NCAA Basketball: Oregon’s potential, Livers’ importance and more takeaways

5) Colorado is not one of the Pac-12’s elite teams

Colorado was supposed to be at the forefront of the Pac-12’s return to glory – or at least the return of national respect – in the 2019-20 season. They returned 84.5 percent of their minutes (second-most in the nation) from last year’s 23-win team, including a pair of potential stars in Tyler Bey and McKinley Wright.

The Buffs were picked to finish second in the conference as a result and had as many first-place votes in the media poll as Oregon, who was picked ahead of them.

Unfortunately, Colorado has looked nothing like the team many were hoping they would be.

A 7-0 start was highlighted by wins over Arizona State (in what counted as a non-conference game) and Clemson, neither of whom rank inside the KenPom top 70. Colorado struggled against the Tigers, too, only winning by four.

Their first loss came last weekend, a 72-58 defeat to Kansas at Allen Fieldhouse. That’s certainly nothing to feel bad about, but they followed that up with a 79-76 home loss to Northern Iowa. Then, on Friday, the Buffs nearly blew a 16-point second-half lead before holding off a Colorado State rally.

Turnovers have been the biggest reason for these struggles. Head coach Tad Boyle’s squad turned it over 17 times against Kansas, 15 against UNI, and 21 times in the win over the Rams. It’s a problem that has plagued them all year (298th in turnover percentage) and is now hurting them against better competition.

Sloppy play was a country-wide epidemic in November, yet most teams have shaken off the rust and cleaned up their offense at least a little bit by now. Colorado hasn’t, and we shouldn’t expect them to change. The Buffaloes ranked 219th in turnover percentage a year ago and 281st the year before that. This is usually an area of the game that improves with experience – someone must’ve forgotten to tell Colorado that.

This is simply who they are, and they’re not a good enough offensive team to make this many mistakes. They rank outside the top 100 in offensive efficiency and 249th in effective field goal percentage, largely because they really struggle to finish around the rim.

Colorado’s defense is fine and should make them an NCAA Tournament team. However, their turnovers and lackluster offense will keep them from being a factor in the Pac-12 title race.