Women’s basketball:
Women’s basketball placed sixth in the 2023 Atlantic 10 Conference preseason poll conducted by a panel of A-10 head coaches, five spots above their 11th-place rank entering last season.
Pitted against the 14 other A-10 conference teams, GW nearly broke the top five. The Revs played 16 in-conference games last season, finishing with a 9-7 record, good for sixth in the conference.
Averaging 63.6 points per game, the Revs finished last season shooting 36.2 percent from the field against conference competitors. GW also snagged an average of 39.4 rebounds per game and went 69.1 percent from the free throw line during conference play.
GW fell just below Duquesne, who they knocked out of the A-10 tournament last season, in this year’s preseason poll. The Dukes finished 8-8 in conference play last season.
Davidson ranked seventh, placing just under GW in the poll after going 6-8 in the conference last year. Davidson averaged 62.3 points per game last season, just 1 point less than GW.
Among the A-10 up-and-comers sits VCU, who ended last season ranked 13th after going 4-12 in the conference but placed 10th in this year’s preseason poll.
On the other end of the spectrum, UMass, a team that tied for first in the A-10 last season, plummeted in the preseason rankings, clocking in at an eye-popping 11th. The squad had a tough offseason that saw Head Coach Tory Verdi leave the team to take an open position at the University of Pittsburgh.
Fordham was also among the fallers, tumbling 10 spots to 13th in this year’s poll after going 10-6 in A-10 play and finishing third in the conference last season. The Rams also had a turnover-filled offseason that saw several key players transfer as well as the hiring of former Northeastern Head Coach Bridgette Mitchell.
Apart from the Revs, the conference’s team to watch this season is Rhode Island, as they received 12 first-place votes from the 15 A-10 head coaches voting in the poll. URI went 14-2 in A-10 play last season, tying for first in the conference alongside UMass.
The only other teams to receive first-place votes were Saint Louis, who placed third, and Duquesne. Saint Louis went 10-6 in conference play last year and finished fourth behind UMass, URI and Fordham.
GW’s season starts Nov. 6 in a crosstown showdown against Howard at the Smith Center at 5 p.m.
Men’s basketball:
Men’s basketball placed ninth in the A-10 preseason poll, three spots higher than their 12th place ranking in last season’s preseason poll.
The ranking predicts a drop in production, as the team finished the 2022-23 campaign with a 10-8 record in conference play en route to the seventh seed in the A-10 tournament last March.
The projected No. 1 seed in the A-10 this year, by an overwhelming margin, belongs to Dayton. The Flyers, who finished second in the conference last season, made it to the A-10 tournament final, where they ultimately fell to VCU. The rest of the top five consists of the reigning A-10 Champion VCU in second, St. Bonaventure in third, Duquesne at fourth and Saint Joseph’s holding down fifth place.
In the 2024 Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings, or KenPom Ratings, GW placed 217th out of the 362 total Division I teams. Prior to the season, the ratings take into consideration adjusted offensive and defensive efficiency as well as adjusted tempo to calculate a number. That number is referred to as the adjusted efficiency margin.
GW’s AdjEm was -3.88, placing them at the lowest of any A-10 team. The closest A-10 team to GW was UMass, who placed 210th.
On the other side of the spectrum, Dayton came in at 69th overall, followed by St. Bonaventure at 70. Those two schools have AdjEms of over 10, a 13-point swing compared to the Revolutionaries.
“No, I’d say I don’t look at it at all,” said Head Coach Chris Caputo when asked about his team’s KenPom rating as well as their ninth-place finish in the A-10 Preseason Poll. “I mean, quite honestly, I think most teams in this climate of transfers and media eligibility and, you know, it’s hard to predict.”
The Revolutionaries’ season starts Nov. 6 against Stonehill at the Smith Center at 8 p.m.
