NCAA Basketball: 3 way-too-early Final Four sleepers for 2022-23 season

Xavier Musketeers

Fresh off of a run winning the NIT Championship, the Xavier Musketeers are ready to build off of that under new head coach Sean Miller. Last year under Travis Steele, the Musketeers went 18-13, but 8-12 in Big East games including a loss to Butler in the Big East Tournament. After that loss, Steele was fired, and Jonas Hayes took over for the NIT and the Musketeers won all five games in his tenure. Hayes left to take a head coaching job at Georgia St. leading Miller to end up in Cincinnati.

All of the pieces are there for the Musketeers. They started the season 14-3 before going 4-10 including the BET loss. This has been a common trend, as the year before they started 8-0 and finished at 13-8. They are bringing back most of their core from a year ago, including senior Zach Freemantle and graduate student Jack Nunge. Nunge returns as the teams leading scorer and rebounder from a year ago. The NIT Most Valuable Player in forward Colby Jones also returns for his junior year, giving Xavier a solid core to run through.

The Musketeers lost three members of their backcourt from last year but replaced them with three newcomers. Paul Scruggs used up all of his eligibility, as did Nate Johnson. Dwon Odom followed Coach Hayes to Georgia St. in the transfer portal. To replace them, the Musketeers add grad transfer Souley Boum from UTEP and recruits Desmond Claude and Kam Craft. Boum is expected to start at the point this year with senior Adam Kunkel starting at the two.

So why can Xavier make a run to the Final Four this year? They have the postseason experience and thrived in the single-elimination NIT last year. They also bring back a majority of the contributors from that team and add to their already deep roster. Combine that with a veteran head coach in Sean Miller, the Musketeers are poised to not only return to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2018 but go on a big run.