SWAC Basketball: Preseason rankings for 2018-19

Once conference play starts, SWAC Basketball becomes an entertaining brand of basketball. Which team is the favorite for the upcoming season?

College Basketball has its dominant conferences, and then it has those that are outmatched in every way possible except in their own conference foes. The SWAC is one of those conferences, as every team in this conference has at least one player who could play for a quality mid-major.

The conference is made up exclusively of historical Black Colleges, and all these schools have a hard time competing with other Division 1 talent because they do not generate any revenue from sports. Due to the lack of revenue, the schools do not have great facilities and their recruiting budgets are minimal. These factors lead to a cycle that for fans seems like a never-ending rebuilding cycle. All the SWAC schools put all of their eggs into the conference schedule.

The lack of dollars for athletics, means these schools spend most of the year on the road, playing games against high major programs, games that have a lopsided score, to obtain any money to keep their program running for the season. The conference regular season winner does not get an automatic bid into the NIT like some other mid-major conferences. The only postseason representative in the SWAC is the conference tournament champion.

One other factor in the SWAC, is some of these schools have a difficult time meeting their Academic Progress Rates. These numbers are imperative to keep your NCAA division 1 eligibility. Two of the four school who were ineligible for postseason play last year reside in the SWAC conference. Grambling and Alabama A&M  were ineligible for the 2017 postseason but will be eligible this year.