts than expected.

New Year’s Resolution: Find easy points. Dalton Knecht has no-doubt added a spark offensively and he has the kind of ceiling on that end of the floor that Rick Barnes has only seen in Grant Williams and Admiral Schofield. However, the Volunteer offense simply can’t generate easy buckets. They shoot relatively poorly from two and three, don’t take a lot of threes, don’t get a ton of second-chance points and aren’t great at getting to the free-throw line. It’s just a lot of tough twos for this group, which is putting them at an immediate mathematical disadvantage.

3. Auburn (9-2)

The margin between Auburn and Tennessee is razor thin and it’s really the loss to Appalachian State plus a lack of quality wins that made the Volunteers the better pick. Although, the Tigers have made mincemeat in their power conference victories, beating Notre Dame, Virginia Tech, Indiana and USC all by 17+.

New Year’s Resolution: Stop fouling! Looking at Auburn’s team page on KenPom or Bart Torvik, and you see so many green numbers, meaning that the Tigers are strong in a particular category, like two-point defense or offensive rebounding rate. But there’s one big red category and that’s foul rate, since Auburn fouls more often than 300 of the 360-some-odd teams and they’re 336th in free throws allowed per game. Keep up the aggressive D and terrific rim protection, but perhaps with a little bit more discipline.

4. Ole Miss (12-0)

We’ve just got to see the Rebels swing swords with the best in the sport. Ole Miss is undefeated but you just don’t know how good they are, especially after they won so many close games to start the year. However, their last four games featured the Rebels hitting their stride. They won at UCF, beat California and Southern Miss by double figures on neutral courts and then beat Troy at home by 20.

New Year’s Resolution: Win one of first two SEC games. Ole Miss’ only top-50 game so far came against Memphis at home, where the Rebels outscored the Tigers by 24 points from beyond the arc to only win by three. So we don’t know how they’ll really fare against high-level competition. With matchups at Tennessee and home vs. Florida coming up, let’s see what they’re made of. Winning both seems tough but losing both means the narrative about the Rebels puffing up their non-conference vs. a bunch of nobodies will, unfortunately, be true.

5. Texas A&M (8-4)

Admittedly, it’s easy to give Texas A&M a little more benefit of the doubt than some of the other members of this very fat middle class in the SEC. For starters, they still have a terrific offense numbers-wise and have played a brutal schedule that’s led to four losses but also several solid wins. Plus, this Aggie team has suffered immense blunders in each of the last two non-conference slates, making this one look pretty strong by comparison. This is a January-March type of team.

New Year’s Resolution: Play faster. Texas A&M is a brute force type of team, and you may think that those sort of clubs typically play slow, and they do, but perhaps that shouldn’t be the case for Texas A&M since they rebound the ball better than any team in the country while shooting terribly. Their advantage is the ability to grab nearly half their misses, so why not speed up the tempo to create as many possessions as possible, therefore giving you even more opportunities to rebound the ball. Plus, for a weak defensive team, which they are, more possessions likely means quicker and worse shots from the opposition. They don’t have to sprint down the court, but they’re currently 335th in the country in tempo, so there may be a happy medium.

6. Mississippi State (10-2)

If you’re charting a line graph of Mississippi State’s performances this year, there’d be one big downwards vertex for the Georgia Tech and Southern games before shooting right back up. Aside from those two putrid outings, this Mississippi State team has been rock solid, and without their leading scorer from last year either in Tolu Smith.

New Year’s Resolution: Shoot less threes? Posed as a question, because in today’s age, it’s the sort of suggestion you rarely hear. For Mississippi State, the math makes sense. They’re making just 30.7% of their threes but shooting more of them than 75% of the country. Meanwhile, they shoot 54.2% from two-point range, which is a top-70 figure. Basically, most teams trade worse two-point shooting for better three-point shooting, but the opposite is happening here. MSU is scoring 0.92 points per shot on threes and 1.08 on twos while chucking up more twos than threes.

7. Florida (9-3)

Florida absolutely nailed the transfer portal this past offseason and Todd Golden’s second group in Gainesville is reaping the benefits. Walter Clayton, Zyon Pullin and Tyrese Samuel have been the starring contributors, while returners Riley Kugel and Will Richard have taken leaps in their second seasons with the program as well. Plus, there’s a tournament-worthy resume packed underneath the ice as we enter league play.

New Year’s Resolution: Find a more effective offensive role for Riley Kugel. After surprising folks with some flashes of crazy upside as a rookie, Kugel came into this season billed as a likely breakout star. While he’s certainly improved and his tough shotmaking is admirable, he’s just not a productive enough option on this team. He’s shooting just 46% from two and 27.8% from three while tossing up the second-most shots on the team and scoring the fourth-most points. Find him some better shots, or perhaps, less shots.

8. Alabama (7-5)

Much has been made of the Alabama schedule, because it’s likely been the toughest in the country, featuring a stretch with six of seven games vs. top-50 opponents. But here’s the kicker: Alabama lost five of those six and beat the team rated 49th in Oregon, who had already lost its two starting big men. Yet, even with those losses, the Crimson Tide have the No. 1 offense in the country. That can only mean one thing…

New Year’s Resolution: Guard somebody. There’s no other way to put it: Alabama has really struggled to stop most of their opponents. The advanced numbers aren’t terrible thanks to a very strong schedule, but make no mistake, this team has given up as many points as any power conference team lately. During that aforementioned six-game stretch, ‘Bama posted bottom-100 numbers in the country in the following stats: two-point defense, three-point defense and free throws allowed. Plus, they’re letting opponents shoot over 54% from the field. All bad.

9. Arkansas (8-4)

Like Alabama, Arkansas has experienced its fair share of top-50 battles so far this season. They scored a massive win over Duke but otherwise possess a nasty home loss to UNC Greensboro and fell against Memphis, UNC and Oklahoma. The win over the Blue Devils will carry their non-conference slate, but it’s fair to wonder if this group is really capable of a third straight second weekend in March.

New Year’s Resolution: Re-find their identity on defense. Arkansas has never been a pretty operation on the offensive side of the ball under Eric Musselman, but that was alright so long as the Razorbacks blitzed opponent on defense like they did in the 2021, 2022 and 2023 seasons. So far this season, they’re far off the mark, allowing 7-8 more points a game than they did the previous two years while forcing far less turnovers and fouling at a crazy-high rate. The pieces are still there, but the system isn’t taking so far.

10. South Carolina (11-1)

We are still on the quest to find out whether South Carolina’s 2023-24 team is actually a threat to contend in the SEC. At the worst, the Gamecocks have let the league know that they certainly aren’t the door mats of the past couple years while Lamont Paris appears to be finding his stride in Columbia. His group’s ability to take care of the basketball and force opposing teams into tough shots are the reason behind the success so far. There’s one small area that could be the reason for even more success, though…

New Year’s Resolution: Get cleaner looks. South Carolina is one of the best teams in the country at contesting shots, and the best evidence of that skill is their top-flight two-point defense. However, they also struggle to get their own clean looks on the other end and are getting their shot blocked as much as any high-major team in the country. It may not seem like a huge deal, but they’re hemorrhaging away opportunities by getting their shots blocked three times as often as Arkansas.

11. Georgia (9-3)

The best of the basement, we’ll say. Like South Carolina, Georgia looks like a more professional and buttoned-down outfit than a year ago, which is understandable when transitioning from year one to year two as a head coach — which is the case for SIX coaches this season, including Mike White. Heck, they may be right at Carolina’s level, but the resume just isn’t there yet. Though UGA has won seven in a row.

New Year’s Resolution: Hit the boards. Aside from the ultra-small-ball Missouri Tigers, Georgia is the worst rebounding team in the SEC, and is currently the worst at getting offensive rebounds. That’s a strength for teams like Texas A&M and Florida, who grab 40% of their misses and are top-five in the country in rebounding. So the Dawgs will face some of the strongest rebounding units in the country over the next few months, and against pretty poor competition, they’ve been beat up on the glass.

12. Missouri (7-5)

Dennis Gates’ second team has the touch of last year’s group but not the magic. That’s to say: they play the same style just with pieces that aren’t as talented as D’Moi Hodge or Kobe Brown. The result is, so far, is a micro-ball lineup that suffers all the flaws of the Gates system but with pretty much none of the advantages. Now, they’re bottoming out on the court, having lost three straight to Kansas, Seton Hall and Illinois.

New Year’s Resolution: Develop. No rose-colored glasses here. Instead, we’re looking through clear lens and facing the fact that this team struggled mightily out of the gate and may not have a runway for great improvement unless they start shooting lights out. Built like a Gates team, they don’t have the horses down low to compete with SEC teams on the glass or at the rim, and there’s a drop-off in overall skillset of this year’s perimeter pieces vs. last year’s. Kobe Brown may have been the single biggest loss in the league last offseason. So now, of course try to win, but also try to develop some younger big guys, because it’s a flaw that keeps dooming Gates.

13. LSU (7-5)

Completed on a Friday and Sunday on the second weekend of the season, LSU’s wins over North Texas and Wake Forest are its only in the KenPom top-250. Otherwise, the Tigers lost all four of their other games against top-100 teams and even lost to dreadful Nicholls State. After some positivity at other schools, the Tigers appear to be heading towards two straight years with little hope after their latest coaching hire.

New Year’s Resolution: Hope and pray Jalen Cook is the answer. The former Tulane point guard was one of the top guys at his position in the portal cycle and it was Matt McMahon who landed him. However, due to waiver rules, he couldn’t get on the court to begin the year but has now been granted eligibility. So, in two games, he’s participated in an 11-point shootout loss to Texas on a neutral court and then a win by 21 over Lamar. Maybe he doesn’t change much, but it’s worth wondering what kind of spark he’ll bring once fully integrated.

14. Vanderbilt (4-8)

Jerry Stackhouse was really turning a corner. After taking over a program that went winless in the SEC the year prior, Stackhouse took them to three SEC wins in each of his first two years then earned seven in year three while also getting Vandy back over .500. Year four, last season, featured another improvement as Vanderbilt loosely competed on the bubble, finished 11-7 in conference and 22-15 overall — plus got their backcourt back for this season. All that promise has led to… the worst Vanderbilt team of the Stackhouse tenure by far, at least to start the year.

New Year’s Resolution: Find some hope. Because there isn’t a whole lot of it after a 4-8 start which includes an opening night loss to sub-300-ranked Presbyterian plus now seven losses in the team’s last eight games. Those losses: Arizona State, NC State, Boston College, San Francisco, Texas Tech, Memphis and Western Carolina. Not exactly a murderer’s row, though most are somewhat respectable. The point is: the non-conference is so off the rails it’s hard to imagine how Vanderbilt rebounds to make any sort of run at the NCAA Tournament.

There you have it, folks. That’s the snapshot of the SEC as non-conference play comes to a halt and league play gets going — with one resolution for each club.