NCAA Basketball: 5 biggest winners and losers from week 1 of 2022-23

Winner – Big Ten

Not very many high major teams got high major opportunities and the Big Ten is, for the most part, not an exception to that. But, through seven days the Big Ten has lost just one game – prior to the Gavitt Games. And that one loss was a Michigan State 1-point loss to Gonzaga on a boat. More on that later. Indiana made quick work of both Morehead State and Bethune Cookman save for a slower start against the Golden Eagles. Illinois has 30 and 38 points wins over two circa top 300 teams at KenPom and Coleman Hawkins looks like one of the breakout players of the season. Even the bottom tier teams like Nebraska and Minnesota beat bad teams.

With the way the schedule was to start the season, it would’ve been hard for a conference to separate itself based on high quality wins, but the Big Ten has completely avoided the eye sore losses that every other major conference has fallen victim to. The Big 12 has losses to Southern Illinois and Sam Houston State. The SEC has a loss to Southern Miss – and had one of its best teams get handled by Colorado. The Big East is the closest competition with just one loss to Temple, but that’s obviously not in the same category as a Gonzaga loss and it was also one of its best teams that fell short. We’ll talk more about the Pac 12 in a moment.

Loser – Florida State

From 2017 to 2021, Leonard Hamilton’s worst defensive team was 33rd at KenPom. Lockdown defense is no longer the case around Tallahassee and the start to the season has been ugly for Florida State. They’re 0-3 with losses to Stetson, UCF and Troy. Two of those losses came at home and the closest loss is by seven points.

Hamilton’s squad is 145th in defensive efficiency, 209th in defensive effective field goal percentage and 308th in opponent 3-point percentage. Just to add insult, they’re also outside the top 345 in defensive rebounding. On the offensive end, they’re shooting the 3-ball at a respectable clip but they’re 254th in 2-point field goal percentage and shooting just 61 percent from the free throw line as a team. The Seminoles were picked to finish fifth in the ACC preseason poll. They join Louisville as the only two teams in the ACC without a win this season.