NCAA Basketball: Ranking the 6 remaining undefeated teams in 2020-21

Here is a look at the NCAA basketball teams that are still unbeaten and how they are ranked using average means of the NET, KenPom, and Sagarin rankings.

There are six remaining NCAA Basketball teams who currently have a minimum of eight wins entering week 8 play. Which ones are considered the most legit right now based on the average of the three rankings?

There have been three mid-major NCAA Basketball programs that have done well this season due to major conferences unable to play at most seven multiple non-conference games. Also, there are three major programs that remain undefeated at this point of the season.

Mid-majors teams such as Winthrop and Drake who are both still undefeated have not been given much respect this season as we are now into 2021 and both of them are not ranked in the top 25. However, there are still two Power Five teams one from the Big Ten and one from the Big 12 in these power rankings as well as another major program not in a Power Five conference that looks to remain undefeated in the month of January.

There also were teams like The Citadel who are entering this weekend undefeated and hope to remain undefeated as long as they can. Multiple teams that lost this past week and are no longer undefeated are Arkansansas, Washington State, and SMU.

Let’s take a look at the six remaining teams and how they are ranked according to the average of their Net, KenPom, and Sagarin rankings this week in these undefeated power rankings.

*Must have at least five games played to qualify

6. The Citadel Bulldogs

Team: The Citadel

Conference: Southern

Record: 8-0

Leading Scorer: Hayden Brown is averaging 23.4 points per game.

Victories: Chattanooga, Presbyterian, Piedmont, North Carolina A&T, @ Longwood, Toccoa Falls, Columbia International, and Carver College.

Net ranking: 146

KenPom ranking: 307

Sagarin ranking: 312

Average ranking: 255

Why they are undefeated: The Citadel offense can score putting in and hurry and that is the number one reason that the Bulldogs are still unbeaten. The Citadel has by far done an excellent job of producing points on the scored board as they have scored 91 or more points six times this season and the Bulldogs have scored over 100 points two times thus far and the season is not even halfway through.

The Citadel defense has been very efficient when they have to this season specifically when they have gone up against non-division one teams. The Bulldogs defense, for example, has had three games where they played very stingy pressure defense against the opposing team’s offense and limited their offensive output to only 58 or fewer points.

Look at The Citadels season as a whole, the Bulldog’s offense is by far the main reason why they have not been beaten on the court yet this season. The prime example is that they have scored 91 plus points in their last six games this season. The Citadel has also proven that they are able to win a road game which still a decent amount of division one teams have still failed to do so this season.

Reasons to be Pessimistic: Looking at and analyzing their very low Sagarin and KenPom rankings, it is not shocking that the level of play for the Citadel has not been very good. The Bulldogs have played four non-division one teams this season which is very unusual in comparison to past seasons. Their three division one teams, excluding their victory over Chattanooga, that they have defeated have records of 5-9, 2-11, 3-3, which is a combined record of 10-23.

Next Opponent:  Furman on 01/13