First

So, who is ranked higher - Moeller or Elder? I haven't a clue.

How big are they? What kind of size do they have?

Well, Madison Central plays Mercer to within 2 and beats Dunbar. Maybe they should be getting more credit. We know they're always going to be well coached. Anyone have their shooting percentages - three point and overall? As I said before, if they shoot like they did against Mercer, they can beat anyone.

Is it put together with input from multiple moderators?

I think of it like college polls. There are your RPI power ratings, which factor in results, strength of schedule, etc. This is similar to the Litkenhous and Cantrall rankings. Then you have the AP poll which is a media vote. And then are polls like BGP's which is done by an individual, but with input from numerous "employees" of BGP (I think). If you see teams consistently in a range across multiple polls, you can just about bank on those.

Associated Press basketball polls: Jan. 4 | Lexington Herald-Leader

I suppose I should have said a healthy and effective Hager. Had missed 2 weeks and came back that game. I believe he came in towards the end of the first quarter and he also subbed out quite a bit throughout the game. He had a nice spurt in the second quarter but was mostly passive other than that.

To your comment about only looking at what they've done, they've beaten three regional favorites in South Laurel in Laurel County; Meade at Mercer; and Montgomery at their place. While SL was by 1 point, that was largely without Hager (due to illness). The other 2 were by 17 and 15, respectively. Another example was an 88-44 win over their district rival and the 5th or 6th ranked team in the 12th. Litkenhous and Cantrall rating systems haven't seen them either, using just results to date. They have them rated 1st and 4th, respectively. And BGP has them ranked 5th. All it takes is a bad night to lose. They could do that at any time, and will I'm sure. Same for any of the other top teams. But they do belong in the top 5.

Mercer County (14-0) tops first Litkenhous Ratings | USA Today High School Sports | USA Today High School Sports I always look forward to the computer generated ranking models, specifically the Herald Leader's and Courier Journal's as both have been around for some time. Everyone has their opinions about who should be ranked where, but these are free of bias. Their one major limitation is they cannot factor in players missing games due to injuries or sickness. Otherwise, they're pretty comprehensive. Obviously, they don't mirror each other as they likely assign different weights to things. However, I do see a lot of similarities in the 2 rankings, at least at the top.

I too saw a game and he played quite a bit in that one. I was also told that he played close to 30 minutes in his last game with them.

I wasn't implying that Boyle isn't a good defensive team. They generally are tough on the defensive side. This FG% number is much better evidence of that fact than points allowed. Coach Adams is also known for a deliberate offensive style, which lends itself to allowing less points.

I don't think that points allowed is a great indicator of the quality of a team's defense. It's more a reflection of how deliberate a team plays on the offensive side of the ball. A much, much better metric is FG% allowed.

Quality win for Boyle at a place that is never easy to play. Looking at the stats that were posted, one player (Farmer) took 46% of the shots for Clay County. And looking at his FG percentage, he wasn't exactly lighting it up. They also had only 3 assists as a team. That's not a formula for success.

Geez. And Taylor was the preseason #1.... That's CCH's largest margin of victory this year. They beat Bellevue by 40 and Taylor County by 46.

I would agree. They won't play man, rarely do. But they certainly don't play a typical 2-3. They try to speed up the game with trapping and pressure, and are good at it. In the regional tourney last year, they played variations of those defenses, then had Butt chasing Hager the second half. Don't recall any man at all.

You're saying that you would have Gover guard Hager. So, back to your comments earlier today about James having to guard one of their three backcourt players and how his inability to guard them would create a matchup issue for Mercer. So, as a coach, you would have Gover, giving up at least 9" and 50 pounds, guard a physical player whose game is to get in the lane, and who is also comfortable posting up? That doesn't present a matchup problem for Southwest?

I'm not willing to concede that Clay is better than SL, nor that NL and Corbin are "good" using the standard that we are talking about here. However, I will agree that SL and Clay are the two mountain teams that could play with the type teams that were referenced above.

One has to truly understand systems and what players are asked to do for their teams as opposed to strictly looking at stats. The Mercer guys are playing their roles to perfection but, as you mentioned, they also have significant contributions from interior players. So, a Gover type, high volume shooter as PG in this Mercer system wouldn't work. Hager is only shooting about 60% of the shots he did last year, while averaging about 30% less PPG. Yet he is shooting higher percentages across the board and his assists are up considerably. James is a sniper that spreads the floor and no one does a better job at that. He's shooting a similar percentage as he did last year when he averaged 23 PPG for Sheldon Clark, but he also is averaging about 30% less PPG. As the SG, Faulkner is shooting a similar amount as last year but a higher percentage, and his average is up slightly. He too is playing his role. You may see gaudier stats (PPG) from the SW backcourt, but that's by design (for both teams). And, as I've explained above, that's not a legit basis for comparison.

Hey, the schedule is what it is. All they can do is take care of business with the teams they're playing in a way you'd expect a top 5 team to do, and they have done so in 13/14 games. The lone exception was Madison Central where they had to claw back to win. They've played 3 regional favorites and won all 3 games. They played Bullitt East twice this past summer, as well as Owen County, Bryan Station, Southwest, Lafayette and Henry Clay. They won each of those games. I know, I know, it's "only summer ball," but an irrelevant team couldn't do that. Oh, and then there was the pre-season scrimmage at Trinity. I'm confident that if you asked their coach he would say Mercer is legit. I don't mention these for any other reason than to illustrate the fact that it's silly for you to act like they are only winning because of their schedule. Looking at your posts, it's obvious that you're a fan of one of those teams mentioned above so I'm confident that you already know this.

What constitutes your backcourt? Seems like I remember you saying the 1, 2 & 3 in the past. Is that your backcourt? Or is it just the 1 & 2? Technically, a backcourt is a team's guards. I think of a backcourt as the PG & SG. Mercer actually starts 2 guards and Southwest starts 3, maybe 4 players that are truly guards.

Looking at it objectively, Mercer beat SW in region last year. SW lost 2 starters in Isaacs and Gaskin and sometime starter Cromer. Mercer returned all starters plus picked up transfer Dylan James. On paper, advantage Mercer. If it were a best of 5 series, I'd pick Mercer with confidence. BUT, the way Southwest shoots the three, they can beat anyone in the state when they're hot. I think they've recently shown that they're a top 15 team and headed in the right direction.

Southwest by 6 to 8. However, if Southwest's 3's aren't falling, that would change things.

I understand what you're saying but will have to disagree. If not for the three ball, they'd have never been in the game to start with. It's what they have and what they do. It's to their advantage to play that way IMO.

Back to the team..... So they have Faulkner at the 2. They have Hager at the 1. They have James at the 3. They have Dow at the 4. Then they have Mink. Off the bench, they have Davis, Baughman, Souder, and Dunning, all kids that would start for many other 12th region teams. This is why I'm excited about this team's ceiling.