Official season prediction thread

How many regular season wins will the 2019-2020 Vols have?

  • 25 or more

    Votes: 10 4.7%

  • 24-7

    Votes: 5 2.3%

  • 23-8

    Votes: 19 8.9%

  • 22-9

    Votes: 40 18.8%

  • 21-10

    Votes: 45 21.1%

  • 20-11

    Votes: 47 22.1%

  • 19-12

    Votes: 37 17.4%

  • 18-13

    Votes: 13 6.1%

  • 17-14

    Votes: 4 1.9%

  • 16 or less

    Votes: 3 1.4%
  • Total voters
    213
#51
#51
19-22 wins. We will take a step back this year, but will be fun regardless. Just hope our record isn’t awful before early signing because we are looking at a fun 2020 year.
 
#52
#52
TheMookieMonster said:
I don't think any rational fan will be calling for heads should that happen, but Tennessee has never exactly been an entirely rational fanbase. So who knows. I just tend to believe that this roster (and coaching staff) will surprise us. I think 24 wins is entirely doable. Is that my official prediction? No. I'll play it safe and say 22. But I have some real optimism for this season. There are a lot of teams with big "?" this season. A lot of new coaches too. I think Barnes & the Boys will get it done. I just hope this recruiting success in 2020 and 2021 finally translates into real postseason success. That's the big question. This upcoming season will just be fun and with little expectations.
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24 wins doable? I hope you mean for the entire year and not just regular season. We lost four starters, all four are on a current NBA roster, brought in 1 and won 27 games last year in the regular season. 24 regular season wins will be damn near impossible, not “doable”.
 
#53
#53
zjcvols said:
24 wins doable? I hope you mean for the entire year and not just regular season. We lost four starters, all four are on a current NBA roster, brought in 1 and won 27 games last year in the regular season. 24 regular season wins will be damn near impossible, not “doable”.
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It is not "damn near impossible." And doable does not mean it's a guarantee. I literally said two sentences later my prediction was 22 wins. For a staff member, your reading comprehension is very poor. And you're also incredibly negative. There are two "elite" teams in the SEC this year, Florida and UK. The rest of the conference is "good" but have a lot of question marks with a ton of new coaches. Excuse me for having faith in Rick Barnes over a bunch of unproven entities. 24 wins will be tough but it is not "damn near impossible" and if that's your mindset going into this season I can't imagine you would be fun watching a game with. There is more talent on this roster than you realize.
 
#54
#54
TheMookieMonster said:
It is not "damn near impossible." And doable does not mean it's a guarantee. I literally said two sentences later my prediction was 22 wins. For a staff member, your reading comprehension is very poor. And you're also incredibly negative. There are two "elite" teams in the SEC this year, Florida and UK. The rest of the conference is "good" but have a lot of question marks with a ton of new coaches. Excuse me for having faith in Rick Barnes over a bunch of unproven entities. 24 wins will be tough but it is not "damn near impossible" and if that's your mindset going into this season I can't imagine you would be fun watching a game with. There is more talent on this roster than you realize.
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Realists aren't negavols. Our team will have to Gel and find it's identity in a very Tough preconference schedule. 22 regular season wins could very well be a ceiling for this squad and that's if Plavsic gets cleared and Kent is finally worth his scholarship. Add everyone staying healthy for 31 games. I look for about 20 to 22 wins if Barnes' history remains true. Then 2 and 2 in post season.
 
#55
#55
TheMookieMonster said:
It is not "damn near impossible." And doable does not mean it's a guarantee. I literally said two sentences later my prediction was 22 wins. For a staff member, your reading comprehension is very poor. And you're also incredibly negative. There are two "elite" teams in the SEC this year, Florida and UK. The rest of the conference is "good" but have a lot of question marks with a ton of new coaches. Excuse me for having faith in Rick Barnes over a bunch of unproven entities. 24 wins will be tough but it is not "damn near impossible" and if that's your mindset going into this season I can't imagine you would be fun watching a game with. There is more talent on this roster than you realize.
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My reading comprehension is fine. Thinking that 24 regular seasons is “doable” for this team with their OOC schedule is simply unreasonable. And I’ve seen nobody else say that. It’s not even negative, it’s simply true. 22 more reasonable but even I think most would say that’s still pretty on the positive side. We might simply have different definitions of what “doable” is.
 
#56
#56
zjcvols said:
My reading comprehension is fine. Thinking that 24 regular seasons is “doable” for this team with their OOC schedule is simply unreasonable. And I’ve seen nobody else say that. It’s not even negative, it’s simply true. 22 more reasonable but even I think most would say that’s still pretty on the positive side. We might simply have different definitions of what “doable” is.
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I guess it will remain to be seen, but calling 24 wins "damn near impossible" is just an incredibly dramatic statement. Especially when that wasn't even my original prediction, that you just happened to gloss right over until I reiterated it to you. Most people on here are saying 19-20 wins. I don't think my belief that 22 is where we'll land is that unreasonable, or really any different. The 24 wins would be "doable" if some of these new coaches struggle early on, which I believe will happen. Here is a theoretical example of a 24 win season. Once again, not predicting this by any stretch of the imagination. I would say @ Alabama and vs. LSU will be losses (leading to my prediction of 22-9).

Record: 24-7

Nov. 5 H UNC-Asheville - W
Nov. 12 H Murray State - W
Nov. 16 N Washington - L
Nov. 20 H Alabama State - W
Nov. 25 H Chattanooga - W
Nov. 29 N Florida State - L
Nov. 30 N VCU/Purdue - W
Dec. 4 H Florida A&M - W
Dec. 14 H Memphis - L
Dec. 18 @ Cincinnati - W
Dec. 21 H Jacksonville State - W
Dec. 28 H Wisconsin - W
Jan. 4 H LSU - W
Jan. 7 @ Missouri - W
Jan. 11 H South Carolina - W
Jan. 15 @ Georgia - W
Jan. 18 @ Vanderbilt - W
Jan. 21 H Ole Miss - W
Jan. 25 @ Kansas - L
Jan. 28 H Texas A&M - W
Feb. 1 @ Mississippi State - W
Feb. 4 @ Alabama - W
Feb. 8 H Kentucky - W
Feb. 11 H Arkansas - W
Feb. 15 @ South Carolina - W
Feb. 18 H Vanderbilt - W
Feb. 22 @ Auburn - L
Feb. 26 @ Arkansas - W
Feb. 29 H Florida - L
Mar. 3 @ Kentucky - L
Mar. 7 H Auburn - W
 
#57
#57
TheMookieMonster said:
I guess it will remain to be seen, but calling 24 wins "damn near impossible" is just an incredibly dramatic statement. Especially when that wasn't even my original prediction, that you just happened to gloss right over until I reiterated it to you. Most people on here are saying 19-20 wins. I don't think my belief that 22 is where we'll land is that unreasonable, or really any different. The 24 wins would be "doable" if some of these new coaches struggle early on, which I believe will happen. Here is a theoretical example of a 24 win season. Once again, not predicting this by any stretch of the imagination. I would say @ Alabama and vs. LSU will be losses (leading to my prediction of 22-9).

Record: 24-7

Nov. 5 H UNC-Asheville - W
Nov. 12 H Murray State - W
Nov. 16 N Washington - L
Nov. 20 H Alabama State - W
Nov. 25 H Chattanooga - W
Nov. 29 N Florida State - L
Nov. 30 N VCU/Purdue - W
Dec. 4 H Florida A&M - W
Dec. 14 H Memphis - L
Dec. 18 @ Cincinnati - W
Dec. 21 H Jacksonville State - W
Dec. 28 H Wisconsin - W
Jan. 4 H LSU - W
Jan. 7 @ Missouri - W
Jan. 11 H South Carolina - W
Jan. 15 @ Georgia - W
Jan. 18 @ Vanderbilt - W
Jan. 21 H Ole Miss - W
Jan. 25 @ Kansas - L
Jan. 28 H Texas A&M - W
Feb. 1 @ Mississippi State - W
Feb. 4 @ Alabama - W
Feb. 8 H Kentucky - W
Feb. 11 H Arkansas - W
Feb. 15 @ South Carolina - W
Feb. 18 H Vanderbilt - W
Feb. 22 @ Auburn - L
Feb. 26 @ Arkansas - W
Feb. 29 H Florida - L
Mar. 3 @ Kentucky - L
Mar. 7 H Auburn - W
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Yeah I don’t see that happening at all. Any road conference game right now is probably 50/50 and I think Wisconsin and Cincinnati would be favored right now. I don’t see it at all. That’s highly optimistic. Especially since we don’t know if Uros will be eligible.
 
#58
#58
zjcvols said:
Yeah I don’t see that happening at all. Any road conference game right now is probably 50/50 and I think Wisconsin and Cincinnati would be favored right now. I don’t see it at all. That’s highly optimistic. Especially since we don’t know if Uros will be eligible.
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I guess I just choose to not be so pessimistic about this season, considering that although we aren't deep, we still have a roster with talent and a triplet of Turner/Bowden/James that many would be envious of. Yeah, 22 wins might not happen, but I just see essentially every game on that schedule outside of Washington/Memphis/Kansas/Florida/Kentucky as winnable games, and with our recent track record against UK and UF under Barnes, I wouldn't rule those games out either. And if it truly is a coin flip between most other teams, I'll take the experienced coach who seems to excel in the regular season over others.
 
#60
#60
zjcvols said:
Yeah I don’t see that happening at all. Any road conference game right now is probably 50/50 and I think Wisconsin and Cincinnati would be favored right now. I don’t see it at all. That’s highly optimistic. Especially since we don’t know if Uros will be eligible.
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Your last sentence is what has kept me from making a prediction, yet. 24 wins without knowing that answer is extremely optimistic, IMO. I have to think we take a step back, and gun to my head, I think 21-22 wins is probably this team’s regular season ceiling with Plavsic. Without him, 18-19. I am conservative by nature, but those numbers probably seem to be both realistic and attainable barring any key injuries.
 
#61
#61
I say that we take people by surprise this year kind of like how 2 years ago when not much was expected from us. If the ball bounces right, we win 20 games minimum and get a 4 seed.
 
#62
#62
Now that the Plavsic ruling is in, I'm making my prediction.

Reluctantly, I'm going with 18-13. Clearly, we will be deficient in the paint, both in size and talent. Remains to be seen how much talent UP would have brought, but his size is undeniable. We play a tough OOC schedule, and could realistically lose 5 of those. The back end of our SEC schedule is also brutal. 18-13 (10-8) would still have us on the bubble, and perhaps on the right side of it with our strength of schedule.
 
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#63
#63
We need Florida State, Cincy, Washington, and VCU/Purdue to not be great teams. Also helps if Memphis stumbles with their young roster.
 
#64
#64
How well we shoot free throws will be important. Turner hits a high percentage but doesn't have a history of drawing too many fouls. I think that Bowden draws fouls fairly well considering he really doesn't hold the ball real long during possessions. Fulk seems to have improved year-to-year. Hopefully JJJ draws lots of fouls and can knock down close to 75%. Pons is a brick layer. JJ and ZK have potential if they can get to the stripe. O(R)N might could be the wild card.
 
#66
#66
Free throw attempts per 40 minutes last year:

8.8 Grant
4.8 Walker
4.2 Fulkerson
3.7 Bowden
3.6 KA
3.0 Bone
2.9 Admiral
2.4 Lamonte
1.5 Yves
0.8 JJ
 
#69
#69
Every year I calculate season win probabilities in a way similar to how 538 does for the NCAA Tournament. They use 6 different computer rankings plus 2 human rankings to calculate a power rating. The six statistical ratings I use are: KenPom, TeamRankings, Yale Sports Analytics Group, T-Rank, Sagarin, and ESPN's BPI. The two human ones are from Matt Norlander at CBS and Sports Illustrated (which used to be statistical based but their guy got hired away by the NBA. Now it's a human ranking).

Since all of the projections operate on different scales (and the human ones are ordinal only), I normalize them to have the same mean and standard deviation as KenPom since I know the std deviation of the win probability curve he uses. The statistical ratings are averaged and weighted to 75% of the total and the human rankings are averaged and weighted to 25%. Once their power ranking is calculated I apply it to every one of the 5,441 scheduled games to calculate win probabilities for each game. Then I simulate all of the early-season tournaments which use bracketed-style format. (This year Liberty is expected to pick up 2 additional wins from early season tournaments. They play in 2 tournaments).

For conference tournaments, I consider the probability of every possible seed and how many wins would be expected from that position. For example, Tennessee has a 9% chance of being a 5 seed and would be expected to win 1.1 games. They have essential the same chance of being a 4 seed, but would only be expected to win .5 game (basically a 50/50 game). The cumulative wins expected in SECT play (even considering a 0.1% chance they're the 14 seed) is slightly over 1 win.

I also calculate win expectations for post season play including NIT, CBI and CIT but that's really wacky.

Based on all of this, come Selection Sunday.........

Tennessee 20-13 (10-8)

(19-12 in the poll on this thread)
 
#70
#70
Projected SEC Standings:
1. Kentucky 14-4
2. Florida 13-5
T3. LSU 10-8
T3. Tennessee 10-8
T3. Auburn 10-8
T6. Mississippi St 9-9
T6. Missouri 9-9
T6. Alabama 9-9
T9. Ole Miss 8-10
T9. Arkansas 8-10
T9. Texas A&M 8-10
T9. Georgia 8-10
13. South Carolina 7-11
14. Vanderbilt 4-14
 
#72
#72
Top 25:
1. Michigan St.
2. Kentucky
3. Duke
4. Louisville
5. Florida
6. Kansas
7. North Carolina
8. Virginia
9. Gonzaga
10. Maryland
11. Villanova
12. Texas Tech
13. Purdue
14. Ohio St.
15. Oregon
16. Baylor
17. N.C. State
18. Wisconsin
19. VCU
20. Florida St.
21. Saint Mary's
22. Cincinnati
23. Marquette
24. LSU
25. Seton Hall

Tennessee ranked 35
 
#73
#73
I'd say without Uros I'd revise my projection down from 22 wins to 20 wins. I'm still higher on this team than most I feel. I really do think once the growing pains are done this team could surprise us. Not predicting an SEC Title or anything like that though. I just think we'll be pleasantly surprised.
 
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